Song: Animals – Maroon 5
KEIFER POV
The early morning light was just beginning to cut through the heavy charcoal drapes, painting soft silver lines across the mattress.
I hadn’t slept a single wink, and I didn’t care.
Sleeping felt like a waste of time when the only thing I had craved for years was finally lying right beside me.
I propped myself up on one elbow, staring down at my wife.
Finally.
Finally in my house, under my roof, in my bedroom, and in my bed.
After years of running from my shadow, dodging my phone calls, and glaring at me from across crowded ballrooms, she had nowhere left to hide.
“It has been so long since you came to my house, Jay,” I whispered into the quiet room, my voice rough and husky, even though I knew she was out cold and couldn’t hear a word.
Just watching her chest rise and fall beneath the gray cotton tank top eased the violent, burning itch that had lived inside my ribs for a decade.
The gold band gleamed on her left hand, matching the one on mine, sealing her to my name and my world forever.
As if sensing my voice, she let out a tiny, soft murmur in her sleep.
She shifted against the pillows, turning completely away from the edge of the mattress, and lazily swung one of her bare legs straight over mine.
Her warm, soft skin rested heavily against my thigh, completely shattering that ridiculous fifty-fifty invisible border she had threatened to end my bloodline over last night.
A quiet, genuine smile broke across my face.
She could act as fierce and untouchable as she wanted while awake, but her body still remembered where she was safe.
It still gravitated toward my heat the second her guard went down.
I leaned down slowly, careful not to wake her, and pressed a lingering, reverent kiss right to the center of her forehead.
She let out a contented sigh, leaning into the contact.
My mouth moved to the soft skin of her temple, lingering there before trailing gentle, feather-light kisses down her flushed cheek, over the delicate line of her cheekbone, and finally pressing against the soft, warm corner of her lips.
“You are never leaving this bed, amor,” I murmured against her skin, smoothing a loose strand of dark hair behind her ear.
“Never again.”
Just then, the sharp buzz of my encrypted phone vibrated against the marble nightstand, shattering the quiet room.
I let out an irritated sigh, carefully sliding my arm out from under her head so I wouldn’t disturb her sleep, and snatched the phone before the ringing could wake her up.
“What now?” I asked, my voice flat, cold, and stripped of all the softness I had just given my wife.
“Boss, we found Julian’s location,” my man reported through the encrypted receiver, the background static humming with quiet urgency.
That bastard.
We finally had him cornered.
The only reason this wedding had been dragged forward to yesterday was because Jasfher had forced our hand.
The man refused to take any chances with his daughter’s life, knowing the Lockharts and their allies were mobilizing.
Jasfher had even looked me dead in the eye and threatened that if I did not marry her immediately on his revised schedule, he would cancel the entire union, pull Jay into a private compound across the country, and cut off my access to her permanently.
He left me zero choice.
If I had my way, if it had been entirely up to me, I would have hunted down and butchered the entire Lockhart bloodline down to the last drop before ever letting my Jay Jay walk down an altar in a rush.
I would have laid their severed heads at her feet just to ensure the city was completely quiet for our vows.
“I will be there in thirty minutes,” I commanded in a low, lethal murmur, terminating the call.
I tossed the phone onto the armchair and carefully moved the heavy comforter aside, easing my legs over the edge of the mattress.
“Keifer…”
The tiny, drowsy murmur came from behind me.
Jay shifted blindly across the empty sheets, reaching her hand out into the cold space where my body had just been, her eyes still squeezed shut in heavy sleep.
My heart squeezed with an intensity that almost brought me to my knees.
The monster ready to execute a rival syndicate completely bowed to the sleepy girl searching for my warmth.
I leaned back over the bed, resting one hand on the mattress beside her cheek, and dipped my head down until my lips brushed against her warm, soft skin.
“No me tardo nada, mi vida, quédate pensando en mí,” I whispered against her temple, pressing a slow, tender kiss right to the delicate bone.
I won’t be long at all, my life, keep thinking of me.
She let out a soft, sleepy hum, nuzzling her face directly into the dent of my pillow where my scent lingered, drifting right back into her dreams.
I pulled the thick blanket gently up to her chin, making sure she was completely warm and tucked in.
The moment I straightened my posture, the gentle husband vanished behind iron walls.
I grabbed a clean black button-down, slipped my shoulder holster into place, and walked out of the room to finish the bloodbath that should have ended days ago.
Luckily, my men had moved fast.
They breached Julian’s safehouse before he could even reach for his piece, knocked his teeth loose, and dragged him kicking and screaming straight to our deserted warehouse near the old docks.
I pulled my car inside the perimeter gate, cut the engine, and stepped out into the damp morning air.
I unbuttoned my black dress shirt, slipped it off my shoulders, and tossed the fabric through the open car window onto the leather seat.
The only thing left covering my torso was my fitted black ribbed tank top, leaving the heavy ink on my skin and the old, jagged scars across my arms and ribs completely exposed.
