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Lucas Emmerico climbs out of his Escalade and strolls up to the Range Rover. The front of his car is totaled, but in the darkness, that won’t pose much of a problem. As long as it runs, he’s free and clear.
With a grunt, he pulls open the passenger side door. Vivian is unconscious but alive, slumped over the dashboard with her pretty-boy chauffeur in the driver’s seat. He’s bleeding from the head, and judging by the amount, it looks bad.
Good, Lucas thinks. One less interloper to deal with. Who gives a shit, anyway? Sienna can go to hell; he has what he came for, and he’s not here to make sure her precious ex makes it out alive. Soon he’ll run more than just London; he’ll run the entire scene in this fucking place, and he won’t have need of her anymore. If she didn’t see this coming, then she must be stupider than he thought.
Wrapping an arm around his runaway bride’s torso, Lucas hauls her out of the car, careful not to let her feet drag as he scoops her up and carries her back to the Escalade. She lets out a low groan as he pushes her into the back, buckles her in, and climbs back into the driver’s seat.
“Nice to see you again too, Vivian,” Lucas says. “It’s been too long.”
With that, he turns the car around and speeds off into the night, leaving Vivian’s new boyfriend to bleed to death on the road behind them.
Keep readingwith Tattered Vows here…
ChapterThirty-Four
Pain is the first thing I feel, and it consumes everything else. My whole body burns with it, my head pounds with it, and even though darkness surrounds me, despite my best efforts to open my eyes, the pain overshadows even that.
After the pain, relief is the next thing I feel. Yes, relief—and if you're wondering why, the reason is simple: the pain means I'm still alive.
Slowly, even as the sensation intensifies from a dull roar to a blinding, searing light, I begin to become aware of wetness on the skin of my temple—blood—and soon other things encroach on the darkness, too. My head is a throbbing, bleeding mess, my chest and shoulder are on fire in the place where I was shot, not so long ago, and my body feels like it weighs about a million pounds.
But I'm still alive.
That thought runs through my head, drowning out the pain, and it's the last thing I remember before the relief vanishes and the darkness closes in on me once more.
I dip in and out of consciousness more times than I can count, sometimes in darkness, sometimes in light, and it's hard to tell which is worse. With my eyelids feeling heavier than anvils, I can almost pretend this is just a bad dream, a nightmare like so many of the nightmares I've had over the past months. It could almost pass for one, too, like a movie sequel that's just a ripoff of the original: Lucas, my psychotic husband, trying to kill me and almost succeeding. Theo, his brother, my first love, willing to fight for me—and for the criminal empire that's rightfully his. My parents, so loved but so incredibly naive, thinking Lucas is the key to uniting our families and cementing our hold on London's underworld, so blind to the truth that they don't even see it when it's right in front of them.
And me, the wife of a criminal kingpin, left with only one choice: do whatever it takes to survive.
The big difference? Now I have more to fight for than just Theo. Now I have two other reasons to keep going, and their names are Liam and Tristan. That's why, despite the raging aches and pains, despite the stomach-churning movement that jostles me and brings fresh tears to my eyes each time, I refuse to let the darkness pull me back into its clutches. I have to stay awake. I have to live, so that the ones I love can live, too.
By the time I crack my heavy eyelids, I've identified the source of the motion around me: I'm in a car—and it's not the car I fled Theo's safe house in with Tristan when the compound was attacked. I'm not sure how long I've been out, but sunlight is already starting to peek through the window next to my head, and the stretch of open highway speeding along outside is completely unfamiliar. So I've been out for a few hours. Maybe more.
I don't need to look to the right to know who's in the driver's seat, but I do anyway, my dry mouth going drier and my heartbeat speeding up when my suspicions are confirmed. It's amazing how, even after all these months, all the atrocities he's committed, Lucas Emmerico still manages to make a cold sweat break out across my skin. He's lost the pretentious suit and tie I'm used to seeing him wear in his attempts to prove himself a worthy successor to his father. Instead, he's dressed in a plain white T-shirt and a pair of dark jeans. His dark hair is mussed up, and his black eyes are pinned to the road. The hands that shot me months ago are clenched around the steering wheel, his entire body tense and rigid.
Surreptitiously, I glance out the front window, desperate to get my bearings, but the world outside is unfamiliar, and all I know for sure is it's not where Tristan and I were headed when we made our escape. Even the act of turning my head is enough to make my entire body throb with pain, so I stop and close my eyes, sweat beading at my temples and upper lip, my whole body aching like I've been hit by a car. Which is, coincidentally, exactly what happened.
A groan escapes my throat, and next to me, Lucas hums out a smug little laugh. "Look who's waking up," he says conversationally, his tone so light that it almost sounds practiced. "How are you feeling?”
"Where am I?" I croak out, afraid of the answer.
"With me," he answers simply.
I swallow and lick my lips, my eyes returning to the road. A fresh trickle of blood makes its way down the side of my head, but I can barely muster the strength to wipe it away.
I can feel Lucas's gaze on me, and it makes my skin crawl. "You're a persistent little thing, aren't you?" he asks.
I don't make a sound, refusing to give him the satisfaction of a response.
Lucas snorts. "Now isn't the time to clam up, sweetheart," he says, and I can tell he's smiling. "We need to have a little talk, you and I.”
"I'd rather not," I tell him, and he laughs.
"Then it's a good thing I'm not asking for your permission," he replies, and his tone makes it clear that any protest on my part is pointless. "How about this: you can keep quiet, all right? You can keep your mouth shut and not say a word. In fact, I think it's better that way. You'll just sit there and look pretty and let me do the talking. How does that sound,darling?" The word is laced with venom, grating on my ears, and I hate him in that moment more than I ever thought I could.
"You've been a fucking pain in my ass ever since I met you, Vivian," Lucas goes on, his voice flat and calm, almost bored. It sends a shiver down my spine and a fresh wave of pain through my body. "You have no idea how much trouble you've caused me.”
I don't respond, my eyes trained on the unfamiliar stretch of pavement ahead of us.
