Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 73724 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73724 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
I nod and suck in another calming breath.
My sisters come to give me hugs, then Eleni wraps her arm around my lower back and rests her head against my shoulder. “We’re all here for you.”
Without them, I wouldn’t survive this brutal world. I need to dig deep and somehow become more powerful than my father.
But how?
Chapter 3
KNIGHT
Standing to the side near the SUVs, I’m holding an automatic machine gun while my eyes scan the shipping docks.
Santiago is busy meeting with a businessman who needs to be safely extracted from Albania. From what I understand, the man got his hands on sensitive data and the company he’s employed with now wants him dead.
I’ve been working with Santiago for over two years, placing me in the position where I’m able to kill the most evil motherfuckers.
Like the ones who murdered my sister.
The image of Ronnie’s lifeless body flashes through my mind, and my jaw clenches as my finger tightens around the trigger. While I was away from home on a tour as a Navy Seal, my sister was grabbed from her campus and sold into sex slavery. She suffered for nine months before I was able to track her down.
But I was too late. The fuckers pumped her full of cocaine, and she overdosed while some bastard was raping her.
Sweat starts to bead on my forehead and the back of my neck, and I have to try to forcefully shove the gruesome image from my mind for the zillionth time.
Santiago found me after I killed every single fucker responsible for Ronnie’s death. I was standing among a pile of bodies when his men breached the house where my baby sister died. Apparently, the same assholes who took Ronnie grabbed the girlfriend of one of his soldiers, and they were there to get her back.
The day I lost Ronnie, I also lost my will to live.
Ronnie and I grew up in a rough neighborhood, and our father wasn’t around much, because he was too busy getting drunk. Our mother up and left the night before Christmas. After that, Ronnie and I only had each other. As her much older brother it was my duty to take care of her.
She was my entire life. That’s why I joined the Navy. I wanted to make something of myself so I could provide for her. She was studying to become an engineer and had a bright future ahead of her.
A tremble ghosts through my body as the past creeps around the edges of my mind. It’s always there to haunt me, and when there’s no work to be done and things are quiet, it fucking torments me to within an inch of my sanity.
It’s a fucking miracle I haven’t pulled the trigger on myself.
Yet.
Santiago ends the meeting and watches as the businessman gets into a container that’s been rigged with an air conditioning unit, the interior looking like a luxurious living room.
The door is shut, and after it’s locked, we remain in place until the container is safely loaded onto a ship that will take the man to Australia.
My eyes flick back to Santiago. Even though he’s a criminal, the man suffers from a bleeding heart. The only reason I aligned myself with him is because he despises sex slavery almost as much as I do. He’s made it his life’s mission to take down the Rojas cartel, and I figured I’d hang around to help him do that.
But over the past two years, I’ve gotten to know Santiago well, and the man has grown on me. He never shuts up, and I don’t have much to say, which works well for our friendship.
Looking like he doesn’t have a care in the world, Santiago saunters closer to me, and noticing I’m wound tight, he lets out a chuckle and says, “Relax. We won’t run into any problems today.”
I nod, my body remaining tense.
He leans back against the SUV, his eyes resting on the ship. “We’ll head home tomorrow for the meeting with the other alliance members.”
I nod again.
From my peripheral vision, I see him looking at me. A few seconds later, he murmurs, “Bad day?”
I quickly learned not to bother hiding my bad days from Santiago, because he’ll pester me until I give in. I also don’t get angry anymore, since his concern comes from a place of love.
When I nod, he says, “Just twenty minutes, and we’ll head back to the hotel and get drunk.”
The corner of my mouth lifts. “We don’t need to get drunk.”
He nudges his shoulder against mine. “Pussy?”
This time, I let out a chuckle. “Contrary to popular belief pussy isn’t the solution to every problem.”
“Yeah, but it sure as hell helps to relieve tension.” His words are closely followed by a bark of laughter. “Fine. I give up. What do you want to do?”