Accepting no help was forthcoming without dire consequences, I gave my best friend Jayne and my lover Bruiser, who was determined and accomplishing becoming so much more than that to me, one last look. My stalker tugged on my shoulder with one hand, motioning for me to back up. I made the selfless decision to do as he wanted to keep my people safe. He quickly guided me away from the celebration.
With each step we took toward a black, tinted Bentley, I started to feel more and more like I was being led to my death, and there was nothing to be done about it. All I could control was going out with my dignity intact. Just as soon as I succumbed to that idea, I could hear my mother’s voice in my ear saying, “You always gotta fight, baby. Fight for whatever it is you want in this world.”
Well, I wanted to live. I wanted to sing, travel the world, and one day have babies. More than anything, I wanted to be free to live and die on my own terms, not this obsessed freak’s terms. However, it wasn’t time to fight yet.
After he escorted me to where I measured was far enough from the crowd, I felt I could make a move to save my own life without endangering anyone else. Spinning around to face him, I pushed him with everything in me and yelled, "I'm not going with you!"
He stumbled back. Not sticking around to see if he regained his balance, I whirled on my heels to run back to the party. The gun went off behind me. The noise from the celebration drowned out the shot he must've discharged in the air as a warning because I wasn't hit.
“Stop!" he bellowed before tackling me, knocking us both to the ground.
“You’ve done it now, my evermore,” he said as he jumped up and snatched me to my feet. “Now, you’re going to get what I should have done to you a long time ago, my Raven.”
“Who the hell is Raven?”
As he pulled me, I went limp so that I would be dead weight and harder to move, but he dragged me on the ground, my beautiful mermaid bridesmaid dress turning into crumpled up dirty rags with each tug. Nervous sounds of people chattering along with shocked gasps could be heard as he yanked me up again, wrestling me into the backseat of his car and slamming the door shut.
As he ran around the trunk to the driver's side, I tried opening the door. It didn't budge. Scrambling across the backseat, I tested the other door, which didn't move either. The fucking child locks were engaged. Realizing there was no getting out of here, I panicked while trying to think of another way out of the truck. It hadn't presented itself by the time my kidnapper climbed into the driver's seat.
He couldn't be allowed to drive away. That would bring the end of me for sure. Somehow, I had to let Bruiser know that I was in trouble. Twisting in the seat to look out the back glass brought a glorious sight. Bruiser, Jeb, Channing, and a few other men were sprinting toward the car, but they would never make it across the grassy field before we pulled away.
Buying them time to get to me, I dove over the bridge between the front and back seats, wrapping my arms around his neck to cut off his air. Hell, I'd be happy if we wrecked. He would have to stop then.
His body rotated in my grip enough for him to reach out, shoving me away with one hand. As I crashed against the backseat, a partition rose up out of the bridge in the center of the car, blocking the front from the back. I lunged for the rising, thick glass with both hands, desperate to keep it from raising all the way up and cutting my only escape. My strength wasn't enough. The most I could do was retract my fingers before they were smashed between the partition and roof.
"Fuck!" I screamed, slamming a palm into the glass out of pure frustration.
I was in a cage. This would not do. Come on, Alise, think. What can I do to get out of here? Examining the exterior on my side of the glass, there was nothing but cold tan leather seats. What kind of car is this? Besides the kind designed for the sole purpose of taking people against their will, that was.
Gunshots fired behind us as my captor peeled away from the reception area. I looked back at the stunned crowd as my heart raced a million beats at once. Bruiser was crouched down, firing off shots. Attempting to flatten the tires, he was trying to protect like he had done since I met him at Club Elite a few years ago.
I had a feeling that he wouldn't succeed this time. No, I wouldn't make it out this time around, and everything that mattered the most became crystal clear. I loved Bruiser wholeheartedly, would never get to tell him so, but my kidnapper couldn't stop me from sending Bruiser my love.
"I love you, Bruiser!" I shouted out the back windshield.
"Don't fucking say that, Raven!" Van howled through the partition, pounding the steering wheel with a fist like the lunatic he was.
Ignoring him, I quietly said my goodbyes to each and every person that watched on in agony. All of us were fading in the distance to the other. This was it.
✦
Bruiser
I did something I rarely do. I got lost in the moment. I let my guard down and decided to have a little fun for Jeb’s wedding dance, and some asshole walked right up on Alise and took her from me like I wasn’t that guy that would rip his heart out of his chest and taste the blood from it.
I ran after the car full speed, aiming at the tires and unloading bullets as the vehicle skidded away in haste. The driver was skilled as if he’d expected someone to shoot at his tires, so he zigzagged down the street. Before he was entirely out of sight, I made it to my car, jumped in, and sped off behind the Black Bentley.
“Alise, baby. I’m coming for you. Dammit!” I yelled as I laid into the gas. I couldn’t believe I got caught slipping like this. I had Limel out there with me, but Dimir was away in Montgomery handling the security for a major statewide festival. As I flew down the street, the police came our way and passed right by the car that held Alise captive. “Goofy motherfuckers.” I sighed as I watched Barney Fife and his lackey head to the wedding location as if they were doing a regular well-check, and not in pursuit of a kidnapper.
