Vengeance Unleashed (The Wanted Men Series Book 1)

by Nancy Haviland

  Not that he’d really cared at that point.

  He’d gone about two blocks when his question was answered. The explosion had rocked the ground, feeling like an earthquake, the sound so loud Gabriel could have sworn he heard it even now. The trip back to his house had been spent wondering if anyone had been inside the building. Or had his father just wanted to put an end to his enemy’s livelihood?

  Back at home, he’d found his father in the living room, the boss pale and shaken. Gabriel’s concern had been waved aside, pushed onto his mother, who was crying. Something had gone down, and to this day, Gabriel didn’t know what.

  Shortly after, at Stefano’s request, Gabriel had gone to a warehouse they owned in the heart of Queens. When his brother had moved into a swath of moonlight that shone through one of the high windows, he’d been blood splattered, his face ravaged with emotion. He’d brought to light the damage done by Gabriel’s drop off, revealing that the factory had belonged to Stefano’s girlfriend’s family, and that Adrianna had been in the building when it was destroyed.

  I won’t get my vengeance by killing you now, Gabe. Nah. I’m gonna do one better. Hatred had shone from Stefano’s eyes as he’d made his vow. I’ll wait as long as it takes. Don’t care if it’s years. But the day I hear you’ve found the woman you want to spend the rest of your life with…I’m gonna be there to take her away from you. The same way you took Adrianna from me.

  Gabriel blinked back to the present and the cell in his hand. Feeling cold as ice, he scrolled through his contacts until he reached one that Vincente had given him a while back. One neither of them had ever expected him to use. But for Eva, Gabriel was clearly willing to do just about anything.

  He engaged the call.

  “Yeah.”

  Something warm tried to roll through him when he heard his brother’s familiar voice, but it was crushed as rage slithered to life under his skin. The feeling was so dark and sinister it would have left the man on the other end of the line beaming with approval had he sensed it.

  “Stef.”

  A chorus of under-the-breath curses came from around the suite as what he was doing became clear.

  “Well,” his brother drawled after a pause. “My efforts haven’t been wasted after all. Looks like my wait is finally over.”

  “Call off the dogs. End this now.” Would he benefit from appealing to a softer side of his brother that he wasn’t sure the guy even possessed? “Weren’t three lives to Adrianna’s one enough?”

  “You mean the three women you were banging last year?” Stefano snorted derisively. “You tell me. Talk about taking things too far. There was no reason those girls had to die. Other than you needing to get laid. And people accuse me of being harsh.”

  In other words, Gabriel’s need for companionship and sex had sealed the girls’ fate. By attempting to have a relationship, he’d given Stefano the green light to come in and take his revenge by killing three innocent women.

  Grinding his teeth, he tried again, keeping his tone even when he said, “Eva Jacobs has nothing to do with—”

  A boom sounded in the background, like Stefano had slammed his palm on a hard surface. “She has everything to do with this! Or she will. And thank you, by the way, for saving me some footwork with this call. I was on my way over to the clubhouse to pick the biker’s brain about your woman.” Papers shuffled in the background as if he were looking for something. “Ah, yes. Before you go off on Paynne’s loyalty being with you, we found some damn attractive insurance that would have guaranteed his cooperation.”

  The wheels in Gabriel’s mind turned until Stefano’s threat clicked into place.

  Nika.

  His brother was willing to use Nika as collateral to make sure Paynne answered his questions about Eva? “You seriously gonna start a war with the ODMC?” Gabriel snapped incredulously. “The fuck’s wrong with you? You’re making a lot of enemies, man.”

  “So you say. I assume you or one of your boys managed to tag Furio. That why he hasn’t gotten in touch?”

  Gabriel left him wondering. “How much damage has to be done before you’re satisfied?”

  “I’ll be satisfied once I take care of Eva. And if you really want to know, I’m looking forward to ending this, Gabe. You don’t deserve the time and effort I’ve put into this game.” An underlying exhaustion came through the line, giving truth to his brother’s words. “Eva Jacobs is obviously the one I’ve been waiting for. And, really, Gabriel, you had fair warning about what I’d do when the time came. You knew I’d come after her. It makes quite the difference when your feelings are engaged, no? Well, just you wait.”

