Scarred (Lost Series Book 2) (17 page)

Ethan

I
felt sick to my stomach. Fucking nauseous as I watched River’s head loll from one side to the other. Her face was slightly puffy and an ugly purple bruise was already forming on her jaw. I bound her to a chair after transporting her to a warehouse on the outskirts of Port Chicago. Not too far from the water, it was a place most people didn’t come by. It was abandoned over ten years before, and so were the surrounding buildings.

My woman was here, the ropes biting into her wrists until they bled, and trying to regain consciousness after I beat the shit of her. And why? So I could send pretty pictures of her to that wanker and tell him to come pick up his shitty merchandise. She couldn’t make me money, and she was getting too expensive to keep protected. Especially after she tried to run back to him,
again
.

And hell, I didn’t want the bitch anymore.

It made me ill to talk about River that way. My woman. My heart. But the prick on the phone got hot to hear it, and was stupid enough to believe me. I heard the desire to get her again in his voice as he told me he’d be coming to get her, and he wouldn’t be coming alone.

I knew that, and didn’t care. Whoever he came with wouldn’t be as bad as who I had with me, and they would all die if they got in the way. I made sure to reach out to Anatoly, Grigoy, Evgeny, and Leo. Evgeny was sending some of his men to make sure things happened the way they were supposed to. But it was dangerous.

River was tied down, and helpless. I couldn’t fake that with the psycho fucker. He was smart, even if he was an idiot to think I’d let her go. If I painted on bruising just for some pictures, seeing her would have made him realize it was fake.

Besides, when you spent your life beating up on things, you recognized real wounds from fake ones.

I waited with my guns on my sides, my men at my back, and the love of my life, spitting blood next to me. And waited. An hour passed and Derrick still hadn’t arrived. I forced myself not to check my phone or send him a message. I told him I’d kill her if he didn’t come in time, just to be rid of the problem.

“He’s here, watching,” I heard in the microphone in my ear. The lookout I had waiting to see when Derrick would get there was right on time.

If he wanted to make sure that was what I’d do, I’d give him a show.

“Pavel, I’m going to take her to the water.” I looked over my shoulder and switched to Russian. “Keep an eye out for him.”

“Worthless bitch,” Pavel said out loud in English. He spat on the ground while I cut her ropes off and pulled her from the seat by her hair.

I wanted to pick her up in my arms and kiss her pain away when she cried out but I forced myself to drag her. She started screaming, kicking out at me and clawing at my fingers.

“Please! I swear I’ll do whatever you want. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I won’t run again. Please! I don’t want to die.”

I ignored her, my heart feeling heavy and my feet dragging. I wanted to stop everything, but I didn’t.

“Shut up, bitch, before I put a bullet in you and be done with you. If Derrick don’t want you then at least I’ll enjoy watching your life fade from your eyes.”

My words had the desired effect. She read me, so clearly. Her gaze locked on to mine, and even though she was hitting me and screaming at me to let her go, there was love in her eyes. She knew how hard this was for me. I knew how hard it was on her. But we were doing this together so she wouldn’t have to be afraid anymore.

When we reached the ramp that lead into the water, I lifted her up against my body and covered her mouth. Her muffled screams were loud in my ear, but I didn’t stop. I walked to the edge of the ramp and slammed her down. She sputtered, trying to catch her breath.

I hesitated, using the time I was giving her to take a deep breath to look back at Pavel.

“Make sure we aren’t disturbed.”

Pavel ordered the men to move out. They would, blending into the surroundings, but I had snipers posted, and the men wouldn’t be far enough away that they wouldn’t be able to help River and I. Thinking I gave River as much time as I could, I grabbed her by the scruff of her neck and pushed her head under the water. She flailed around, but she kept her eyes on me, holding her breath. I knew eventually she would start to fight for real, her body’s reaction to the depletion of oxygen. I could only hope that Derrick would show his fucking self by then, or I’d pull her and be damned with trying to lure the cunt where I could get him easier.

“He’s moving in,” my lookout told me. I rubbed my fingers in River’s chin, trying to let her know that it wouldn’t be much longer. I wasn’t supposed to know Derrick was here, so I held her under. She swung at me, her back arching and her body fighting harder to get free. She couldn’t take much longer.

“The bitch probably likes that,” I heard from behind me and pulled River up. She coughed and spat water as I let her go and stood.

Derrick was there. It was the first time I got a good look at the man that had done so much to River. He was the All-American boy, with dirty blond hair, blue eyes, and a chiseled jaw. He carried himself like he didn’t have a care in the world, His blue business suit was expensive, I recognized the cut, and he had an air about him that said he was used to getting what he wanted.

