Page 111 of Liberated By Sin

“Amara!” Santino’s voice echoed off the walls, mixing with Athena’s.

A fork in the corridor caused us to pause and listen, her screams both a beacon and a source of anguish. But she was alive, hurt, but alive, and that was all we could hope for. Another cry tugged us left to the only closed door in that hallway without a thought, and in a simultaneous gesture of desperation, we shot at the door handle and kicked it open.

Athena and Ronan whipped around. She was straddling his abdomen, wearing only a black bra and underwear. Her skin was stained with dried blood, and the side of her torso was bandaged. But in a split second of distraction, Ronan removed the knife she had presumably stabbed into his shoulder and raised it, aiming for her chest until Santino’s bullet pierced his forearm and into the wall. He yelped like a bitch and dropped the weapon.

“Santi!” Athena staggered to her feet, nearly collapsing when Santino lifted her into his arms.

“Fuck,preziosa, I found you.”

She smiled through the tears and kissed him. “I knew you would.”

My gun was trained on the son of a bitch who once thought himselfmy adoptive father and savior, but his time had come to an end. I finally had him at my mercy. But first…

“Athena.”

She turned to me, cautiously getting to her feet, as a rush of tears flooded her eyes. “Hi, Derek.”

After so many years, my sister was back in my arms and in my life. My stomach reeled when I thought of how easily we’d let her go, believing Ronan’s lies that she’d gone and didn’t want to be found. Maybe I’d felt hurt, betrayed that someone else I cared for had walked away. And that couldn’t have been further from the truth. Kai hadn’t gone into detail, but he said she’d crawled out of hell, a nightmare Ronan had set into motion.

“I missed you,” she said, wiping a tear from my cheek.

I held her gently, afraid to cause her pain, more than she’d already endured. Her face was bruised and swollen, her lip split open, with blood covering most of her skin.

“You need to get out of here. Get checked out.”

She gave me a teary nod.

“You know, I’d hate to break up such a beautiful little family reunion, but I got a hole in my goddamn arm.” Ronan propped himself against the wall.

“You need me to even you out?”

He tipped his head and laughed. “Derek, my pride and joy. It’s been a while, huh? How’s that pretty little wife of yours? And my granddaughter.”

I vividly remembered the last time I’d blown a man’s kneecap.

JamesfuckingFord.

Fatherhood had always terrified me because every man I’d encountered in my life had failed me, beat and destroyed any glimmer of hope and love I’d once craved until I became nothing but a vessel and messenger of death.

I might have forgiven Ronan for all his wrongs, but what he did to Eva warranted a death of the uniquely painful and creative variety.

“Go,” I said to Athena, setting her frail frame back into Santino’s arms. “Get to a hospital. I’ll see you later.”

“Running again,mo stoirin?” Ronan chuckled tauntingly, breathing through the pain of now having a hole in his leg. “You promised me a slow, torturous death, blah blah. Isn’t that what you said?”

Her eyes connected with mine, and a grin lit up her battered face. “Promises kept.”

I sent her a wink as Santino carried her out of the room. Ronan called her name in a sudden panic.

“Begging doesn’t suit you. You knew this would be your end. And here I am, keeping my own promise, and the one I made my wife—the woman you sold to that Belov motherfucker.”

He hissed, dragging his mangled leg as he attempted to sit upright. “Come on, son, are you going to let pussy ruin our relationship?”

I holstered my weapon and slowly unsheathed my blade. “You’re talking too much, and I haven’t even started. Maybe I should take your tongue first.”

“You goddamn ungrateful son of a bitch. I should have let you rot in that home. Maybe that’s what you wanted, to stay on your knees and become a whore too.”

I swallowed thickly as unfettered rage caused my hands to tremble at his words and the memories they evoked. Gripping the leather hilt, I brought the knife to his throat and pierced his skin until his blood dripped down my forearm.

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