After inconspicuously nodding as if she can see me, I ask, “If you go, you could get killed. Do you understand that, J?”
She nods without the slightest pause for reflection. “At least I won’t die a coward. Col stripped the life from my veins years ago. He made me hate everything I was and everything I had once hoped to be.” Her pain is my pain when she whispers, “If I lose Nikolai, I will once again lose every part of who I am. I won’t survive going through that again, Maddox. I was barely living before Nikolai came into my life, so I refuse to live a life without him in it.”
“J...” I want to tell her my plans, to explain I understandexactlywhat she’s feeling, but with this not being the time nor the place for a sibling heart-to-heart, I do what I always do when I feel snowed under. I shift the focus to anyone but me. “Dad is going to kill me.”
When Justine nods, agreeing with me, I drift my eyes to Trey. “I’ll keep her out of harm’s way.”
Trey chuckles like I sentenced my baby sister to death. “Do you truly believe you have what it takes to keep her safe? These men are like me… they don’t have morals.”
Once again, my hotheadedness gets the better of me. “Doyoutruly believe Justine would still be here if I couldn’t protect her from men like you?” I step up to Trey like he’s the enemy, and he’s to blame for all the fucked-up shit India has done in the past almost four years. “I took one night off, and look what happened. Men trained to keep my sister safe didn’t, yet you feel you have the right to judge me.”
I stare at him in warning and threat. Then I stare some more when I realize it isn’t arrogance projecting from his eyes. It’s fear.
Fear for what has been.
Fear for what is happening.
And fear for what is still yet to come.
He knows a storm is brewing. He’s just hoping like fuck he packed enough sandbags to see him through the deluge.
Our stare down ends when Trey shoves a loaded colt into my chest. “I don’t have time for this shit. If you want to walk into your death head-on, who am I to stop you?” He drops his eyes to the semi-automatic weapon I angled away from him since the safety is off. “The safety is on the tang. If you don’t know what that is, you shouldn’t be carrying a gun.” While I flick the safety back on, he slings his eyes to Justine. “If you so much as get a scratch on you, you’re going to take Maddox’s gun, aim it at my head, then fire. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” I shouldn’t be shocked by Justine’s brisk answer, you do anything for those you love, even murder, but I am. She protected Brax the best she could when I threatened him, but the instant the first pellet left my BB gun, she was out of the hot tub and racing for her bedroom, leaving Brax alone with three of her older brothers. Today, she not only agrees to take down one of Nikolai’s men if he doesn’t follow her orders, but she also assures him she won’t need to borrow my gun to do it. “But I won’t need to borrow Maddox’s gun to take you down. I’ll use mine.”
With confidence I had always hoped to see in Demi, Justine pulls open the bottom drawer of Nikolai’s desk, then removes a Sig Sauer P365 Nitron. Memories of my time at the range with Demi pop into my head when Justine loads the ten-round magazine with bullets without the slightest shake to her hands. She weapons up like a pro, assuring me I’m not the only member of the Walsh brethren to classify a firing range as a date location.
Once Justine has her gun loaded, she walks out of Nikolai’s office with her head held high and her heart on lockdown. Today, she isn’t taking no for an answer, and if the groove between her brows is anything to go by, no prisoners either. My baby sister is on the warpath, and for the first time in my life, I’m not going to interfere with her reign.
37
Maddox
“Not a scratch, Justine,” Trey warns Justine just before he signals for his men to raid the compound I pointed out only twenty minutes ago.
The grass surrounding the dome-like building is waist-high, and the metal is rusty and old, but there are clear indicators that India has been at this site sometime the past year. Stacks of diaper boxes are under an awning on my right, and the men unaware of Trey’s sneaky approach are using empty formula tins as ashtrays.
My wish to seek out more clues is ended by six men in Nikolai’s crew circling Justine and me like we’re royalty. They don’t just block the view, they also stop me from utilizing a single ounce of the adrenaline surging through my veins.
It’s like a real-life video game, except you can smell death as much as you can see it.
“Drop!”
The youngest man in a protective detail pulls Justine into his chest before he fires a single shot over her shoulder. I only just catch her when he flings her into my chest so he can kill another perp charging at her with a machete. His desperation to get to Justine without adequate equipment sets off alarm bells in my head.
To men in this industry, Nikolai is the prize gem. If you have him, you have the ultimate power. Only a woman desperate to be loved understands the true value of the queen. Without his queen by his side, the king is worth nothing.
“Wait!” I demand when Justine attempts to break free of my hold when the padlocked room we’re slowly pacing toward comes into her view. “Let Trey clear the room first.”
If India is inside lying in wait, I’m as sure as fuck not letting my pregnant sister enter the room first. If India wants to hurt my niece or nephew like she did my child, she’ll have to get through an army of men first, but then I’ll still be here, ready and willing to take her down.
Once Trey’s men have the final two dozen men neutralized, he signals for Justine and me to follow him to the door Justine hasn’t taken her eyes off for the past three minutes. From there, everything happens in a quick, mind-blurring ten seconds. The lock is popped open with a bullet, the door is kicked in by Trey’s boot, then Trey is yanked into the room by a tattooed hand.
His feet dangle mid-air as a dark-haired man with biceps as big as my head squeezes the light out of Trey’s eyes by a brutal clutch of his throat. I, along with several members of Nikolai’s crew, aim our guns at the brute’s head. He’s lit up like a Christmas tree, the twinkling of red only fading when Justine steps into the line of sight of numerous guns.
“J!” I scream in frustration at the same time she yells, “Stop! He’s one of us.” She jabs her fingernails into the man’s hands, pulling him out of his psychosis before she locks her eyes with his. “It’s me… Justine.” Not a single red dot highlights her back when she adjusts her position so he can see the honesty in her eyes when she assures, “We’re here to help you. Where are Blaire and Eli? Where’s your Kitten, Rico?”
Trey falls to the floor like a bag of shit when Rico releases him from his grip a mere second before I notice the chain dangling from his left wrist.
