Beyond Vengeance: Pacific Prep #3

by R. A. Smyth

  He watches enraptured as I suck on his thumb before slowly removing it with a pop. His hand moves to take mine, placing it over his rock-hard erection. “Just like this dick is yours.” I squeeze his shaft, and he groans, his hips involuntarily thrusting into my grip.

  The look in his eye softens, and using his grip on my hand, he pulls it away, slowly sliding my palm up his shirt until it’s resting over his heart. I can feel the steady beat of it beneath my hand and I can’t look away from the unusual vulnerability I see in his eyes. “This heart is yours. I am yours.”

  I swallow around the lump of emotion in my throat.

  “You’re perfect for me, Little Warrior. We were always meant to be together. You’re mine—not because you belong to me, but because you own every part of me.”

  Well, fuck me. Give this man a standing ovation, because that was one hell of a declaration.

  My voice is hoarse as I lick my dry lips. “You own all of me too,” I admit, curling my hand into his shirt and using it to yank him toward me.

  Our kiss is brutal. All teeth and violent possession as we assault one another. My hands roam frantically over his chest, pulling and tugging on his clothes until they come apart, and in no time at all, he’s throwing me back against the door and driving into me, making my eyes roll back in my head.

  His hand clamps down over my mouth, silencing my cries. The sex is rough and intense, but with our faces inches apart, our eyes never straying from one another, it’s intimate and overflowing with raw emotion. All too soon, I feel him swelling within me, and as his cum hits my inner walls, I fall apart, my ecstasy muffled behind his hand.

  When we’re done, he removes his hand from my mouth, resting his forehead against mine and looking deep into my eyes.

  “I love you,” I pant, loving how his eyes soften, and a boyish grin graces his lips.

  “I love you, baby. You're mine, and I'm yours. That’s the way it's always going to be.” He kisses my forehead, and the two of us share a moment of blissful contentedness before he speaks again. “I actually came here to get you. West found something.”

  “He did? What?”

  “I dunno yet. He wanted to wait until all of us were together.”

  Satisfied, and with a renewed purpose, we quickly redress and leave the study room, and I quickly gather my belongings, blurting out an excuse to Daniel and his friends before I rush out of the library with Mason.

  By the time we make it to the guys’ dorm, everyone else is there, waiting impatiently.

  “About time,” Cam grouses. “What took you so long? This asshole won’t tell us anything.”

  “Sorry. We’re here now. What’s going on?” I ask, skipping over the reason for our tardiness and wedging myself into the space on the sofa between him and Hawk.

  When all of us are seated, we stare impatiently at West, waiting for him to share what he’s found. He’s sitting opposite us, with a laptop open in front of him on the coffee table.

  “So, I’ve been monitoring the security cameras at both our parents’ office, and their homes. It’s all been pretty boring stuff, but today I was going through the footage from last week, and I came across this from a few days ago.” He turns the laptop around and we all huddle together so we can see the screen as he presses play.

  The footage is of the kitchen in one of our parents’ houses. At first, it’s just an empty room, but after a second a woman in a revealing dress and sky-high heels enters the frame. We can’t hear what’s being said, but based on her frantic hand gestures, she’s upset. I don’t recognize her, but I do recognize the man that enters the room next—Frank Hayes. His face is thunderous, and it looks like he’s yelling at the woman. An argument ensues, and I gasp when he slaps her across the face hard enough to have her stumbling sideways into the kitchen counter.

  She stares at him in shock, cradling her stinging cheek in her hand, but Frank is on a roll now. He storms toward her, his cheeks reddening as he yells in her face. I can see the terror in her eyes as she tries to backtrack, cowering and most likely apologizing to him. The asshole isn’t hearing any of it though, too lost in his rage as his hand grips tightly around her upper arm, easily throwing her across the room.

  The woman goes flying, crashing onto the tile floor. She curls in on herself, but Frank still manages to get his foot in as he kicks her relentlessly, not caring what body part he connects with.

