The woman I searched the top and bottom of earth for every second of every day. “I don’t ever want to hear you talk about yourself like that again, okay? You aren’t worthless, and you aren’t broken—you are good enough. You’ve always been good enough, and destined for more than whatever Kendrick has planned for you.” I trail my finger along the bruise of her neck, damning that collar and him. I hope my brother dies from his injuries, and if he doesn’t, I will fucking kill him. Now that I know he is in Trinidad, he can’t hide from me. I have a few ideas in the back of my head to ruin him.
Death, which is the easy way out.
Or set him up for a crime he didn’t commit and have him rot in prison. I like the sound of that one more. I should do to him what he did to me. It would have to be something serious, something so heinous that he would spend the rest of his life behind bars, but how much reach does he have? Will he know people on the outside and try to plan to get Gabriella back?
I’m not sure what to do now.
“We’re here,” Owen says, and I forget that I have yet to introduce Gabriella to him. My mind is too busy.
“Where is here?” Gabriella’s voice is muffled as her head lay against my chest, her breath sweeping across my neck just like the wind from the farmer’s market carrying her scent.
I bury my hand in her hair and place my chin on top of her head. “Home, Gabriella. We are home.”
“When we get inside, I’ll check her over to make sure she has no injuries and to make sure she’s healthy.”
“She’s right here. You don’t have to talk about me as if I’m not present,” Gabriella’s eyes widen, and then she curls up in a tight ball, protecting herself from being hit. “I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I won’t talk back. Please, I’ll be better.” Her body trembles with fear, and her eyes are closed tight, waiting for the blow to come.
Yeah, I am going to torture him and then kill him. Kendrick has achieved his goal. Gabriella has significant trauma. Owen meets my eyes in the rearview mirror as he reaches toward the visor to click the garage door opener. His gaze softens on her, as he enters the garage and parks the car; he unbuckles his seatbelt and turns around.
His hand hovers on her shoulder, debating if he wants to touch her, and she flinches. My arms tighten around her, and she lets out a breath, digging her fingers into my chest to try to calm herself.
I’d take the pinch of pain while she gets over a lifetime of agony. It’s what I am here for.
“Gabriella? My name is Owen. I’m a good friend of Sebastian. I’m not going to hurt you. You’re right. I should have addressed you instead of talking about you like you weren’t here. You were in your right to stand up for yourself.”
Especially when she hasn’t been able to for years.
She lifts her head from my chest, and I brush away a tear from her cheek. She is killing me with those. How can I prove I’ll keep her safe and she no longer has to shed another tear?
“Really?” she asks, a hint of wariness in her voice.
“Really,” Owen agrees, and the softness in his eyes remains, something I’ve never really seen before. The man is so angry all the time, his face pinched, like every day is a battle, but here he is, being a teddy bear.
I know there is a pile of goo down deep in his heart.
“You aren’t going to punish me?” she asks. “Is anyone going to punish me?”
“I’d like to see anyone try because I’ll kill them, baby,” I bring my lips to her forehead, fucking overjoyed that she is here in my arms. What a fucking strike of luck that she would be at the market. I knew it was her. I knew it. I’ve never smelled that perfume on anyone else before.
“I’m safe,” she says with wonder and confusion. The crease between her brows tells me she is trying to wrap her head around the idea. “Sebastian.” Her eyes widen before they roll to the back of her head and blood spreads along the middle of her gown, staining the light purple with a horrid red.
Her face goes pale, her skin translucent, her lips turn blue, and I shake her with so much violence to wake her up, I cause the wound to bleed more. “Gabby! Gabby! Baby? Wake up! Come on, not now! You can’t give up on me now.”
I gasp.
I jolt out of bed and wipe my brow. My entire body is drenched in sweat, and my heart races a hundred miles an hour. I look out the window. It’s the middle of the night. My head is killing me. I reach to the other side of the bed, the cold, empty sheets mocking the hope I’ve carried for far too long.
