If a thing existed, a melding of a mental and physical orgasm, this was it. My body was warmed from within with a heightened tinge of satisfaction bursting at the seams. My mind was pirouetting around his words and the feelings he elicited. Untamed whimpers and professions of how he felt slipped from my lips.
We stilled in the aftermath, him still throbbing inside of me and my sex clenching and retracting around him, pushing his cream down my legs and onto him. We both knew everything that had teetered the line firmly fell to one side.
I was his, and he…was mine. He freed me from the constraints preventing me from letting go, and I fell into him. He held me in his arms and took me down on the adjacent bed. What little energy I had pushed me toward him. I rested my head on his sticky and moist chest, placing my palm against the faint scar, thankful for the first time in my life that it was just a scar and not the cause of his fatality.
THROUGH THE DENSE smoke rings obscuring a view of my face, I observed the security at several points, protecting what was precious to me. A few bitter pills were slipped into my mouth and quickly swallowed without water. The pain curdled inside my abdomen and increased with every second I pretended it didn’t exist. Archie’s quick strides out of the car, parked in the corner lot of the hotel, indicated I was in for a little bit of trouble.
“What in God’s green earth were you thinking?” Archie threw up his hands and increased his volume. “Didn’t you receive my messages about what had occurred? Your brother discovered my connection to you and knows your true identity and prevented the false characters you hired from carrying out your wishes. He gained control of the true members, and—”
“True members you recruited?” I questioned, indicating to him my knowledge of his lies. He swore he would never contact the members of the Birth of a Prospering Nation, but instead, hire actors who would pretend to be members of the community and make Archie believable as the character of Richie, a zealot looking for his lost prophet, and gain Noah’s trust. He knew well what a mistake it would have been to contact the true members, knowing many were loyal to my father and believed I was to be their next leader. “Is that what you’re referring to? Seems we both are capable of deceiving each other.”
The strength was pulled from Archie’s anger. “He wouldn’t have believed me unless I had the true members at my side. You haven’t the slightest idea what I had to do to convince those deranged individuals to follow me and lead Noah to believe my lies.”
“Short of gluing a beard onto your face and providing them with support in the form of handsome monetary rewards, I’m sure it wasn’t difficult.”
His neck angled as though my words had shocked him.
“Apologies,” I grumbled, siphoning the bitterness from my demeanor. “You didn’t deserve that.”
“Excused. I’m assuming you allowed it to go on for longer than you should have and the pain has taken control of your words. Do you need anything from me?”
“The pain is of no consequence.” I snuffed the edge of the cigarette on the brick exterior of the hotel. “In fact, Noah’s underhanded plans against you were a present to me. He put me in a place I struggled to maintain, a place I wasn’t certain I deserved to be.” I glanced back at the hotel, a smile upon my face when I thought of Keaton. I’d endure last night a million times to relive the night again.
“All carelessness aside, how are—”
“There’s no need to be concerned about me. We both know I’ve faced worse.”
Archie appeared troubled by something other than avoidance of discussing my pain.
“Since our plans went awry, has anything else unplanned occurred?”
“I’m afraid so.”
The lingering effects of my night with Keaton began to dissipate. I knew what troubled him before it was stated. “Brandy is dead, isn’t she?”
Unable to look at me, he set his gaze to the sky.
“You were supposed to protect her and keep her at a distance, don’t you recall?” My stride brought me close to him as the anger emanated from me in an uproarious heat. “I was against using her to get to Noah, but you both ignored my wishes.”
“Brandy knew the risks. She was willing to face them if it meant protecting her friend.”
“How am I going to tell Keaton this? She’ll fracture if she knows she’s lost another friend to Noah.”
Archie’s olive complexion drained of color.
Heat prickled the back of my neck, and I knew the source of Archie’s horror. Keaton had snuck past my sensors and heard more than she should have. I turned to her carefully. The tears streaming down her face indicated she’d learned more than I was prepared to tell her.
Too swift for my grasp, she turned and returned to the hotel.
“Braedan—”
“Not right now,” I barked back at Archie.
Slowed by my pain, I was unable to stop her or catch up to her. In the time it took me to reach her room, Keaton was flittering around the suite, packing her belongings.
“Think about what you’re doing, Keaton. Even if you somehow managed to get past me and went to him, you’re not ready to face him.”
She slammed her clothes across her suitcase and sank her tired body on the edge of the bed. “He killed my friend, Braedan. He won’t stop killing his way through everyone I love to get to me.” With a slump of her shoulders, she covered her face and wept into her hands.
Sitting next to her with care, I held her in my arms, providing her with the security she needed to reveal her profound sadness.
My arms were stiff and pieces of me were sore and screaming for more medication to numb me. Projecting myself to somewhere outside of my body, I suppressed it all to be what she needed.
“He can’t be allowed to keep doing this. I have to do something.” She parted from me, assaulting her lips with her teeth while sinking into a pensive and sullen state. “You said you planned to use me against him—”
“That’s no longer a viable option.”
