Page 19 of K: The Aftermath
I almost pivot on my heels to sprint back up the stairs. The only reason I don’t is because I cleared Vladimir’s room only minutes ago. It was as black and as lifeless as my heart now feels—as dark as death.
With a roar of a deranged man, I fire at the surveillance monitors like I wish I could have done to Achim and Vladimir. I gun them down before I discover the ending of Vladimir’s stalk to K’s side of the room. He has a gleam in his eyes I’m all too familiar with. The same savage glint that brightens my eyes anytime I look at K. The wolf is hunting his prey. He’s going to hurt my duchess.
I continue firing at the now-mangled security system until the faintest snivel steals the devotion of my gun. I aim it in the direction the cry came from before stepping deeper into the dark. “You didn’t listen. No matter what I said, no matter what I did, you never heard a word I spoke. You wanted the castle, I gave you the entire fucking kingdom, but it still wasn’t enough for you, was it?” As I inch back the trigger, I hear someone call my name. Well, I assume they’re saying my name. I can’t hear anything through the pounding of my pulse in my ears. “Is this where you hid when he brutalized her? Did you sit back and watch the videos of the sick fucks raping her over and over again?” As the evil inside of me roars to life, I scream, “Did you ever feel one fucking day of guilt! She could have given you the world, but you were too fucking stupid to see it. Too fucking blind. Her head would haveneverworn your crown because it was too tainted for her level of royal-ness.”
“And here I was thinking the Corbyn men cared about no one but themselves,” says an unfamiliar but heavily accented female voice.
My eyes blink in rapid concession when a light is suddenly switched on. I blink and blink and blink but nothing takes away the image of my nightmare sitting directly in front of me. K is tied to a wooden chair. A hessian bag is pulled over her head, and my gun is pointed at her stomach. Eight is on her right. Although he doesn’t have his head covered, he is gagged.
They shouldn’t have bothered impacting his speech. His eyes tell me what he wants me to do. No matter what, he wants me to pick K.
Although I appreciate his loyalty, I’d rather gun down the bitch responsible for K’s slumped form than play a second game of roulette.
India smiles with smugness when I direct the barrel of my gun at the crinkle between her brows. “What the fuck is your issue?” I’d take her down without any questions if I hadn’t seen the pistol she has butted up against K’s ribs. She could survive a bullet wound to the stomach, but our daughter most certainly wouldn’t. “Did daddy spoil his little princess too much she’d rather run his legacy into the ground than see it thrive?”
I realize I hit the motherlode when India’s eye twitches out. “Quite the opposite, actually. He’d rather betroth his only daughter to a monster than make her feel one-of-a-kind.”
If anything she’s saying is true, why is she taking her anger out on K? She’s been Achim’s victim for far longer than India. Hasn’t she suffered enough?
When I say that to India, she replies, “Because she took what wasn’t hers! First you, then Cole.” When I balk in shock, India smiles like a vindictive cow. “Oh, you didn’t know? You’re not the only Corbyn man with a fascination for the help.Inursed him back to health.Ishowed him how he could re-seize his throne, then he tossed me aside the instantshewas placed on his radar.” K’s whimper is silent when India pushes the muzzle on her gun deep into her stomach but I feel every painful scream bubbling in her chest. “We were supposed to destroy our fathers as they had us before ruling together, but he was too obsessed with her.” Her eyes come up to mine. “Why do you think Achim killed him? It wasn’t for me. He couldn’t care less that I was sleeping with Cole. But he was never going to let another Corbyn man touch her.”
Hate makes my blood hot when her dig of K’s ribs this time around sends a pained sob rippling through my ears. India tilted her gun to ensure K’s stomach won’t be the only thing pierced by her bullet. So will her heart.
If I fire at her, she’ll kill my wife and daughter with one bullet.
“What do you want?” The fact I’m negotiating reveals how lost I am. As Nikolai said months ago, we don’t negotiate with whores. We tell them what to do, and they do it or die, but this is different. My entire world is strapped to that chair. I won’t risk them for anything.
