She grinned and covered her eyes with her hands. "I'm kinda nervous about what this could possibly be," she mused.
I kissed her temple and grinned. "Don't be. You'll like it," I said.
I heard them before I even saw them, our victim of the night saying only god knows what behind the gag in their mouth. Mikhail struggled against Saint and Nyxin, his hands bound behind his back as the men dragged him along. Aurora frowned but kept her eyes covered.
"Bennett?" she called out.
Saint and Nyxin threw Mikhail at our feet, immediately drawing their guns and pointing them at him. I gently pinched Aurora's side.
"Open your eyes, babe."
She uncovered her eyes and looked down. "Um...why is he on our boat?" she slowly asked.
"It's been a while since we killed together, so I figured it would be nice to show him what happens when he threatens my wife and son," I said, glancing down at him. Saint and Nyxin had already done a number to his face, his lip busted and bleeding as well as a cut near his eyes that made the side of his face bloody. Nyxin removed the gag and Mikhail spit blood at Aurora's feet before glaring up at me.
"My boss will murder all of you," he sneered, showing off blood-tinted teeth. "And he'll make you watch as he kills your bitch of a wife and worthless son before he beheads you."
The muscle in my jaw ticked as I looked down at him. He'd been spouting off threats since we'd picked him up a few hours ago. It took everything in me not to cut his tongue out earlier, but I didn't want to rob Aurora of the chance to get her revenge, too. I saw how their interaction this morning bothered her, so I figured this would be a perfect date night activity for us.
Besides, nothing turned me on more than seeing my wife covered in someone else's blood.
I glanced at Aurora, grinning when the lustful, loving version of my wife took a backseat and the dark princess emerged. She moved over to the table before I could even react, snatching a steak knife from the table and stabbing Mikhail in the side.
“You stupid bitch!” he roared in pain. Aurora held the tip of the bloody knife under his chin to force his gaze up to her hard, cold eyes.
“I bet you felt so powerful scaring a woman and baby that you thought were defenseless,” she murmured, digging the tip of the knife into his skin. “But like my husband, I’m a killer, too. And I’m damn sure not defenseless.”
“I don’t give a fuck what you are, whore,” Mikhail spat. “You’re going to be dead soon anyway. You, Bennett, your son, and your whole organization are dead people walking. You’ve fucked with the wrong mother fuckers!”
Aurora giggled and gave Mikhail a firm pat on the cheek. “You talk too much. I'm going to have to do something about that, as I don't take too kindly to threats against my family."
“Fuck your family, you useless slut,” he snapped, spitting at her once again. I sighed and removed the brass knuckles from my pocket, shaking my head as I slipped them on.
Aurora jumped at the sound of crushing cartilage when I punched him in the nose. Blood poured down his face as he groaned, but he was smart enough to not hurl another insult. I squatted down in front of him, holding his bloody face in a firm grip.
“I know you probably feel a little inferior to the gorgeous woman in front of you,” I murmured. “But I won't allow you to continue disrespecting her.”
Mikhail glared at me. "Fuck...you,” he growled, panting.
I chuckled before landing another blow to his face, his blood speckling the white of my trousers. I tsked and shook my head. “Perfectly good pants tainted with the blood of a dickhead.”
“Since he can't mind his tongue, maybe we should cut it out,” Aurora said from behind me.
I turned to look at my wife. God, she looked fucking incredible tonight. I had half a mind to skip this whole thing and take her below deck to show her a good time, but I knew this was what she wanted. When she was the dark princess, she didn't revert back until she spilled blood.
“As much as I love watching you make a bloody mess, I don't want to have to wait for you to clean up when I want to fuck you the second this fucker is dead,” I stated, resulting in an eyeroll from Nyxin.
Aurora giggled, her cheeks turning a light shade of pink. “Then what do you propose we do, handsome? Because I still want his tongue.”
“I know you said you didn't want to take a trip down memory lane, but I think this memory is perfect.”