She sank back onto the bed, covering her face and sobbed. “Brandy.” Her weak and destroyed voice carried enough pain to weight my world with one simple utterance of her friend’s name. “Why would she do something so stupid? Why would you let her?”
“Brandy is—was incorrigible when she set her mind to a plan.”
“I know…but you could’ve told me, so I could’ve stopped her. She had no idea what Noah was capable of.”
“She expressly stated, with very convincing and threatening words, that she didn’t want me to manage her in any capacity.”
A sullen smile imprinted itself on her face. “That sounds like Brandy.” Pushing herself to sit upright, she continued to stare into the invisible. “What did she think would happen? That she would break Noah? Why would she do something like that?”
I remained silent.
“He’s not going to stop. You know that. Either teach me to be strong, or get out of my way.”
“You don’t need me to teach you. You have so much strength already, Keaton. So much, I admire it.”
“Not like you. Not at all like you.”
“I had to survive. I hope you never have to find yourself in a situation where you have to carry the burden of my type of strength.”
“Someday I’ll have to. He’s going to come for me, eventually. He’s…more dangerous than you, especially now that he has nothing to lose.”
“Even if the worst happens, and I somehow fail to protect you because he pulled you from my cold, dead hands, I’ll find him in death and bring him down to hell with me. The only question is, will you allow it to happen?”
Her silence was a worrisome answer; Keaton held strongly to her values, even to her detriment.
Keaton remained in a sullen state on the flight to D.C. Her unshared thoughts kept her awake throughout the flight and distant from me.
Noah had taken one more from her when I promised her it wouldn’t occur. Regrets had no place in the aftermath. I couldn’t help myself fr
om pondering what would’ve transpired if I stuck with my convictions and turned Brandy down, even imprisoning her for her safety, if needed.
We were in the thick of silence the entire way back to her home. I reluctantly left the vehicle, keeping my steps slow and prodding, waiting for something not immediately known. She turned around once she was halfway up the stairs to her parents’ home.
She leapt down the stairs, enveloping me in her arms. Opening my mouth, I caressed her lips. I held her protectively, chasing her lips with my own and presented her with more than she could return.
When I felt something between us, ready for a repeat of last night, I pulled away, dropping my hands and my eye contact.
Before she could leave my sight, I grabbed her and gave her one last kiss to remember me.
I took a step back, granting her space to leave.
I could've gone without the text from someone on my security team, alerting me to what I already knew. I felt his presence like a niggling shadow, blocking my view of the light.
I pretended as though nothing was out of the ordinary and made slow strides down the sidewalk to greet him.
I RUBBED MY eyes. When they didn’t clear up the vision of my brother kissing Keaton, I rubbed them again. It was another thing to have the knowledge, it was an entirely different thing to see it in front of my eyes. I shot him, meaning for him to bleed slow and burn to death. Somehow, he cheated death and wound up in the arms of the woman who was supposed to be mine. I saw his charred remains and damn near danced on that fucker’s grave. In what kind of skewed world does this happen?
“Brother, it’s been too long.” His voice resonated behind me.
I had no idea I’d been stuck looking in the same spot for so long, I missed where he’d gone to. I took my time turning around. I smiled at the thought that he might’ve had to have reconstructive surgery because of me. It was at least one thing to hold onto. “What the fuck happened to your face?”
A grin I had a thought to wipe away with my fists popped onto his face. “Upgrades.”
“If you say so. I’d say no.”
“Most would disagree with you.”
“By most, I’m assuming you mean Keaton?” I chuckled more out of anger than the hilarity of the situation. There was nothing hilarious about my brother fucking Keaton. I could’ve accepted her spreading her legs for some unknown random man without so much as a stitch of rage when I killed him. But this? This never should’ve happened.
He noted my balled fists and it turned up the wattage of his smile. “Don’t you want to hear what I have to say?”
I shoved my fists into the pockets of my slacks and rounded my shoulders. “Can’t say that I fucking do.”
“So much for a new start between us.” And for some reason beyond me, he thought it was hilarious. “I’m on your side here. I always was.”
“You can at least try to make your lie believable, brother. Because from where I’m standing, I see you trying, and once again failing, to betray me.”
I’d successfully taken his smile away. “Interesting you’d say that considering you were the one who betrayed me, but let’s not get into petty squabbles. You want Keaton, I want to give her to you.”
I slanted my head to the side, shocked at the set of balls he’d suddenly adopted. “You want to give her to me?”
“I do. All I’ve ever wanted is to serve at your side. You want Rebirth to begin again, and so do I. Don’t pretend you couldn’t use me. We could both use Keaton. While I don’t think she’d fit the role of Reven, she could take on another role entirely. She could be a more predictable and controllable version of Nadine.”
“You mean to tell me…” I paused to laugh, because the situation was so unbelievable, what else could I have done. “…you’ve been fucking her and whispering sweet nothings in her ear all in my name? After I tried and intended to kill you? What makes you suddenly forgiving?”
