Defiance (The Protectors, Book 9)

by Sloane Kennedy

  “What are you doing?” Nathan asked with a laugh as I lowered him onto his back on the table.

  “Christening our new table, what does it look like?” I asked as I skimmed my lips over his pulse point. He moaned and pushed up against me.

  “The furniture’s rented, remember?” he said hoarsely.

  “Not anymore, baby. Any piece I make love to you on goes in our new place.”

  Nathan smiled and kissed me. “Well then, you better get busy. We’ve got a big house to furnish.”

  I chuckled. “On it.”

  “Love you, Vincent,” Nathan whispered.

  “Love you too,” I said as I sank my fingers into his beautiful hair. “My Nate,” I said firmly.

  His gorgeous eyes held mine. “Always,” he said simply.

  And it was true. Whether he was my husband, my lover, my boyfriend…didn’t matter. He was and always would be, first and foremost, My Nate.

  The End

  Turn the page to check out a sneak peek from Shattered, Jace and Caleb’s story!

  Sneak Peek

  Shattered (The Protectors, Book 10) (M/M)

  Prologue

  Jace

  “You’ve gotta be kidding me,” I muttered seconds after my phone began ringing. A glance at the clock on my nightstand showed that I’d been asleep for less than twenty minutes. I was half-tempted to ignore the damn thing, but something deep in my gut twisted with uncertainty. I’d learned long ago not to ignore the odd sensation. My grandmother had assured me it was just the gypsy blood running through my veins, but I suspected it had more to do with the years I’d spent learning how to read my uncle’s moods so it would be easier to dodge his fists. It had served me well in the military many years later and had saved my life on more than one occasion, so I wasn’t about to cast it aside in favor of some much-needed sleep.

  I fumbled for the phone as I pulled myself to an upright position and swung my legs over the side of the bed. I glanced at the Caller ID and saw that it was my boss, Memphis Wheland. My plan had been to call him in the morning to let him know I was ready to be put back into the rotation, but the fact that he was calling me this late meant he likely already had a job for me.

  “Yeah,” I said into the phone as I searched out the light switch on my nightstand.

  “Jace?”

  “Yeah, what’s up?” I asked as I wiped at my eyes. It had been almost thirty-six hours since I’d last slept, but the adrenaline was already kicking in as my body began to anticipate the job he’d be assigning me. Between work and my countless trips overseas, I’d been killing myself lately, but it hadn’t been without purpose.

  It was the only thing that helped me forget the pain-filled blue eyes that had been etched into my brain for nearly two years now.

  Please…help me.

  I flinched as the hoarse voice filtered through my brain.

  He’s fine. You got him out of there, I reminded myself.

  “Caleb’s gone.”

  My stomach dropped out at Memphis’s words.

  “What?” I asked, my voice sounding like I’d swallowed a handful of broken glass.

  “He’s been missing since yesterday morning.”

  “Jesus,” I muttered as I climbed to my feet. “What happened?”

  Memphis sighed. “I take it you haven’t been watching the news.”

  “No,” I said. “I’ve been…busy,” I said lamely, though the word didn’t even begin to describe the shit storm I’d been dealing with these last few weeks.

  “The trial against Caleb’s father started last week. Eli’s case.”

  I knew exactly what he was talking about and I automatically sat back down on the bed as memories of the young man came flooding back to me. I’d met Eli Galvez nearly two years earlier when I’d been asked by my then boss, Ronan Grisham, the head of the underground vigilante group I worked for, to check on Eli’s step-brother who’d been institutionalized in a psychiatric hospital. My plan had just been to make sure young Caleb Cortano was okay when I’d broken into the hospital and disguised myself as an orderly. I’d found Caleb strapped to a bed, drugged to the gills and scared to death. I’d tried to convince myself the treatment must have been necessary for whatever mental problems he’d been dealing with, but the second he’d turned his terrified blue eyes in my direction, I’d known something wasn’t right. A single tear had rolled down his cheek and I’d been reaching for the restraint on his wrist before he’d even whispered the words that still haunted me.

  Please…help me.

  Everything had changed from that moment going forward.

  Two days after I’d gotten Caleb out of there, I’d been sitting across from Eli and Maverick “Mav” James, another one of Ronan’s operatives who also happened to be Eli’s lover, explaining to young Eli that I’d watched several videos of him being brutally raped by his stepfather, Jack Cortano, Caleb’s father. As if that hadn’t been bad enough, I’d discovered multiple videos of Caleb and his older brother, Nick, being repeatedly sexually assaulted by their own father as well.

  Jack had been arrested on multiple charges, but the district attorney had decided to start with Eli’s case first.

  “What happened?” I asked, my heart in my throat.

