THE OUTLAW’S BRIDE

by April Lust

  “I just found your boy selling on our territory, that’s what’s going on,” the man with the gun, Alexei, said.

  “The Crabtree isn’t supposed to be anyone’s territory, Alexei. You know that,” Ace said patiently. “And if it were going to be anyone’s territory, it would be The Hell Brothers.”

  Alexei sneered at him. “You know all of downtown Chicago belongs to the Russians. Don’t make me give you a reminder,” he threatened, stabbing the gun into Jackson’s side, causing him to grunt with pain.

  Ace sighed, annoyed. The Russians had their hands in a lot of cookie jars—trafficking, witness intimidation, hits—but their drug game was weak. They cut their coke with caffeine pills and their ecstasy was always laced. Alexei was too proud to admit it, but anyone who wanted good product came to The Hell Brothers.

  “You should be happy The Hell Brothers keeps to themselves and doesn’t infringe on your other areas of business.” Ace countered Alexei’s threat with his own.

  “What are you trying to say?” Alexei asked.

  “I’m saying you’re a shitty businessman, Alexei,” Ace said disgustedly. Goosebumps raced up and down his bare arms. “If you did good business, you wouldn’t need to resort to busting low-level gang members who are breaking meaningless rules.”

  Alexei looked at Ace like he was crazy. Who the fuck did this man think he was? Alexei raised his gun, cocking it as he pressed it to Jackson’s head. Jackson whimpered, staring at Ace, pleading with his eyes for him to do something.

  “I’m going to kill this man if you don’t swear to me right now, in front of your own men, that you will stay out of Russian territory,” Alexei said flatly.

  “Didn’t I just say he was a nobody?” Ace said, chuckling. He pushed his shaggy auburn hair back with one hand. “I don’t care about him.”

  “Please…” Jackson sobbed, “Ace, help me—”

  Jackson’s voice was cut off by a loud gunshot and he fell from Alexei’s grip, crumpling to the gritty asphalt of the wet back alley. He let out a high-pitched scream that settled into a low wail and he sat up, gripping his leg where Ace had shot him.

  Ace lowered his gun and put it in the back of his waistband. “See?” he said. “Go ahead and shoot the dumb bastard for all I care.”

  The men flanking Alexei shifted, muttering to each other under their breath. Alexei looked at Ace, snarling. He pointed his gun down at Jackson and fired, shooting him in the opposite leg. Jackson screamed and then immediately passed out.

  “Don’t let me catch you interfering in our business again, Ace,” Alexei growled, his Russian accent finally making a subtle appearance. He turned and left, his men following him without a backwards glance.

  Ace didn’t move until they had rounded the corner. Once they were out of sight, Ace whipped around to face his own men and began barking out orders.

  “Riley, go tell Blake to call an ambulance. Tell them to prep for multiple gunshot wounds.” Riley took off at once at a run, his long legs silently carrying him back to the bar. “Diego, find Lianna and tell her to bring her kit around back.”

  The shorter man nodded, his sunglasses gone. “On it, boss,” he said, quickly following Riley’s path, his feet slapping against the ground in his haste.

  “Smalls, help me,” Ace said, pulling a bandana from his back pocket. Smalls’ hands shook as he removed the dark red bandana from around his head and passed it to Ace, who tied the two pieces of fabric together and wrapped them around Jackson’s leg, applying pressure to the wound.

  Jackson woke slowly, groaning in pain. “Wh-why’d you shoot me, Ace? Why’d you do it?” he asked, taking shallow breaths.

  “Because if I hadn’t shot you in the leg, Alexei would have shot you in the head,” Ace answered angrily. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing selling behind here, anyway?” he asked, tightening the tourniquet.

  “Not so tight!” Jackson squealed. “Some college kids were down here looking for coke, enough for a party,” he explained. “What was I supposed to say to them? ‘Meet me five miles from here and it’s a deal’?”

  Ace sighed, but didn’t loosen the makeshift bandage. If he did, Jackson might bleed out. “How much did you get?” he asked out of curiosity.

  “A grand,” Jackson said, his eyelids beginning to flutter. Ace heard rapidly approaching footsteps.

  Lianna had arrived with her medical kit. She had spent a couple of years as an EMT before joining The Hell Brothers, and was their resident doctor for sticky situations when the hospital wasn’t an option.

  “Hang in there, Jackson,” Ace said, stepping back to give Lianna access. An ambulance wailed in the distance. Ace had a feeling it was only the first of many he would be hearing. Things with the Russians had been tenser than ever. It wouldn’t be long before something happened that forced the two gangs to settle the matter between them once and for all.

  ***

  The thin wail of an Enrique Iglesias song echoed from the depths of Fiona’s purse. She stopped in the middle of lobby of the office she worked at and dug through the contents of her bag until she found her phone.

  She pulled it out and looked at the screen. It was her best friend, Melanie. Fiona pressed the green button and answered. “Hey, Melanie. I’m just leaving the office now.”