She frowned. “I'm pretty sure it isn't, but continue,” she stated, folding her arms over her ample chest. I fought the urge to stare at the swells of her breasts, clearing my throat and bringing my gaze to hers.
“Do you remember those three unfortunate women you met down in the bunker?” I asked.
If I were being honest, I couldn’t even remember their fucking names. Maybe it was due to all the whiskey I'd consumed tonight or the fact that they didn't mean shit to me, but I did remember the way I got rid of the sluts that thought they were above my rules. No one could touch what belonged to me, and they quickly found out what happened when they did.
She looked at me, her expression blank and indifferent. “Yes. What about them?”
“What happened to them?” I asked with a grin. “You gotta admit that it was a pretty iconic kill.”
After staring at me a few moments longer, she finally smiled, coming over and planting a wet kiss on my lips. “The dark crevices of your mind always make me so wet,” she purred.
I licked my lips, wrapping an arm around her waist, my hand settling on her ass. "Mmm...you shouldn't talk like that unless you're planning to be fucked in front of an audience,” I murmured, kissing her again.
“We're still here, Mom and Dad,” Saint teased with a chuckle.
“And I'd rather not have the imagery burned in my head,” Nyxin complained, rolling his eyes.
She giggled and pulled away from me. "If you're talking about what I think you are, where is it?”
“Nyx, could you get my package from inside please?” I asked.
Nyxin growled down at the man at his feet before walking away, Saint delivering a kick to Mikhail’s ribs.
“Just know if you kill me tonight, you’re automatically declaring war with the Korolevstro bratva,” Mikhail growled.
I looked down at him and nodded. "Yeah...I'd assume that's the whole point of you third-wheeling my date, genius,” I said with a smirk. “But I'm sure Alec knew that when he sent you after my wife and son.”
Nyxin returned with a small cooler, a grin appearing on Aurora’s lips. “Was this something you'd already planned to use?”
“So, you know what it is now?" I asked.
“If you're bringing me a cooler after mentioning those three women, I can only assume that it's dry ice in there,” she mused.
“And your assumption would be correct, gorgeous,” I said, opening the top of the cooler. Smoke billowed from the opening as Aurora looked in and smiled.
“I know exactly what I want to do with it that'll make the least mess,” she stated. "I'd rather not ruin our new boat with more blood than we have to.”
I gestured to the man before us. "The floor is yours, babe.”
Nyxin pulled a pair of thick black gloves from his back pocket and handed them to her. "Get his pants off, please," she ordered.
The guys looked to me with a raised brow, but I only shrugged. "You heard her. Get his pants off.”
I wasn’t too sure where she was going with this, but I knew it would be interesting to watch. I folded my arms across my chest, observing as Saint and Nyxin practically wrestled with Mikhail to get his pants down to his knees. Aurora shook her head.
“Never took a man as big as you in tighty whities,” she mused with a giggle. “But it’ll make this part a little easier for me.”
She put the gloves on and reached into the cooler, retrieving a single ball of billowing dry ice. Mikhail struggled against the two men pinning him down to the floor, looking at Aurora with wide eyes as she approached him.
&
nbsp; “Don’t you fucking think about it, you slimy bitch!” he snapped, kicking his legs at her. I pulled my gun from my waistband and shot him in the thigh, a frown on my face.
“I’m not going to keep warning you about your disrespect,” I stated, my voice firm.
“You fucking dick!” Mikhail wailed.
Aurora looked at me with a frown. “Babe, I literally just said I didn’t want to get blood all over our boat,” she said.
I held my hands up and grinned. “Sorry, gorgeous. I couldn’t resist,” I said and looked to Mikhail. “And his mouth is making my trigger finger itch, so hurry up and do something about it.”
She turned back to him and squatted down next to him, grabbing the waistband of his underwear and lifting it. “I guess the world won’t be missing much after all,” she said with a disapproving shake of her head when she peeked in. Mikhail opened his mouth to speak, but instead screamed in pain when Aurora tossed the ball of dry ice into his underwear and let go on his waistband. He squirmed around on the ground, his screams mixing in with the wind that’d picked up. We were a good ways away from the marina now, the sun nearly gone from the sky as we sailed along the open water. All the noise he’d make would go unheard from anyone that could potentially help him. There was nothing but open space and sea around us now, the marina now only a speck in the distance.