  “The judge threw out the videos on a technicality.”

  I swallowed hard as I shook my head. How the fuck was that even possible? There’d been no question what had been happening in those videos and who the parties involved had been.

  “Did Eli testify?” I asked. I knew that had always been the plan, though the videos alone should have been enough to prove that Jack had raped a then sixteen-year-old Eli.

  “He did. It was…”

  The fact that Memphis had to pause pretty much answered the question for me. My heart broke for Eli and Mav. I stiffened as I realized where Memphis was going with this.

  “Jesus, Memphis, don’t tell me he got off.”

  There was a long pause before Memphis said, “Acquitted on all the charges.”

  “Fucking Christ!” I yelled as I got up and began pacing the room. “How the ever-loving hell is that even fucking possible?” I shouted. “The fucker raped him! I saw the goddamn proof myself!” I snapped.

  I managed to calm myself down as Memphis remained silent. I suspected he and the rest of the team had likely had a similar reaction to my own.

  “The defense brought up Eli’s history,” Memphis murmured.

  I shook my head in disbelief. “He was a fucking kid,” I whispered. As a teenager, Eli had been forced to prostitute himself for money before someone had finally stepped in and put a stop to it. I couldn’t even begin to fathom what it must have been like for him to have that shit thrown in his face in an open courtroom.

  “How is he doing?” I asked.

  “Not good,” was all Memphis said. “That’s why he and Mav didn’t realize Caleb had taken off at first. They found his phone in his room and he didn’t take his car. We can’t find his name on any flights and we’ve searched everywhere we can think of. We think he might be headed to D.C. – maybe to meet up with some old friends or something. He…he hasn’t contacted you, right?”

  “No,” I managed to get out as my worry for Caleb grew. “I’ve never given him my number and he doesn’t know where I live.”

  A fact I was cursing now. The last time I’d seen Caleb had been more than a year ago at Christmas. I’d flown to Seattle after Caleb had begged me to come see him. He hadn’t been doing well then either, but after spending the holiday with him, I’d hoped things would start turning around for him. He’d even agreed to go to therapy to start dealing with what his father had done to him.

  But I hadn’t had the balls to check in with him since then. I’d told myself it was for his own good since he’d become far too attached to me, but I knew that was only half the truth.

  “Is there any chance you can check out his old neighborhood…maybe stop by his friends’ homes and see if they’ve heard from him?”
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  “Yeah,” I said absently, though from everything I’d learned from Caleb, there hadn’t been many friends left in his life. And if Caleb had left his phone and car behind and he’d avoided taking a plane, it was because he knew how easy it would have been to track him down using those things.

  Fuck, why the hell hadn’t I sucked it up and kept in touch with him?

  “Jace,” Memphis said quietly.

  “Yeah.”

  “Caleb…he hasn’t been doing well. So if you find him, don’t let him out of your sight, okay?”

  I could barely get my next words out. “Yeah, okay.”

  I said my goodbyes to Memphis and tossed the phone onto the bed. It was two in the morning so I couldn’t even start searching his old neighborhood for a few hours yet. But as I studied my bed, I knew there wasn’t a chance in hell I’d be able to sleep now.

  No, Caleb needed me.

  I might not be able to check in with his friends for a little while yet, but I sure as hell couldn’t just sit here doing nothing. There were a couple places I could go. They were longshots, but I literally had nothing to lose.

  So I grabbed my phone and my keys and told Caleb exactly what I’d told him when he’d called me just before Christmas and begged to see me.

  “Hang on Caleb, I’m coming.”

  It couldn’t be.

  That was the thought that kept running through my mind as I stared at the motel room door that had been propped open by flipping the security latch into the locked position before closing the door.

  Driving to the motel in the Appalachian Mountains had been so much more than a longshot, but I’d been desperate. I’d spent the entire day scouring all the places I thought Caleb might go if he’d indeed made his way back to D.C., but to no avail. The motel had literally been my last shot.

  There were absolutely no cars in the parking lot, but when I’d slipped the manager some cash, he’d confirmed that a young man with blond hair had checked into the very room Caleb and I had used nearly two years earlier while we’d been waiting for Mav and Eli to arrive.

  The same room where I’d held him for the first time in my arms so he could finally find some peace in sleep.

  I should have been relieved to know I’d finally found him, but I was terrified about what I might find in that room when I opened the door. Two years ago, Caleb had barely been hanging onto his sanity. From what Memphis had told me, things hadn’t seemed to have gotten any better for him, despite having found some stability with Mav and Eli. At nineteen years old, Caleb should have had the world at his feet. Instead, it seemed to be crumbling around him.