And he had a gun pointed at me.

“Took you long enough,” I said to him. I tucked my hands into my slacks, more to hide my balled up fists. River curled around my feet, sobbing and still apologizing. I’d believe she was in shock if I didn’t know better.

“He’s got guys with him,” my lookout warned.

“Had to make sure you were real,” Derrick said.

I laughed. “The fuck do I care about your game, hmm? If you want her so God damned much, you come and get her. I’m done with her.”

“You see, I got a problem though,” Derrick said. “You touched my goods. Played with it. Sampled it. She’s got good pussy, I know. She likes it rough, and a man like you would appreciate it. But I don’t like shit that belongs with me played with.”

Eight men came from behind the warehouse, four on each side and flanked Derrick. He smiled as they pointed their weapons at me.

“So I think it’s better if I just kill you both. Leo thought the same.”

I froze as Leo stepped around the warehouse as well. Was he on our side, or theirs? He hadn’t contacted me about being of assistance, but I hoped and fucking prayed that he really did believe that the family came first. Leo smiled at me, pulling his gun. But before he made it to Derrick’s side he shifted it towards the man closest to him.

“Snipers ready?” he asked.

“Go!” I cried.

I ducked low as shots went off. My gun felt like heaven in my hands. River tucked in tight behind me as I picked off men racing towards us. A bullet bit through the skin of my arm, just enough to burn me, but not enough to disable it.

I grunted, shaking the offending arm out. River cried out behind me, slapping her hand over the wound.

“Keep him alive!” she demanded.

“I hear you,” the lookout said in my ear, picking up the order.

“Make sure you don’t hit that son of a bitch Derrick either,” I said into my mic.

“He’s caught one in the leg, to keep him down, but other than that, he’s all yours.”

It was slow getting River back up the ramp as we mowed down the other men there. When the bullets stopped flying, Derrick was pinned down, Leo holding a gun to his temple.

“Look, have the girl. I’m fucking done with the slut. Just let me live,” he begged.

“Is everyone who isn’t family bitch made?” Leo asked.

I laughed, it was choppy, but it eased the tension. “I think he’s a special case.”

“Better that he is gone from the world then,” Leo said. He tucked his gun into his holster before looking up at me.

“We are good,” he said.

“Is that possible?”

“My brother told me once that you were our big brother, and one day you’d know about me and would help watch out for me like you did for him. It was the day before he died. Seeing the pain it caused you meeting me, I believe it.”

“I will be here,” I told him.

“And I will come and talk with you one day, about Mikhail, and who he was.”

I watched Leo walk away, a lump in my throat. I felt hands grip my shoulder, and then I sensed River, pressing her face into my back. Water dripped on me, seeping into my shirt. It reminded me what we were here for, that she was safe, and that we could start our lives.

I looked down at the crying man, bleeding from a gash to his calf and felt lighter than I ever had in my life. Leo and I would find a way to make things work. And through that I would find a way to apologize to my friend in spirt. River was going to be safe, and the families would go back to smooth sailing.

There was just one final thing to take care of and that was within my grasp.

“You crazy bitch, you think he’s going to treat you better than I did? Look at your face. Don’t let him do this to me,” Derrick cried.

River stepped around me. She stood tall, her head held high and her eyes flashing. “Anyone have a hair tie or a rubber band?” she asked.

Pavel reached into his back pocket and gave her a pink one. I recognized it as her favorite as she put her hair up in a ponytail. Then Pavel handed her the knife and sheath she usually kept on her and she tied it on her thigh.

“Thank you,
otets
,” she said. Father. I had never seen Pavel blush, but he was close to it. But there was pride in his eyes as he looked at River.

“Now, to you,” she said to Derrick. Her smile was a mirror of mine, just as crazy and dark. “I don’t really give a shit about what my face looks like right now. You should see it after we’ve fucked. But you don’t worry about how he’s going to be treating me. After you’re dead, you won’t care anymore will you?”

“You bitch! You crazy fucking bitch! I’m a senator’s son. You can’t kill me. You know how fast they will come looking for you?”

“Whatever. First man that makes sure he can’t talk shit to me anymore gets a thousand bucks,” River offered.

Pavel beat everyone to the punch and knocked Derrick out.

“I’ll take my payment in your art,” he said.

“For that, otets, you get two. Oh, and bring the other guy, the one who shot Ethan. He and I have a date.”