“Gabby?” I call out for her into the massive room, hoping she is in the bathroom. “Gabby, baby, you okay?” I don’t hear her voice. “No, it couldn’t have been a dream. It felt too real. It couldn’t have been. She was with me. She had to be. I felt her in my arms, the tears on her face; I fucking felt it.
My feet land on the cold floor, waking my entire body up with the sudden jolt of frost. My head hangs, and the space between my shoulders burn, a deep ache in my spine. I hold my hand in my hands and rock, thinking about what has happened over the last few days. We went to the market.
It felt too real for the dream to be fake.
I stand and run out of my bedroom door into the hallway. “Gabby!” I shout, refusing to believe my mind would play a horrible trick on me. The corridor feels like it is closing in. “Gabriella! Are you here? Please tell me you are here,” I cry out, my chest constricting as the truth shines brighter and more evident.
“Gabby!” I roar one final time until I stop in the kitchen.
The light above the stove is on, casting a faint glow toward the living room. Darkness incases everything along with silence. I can’t even hear the waves crashing against the shore. My body drips with sweat, anger, disappointment, and sorrow.
A dream.
A fucked-up dream. My subconscious is a guilty motherfucker. I hate myself for not being able to find her. I open the cabinet and grab a bottle of whiskey, and then I take a down a shot glass. I pour the amber fire until it hits the rim then down it, feeling the burn all the way down my throat until it settles into a warm pool in my belly.
“What the hell is all the racket, Sebastian?” Owen scratches his stomach as he walks into the kitchen and takes a seat at the bar. His hair is a mess, and he still looks half asleep.
“Seriously, it’s two in the morning,” Jaxon speaks next, stretching his good arm over his head while the other one cradles against his chest. “What are you doing?”
“Oh my god, people are trying to fucking sleep,” Grayson bitches, clutching his side as he waddled into the kitchen next and takes a seat. Heaven is the only one who isn’t here, which is good, because I’m not in the mood for his bright and cherry bullshit.
“Whatever is happening, I want in!” Heaven shouts from the hallway, the crutches thumping against the floor with every hop he takes.
Damn it, I spoke too soon.
I pour myself another shot and ignore all of them.
“You going to share?” Owen asks, crooking a brow at me.
“No.” They don’t understand, well, Jaxon could. I can’t put it into words with how strongly I feel about this.
“Well, then, it’s a good thing we keep so many extra bottles.” Owen stands and his knees pop as he walks around the kitchen island and opens the cabinet to grab a bottle. He takes down a few shot glasses and lines them up in front of each man.
I down the next one, then grip the edge of the counter as they stare at me, questioning in their eyes. I glare into the bottom of the shot glass, a bit of whiskey dripping down the rim and pooling at the base, leaving nothing but a drop.
That is how I feel now. There is nothing but a drop left of sanity in my mind before I lose myself completely.
“What happened yesterday, Owen?”
The clink of his glass tells me he just drank his shot. “What do you mean? You don’t remember?”
I shake my head and think as hard as I can, but the dream mixes with reality, and I can’t decipher it. “I think something i
s wrong with me. I can’t … I can’t tell the difference between my dreams and what is real.”
“That must have been one hell of a dream,” Grayson says, tilting a shot of whiskey to his lips, sipping it like some fancy fucker instead of taking it all the way down. “Shit is nasty. I don’t know how you guys drink this shit.”
“Only real men can handle it.” Heaven sticks out his chest, and his glasses are empty in the next second. He sticks his tongue out, then gags. “I guess that makes me a bitch because my god, that shit is gross.”
“Told you,” Grayson grumbles.
“I like it,” Owen says. “Makes the hair on my chest tingle.”
“Guys, we are losing focus,” Jaxon says tiredly, reminding everyone to focus. “What was your dream, Sebastian? Talk to us.”
I lift my head to meet Jaxon’s concerned gaze. His brown eyes have dark bags under them, and he seems to be in a lot of pain. “It doesn’t matter.”
“You running down the hall, shouting for Gabriella, waking all of us up, sounds like it matters,” Jaxon says, taking the neck of the bottle with his hand and drinking a swig directly out of it, not even using the shot glass.
