Page 96 of The King of Hearts

My eyes track up and down her body, pausing a moment on her stomach, looking for any signs of injury, as I stride across the room. She has splotches of blood on the side of her face, and I’m guessing it’s from the dead man without a face lying on the floor a few feet away from them. Seeing that red on her skin, knowing it’s there because Marcelo shot the man in the head when it was only inches away from hers, has my own blood turning to lava. Marcelo wouldn’t have taken the shot unless he was certain Savina wouldn’t be harmed, but it still pisses me off. It’s not directed at my trusted guard, but at the man on the floor. He’s already dead, but I still want to mutilate his body.

As soon as I’m standing in front of Savina, I grab her chin and lift her face to mine. I turn her head from one side to the other, checking to make sure there are no fragments of bone matter that’s cut into her skin. I run my hands down her sides, my eyes following their movements, spending an extra minuteon her belly as I inspect every inch of her closely. Then I turn her around and do the same to her back half.

Once I’m satisfied she’s not injured, I take hold of her chin again and lift her face so her wary gaze is on me. I can only imagine what she sees on my face. I’m fucking livid, but what I feel the most is relief. The relief is easier to keep off my face, but the pure rage going through me, there’s not a chance in hell of hiding that.

“Are you okay?” I ask, the words grate through clenched teeth.

“Yes, I think so.”

“Excuse me,” one of the officers says from across the table. “We need to ask Ms. Rivers a few questions.”

I don’t take my eyes off Savina when I reply with, “Talk to the other witnesses first.”

“We already have officers talking to them outside.” The officer, Stewart Mason, a wannabe jock who played on the basketball team in high school a decade ago, clears his throat and the sound grates on my nerves. “It’s imperative we speak with Ms. Rivers now.”

“It’s fine. I can?—”

Savina stops talking when I let her chin go and slowly turn my head toward the officer.

“I’m taking my fiancée home. She’ll come by the station tomorrow, and you can speak with her then.”

Whether it’s the tone of my voice or the ire darkening my eyes, or it could be the threatening vibes radiating off of me that’s slowly filling the room, but Stewart relents with a chin jerk and takes a step back. “Tomorrow then.”

“There’s no need for that,” Savina says, pulling my attention back to her.

“For what?”

“Intimidation. I’m fine to talk to the police now.”

“No, you aren’t. You’re fucking shaking.”

“Of course I am.” She rolls her eyes, and I want to smack her ass for it. “I just had a gun pointed at my head, and the man holding it there just had his head blown off. Now I have his blood and pieces of brain on my face.”

“Exactly.”

We stare at each other for a moment before she releases a breath. “Fine. I’ll talk to them tomorrow. Let me check on Emersyn and say goodbye to her and Tomas.”

I only allow her to move away from me because she’s just going to the other side of the table. Her friend, Emersyn, is sitting in one of the chairs. She has a small cut on the corner of her mouth, and a bruise is already forming on her cheek. I want to kill the dead bastard on the floor for touching her. Not because I care for Emersyn, but because Savina cares for her. I know seeing her friend like that hurts her, and anything that hurts my Vicious deserves to die. Tomas stands by Emersyn’s chair, and there’s a paramedic who’s just approached.

I turn slightly to the side, still keeping Savina in view. “I only see one dead body. Where’s the other one?” I ask Marcelo. I heard two voices on the audio feed in my car.

“It’s being taken care of,” he replies.

“I want him alive.”

Marcelo dips his chin. “Of course.”

I look at my head of security, a man I’ve known for fifteen years. If I had the emotional ability to have a best friend, it would be this man.

“Thank you,” I tell him. I don’t give my gratitude often because more times than not, the shit I’m grateful for I earn myself without the help of others. Today though, Marcelo more than earned my eternal thanks.

He looks over at Savina, who’s quietly talking to Emersyn and Tomas while the paramedic checks over the damage to Emersyn’s face. “Don’t mention it.”

Marcelo is like me in many ways. What little emotions he’s capable of feeling, he never lets show. He grew up on the streets after living twelve hellacious years with his parents. I’ve never delved into the details of his life, but I know shit happened to him that wasn’t pretty. Surviving on the streets wasn’t much better.

When I saw Savina for the first time two years ago and made the decision to own her, I wanted access to her at all times. Marcelo was the first person I thought of to have shadow her. I wasn’t the person who orchestrated her kidnapping, but I used that incident to my advantage. The letters my Vicious received, the threats of retribution for killing the man who took her, were my doing. I needed her father to believe that, although they found and murdered the man who abducted her, the threat was still alive.

There were three reasons why I waited two years to claim my vicious little angel. The most obvious was her age.

---