10

Jack

October 29th, 2019

I watched her from the balcony as she went from group to group, only to be approached by others.

Everyone wanted her attention.

It was pure coincidence that we happen to be here too. Malachi had business here, commandeered a ticket last night, and I had no idea that she would be here until I saw her appear at the top of the stairs.

I should have guessed. If Marla Bennett was said to be as renowned as the papers claimed, of course her daughter would be invited too.

Although, even if I had considered it, I would have never guessed that she’d actually come, her being the homebody she was. Even still, she commanded attention. Everything about her was to draw the eyes of the unsuspecting. The way she floated around the room, the gait in which she walked, the way she held her glass. She was born for this.

Not to mention that fucking dress.

Mr. Braltor, the greeter in charge of checking off names, had made it a point to stare at her tits as she walked up, her ass as she walked away.

I wanted to kill him just for that, let alone for the thoughts I was sure he’d be jacking himself off to tonight. As if he could ever score a woman like her.

No, she was mine.

I gripped the banister until my knuckles turned white, my gaze searing into those whose eyes lingered too long on her. I wanted to fucking kill them all. I wanted to be the last cock inside of her before she met her inevitable end, whenever that might be. She wasn’t allowed to know what anyone else felt like now that she had felt me.

“Nikita should be here soon,” Malachi informed me, joining my side. “Thank goodness too, if I eat any more of these finger sandwiches, I’ll have to go up a size.”

He’d let himself go in the last 18 years. Which was fine. He ran the place now, he didn’t need to be in the field, but sometimes there were moments when I felt that softness getting to his head.

It had been a couple of hours since Rae had arrived, and I couldn’t help but wonder if she even noticed the men adjusting themselves when she neared. She wasn’t acting as if she saw it, but I was sure she did. She loved the attention, and I didn’t believe it was for the validation of it, she just liked being seen.

“I see you, Princess. I see the things they don’t.”

“She doesn’t seem ashamed of those scars,” Malachi noted.

He had been acting a little off since Rae arrived, and part of me feared that perhaps he wanted her too, but as the night had progressed, he hadn’t said anything to confirm my suspicions, so I tried to let them fall away. He was an observant man. Even after spending nearly two decades with him, it was hard to decipher what he saw, what he thought.

“She’s had them for a long time, she might not notice them anymore.” They were fighting scars. Torture scars. I was certain she wasn’t who she said she was, which was why Malachi has hesitantly lifted the kill order, but I never would have done it anyway. I had a plan for that. Rae wasn’t going to escape me that easily.

Not now, not ever.

She was keeping something from me, and that just wasn’t allowed anymore.

Rae laughed lightly and nodded, giving a soft wave to the couple she was talking to before turning away, only for her steps to falter.

I straightened. That didn’t happen often, her being unsure. I followed her gaze to the man and woman Mr. Braltor was taking coats from. The Police Captain.

I turned back to her, finding her now casually making her way over to them, her composure regained. After that little show outside the precinct, I was eager to see what she would do.

Even I thought that what the police had done was bullshit. Giving up looking into a murder after only eight months? The body wasn’t even cold yet. I couldn’t completely blame them with the pure lack of everything, but I certainly wasn’t blaming her for her anger.

As Rae approached, the woman on his arm, his wife presumably, tightened her grip, her eyes icing over.

I couldn’t blame her, as the captain was already looking at Rae as if he were imagining sticking his own cock where only mine was allowed.

My knuckles cracked.

Rae’s lips moved quickly.

He watched her for a moment before turning to the woman. He patted her hand and kissed her head, nodding towards the bartender.

The woman looked absolutely furious but complied anyway. I wish she wouldn’t have.

As soon as she walked away, the captain stepped up to Rae, close enough to look down her dress and get a glimpse of the tits it nearly covered.

He reached out to her, touching her elbow, sliding his hand up, tenderly brushing a strand of hair off her shoulder before his hand fell back to her arm.

I guess I was making a home visit tonight.

Words were exchanged, Rae’s frown deepening, her shoulders tensing.

She ripped her arm out of his grip and pointed a finger at him. What was she telling him? What did she want?

He grabbed her wrist and shoved it down, snapping at her.

I straightened. I knew where he lived. I knew where he slept. I knew that his children hated him, and his wife wanted to file for divorce. Killing him would give her a great pension at the very least. It would be easy.

She twisted her wrist and snapped it down, breaking his grip in less than a second.

My brows lifted.

“Hmm, now that’s interesting,” Malachi commented.

I had forgotten he was there, but yes, it was interesting. Despite what most believed, watching internet videos or going to a few classes didn’t suddenly give you the agility and strength it took to break out of a grown man’s grip without severely hurting yourself. Rae was maybe 2 soaking wet, and the captain clearly kept his body up to par.

