Page 132 of Unorthodox
Interesting when the lion becomes the lamb, just days away from slaughter.
And it’s infuriating that I can’t help but feel a sense of foreboding about what’s to come. A sliver of unease at making a man like Max become…nothing.
As I watch him sleep, a slice of moonlight illuminating the sharp planes of his face, the wounds on his perfect skin, it’s his eyelashes, more than anything else, that remind me that he was once a little boy.
They’re long and black, nearly grazing his cheeks as he sleeps. I don’t know what horrors he lived with, but I can only imagine they’re as bad as mine. To become this evil, this monstrous, yet with that finely-honed edge of manipulation…he came from somewhere dark.
But I think he’s forgotten, in his world of wickedness, that he isn’t the only one. He isn’t the only one that grew up with fiends masquerading as parents. He isn’t the only one who received pain instead of comfort. And he’s not the only one who can snake his way out of a fate worse than death.
I breathein Addison’s innocent scent, hold her closer to me in her bed, my hands wrapped around her chest.
Blinking my eyes open, I wince, taste blood in my mouth.
There’s dim light coming from the small window set near her ceiling, and I know today is going to be a long one. I know I should get up, slip out of here.
But I don’t.
Luca is holding another party before he returns south, to Miami. I have no interest in going, considering what happened last time I did, but he has information that I need. He’d looked into Jameson’s claims that Danik London is a narc, but he didn’t want to tell me what he found over the phone, and the past five days, I’ve been a little fucking busy.
I press my swollen lips to Addison’s hair, letting my eyes flutter closed. A sharp pain lights up along my brow, and every muscle in my body aches.
Still, with her so close to me, her perfect body, her beautiful face and the memory of her staring up at me, on her knees…my dick is aching being so close but knowing I have to give it all up soon.
Giveherup.
The second visit to see Elliot down in Culiacan was a reminder of just what I have to lose.
I took the flight because the day after Luca’s party, the asshole with the face tattoos wouldn’t leave the edge of my property, him and his men in blacked-out vehicles on my street. Typically, I would’ve fucking killed them, called in a guy to bury the bodies.
But this is different.
I’m a puppet on a string until I have Oliver back. And not only is there more to lose, but the playing field is far dirtier.
This isn’t on the same level as the factions of individuals that work along the east coast hoarding their own assets, stacking their own cash, dealing in drugs and guns and trafficking.
I have no love for America, but their criminals know how to keep things on the low. There are no heads in freezers, no bodies hanging from bridges.
In some parts of Mexico, with the cartels, things aren’t so…nice.
I was reminded of that the second I stepped foot out of the airport and me and my guard were both drugged.
I woke up in a warehouse, a bag over my head, arms bound behind my back.
Things got worse from there.
Zeke, I was told, took things too far. Zeke was only supposed to “check on” Addison. ButI, apparently, wasn’t supposed to kill him.
For that, I paid with my own blood.
And I saw another video of just the sort of hell Oliver has endured.
My stomach twists up in knots, thinking about it.
About him.
On his knees.
A collar around his throat. His mouth opening and closing as he tried not to hum, like he always did when we were kids and he was nervous. Of the way he rocked back and forth, and Addison’s future buyer struck him with a whip each time he moved.