  Staring out over the twinkling lights of Seattle, Gabriel ached to reach through the phone and slap some sense into his brother. “You will back the fuck off, brother,” he growled. “If you don’t, the destruction of the family, and your life as you know it, will be absolute.”

  There was a slight pause, and then Stefano drawled in a bored voice, “Been there, done that, lived through it, so you can be sure that threat doesn’t impress me.” His voice went low. “Let me just say, I’ve gotten to her twice already, but next time, it won’t be one of my boys who has his hands on her—it’ll be me. And because I know you, I know it will drive you insane when I tell you I’m going to enjoy the hell out of her before I end her life.”

  Fury nearly blinded him, flaming a path from his sternum to his throbbing head. “You touch her, you even breathe on her,” he warned, his voice warping to something demonic even to his own ears, “I’ll make you wish for death with every remaining beat of your blackened heart. She’s mine, brother. Understand that, or you will die.” He hung up and slid his phone into his pocket with a shockingly steady hand.

  “Well, that was a long time coming,” Alek commented from his stance next to the fireplace.

  Jak, who had walked in during the call, grunted his agreement from where he was leaning against the doorjamb.

  Quan was staring out the window, his ass planted on a corner of the desk two feet away from where Gabriel was standing. “And so it begins,” he murmured.

  “If for any reason I’m not around,” Gabriel said quietly, looking Quan right in the eye, “You and Jak are with her. Fuck my back. She’s what you’re to protect now, at all costs. Spread the word.”

  THIRTEEN

  A hush fell over the room as Eva came in carrying her purse. Gabriel searched her face for a sign she might have overheard something…his lungs deflated when all he saw was the same anxiety etched into her features that had been there when she’d gone inside earlier.

  She curled up in the corner of the sofa and took her cell out before placing her purse on the floor. Gabriel could tell she’d brushed her hair because the satiny mass now flowed over her shoulders and down her back like a shiny oil slick.

  “Blink or something, you guys. I feel like I’m in a zoo,” she muttered with a self-conscious look around.

  “Definitely be the main attraction, even with the shiner,” Jak quipped as he went over to the bar and filled a towel with ice. “Relax, dude.” He raised a hand in Gabriel’s direction without looking at him as he brought the pack to Eva, then dropped into one of the chairs. “You know everyone was thinking it.”

  “The asshole is Jak,” Gabriel said. “You haven’t met him yet. But don’t get too attached, his days are numbered.” He placed his glass on the bar, instead of beaming it across the room and into his friend’s skull. “Are you okay?”

  She met his gaze, and he was glad to see a twinkle of humor in her eye. She shrugged as she tucked her wounded feet under her and placed the ice on her cheek before turning to Jak. “I remember you from the other night. How’s your head?”

  “S’all good. Definitely had worse.” He smirked, running his finger across the scar on his face.

  “Bar fight?” Eva inquired.

  “Afghanistan.”

  Her perfect brows popped, and then she smiled. “Thank you. I don’t often get to personally
thank those who risk their lives for us.”

  Jak nodded through a scowl, clearly uncomfortable. Gabriel wanted to high-five Karma for finally showing up.

  It’s Caleb, honey. Read up.

  Wincing and shooting him a quick glance, Eva grabbed her phone. She sent a reply after reading the message, then put the phone back on the table.

  “Caleb,” she said unnecessarily, as if Gabriel wouldn’t hear that fuckin’ ringtone in his nightmares.

  He nodded and tried to look as though he wasn’t contemplating a good ass kicking for the biker.

  Keeping his hands buried in his pockets, he walked over to stand by the fireplace, avoiding the boys’ eyes. He’d have told them all to get the fuck out, but he wanted them to hear what had happened tonight in case he blacked out from rage overload halfway through the story.

  “What did he want?” Fuuuck. He hadn’t meant to ask that.

  But he needed to know.