Now, it was just me and the scumbag, who I would soon annihilate. We were traveling over one hundred and fifty miles an hour away from the Oak Bowery house, and not one cop thought to come after us. I caught up and was within a quarter-mile behind them. There was nothing but open road ahead of us, so I put the hundred eighty on my Charger’s dashboard to the test. The Bentley Continental that held Alise sped up. That car had more speed on the dash than mine, but the turbo kit on my Charger allowed me to be right on his ass. He was going to have problems when I caught him. Big ones. A whole lot of big problems.
“Yeah, motherfucker. I got you now,” I said as I ran bumper to bumper with him.
That’s when the Bentley’s trunk flew open, and hundreds of black pieces of metal poured out into the road.
What the…
“Fuck!” I yelled when my tire hit the first piece of metal, popped, and flattened. There was one loud pop after the next. Then, my car spun out of control until I landed in a grassy pasture nearby. My head hit the steering wheel, and everything went black.
I didn’t know how long I’d been sitting there when I heard a man ask, “You okay, buddy?” I looked up and saw an old man wearing overalls and a plaid shirt approaching.
The police were approaching, as well, with some of the people from the wedding party who had pulled over to check on me. So now you want to pull up, I thought as I looked at the goofy officers who had their hands on their gun belts as if I was the criminal they were searching for.
“I’m fine,” I said to answer the old man as I gathered my wits about me. I had crashed, but I had to get to Alise.
“You must have passed out when you spun off the road at the end of my driveway there,” said the older gentleman as he pointed to the skid marks that were left on the road, making a trail to his property.
Pushing through the pain in my body, pure adrenaline rushed through me as I jumped out of the car and looked down the road and saw no sign of the Bentley or Alise. I banged my hand against my hood, making a dent in my car.
“I let them get away!” I yelled, go
ing into a rage and saying all kinds of expletives as I looked at my incapacitated vehicle. I needed a car fast.
Goofy officer number one approached me. “Sir, I need you to calm down. We need to ask you a few questions. What’s your name?”
“Bruiser.”
“Bruiser, is that your real name?”
“It’s Rowland Cunningham.”
“Do you have your license on you?” he asked.
I pulled it out and handed it to him. “I have to go. I’ll come back and get my car later,” I said as I saw Jeb pull up.
Officer number two asked, “Are you alright to leave, sir? Do we need to get you checked out by medical?”
I couldn’t, for the life of me, understand why they were acting so calm when Alise had just been kidnapped.
“I’m fine, officer. We need everyone you have on that black Bentley. Alise Taylor was just kidnapped by the man driving a Black Bentley, license plate number 2017LVR. His name is Van Deveraux, and they can’t be far,” I said in a calmer, more police accommodating tone.
“How do you know his name, Rowland?” the second officer asked.
“That’s his name. Now, get on your job, and don’t let him get away with her.” I yelled. I couldn’t deal with the incompetence being displayed right in front of me.
Goofy officer number one said, “Sir, we have every officer in town and nearby cities on the lookout for that car. It’s not common for a late model Bentley to be riding through here, so we’re going to locate them.” He sounded confident, but I wasn’t so sure.
At least the second officer was radioing the license plate number that I’d given them.
“If every officer is trying to locate them, why aren’t you two out there looking for her?” I asked, getting agitated.
“Bruise, man. You alright?” Jeb stepped up and put his arm around my shoulder, knowing I was getting agitated with the cops and that this could go left at any moment. Soon, I would turn my ire on the officers who were dead set on wasting my time. Some of the chumps in blue acted tough and mighty but couldn’t count two and two and make four to save their lives.
Thankfully, Jeb’s father walked over and took over talking to the officers who were some of his old friends. I sent a text to Limel and told him to call Dimir and tell him to get back to the office. We had work to do.
I turned to Jeb and said, “Let’s go, man. We have to find her.”
I had let her down. My blood boiled at the thought of another man touching her, much less taking her away from me. I told her I would protect her. I had taken her into my arms the night before the wedding and promised her that much. Van would pay for making me eat those words, and it didn’t matter if I got that payment in blood, sweat, tears, or all three.
Chapter Eleven
Van
Evermore
As I drove to the cabin Raven and I shared in Alabaster, I thought about her and all the wonderful times we had together there. The love we shared. The times we would travel out there with plans to make love all weekend long. And that we did. Sinking inside of her tautness was magical. Every time we were together, it was blissful. Sometimes, we would spend weeks out here, just frolicking around and being together as if we were the only two people in the world.
To this day, I couldn’t understand why she had to go and change what it was that we were. She tried to change the very fabric that had woven us. That change broke us. Attempting to be something else, as if she didn’t realize our makeup as a couple was already set in stone, ruined our sacred union. She, a stay at home wife. Me, a man who had inherited a small fortune but worked hard so that my family for generations would have everything they could ever dream of having. My father did that before he died. My grandfather did it too. Why did Raven feel the need to change it for our family? Why did she want to go outside of our home to find happiness?