  I pushed open the door. The room was dark, but I could make out a slim figure lying on one of the two queen beds in the room. There was enough light seeping in from the open door to see the shock of blond hair and I knew I’d found him. I flipped the lock so I could close the door and then made my way to the bed.

  “Caleb?” I said softly.

  He shifted slightly in the bed, but didn’t respond or acknowledge me in any way. He was lying on top of the bedspread, his jacket and shoes still on. There was a black backpack sitting next to the bed, but no other luggage.

  I went to turn on the light, but as soon as I did, he whispered, “Please, don’t.”

  I quickly turned the light back off and sat next to him on the bed. I couldn’t stop myself from running my fingers through his hair. “Are you hurt?” I asked. I had no clue how the hell he’d gotten all the way to West Virginia on his own, but I had a few thoughts and none of them were good.

  Caleb shook his head.

  I pulled out my phone and sent a quick text to Memphis, telling him only that I’d found Caleb and he was okay. I included a note telling him I’d call him as soon as I could, but since I knew that likely wouldn’t satisfy him, I turned the phone off and then tucked it into my pocket. As hard as all this probably was on Eli and Mav, I needed to focus on Caleb right now.

  There was a reason he’d picked this motel…that he’d come all the way out here, to me, even though it had been more than a year since I’d last seen him. So I carefully shrugged off my coat and tossed it on the other bed. It wasn’t a surprise that Caleb had picked the far side of the bed. I eased myself onto the bed and settled myself against his back. The second I wrapped my arm around him, a choked sob escaped his throat.

  “Shhh, I’m here now,” I murmured as I brushed my lips over the nape of his neck. He’d grown a little taller since I’d last seen him, but he hadn’t filled out at all, proof that his health hadn’t improved. His skin felt cold and tremors kept wracking his body every few seconds.

  There were so many things I needed to talk to him about, but I knew that wasn’t why he’d come. I knew that wasn’t why he’d searched out this motel, this room and deliberately left it unlocked for me. The thing he needed now was the same thing he’d needed that first night when I’d given in to the need I’d heard in his voice.

  Giving him now what I’d given him them was just the start of what I needed to do for the young man who’d trusted me with his very life. I’d failed him once because I’d been a coward. Because I hadn’t liked what holding him that night and all the others had made me feel.

  But Caleb had been the one to pay the price.

  Never again.

  I settled my palm over the arms he had crossed protectively against his chest. When my fingers found his, he linked them with mine and a soft sigh shimmied through his lean body.

  “Everything’s okay, Caleb. Sleep now,” I said as I brushed a kiss over his temple.

  I could feel moisture on my hand and knew it was likely from the tears I couldn’t see or hear Caleb shedding.

  “He’s coming for me, Jace,” Caleb said, his voice cracking as he said my name. “He’s going to get out and then he’s going to find me.”

  I settled my mouth near his ear so I’d be sure he heard every word I said to him. “He’s welcome to try, Caleb. But he’ll have to get through me first. No one touches you ever again, do you hear me?”

  But he didn’t answer me which was just fine with me.

  Because he’d finally found the very thing that had sent him running to me in the first place…the thing he’d likely been searching a lifetime for, but would only last for as long as sleep held him in its gentle grip.

  Peace.

  About the Author

  Dear Reader,

  I hope you enjoyed Vincent and Nathan’s story. And yes, Everett, Gage and Nash will be getting their own book as part of The Protectors series. Reese will also get a book at some point!

  As an independent author, I am always grateful for feedback so if you have the time and desire, please leave a review, good or bad, so I can continue to find out what my readers like and don’t like. You can also send me feedback via email at sloane@sloanekennedy.com

  Join my Facebook Fan Group: Sloane’s Secret Sinners

  Connect with me:

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  Also by Sloane Kennedy

  (Note: Not all titles will be available on all retail sites)

  The Escort Series

  Gabriel’s Rule (M/F)

  Shane’s Fall (M/F)

  Logan’s Need (M/M)

  Barretti Security Series

  Loving Vin (M/F)

  Redeeming Rafe (M/M)

  Saving Ren (M/M/M)

  Freeing Zane (M/M)

  Finding Series

  Finding Home (M/M/M)

  Finding Trust (M/M)

  Finding Peace (M/M)

  Finding Forgiveness (M/M)

  Finding Hope (M/M/M)

  The Protectors

  Absolution (M/M/M)

  Salvation (M/M)

  Retribution (M/M)

  Forsaken (M/M)

  Vengeance (M/M/M)

  A Protectors Family Christmas

  Atonement (M/M)

  Revelation (M/M)

  Redemption (M/M)

  Defiance
(M/M)

  Non-Series

  Letting Go (M/F)