  “Oh. Um, nothing. He just asked how I was.” Her gaze was sharp as she looked at him. “I wanted to call him earlier but didn’t have my phone.”

  She was gauging his reaction to that. He could see it. So he tried to play it off like he didn’t give a fuck that she’d wanted to call another man when she’d been in need.

  When her scrutiny persisted, he cursed. Never thought he’d wish his woman was a dummy, but he was wishing it now because this observant little thing didn’t miss shit.

  “Why call him?” he ground out, voicing his thoughts again when he didn’t want to. “What could he have done for you from New York?” His tone came out robotic, no inflection whatsoever. But he knew she wasn’t buying it. She could see he was jealous of her relationship with the biker, and the fact that he was now trying to pretend he wasn’t was a definite flag on the field. Fuck. He should have just gone with his gut and slapped the phone out of her hand.

  She was silent for a minute, and then uncertainty seeped into her expression. It soon morphed into doubt, and then suspicion. Weariness and fear weren’t far behind, but she tried to front as she hugged her knees to her chest and shrugged, striving for a nonchalance that missed its mark by a mile.

  “Caleb knows people who would have helped me if that guy had come back,” she said, distracted, like she was saying one thing but thinking about something else.

  I know people! he wanted to roar as envy sheared through muscle and bone. I am those people! Her first thought should have been that he would help her, not Caleb Fucking Paynne.

  His limbs felt mannequin stiff as he crossed to her once more, preparing himself as best he could to tell her everything. A murdered mother, an unknown father, a mobster lover with a bloodthirsty brother…

  He only hoped that she wouldn’t want to run from him once she learned the truth.

  Because he would not allow her that freedom.

  † † †

  “Can I get you a drink, Eva? Are you hungry?”

  Drop food into her churning, aching stomach? Not happening. “No thank you, Quan.” Eva didn’t look at Quan as she refused his kind offer. She was too busy watching Gabriel advance, his movements measured and precise. Not at all his style.

  Something about his reaction whenever Caleb’s name was mentioned didn’t make sense. For all he knew, Nika’s brother could be a hunchbacked nerd with a hairy wart on his nose, yet his apparent jealously said he knew that wasn’t the case.

  Also, Caleb didn’t text her for no reason. And certainly never to randomly ask if she was okay. Like he’d just done. As if he knew there was a possibility something might be wrong. How could that be when she hadn’t been able to get in touch with him or Nika?

  “Nika’s brother has an interesting circle of friends. He’s a member of the Obsidian Angels,” she said, watching closely.

  “It’s the Obsidian Devils,” Gabriel corrected.

  She gasped and his gaze clashed with hers, narrowing, his jaw rippling as if he were grinding his teeth.

  “Slow your roll, sweetheart,” he muttered with dry amusement. “It’s an MC known throughout the world. As if I wouldn’t know the proper name of it. Now stop distracting from the issue here and tell us what happened earlier.”

  What he said was true, but she wasn’t buying what he was selling. Her suspicions that he and Caleb knew each other were only growing, but since they had an audience, she’d drop it for now.

  Gabriel came to stand next to the sofa, his big body strung tight, his hands flexing in a way she found oddly entrancing. Way too distracted by him, and suddenly too wired to sit still, she got up and walked the room as she talked.

  “I was in my bedroom when I heard the window break,” she began. “I went down the hall and found the guy already halfway up the stairs.” Wandering over to the credenza in the corner, she ran her finger over the hotel’s logo on a room service menu that had been carelessly tossed onto a small mountain of mail.

  As she cleaned up, making even stacks of all the letters—keeping them upside down so she didn’t appear nosy—she described the man with the Mohawk as best she could. “I tried to make it to the bathroom, because the door has a lock, but he grabbed my ankle and pulled me down. That’s how I hit my cheek…when I fell…” Her hand came up to touch the bruise on her face, her heart thumping when she remembered the man’s warning. She left her neat work and walked back to Gabriel, watching him as intently as he normally watched her.

  “He told me to stay away from you. He said you’re not who I think you are. What did he mean by that?”

