Capital Risk (9 page)

“You knew
that
instant?” His words were heavy, like he jammed the pillow over my face himself. “As soon as Nick rolled off of you?”

I said nothing. Max expected it. His voice lowered.

“The only difference between a secret and a lie is the work you put into keeping it.”

“And you would know?” I whispered.

“Far better than you, sweetheart.”

“That’s comforting.”

Max laughed. “I’ve never been the one to comfort you. I’m not the one you love, and I’m not the fucking puppy dog wagging his tail and chasing after you.”

“Then what are you?”

“Not someone you should ever trust.”

“I don’t want to play games, Max. Just say what you want to say and let me sleep.”

He frowned. “You’re pregnant. Finding that shit out should have pissed you off. Shocked you. But it shouldn’t scare the fuck out of you.”

“I’m not scared.”

“No. You’re
devastated
.”

“Max—”

“You ran the instant Nick left, and it was only once you split that you realized he knocked you up. So what happened, Sarah? Did you try to escape from us? Did you really think you could hide from the Bennetts and we wouldn’t capture you? Find you?” he snorted. “
Hurt
you?”

I had enough. “You have no idea how much I’ve been hurt, Max Bennett.”

“Then explain this shit to me, Sarah, because none of it makes sense.”

“Get the hell out of my room.”

“You gonna make me?”

I moved faster than Max anticipated. The smack centered hard on his cheek.

“Haven’t you done enough? Your family
bred
me. What else do you want? Blood? Pain?”

“Forgiveness.” Max gripped my hand and pushed me down on the bed.

For a moment, I feared he’d follow. The cold terror leeched through me. Even his familiar weight would tangle me in darkness.

But he didn’t. Only his voice hardened, a shield from the mournful shadow in his words.

“But you’re never gonna forgive us, are you, baby? You’re already looking for vengeance. You’re beyond mercy, aren’t you?”

“How can you ask me that? If you knew what happened—”

“A lot of bad shit happens to good people, Sarah, and the Bennetts cause it all. How much blood will make it right?”

“I’m
pregnant
, Max.”

“Yeah,” he said. “So fucking think about what’s best for that baby, growing up in the middle of a goddamned war he wasn’t supposed to cause. Think about what
you
really want. You aren’t a murderer. You’re stronger than that.”

I met his gaze. “No. I’m not. I won’t stop until Darius is punished for ruining my life, my family, my…everything. And don’t you
dare
tell me I shouldn’t do everything in my power to get justice.”

“And once he’s dead?” Max leaned in. “Who else are you going to punish?”

Myself.

“Anyone who dares to endanger my family.”

Max grunted. “Christ, you are an Atwood.”

“And you’re a Bennett.”

“And this is one weak-fucking truce.”

The door slammed behind him.

What was his fucking problem?

The blankets twisted under my feet. I kicked them away. I often felt used after my time with Max, but the words he said and the regretted hate in his voice were new.

Guilt blended with a new wave of weeping, but I’d be
damned
if either Max Bennett or my raging hormones forced me from the bed. Our conversation was over. I didn’t care if I got another apology, if I slapped him again, or if I finally figured out why he sounded so goddamned
lost
every time he talked to me.

Like he already mourned for me.

I wrapped the blanket over me just as a sizzling pop echoed through the beach house. The air conditioning squealed, and the grind of electronics abruptly silenced.

I hadn’t felt an earthquake. Why else would the electricity go out?

The silence didn’t settle. It crashed.

And I knew.

I burst from my room for Max—fight forgotten, ready to run.

“
Sarah
!”

Max shouted from the living room. I called back, but the splintering crash of glass muffled my cry. Hamlet yipped and ran with me to the kitchen. I forced my dog beneath the open island. He whined, but I covered him as a second torrent of shattering glass rained over the house. The crunch of wood slammed the front door against the wall.

The security system stayed silent. No explosive barrage of sirens and flashes that always tripped up Josiah when he snuck out at night.

Whoever broke into the house studied how to disconnect the system.

