Cruel Surrender by Terri Anne Browning

Bain

Annoyed,I wiped my hands on the rag Declan offered, getting rid of the blood as I stared down at the dead body disdainfully. The smell of bile and human excrement was thick in the air, but other than the sniveling piece of shit on the table beside the now-dead arms dealer, everyone in the room was long used to the stench.

These motherfuckers thought they could cheat me, selling my men faulty guns, thinking as long as a few of them worked when the shipments were picked up and tested that they would be in the clear. But these bastards should have known better. No one cheated me and lived to tell about it.

As my second-in-command, Declan could have just as easily dealt with these two scum arms dealers, but we’d lost five men because of them. It was my responsibility to make sure these fuckers paid with blood and flesh, and then I needed to personally pay my condolences to my men’s families so I could assure them they had nothing to worry about now that their breadwinner was gone.

“Gun.” One was immediately placed in my hand. I chambered a bullet and pressed the barrel to the middle of the arms dealer’s forehead. But when I squeezed the trigger, it dry fired, just like so many of the other guns this scum sold me. That defect had been the reason why five good men had been unable to protect themselves and had been killed by one of our enemies.

A whimper left the man, while the sound of piss running over the side of the table he was strapped to reached my ears.

“Give me another one.” I tossed away the gun in my hand and took the next one Declan offered. Again, a dry fire. Over and over again, I demanded another gun, squeezing the trigger, only for it not to release the bullet I’d chambered. Each time, the arms dealer would release a pathetic, pitiful sound that only pissed me off more.

We went through an entire case of guns, and then Conor opened another. As he loaded a magazine into the newest one, my phone rang. Muttering a curse, I pulled my phone from my pocket, ready to silence it until I saw the name on the screen.

“Everyone quiet,” I growled, lifting the phone to my ear. “Is everything okay, mo chroí?”

“Hi!” Ciana greeted, her voice like a balm to my frayed nerves. “No, everything is fine here. I just miss you and wanted to hear your voice.”

A whine left the arms dealer.

“What was that?” Ciana asked with concern. “It sounds like a sick cat.”

“It is a sick cat, my love. Give me two seconds. We are saying goodbye to the poor thing before it’s put to sleep.”

“Oh no!” she whispered, emotion thickening her sweet voice. “Torin, I’m so sorry. Of course. Take your time. Call me back when you can. I love you.”

“I love you too, my beauty,” I murmured. “Hold on for just a moment. Don’t hang up.”

“But—”

“Two seconds,” I repeated quietly. “I promise.”

“Okay,” she said in that soft voice that brought light to even my darkest parts.

I made sure the phone was on mute and then took the latest gun Conor had loaded. Chambering yet another bullet, I put the gun back to the arms dealer’s head. He whimpered again, but his fear made it impossible for him to beg one last time for his life. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway. His miserable life had been over the moment he and his partner decided to steal from me. They not only took my money, but good men as well. I pulled the trigger. The bullet pierced his brain, and the smell of the man releasing his bowels added to that of his partner who lay on the table across from him.

Brain matter and blood sprayed across my chest, but I pulled off my shirt and tossed it to Declan as I grabbed my phone and took it off mute. “Are you there, my love?”

“I’m so sorry I interrupted.” I could hear the tears in her voice, and I swallowed a curse. A woman’s tears had never affected me before, but hers—fuck, they made my knees weak. “I-is that why you had to leave? Your family pet died?”

“No, mo chroí. I had business that needed my attention. It was imperative that I see to it myself, out of respect for some of my workers.” I grabbed the rag from earlier, wiping blood from my face. “There was an accident, and we lost a few valuable employees. Once I’ve visited with their families, I will be back. Expect me no later than tomorrow night.”

“That’s awful, Torin. Please give the families my condolences.”

“I will.”

A sigh left her, but there was something in it that set my nerves on edge. I knew her every smile and the meaning behind them. If she was sad, happy, tired, annoyed, hungry. It was all right there in her smiles, no matter how hard she tried to conceal it. The sounds of her different laughs were stored in my brain under all things Ciana. Every noise or facial expression she’d ever made, I had memorized. They were like a symphony in my head. That sigh, it wasn’t a good one. “Is everything all right, my love?”

Declan and Conor both shot me raised brows, surprised at my gentle tone. But while Conor’s scowl remained, Declan’s eased into a knowing grin. I flipped him off and turned my back to him so I could focus only on Ciana.

“What? Oh, yeah. I’m good. Don’t worry about me. You have enough to deal with right now.” I waited, hoping she would say more, tell me what had put that heaviness in her exhale and that fake cheerfulness in her tone. “I won’t keep you. I’m sure you have enough on your plate at the moment. I wish I were there to help you, but this probably isn’t the time to spring our relationship on everyone.”