“Because I’ve realized, I’m not fit for this world, and maybe you’ve realized the same. We were made for one purpose. With the members of our father’s church ready to worship me as long as I put on the robes they demand I do, and with our connections, there isn’t anything we can’t do. We could convert the masses and the stragglers who are wandering without a leader. Rebirth was sloppy, but what I have planned? Perfection.”
“After I tried to kill you, and showed you how worthless you or anything having to do with you was to me, what makes you think I need you?” I asked.
“You won’t gain the followers without me, and you know that.”
“About that…” I grinned as I imagined what he’d been through thanks to seeing through the distrustful new people he sent to me. He probably thought he was hiding his pain well; he’d be very fucking wrong. “Most of the members never returned to give me any news. The women were silently weeping for a few hours, too scared to speak to me. I’d be impressed if I actually cared. The pussy I’ve always known to be weak and easily dominated has grown up and turned into a mass murderer. I bet Keaton gave you shit about that, knowing her virgin-whore ways.”
He turned colder. “I don’t care about your love or pride. I care even less about what you think of me. You only have to respect me as much as I respect you.”
“Meanwhile, you have control of Keaton? My blessing?”
His forehead creased with the arch of a brow. “She’s our blessing in very different ways.” He glanced down the street for a moment. “I won’t play the Cain to your Abel.”
“Don’t be too fucking sure.”
“You shouldn’t be seen out here. Come to my home tonight, and we’ll discuss everything I have planned.” With a nod, he turned toward the opposite end of the street.
I cursed my brother and his complete lack of ability to see that I hadn’t bought any of his lies on the way to my car. I hated to admit he had a point. I was stalled and nowhere near where I wanted to be. I knew all roads pointed to him as the massive blockage between me and what was owed to me. His offer had to be considered on my terms. Once I was able to get well-placed individuals within the BoPN to see I was born to be their leader, I would kill Shiloh, and this time, he would remain dead.
As I slipped in my seat, a rustle and the clink of metal pulled my sight to the rearview mirror. Keaton’s amber eyes stared me down through the mirror. She wasn’t alone. A stone-faced man in a cheap suit who I could only assume was her bodyguard accompanied her.
“Keaton,” I said with a smile. The jagged and cold blunt edge of a gun wedged against my waist dimmed my smile. “My how you’ve changed, princess.”
“Don’t think I won’t use it,” she warned me. “My bodyguard has instructions to hurt you.”
My taunting grin was untamed. “I wouldn’t put it past you to do much of anything, being that you’ve become a whore for my soon-to-be deceased brother.”
She barely flinched. “Drive.”
With a wink, I turned on the car and pulled out of alley, driving to somewhere. “Where to?”
“The police station,” she said, convicted in her belief that it would somehow actually happen. “You’re going to turn yourself over and admit to all your crimes.”
“Is that right?” My laughter was unconfined. “And for a minute, I was actually impressed, princess.”
“I’ve realized something over the past few months.” She went silent for a beat. “Without my convictions, I’m no one. I have to hold on to them, even if it means nothing to someone else. You have to pay for all the innocent people you killed and kidnapped.”
“But Shiloh—excuse the fuck out of me—Braedan gets a pass for the people he murdered?”
“They weren’t innocents.”
“I think I understand your skewed way of thinking.” I nodded, catching her eye in the rearview mirror. “You, ideally, should want me dead and not in prison. You still have a soft spot for me. I know you do.”
Her shoulders shuddered, and I wouldn’t fool myself into believing it was disgust at the idea
. “You won’t pay for all the things you’ve done by dying. You have to pay for what you did to Brandy, Sonja, and so many other people.”
I was suddenly feeling so smug I missed the red traffic light. “We are what we believe, princess, and I agree.”
She loosened the pressure of the gun against my side, in her way, giving me the signal to fuck her head up.
“Say I turn myself over to the police? What do you think will happen to the people who live and die by my presence?”
“W-what do you mean?” She moved her hand until I couldn’t register the cold barrel of the gun.
Approaching the turn off for a dead end with no person in sight, I slammed on the gas and swerved across the road into the alley. The car jounced, throwing Keaton and her bodyguard around in the back seat. I turned the wheel hard, forcing the man who didn’t belong in my car to slam his head against the side back passenger window.
From the mirror, I watched his eyes whirl around in disorientation. Blood seeped from the newly opened wound.
I slammed on the breaks and got out of the car. I jerked the back door open and pulled him out, wrapping my forearm against his throat and slid the gun from his holster. I took a brief look around, satisfied no one would be witness, and jerked his shoulder and head in opposing directions until a crack resounded and his body turned limp, falling out of my loosened grip.
Keaton straggled out of the car, holding the gun up toward me while sheepishly looking around for any prying eyes.
I reached into my back pocket, making her tighten her hold on the gun and point it toward a strategic place: my heart.
I gave her my signature dimpled grin and stepped forward. “Relax, princess. I’m not going to hurt you…yet. I only want to show you something.”
“I don’t want to see anything. I want you to get back in the car and…” Her eyes drifted to the man on the floor, and she struggled not to weep over his insignificant life.
Seducing Virtue (Wicked Trinity Book 3) Page 21
