Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 96714 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96714 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Then my cell phone went off. She gave me this smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. The smile she’d given me when we were first married. She wasn’t happy, but she didn’t want to be questioned.
Now the cartel had my wife.
Ivan was nowhere to be fucking found, and I was pissed off.
Rage had been the one to call me away. He’d been approached last night, while I was balls-deep into my wife, loving the sounds of her pleasured moans.
“What do you want?” I asked into the cell phone.
“It’s simple, I want you. I want this territory. Is your wife worth giving up everything for?”
I didn’t like the humor coming back at me.
Three years. Charlotte and I had three years.
I don’t know why I didn’t tell her that I loved her before now. She didn’t know how I felt. That I was a man who’d never known what love was, but being with her, I knew it. I knew I woke up every single morning, looking over at her, and feeling this sense of peace I’d never known. Charlotte was Volkov.
After our first year together, Ivan had arranged the tattoo on her wrist, which consisted of ivy surrounding a V. She’d earned her place in the Volkov Bratva. She was my wife, loyal to me. Mine. All freaking mine.
This man didn’t know what he’d done. I was going to kill him.
“Where?” I asked.
He gave me the location. It was in the middle of nowhere. There would be no civilians. It was the perfect spot to take either side out.
“I’ll be there.”
How did they know to take my wife? I protected her. She and Hubert had been out, walking Rose at the time she’d been taken. I had already seen the footage.
“We’ve got to go,” Rage said.
His anger was as strong as mine. I knew Charlotte hadn’t spoken to him much over the past few years. Cassie had never returned to the MC either. She stayed in the building I owned, working hard at the clothing store. From what I’d been told, she loved the job, clients loved her, the staff loved her. She blended in well.
I put my phone down on my desk. Vlad was looking at me, waiting for instructions.
“Goddamn it, Ive, this is no time to second guess. They’re going to kill her. They’re already torturing her.”
Swiping my arm across my desk, I sent the whole contents but the phone flying to the floor.
“Do you think I don’t fucking know that?” I asked.
“I made a vow to my wife. I promised her. I told her she was Volkov. I told her nothing bad would ever happen again. I was going to protect her.”
“You’re Volkov now, Charlotte. That means nothing will ever happen to you again.”
I’d told her those very words after she got the ink. But now she’d been taken. The love of my life.
Turning to Vlad, I told him to get the car ready.
“I’ll call my boys,” Rage said.
“No.”
I glared at him. “If you bring an army, he’ll kill her.”
“And you don’t think he’s going to bring men? This is a suicide mission, Ive. You can’t do that. Charlotte won’t let you and they will kill her and you.”
“My wife is not dying today.”
Grabbing my cell phone, I leave my office and head down to the main street where Vlad is waiting. I don’t allow Rage to drive with me. I’m going to arrive on my own. As Vlad pulled away from the curb, my cell phone lit up.
“You go to the meeting,” Ivan said.
“You knew,” I said. “You knew they were going to take her.”
“Charlotte is not going to die today.”
“Tell me what the fuck you know!”
Ivan hung up.
I wanted to throw the phone, destroy it, lash out all my pent-up aggression, but instead, I put my cell phone on the seat beside me.
Hubert had been killed with a single gunshot wound to the head. He and Rose hadn’t been able to react. The bastard who’d shot Hubert had then shot Rose. The vet had told me she would do everything in her power to keep Rose alive. I loved that dog. My wife loved that dog. Nothing could happen to either one.
Running a hand down my face, I felt the tension rising inside me. The anger, the rage, It started to consume me, filling me, and it was exactly what I needed.
Three years. Charlotte and I had three years, and they were not enough. She couldn’t die on me. No one was going to take her from me.
Our three years together had been the most amazing of all. Coming home had been a dream come true. No matter what time of day it was, other than early in the morning, my wife would come rushing toward me. If I was alone, she’d throw herself into my arms. If I wasn’t alone, she’d offer me the sweetest of smiles.