  It feels like it goes on for ages, and based on the way the woman's muscles slacken, she must pass out at some point. But that’s not enough to stop the sick bastard beating on her. I have to look away, unable to watch anymore, and my hands tremble as I struggle to force back long buried memories. My gaze lands on Mason’s hard one. His body is wound tight, his fists clenched as he watches his father beat the ever-loving shit out of an innocent woman. I can only imagine the extent of the beating he took as a kid. For that reason alone, the fucker in the video needs to pay.

  When the woman is bloody and lifeless on the ground, Frank finally stops his assault. Panting heavily, he stands and stares at her with a vacant look in his eyes. There’s no remorse over the fact he’s just killed someone. No guilt. Nothing.

  As he storms out of the frame, leaving the woman lying on the cold floor, West pauses the recording. “This was three days ago.”

  “He killed her?” It certainly looks like she’s dead, but I need to know for sure.

  “Yeah, he did. He got some guys from their organization to come clean up his mess.”

  “Who was she?”

  “Lacee Hamilton,” Mason supplies, staring off into space. “Her family owns a chain of high-end jewelry stores.” He grits his teeth, looking ready to explode as he pushes himself out of his seat, pacing back and forth across the living room.

  “How do you have this?” Hawk asks. “Surely he would have wiped the tapes?”

  “I’ve been downloading all of the security footage onto my own secure drives, so even if they delete anything, we’ll still have a copy of it.”

  “So what do we do with this?” Cam questions, watching Mason out of the corner of his eye.

  Mason turns on his heel to face us. His features are dark and terrifying as he struggles to deal with what he just witnessed. “We use this to put that sick fuck away for good.”

  Chapter 18

  Hawk: We’ve been summoned for dinner tonight. 7pm.

  I groan, already predicting how bad tonight is going to be. If the last two times I’ve met my parents is any indicator, it’s going to be pretty grim. I haven’t seen either of them since the night of the party, nor have I spoken to them. Which is totally fine with me. I’ve decided it’s much better if I can skirt by, lurking on the periphery of their awareness. I’m not sure they know what to do with me yet, but I have no doubt that they’re contemplating how they can get the best use out of my unexpected arrival.

  The problem with trying to maintain as much distance as possible from them is that I’m no closer to finding out what happened to me, or if they are involved. I mean, they have to be on some level, right? Even if they aren’t, they’re shitty parents for not funneling all of their resources into finding me, and instead putting the priorities of their company first.

  Sighing, I fire off a less than enthusiastic response to Hawk as I lean back against my headboard, trying to think of a way to get the information I need from my parents. They aren’t just going to come out and tell me the truth about what happened.

  I spend the rest of the day going back and forth between homework and thinking about all of our parents and what the hell we’re going to do. West finding that footage of Frank enables us to finally fight back. It’s a small step, but a step forward nonetheless. West sent a copy to the local police, the state police, and another one to the family. He’s also kept a secure copy for us, which could come in handy. Now all we have to do is wait, and let the chips fall where they may.

  As for the other parents, the six of us have thrown around a few ideas, but we need to actua
lly sit down and come up with a real strategy for how to tackle them, and the company. The end of the school year is quickly approaching, and I have a feeling things are only going to get worse once the guys graduate and are working full time for them. I don’t even know—or want to know—what their plans are for me after graduation. I can hazard a guess that the future they’ve mapped out for me is not the one of freedom I envisioned when I escaped the compound.

  By the time Hawk knocks on my door that evening, I’m dressed in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. I’ve done my best to flatten my hair and I even borrowed another pair of flats from Emilia—look at me making an effort!

  “Ready?” he asks when I open the door.

  “No,” I grumble. “What do they want this time?”

  “No idea, guess we’ll find out soon.”

  We make our way out of the dorm and along the path to the parking lot, before I speak up again. “West told me you all want out from under your parents’ thumbs.”

