Absolution (The Titans of Founder's Ridge)

by Nichole Greene

  The idiot scoffs.

  Dad removes his jacket and hands it off to Lake. “Who do you work for?” he asks again, while rolling up his shirtsleeves. When he still gets no answer, he pulls out a gun and shoots the guy in the foot.

  I shoot a glance over to make sure Lev is okay. His family isn’t involved in crime like this. Dad grew up watching his father run a large-scale crime syndicate in St. Petersburg. He’s not messing around.

  For the next twenty minutes, I watch Dad systematically wear this guy down until he’s told us the family he works for and what the exact plan was. They were going to meet up with a cargo ship in Rhode Island and travel to the Baltic Sea that way. These guys work for a Latvian family that traffics women and children exclusively. They are the lowest of criminals.

  Dad walks away from him and starts straightening himself up. The guy looks at me and decides to push all the wrong buttons.

  “We were going to break all your women in. Take your fiancé and sister two at a time, break their spirits before selling them at auction like livestock.”

  Levi’s fist connects with his face, and a tooth flies out. His foot connects with the guy’s nose, the crunch of bone audible.

  “It would have been fun to break such a whore. It’s all I could think of when I grabbed your fiancé’s tits. They were a nice-” His words are cut off when I pull my gun and shoot him dead center in the forehead. None of us needed to hear anymore of that trash.

  “Can you clean this up?” Dad asks Lake. “Or do we need to call in our cleaners?”

  “I’ve got it.” Lake answers as he sends a text off.

  I turn as I exit the building. Lev’s calling my name for the first time in days grabs immediate my attention. My head snaps to the side as his fist connects with my jaw.

  Now is as good a time as any for this.

  I let him punch with another right hook, feeling the pain bloom around my eye. I’m so sick that I revel in the pain. He punches me a third time in the stomach, and I double over. When I catch my breath and look up at him, I can see his chest still heaving and fists still clenched.

  “The first three were free, the next will cost you,” I say as I wipe blood from the corner of my eye.

  He comes at me with a jab from the left, which I block before landing one of my own punches to his face. We go punch for punch, kick for kick, until we’re rolling around on the grass grappling with each other. I don’t know how long we fight with my dad and Lake looking on, making sure we don’t cross any irredeemable boundaries with each other as we exercise our anger out.

  Lev has me by size and weight, so when he pins me under him on the ground, I know I’m done. I might be a better fighter, but I also know when to quit. I put my hands up in surrender, and he stops just before another punch was about to land on my face.

  I watch the fight leave his body as he deflates and flops onto his back beside me. We’re both covered in blood and going to look like hell tomorrow. He starts laughing.

  “Ives and Hoodrat are going to be so pissed when they see us,” he keeps laughing.

  “Especially when they realize we did this to each other,” I join in laughing. “I think you cracked a few of my ribs.”

  “Good. You deserve it,” he says sobering. “It’s not even that I blame you for what happened to the girls. You love them as much as I do. It’s that you never fucking share what’s going on in your life. I didn’t know how serious the threats had gotten.” He sits up and hauls me up beside him. “We’re fucking family, so stop keeping us in the dark.” His gaze is dark and intense as he stares me down.

  “Understood.” I hold my hand out for his, and he pulls me into a hug.

  3

  LILITH

  On the list of things I most despise, being smothered by the overprotective cavemen in my life is at the top. Which is why I’m currently glaring daggers at Griff while he ignores me and continues working in the kitchen. He hasn’t made eye contact, but I know he can feel me staring him down because he’s fighting a grin.

  I stand up and walk over to him. “You know, you used to be my favorite,” I say as I fight a wince from the pain of my stitches.

  “I’m still your favorite,” he says without looking up from his computer screen.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Looking through some acquisitions research. I’m trying to convince the family to buy some more newspapers in smaller markets across the country.”

  “Isn’t print dead?” I ask knowing full well this is a hill he’ll fight and die on.

