Captivated

“When we’re through here, remind me to plant my foot in your ass.”

“As you wish.” He always gets snooty after talking to gramps. It’s because of the bitch teeth in his damn mouth. He reached for the doorbell, but that shit seemed way too polite for what we came here for. I pounded on the door like the heat, full fist.

I know how that sound can put fear in lesser men, and since this one was as low as you could get, I figured he’d be shitting his pants or damn near to it, wondering which one of his fucked up sins had caught up to him.

He tried that opening the door just a crack bullshit with the chain still in place, but I had other ideas. “Who…?” I was born knowing how to approach doors without being seen, so he only saw Dray standing there. But before he could finish his sentence, I had my foot already planted in the door and was kicking it in.

That shit sounded loud as fuck as it splintered under the pressure of my foot, pushing him back against the wall. He was so flustered by the sudden move that he didn’t have time to catch himself before I was on him. “Hi, asshole, remember me?”

I pulled him up by his collar and planted my fist in his face over and over until I heard bones crack. Gramps only said not to kill the fuck; he didn’t say shit about maiming. “Alright boss, that’s enough go get your girl.”

“Wait, what girl?” It was the first words out of the fuck’s mouth as we heard running footsteps heading our way.

I pushed past who I’m guessing is his wife and walked down the long hallway calling out for her. “Michele baby, where are you?” She opened the door to the room at the end of the hall, looking scared. “Damien? What’s going on? What’re you doing here?”

“Grab your stuff, baby; you’re coming with me.” She still didn’t move as if her feet were stuck, but I knew she was just in shock. Seeing her, I felt my heart beat normal again and didn’t realize that it had been damn near beating at twice its rate this whole time.

I pulled her into my arms even as her sister yelled obscenities in the background, and Dray kept telling the asshole to keep still before he breaks his neck. I held her close and lowered my lips to her ear after kissing her forehead. “I know, baby.”

She jerked back like I’d gut-punched her and would’ve fallen if I hadn’t still had my arms around her. “You know? Know what?” From the tone in her voice and the way her eyes looked around for an escape like she was being cornered, I knew she knew what I was referring to. And when her body started to tremble, I was doubly sure.

I had to grit my teeth to hold onto my composure, torn between obeying the grandfather I love and exacting revenge on the two people down the hall for the shit they’d put my woman through. Again the need to get her out of there as quickly as possible won out, and I pushed her back into the room with an order.

“Pack what you need, you’re not coming back here.” She went into flight mode, but the thing that gutted me is the way she moved around the room, picking up shit like she’d already mapped it out in her mind. It was obvious that these were her hiding places, the place where she kept her phone, there was another bag with clothes, this one a little bigger than the one she hid behind the store.

She looked at the picture of her and the sister on the nightstand for a good few seconds before sighing and walking away. I took the stuff from her in one hand and took her hand in the other, pulling her along behind me.

Dray had his hand across the asshole’s neck, pinning him to the wall while the sister ineffectively pulled at him to get him off, screeching like a banshee. “Bitch shut the fuck up!” She stopped mid-scream or yell or whatever the fuck it was she was doing and looked at me with wild eyes.

Now I’m not one for calling a female out of her name, but chick’s lucky that’s the extent I went to. I couldn’t help but lean in and share a little parting truth with the two of them, though.

“You’re lucky she’s here; if not, they’d never find you. Come near her again, and there’ll be pieces of you all over this fucking city. Dray, let’s go.” The asshole struggled hard once Dray let him go, and when he made a move as if to grab her, I throat punched his ass…hard.