Perceive by K E Osborn

 

 

AXEL

THE NEXT DAY

 

Quickly, I scarf down the protein bar Luca handed me, trying to fill the hole in my stomach and stop my body from aching. My team is worried I know they are, I am too.

Worried the assholes who are on the board, will override Jack’s control in The Agency and try to push their agenda. Worried they will do whatever they fucking deem necessary to get the precious information that we aren’t even sure at this stage Kenzi knows.

There’s something different—something incredibly off about Kenzi. The way she looks at me like she is unsure or even scared at times. Or the way she’s so eager to ignore our past, her past, and who she is.

Hendrix has done damage, and a fucking lot of it. If I can’t fix it before the board says time’s up, then this time, I’m scared they will try and take her forever.

“Have you got any kind of response from her? Tears, laughter, any kind of emotional response to what you’re saying?” Everly asks with a gentle smile.

I shrug, feeling the ache of sitting around here at The Agency for three days really beginning to soak through to my bones. I’m scared to leave, scared the second I’m not here to have her back, they will take her, punish her, torture her for just a name that will do them any good.

Even as Kenzi’s screaming at me, I can’t help the protective instincts I hold for her, even though she’s telling me to fuck off, begging me to leave her alone.

I can’t.

I won’t walk away.

“Yeah, I guess. She tells me to stop, cringes like she doesn’t want to hear what I’m saying. Like she doesn’t want to remember. And when I talked about her dad, she merely blocked her ears and refused to listen.” I roll my shoulders, trying to ease out the tension that’s permanently taken up residence. “It’s making me angry. I want to force her to hear it, to listen to how much pain she put us all through when she disappeared.”

Everly reaches out, rubbing my arm with a sad smile.

Luca’s head bobs up and down as he tries to stay balanced on his crutches. “Man, we have your back. Whatever you need to do to stay in control and not let those assholes from the board take over, just let us know. We’ll stand by you.”

From beneath my brow, I look up at him. Everything in me is a little too heavy and tired to express any more emotion than a slight nod in grateful thanks. “I refuse to give the board a chance to screw her up even more than she already is,” I tell them through gritted teeth. “She won’t talk. Not to me. Not to the other agents. Not to Jack… so, I finally had to get clearance to do something drastic.”

It took a lot of fucking strings, but I know those assholes at the top were never going to let me take her out of here before she gives them what they want, so it means if I want this to happen, I’m going to have to get creative.

Luca’s brow pulls into a confused frown. “What did you do?”

I open my mouth to explain but the door in the hall clicks open, and I drop the unfinished protein bar in my hand to the floor. The lights and sirens light up the small hallway, causing Everly to jump and Luca to toss his crutches to the side so he can wrap his arms around her.

The swirling lights above us are almost nauseating, but as they swing around, they highlight Kenzi’s face as she pops out through the crack in the door, her frantic eyes searching for an escape. She catches one look at us, her eyes growing wide before stumbling out the door and rushing toward the exit at the other end of the hall.

Luca lurches forward but I grab his shoulder, pulling him back into place earning me a stern glare. “What the hell man?” he calls over the deafening noise, but I don’t even bother to answer, just direct my nod toward the double doors.

She’s only a few steps away before they swing open, flying back against the walls on either side, sending her skidding to a halt. She leaps back and I can’t help but smirk as the Malice MC, my family—our fucking family—steps through and fills the hall in all their leathered glory.

Kenzi wavers, moving nervously on her feet, making me think for a second she might even just take her chance and try to fight her way out. Honestly, it wouldn’t surprise me at this point. The Kenzi I knew probably would say ‘fuck it’ and give it a go. It’s the reason we were always in trouble when we were kids. At least one of us was doing shit we shouldn’t, and the other was following along to make sure the other person wasn’t going to die.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the Kenzi I knew. She’s different and as much as it hurts to watch her collapse to her knees and see her body heave with a heavy sob, I know if anything, this would be the one thing that could work in our favor with her.

She can turn her back on me, and I can fucking live with that, but she can never turn her back on the club. They are her blood, her heart, a part of her soul.

