Page 10

Chapter Ten

Elena

B efore Aiden gets the chance to retaliate, the four bikers swarm him and shove him to the ground. One gets on top of him, his knee between Aiden’s shoulder blades. Another biker holds Aiden’s legs down.

The one Aiden hit – the one who whistled and catcalled me – eyes me over. “You’re such a pretty little thing. We never get pretty little things around here.” He lunges for me and I scramble out of the bed. His hands swipe towards me but I kick at him and land a hit to his stomach.

“Elena, run!” Aiden shouts.

My eyes land on the open door. But there are four bikers between me and my freedom.

“Run!”

I have to try.

I jump onto the bed and dive across the room but the main biker manages to grab me around the waist and laughs as I struggle against him. There’s something hard in his pants. I go cold, knowing exactly what it is.

“She’s a feisty one!” he says, tossing me onto the bed. I try to get up but he lays on top of me. His weight is suffocating. “We’re gonna have fun with you tonight, girlie.”

“Let her go,” Aiden shouts.

“Why would we listen to you? You humiliated me. Now I’m gonna humiliate you by fucking your girl right in front of you.”

God no. Please.

My eyes meet Aiden’s. He promised to protect me.

As if reading my mind, Aiden bucks hard against the man on top of him and manages to shove him back. He kicks the man holding his feet in the face and scrambles forward.

“Not so fast,” one biker growls but Aiden is quicker. He rolls onto his back and grabs his gun from his waistband. With one quick shot, he kills the man with a bullet to the head.

The room goes silent before the biker on top of me jumps up and grabs and hauls me from the room. Aiden manages to shoot another of the bikers before the third one gets away.

The main biker shoves me onto his motorcycle. I try getting off but he clamps his hand around my waist. Then he drives off, me with him.

Looking back, I see Aiden leave the motel room and start running after me. But the motorcycles are too fast. Aiden stops running and then I lose sight of him the further we go.

I could try diving off the bike but that could lead to my death. I’m too much of a coward to risk dying.

The biker holding me lets out a loud holler. “We did it!”

“We lost two of our guys,” the other biker calls out over the loud engines.

“We’ll just have to finish our revenge. But I want to get this girl somewhere so I can fuck her.”

I freeze. No matter how much Aiden promised me he’d be able to protect me, no one can protect me from the harsh realities of this world.

I’m a victim and I always will be.

Aiden

I don’t hesitate to get into my car and follow those damn bikers. My speed is over a hundred as I race through the street, searching for them. I will not let Elena get hurt again. She’s already been hurt so many fucking times – part of that being my fault.

Maybe she would be better off with Viktor and Erik. Maybe I can’t do this all on my own. I’ve always had Finn at my side.

I finally hear the sound of motorcycle engines. Just up ahead are the two bikers who stole Elena. I slow my speed so I can keep steady with them. There’s no way I can try to attack now – not when Elena could be hurt.

So, I follow them. They’ll have to get off their bikes eventually and when they do, I’ll fucking murder them for even looking at my girl.

My girl . No. Elena isn’t mine. She can never be mine.

After following them for miles, they finally pull up to some shitty apartment building. If I start shooting at them out in the open, it will attract too much attention. Already, I left two bodies behind in the motel. Before I got in my car, I shut and locked the motel door, just in case anyone happened to walk by. I don’t need the police called.

I need to let these bikers take Elena inside where I can get them alone.

And I can torture them.

Torturing people was always Finn’s M.O. He loved it just as much as killing people whereas I was the sort of man to get in and get out. Do my job. Kill the person who needed to be killed and move on with my life.

But now, for the first time, I want to fucking torture these motherfuckers.

Elena screams as they drag her up the outside stairs to an apartment on the second level. Once they’re inside, I don’t waste another moment. I rush up the stairs and kick the door down in one motion.

The biker has Elena on the couch. Fortunately, she’s still clothed. But that bastard is leaning over her and saying disgusting things to her.

I resist the urge to kill him and instead, storm into the room.

Both he and the other biker look up.

“What the fuck?” the other biker says. “How did he find us?”

I shoot that fucker in the head. He dies instantly. He’s not the one I want to hurt.

The biker on top of Elena quickly scrambles to his feet. “You’re going to pay for hurting my men.”

“Oh yeah? Who’s going to make me pay? I killed all of you.”

“You haven’t killed me.”

“Not yet.” I pistol-whip him in the head and he stumbles to the ground. Sounds of pain escape him. Good.

But the fucker surprises me.

He kicks out his foot and lands a hit to my ankle, sending my lug buckling to the ground. With a snarl, he jumps onto me and rakes his fingers down my face. It stings.

I wrench my head back, then do something that I know I’m going to regret later: I head butt him. It hurts him but it also hurts me.

The biker jumps off me and stumbles into another room.

