Page 260 of Pretty Ruthless Monsters: Complete Series

NICO

Quinn looks up at me first, then at Atlas and Killian, her lips curving into that tired, fucked-out smile I’ve been dreaming about since that bastard took her away.

And then she starts to cry.

Not quiet tears. These are gut-wrenching sobs that wreck her entire body. They rip out of her like she’s been holding this shit in for fucking years.

My first thought is that we’ve taken things too far. That we’ve pushed her body past its breaking point and she was too far gone to tell us.

I ease myself down onto the bed next to her. I want more than anything to pull her into my arms, but I’m hesitant to move her too forcefully if she’s in pain. “Fuck, mia cara, what is it? Did we hurt you?”

Atlas and Killian crowd in immediately, looking as panicked as I feel. Killian grabs her hand while Atlas pushes her hair back, showing that softness he pretends he doesn’t have.

“No,” she chokes out between sobs, shaking her head. “It’s not you. You didn’t hurt me. Not more than I wanted. It’s…” Her voice breaks, and she can’t finish.

But she doesn’t fucking need to. I can see the problem now.

My jaw locks so hard I nearly crack a tooth. I run my fingers over the marks on her arm—the clear outline of some asshole’s grip pressed into her skin.

“Is it because of these?” I try to keep my voice low, but there’s no hiding the fact that I’m ready to fight whoever did this. Ready to kill.

Atlas and Killian go completely still beside me as they spot the bruises.

Quinn has stopped crying enough to manage a nod. There’s something in her eyes that ties my fucking gut into knots—a frightened look I’ve seen before.

It’s the same look she had when we pieced together what happened with the Bullets, those motherfuckers who dared to fuck with what was ours.

Their poor judgment cost them their lives. And their hands.

I still don’t know everything they did to her, but I understand enough. She’s got scars that go really fucking deep, and someone just ripped them wide open again.

“Who did this to you?” I ask, even though I already know the answer. “Was it Malcolm?”

Her bottom lip trembles as she nods again. “He… he cornered me in his office. He tried to…” She doesn’t finish, but she doesn’t need to.

The rage that floods through me is so intense that for a second, everything goes red. My vision literally fucking blurs with it. I can feel my pulse pounding in my temples, and my hands curl into fists so tight my knuckles crack.

“I’ll fucking kill him,” I say. “I’ll rip his goddamn throat out with my teeth.”

Killian’s eyes have gone cold with an emptiness that means someone is about to stop breathing. Atlas looks like he’s barely containing himself from punching through the wall.

I force myself to take a breath, to focus on Quinn right now instead of the revenge fantasy playing out in my head. She needs us here, not off half-cocked on a suicide mission.

“Show us.” I swallow back as much of my rage as I can. “Show us everywhere that motherfucker touched you.”

She hesitates, then slowly sits up, wincing slightly. She points to her arms first, where the finger-shaped bruises are already darkening. Then she touches her jaw, where there’s a faint redness that’ll probably bruise by morning.

“He grabbed me here,” she says, her voice steadier now. “And he…” She touches her lips, and I see red again, but I channel it into something better as I lean down close to her face.

“He doesn’t get to claim any part of you,” I whisper to keep the raw emotions out of my voice. “Not a single fucking inch.”

I press my lips gently to the redness on her jaw in a deliberate, almost reverent touch. Then I move to the bruises on her arms, kissing each mark with a gentleness that is completely at odds with the burning hatred I still feel toward Malcolm inside me.

“These are ours,” I tell her, my breath hot against her skin. “You’re ours to protect. Ours to care for. Ours to love. No one else’s.”

“No one else’s,” she murmurs just before I finally kiss her lips.

These kisses aren’t just about love and desire. They’re about reclaiming what that bastard tried to take and erasing the memory of his touch with mine. I don’t want her to doubt for a single fucking second that she belongs with us, to us, even if she has to wear his ring for now.

Killian moves in next, taking her wrist and turning it carefully to expose the marks there before pressing his lips to each fingerprint bruise.

“I should cut his fucking hands off,” he rumbles against her skin, and I know from previous experience that he means every word.

Atlas follows suit, cradling her face with his large hands as he kisses the redness on her jaw.

“No one hurts what’s ours,” he says simply, echoing what we’re all thinking right now.

