The Slayer (Untamed Hearts #2) (45 page)

Chuito winced at that, as if regretting that he hadn’t.

“You can have yours. We’re keeping the woman and the Italian,” the Russian leader said. “I don’t know who the woman belongs to. Maybe they all share her. Or maybe they don’t give a shit. Either way, she’s worth keeping.”

“Why the fuck do you get to keep her?” Angel shot back.

“’Cause I said so,” the Russian said simply. “We get the whore.” He eyed Alaine as she knelt on the floor. “What do you do for the Italians, sweetheart?” He stepped away from Chuito, gesturing to one of his goons to guard him, and then squatted down until he was eye level with Alaine. She flinched when he used his gun to push the neckline of the hoodie aside, exposing the marks Chuito had left on her throat. “You like it rough? I can give it to you better than they can. I invented rough.”

Alaine swallowed hard. Her heartbeat was still deafening her. Her cheeks were hot, but the fear was glacial, making her stomach feel leaden. She tilted her head and looked at the Russian, staring at the rim around the blue of his irises to keep herself from turning away.

She couldn’t find a way to speak. She was too terrified of saying the wrong thing, of somehow having all their murders on her head. It was cowardly, maybe, but all she could really manage was to look death in the eye rather than hide from it.

“Motherfucker—” Chuito started before Alaine had to respond.

“Chu—” Tino snapped in warning.

“No.” Chuito shook his head, his hands still threaded behind his neck. “No. Just—” His voice was shaking with fury. “You will have to kill me.”

“Oh, now he speaks English.” The Russian laughed as he turned back to Chuito. “You can die. Doesn’t bother me. I’m still going to fuck her.” Then he shoved his gun underneath Alaine’s chin and said, “Or maybe I’ll just kill her instead. I have unique tastes. Pain turns me on.
All pain
. You think you’ll feel pain if you watch this bullet tear through her skull?”

Alaine closed her eyes, feeling her entire body start shaking as the terror swooped in and claimed her, making her almost numb with it, because there was something in the way he said it that seemed very honest. Like he would kill her just to watch Chuito’s reaction to it.

She prayed, silently, asking forgiveness not just for her sins, but Chuito’s as well, because she knew instinctively he was going to follow her.

“What do you want?” Chuito choked out, and Alaine opened her eyes to see Chuito staring at the Russian with a look of abject pleading she hadn’t thought was possible for him. “You’re bored. You want to hurt someone? Hurt me. Go for it.”

The Russian was quiet for a moment and then said, “I’ve decided I like to watch.” He glanced to Angel. “She belongs to one of yours. Clearly the Italian could give a shit, so you take her. Fuck her. Let him see you do it.”

“Angel, I will fucking kill you.” Chuito obviously chose to speak English so everyone could understand him. “I will find a way to cross over and torture you if you touch her. I swear it on Juan’s name; I will drag you into hell with me, cabrón.”

Alaine looked to Angel, who was staring down at Chuito with an unreadable expression, and she honestly tried
very hard
to read it because her fate depended on it.

“I like to watch too,” Angel finally announced. “Seeing this hijo de la gran puta suffer gets me off more than it gets you off. Let my boy fuck her. We’ll all watch him suffer. If anyone needs a little humility, it’s this motherfucker.”

“Ay Dios mio.” Chuito shook his head, looking from Alaine to Tino, as if searching for a solution.

“Just keep her alive,” Tino whispered, though his voice was shaking too.

“So it’s your choice.” The Russian jammed his gun under Alaine’s chin and gave Chuito a dark smile. “You watch her die, or you can watch her get fucked. I want you to pick.”

Alaine took a shuddering breath and stared at Chuito, who was still shaking his head. “You’re gonna kill us anyway,” he whispered, and she knew he was about to choose death rather than the alternative.

And she was relieved…for both of them.

“Chuito!” Tino shouted at him. “Get over your bullshit!”

Then Chuito crumpled right there in front of all of them, his hands still behind his head as he pressed his forehead against the wood floor and let out a sob. “No.” One word, broken and full of so much pain Alaine forgot her own fear in the face of such a massive collapse from Chuito, whom she always thought was unbreakable. “No, you can’t have her. I’m not gonna let you do that to her. You’re gonna kill us anyway. So fuck it.”

“She dies.” The Russian shrugged. “Make sure he can watch.”