Revenge tasted sweeter when it was over time. I didn’t want Derrick to have it easy. Besides, how hot was it to have a man kill for you… Slowly… Deliciously… Just because you asked?

River

T
here was something absolutely wrong with Ethan and I. There was nothing I would do to change it, but it didn’t make it any less crazy. We stood in our dungeon, where Derrick was hanging by his wrists on one side of the room, and slumped on the other side was the man who shot Ethan.

Rage twisted through me as I watched Pavel check him to make sure he was still fucking breathing. I knew it was a flesh wound, that Ethan would survive. But someone had decided, had the fucking
nerve
to hurt what belonged to me. As Ethan held me in his arms, calling out orders to his men to lock our home down and get the clean-up crew working to make sure what happened today would be erased, I couldn’t stop staring at my enemy as he crouched on the ground. The little shit spit blood on the ground and groaned.

“Pavel,” I said.

“Yes, River?”

“Stand him up.”

“What?”

“Do as I say.”

Pavel looked up at Ethan, and I caught the movement. I bit my tongue to keep from lashing out at him for seeking permission. I was Ethan’s wife, but I understood how the business was run. It was Ethan’s voice they needed, his control that kept them together. It didn’t matter to me. As long as they did what I needed them to.

“What are you planning, detenysh?” Ethan lifted my chin towards him, but I couldn’t take my eyes off. my prey.

I finally understood what he’d been trying to tell me. That coldness that bled through my veins was beautiful. It was so sweet to taste, powerful and strong. I knew this man, my enemy, could be killed, easily, by my hand, and I wasn’t afraid any longer. Completely unafraid.

“River? What do you want?” Ethan asked again.

“Retribution,” I told him. His chuckle sent fire through my womb.

“Do as she says, Pavel.”

Guards surrounded us in the dungeon. Leo leaned off to the side, watching everything with hooded eyes. I think a part of him was pissed as well that Ethan had been hurt. Or maybe he wanted to be around the man that his brother had cared so much for. I’d figure it out later, but for now I pulled my ever present blade from the sheath on my thigh.

“I need another one.” Pavel produced a second one. It didn’t match the color, and the weight was a bit different, but I gripped them in my fists. They felt good, like the best sex, in my hands. Pavel then locked his charge upright with chains at his wrists and ankles. He hung there limply, breathing roughly.

“Take your punishment like a man,” I told him as I stepped away from Ethan.

“Fucking bitch. If there weren’t so many men around I’d show you exactly what I could do.”

“Oh, really?” Yeah, talk shit. He was going to fucking die tonight.

“Whore.”

I chuckled, the same, dark, twisted sound I heard from my husband so many times before. I was his equal, created in his image, loved by his darkness, and this man was nothing in the face of that.

“I am, but only for him. And you hurt him. Your blood belongs to me.”

It was a promise. I ignored his threats as I stalked over to him. My blade cut easily through his pants, and I wasn’t specific about his pants versus skin. He yelled, bucking away from me, but I didn’t give a shit. His limp dick felt like mushy shit in my hand, but then my blade was cutting, his screams twisted up inside of me, and I was laughing.

I don’t know how many times I cut him. I lost count. I just kept going, seeing Ethan shot over and over. In slow motion I saw him grimace. That was all it took to incur my wrath. It wasn’t until blood was dripping off me and I didn’t hear anymore cries that I stopped. Then I was stumbling back, smiling through the red haze. When I turned to face Ethan, he had that lopsided, twisted smile. Pavel nodded once at me, and the guards placed their fists over their hearts.

“Pika,” one said.

“Yeah, wouldn’t want to come against her with one in her hand,” Ethan said.

“Pika?” I asked. I wiped my blades on the sides of my pants, but there was no way they would get clean. I’d have to take a few showers, I supposed.

“Blade, baby. They are calling you Blade.”

“A name I earned. A name I carved into my enemies so that they would never forget,” I said, remembering his words to me so long ago.

“Yes.”

It was sick, we were sick, but we loved one another. It was okay, the only way we knew how. Derrick flipped a switch inside of me, so deep it could never be fixed, but I was lucky enough to find a man who could love me anyway. A man whom I could love because he was just as fucked up as I was.

It wouldn’t make sense to so many others. We weren’t normal and we never would be. We deserved love too. And, unless they tried to tear us apart, they would be safe from our anger. Ours was a love that was forged with steel, tied in blood, and sweetened by pain.

I needed a monster to make me one too, so I could love him.

I am so fucking happy he did.