  It had been a miserable day at work for Fiona, again. She had come into her new job with the title Administrative Assistant, fully expecting to spend the first couple of months doing all of the bitch work, but last week marked six months, and she was still just the gofer girl.

  She wasn’t even the gofer girl for the PR department either, which was where she eventually hoped to work. No, she was the designated bitch for the whole office. Step right up, everybody, and give Fiona an errand to do. Out of coffee? Fiona would get it. Need those papers sent out? Fiona would do it. How about your asshole wiped?

  “Fiona?” Melanie said in her ear. “I’m really sorry you had a bad day, but remember to breathe, okay?”

  Fiona realized she had been standing the parking lot next to her car, ranting for the last five minutes solid. “Sorry, Melanie,” she muttered, smoothing her thick brown hair. “I could just really use a vacation.”

  “Couldn’t we all,” Melanie replied, drily. “Wanna have a girls’ night soon? Maybe we can have a staycation this weekend,” she suggested.

  “That sounds exactly like what the doctor ordered,” Fiona agreed, her blue eyes lighting up at the idea of homemade hair masks and a bottomless glass of merlot, though Melanie was probably envisioning a nightclub and enough vodka to put down a horse.

  Melanie Lang had always been Fiona’s wild friend. She was incredibly beautiful, tall and lithe, a model’s figure, with long, straight black hair that hung to her waist. In college, it had been Melanie who had given Fiona her first beer, encouraged her to try her first one-night stand, and once upon a time—and perhaps once or twice since—had given Fiona her first experience with pot. Melanie was daring, promiscuous, and she took risks Fiona would never even consider. She was, in short, everything Fiona wasn’t.

  Fiona’s phone buzzed, bringing her back to Earth.

  “Hey, can I call you back?” Fiona asked. “Niko is calling.”

  “I wonder what he needs,” Melanie said cynically.

  As Fiona’s younger brother, there was nothing Fiona wouldn’t do for Niko, and she knew the opposite was true, too, no matter what other people said.

  “He’s better now,” Fiona insisted. “He got off probation five months ago and he hasn’t been in trouble since.”

  Fiona and Niko’s childhood had been less than happy, with Fiona doing her best to shield Niko from the worst of it. Their father was a drunk, to the point that their mother had eventually abandoned him, leaving Fiona to pick up the pieces of their family at age fourteen. Niko had only been eight at the time, and now, eleven years later, he was still dealing with the aftermath in a variety of ways.

  When he was younger, it was just schoolyard fights. Som
eone would say something about their mother running off, or their father’s consistent unemployment, and it would set Niko off. As he got older, though, Niko began to turn to drugs, usually coke, but any kind of upper would do. Anything so he could feel good for once.

  Fiona felt sorry for him. He had been too young to remember when their family had been happy. She still had memories from before things got bad. Niko had no happy times to fall back on when he was struggling with life. But three months ago, Niko said his friend Paul had gotten him a job, and that things were finally looking up.

  “I wish you would at least give him a shot,” Fiona said.

  “We’ve been down this road before, Fiona. Several times, in fact. He’s a drug addict.”

  “I told you—not anymore!” she protested. “And if you would just go out with him the one time, then maybe he would stop bugging me to bug you and he could move on.”

  “Shouldn’t you answer your brother’s call?” Melanie asked, trying to change the subject.

  Fiona rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll talk to you later,” she said. She quickly hung up with Melanie and switched lines, managing to catch Niko just in time. “What’s up, little brother?” she said when she answered.

  “Just checking up on my Fi,” he replied, charmingly using his childhood nickname for her. “How do you feel about some brother-sister bonding time? Tonight? Your place?” he asked.

  Fiona’s gut turned. It wasn’t unusual for the two of them to spend lots of time together. Growing up, they had only ever had each other, with Fiona as the primary caretaker. Fiona had even selected a college nearby so she and Niko could stay close. They never went more than a week without seeing each other.

  And yet…Was Melanie right? Did Niko want something? More often than not, during their brother-sister bonding time, Fiona paid for their dinners, the movie, and anything else that came up, even going so far as to buy him groceries on occasion.

  Fiona gave herself a mental shake. Niko wasn’t a bum, he was her brother, and he was just going through a rough patch. He was getting better, after all.

  “Sounds great, Niko,” she finally answered.

  “Awesome,” he said. She could hear the grin in his voice. “I’ll bring the booze!”

  “Niko, you’re nineteen,” she reminded him.

  “When has that ever stopped me before?” he said, chuckling.

  Fiona hung up after giving Niko a warning about underage drinking. She got into her car and resisted the urge to send Melanie a smug text about Niko paying for something for once.

  An hour later, he was at her front doorstep, brown paper bag in hand. Fiona brushed a chip of peeling paint from the doorframe as she answered. Her place was a piece of crap.

  “What’d you bring me?” she asked cheekily, putting her hands out.

  Niko reached into the bag and pulled out a box of wine. “Merlot, right?” he asked hesitantly.

  Fiona nodded, happy he remembered. Melanie would probably scoff at the fact that it was box wine, but Melanie could stuff it. As far as Fiona was concerned, it was another point in her brother’s favor. “I have lasagna or empanadas,” she told him as she grabbed two wine glasses.