Max’s profanity roared. In the darkness, a shadow launched over the sofa and crashed into the coffee table, wrecking it into pieces. The man grunted, and the sickening crunch of fist against shattering jaw echoed through the room.

I screamed as an unfamiliar snarl bit through the night. Hamlet surged forward, knocking the second shadow to the ground. The man he attacked howled in pain.

“Sarah,
run
!”

Max’s order gurgled over bloodied words. I crawled from behind the counter. My chest tightened. I ignored it. Hamlet attacked again, lunging for the man holding Max. My step-brother’s choked grunt and pounded struggles snapped over the living room.

He told me to run.

But they’d kill him.

My fingers curled over the stool before I realized how stupid it was for me to try to fight. I rushed forward, crashing the chair over the head of one of the intruders. He groaned and collapsed.

The flash lit the living room.

The gunshot came immediately after.

I didn’t even scream. The shot fired so close to me the heat practically seared through my shirt.

It was too near to my tummy, and I realized what I almost lost.

Hamlet bolted, unharmed but terrified by the sound. He wasn’t the only one.

A second shot fired, but this one aimed for the intruder. He crumpled to the floor.

Dead.

I threw up. Max shouted.

“Sarah, get the
fuck
out of here!”

Max killed a man.

A man who hunted me.

This wasn’t happening.

I tripped backwards, kicking the fallen man as I blindly sprinted away from the guns, the blood, the
body
. I rushed into the night and kicked a path through the sand. The roaring surf muffled any other sounds from inside the beach house.

Then I found the second body.

Our security guard—garroted and left to rot in the sand by the water.

Oh God.

Everything had changed.

What had once been a feud between families now extended beyond our own walls.

He wouldn’t stop this time. Not until he waded in blood to finally capture me.

I turned from the body, repulsed and enraged, but I couldn’t get help easily. My family built the house a half mile from anyone—far enough to ensure our privacy and mimic the rural openness of the farm, far away from the crowded beaches. I left my phone charging by the bed.

I needed to find another way to call for help. For Nicholas. The police.

Like I should have done months ago if I hadn’t been so terrified of ruining the Atwood pride. If I hadn’t feared what Nicholas would do or think after he learned the truth.

I turned, rushing back to the road.

I never made it.

The hands clutched me from behind. So familiar.

Too familiar.

I kicked. It did nothing.

The cold barrel of a gun jammed against my side. The cloth dosed in chemicals covered my mouth and nose.

“Time to come home, my dear.”

Sarah didn’t answer her cell phone. I tried Max. Same issue.

Neither were exceptional
morning
people. Previously I had been threatened with grievous bodily harm and implements shoved in places best suited for men of other tastes. Max wasn’t pleasant when he woke either.

It meant nothing that I’d be ignored by them at five in the morning.

Or six.

But by seven, I worried. I left both voice mails and text messages, and I called Reed and ordered him to return to the Atwood’s ten thousand square foot “beach house.”

It was easy to forget how tremendously wealthy Sarah’s family was, and how much money, land, and investments one woman now owned. My father never forgot, and his obsession became mine.

She should have answered her phone.

I wasn’t waiting to find out why she was ignoring me this time. My real reason for leaving her was done. The arrangements for my father’s murder rescheduled once more.

It’d cost twenty million this time. Non-refundable. He didn’t like that we’d called off the last attempt so suddenly. He said it made him nervous. I didn’t care, so long as it didn’t make him sloppy.

But it took time. Another month, another drop, another series of gut-checking complications.

Then she’d be safe, and I could let her rest without calling her cell-phone every hour to check on her.

If
she’d answer.

I didn’t trust it. I tried to reschedule the meeting, but my client asked to meet for breakfast instead. I waited for a chartered plane as my father currently flew in our private jet through Oregon. I had an hour to spare. My partner on this particular meeting wasn’t pleased by the change of plans.

Bryant Maddox uttered a few choice words as he berated me for my irresponsibility, but he met me within his chosen café a half hour prior to the meeting. He ordered the server to take us to the table he selected—a secluded location outside on the terrace, completely inappropriate for a business discussion. I permitted it only as I intended the meeting to be brief.