“Did we go to the market yesterday? Was Gabriella here?” I know I sound hesitant, full of fear because if none of that happened, if we didn’t go to the market, I am crazy.
Full blown, losing my goddamn mind.
Owen speaks first. “You and I went to the market, but then it started to rain, so we got out of there. Gabriella isn’t here, Sebastian. She hasn’t been here ” His eyes show the familiar warmth that my dream held when he stared at Gabriella.
I lay my hand on my chest and try to breathe, try to focus, but what they are saying makes no sense. “But I felt her,” I say. “Goddamn it, I felt her. She was here.”
“She isn’t here, Sebastian.”
I take another shot and slam the glass down so hard it shatters. “Then where is she!” I shout through burning eyes and raw throat. “Where is she?” I repeat. “It felt so fucking real. I held her; I could smell that fucking perfume.”
“The perfume was a real thing,” Owen adds, shooting back the bourbon. “You went insane looking for her. You combed the entire area, but the perfume, yeah, that was probably what set off your dream. Smells are the biggest trigger for the mind, and since you are so connected to it, it makes sense that you would have such a vivid dream.”
“You didn’t shoot Kendrick?”
“No, Sebastian. I unfortunately did not get to shoot anyone yesterday.” He pushes out his bottom lip before taking another drink.
“I’m losing it,” I groan, leaning my elbows on the table, and running my fingers through my hair. I don’t feel like myself. “I have to find her, guys.”
“Well, if her perfume is the real deal, say she was there, then she is closer than you thought, right? She’s here.”
“Heaven, I don’t need your positive rainbow and butterflies fucking attitude.”
“He’s right,” Jaxon says. “Why don’t you search Trinidad? What harm could it do? You don’t have her now and if you come up empty handed—”
“Then I still won’t have her. It isn’t a possibility. If I continue to dream like that, then I won’t know what is real or fake one day. I believe she is here, guys. I believe it. To my fucking depths. What happens next time? What if I don’t just pull out of the dream? What if I think I’m really living it?”
“Then I’ll shoot you myself and put you out of your misery.”
Grayson slaps Owen on the back of the neck. “What the fuck, man?”
“What? he asks.
“He asked for something less dark than that.”
“No, it’s fine,” I say. “It would be what I’d wanted. Slowly losing my mind isn’t the way I want to live.”
I still believe there is something real about the dream, and it isn’t just the perfume. She was here, somewhere, and if I have to lose myself to find her, if I have to lose my grip on reality to make sure she is safe, then I’ll do exactly that.
I’ll forget myself if it means remembering her.
“I’m sorry for waking you guys up. Go back to sleep. I’m sure Quinn is pissed at me.”
Jaxon shakes his head. “She’s currently puking her guts up in the bathroom. She told me to get out when she heard you shouting for everyone, then locked me out.”
“Still puking?” Grayson taps his fingers along the counter. “That’s odd. She’s changed her diet enough where that shouldn’t be happening.”
“Unless she’s pregnant,” I say offhandedly with a snort, taking another shot. Everyone chuckles and then we all really think about what I said, as if it dawned on us that her being pregnant is the only explanation that fits.
“Oh, shit,” Jaxon whispers and guzzles down four shots worth of whiskey from the bottle.
“I could be wrong. I wasn’t serious. It was just a joke, Jaxon.”
“A joke that makes sense,” Jaxon says, then slides from the barstool and rushes down the hall toward his room. The slam of the door makes me feel a bit guilty. I don’t like being the one to drop the bomb on them.
“Well, that will be exciting, if they are. I love kids,” Heaven sighs. “The laughter is going to be so cute.”
“I hate the crying.” Owen gets up from the island and slaps Grayson and Heaven on the back before he strolls around the island and stands next to me.
“They are babies! They cry,” Heaven defends the children that aren’t even here yet.
Owen wraps an arm around my shoulder and guides me away from the kitchen and down the hall where my room was. It’s just me and him. The motion lights turn on with every step. The more we walk, the more the whiskey sets in my bones, and my mind starts to feel numb.