It took three Russians to force Chuito to lift his head. Somehow he had made his body leaden, tight with raw fury. He started fighting them, despite the guns, and for one horrible moment she thought they were going to have to kill him to subdue him.

“Repent. Chu, listen to me!” Alaine shouted, because she knew he wasn’t listening as he fought their hold on his head. He became a watery blur as the tears rolled down her face, because she knew they were going to shoot her while Chuito watched. Right now. It was over before it really started, so she begged, “Meet me in the right place! Please repent! Promise me!”

“Fuck her!” Tino shouted before Chuito could promise. “You want to fuck her? Do it, you sick motherfuckers. Let him watch! He clearly can’t handle it. If pain gets your dick hard, you’re not gonna see more pain than that.”

“I will kill you too, Tino!” Chuito shouted at his best friend. “If these motherfuckers don’t kill you, I’ll drag your ass down to hell with me. I will spend the rest of eternity making you suffer.”

“I’m willing to deal with that,” Tino said in such a cold, deliberate voice it gave Alaine chills as he repeated, “
Fuck her
.” Then he turned back to the Russian as if he was negotiating. “He’s a child of rape. Did you know that? This right here. It’s his worst nightmare. He’d watch her die a thousand times over seeing her raped. He’s Catholic, motherfucker. He believes in heaven, and this girl couldn’t kill a fly. He knows where she’s going, but this, it’d fucking break him into a million pieces. You found his weakness. His only weakness. Congratulations.”

“Holy shit,” Angel whispered, looking down at Chuito with wide eyes. “Is that why you’re so angry, cabrón? Not that I can blame your
papá
. I’ve thought about raping Sofia a time or two myself. Maybe I’ll stop by her house after I’m done with your chica, since she obviously likes it.”

Chuito tried to jump at Angel, but the Russians held him back.

“I like the Italian’s idea,” the one holding Alaine said with a smile. “We’ll break him. Then we’ll kill him and keep the woman. Everyone wins.”

“Let Junior have her,” Angel announced. “He’s enthusiastic. Nothing like the stamina of youth.”

Chuito screamed when Angel shoved the man with him forward. He was obviously young, but he was huge. Bigger than even Chuito, all muscles, with a dark gaze that was terrifying as he looked down at Alaine in cold, unforgiving detachment.

“I need privacy to enjoy her,” Junior said as he studied Alaine. “But I’ll make sure he can hear her.”

The Russian held up his hand at that. “Make sure we
all
hear it.”

“No!” Chuito screamed again, this time raw and horrified when Junior reached down and grabbed Alaine’s arm. “
¡Puñeta! ¡No la toques! ¡Suéltala! ¡Maldito, cabrón! ¡Si la tocas te lo juro, por mi madre, te lo juro que te mato!
”

Alaine tried to make herself leaden like Chuito had, to somehow slip away from Junior’s grasp and take the bullet instead. If Chuito thought they were going to die anyway, it was a better option than having to go through that while Chuito and all these other men were listening.

No.

“I don’t want this!” she shouted at them despite the chaos around her, because there was nothing now that could make it worse than it already was. She turned to Tino as she fought Junior’s hold on her arm. “Take it back! Tell them you take it back, Tino! I’d rather die! Let them kill me instead!”

Junior slammed his hand over her mouth before she could rail at Tino more. He jerked her back against his chest as Chuito kept screaming in Spanish, saying what, she didn’t know, but she could hear the violence in his words. The absolute horror that this was where they were going to end.

She refused to walk, but Junior forced her forward anyway, because he really was a massive man. She saw that Tino had lowered his head, as if he couldn’t look, and she realized right then how true his warning in the Ferrari was.

He wasn’t nice when he was protecting someone.

He’d just sacrificed her to keep Chuito alive for a few more minutes.

Chapter Forty-One

Chuito’s screams followed her all the way up the stairs. Something about them was a thousand times more horrible than the idea that this boy trapped inside the muscular body of a man was going to do things to her that were ghastly enough to make her scream so loudly Chuito could hear it downstairs.

Junior let go of his hold on her mouth to push at the door to the bedroom she and Chuito had been sharing. Knowing it was going to be here, where Chuito had loved her a few hours earlier, made her more than terrified. She was angry, and she screamed out, “I HATE YOU, TINO! I HATE YOU!” Junior shoved the door shut and pushed her against it, but she kept screaming because it was Tino who did this to them. It was him who sold her for a couple more minutes, when Chuito was going to repent instead, and they could get out of this terrible place. “I HATE YOU!” She hit Junior’s chest. “I HATE ALL OF YOU!”