  “Speaking from my vast knowledge of wine pairings, I think lasagna would go better with this oaky merlot. Once it’s been properly aired out, of course,” Niko said, opening the plastic bag inside the box and pouring the glasses for them.

  Fiona laughed. Her brother was always cracking jokes.

  “So, how have you been?” he asked once they had sat down to eat. “Are you still seeing Ass?”

  Fiona set down her fork and glared at Niko. “I told you not to call him that. He overheard you last time.”

  Ash, referred to as Ass by her brother, was a guy from the office a floor below hers. They had met in the building cafeteria one day two months ago and, from Fiona’s perspective, had been involved in a lukewarm, sporadic, half-formed relationship ever since.

  Ash, however, had a tendency to be romantically aggressive, as Fiona liked to call it. Niko just called him Ass. Ash frequently dropped hints about bringing her over for dinner with his parents, despite her obvious reluctance, and he had even once suggested the two of them move in together, though he later claimed to be joking.

  “Why are you still with him?” Niko asked. “Is he really that good in bed?”

  “No, not really,” Fiona admitted. “But it’s better than nothing.” She wasn’t too sure about that last part, especially as of late.

  Fiona wouldn’t consider herself a kinky person, but she still liked to mix it up a little in the bedroom. She couldn’t remember the last time Ash and she hadn’t had sex in the missionary position, if ever. She had tried to initiate sex with her on top once, but Ash had stopped her and moved so she was beneath him again. She stopped trying after that.

  Maybe it’s my fault for not being open enough with him, she thought.

  “Whatever you’re thinking,” Niko said, interrupting her, “it’s not true.”

  “How do you know what I’m thinking?” Fiona said defensively, knowing the question was pointless even as she said it. Niko always knew when she doubted herself.

  “I know there’s nothing you, or anyone else, can do to fix whatever problems that guy’s got,” he said with a snort of laughter.

  “Well, if it isn’t the pot calling the kettle black!” Fiona exclaimed. She may have defended her brother to Melanie earlier, but Niko had enough of his own issues to focus on without making fun of someone else’s.

  “Hey now,” he protested, “play nice.”

  Fiona reached forward to poke the ticklish spot under his arm. “How’s that?” she teased, just like she used to when they were little.

  Fiona had always had a solid, athletic build, with a narrow waist and thick thighs that gave her a much lower center of gravity than her skinny younger brother. Once she got a hold of him, she almost always won their fights.

  Niko let out a satisfying yelp and Fiona reached to tickle the back of his neck. She spotted an opening and dug her finger into his side, expecting a girlish squeal.

  Instead, Niko grunted loudly and dropped to one knee, holding his ribs where Fiona had poked him.

  “Niko?” Fiona cried, alarmed. “What did I do?” Before he could stop her, she pulled up the hem of his shirt to take a look.

  Huge bruises, blue, black, and purple, spread across his chest and sides, their edges tinged with green. Niko had always been skinny, and even now his ribs were clearly visible beneath the boot-shaped bruises.

  Fiona gasped. “What happened?” she demanded. “Did you get into a fight?”

  “Not exactly,” Niko said.

  “Then what happened?” she repeated. “And don’t even think of lying to me right now, Niko Arthur Brown!” Fiona said, using his full name.

  “I’m handling it, Fiona,” Niko said, glaring at her. “I don’t need your help, you know.”

  “Have you taken a good look at yourself recently? Or, better yet, been to a hospital? I’m willing to bet you’ve got at least one fractured rib, by the look of you.” Fiona went into the kitchen and returned with her purse, which she sat on the dining room table and began to sort through.

  “What are you doing?” Niko asked suspiciously as Fiona pulled out her phone.

  “Since you won’t tell me what happened to you, I’m calling you an ambulance to take you to the hospital,” she replied smartly, dialing.

  Niko lunged forward to knock the phone out of her hand. “I won’t let you. You can’t be getting involved in this, Fiona! It’s too dangerous for you!”

  Fiona easily moved out of his way, holding the phone just out of reach. “Too dangerous for me?” she said. Niko crumpled as Fiona viciously stabbed a finger into his side. “You can’t even defend yourself against your sister right now. What hope do you have of defending yourself against these people again?” she asked, waving her arm towards his discolored midsection.

  Niko said nothing. He merely lay on t
he floor, clutching his stomach. He was furious with his sister, but only because she pointed out something he already knew to be true. He had no hope of standing up to the Russian mob. Not by himself, anyway. He certainly wasn’t going to ask his sister for help, but perhaps there was someone else who could help him. Someone who already had a vendetta against Alexei and his men.

  Fiona sank down to the ground next to her brother. “Please, Niko. Tell me what happened,” she begged. The longer Niko sat in silence, the more creative her imagination became. She closed her eyes. “How much money do you owe?” she asked resignedly.

  Fiona knew there was only one reason Niko wouldn’t want to tell her how he had gotten his bruises. He was ashamed of them. Which could only mean one thing: Niko was in trouble again.