He’s not standing Rory to his feet to help his lungs fill with the air Nikolai’s beating stole. He’s doing it so he’s forced to face the person responsible for him being sent to hell. Trey wants him to know why he’s ending his life as Nikolai failed to do. He wants him aware he’s being killed because he touched me.
It proves without a doubt how many lies I’ve been told the past six years. He didn’t send me away because sleeping with me sickened him so much he wanted to die. I doubt he even knows what happened to me. He’s in the dark just as much as I was only yesterday.
After wrapping the cord he removed from the curtain stretched across one wall around Rory’s neck, Trey’s focus shifts to me. He stares at me for mere seconds, his eyes deadly and murderous, before he drifts them to Nero. He barely lifts his chin an inch before I’m grabbed around the waist and yanked out of the room.
Although the door separating us rapidly closes, it doesn’t stop me hearing the sickening crunch Rory’s neck makes when Trey tugs on the thick twine curled around his throat so brutally it snaps his neck. If the initial break didn’t kill him, he’ll be dead within seconds. Trey’s murderous smirk leaves no doubt about this.
He killed for me—twice—and I have no clue how to repay him for that.
Thirteen
Trey
As my thumb skims over the rope burn on my index finger, I follow Eight through the sleeping quarters at Clarks. Since Rory’s death was so quick, it gave me little satisfaction. I’m still itching for a bloodbath, but since my desire to make sure K is okay outranks my urge to kill, I’m prioritizing her first.
“Did she need stitches?”
Eight strays his eyes from a body bag housing Bailey’s body to me before he shakes his head. “Dok said her wound was deep, but he glued it instead of stitching it up. Some shit about it being easier to keep clean if its fully joined.” He shrugs before scrubbing at the bristles on his chin. He’s usually a smooth-jaw type of guy. The past thirty-plus hours must be fucking with his head too. “What’s the go?” He motions his head in the direction we just left. “Is he being buried with the rest of them or…”
He leaves his question open for me to answer, which I do two seconds later. “Rapists don’t deserve proper burials. Nero suggested I take him to Jim’s. I’m not opposed to the idea.” When we reached the door all my brothers avoid as if it’ll give them the clap, I say, “Get someone to help you put Rory in my trunk. I’ll be out in a few.”
Apfftvibrates his lips. “I don’t need help.” He doesn’t. Even though he was a pathetic pin-prick weasel, Rory was a decent build, but Eight is a real-life giant. “You traveling alone? I could come with you, if you want.”
I consider his offer for all of two seconds before shaking my head. “Jim hasn’t forgiven you for fucking his granddaughter.” I wait for his smile to fully incline before adding, “I’m also not traveling alone. K will come with me.”
“The boys won’t touch her. Not after how you responded to Bailey’s taunt.” Everything Eight is saying is true, however, until my blood pressure returns to a safe level, I’m not letting K out of my sight. Tension is still hanging heavily in the air. It’s just bristling with the unease I felt when I was blindsided by my father’s unexpected arrival at Mikulov.
Knowing better than to second-guess any decision I make, Eight says, “Aight. Offer stands if you change your mind.”
When I jerk up my chin in thanks, he barges me with his shoulder before stalking away. I wait until he disappears down the isolated corridor before entering the makeshift hospital room Dok commissioned within weeks of joining Nikolai’s crew. Supposedly, he can’t do surgical procedures in a ‘standard ole room.’ I don’t bother knocking. The fact he’s alone with K already pisses me the fuck off.
Some of the annoyance heating my veins cools when I spot K sitting on the end of a sterile-looking bed, several feet from Dok. It’s one of those examination beds you find in all general practitioners’ offices. It even has the stirrups I often threatened to borrow.
“You good?” Not waiting for her to answer me, I lift K’s chin to check the cut she made to her neck when she pierced it with the glass. It’s angry and red and has me wanting to resuscitate Rory so I can kill him all over again. If he had listened to my directive, K wouldn’t have been forced to put her life on the line for her sister as I did for Cole years ago.
Cole thought taking down our father would make him the cream of the crop. Nothing would take him down. Then Achim double-crossed him as he convinced Cole to do to our family only months earlier. I should have let Achim kill him without intervening, but what can I say, I’m a stubborn prick who couldn’t forget the morals our parents had instilled in us even only having half my strength.
I survived the carnage.
Cole didn’t.
Nikolai helped me bury his bones in the compound his crew seized at the request of his father. It was years after Cole had died, but it was better than the corner of my cell where he was rotting and decaying like his head had never worn an invisible crown.
After taking a big breath to free my mind of memories of my past, I crank my neck to Dok, who does a mighty fine job of appearing invisible when he isn’t needed. “Did you give her anything for the pain?” My jaw spasms when he shakes his head. “Why the fuck not? She’d have to be in pain.”
“I agree,” he replies, stepping closer. “She refused to take anything.”
I return my eyes to K, smirking when I catch her gawk of my face before she can drag it away. A less cocky man would think she was staring at the droplets of Bailey’s blood I can feel on my cheek. I know that isn’t the case. She’s not scared I have and will again kill for her. She’s happy about that—quite possibly turned on.
“Is that true, K? Did you refuse to take your medicine?” Although I’m asking a question, I don’t give her the chance to respond. I plant my palms on each side of her teeny tiny thighs before leaning in really close to her face, stealing more than her words. I’ve got a lock on her senses as well. “Do you want me to feed them to you like you’re a baby bird?”
While seeking an answer to my question in her expressive eyes, I scan every inch of her grubby face. She’s so young, my cock shouldn’t be twitching like it is. It wouldn’t be if I truly believed she was underage. She’s a couple of years younger than me, but I wouldn’t put it past ten, making her legal. She just has a real youthful face the cruelest circumstances couldn’t age.
After hitting her with a wink that doubles the width of her pupils, I click my fingers at Dok two times, demanding he cough up the painkillers he wants her to take. “Give me a double dose,” I demand when he hands me two measly white pills.
“Trey, pain killers were one of your dependencies—”
“I wasn’t asking, Dok,” I interrupt, my roar loud enough to make K jump. “I’m telling you. Give me a double dose.”