It was better this way.
Blood has an annoying habit of ruining good Italian cotton.
I pulled a cigar from my silver case, clipped the end, and sparked the lighter with a quiet metallic click.
I took a slow, heavy drag, letting the smoke curl past my lips, and pushed open the rusted metal service door of the warehouse.
The moment my combat boots crossed the threshold, the high-voltage industrial floodlights hummed and flared to life, washing the concrete floor in a harsh, blinding glare.
Julian Lockhart was strapped tightly to a rusted metal chair in the dead center of the room.
His face was already swollen purple from the breach, blood trickling from his split eyebrow down onto his designer shirt, his breath rattling wet and shallow in his chest.
Four of my executioners stood behind him with their hands crossed, like statues carved of lead.
I walked over at a calm, unhurried pace, the steady click of my boots echoing against the high corrugated walls.
Julian raised his bruised head, his eyes widening in pure, panicked horror the second he recognized who had just walked into the light.
I stopped right in front of him, towering over his battered frame.
I took one more long, deliberate pull from the cigar, tilted my head down, and blew the thick gray smoke directly into his bleeding face.
“Why were you after Jay?” I asked him, my voice flat, quiet, and completely devoid of anything human.
“Who says we were after Jay?” Julian spat out, coughing up a dark glob of crimson saliva that splattered against the concrete near my boots.
The syllables barely left his mouth before my fist connected with the side of his skull
A sickening crack echoed through the cavernous room as his head snapped violently sideways, teeth and blood spraying across the floor.
The metal chair squealed against the cement from the pure impact.
“Don’t you fucking dare call her Jay,” I threatened, my voice dropping into a guttural, vibrating snarl.
I dropped the cigar, crushed the glowing ember beneath the sole of my boot, and lunged forward.
My hands clamped onto the collar of his ruined designer shirt, hauling him straight up until his feet barely grazed the ground, the rusted bolts of the chair groaning under the strain.
I dragged his face within an inch of mine, letting him smell the tobacco, the cold sweat, and the absolute, unhinged murder radiating off my skin.
“Her name does not belong in your filthy mouth, Lockhart,” I whispered, the veins along my neck and temples throbbing with lethal intent.
“You speak of her as Mrs. Watson, or you never speak again. Now answer the fucking question before I start peeling your fingers off one by one.”
“I swear we weren’t after Mrs. Watson!” Julian begged, his voice cracking into a high-pitched, pathetic whimper as he choked against the collar of his shirt.
“I swear on my life, Watson! We were never targeting her!”
“Then why kill the Mariano men? And what about those imported weapons at the docks?” I asked, my voice low as I shoved him backward, letting the chair slam hard against the concrete floor.
Before Julian could sputter out another useless excuse, the sliding doors at the far end of the warehouse rattled loudly and rolled open.
Heavy, deliberate footsteps echoed across the empty space.
“Did he say anything yet?” Aries asked, stepping directly into the glare of the overhead floodlights.
I shook my head once, my jaw clenched tight.
“Just begging and denying everything.”
Aries did not waste a single second.
He unbuttoned his crisp white dress shirt, stripped it off with smooth efficiency, and tossed it carelessly onto a nearby shipping crate, leaving him in a dark gray tank top.
“Where is Percy?” I asked, rolling my shoulders as the blood pounded behind my ears.
“He is with Dad. They are tied up in an emergency meeting with the elders,” Aries answered, his cold, deadpan gaze drifting down to where Julian was
Aries tilted his head slightly, studying the blood dripping from Julian
“Hmm,” Aries muttered, cracking his knuckles with a slow, sickening pop.
“I don’t think he is damaged enough yet.”
A dark, mocking smirk pulled at the corner of my mouth.
I stepped back, crossing my arms over my chest, giving Aries all the room he needed to work.
“Better to answer now, Lockhart,” Aries warned him, his voice flat, dangerously calm, and stripped of all patience.
“Because once I start, I don’t stop until there is nothing left of you to put in a grave.”
“We weren’t fucking after your sister!” Julian yelled, thrashing against the heavy ropes as panic completely overwhelmed whatever common sense he had left.
Aries paused mid-step, his dark eyes narrowing “Then who the fuck were you after?”
Julian choked on his own bloody spit, his eyes darting frantically from Aries to where I was standing in the shadows.
“Keifer Watson,” Julian blurted out.
The entire warehouse went dead silent.
Then the sheer absurdity of the words hit my brain, and a loud, uncontrollable bark of laughter tore out of my throat.
I burst into full, hysterical laughter.
I threw my head back, my chest heaving with raw amusement, running a hand through my dark hair as Aries raised an eyebrow at me.
“You motherfucker actually thought you had the courage, or even the power, to touch me?” I asked, still chuckling darkly as I took slow, deliberate strides straight back into his personal space.
“This is honestly the funniest fucking joke I have heard in my entire life, Lockhart. You really thought a pathetic rat like you could put a bullet through me?”