Vengeful Soul by Emma Creed
My rage is uncontainable as we ride down the long drive to the derelict mansion. The whole ride here, I’ve felt helpless. My knuckles white from holding down the throttle and my chest aching from the constant stabbing feeling I’ve had to deal with since I found out she was in danger. I don’t know how many there will be, and there’s no chance they won’t hear us coming. But none of that matters. I want the fight. I want all the fuckers to pay for what they’ve done. The more the fucking merrier in my opinion.
We park up beside a fancy looking limo, and we haven’t even dismounted our bikes before a tower block of a man steps in front of the entrance.
“I’d move out the way if I were you,” Nyx warns.
“Can I help you, boys?” The big guy folds his arms in front of his chest in an attempt to seem intimidating.
That shit doesn’t work on people like us.
“You can get the fuck out of my way.” I square up to him, he’s a half a foot taller than me and much wider, but that doesn’t mean the fucker stands a chance of stopping me.
“The boss ain’t seeing guests,” he stares back at me, without budging.
“Ya hear that, Jess, the boss ain’t seeing guests.” I look back over my shoulder, and Jessie nods understandingly as he gets off his bike and pushes his knuckle duster over the fingers on his right hand.
“Good thing we ain’t here as guests,” he says, just before he slams his fist into the guy’s jaw, I hear a loud crack as blood sprays out his mouth and he stumbles backward. I take it as my cue to march past him, and with Nyx following behind me, we leave Jessie to have his fun.
The house is clearly unlived in. It's empty of furniture and there’s a musty tinge in the air. Frayed curtains hang from the windows and there’s debris scattered all over the floor. Nyx nods his head toward a door that’s slightly open at the other side of the hall before pulling out his glock to cover me.
I check it out, the door leads into pitch black, and cool air seeps up the wooden staircase as I take the steps as silently as I can. I drag air through my nose and release it out through my mouth slowly, as I envision ripping the heart from the chest of whoever’s keeping her here.
There’s a corridor when I reach the bottom of the stairs, and I follow it all the way to the bottom where a steel door stands between me and the muffled voices on the other side.
Checking over my shoulder, I see that Nyx is still with me, and I give him a nod before I push open the door. The anger I felt up until this point ain’t a scratch on the surface compared to the fury that surges through me when I see a guy holding Gracie down while some suited fucker holds a knife under her chin.
It’s the cunt with the knife that has to go first, and I don’t even give him the chance to anticipate what to do in defense. The force that comes from my fist as it impacts almost lifts him from the ground, and as he stumbles backward, his knife falls from his hand and clatters onto the floor. I make my assault, kicking all the air out of him with the heel of my boot. A glance out of the corner of my eye confirms that my brother got the big man covered. That just leaves the other guy I’d caught in my peripheral when I walked in. Gracies’ supposed boyfriend. I feel him before I see him again, his hands tugging at the back of my cut in an attempt to drag me off his piece of shit buddy.
I greet him back with a swing of my shoulders and a right hook to his temple. I don’t have the time to make him suffer like he deserves. I need to get to Gracie, cause I ain’t gonna believe she’s okay until I’m holding her in my arms and feeling her pulse beat against mine.
In any other circumstance I would enjoy the fight, I would have dragged out these mother fuckers’ torture a little for my own entertainment. But the need to get to Gracie overcomes that craving. These men have to die and they have to die fast.
The guy on the floor smirks up at me when I stand over him. “You know not what you do,” he tells me, clutching his stomach as he attempts to sit up.
“I know what you do, ya sick fuck.” I angle my body around his and twist his neck until it snaps in my hands, then I move on to my next mark. The guy who I should never have taken Gracie home to.
“You,” I point my finger at him, and I feel myself seething as I stomp closer to him. I reach out and grab the front tuft of his hair. Forcing him to his feet. I reach into my belt and take out my knife, twisting the blade in my hand so it rests against his jugular.
“You think you're the only person who knows how to betray? Wanna know who ratted you out?” I ask him, watching his fear drip out of his pores. He shakes his head back at me and I smile. “Your papa. Your own fucking father ratted on you. He put his own life before his son’s. I promised to kill him last. And I’ma keep on sending him little pieces of you to remind him of his decision until his day comes,” I growl.
“Go to hel—” I cut off his final words by slicing my steel through his flesh, his blood warms my knuckles as it pumps out of his body. I look across and see that Nyx and now Jessie have taken care of the other guys, and I release the limp piece of shit’s body out of my arms and rush straight to Gracie.
She doesn’t even give me the chance to untie her wrists before she throws her arms up over my head and clings to my neck like a lost child.
I can feel her heart thumping like it’s trying to escape her chest, and a relief I’ve never felt before drains me of all my adrenaline. I feel myself shaking as I hold on to her so tight that I worry she’ll shatter in my arms.
“You’re okay, Gracie, I’m here now,” I whisper, forgetting that my hands are soaked until I see the blood coat her hair as I soothe it. She doesn’t seem to care and her lips seek out mine, pressing into me and trembling with desperation as her warm tears spill between us. It makes me hold her that little bit tighter.
“You killed them,” she manages, when she’s gathered herself together enough to look at the space around us. She’s in shock, she knows this is what I do, hell, she even saw me do it to that CIA agent. I have no idea what state I’m in, I didn't feel a damn thing when I attacked those men. And I don’t care, all that matters is that she’s safe.
“I had to,” I tell her, kissing her lips again, being this close it’s impossible not to.
“We should have gone to the police this time, used them to find the others.”
“That ain’t our style, and you're too stubborn to let me take care of you, so I have to eliminate threats my own way.”
“I’m gonna go check the rest of the place out,” Jessie backs out the door and heads back up the stairs.
“I’ll give Grimm a call and tell him to come sort this shit out,” Nyx kicks over the body at his feet with his boot and pulls out his cell before following Jessie out.
“How did you know I was in trouble?” she asks when I pull myself away from her to untie the ropes around her wrist and ankles.
“Mads found another list, it was in some hidden file. Him and his dad were on it.” I look at the ex fucking boyfriend. His eyes open and staring across at us. “You know who that guy is?” I tip my head to the dead guy in the suit, the one who had the knife.
“Julian called him Adriano,” she answers, still shaken up to fuck.
“Mads took the list of names to Prez, the boys are on it as we speak. It won’t take us long to get through them and make things safe for you again, Gracie,” I promise. “But while they’re on it I’ma get you as far away from this town as I can, until we know it’s safe, okay?”
She shakes her head at me defiantly, and I huff with frustration, now’s not the time for the stubborn brat to be testing my limits.
“Gracie,” I warn.
“I want to go back to the club,” she blurts out. “With you,” she adds softly.
“Anything you say, darlin’.” I try to hide the smile on my face, and the only way to do that is to kiss her again. When I’m done, I force my knife through her restraints and lift her up. I don’t bother to ask if her legs are too shaky to walk. I'm carrying her up the stairs and out the house either way, and then I’m gonna put her straight on the back of my bike where she belongs.