  “Yeah,” he agrees. “Obviously we’ve never wanted to go into the company. Initially we’d hoped we could at least talk them into letting us go to college first, so we could buy ourselves a few more years of freedom and enough time to come up with a better exit strategy, but now…” He shakes his head. “None of us want anything to do with what they’re involved in. They want us to spend some time at the company, shadowing them over Easter break, but honestly, I can’t imagine anything worse.

  “After the way the guys were treated growing up, and the threats our parents have been shoving down our throats this year, I can’t stand to be in the same room as any of them.”

  “Even your own parents?” I ask cautiously, knowing his relationship with his parents was nothing like what the other guys had to endure.

  “Them most of all,” he growls out. “Yeah, the other guys had a harder time growing up, but at least they knew their parents were shitty parents. I thought mine were okay. Not overly affectionate or around much, but they never harmed me or made me feel like a failure. But this past year, they’ve been completely different. Nothing like the parents I had when I was a kid. It’s making me doubt everything I thought I knew growing up, and I hate that. I hate how I can’t trust any of my memories, and that I’m second guessing every second I spent with them,” he growls in frustration. “I probably sound like an asshole. In comparison to Mason or West, or fuck, you, I have nothing to complain about. At least I had those years where things were good with my parents, right?”

  I bump my shoulder against his. This is the most he’s opened up to me, and while it’s a difficult, convoluted subject, I’m silently squealing like a girl on the inside at the new level we’ve reached in our relationship.

  “You’re entitled to feel whatever you’re feeling,” I assure him. “It doesn’t matter what anyone else’s past is. That doesn’t negate what you experienced, or what you’re feeling with all these new developments recently.

  “I can understand where you’re coming from. You felt more blindsided than the others because you didn’t think your parents were as bad as theirs. The others had time to prepare, so while the whole mercenary discovery might have been a shock, the fact their parents were caught up in that shit wasn’t a complete surprise.”

  “Exactly.” He sighs, lapsing into silence as we reach the car and he starts the engine, driving us out the campus gates.

  As we enter the house, Maria strides toward us. “There you are,” she scolds, like we’re late, but I know for a fact we’re exactly on time. The clock in the car read seven on the dot as we got out of it. “Hair and makeup are waiting for you, Elizabeth.”

  Uh, what now? Why the fuck do I need my hair and makeup done?

  “What’s going on, Mom?” Hawk asks.

  “We’re having a couple of guests this evening. It’s important everyone looks their best,” she answers vaguely, looping her arm through mine as she drags me away from Hawk.

  I glance over my shoulder, begging him with my eyes to get me out of this, but he shrugs his shoulders, not showing any signs of coming to my rescue. Fucking asshole.

  Sighing in defeat, I accept my fate as we climb the stairs. All the while, Maria rambles on about some shit or other. The woman honestly baffles me. Right now, she’s almost acting as though we’re friends, but she’s barely said more than a handful of words to me before now, and most of them have been snapped out in irritation—guess I know where Hawk gets his shitty personality from.

  Directing me to a bedroom where two women are waiting, Maria lifts a garment bag off the bed. “Put this on,” she orders, shoving the bag against my chest and leaving me with no choice but to catch it before it drops to the floor.

  She doesn’t bother to turn around as I strip out of my clothes, instead averting her eyes, like that’s going to do any good. I don’t give a fuck what this bitch thinks of me and my scars, so if she wants to watch, then fine. I shimmy into the skin-tight dress that I have to stretch over my breasts. It clings to my hips, the sheer black material barely covering my ass.

  Maria gives up all pretense of pretending not to watch, staring openly at me with her lips pinched as she assesses me.

  “Not bad.” She taps her index finger against her lip in thought. “We might have to do something about that tattoo though. It’s unseemly. Thank goodness the dress covers it all for tonight.” Before I can tell her she’s not doing shit with my tattoo, she twirls her finger in the air. “Turn around.”