“Please let me go. Oh my God, please,” Derrick cried behind me.

“Oh, you fucking spoiled the mood. I’m trying to tell this guy over here I’m fucking in love with him, and you
ruin
it.”

“I think I just heard you say it anyway,” Ethan said, laughing at me. I stuck my tongue out at him, bloody and all, and the guards laughed around us.

“You want to start on him now or later?” I asked.

“Clean up first, baby, he’ll be here when you get back.”

“You won’t do anything without me will you?”

“Of course not. You’d probably cut the shit out of me.”

I was laughing as I ran out of the dungeon area and headed upstairs. The only thing that could have made any of this better was hearing Ethan loved me too, but I may not have used the best moment to tell the man that I was in love with him. It didn’t matter, I meant it.

As I climbed in the shower, I didn’t think I could feel freer. Someone who had never been captured, or held against their will may not have understood what was going on. They wouldn’t get that being free of the hell that went on before, of learning to accept yourself, no matter how dark it got, could be something liberating.

Ethan freed me. From my past, from the shame that what I wanted in my soul was wrong, that loving the way we did was fucked up. It didn’t matter that no one would understand, or maybe only those in our world would get it. It was enough that we did. He didn’t have to tell me he loved me. I knew he did.

I’d just have to get him to say it at least once.

The shower felt good as I washed the blood off me. There was something to be said about a shower doing as much for your soul as it does for your skin. I just had a few more things to do before I would rest and live my life: kill Derrick Reese, marry my husband the right way, and move on. But all those things were possible. It was a matter of when instead of how.

Who was I now? A bratva wife? Victim? Survivor? Lover of dark things, even as I danced in the light? All those things, and none of them. I was River Kendall, monster with a Frankenstein soul pieced together with Ethan’s. Sometimes I’d cry, other times I’d laugh. There would be times I’d fear the pain I could receive, and other times I’d be giving it out. No matter what though, I was comfortable in my skin. For the first time, I could honestly say that.

I climbed out of the shower and turned it off before towel drying, My hair was a damn mass of curls and I found one of my t-shirts to suck up the moisture, but leave it wet enough to air dry without frizz. I chuckled at doing that. It was funny how little things that used to be my habit disappeared when I had other things running through my mind so fast that I couldn’t think straight. Soon I’d be wearing makeup again and keeping up with the latest fashions because I had a figure that could pull it off.

I was me again. No, that wasn’t right. I was me, brand new and improved. The thought put a skip to my step as I looked around for my black tights and tank top. I wouldn’t be involved directly in Derrick’s demise, but I wanted to see his face as he suffered the many things I went through. I tucked my hair back up in my pink hair tie and left the room.

Pavel was at the bottom of the stairs waiting for me.

“Otets?” he asked me.

“Does it bother you?” I hadn’t thought that maybe he hadn’t wanted the term of endearment.

“No. Ethan called me the same. When he’s Ethan with me and not Pantera, he will still call me the same. I could not be more proud of you. Our life isn’t easy, and much of what we do isn’t right, but we are a family. You are good for him.”

“He healed me, otets. He doesn’t even realize it, but he saved my life.”

“You saved his too. I think he held on for as long as he did because I wouldn’t let him run from it. I forced him to keep going and survive. There were days though, I saw more death in his eyes than life.”

“I’ll keep an eye out for him.”

“I know you will. And,
doch
?” Daughter, I knew that word. I think I liked hearing that from him more than Pika.

“Yeah?”

“I want the picture from you in the hospital, and the other after you fell in love with him.”

“You recognize them?”

“We all know love, child.”

“They are yours.”

“Then go to your man. He needs Pika now more than River. What he will do, he needs your strength to help him through. After, you can be River, and he can be Ethan for you. Together you will get over what you have done.”

It was a warning and advice, and I took it to heart. He knew much more about what was about to happen than I did. As I headed down the stairs to the dungeon I allowed Pika to push through, and let River fall away. Pika wouldn’t cringe at the blood. She wouldn’t feel bad for Derrick, or wish to put an end to his misery because she couldn’t see any human in that much pain.

Pika was the blade by which River would cut her revenge out on the world. A creation of Pantera, vor of Northern California. I was her as I opened the door to the dungeon where Derrick was kept. Pantera turned around and smiled at me. We were a match forged in violence, and our union was to be consummated in blood. Nothing felt as good as shutting the door behind me and hearing Derrick whimper.

Because neither of us gave a shit about how much he begged. When we were through with him, he’d be fucking happy to die.