“Aiden,” Elena says.

“Stay there. Stay out of the way.” I get up right as the biker comes back into the room.

With a gun in his hands.

He fires.

The bullet lands right in my shoulder, knocking me back. He goes to fire again but I shoot him first. I land a hit to his leg.

His yelp is the most satisfying sound. Clutching my arm, I run over to his side and kick his gun away. Then I bring my foot down, stomping right onto his face. The sickening crunch of his nose breaking makes me so fucking happy. This asshole thought he could hurt Elena.

The possessiveness inside of me is unlike anything I’ve ever felt before. It’s raw and brutal and dangerous.

“I touched her,” the biker wheezes. “And she felt so fucking good. It made me hard.”

“Shut up,” I growl and kick him in the stomach. Despite his groans of pain, he laughs. “Elena, look away.”

“Aiden?”

“Look away. I don’t want you to see this.” When I glance at her, I see that she has turned in the opposite direction and fortunately, she doesn’t ask me what I’m going to do.

I take the knife out of my boot and press it to the tip of the biker’s head. Then I start cutting off his face. The biker screams and bucks but with his bullet wound to his leg, he can’t run away. I keep cutting a line around his face as he screams and screams.

Then I begin to pull his skin right off. Behind his skin is red muscle and blood. It’s fucking disgusting. This is something Finn would do but right now, I don’t care that I’m acting like my brother.

When I reach his nose, the biker finally falls quiet. Because he’s dead. I keep peeling his skin off for good measure. Once his face skin is gone, I fling it back onto him.

“Good fucking riddance.”

“Aiden?”

“Don’t look. Just… don’t look. I need to go wash my hands and then I need to deal with the body.”

Another body in less than twenty four hours. Shit. In less than a night. It was only hours ago that I cut up Jack and Liam. I’m going to have to dispose of these fucking bikers too.

I can’t do it all on my own. There’s no way I can call Finn for help. But there is someone.

Dante.

He won’t be happy with me. Hell, he’ll probably try to take Elena back just for good measure but he would help me clean up all of these bodies. If it meant keeping Finn off my radar and Elena safe, Dante would do it.

Fuck. This is going to get messy.

Once I wash my hands, I dial his number. I keep my eyes on Elena to make sure she doesn’t sneak a peek at the biker. She hasn’t looked. But she hasn’t looked at me either.

“Hello?” Dante answers.

“It’s Aiden. I’m calling from a burner phone.”

“Aiden. Where are you? Have you changed your mind? Ready to give Elena back?”

“Not until I know she’s safe from Finn.”

He sighs. “Your brother is still out there, looking for you and Elena. He’s been leaving a trail of bodies behind. I think he’s doing it just for shits and giggles. But I haven’t been able to stop him. He’s too fucking elusive. That’s why I needed you to stop him and you couldn’t do it.”

“I know.”

“Why are you calling?”

“I… I’m in some trouble. I need help cleaning up some bodies. I need to keep Finn from finding me and Elena. Can you help me?”

He’s quiet for a long moment. My heart beats faster as I wait. “If I come help you, I’m going to take Elena back home. Viktor and Erik are pissed at me. Viktor is ready to start another war. Erik is the only one keeping it somewhat at bay. I have to bring Elena home, safe. Or there will be more bloodshed.”

“I understand.” Bullshit. I’m not letting Elena go for anything but Dante doesn’t need to know that. “I’ll give you my address.” Then I hang up.

“Who was that?” Elena asks.

“Dante. He’s coming to help clean up the mess I’ve made.” Slowly, I approach her. She tenses. When I reach my hand out to her, she flinches. She’s scared of me, I realize. I can’t fucking blame her.

“Dante will take me back home, won’t he?” she asks.

“He’ll try. I won’t let him.”

“What if I want to go back home?”

“Do you? Really? You only have your mom waiting for you. And if you return home, Finn will know exactly where to find you.”

“But I also have my friend, Inessa.”

“Is she enough?”

Elena’s shoulders slump. She knows I’m right. “Can I look now?”

I glance over my shoulder. The biker’s face is still seeping blood, despite him being dead for minutes now. It’s a horrific sight. I’m shocked I was capable of that.

“No,” I tell her. “You’re never going to want to look.”

“What did you do?” she whispers.

“I hurt him,” I say matter-of-factly. “He hurt you, so I hurt him. Fuck, Elena. I’m sorry. I’m trying to save you and within the span of one night, you’ve been attacked by multiple men. I’m doing a fucking shitty job at this.”

Some of the tension in her body dissipates. “But you’re also the reason I am safe. If you brought me home, Finn would just find me. I’m not safe anywhere I go. At least at your side, I know you’re trying to keep me safe. That’s more than a lot of people would do.”