That grip would leave a bruise, but nothing more than that. She broke his grip just like Zo would have.

My eyes shifted at the thought, finding Zo watching the exchange from the far corner. Even she looked slightly confused.

I turned back to Rae just as she said a few words. The captain’s face went slack, and she turned and left without another look back. She rolled her shoulder slightly as if trying to rid herself of the memory of his touch.

My gaze remained on the captain. He was wiping his hand over his mouth, the other finding his hip. Whatever she had said to him, he didn’t like it in the slightest. After a moment, he pulled out his phone and headed back out the door.

I watched after him for only a moment before my gaze shifted back to Rae. There was nothing I could do about it now but watch.

She was going back for a third drink, and while normally most would look at that as a drunk child, it was different because of how she looked. The air around her screamed ‘elite’. She demanded respect, so unless she was stumbling or slurring her words, nobody would care. In fact, I was sure some of the men were waiting for her to get a little tipsy.

She stopped at the bar, sliding her empty glass over and gesturing for another before turning away to gaze around the room. Not once did her eyes lift, which was fine. That look in that amber gaze was professional. She was wearing another mask. This wasn’t the girl on social media, the one walking to the café, the one sitting diligently at her coffee table researching a murder, or the one I had fucked last night.

Rae wore many masks, and I’d like to think I had the power to destroy all of them, revealing who she truly was underneath.

“J,” Zo sounded in my ear.

I found her across the room, quickly heading towards Rae.

My brows furrowed. “What is it?” I asked, finding Rae again.

Nothing was out of place. Her drink had been refilled, she was still looking around the room, studying, watching.

“You were right. Someone put something in her drink.”

Panic filled me as Rae turned back.

Malachi grabbed my arm, warning me to stay.

My nostrils flared as I ripped my arm out of his grasp watching her lift it. I looked away for two goddamn seconds. Two fucking seconds. How had that happened? Who the fuck was trying to kill her?

“Jack,” Malachi stated as I shoved passed him.

I turned back towards her, watching as she turned towards the room again, the glass nearly to her lips. I inhaled sharply, getting ready to shout when Zo ran into her, bumping the drink out of her hand.

My heart was racing as I watched the exchange. Zo laughing nervously, Rae waving her off with a smile on her lips, people glancing, chuckling at the scene.

Rae placed the cup down and flicked her hands, turning back towards the bartender to order another.

Zo walked away, brushing off her now wet dress. “Averted,” she mumbled, still acting like the nervous, embarrassed woman that caused an elite to spill her drink.

“Did you see them?” I asked, watching Rae unblinkingly.

“Masks, J. I saw a white mask. I’ll watch her while you have your meeting. Nikita is coming up the stairs now.”

It was a struggle. I didn’t want to take my eyes off her, but I had no choice, this was my job.

With a slight snarl, I stepped away from the railing and straightened my jacket as Malachi turned towards the stairs to greet our client.

It was more of a struggle than I wanted to admit not looking back towards the room, so I removed myself, walking over to the far wall, preventing my own wandering eyes. This was my job first. I trusted Zo with my life, with the lives of my brothers, yet this felt different somehow and that wasn’t something I was necessarily used too.

Malachi greeted Nikita like an old friend after putting on a mask of his own. They chatted about their lives in Nikita’s native language; Russian. I knew it flawlessly, we all did, but the people here didn’t. Flaunting their money and education, not many of them actually learned more than the American Language. They didn’t need to. They had people for that, people for everything. So, discussing business dealings here was safe enough.

“Coming your way.”

This worked out in my favor after all.

My eyes flicked to the stairs, only one leading up or down, to find Rae walking up, her fingers delicately tracing the railing, her eyes still focused on the people below, unaware that she could have just died minutes ago.

She was so transfixed on the crowd below, she didn’t even spare us a glance as she reached the top of the stairs and walked over, stopping directly in front of me. She leaned over, resting her forearms on the railing, sticking out that perky little ass as her gaze fell below her.

My cock throbbed, remembering how good it had felt inside of her. Fuck me.

I glanced over, nodding at the three other men we had brought just in case something went wrong. I glanced towards the stairs and turned back to Rae.

Two of those three men made their way to the top of the stairs, started up a causal conversation about nothing just to block the stairs from anyone else coming up.

Nobody was coming near her again.

The balcony truly wasn’t that large. A handful of people could fit up here. I was standing against the far wall and only stood yards from Rae. I was two good strides away from her. Two good strides and I could fuck her in front of everyone, claiming her as my own.

It’d be easy enough. That slit proved that she wasn’t wearing underwear. All I had to do was brush her dress to the side, wrap my arms around her waist, and pray that she had enough self-restraint not to moan too loud, although I wouldn’t be mad if she did.

She straightened, taking a sip of her now clean drink. I was angry with her that she had been so observant yet so oblivious at the same time.

