I glance over at Lilly, taking her in in all her majesty. She’s a fucking goddess walking this Earth, looking over at that cunt with all the disgust a lady would look at the shit that dared to get on her shoe.
Her statement rings true down to my very soul. All the best people I know are in this room, including the Shadows lingering in the corner. And we’re all as mad as hatters, psychos that delight in bloodshed, that thrive when the light leaves our victims’ eyes.
I gesture for everyone to form a semicircle around the waste of space.
“Adrian Ramsey, you have been found guilty of being a murderer, a pervert, and a general waste of oxygen,” I tell him, my voice grave with the edge of a sneer. I look up at the people surrounding me. “What punishment shall we give this monster?”
“Punishment?!” Adrian gasps, his voice that of a broken man, and my blood sings to hear it. It’s been too long since I let my own inner demon out to play. “Haven’t I suffered enough? You said there were two ways this could go! I told you what you wanted to hear,” he babbles as snot, blood, and tears leak down his face. I’m actually kind of impressed that he’s still with us. I guess shock is a great masker of pain.
I turn back to look at him, my face a blank mask of indifference.
“I lied.”
“If I may make a suggestion?” one of the twins—Roman, I think—asks. I nod for him to continue, folding my arms to hear him out. “During the Troubles, in Ireland,” he continues, eyes alight with fevered excitement, “traitors to The Cause were given a six pack. Six shots, one in each ankle, knee, and elbow.”
My lips tilt upwards at the idea, liking the sound of it. Turning to the guys, I raise my brows in silent question.
“Sounds good to me,” Loki answers, hand clasped in Lilly’s.
“Me too,” Kai adds from Loki’s other side, turning back to look at Adrian with dark eyes. Adrian doesn’t know how lucky he really is; if we’d let Kai loose on him, he’d be in much worse shape than he is now.
Jax grunts his approval, his big hand wrapped around Lilly’s, Adrian’s blood coating their hands.
“Princess?” I ask, looking directly at her and seeing that Jax has left a bloodied handprint on her cheek. It makes her look like an angel of death, and my dick stirs in my combat pants just seeing it there.
She gives a sharp nod, her beautiful, hazel eyes boring into mine with her own monster front and center, gazing out with approval.
Hunter steps forward, clicking the safety off of a handgun just as Straitjacket by Bohnes starts to play.
“Y–you can’t do this, you fucking bastards!” Adrian seethes, his voice barely above a whisper and his movements slow and sluggish. “Julian won’t stand for this!”
Hunter hands the gun to me, its weight a comforting familiarity in my hand.
“Ah, I’m afraid that’s where you’re wrong,” I tell him, stepping up close and taking aim at his left elbow. “Julian will never know.”
The sound of the shot is loud, no need for silencers when we’re the only ones here. The twins made sure of that. A garbled cry leaves the older man’s ravaged throat as he slumps in his seat. Jax immediately steps up and revives him with ammonia. I pass the gun to Hunter, who’s stepped up on Adrian’s other side. He knows the drill, we all have to have something at stake here. All have to be involved.
Another shot rings out when he shoots the right elbow, Adrian groaning and whining with the pain. Hunter passes the gun to Jax, who steps around and points it at Adrian’s knee. I watch without flinching as another shot rings out, Kai taking Jax’s place and shooting his other knee out. Loki is up next, coming to stand beside me and shooting out the now, almost unconscious man’s ankle.
He goes to pass the gun back to me to finish the job, but a small, dainty hand reaches for it instead.
“Princess? You don’t need to—” I start, but she cuts me off with a fierce look in her eyes.
“He took my mum’s life long before he drove the knife into her body, Ash,” she tells me, staring down at the gun as if it’s an inevitability. “So yes, I do need to. Show me?”
The last is said with a thread of uncertainty, her eyes wide and pupils blown with the adrenaline no doubt coursing through her veins. I cannot deny her, now or ever. She owns me, body and pitch-black soul.
Stepping up behind her, I pull her in close until our bodies are flush. I can’t help but nuzzle her hair with my nose, my fingers tightening on her hips.
“Focus, husband,” she chastises, but I can hear the smile, and a small growl sounds in my throat at the term. I fucking love it when she calls me that.
I push my semi into her, thriving on the gasp that leaves her own lips when she feels me growing. Deciding to play with her a little more, I remove one hand from her hips, gliding it down her arm, goosebumps following in my wake. Wrapping her hand more firmly round the gun, I place my own on top of hers and use it to take aim at his other ankle.
“Such a good girl knowing not to put your finger on the trigger until you’re absolutely ready,” I praise, my breath tickling her ear, and I delight in the shudder that rocks her body. “Now place your finger on the trigger. Yes, that’s it. Take a deep breath, let it slowly out, and pull when you’re ready,” I instruct, holding her aim straight so that it doesn’t waver.
“P–please…Lilly…” the bastard whispers, and I look to see his eyes pleading with her, but my wife shows no mercy, ignoring him completely as she exhales and then pulls the trigger, just like I told her to. His ankle shatters, blood and bone flying from it. She doesn’t flinch, just lowers her arm, taking her finger carefully off the trigger and letting me take the gun. I hand it back to Hunter, an unspoken trust passing between us. We are brothers in bloodshed now.
“Done like a pro, my love,” I whisper, placing a soft kiss on her neck before letting her spin round and face me.
“What happens next? How will Julian not find out what happened here?” she questions, a cute as fuck frown marring her forehead.
“Now, we burn this shit to the motherfucking ground!” Loki crows, whooping like the fucking pyro that he is. A grin takes over my face before I can stop it, and I cast my glance down at Lilly to see how she’s dealing with this.
“Where are the matches?” she asks, giving me the sexiest smile known to man that has my dick rock-hard in an instant.
Unable to hold back, I grab her face with my free hand and give her a bruising kiss, telling her how much I love her with my lips and every caress of my tongue. We break apart panting, the stinging smell of expensive brandy burning our nostrils as the guys smash bottles around the room, pouring it liberally on Adrian’s prone form. He splutters awake, eyes unfocused as he tries to make sense of what’s happening around him.
“Brandy?” Lilly questions as her nose twitches, and she turns to look around the room.
“The finest we could find in this dickhead’s cellars,” I tell her, slinging my arm across her shoulders and pulling her close. “And it’s less suspicious than petrol.”
She makes an impressed sound, her head bobbing, and my lips twitch to see her act surprised that we know what we’re doing.
“Not our first arson, Pretty Girl,” Loki tells her as he comes to stand with us, Kai, Hunter, and the twins following.
We all watch in silence as Jax picks up the blowtorch once more and lights it, flames racing across the books and curtains where the alcohol has seeped into them.
“I can’t believe that you’re burning all these innocent books,” Lilly admonishes as we watch Jax make his way round the room setting the books and curtains alight, Adrian’s futile attempts to escape boring by now. “Fucking heathens.”
“Can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs, pixie girl,” one of the twins says with a grin, and I flash him a glower, which only makes him smile wider. Fucker.
We stand sentinel as Jax approaches the man in the chair, watching as the flames catch on the alcohol that was poured over him. His mouth opens in a soundless scream as he’s engulfed in fire, and I feel nothing other than a swelling sense of satisfaction that he will no longer be alive to torment Lilly. That revenge has been enacted on behalf of her mother.
“Let’s go,” my wife says, my arm dropping as she turns around and walks towards the door.
We all follow her out, her Knights, her lovers, her soulmates.