  Not seeing that I have a choice, I bite my tongue and do as she says, hearing her gasp when she notices the scars covering my shoulders and back. If you look at me from the front, you can hardly notice them. There are only a few faint, white lines along the tops of my shoulders and my collarbone, but when you look at my back, it would be impossible to miss the obvious white lines marring the skin.

  “Oh my,” she breathes.

  You’d think this might be the moment she softens toward me, now that she realizes what hardships her daughter has had to face. But no such kindness or compassion exists in this hard shell of a woman.

  “We can’t have that now. I’ll make an appointment with my plastic surgeon.”

  “No,” I bark out sharply as I spin around to glare at her. There is absolutely no fucking way I am letting anyone come near me with a scalpel. My scars are a part of who I am. Yeah, they might be an eyesore, but anyone who can’t bear to see them can just look the fuck away.

  Her lips purse, and her eyes narrow in warning at my outburst, but she doesn’t push the matter, for now.

  “Stella, make sure her hair covers that…atrocity on her back.”

  I grit my teeth, biting my tongue against the nasty words that want to pour out, knowing it will do nothing but rile her up more.

  “Yes, ma’am,” a demure woman responds, nodding her head.

  Happy with that acknowledgement, Maria exits the room, leaving me alone with the women who usher me into a chair set up in front of a floor-to-ceiling mirror. I can’t do anything but let them fuss over me like mother hens, too overwhelmed with everything to tell them to stop.

  “You have such thick curls,” the one sorting out my hair coos as she runs her fingers through my thick locks before attacking it with a brush, while another woman wipes my face and starts to apply gunk to it. Between them, they tug on my hair and direct me to close my eyes and push out my lips until they’re satisfied with my appearance.

  “Much better,” Maria praises when she enters the room nearly an hour later. Her gaze roams over my too short dress, primped hair, and over-the-top makeup. I’ve never been so dolled up in all my life, and I don’t mean that in a good way. I look like some sort of expensive, high-end prostitute.

  “Put these on.” Her words are a sharp order as she hands me a pair of black peep-toe high heels. I sway dangerously as I struggle to get my feet into them, not seeing the point in arguing with her. God knows, my inability to wear heels will only give her another reason to dislike me. Before I’m even standing uprigh
t in my new shoes, she’s already ushering me out of the room, looking impatient. “Come on, our guests are waiting.”

  Cement forms in my stomach at her words as I try to figure out what the hell is going on. I’d naively thought tonight we were all going to sit down and discuss what would happen now that I was a Davenport. I’d hoped I would finally get some answers to what happened to me, but with each passing second, that is looking less and less likely.

  When we enter the dining room, Hawk, Barton, and two men I don’t recognize are sitting around the dining table. All four of them stop mid-conversation when we enter, their attention turning to us.

  Hawk’s eyes widen and his lips press together as he struggles to hold back a laugh. Yeah, I bet I look fucking ridiculous—like a five-year-old who got into her mom’s makeup.

  I ‘accidentally’ knock my elbow against the back of his head when I walk past his seat, and he glowers at me as I sit down in the empty chair beside him, taking in the guy seated opposite me. He looks like he’s around our age, with wavy, tousled chestnut brown hair. He’s got a broad chin, and dimples form in his cheeks as he smiles at me. It’s a dirty smirk that, combined with his honey brown eyes that twinkle with mischief, lets me know his thoughts are in the gutter.

  There’s something wild about the look in his eye. It’s not quite normal, but I can’t put my finger on what it is. Shrugging it off, I flick my gaze to a similarly built older man with tints of gray in his hair and lines around his eyes and lips that is sitting beside him, watching me intently. The way he looks at me makes my skin itch, as though he’s trying to determine my measure.

  I quickly look away from him, but I continue to feel his eyes on me as Maria takes her seat at the end of the table, sitting opposite her husband.

  “Benjamin, meet our daughter, Elizabeth,” Barton introduces, barely sparing me a glance—as has become his usual. I don’t know what it is about me that he can’t bear to look at. Maybe it’s guilt eating him alive?