Nikita and Malachi’s conversation shifted to the real topic at hand. He was friends with the Raine’s, who had spent a few months in Russia several years ago. He had children, four boys, who he wanted to insert into the program, so he was trying to prove himself useful by warning us of an incoming shipment of fentanyl tainted cocaine.

Although we didn’t do much in the drug world, we were a part of it, if not to just keep it controlled. No children, no pregnant women, no tainted product. We couldn’t rid the world of drugs, but we could at least do our part in keeping it as safe as possible.

Everett, Greyson, and I had actually had long discussions on whether or not we’d stay in the drug game once we took over. We had yet to come to an outright decision. It was a lose-lose game. No matter what, people would die, innocents would get their hands on it, there was no stopping that. The product could be as clean as a nun’s pussy and people would still die.

We were at a stalemate.

Rae’s shoulders tensed suddenly, my eyes flicking to the way her back curved. She had done such a good job in covering up all of the bruises I left on that body of hers. Too good of a job. I wanted those marks so dark, she could never hide them.

I’d give her a reason to stay inside.

She angled her head ever so slightly as if she were listening in on the conversation.

I fought the urge to roll my eyes. It was cute the way she acted as if she could understand what they were saying. “You watch too much crime shows, Princess.”

She turned back to the room and finished her drink before setting the glass down on the railing and relaxing her shoulders as if she were preparing to step in.

I angled my chin, my eyes narrowing, curiosity rising. Maybe she wanted to ask what they were talking about. Maybe she had seen something far below that caught her attention.

Or perhaps she just liked the way they were speaking. Many people loved listening to people speak in other languages. Not because they understood it, but because of the romance of it, the cadence. “I’ll speak Russian to you all you want, baby. Russian, French, Latin. I’ll speak such pretty words that you’ll melt at my feet and beg me to fuck those pretty pouty lips of yours.”

She turned away from the railing, making a large circle around us before circling back to Malachi.

I reached for my gun on instinct, studying her, waiting. Would she grab for something? Was she in this game further than I had originally believed?

But her hands never left her side, not until she came up behind him and placed one on his shoulder as if she had always known him.

Malachi paused, glancing over just as she leaned in and whispered something in his ear.

There was that jealousy again, causing my rage to flame.

His head tilted to the side, his brows furrowing.

I quickly stepped closer, wanting to know what she was saying.

Was she…

Was she speaking fucking Russian?

What the fuck?

Malachi straightened, considering her words.

Her hand slid away, but she remained where she was, her cool amber eyes finding mine for half a second before they found Nikita’s. It wasn’t her fault that she didn’t recognize me this time. My mask covered the upper half of my face, a screen stitched around the eyes to shield mine. All she saw was black.

Nikita’s eyes narrowed. “Another daughter?” he asked defensively.

Malachi chuckled, another mask falling over his features. “Yes. I suppose now is the best time to introduce you. This is Maria,” he said, taking a step back to showcase my girl. “She informed me she wouldn’t be here until tomorrow, but what father doesn’t love a surprise.”

What. The. Fuck.

I rolled my shoulders and straightened. She spoke Russian, she had battle scars, her mother was murdered, and the body was never found. “What else do you have in that head of yours, Rae? What other masks do you wear?”

Rae tilted her head forward in greeting. “Being unpredictable is the best thing in our world,” she said easily, giving him the sweetest little smile.

Our world. God, that sounded good coming from her lips.

“My father taught me at a young age that chaos is only chaos to those who refuse to understand it.” She shrugged one shoulder. “If I’m the girl no one understands, then I’m protected from those trying to hurt me.”

Is this the real you then? The girl nobody understands.

Nikita eyed her for only a moment before nodding in her direction. “I have a daughter myself. She took after her mother,” he shrugged.

Malachi beamed.

I was in fucking disbelief.

“So, you understand the battle,” he boasted. “I raised her to believe that she was fire and ice, a Queen among mere mortals. I suppose I’m reaping what I sowed tonight,” he chuckled.

She looked more at ease in this moment than I had seen in her the last two weeks of watching her.

Rae said a string of words in Russian, causing Nikita to laugh.

“You speak Russian better than your father. I never would have guessed you were raised anywhere other than Mother Russia.”

She smiled lightly. “I have many talents.”

My hand twitched, itching to be around her neck, to spread those legs wide and fuck the answers right out of her.

“Now, as I was telling my father, I do hope that shipment you were discussing isn’t going to Port Capleon.”

Nikita’s chin lifted as if he were trying to test the daughter of Malachi Adler. “Why wouldn’t we want that?” he questioned.

Her brows furrowed softly behind that mask, her lips pouting ever so slightly. “Haven’t you heard of the parties?” she asked as innocently as she could manage.

What fucking parties? That port was clear. I made sure of it.