She throws her arms around me and buries her head in my chest. It’s so startling, it takes me a moment to respond. Then, I hug her back.

I wince when her head brushes against my shoulder wound.

“You’re hurt,” she says.

“I’ll be fine. I’ve survived a lot worse.”

“You were shot. We should get the bullet out.”

“Well, I guess we have nothing to do while we wait for Dante. Remember, don’t look.” I shield Elena’s eyes from the biker’s body as we walk into the bathroom. There’s not much we can use but there are a pair of tweezers in a drawer.

“You’re going to have to help me get the bullet out.” I hand her the tweezers.

“What? No! I can’t do that.”

“Do you want to be brave or not?”

She frowns. “That’s not fair. I’m not a coward just because I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Seeing as I’m already hurt, there’s not much more you could do to me.” I wrap my hand around hers. “I need you to help me.”

She sucks in a breath. “I can’t believe you’re asking me. A man like you…”

“I can admit when I need help. I’m not too proud like my brother is. If he was hurt, he’d be bitching and moaning but he wouldn’t ever ask for help.”

“I don’t want to talk about your brother,” she mutters.

There it is. The one barrier between us. Finn. I love him and she hates him. This is just a reminder that we can never be together. I cannot forget that.

“Wait,” I say. “I need to sterilize this thing. Wait here.” I head into the kitchen and find a bottle of vodka. That will do. I pour it over the tweezers. This isn’t perfect and there’s a good chance I could end up with an infection but it beats having a fucking bullet in my shoulder.

When I come back into the bathroom, I see that Elena is standing up taller. There’s courage in her eyes.

“I’m ready,” she says. I hand her the tweezers.

I slip my shirt off. Elena’s cheeks turn pink. I try not to think too hard about that.

With a shaky breath, she presses the tweezers to my wound and inserts it. I wince. It fucking stings so bad.

Elena stops. “Are you ok?”

“Just keep going until you find the bullet.”

She nods, then resumes her work. I fight to hold still as she digs around in there but finally, she finds the bullet and pulls it out. Instant relief.

I use a hand towel as a makeshift rag to stop the bleeding. “I’ll need stitches but I don’t have any needle or threat. I’ll have to make a stop at a store to get some.”

“While you’re bleeding?”

I find gauze under the sink. “This will help for now.” I hand it to her. “I need you to wrap it around my shoulder.”

Elena’s fingers are soft on my skin as she does as I say. Goosebumps break out on my arms. I never get goosebumps. This is a first.

She walks around me, wrapping the gauze around my shoulder and arm and chest. Then she faces me again. Her fingers linger on my chest. Neither of us move or speak as we look at each other.

The urge to kiss her is so strong, I feel like I’m losing my mind.

I cup her face. Miraculously, she leans into my touch.

Our foreheads press together. One more inch forward and my lips will be back on hers.

She inhales sharply.

A knock on the door breaks us apart.

“Dante.”

“Right.”

“Stay here while we clean up the body. Trust me. It’s for your own benefit.”

“What did you do, exactly?”

“I… ripped his face off.”

Her eyes widen but she doesn’t back away from me. “Aiden.”

“I was angry. He hurt you.” That’s the only reasonable explanation I can give. “Stay here.” I head past the biker’s body to open the door.

Dante is alone.

“Did anyone follow you here?”

“I made sure no one did. I’m here because this is my best chance at retrieving Elena. If I had brought Erik and Viktor, you’d be dead within seconds. And I like you, Aiden. You’re my friend. I know you’re just trying to keep Elena alive. So, where’s the body?”

I show him the biker.

He lets out a low whistle. “Damn. Even I’ve never done something like that. It looks like something…”

“My brother would do?”

“I didn’t want to say it.”

“Can we just clean him up? There’s also him.” I nod to the second biker I had shot in the head. “And I have two other bikers at the motel I was staying at.”

“You’ve been busy.”

“You have no idea.” I mutter.

Together, Dante and I make quick work of the biker’s body. We find a large box to stuff him in. Since there are no plastic tarps like at Liam’s place, we don’t cut up the body. It would leave behind too much of a mess.

I place the box in my trunk next to Jack and Liam’s cut up bodies. What a night this has been.

We quickly shove the other biker into another box and he joins his friend in my trunk.

“I’ll handle the two bodies at the motel,” Dante says. “You shouldn’t go back there. Not if you want to get caught in case anyone saw you.”

“Thank you.”

“But before I do that… I need to take Elena back home. You know I do, Aiden. So, where is she?”

“I’m here,” Elena’s soft voice filters through the air. She stands in the living room doorway, looking uncertain.

“Nice to see you safe,” Dante says. “I’m sure I’m not exactly the sight you wanted to see. That would be Viktor, huh?”

“I don’t really know Viktor,” she mumbles, staring at her feet. “So no. It would have been my dad but…”

“I am sorry you had to go through that.”