Saint chuckled and shook his head. “That’s pretty savage, Boss Lady,” he said.
“He only got what he deserved,” she said as she rose back to her feet. “I’ll let him scream for a little bit before I permanently silence him.”
I always thought it was the sexiest thing to see her darkness. When she’d come out of hell week, I didn’t know what I’d get. She didn’t speak for days afterwards, and I thought I may have just ended up with a shell of a woman instead of the blank slate I was hoping for. But when she finally emerged in the basement of the club at the sight of blood, she was more than anything I could’ve asked for. The dark princess rarely appeared these days, even more so since she was a mother now, but it was always a beautiful fucking scene when she arrived. And if this scene didn’t wrap up soon, my men would have the unfortunate pleasure of watching me bend her over the table to show her just how sexy I thought her actions were.
“Nice job putting your own twist on my iconic manner of death,” I teased with a smirk, earning a grin from her. The last time I’d used dry ice, I’d opted to tape a couple of chunks of it to the women’s nipples before taping their mouths shut with a ball of ice in it, watching as they suffocated to death as the ice burned their skin. I fought the urge to cringe when I remembered pulling out the one girl’s implants that had adhered to the ice once it burned through her skin. While it was an effective kill, that was a messy clean up when the tape was removed from their chests, one that my guys bitched about for days.
“The goal is to make him suffer, right?” she mused, glancing down at the screaming man.
“Do you think that’s enough?”
She looked down at him, a flash of different emotions passing over her beautiful features. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that she was thinking about what’d happened this morning, as if she was experiencing the emotions she’d felt in that moment. After a few seconds, she finally looked up at me.
“In a perfect world, I would’ve wanted to put him through a wood chipper and send the remains to Alec’s doorstep,” she said with a slight shrug, her words making me chuckle. “But we’re on a boat with limited supplies at our disposal, so this will have to do.”
I wrapped an arm around her waist and kissed her. “Do you know how sexy it is to hear you say violent shit like that?” I murmured.
She blushed. “Focus, Mr. Moreno. We still have an audience before us and I already know where your mind is going,” she replied, stepping out of my grasp before looking to Nyxin and Saint. “Do we have a plastic bag?”
“I’m sure I can find one,” he said and looked to Nyxin. “Think you can hold him for a minute?”
Nyxin grunted and nodded. “Just be fast or I’ll just put a bullet in his head and call it a day,” he grumbled, pinning Mikhail down by putting his knee in the center of his chest. Mikhail spat out angry words in Russian, his face growing red as hot tears rolled down his cheek. Aurora looked unbothered, only looking down at the painful show before her.
“I have a question for you though,” I said as Mikhail continued yelling. "What were your exact orders when you were sent to talk to Aurora?”
“Fuck you!”
I sighed deeply, raising my gun. "I'm not a fan of repeating myself, Mikhail,'' I stated. “Were you just trying to scare her? Trying to get a rise out of me? Were you—”
“I was supposed to kill her!” he sneered, bloody drool dripping from his mouth. “And I should’ve went ahead and blown the kid’s head off while I had the—”
My gun went off before he could even finish his sentence. Bullet after bullet sank into his face until my gun clicked, signaling it was empty. Pure rage blinded me in that moment, realizing how close I was to losing the two most important people in my life this morning. If Alec had sent someone else to do the job, I would’ve been mourning the loss of my family instead of having a date night with my wife. Plans of more children with her would’ve evaporated. The pure light that was my son would’ve been snuffed out. And I would’ve been consumed with the same anger and revenge that held me hostage after losing Stephanie, not letting up until everyone responsible was dead. How Alec thought he could put a hit on my family and get away with it was beyond me, but now I wouldn’t tread lightly.