Malachi’s hands tightened, his smile following in suit. “I apologize, darling, but I don’t know about any parties.”

She touched his arm as a daughter would do when speaking to her father. “I told you before, but it was in the middle of a dealing, my apologies father, I should have clarified. This is why you need me on the job, hmm?” Her eyes shifted to Nikita’s. “The college kids have been going down there a lot recently to throw parties in the shipping containers. The police have done their best to stop them, but we all know how…dense they can be.”

The bitterness in her words was clear. She hated the cops, and I could understand why.

“Now, if I were you, I’d consider Lowell Bay. It’ll add an extra hour onto your time, but it won’t get checked by anyone. They’re far too lax down there. Lazy. You go there, tell them whatever lie you want, they’ll look the other way, no questions asked.”

I fought the urge to grab the bridge of my nose. I would never hear the end of this. Never.

Nikita watched her for a second longer before turning to Malachi. “You should bring her to more of your business meetings. Lowell Bay it is. Just one moment so I can make the call.”

My eyes shifted to Rae, narrowing to slits.

Her mistake was allowing herself to be the only one up here with six other men.

Malachi stepped away, pulling out his own phone, and as she was turning back, I stepped up behind her, wrapping my hand into the hair at the base of her skull, while the other wrapped around her wrist, twisting it behind her.

She gasped, her body tensing as I leaned in until my lips were inches from her ear, my hardened cock rubbing against her ass. “Why did you do that?” I asked, my voice cracking in desperate anger.

Tonight was too much. From the men staring at her, the captain grabbing her, the strangers poisoning her, and now this? Fuck, I was losing my grip.

She shuddered, her body melting at the sound of my voice. “You,” she breathed out as Malachi eyed her, uncaring of what I was doing.

My grip tightened in her hair, pulling a whimper from her lips. “Me,” I growled threateningly.

Malachi lifted his chin as he slid his phone away. “That was impressive,” he said, searching her eyes. “For a moment there, I thought I had miscounted my own daughters.”

She struggled, her ass wiggling against my hips, shoving back against me angrily only to stop when she felt my cock pushing into her. “I was trying to help,” she said through her teeth, her voice, much to her credit, unwavering.

“And you accomplished your task. How do you know Russian?”

She swallowed, her body as still as a cat on the hunt. “My nanny taught me,” she replied evenly.

Why would Donna teach her Russian? That wasn’t a language most just learned. Spanish, French, but Russian? No.

“Hmm,” Malachi pondered. “While I do appreciate the tenacity, and the warning, I am a businessman. The way you spoke, clearly you understand what’s next.”

I was already reaching for my gun, regretting not doing what I had needed to do earlier. If Malachi made the call, it was too late. I’d have to finish the job.

“If you’re going to threaten my life, there is no need. My fearlessness comes from a lack of will, not bravery,” she told him, her voice thick with anger.

Lack of will, that was bullshit. She was reckless, she didn’t want to die.

Malachi studied her carefully. “You kids and your shows.”

“I didn’t do this because I watched a show,” she hissed.

“Then why?”

“Because I hate the police and they don’t deserve another win. There are always cops lingering around Capleon. Why should they get the bust of a lifetime when they don’t even care about their own people?”

She was pissed they gave up on her mother. She wasn’t trying to help us, she was trying to ruin them.

My grip in her hair tightened, but this time in praise, pulling another whine from her lips, my cock throbbing painfully as her cheeks reddened, her body melting into mine.

Malachi’s eyes flicked towards me.

I watched his carefully. We couldn’t kill her yet. Don’t make me kill her yet. I needed a little more time.

After a moment, he nodded. “If you go near Lowell Bay, we’ll kill you. With that being said, if it’s a purpose you’re looking for, I think you’ve found it. Luckily for you, you did me a favor. This is me repaying it.”

I twisted her arm a little more, forcing her to arch her back as Malachi turned away, pulling a whimper from her throat. “You taste like fucking honey.” I growled before releasing her.

I stepped back so suddenly, she stumbled a bit before catching herself.

To her credit, she didn’t even make a move to rub her wrist or her head. Rather, she straightened and turned to face me, her expression hard, unwavering. “It wasn’t the best I’ve ever had,” she lied.

I laughed, knowing that the night was far from over. Challenging bitch.

She swallowed, clearly nervous of the smile I now wore.

Rae turned back towards Malachi. “I apologize.”

“Don’t apologize for something you meant,” Malachi stated clearly. “Perhaps it’s not fearlessness or bravery, perhaps it runs deeper than that. You’ve bought yourself some time, Rae, don’t waste it.”

Her brows pulled together but other than that, she showed no emotion, no fear. She simply nodded and headed back for the stairs.

I watched after her, the way her ass swung, the way Nikita watched after her, lust in his eyes.

Fucking son of a bitch. She was mine.