My brows stitch when India replies, “I don’t want anything.” I realize just how vindictive she is when she adds, “From you. You’ve done enough, now you can leave the rest up to us.” With a smile as hideously ugly as her insides, she nudges her head to the right.
“You fucking piece of shit,” I growl out in a roar when Maddox steps out of a darkened nook in the corner of the almost pitch-black room. He’s holding an automatic weapon in his hands and has the sneer of a murderer stretched across his face. “Not even your sister will save you from this. Do you hear me? You’re a dead man walking.”
“Blood isn’t always thicker than water, Trey. Thought you’d know that better than anyone.” After dotting my chest with the scope of his rifle, he adds, “I heard lots of stories during my time in lock up. Failed takeover bids. Men being brought back from the brink of death. Duchesses so desperate for a crown, they fucked with the wrong family over and over again.”
My brows draw together when he shifts the red dot on my chest to India’s. I’m not the only one shocked. India is just as taken aback. “Wraith…”
Wraith? Who the fuck is Wraith?
“I don’t know what shocks me more, the fact you think I didn’t scan the face ofeveryperson surrounding the cage my sister was mauled in, or that I didn’t hear your disappointed sigh when Col agreed with my barter of my life for Justine’s.” Maddox adjusts the perimeter of his scope from India’s thrusting chest to her head before he says, “You were so fucking desperate to be top dog, you didn’t consider who you were taking down in the process.” When he breathes out, “Dimitri says hello,” I growl K’s name in a mangled groan.
K’s chin has only just balanced on her chest when a bullet from Maddox’s assault rifle pierces through India’s skull. The impact is so direct, only the wall behind India’s head gets splattered with her brain matter.
When she slumps to the floor with a thump, in sync, Maddox and I take aim at each other. He may have just killed one of my enemies, but he did it while speaking the name of another. That puts him on the opposing side of my team.
Although Maddox’s rifle is aimed at my chest, he tries to weasel his way out of our confrontation. “I couldn’t lure India out of hiding without offering up an incentive.”
“Admitting you brutalized my woman won’t do you any favors.”
“What would you rather, Trey? Your girl tied up and safe, or lying lifeless in a ditch with her stomach barren of your child?” When white hot anger flares through my eyes, he spits out, “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” He works his jaw over three times before he lowers his gun. “If it weren’t for Dimitri and me, she’d be dead in four months.” He nudges his head at K during the ‘she’d’ part of his reply. “Why do you think India wanted her brought in alive?”
My finger curls around the trigger of my gun when he digs his hand into the pocket of his jeans. Like an idiot not in fear for his life, he smiles. It would have been his last if the sale docket he tosses onto the table K and Eight are seated behind had any association with K.
“Who’s Audrey?” I ask after taking in the name of the woman sold in a similar fashion to K. Her sale receipt is slightly different than K’s, though. It mentions she’s eight months pregnant.
My eyes snap back to Maddox when he replies, “Dimitri’s wife. Well, shewashis wife before that piece of shit tested your theory that blood isn’t thicker than water.” After glaring at India lying in a pool of her blood, he returns his eyes to mine. “Up until twenty minutes ago, Dimitri wasn’t your enemy. I guess only time will tell where we go from here. Things get hostile when a mutual nemesis is eradicated.”
After smirking like a smile will stop me from shooting him in the back, he pivots on his heels and stalks toward the alcove he was hiding out in. I should gun him down like he did India, then feed him to the pigs. I should remind him that he’s on Popov turf and that nothing happens here without Nikolai’s permission, but instead of doing either of those things, I suck in the scent of rain-soaked hair and dirt on sweat-slicked skin, aware Nikolai would most likely issue Maddox a pardon since he killed for Justine.
Within seconds, K’s scent brings me out of the darkness. She reminds me that there’s more to living than hate. This lifestyle is a part of who I am, but it isn’tallI am.
I am a husband and a father-to-be.
A brother and a son.
I’m also a survivor who isn’t ashamed to admit his past fucked with his head, but he’s strong enough not to let it steer his future.
A king isn’t born.
He’s made.
And it’s time for this king to return to his realm.