Just as I wiped out every enemy of my past when dealing with Wilson’s bullshit, I’d do the same for the Russian fucks who dared to threaten my family.
Mikhail laid lifeless on the floor before me, his face nothing but a gaping hole that the bullets left behind. All sounds fell away as I stared at him, the thumping sound of my heart keeping me grounded. I could only do so much to him now that he was dead, but I’d make sure Alec and his men felt the same anger and fear that coursed through me in this moment.
“Bennett,” Aurora murmured.
I blinked when she turned my face to meet her gaze, the warmth of her skin against my cheek snapping me out of the darkness of my mind. Gone was the dark princess she was moments before, the loving eyes of my wife looking up at me.
“Yeah?”
“He’s dead. You can put the devil away and bring my husband back. We still have a date to finish,” she said with a smirk.
I tightened my jaw and nodded to acknowledge that I’d heard her, but I couldn’t let go of my anger so easily. Saint rushed back to the deck with the plastic bag, frowning when he saw the scene before him.
“What the hell happened? I wasn’t even gone for three minutes,” he said.
I looked down at my pants, the previous crisp, white material now splattered with blood. “A good pair of dress pants were ruined is what happened,” I mumbled. I thought killing Mikhail would’ve set an even more romantic mood, but it did the complete opposite. I’d had one more thing I’d wanted to do with Aurora tonight—giving her a ring the proper way—but I was no longer in the mood. “I’m going to take a shower. Take a picture of him and send it to Alec.”
“Dump him overboard or do you want to dispose of him when we get back on land?” Nyxin asked.
I glanced down at him. “Overboard. And cut his chest open so he doesn’t float,” I said.
“Babe,” Aurora called, grabbing my wrist but I pulled out of her grip and sulked away.
My mind was on autopilot as I made my way below deck, not stopping until I got to the bathroom of the master cabin. I took off the brass knuckles and tossed them on the counter of the sink before looking at myself in the mirror, taking in the specks of blood on my hand, smeared on my cheek, and on my pants. Mikhail’s words repeated in my mind in a dull echo the longer I stared at myself.
I was supposed to kill her.
I was supposed to kill her.
I gripped the edge of the sink and closed my eyes, taking a deep breath to calm myself. I had to remember that Aurora wasn’t Stephanie, and that I was more than capable to protect my family than I’d been back then. But that thought didn’t stop visions of Stephanie’s bloody body on our bed from filling my mind. It didn’t stop me from imagining a bullet hole in the middle of my wife and son’s head while she was helpless in a public restroom.
Aurora’s perfume surrounded me when I took a deep breath, her arms snaking around my waist from behind. I didn’t open my eyes, not wanting her to see the darkness that still mirrored within them.
“Honey,” she murmured.
I tightened my jaw and expelled a breath. “Yes, gorgeous?”
“Can you come back to me, please?”
I opened my eyes and lifted my head, meeting her gaze in the mirror. “I’m here.”
“You’re still angry. Don’t let him ruin our night.”
“I could’ve lost you today, Aurora. Why the fuck wouldn’t I be angry about that?”
She let go of me and pulled my arm, forcing me to face her before wrapping her arms around my neck. “But you didn’t lose me, babe. I’m right here in front of you, 100% unharmed and horny,” she said and smirked.
I chuckled and shook my head. “Sometimes you make it a little hard to stay upset when you say shit like that.”
“That’s the point,” she said and smiled. “But really. I’m fine; we’re fine. Everything is fine.”
“I can’t pretend everything is fine when it’s not,” I stated, my voice flat. “How can I fucking relax when I now know that Alec has a fucking target on your back because he knows you’re my weakness?”
She gave me a soft smile and reached up to caress my cheek. “Everything in this life is unpredictable, babe. You told me that,” she murmured. “All we can do is live in the now, because tomorrow is promised to no one. So, for tonight, neither of us are hurt, our son is safe, and we can continue to have a sexy night. Alec and plans of revenge can wait until tomorrow.”
Rules of Bennett: The Complete Collection Page 80