  “Nice try at baiting, but you’ll have to do much better if you want to fight,” he looks at me over his laptop. “Con and Lev are on their way back. They texted a while ago.”

  Good. I want to know what they learned, so we can plan our next steps. The guys have been freezing me out of everything since I was injured, but that’s not how we operate. I’m an equal to them in all this. Ivy and Claire are too, in fact. None of us are the type to tolerate misogynistic, bullshit, overprotective behavior. Ivy saved herself and Claire, no white knights needed.

  “What are you thinking about?” Griff asks. “You have that look.”

  “What look?”

  “The look you get when you’re proud of something you’re about to do that’s reckless as fuck. Your trouble look.”

  He’s not wrong.

  “I was just thinking about how badass Ivy is. Breaking out of her restraints and swimming to shore, pulling Claire along all while she had a concussion.” I smile sweetly at him. “You guys are lucky to have such strong women in your lives.”

  “Agreed.”

  “So, did Con and Lev say anything about how it went? Did they get any answers?”

  “They didn’t say.” He pulls his glasses off and closes his laptop. “I think we should give them space when they get back. I have a feeling it was an intense day for them.”

  I narrow my eyes. He definitely knows more than he’s letting on.

  “I’m just saying that as a suggestion,” he holds his hands up and looks past me as Ivy joins us.

  “What’s a suggestion?” Ivy asks.

  “That we give Levi and Con space when they get back,” I answer.

  She looks at me with a raised eyebrow before turning back to Griff. “What do you know that we don’t?”

  The corner of his mouth tilts up. “Claire looks like she could use a blanket.”

  “Coward,” I say as he walks past me.

  “Shamelessly.” He kisses my forehead. “I learned my lessons about girl gangs before I could walk.”

  “I don’t like when they keep secrets from us,” Ivy says once he’s gone.

  “Me too. Those three are always completely honest with me, so whatever it is, it must have been intense.”

  Just as I finish talking, the door swings open. Griff shoots to his feet, hand reaching behind him for his gun. Levi walks in, and we all relax for a split second. Then we realize his face is bruised and cut open. Connor walks in next, and he’s in even worse shape. There are spatters of blood on his shirt and jeans, the beginning of a black eye, a split lip, and bruised knuckles. They even both have grass and mud stains on their shirts.

  Ivy and I share a sideways glance. Our guys have clearly fought and made up. They’re both beat and bloody, but their body language is back to normal. To my surprise, Connor goes straight to Ivy and pulls her in for a tight hug. He leans down and kisses the top of her head before letting her go and grabbing my hand.

  He pulls me down the hall and into our bedroom, closing the door behind us. I can see the concern in his eyes, but it’s shadowed by a darkness I rarely see. Occasionally he wakes up from nightmares with a haunted look in his eyes, but this is different.

  I pull him to me by his shirt. Our lips meet, and I immediately open for him, tasting his tongue as it sweeps into my mouth. I can feel him holding back, afraid to hurt me.

  We’re not doing that.

  I walk him backwards into our bathroom, str
ipping his clothes off as we go. First his blood-stained shirt, revealing his chiseled chest and abs. Then I unbutton and unzip his pants, pushing them down his hips. I drop to my knees in front of him and hook my fingers in the waistband of his underwear, pulling them down his legs. He steps out of his pants and looks down at me before fisting his hand in my hair.

  “I can’t do this right now. I shouldn’t,” he says as he starts to softly massage my scalp and pull his hand from my head.

  “I’m fine,” I say with my hands on his hips and tilt my head back to look up at him.

  “I’m not,” he chokes out. “You’re not. None of this is fucking fine!” he roars, slamming his fist into the wall just to the left of the mirror.

  “Hey.” I stand and grab his face. “It’ll be okay. Nothing is beyond fixable.”

  “You were stabbed in the back. You lost a kidney.” He leans down and rests his forehead against mine. “They were going to sell you and Claire into sex slavery. They were going to rape and murder Ivy and throw her body over the side of a cargo ship in the Atlantic.” A single, lone tear escapes his eye. “And everything is my fault,” he grits out.