The three of us continue our trail of kisses, covering every spot Malcolm touched, replacing violation with devotion. I watch as Quinn’s eyes drift closed and the tension slowly drains from her face. Her tears have dried, leaving tracks on her cheeks that Atlas wipes away with his thumb.

A small smile begins to form on her lips—not her usual confident grin, but something softer and more vulnerable. Not only is she letting us see her broken pieces, she’s trusting us to help put them back together.

When we’ve finished, she drags in a deep, shuddering breath. Her eyes open, and they’re clearer now but there’s still a troubled look on her face that I’d do anything to get rid of.

“Better?” Atlas asks, still cradling her cheek with one hand.

“I just…” She pauses, then frowns. “I fucking hate this. Being like this.”

“Like what?” I ask, already gearing up to fight, to kill—to do whatever it takes to make her happy again.

“Weak.” It’s a word I’d never, ever use to describe her, and it honestly surprises me when I hear it come out of her mouth.

“I’m supposed to be strong. I used to lead a fucking gang.

I’ve spent my whole damn life staring down people who want me dead, and I’ve done it without blinking.

” Her voice catches. “But one asshole grabs me the wrong way, and I’m reduced to this… this curled-up, sobbing mess.”

She gestures at herself with disgust. “It’s pathetic. It’s?—”

“Bullshit,” Killian cuts her off. “That’s fucking bullshit, and you know it.”

“You think this makes you weak?” I ask her, taking her hand in mine. “Surviving what you’ve survived? Continuing to fight every fucking day?”

“Most people would’ve broken completely after what you went through,” Atlas says, and I can tell from the far-away look in his eyes that he’s thinking about the torture he’s endured and how fucking hard it was. “But here you are, still standing and still fucking fighting.”

“Pushing through all that trauma and all that terrible shit from your past isn’t weakness, mia cara,” I tell her, squeezing her hand. “It’s the definition of fucking strength.”

Killian nods. “You made a deal with the devil to save us. You married him to keep us alive. Even now, you’re risking everything to meet us here.” He shakes his head. “If that’s weakness, then that fucking word doesn’t mean what it used to.”

She looks up at me like she’s finally starting to believe us, then I see another thought cloud her pretty face.

“I don’t want to go back to him.” The pain and honesty in her voice tears at my fucking heart. “I hate sleeping under the same roof, knowing he’s just down the hallway waiting for a chance to… to do whatever he fucking wants.”

“Then don’t go back.” I shake my head, trying and failing to keep some of the anger from my voice. “We’ll find another fucking way. We can disappear tonight and leave this shit-hole city behind. We’ll start over somewhere new.”

I know we’ve tossed that out there as a possibility more than a few times already, but I fucking mean it this time.

We’ll make contacts in other cities and find places we can hide until we’re ready to build something new.

I’ll take this woman to the ends of the earth and guard her with everything I have if it means she doesn’t have to spend another night away from us.

“We can protect you,” Atlas adds, because of course my brothers are on the same page. “Even if we have to cut through an army to do it.”

Killian nods. “I’d enjoy that, to be perfectly fucking honest.”

Quinn shakes her head, and I can see the determination returning. The breakdown we all witnessed earlier is passing. Mia cara—our vicious, our siren—is coming back to herself.

“I can’t run,” she says. “I won’t. My plan is starting to work, and I need to see it through.”

She sits up straighter and brushes her hair back from her face. She really is getting back to her old self now. Thank fucking god. She’s going to need every ounce of intelligence and defiance and street smarts to survive the hell she has to go back to.

“I’ve been talking to Imogen,” she continues.

“I wouldn’t go so far as to say we’re friends, but she’s softening toward me.

And she told me something interesting.” She quickly looks around to each of us before continuing—as if we’d be focused on anything or anyone else right now.

“Every single member of the Dark Lotus Syndicate got their membership the same way—as blood money for someone Malcolm had killed.”

“What the fuck?” The question slips out even though I understood perfectly well what she just said.

“That was pretty much my same reaction,” she nods. “But yeah, Malcolm eliminates someone close to a person he wants to recruit, then offers them power as compensation. It ends up being a twisted fucking blood debt that keeps them all chained directly to him.”

Atlas frowns. “So it’s not an equal partnership like Ambrose thought. Like you were made to believe.”

“Nope. It’s a fucking prison sentence, and they all know it.”

As the pieces of information fall into place, an unavoidable question pops into my head. “So wait… if everyone has to lose someone close to become a member, who did your dad lose? How did he get the marker that he passed down to you?”