Unbroken (The Protectors 12)

“This is Con,” Vaughn said as he motioned to the man. “Constantine. Luca and I grew up with him and his brothers, King and Lex.”

Con sent me a small nod and said, “Vaughn was the best equipped of all of us to look for Gio from the inside. Luca’s name was too recognizable.”

I didn’t know what that meant, but I didn’t care either. To Vaughn I said, “What does he mean ‘you looked from the inside’?”

“I started pawning myself off as hired muscle,” Vaughn said.

I felt like I was going to throw up. “You… you helped men like Father keep their secrets?” I whispered.

“Yes,” Vaughn said.

“No,” Luca cut in at the same time. “It was an act,” Vaughn’s brother said. “He never directly hurt any kids and he’d pass the information about the kids back to me. I’d send someone in to get them out as soon as Vaughn had moved onto the next client.”

It took me a moment to process what Luca had said. When I spoke, it was to Vaughn and only Vaughn. “But you had to wait to get them out until you’d gone to work for someone else?”

“Yes,” Vaughn whispered, and I could tell he knew where my mind was going.

I pulled away from him because it was hard to think when he was touching me. “So, when you worked for Father all those months, you weren’t really working for him. But you didn’t try to help me…”

My voice dropped off as everything clicked into place.

“I’m sorry, Aleks,” Vaughn said softly. “I didn’t have a choice.”

I let out a harsh laugh. “Yes, you did. I was the one who couldn’t choose, Vaughn.” I shook my head in disbelief. “All those weeks you knew what he was doing and you had the power to stop it but you didn’t. You… you…”

I couldn’t even put words to what he’d done. “I want to go,” I said as I reached behind me to try and find the knob for the door. But to my own horror, I’d moved in the wrong direction and was closer to the stairs than the door.

And Vaughn was between me and the only way out.

“Aleks,” he began.

“No,” I said, shaking my head violently. “I want to go home.” I backed further toward the stairs. “I want to go home. To Dante.”

I was on the verge of having a complete breakdown. I wanted to believe Vaughn wouldn’t hurt me or turn me over to his brother, but I didn’t know what to think anymore. If I’d been looking at the blue sky and Vaughn had told me it was red, I would have believed him.

He’d done that to me… played me so well I didn’t even know which direction was up and which was down.

Aleks… please… would you... would you call me James… just this one time?

I clapped my hands over my ears and began shaking my head. “No,” I shouted. The darkness came for me and this time I let it in.

“Don’t fucking touch him!” I heard Vaughn shout and then there was more yelling, but I couldn’t make out the words. A hand closed painfully around my wrist.

“Aleks, open your eyes, damn it!”

Not Vaughn’s voice.

“Get your fucking hands off him, Luca!”

Vaughn sounded so distressed that I opened my eyes to look for him. He was trying to get Con to let go of his gun arm. The one holding onto me was Luca and I was no longer by the stairs but in the kitchen. There was blood on my shirt… Vaughn’s too-big shirt, actually, because I hadn’t put my own shirt back on yet.

Had I been shot? Was that why I was so cold?

“Vaughn?” I whispered in confusion.

“Aleks, put the knife down.” The order came from Luca.

Knife? What knife? I looked at the arm he was holding the wrist of, but my hand was empty.

But my other wasn’t.

I gasped at the sight of Vaughn’s utility knife in my right hand. I’d grabbed it off the nightstand when I’d left the room earlier. My intent had been to give it back to Vaughn, but I’d forgotten all about it when I’d heard him, Luca, and Con fighting.

Hadn’t that been a few seconds ago?

I shook my head to try to clear it. Vaughn was shouting at me and Luca. I watched in horror as he slammed his fist into Con’s jaw. I was so distracted that I didn’t notice Luca move until he grabbed for the hand that was holding the knife. Everything happened so fast I couldn’t keep up. One second Luca was grabbing my wrist, the next Vaughn was standing over us, his gun pressed against the side of Luca’s head.

“Take your hands off him!” he snarled.

But Luca didn’t release me.

That was when I registered the blood pouring from Vaughn’s forearm.

The blood that was also on the knife I was still holding.