  “It’s not your fault,” he’s being ridiculous, and I’m not going to allow it.

  “It is,” his green eyes harden and go cold, giving me a look I haven’t been on the receiving end of in years. “I want to be alone.”

  “No.”

  “Leave, Lilith!” he yells, his hands balling into fists.

  Tears prick my eyes at the combination of his tone and his use of my given name instead of the nickname he’s always lovingly called me when we’re alone. I blink them back and straighten my spine.

  “I know you are hurting right now, and I’m going to love you through that hurt,” I raise up onto my toes and kiss his cheek. “But I’m also not going to allow you to treat me like shit. I know my worth and so do you.” With that, I turn and walk back into our bedroom, closing the door behind me quietly.

  I consider crawling in bed and going to sleep, but as much pain as I’m in, my mind is too restless. I want to know what happened today. I walk out into the living room, hoping Levi is still out there. He’s not, and neither are Griff and Claire. I walk down the hall and find Griff, Levi, and Ivy in her room.

  “Hey,” I say as I walk in. They are all huddled up, Ivy’s cleaning off Levi’s face. “What are you guys talking about?”

  “Everything that happened today.” Levi winces when Ivy runs an alcohol wipe over a cut on his face. “How’s Con?”

  “He kicked me out. Wouldn’t let me take care of him.” I try to play off the hurt and not let it show, but Griff reaches over and rubs my back in a comforting circle.

  “Give him time. I know he’s gone dark, but after what we heard today…” Levi trails off and looks between Ivy and me. “It was just bad, okay?”

  “He told me what was said.”

  “Then that’s all you need to know,” Levi says. I can tell by how dull his usually sparkly eyes are that there’s something he isn’t telling me. “I’m going to take a shower.”

  Griff follows me out to the living room and sits down beside me on the couch.

  “Have you taken you pain meds?” he asks.

  “Not yet. I wanted to talk to Con before I did since they knock me out,” I say to his back as he stands to get water and my bottle of pills for me.

  “Here,” he holds out the correct pills—because, of course, he memorized the times for each—a glass of water, and some crackers. When I don’t immediately take them, he leans down face to face with me. “Take the pills, drink the water, and eat the fucking crackers right now.”

  “Calm down,” I roll my eyes at his commanding tone. “That domineering shit doesn’t work with me, you know.” I toss the pills in my mouth and swallow.

  “Really?” He smirks at me. “Because you just took your meds.” He sits down on the opposite side of the couch and pulls my feet into his lap when I scowl at him. “Relax, let’s just watch a movie and let Con have some space for a bit.”

  I wake up in a fog to familiar arms sliding under me and pulling me from the couch. As soon as Connor pulls me to his chest, I nuzzle against his neck. I try to wake enough to completely focus on the conversation I hear between him and Griff.

  “You have to tell her,” Griff says in a hushed whisper.

  “I’m not ready to tell anyone,” Con replies. “You’re the only person I’ve told about what my uncle used to do to me.”

  “She deserves to know. You’ve always known you’ll have to tell her eventually. It’s why you fight. It’s why you don’t sleep.”

  “Yeah, I’m aware that it’s the root of everything wrong with me,” Connor snaps while his fingers flex around my ribs and thighs. “Everything is so fucked because I’m holding on too tight to what happened to me as a kid.”

  “Fuck off with the self-loathing and fix it.” Griff snarls in an aggressive whisper.

  I force my eyes to flutter open and manage to mumble some incoherent syllables, enough to get them to stop fighting. They stare each other down for another minute before Griff kisses my temple and stalks down the hall to the guestroom he’s staying in.

  Con carries me into our bedroom and lays me down on the bed. He hooks his fingers in my leggings and peels them off my legs, making sure not to move me around too much. He pulls my arms out of my hoodie one at a time and gently pulls it over my head. He moves to stand up, but I wrap my arm around his waist. Every innocent brush of his fingers over my bare skin has me waking up.

  “I need you,” I say quietly.