“Well, you weren’t the one who killed him.”

Dante lets out a sharp breath. “You’re right. But I did try. I know I scared you. I’m trying to make amends for things I’ve done in the past. You can trust me, Elena. I’ll keep you safe. I’ll bring you home. You can marry Viktor. Finn won’t get to you.”

She looks up with a jerk of her head. “What happens to Aiden when you take me back home?”

“I won’t tell Viktor or Erik where he is. He’ll be free to leave as long as he stays away. Unless…”

“Unless?” she asks.

“Do you want him punished for taking you?”

“Dante,” I warn.

He holds his hand up. “You’re my friend, Aiden. I will protect you. I just want to know what she’s thinking. So, Elena?”

“No,” she says slowly. “I don’t want him punished. Aiden is just trying to keep me safe. I don’t want him to be hurt because of that.”

“He won’t be. I’ll make sure of it. Now, let’s go. I’ll take you home.”

“No.” Her one word is loud in the quiet of the room.

“No?”

“No. I don’t want to leave Aiden.”

My heart fucking constricts at her words. Why do I have to care so much about this woman when I barely even know her?

No, that’s a lie. I do know her. I know about her relationship with her parents and that she likes to paint and who her best friend is. And she knows about my relationship to my parents and my secrets and where I come from.

We’re not strangers to each other, even though I pretend we are. If we’re strangers, then it’s easier to push her from my mind. But we’re not strangers. And I can’t push her from my mind.

“Why not?” Dante asks. “Don’t you want to go home?”

“To my mother? Not really. Aiden will keep me safe. You can tell Erik and Viktor that. Tell them that I chose to stay.”

“That’s not going to work. If I tell them that, they’ll only wonder why I didn’t kill Aiden right then and there and that will put me at war with them. It will put Nadia at war with her own sister. I know you’re close with both Nadia and Anya. You don’t want them to be separated from each other.”

Doubt crosses Elena’s features. “You’re right. I don’t want them to be upset. So… just don’t tell Viktor or Erik you were here. They don’t need to know. Aiden will keep me safe. I trust him to do that.”

“And you don’t think the power of me and Erik, the head of the Mafia and the Bratva, can keep you safe from one man?”

She raises her chin higher. “I think you could but you have Nadia to think about and Erik has Anya to think about. I’m low on your radar. But I’m not with Aiden. He’ll make me his priority.”

Dante looks like he’s losing his fucking mind. “I can’t believe this. I could just take you home myself, Elena.”

“Then you’d be kidnapping me. Technically speaking. I’m not leaving Aiden. So either lie to Erik and Viktor or tell them the truth. I don’t care. Right now, all I care about is staying safe and Aiden can do that for me.”

“Does this look safe to you?” He waves his arms to encompass the room and the bloody stains left behind from the destruction I caused.

“No,” she admits. “But I feel safe with Aiden. I don’t want to leave.”

A knowing look enters Dante’s eyes. “Ah. I see.” He gives me a pointed look. “Aiden, can I speak to you alone?”

We head into the back bedroom. “Yes?”

“Have you fucked her?”

“No.”

“No?”

“No,” I repeat in a hard tone.

“She likes you though. It looks like she has a crush. That’s why she doesn’t want to leave.”

That thought makes me happy but I keep that to myself.

“Damn it, Aiden. She’s not yours. She’s supposed to marry Viktor.”

“Last I checked, you stole Viktor’s previous fiancée.”

“Yes,” he says through gritted teeth. “And the only reason I was able to survive was because Erik and Ivan promised Elena to Viktor. He was pissed when Nadia chose me over him. But he was appeased knowing he would get a different wife. And now he’s going to be even more pissed when you steal his new fiancée.”

“I have no intentions of stealing her. I know she is not mine. I’m just keeping her safe. That’s all.”

“And you haven’t touched her?”

I hesitate.

Dante groans and rubs his hand down his face. “Aiden.”

“It was just a kiss. That was it. She’s still a virgin if you’re worried about that.”

“I wasn’t until now. You know how protective these men are of their women being virgins. I should know. I took Nadia’s before we were married when she wasn’t mine and I almost died for it.”

“I won’t fuck her.” Even though that’s all I want to do. “I’m just keeping her safe. That’s it.”

Dante sighs heavily. “I’m not taking her home with me, am I? Once I married Nadia, I promised to put away a lot of my bad shit from my past. She won’t appreciate if I force Elena home when Elena doesn’t even want to be home in the first place.”

“I know you’re worried. But this will all work out.”

“How do you know? Because I don’t know if it will work out. You’re my friend, Aiden, and I don’t want to see you die.”

“You won’t. I’ll make sure of it.”

But I’m more confident than I sound and Dante knows it too.