She realized she was breaking down, having some sort of massive psychological crack. Junior was talking, his lips were moving, but she couldn’t hear him. All she did was rage, mainly at Tino, because she had a name for him, and he was supposed to be her friend.

Junior slammed his hand over her mouth again. “Listen to me! Stop screaming for a moment and listen, mami.”

He lifted his hand.

“DON’T CALL ME THAT!” she screamed and tried to reach for the doorknob, but he was blocking it. “NEVER!” She hit his chest, shoving him back from the door. “NEVER! YOU CAN HURT ME! BUT YOU CAN’T CALL ME THAT! NEVER!”

“I’m not hurting you,” he snapped at her. “Am I hurting you right now? Do you see me hurting you? You are freaking out by yourself.”

She sucked in a startled breath, because she realized he was right. He was just standing there, looking at her like she had lost her mind.

“W-why aren’t you hurting me?” she asked, her voice shaking as she looked at the door. “W-why did y-you bring me in here if—”

“I’m trying to help you,” he said in a low, cautious voice. “I’m not gonna rape you. Are you listening to me now?”

“I—” She looked to the door again and then nodded. “Yes.”

“You have to take off your clothes,” he said slowly. “If they come up here and you’re not naked, we’re both dead.”

She let out a sob and turned back to the door, flattening herself against it. “I don’t want this to happen. Why is this happening to us?”

“I’m not gonna hurt you, but you need to make them think I’m hurting you. I sent a message to Marcos. We just got to stay alive until he gets here. You have to get undressed. We both do. We’ll fake it.” He gripped at the back of his shirt, pulling it off in one quick movement. “It’s not real. It’s fake.”

“Oh my God,” she whispered as she glanced over her shoulder and stared at his chest, because so much about him looked like Chuito. The stars on his shoulders. The snake on his arm. The cross over his heart. It had different names, but it was still so horrifically familiar. He had more tattoos than Chuito, but there was so much that was the same. “Why do you look like that? Why do you
sound
like that? I don’t want you to sound like that.”

He gave her a look of disbelief. “I thought you
liked
Latinos.”

“No.” She shook her head. “I don’t like you.”

“Mami—”

She screamed, because hearing a man who wanted her to strip naked for him, who looked like Chuito, call her that was too much.

It was
way
too much.

“Ay Dios mio,” he groaned behind her but let her scream. “Fine, scream, chica. Be a princess. Scream your head off when I’m risking my neck to save your skinny gringa ass. That’s what they wanted to hear anyway, fucking sick
hijos de putas
.”

Actually, the screaming helped.

So did crying, and she sank down to her knees and let out a sob when her throat got raw. Then, as she sat there on her knees, she realized that this boy really
wasn’t
hurting her. She turned back, looking up at him standing there, huge and imposing.

“Are you
really
trying to help us?”

“Duh.” He held out his hands. “I’m not raping you, am I?”

“W-why?” she asked and then wanted to kick herself. “I mean, why would you want to help?”

“Scream again, and I’ll tell you,” he countered with an arch of his eyebrow.

She screamed, and it was easy, but then when she stopped, she heard Chuito from downstairs. Alaine put her hand on the door, hearing Chuito’s agony that was so much worse than hers. He kept screaming, now completely in Spanish, and she wondered what he was cursing about.

She turned back to Junior. “What is he saying?”

“Coño, no.” He shook his head as he gave Alaine a look of horror. “You don’t want to know. I don’t even know where he got an idea like that, but he’s being really graphic about it.”

“What is it?”

“He says he’s gonna rip off Angel’s balls and feed them to him.” Junior winced and looked to the door. “I thought all the rumors about him were a myth. He sounds fucking serious. I’ve seen a lot of nasty shit, but that’s grim.”

Alaine took a shuddering breath. “Tell me why you’re helping us.”

“Marcos, your boy Chuito’s cousin, he’s my bro. His wife, Mrs. Rivera, she’s my teacher. She’s helping me graduate so I can get a real fucking job for the green,” Junior explained simply. “I owe them.”

“Are you still in high school?” she asked. “Why are you here? Why would you get yourself in a situation like this?”