  He turns and stares down at me, his beautiful green eyes heavy with guilt and pain. Several pieces of his dark hair flop across his forehead. In the glow of the city lights from the window, he looks like a dark prince. His jaw ticks as his gaze burns into me.

  “We shouldn’t,” he says as he leans down to kiss me. “You’re still healing.”

  “I don’t give a fuck,” I say against his lips. “I need to feel you. I need to know we’re alive and okay.”

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” he rests his forehead against mine, holding the rest of his weight off me.

  “You won’t,” I lift my hips to grind against him, “you couldn’t.” I give him a bite on the neck right below his ear, knowing full well how much it turns him on.

  “Tell me if it hurts,” he says with a growl against my lips.

  My hands are already sliding down his back and into his shorts, pushing them down as his mouth assaults mine. He’s being careful in every way, but his kiss is just as wild and possessive as ever. His tongue sweeps against mine with an urgency I can feel. He bites my lower lip hard enough that I get a brief taste of blood.

  He works his shorts off, getting completely naked. Then he slides my panties over my hips and down my legs. He looks up at me with a mischievous grin before running his fingers up my calf, behind my knee, and up the inside of my thigh. He drags his finger slowly and way too lightly over my slit. He repeats the movement over and over, driving me absolutely insane with need. I whimper when he finally parts my folds and circles his finger around my clit. He uses the perfect pressure and strokes to have me panting on the edge of an orgasm before withdrawing his fingers and lowering his mouth to my aching pussy.

  He alternates slow, lazy licks of my pussy with targeted, precise suction on my clit. I come apart when he adds his fingers, stroking inside me at just the right angle to make my vision darken around the edges. His tongue laps at me through the aftershocks of the orgasm.

  “Are you good?” he asks in between placing light kisses on my neck.

  “Yes,” I shift my hips and feel him at my entrance. “Connor,” I beg when I feel him hesitate, “please.”

  “Since you asked so nice,” he fucking smirks at me right before he slowly glides inside me. Our movements are perfectly in sync as we make love slowly. He treats me with a tenderness that’s rare for us. I wrap my leg around him to try to increase his pace, but he
keeps steady, giving me long, slow thrusts. He keeps going until I eventually orgasm, my clenching sending him into his own. I pull his mouth down to mine for a deep kiss just as tender as our love making.

  “I love you,” I say against his lips.

  “I don’t deserve it,” his head drops, and he rolls over, giving me his back. I can practically feel the turmoil coming off him in waves. My heart squeezes in my chest as I roll over behind him. I hold him from behind, my fingers spread across his chest, trying to infuse him with all I love I can pour into him.

  4

  CONNOR

  “If I’m not getting out of this family dinner, you’re not fucking getting out of it either,” Claire says with her arms crossed in front of her. We’re currently having a glare-off in my kitchen.

  “Lilith still isn’t feeling well enough for this shitshow.”

  “Don’t be coward and hide behind her as an excuse. She could take on a dozen men and still be fine to handle a meal with Mom.”

  My heart warms with pride because that is so accurate. My fiancé is a gorgeous, badass Amazon.

  “Oh God,” Claire rolls her eyes, “you’re so ridiculous. Might as well have heart eyes.”

  “Fuck off,” I say with no heat.

  “Get dressed.” I don’t know how she does it, but her tiny frame seems to grow as she leans across the island from me. Her eyes narrow on me. “Get. Dressed. Now.”

  “You can’t intimidate me, shorty.”

  “Lilith!” She calls into the bedroom.

  “Shhh!” I cover her mouth with a hand. “Fine. You win. Leave her out of this.”

  She gives me her evil grin as she climbs onto a stool. “Chop, chop, Connie.”

  Fuck’s sake.

  Before I change, I check on Lily. She shouldn’t have laid on her side the way she did last night to comfort me, but I couldn’t bring myself to stop her. I’ve thought of myself as an island for a long time, especially in regard to my history with my uncle. If I’m an island, she’s my seawall, keeping the storms at bay and me on solid ground.