Bryant questioned my decision.

“What’s wrong, Nicholas?” His hands trembled as he poured sugar after sugar into his coffee. “You’d never compromise a deal this way. Bennett rule, right? No business in the mornings?”

“Times change.”

“And you expect the board to tolerate changes in your father’s business plan?”

I frowned. “Garalt Farms is
my
prospective client, not my father’s.”

“Recommended by Sarah Atwood, is that right?”

“Yes.”

“How kind of the little whore to offer us an exciting new customer base.” Bryant slurped his coffee. “At least the bitch is good for something.”

I once respected Bryant—not only as my father’s confidante, but also because he understood the business and strived for our level of perfection. Now, I saw the coward instead of the man. He was a sniveling, greedy, brutal bastard who took pleasure in the suffering of others. He delighted in my father’s evil as he was too weak to be his own sadist.

Bryant deserved worse than a morning coffee in a French café outside a busy intersection in San Jose. An eye-for-an-eye wasn’t enough for the monsters my father fostered within our company, and entirely too kind for the horrors they inflicted on Sarah.

And he’d be fortunate if I were the one to exact our revenge. I hardly recognized the hatred burning in Sarah. The board would flake to ash after she scorched through the Bennett Empire to protect her child.

Our child.

My son.

Bryant checked his watch and swore. “First you jeopardize a multi-million dollar deal by altering the appointment time, and now they’re late. This is unacceptable, Nicholas.”

“Don’t question me.”

“You realize the dire circumstances facing our company?”

“
My
company.”

“That little bitch holds more stock than I do.”

“And?”

Bryant’s eyes narrowed like an irritating weasel, and his voice edged with the animal’s squeal. He checked his watch once more, and his fingers rubbed hard against the linked metal tabletop. A thick gold ring clattered with his motions, tapping a nervous rhythm.

“If you don’t see the danger in an Atwood controlling the company, I won’t pity you when the whore bleeds you dry.”

“If Sarah Atwood is so powerful, perhaps you should beg her forgiveness instead of insulting her.”

“I wouldn’t beg an Atwood for anything. By the time this is done, she’ll beg us for mercy.”

“Continue to threaten her, and you won’t live beyond this breakfast.”

He snorted, his eyes hardening. “You aren’t so noble, Nicholas. You might not beat her, but you won’t let the bitch destroy what’s rightfully yours.” He checked the watch for a third time, stiffening as he pushed his coffee to the side. “I have a call to make.”

He could make a dozen calls so long as it removed his presence from my table before his infection poisoned the deal with my potential clients. I read my phone. No messages. No calls.

Where the hell was Sarah?

And why did Bryant trip away from the table in blind haste?

My gut sunk. Something was wrong.

My phone rang. Reed. I answered, but he was already screaming.

“—
On my bike! Fucker followed me to the office
—”

I didn’t have time to decipher his profanity. The blitzing rumble of motorcycles splintered the peace of the morning. Six bikes thundered through rush hour traffic, splitting lanes and careening over the sidewalk.

They aimed for me.

I kicked the nearest table and dove behind it as the quiet morning bled into sudden war. Gunfire roared over the street, tearing every umbrella and fancy table-scape into a ragged, decimated scene of destruction. I covered my head from a shower of broken glass spilling into the intersection. Women screamed. Men shouted.

Somewhere, a baby cried.

And the little one’s terrified shriek tore through my mind.

It might have been my child terrified and endangered.

Fear turned to nausea and then blinding anger.

I stood once the gunfire stopped and the rumble of bikes peeled away from the intersection, scattering as a siren blared in the distance.

I knew what insignia they wore on their jackets before I checked.

Temple MC
.

Son of a bitch
.

Enough history existed between the Bennetts and that degenerate organization. My grandfather’s few favors and my father’s tolerance of their criminal and despicable behavior hadn’t endangered us before. Hell, the
president
was Reed’s godfather.

This favor cost my father more than money.

He’d lose his soul in attempting to murder his eldest child.