“There will be a memorial next week for them,” I informed her. “You will go with me and offer your condolences in person.”

“I don’t know. That seems really private, and I don’t want to draw the focus onto us. It wouldn’t be right.”

“Right or wrong, I want you with me.” I tossed the rag on top of the newest dead body and crossed to where I’d left my suit jacket. Pulling it on, I opened the door to the storage facility and walked out into the cold Dublin air. “I’m not good at consoling people, Ciana. But you’re different. With your kind, beautiful heart, you will know what to say and do to put everyone at ease. I need you.”

“I don’t believe you wouldn’t know how to comfort those in pain. I’ve seen how gentle you can be. How loving and affectionate you are.”

I grimaced as I walked toward my car, where two of my men were waiting for me. “You would be surprised, mo chroí. I am a different man when I’m with you. A better man. And it’s because of you.”

“Stop,” she whispered. “You’re going to make me cry.”

“No,” I gritted out when I heard her sniffle. “No, don’t cry, sweetheart. I can’t take it.”

“Sorry,” she mumbled. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’ve been kind of emotional since you left. Missing you seems to have tossed my emotions all over the place. I’m super sensitive about everything apparently.”

“What else has upset you?” I asked as I got into the back of the car.

The way she hesitated made me hold my breath until she finally spoke. “It’s nothing. Like I said, I’m just being extra sensitive. Maybe I’m about to start my period. It wouldn’t be the first time I started a week or so early.”

“Did something happen to upset you?” I persisted. Something was off. I could sense it, and it pissed me off that I wasn’t there to fix it for her.

“Torin, you’re busy. Stop worrying about me.”

“Tell me what’s wrong, or I’m going to do nothing but worry,” I argued.

A frustrated huff left her. “Fine, I’ll tell you, but this doesn’t mean you should be rushing around or anything. I’ve got it handled, okay?”

“Ciana,” I growled.

“One of my guards has been acting differently around me. He’s been…”

“It was the thicker one, right?” I cut in when she paused, already thinking of ways to kill the bodyguard.

“H-how did you know?”

“I’ve got eyes, damn it. I’ve seen the way he looks at you.” The cracking sound alerted me to the fact that I was wrecking my phone, and I forced myself to relax my hold on it enough to keep from breaking it. It had already sustained some damage from a few days before when Ciana had worn that tiny bikini and every eye on the island had been glued to her.

Fucking hell, I knew that sonofabitch was watching her too closely, and I should have ended him before I left. It had set me off every time his eyes would so much as glance her way. Now he was growing a pair and getting bolder. But I would cut his dick off before I let him get that close to what was mine. “How has he been acting differently? Making you uncomfortable?”

“A little,” she said with a heavy sigh, the same that I’d heard earlier. “It’s weird, Torin. Like, he’s suddenly all possessive or something. I don’t know. He hasn’t done anything except make comments, and a few times, I’ve caught him looking at me weird today. Ugh! I don’t know. I’m just overanalyzing this. He’s been my guard for a few years now, and this is the first time he’s done anything to make me uncomfortable.”

“The other one…”

“Milo,” she supplied, although I already knew both men’s names. I knew everything about them, all the way down to their social security numbers.

“Stay close to Milo.” I trusted him a hell of a lot more than the other one. Ralph was a dead man as soon as I got back to the island. “Don’t allow the other one to get you alone. We will deal with him when I return.”

“Maybe I should tell my dad. I don’t want Papa to be angry. He’s already going to be growly about us as it is.”

“I don’t want you to worry about your father.” I tried to calm her growing anxiety. “Stop worrying altogether. It’s my job to worry for the both of us now.”

“It doesn’t work like that,” she said with a tiny laugh. “You don’t take on everything all by yourself. This is a partnership. We handle everything together.”

I made a grunting noise deep in my throat. “I don’t want you to be upset by things. I don’t like it.”

“I don’t like when you’re upset either,” she soothed. “But I don’t want to hide behind you. That’s not who I am. We have to work side by side through anything that gets thrown at us, or our relationship isn’t going to work. And I really want us to work, Torin. I love you so much.”

It took a moment to swallow the lump that filled my throat. I was never not going to be emotional when she said those words to me. They were a miracle I’d never thought was possible. “I love you too, Ciana,” I told her, keeping my voice low so the two men in the front seat didn’t hear how close to the surface my emotions were. Unlike with Declan and Conor, I didn’t want my other men to know just how lost I was for this girl. Not yet. All too soon, they would see what she was to me.

She was my weakness when I’d never had a weak spot before.

“I should let you go so you can finish up and visit with those families. Please keep what I said in mind about us being partners. And please, more than anything, please be careful. I don’t think I can live without you now that I’ve found you, moye solntse.”