“I did,” I defended. “Barely.”
“Whatever. I’m sick of this bitch,” Jay spat. “Let’s just kill her and be done with it.”
“Why do we have to kill her?” I asked. “We’re leaving the city anyway. This is all a nonissue really.”
“On principal alone,” Jay said. “The woman is too foolish to be afraid of us. She has no idea who she’s dealing with. I’m fucking sick of people underestimating us. Lack of fear of the Barrett name is what got our parents killed. I sure as hell am not going to allow anyone else in my family to die because people don’t respect the name.”
“Let’s just ignore her.” I was growing impatient with this conversation, and my balls still ached.
“Or not…” Banks interjected, his left brow quirking. “Hear me out on this.”
He stood and began pacing as he often did when he was coming up with a plan. Banks was the organized mastermind in many of our jobs. When he started to pace like a caged animal, we all knew he had something up his sleeve. It was obvious in his stance and narrowed eyes that his mind was spinning.
“Kit likes this woman. A lot. And we are worried about how Kit is going to adjust to living out in the middle of nowhere on the mountain. No friends. No one to keep her company while we are trying to fix what is a disaster of a property and a rebuild. We have each other, but Kit—”
“Has us,” Jay interrupted. He was always the most protective one of us when it came to our sister.
“Which isn’t going to be enough, and we all know it,” Banks said. “But what if we take the woman with us? To the cabin?”
I chuckled. “Like a nanny? Are you fucking kidding me? Have you met this woman? Number one, there is no way she would just agree to picking up and moving with us to a hidden cabin in the woods on an uninhabited mountain. Number two, I think she would drive us all fucking insane.” Yeah, my balls still ached.
“I’m not suggesting we ask,” Banks said, his jaw tightening as he looked at each of us. “We can always take Kit’s advice.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Jay asked.
“We all agree that we want what is best for Kit, right?”
Jay punched his arm. “Don’t be an ass. Of course we do. Get to the point.”
Banks shrugged. “Then it’s simple. We just take the witch.”
“Take? As in kidnap her?” I asked, not entirely against the idea for some odd reason. Maybe because I wanted the ache in my balls to go away, and her tongue licking every inch of my cock would sure help my current situation.
We all sat in silence, knowing damn well what Banks was suggesting. It wasn’t like kidnapping her was all that shocking to any of us. We had all done worse in our lives. Much worse. And when it came to family, our father had taught us there was nothing we wouldn’t do for blood. Nothing.
“You and Jay are heading out tomorrow to get started and meet the deliveries before I leave with Kit. You both could easily take Goldie with you then,” Banks suggested as he ran his hand through his hair, clearly working out the details in his head.
“Are we seriously considering this?” Jay asked.
Fuck yes, we were.
We were.
7
Goldie
“We’re closed,” I called out when I heard the door to the store open.
I had never had to lock the door until right before I went upstairs to my apartment before, but I made a mental note that with all the unexpected visitors as of late, I would have to start.
“We know,” I heard a deep voice say as two figures emerged from the shadows.
I dropped my pen—though I should have probably kept it as a weapon to gouge out the eyes of these assholes—and pushed aside my bookkeeping ledgers to glare at two of the Barrett Brothers walking into my store as if they had every right to do so.
“Seriously?” I asked with the most intense glare I could master, though I would be lying if I said the way they both looked at me didn’t cause my body to quiver. But no way was I going to reveal that fact if I could help it. Moving around the counter, I said, “Is it now your turn to fuck with me like your brother did? Well, like I told him, you can go to he—”
Before I could finish my sentence, before I could even blink, the larger one had me pinned with my face smashed against the wall, his hand wrapped around my throat, his other hand in my hair, pulling it painfully as he yanked my head back, his face a fraction of an inch from mine.