And Reed. Wherever Reed was, his call had disconnected. Dread churned in my gut.

I hadn’t heard from Max.

Where was Sarah?

I sprinted from the café, but Bryant wasn’t in the huddled mass of people shrieking inside. I rushed to the street and hauled my driver out of the car, stealing the keys and ordering him to escape the scene before the police started asking for witnesses.

I wasn’t involving the authorities in this. Too much time already wasted, and I’d spill far too much blood to tolerate investigations and procedure.

I jammed the accelerator and tore through the streets, escaping the crowded intersection before the first responders closed the fastest route to the Bennett Headquarters. I wouldn’t find my father there, but I prayed I’d find my brother alive.

The ten minute drive took only four as I shot through red lights and nearly sideswiped a car failing to parallel park. The headquarters housed the offices for our charity foundation on the third floor. I ignored the chronically slow elevators and slammed through the stairwell, rushing the steps two at a time and knocking a path through employees who hadn’t the courage to complain.

Reed’s office was locked. I sprinted at it full-speed, shouldering the door with the force of my weight and crashing it open.

A man cloaked in black and hiding in a ski mask wrapped a length of rope around Reed’s neck and squeezed. His face turned purple and a blood vessel popped in his left eye. My brother fell to his knees.

I leapt at his attacker, my fists connecting with his face and crushing the fragile bones that made him recognizable as a human.

Punch after punch until the bastard fell.

I kicked.

Pounded.

Brutalized.

My fists dripped with blood, mine and his, my knuckles cut against the few teeth that remained in his broken jaw.

My father hired men to kill us.

This man would have murdered my little
brother
.

Who knew what had happened to Max.

And Sarah?

My father would never kill Sarah. Not yet. Not while her
womb
was still of use to him.

He’d hurt her. He’d make her
suffer
.

And if Sarah didn’t tell him about the baby, his sadistic revenge would kill my unborn child.

I roared, destroying the limp and broken man beneath my bruised fists. I punched as the regions I hit softened into crimson putty. The pulp of his skin slid from my hands.

I didn’t stop. Not until Reed shouted.

Not until the terror in his voice called to me.

“He’s
dead
, Nick! Fuck, stop! He’s
dead
!”

I panted, sweated, and shook with chills. The beaten mass beneath me hadn’t moved or fought. I don’t remember if he ever had, or if my first crunch against his temple killed him.

I didn’t recognize my voice.

“He has Sarah.”

Reed’s hand curled over my shoulder, pulling me beyond the spread of blood.

“Then we gotta go get
him
,” Reed said. “Going wild won’t save her.”

No. It wouldn’t.

I had never lost control before. Never abandoned myself in feral, unbridled rage that demanded such base and horrific punishments.

I’d never killed a man before.

I’d stared at the body upon the ground.

I had kidnapped. Raped. Corrupted.

Never murder.

This wouldn’t be my last.

My father was a fiend, but even he hired others or sent Max. He never
murdered
.

“Don’t tell her I did this.” My voice dropped. “Don’t ever tell her.”

“Yeah.” Reed swallowed. “Believe me, I’m not telling
anyone
about this. Who the fuck is he?”

“A gift from Dad.” I had nothing to wash the blood from my hands. Reed straightened, rubbing the raw flesh on his neck. “He targeted me as well. Had Temple MC do a drive-by.”

“Temple?” Reed’s expression flashed with a new pain. “Toviel Aren is my
godfather
. He’s not doing hits for Dad.”

“He is now, or Temple’s elected a new president.”

“Fuck.”

“Lock the office. I’ll hire someone to take care of this later. We have to find Sarah.”

“Where’s Max?”

The thought pierced me like I had been shot and only now suffered from the bullet burrowing through my chest. Reed swore.

“Does Dad know she’s pregnant?”

I stood, not waiting for Reed to follow. Blood dried on my hands, my suit.

“It doesn’t matter.” I wouldn’t cleanse the filth from my palms until another’s blood stained them. “I’ll kill him before he hurts Sarah or my son.”