“Listen, I don’t know what you’re going through. I won’t ever know, but I do know this, I’m here for you, okay? You want to comb every section of forest and water surrounding us to look for her, I’ll be there.”
“It’s a long shot, Owen. Like you said, anyone could have been wearing that perfume.” I think I remember he might not have said that.
“I did, but I don’t want you to listen to me. I’m a fucking cynic. I’m a pessimistic as Heaven is an optimistic. That doesn’t mean you are wrong. What do you think? Is she here?”
“I don’t fucking know, Owen. Dreams are just dreams. I can hardly remember yesterday. I’ll look for her regardless, like I always have, but I’m not holding my breath. I have to stay realistic.”
“And how has being realistic gotten you? Maybe you should dream a little. Our way of life isn’t like other peoples. We fucking rob criminals for a living and are rich because of it. We do what most people can’t even imagine, so who says being a little fantastical is a bad thing? Maybe that is how our lives are supposed to be.”
“Thought you said you were a cynic?” I ask, lifting a brow as I open my bedroom door.
“I didn’t say I believe in it. I just said there’s no harm in thinking outside the box. Get some rest, man. We will plan our search tomorrow. If she was at the market, it’s nothing the cameras couldn’t pick up.”
“But after all this time, here? I would have found her.”
“Maybe. Unless she never gets to go out.” On those words, Owen shuts the door, leaving me staring with an open jaw.
What if he is right? What if Kendrick never let her out of her cage?
I’m going to get her back.
He fucked up letting her go out in public. It would be impossible for him to get away from me now. Unless this is what he planned all along. Why would Kendrick live in Trinidad? Maybe he knows I’m here and wants to dangle her in front of me? No, that couldn’t be it.
No one knows I live here. I have scrubbed every surface of the web of my name. No records of me exist. I wanted to make sure Kendrick could never find me, but somehow, he did.
This has to be a challenge.
He wants a fight.
I’ll bring him war.
&
nbsp; Chapter Eight
GABRIELLA
I wake up in Kendrick’s bed, the collar still wrapped around my throat, but at least the leash is off. I stare up at the trayed ceiling and think back to the market.
Sebastian.
He was here.
I saw him.
And he had looked … to die for.
Time treated him well. His hair was black, and his eyes were still as blue as ever, and I got lost in a dream. It was as close as we have ever been since I visited him in prison. I almost called out to him.
Almost.
But the fear of Kendrick kept my mouth shut.
It brings me comfort that Sebastian is here, in the same city; even if we barely missed each other.
“My sweet!” Kendrick bellows from the main floor.
I roll out of bed and hurry to the door, slinging on my robe quickly before making my way to the staircase. “Yes, Kendrick?” I say with a sweetness that holds no truth.
“Get down here and make me and my friends so breakfast,” he says.
“Yes, Kendrick,” I agree.
I hurry down the steps as fast as I can, not to please him, but to make sure I won’t get punished. I haven’t been punished in seven days, and I want to keep it that way.
“Wow, Kendrick. You were right,” a man I don’t recognize speaks up. “She is beautiful.”
Kendrick’s arm wraps around my waist and pulls me close to his side. I try to wiggle free, but he warns me to stop by digging his fingers into my skin. “I know. It’s the long hair, that creamy tan skin. She’s succulent, isn’t she?”
“Kendrick,” I plead as his hands tug at my robe. “Please,” I beg him not to. I'm not wearing anything under the robe.
“I have to show my guests what a beautiful pet you are, my sweet. After all, you’ll be seeing a lot of them around now that the time is getting closer.”
“Time?” I ask, my breath coming out in harsh pants as his fingers trail over my chest.
“You don’t need to worry about that right now, my sweet. It isn’t anything you need to concern your pretty little head about.” His fingers curl around the ties of my robe, and my eyes lock on all the hungry eyes sitting around the table. Each man has the same expression, but their faces look different. Two men have blond hair, each have blue eyes, while another one has brown hair and green eyes, licking his lips as he waits for Kendrick to show me to them.
Cruel Seduction: A Dark Romance (Underground Kings Book 2) Page 6