“Who are they?” Everly asks, her voice a little unsure.

“Those guys?” I smile, relaxing a little. “Those are my something drastic. Those are the reinforcements.”

My feet are already moving toward Kenzi as she pushes herself backward on the floor, like she’s trying to escape. My dad, Falcon, the president of Malice MC, pauses, holding his arm up to get the boys behind him to stop, but you can see the way they’re itching to move forward, the group of them with a range of shock and happiness displayed on their faces.

Dad, on the other hand, is watching Kenzi cautiously, his scrutinizing gaze intense, and I can already tell he knows something isn’t right. I didn’t explain much to him on the phone. Just that we needed the club and they had clearance for one hour.

That’s all he needs.

When family calls, the club comes.

No questions asked.

No explanation needed.

That is who we are, that is the world we grew up in. Just like the SO7, I knew these men, they had my back through some of the hardest fucking times in my life.

And this, right now, is no exception.

“Stay away from me,” Kenzi snaps, struggling to get to her feet. I catch her as her feet slip underneath her in her attempt to escape.

“Why are you running?” Ruin demands. He’s my big brother, our club’s VP, and right in this moment, he is looking at Kenzi with a mixture of pain and anger in his eyes. He steps around my father, moving slowly toward us. “What in the hell, Kenzi?”

Her body is shaking, tears dripping down her face as she forces her back against me, obviously deciding I’m the lesser of two evils. “I know what you did to me,” she snarls like a wild animal backed into a corner. “He told me what you did to me!”

Ruin looks at me, a thick knot between his brows while the club members behind him whisper to each other.

We are all confused.

Confused by her reaction.

Confused by what the hell she’s saying.

“Kenzi…” I try, spinning her around and gripping her shoulders, forcing her to look at me. Her eyes are wide, her breathing erratic and abnormal, shuddering as she fights through the endless tirade of tears. “Kenzi, stop!” I order, trying to be firm, attempting to get her to focus on me instead of what’s going on around her.

“I need to get away from them. Please, get them away from me.”

She’s struggling to breathe. It’s more of a wheeze and suddenly something inside of me clicks.

This isn’t her being dramatic—she’s having a full-blown panic attack.

“I got you.” I sweep her up off her feet, hooking my arm under her knees and carry her bridal style back down the hall. “Get the club into a meeting room. I’ll be there soon,” I call to Luca, who snaps me a salute as he hurries past.

Promptly, I duck back into the room she’d escaped from—it’s a hospital suite and the doctor is still inside with a compress on his head where I assume Kenzi attacked him to steal his key card and open the door. Unfortunately, she couldn’t have hit him hard enough because he managed to hit the alert button before she could get far.

“Out,” I order as I place her at the edge of the bed. He doesn’t argue, scurrying past my brother, who’s forcing his way through the doorway. “Not now, Ruin.”

“She’s my family too,” he argues, stepping inside and pressing the door closed behind him with his back. Leaning against the frame, he raises his eyebrow at me, daring me to snap back. Unfortunately, my big brother is also my VP, and while I’m not involved in a lot of club business these days, I still respect our ways and our laws.

“Kenzi,” I try, standing in front of her, lifting her chin.

Her eyes are covered by glasses, and I can tell she isn’t all there. Her breathing is jagged, and her body shakes like she’s standing naked in a snowstorm.

“Kenzi, stop! It is okay,” I growl a little louder, grabbing her face in my hands and patting her cheek softly.

“You’re bad at this,” Ruin snorts out, walking over to the glass of water on the small side table, picking it up, and upending it over her head.

She gasps, gripping the bed sheets in her hands and shaking her head, trying to disperse the water that is now dripping down onto her Agency-allocated white shirt and gray track pants. “Holy… sh… shit,” she rasps, her voice trembling. Kenzi reaches up, sweeping the wet strands of hair back so they are no longer sticking to her face. Swiftly, I grab a blanket, wrapping it around her shoulders. She snatches the edges, pulling it in closer around her like it’s some kind of instant protective cloak.