Looking over my shoulder, I observed the frantic woman riding in my backseat. She was a passionate, independent woman who followed her own path and became a singer. Even with the thousands of downloads that I had bought of her music, her album would have made it to number one without me. The Billboard sales data proved that to me. My fiery gray eyes staring back at me in my rearview mirror expressed the pain I had of not being responsible for putting Alise on top. Like my Raven once desired to be, Alise was in charge of her life. I supported Alise’s career, doing for her what I didn’t do for my Raven. That should count for something, right?
Once upon a time, Raven had dreams too. When she was here, walking the earth, I couldn’t understand why she would want to dream when our reality gave us everything a person could want and need in life. She always talked about opening up a storefront that would have all of her specially baked items in there. I would listen as she spoke and watch the adoration in her eyes as she talked about the bakery, never thinking it would become a reality. Being my wife should have been enough.
Why Raven? Why wasn’t I enough?
My tires ate up the road as I drove down highway 280, playing Alise’s version of forevermore. Maybe it was meant for Raven to leave me so that I could find someone to unbreak my heart by singing soulful songs to mend it. Someone who could bring my soul back alive one dimpled smile at a time. Alise banging on the window, asking me to let her go was the antithesis to my heart’s revival. She didn’t want to be in the back of my car, yet there was no way that I could let her go.
Soon, Alise. Soon, you too will fall in love with me.
I hoped she would.
I hadn't seen or heard from Raven's ghost in two weeks, not since I had gone to Alise’s house, stood in her backyard and listened to her make love to her bodyguard. The man was a nuisance, and I was convinced Alise was only entertaining him because I hadn’t been bold enough to take her heart. Well, now, I had made my bold move and physically took her body. Her heart was next. There was something ominous about taking a woman at gunpoint and smiling as I drove away. However, somewhere deep inside of me, a foolish man was looking for his forever. Nothing more, nothing less.
The way I cried for Alise that night outside of her house must have driven a wedge between Raven and me. Not even her ghost would visit me now, and I missed her. Raven. My lover of all times. She would never have looked at another man the way Alise did. Raven’s smile was reserved for me. It was a smile that had a way of beguiling my sad soul into smiling at any moment.
“Nevermore,” Raven’s voice sounded off in the car.
I glanced around the car to look for her, but I was alone save for Alise, who was doing her best to break free from the backseat. I pressed a button on my dash and a light gas emitted in the air in the back of the car. As the sleeping gas sprayed into the air, it only affected her. I had the car modified for the sole purpose of taking her when I realized I had no other option than to force Alise’s hand to bring her here.
Looking through the rearview mirror, I watched the gas take effect on her. She tried to fight it by yelling and coughing, but there was no use. She rubbed her eyes until she couldn’t hold them open any longer.
“Sleep, my beautiful Alise. My Raven reincarnated. Rest, my dear.”
I reclined my head in the seat and tried my best to be at ease with all that I had done. I laid my foot into the gas and drove faster. Soon, we would be at the place where Raven and I used to drive each other up the wall with passionate lovemaking. I would show Alise what it really felt like to be made love to. I turned on her newest single, Heart Broken, and let the melody take me away. The lyrics told me exactly what she needed:
“Men always want it all. Even as they make the tears fall. They don’t treat us like the queens we are. We travel the world for them, near and far. But they don’t appreciate the diamond in the rough. They never do, and it’s so hard, so tough. He wants the diamond in the rough every time. But won’t do what it takes to make her shine. Never going the extra mile that it takes to be mine…”
Listening to the song, I knew exactly what she needed—not wild, roaring, and growling
relations like Bruiser had given her, but to have a man cherish and mesmerize her with precious diamonds. Soon, her past heartbreaks would be a thing of the past. Instead, she was going to be making the sounds of my love and craving my touch. And, I would use my fortune to give her anything her heart desired.
Two and a half hours after leaving Lafayette, I arrived at the road to the cabin. I turned down the gravelly driveway and rode for two miles before I reached it. It was a highly secluded property, perfect for Alise and me to connect without any interruptions from the outside world. I picked her up from the backseat, tossed her over my shoulder, and walked toward the front door.
Inside, my faint foot-falls against the hardwood floors were the only sounds that could be heard. “You hear that, my love. Complete silence, just the way we like it,” I said to her as I placed her in the center of the bed.
I hated to wield my gun at her earlier. It hurt me even more to have to throw her into the car, but I had to do it so that I could get her to come with me. Spending time here always did Raven good. After some time away from the world, Alise would see things my way too. The cabin was decorated with memories, pictures, keepsakes, and decorations that Raven and I had collected. Now that I had Alise, she could add her touch to it, as well.
“Van!” Alise said, sitting up in the bed and backing away from me until her back was pressed against the backboard. “This is wrong. Take me back to…just take me home.”
“You’re awake, my love?” I asked, ignoring the nonsense about us leaving here. We weren’t going anywhere any time soon.
“Please. Just let me go. I won’t cause you any problems if you just let me go. You don’t even have to take me. I’ll find my way back.”
I slowly crawled up the bed, following her as she moved away from me. “We need this, Alise. This is the only way I could get you to listen to me.”
A Dangerous Way to Love (Dangerous Bonds Book 3) Page 10
