Desiree
These were the guys who we heard arguing up front. I prayed they hadn’t killed the spa owners as a series of gun blasts had been exchanged while we were in the heat of our own battle in the back.
The sight of their friends so brutally displayed over the floor put vengeance in their eyes and had rage pouring into their bloodstream. The shorter, stocky one bared his teeth as his finger tightened on the trigger.
Khane swung his big body around, shoving Patrena and me hard enough to send us to the floor. A gun blast ripped through the air, but it was the pounding impact the bullet made when it struck Khane’s body that shook me before ripping apart my heart. He stumbled back but didn’t fall.
A fire lit in my throat, signifying the volume on my scream, but I couldn’t hear myself. All I saw was Khane take two more deadly shots before his body fell with a powerful impact a few feet in front of us. He lay faced down, and the force of the bullets had turned him so that his head had landed at our feet.
“Khane! Khane! Get up! Khane!”
I scrambled over to him on my hands and knees, not caring that the men were pointing their weapons at me. They were yelling for me to stay away from Khane. He wasn’t moving, and I couldn’t see his face. His big body lay limp and twisted, as if he’d been hit by a car and left in the streets.
“Khane, please get up,” I cried out. The whole time I was yelling for Khane to get up, I could hear the men celebrating in the background.
“I can’t fucking believe it. I killed Khane “The Kannibal.” Mr. Animal himself. You saw that shit?” The man asked his friend. I hadn’t glanced up at them yet. I attempted to turn Khane over. It didn’t matter what they were saying. I had to look into Khane’s eyes. There was no way he was gone.
“No. No. No,” I repeated, shaking my head as tears dripped down my cheeks like raindrops. Patrena was at my side now, her hands next to mine on Khane’s body, attempting to help me turn him over.
It wasn’t the sound of the gun cocking that stopped me. It was the cold metal pressed to the side of my head. “He’s fucking dead. I did that shit. Now, stand the fuck up. Both of you!” the man yelled.
Patrena and I stood, lifting our hands in surrender. My watery gaze fell back to Khane at my feet, so still. He wasn’t gone. He couldn’t be.
“What the fuck are you shaking your head for? He’s gone. Now, which one of you is Desiree Evans?”
I squeezed my eyes tight after they had fallen closed, seeing over and over the images of Khane getting shot. I prayed like hell that I would open my eyes to the interior of a dark bedroom and wake up from this nightmare.
“Neither of us. You have the wrong people,” I heard Patrena answer the man’s question, her voice sounding distant, although she stood close enough that our raised arms touched.
“Me,” I replied when his question filtered through the horrific chatter crowding my mind. Patrena back-handed my arm for volunteering. “The hell are you doing?” she hissed in my direction.
Khane had been shot because of me. I couldn’t let Patrena get killed too. The best thing for me to do was give myself up and hope that they would leave her alone. The man eyed me up and down before his face filled with a devilish grin, my open robe adding fuel to the swirling chaos. While keeping his aim on me, he reached and gripped me by the hair before forcing me to my knees.
“Man, what the fuck are you doing?” the buddy asked. “You know he wants her alive and why.”
“I’m not going to kill the bitch. But, I do believe I deserve to celebrate, after what I’ve just done. You know how many motherfuckers have gone to hell trying to kill Khane? Not to mention how many we’ve lost today trying to get this bitch.”
When he fingered his zipper to undo his pants, I swallowed before glaring up and shaking my head at him. “Don’t do this, please,” I begged.
“We don’t have time for this. At least wait until we get the fuck out of here. Our people are out there fighting that dead motherfucker’s crew.”
A wicked grin came from the man’s throat as he shoved down his pants and fisted his hard dick.
“We brought a fucking army with us. They can wait five fucking minutes. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Do you have any idea whose daughter this is, and who she is about to become? You can keep the other bitch busy with your dick or your gun. It doesn’t matter to me.”
The friend exhaled a deep breath as his grip tightened around the gun he had to Patrena’s head. He started running the barrel through her hair as he unzipped his pants.
“What happens when whoever wants me finds out you assaulted me?” I asked, hoping the person after me wanted me alive and untouched.
“I’m family. He’ll probably shake my fucking hand.”
We begged and pleaded, but it did nothing but hype up the men’s eagerness to bless us with their chaos. The one standing over me pinched my chin in his bruising grip and held his dick in his free hand. I clamped my eyes shut and sealed my lips, delaying the degrading act.
“Let her go and back away before I rip your body to shreds with my bare hands.”
The hair on my arms and neck lifted at the sound of that voice.
Khane!