Kenzi’s head snaps to the side, and she narrows her eyes on my brother, letting him feel the full force of her glare while the asshole smirks back at her. “The hell do you think you are doing?”

“Bringing you back to the land of the living,” he states. “You’re welcome.”

“You just go around throwing water on people?”

“Riot would’ve been annoyed at me if I’d slapped you,” he counters with a grin. “My options were limited.”

“Riot? Who the hell is Riot,” she hisses, shaking her head and looking between the two of us like we’re the ones who are crazy. “I just… I just want to go. I don’t want to see that club. I can’t. I won’t go with them.”

I hold up my hands, grabbing her attention and pulling her gaze back to me. “Hey, ain’t no one making you go anywhere. You wanna stay here, we stay here,” I try to soothe, watching her shoulders slump and her body curl in on itself. I can feel the question on my tongue I know I need to ask. But the idea of hearing the answer I’m almost positive she’s going to give me—that’s terrifying.

I’m not sure what the next step should be.

The only thing I am sure of at this point, is that I’m not going to lose her twice.

Kenzi may be looking at me right now like I’m the scum of this earth, but I don’t care. I don’t give a fucking damn. I’ll be scum on earth every single fucking day if that’s what it takes to make her okay.

“Kenzi…”

“Why do you keep calling me that?” she asks, this time without the hard snap in her tone.

It isn’t defensive.

But it is curious.

“Because that’s what we’ve always called you,” Ruin answers for me, folding his arms across his chest as he leans back against the door. “Shithead over there couldn’t say your name when you guys were kids. We’re like who the fuck is Enzi? And it just evolved from there.”

I huff out a breath. It’s a story I haven’t heard for years. Yes, technically, I had given her, her first nickname. And it stuck. Forever.

She pauses, her eyes glued to mine, her lips rubbing together like she wants to speak, like she wants to know more, but I know first, there’s that looming question hanging above my head like a dark fucking cloud. One that, by the sound of the way Ruin is talking, he’s already figured out himself.

I spread my feet, shoulder-width apart in a strong stance so I’m ready.

Prepared for the impact.

“You don’t know who I am, do you?”

In my head, I can hear her laughing, see that bright playful smile come over her face that will let me know she’s fooled me, that I’ve played into her joke, and she has won. It wouldn’t be the first time.

When we were fourteen and I kissed Sandra Taylor from school, she told me I’d probably got her pregnant because I didn’t use mouth protection.

My dad literally dragged me from the clubhouse to a strip joint, and that was where we had our first sex talk.

Kenzi laughed for weeks.

I told her dad she was dating the sheriff’s son.

We were even.

“You’re Axel Cruise.”

My eyebrows shoot up. “Wow! Did you just full name me?” She tugs the blanket tighter around her shoulders, but her cloak of invisibility won’t work here. “What date is my birthday?”

She presses her lips together, staring me down like the little soldier she is.

“What’s my middle name?”

She doesn’t move, doesn’t utter a single word.

“What’s my go-to pizza topping?”

“Stop!” she snaps, tears brimming on her bottom lashes, threatening to fall. “Stop it. I don’t know who you are!”

The blow is like taking a bullet to the chest.

It throws me, stalls my heart, and cuts my breathing for a few seconds until I can pull my shit together.

“Who told you my name?”

She pauses, the green in her eyes darkens. It isn’t as rich as before, not as full of life as it once was. “Hendrix.”

“You have no idea who I am,” I voice out loud, not really meaning to, but unable to keep the shock bottled up in my chest. My heart is already thumping harder, feeling like it might explode, like at any moment it might break open my ribcage and I’d just be dead.

Maybe that would be fucking better.

“Fuck!” Ruin curses, hanging his head and shakes it back and forth. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

Kenzi’s staring at me. At least she isn’t afraid, she isn’t trying to run or hurt me, or cursing my name for that matter.

She is just here, looking at me like I’m just some guy holding her captive.

Like any other guy.

Not her best fucking friend.

Not her first kiss.

Not the guy who would die for her.

Not the guy who would kill for her.

A stranger.

Ruin is right.

Fuck.