  Gabriel. Turned. To. Stone. “What else,” he demanded, his tone so harsh that she took a step back.

  “He said it was the only warning I was going to get. And he called you Gabe,” she supplied as she wrapped her arms around her middle, her body so cold all of a sudden.

  If she’d thought Gabriel intimidating before, it was nothing compared to what she was seeing now. He was all coiled strength and danger personified. Six-and-a-half feet of fierce and deadly. She flinched when his hand appeared in her periphery.

  He dropped his arm before his fingers came into contact with her cheek. “I will never raise a violent hand to you, Eva.”

  His quiet vow stole her breath. Could she believe him? She didn’t know. She didn’t know anything anymore. Except that he wasn’t being completely honest with her. “I’m sorry. I’m just…freaked out.”

  “Is there anything else, Eva?” Alek’s steady tone was a blessing, and she turned to find him just behind her, his hand swiping through his dark-blond hair. “Any other unusual things happen in the last few days?”

  The memory of being followed came to mind. “Now that you mention it, last night when I got out of my car near the club, it seemed like someone was following me.”

  “What did you notice exactly?” Gabriel asked.

  She quickly told them about the incident with the sedan. When she was done, her teeth worried her bottom lip. Should she tell them about Stefano Moretti’s visit to Caleb’s apartment the other day?

  Unsure, she looked at the four men scattered throughout the room. Then looked closer. Gabriel was angry. But he didn’t seem surprised by any of this. None of them did, she realized as she looked at Jak and Quan and then at Alek, who was now leaning his shoulder into the wall behind her.

  The average person would at least have given her a holy shit. “Gabriel?”

  With a sigh that was nothing short of resigned, he took her arm and led her to the sofa just as her phone rang. Not Caleb’s text greeting this time but The Office theme she had set as her ringtone. Thinking Nika was finally returning her call, she withdrew her arm from Gabriel’s grasp and snagged her phone from the table, just as Gabriel’s cell started to ring. They both answered at the same time.

  “Yeah.” He barked his usual greeting.

  “Hello?” she said, rubbing her temple. God, she felt like she was being pulled in ten different directions all at the same time.

  “What?” Gabriel snapped. “How?”

  Nothing but
harsh breathing sounded in her own ear as a fiercely whispered conversation began behind her between Gabriel and his friends. “Hello?” she repeated. “Nika? Is that you?”

  “Shoulda listened to me, kitty. Couldn’t stay away though, could ya?” said the man who’d broken into her house. “Now I get to play. When I find you, I’m gonna make you screa—”

  The phone fell through her fingers as panic flooded her system. In a far-off corner of her mind, Gabriel’s voice registered as he asked which hospital someone’s brother was being transported to, but she couldn’t organize her thoughts enough to care. A shadow suddenly crossed over her—Gabriel’s—and bent to pick her phone up from where it had landed on the floor.

  “Who was it?” he demanded.

  “It w-w-was h-him,” she mouthed as she tried to breathe around the black spots dancing in her vision. His big hands reached for her. But she was done. Limit reached.

  She was going to the police.

  Ducking under his arm, she ran for the door, too terrified to think of anything other than getting the hell away from this man and his scary-ass friends. Or enemies. She didn’t know which. But she did know he was deeply involved in all of this insanity.

  Her hand was an inch from freedom when a strong arm snaked around her waist and pulled her back into a solid wall of muscle. Gabriel’s fingers dug into her flesh as her feet were plucked right off the floor.

  “I can’t let you do that, sweetheart,” he said into her ear, his voice dark and hushed.

  She went crazy, thrashing wildly, kicking, slapping, and clawing at his arm, trying anything to get free. “Let go of me!” she screamed, her terror rising when he turned with her and began shepherding her toward the bedroom. “No! Nooo!”

  “G!” Alek called.

  “Get out,” Gabriel ordered as he silenced her by covering her mouth with his hand—a hand she immediately tried to bite. He pressed down harder, and whimpering, her vision blurring with hot tears, she continued to struggle to no avail. She was powerless against his strength and the infallible hold he had on her.