In His Keeping

Goon B’s lips curled into a sneer, and he spoke for the first time, seemingly undaunted by her show of strength. Not that it had been an impressive feat by any stretch. She was still weak from the powerful sedative they’d administered. She didn’t even know how much time had elapsed since she’d been taken from the safe room, where she prayed to God Ramie was still safe and sound.

“Cease your tantrum,” he bit out.

“Or else?” she taunted, her eyes narrowing on the focus of her ire.

Immediately his face turned red, and he grasped his neck with both hands as if fighting off an unseen attacker. He pried uselessly at the invisible hand wrapped around his neck, slowing squeezing the life right out of him. Ari wanted to kill him. She was pissed enough to take every single one of these assholes out and damn the consequences.

“Enough!” Goon A barked, yanking her attention momentarily from Goon B.

Goon B coughed and sputtered, holding his neck as he gasped for breath.

“You’re going to pay for that, you little bitch,” he snapped, his face red either from the pressure she’d exerted or sheer fury. She didn’t care one way or another. Never had she felt such a pervading desire for vengeance. Violence. She wanted to hurt these people, whereas a month ago, the mere thought of her unleashing violence on another human being was abhorrent, against her very nature. Now? She was anticipating with every breath just how she would exact her revenge on these people for upending her life, for threatening her parents—adopted or not—and for bringing their fight to Beau and his family’s doorstep.

God help them all if Beau was dead. God may have mercy, but Ari would have none.

“Maybe you should have a look at dear mommy and daddy again,” Goon A said in a mocking tone that grated on her nerves enough to make her want to squeeze a different part of the anatomy than she’d attacked on Goon B. Walking around ball-less and singing soprano would certainly take his ego down a notch or three.

But when she tracked back to the monitor, unable to resist the urge to see her parents after hearing the underlying threat in Goon A’s voice, she froze.

Four men burst into the cell and erupted into a flurry of action. One of them snatched her mother and wrapped a beefy arm over her breasts, curling around to the back, where he fisted a handful of her hair to yank her head upward to bare her vulnerable neck.

It took the combined efforts of all three of the other men—huge men—to subdue her father when the fourth put his hands on Ari’s mother. His rage was a terrible and awing thing to behold, and she couldn’t help but feel a surge of pride that it took three impossibly large men, with the aid of weapons, to subdue her father, and even then it took every bit of their combined efforts to keep him pinned to the floor, although they made certain his face was pointed in his wife’s direction so he could see exactly what was being done to her.

His face was harsh with rage and agony. And suddenly sound burst through the room where Ari was helpless to do anything but watch. Her father’s voice was hoarse, desperate, pleading.

“Leave her alone, damn it. Take me. Do whatever you want with me but leave her alone. She’s done nothing wrong. Take me, goddamn it!”

Tears burned Ari’s eyelids but she furiously blinked them away, determined for these assholes watching her closely not to see how affected she was by the sight of her parents. How relieved she was they were alive even as terror snaked through her body when the man holding her mother’s head at an uncomfortable angle slowly drew a knife and placed it against the front of her neck.

Ari could see the stark fear in her eyes even as she visibly tried to prevent her husband from seeing just how terrified she was. Again, Ari felt a burst of pride, this time for her mother, because she didn’t want her husband to know just how scared she was. Her expression was defiant, a definite fuck you look stamped on her delicate features. Even her eyes, after that first flash of fear, eyes that had never held anything but warmth, love and tenderness, were cold with hatred and defiance. She stared the men down holding her husband as if to tell them you can’t win. He’ll kill you. He’ll find a way and he’ll kill you.

Not if Ari had anything to do with it. She was going to take these bastards out herself or die trying.

Some causes were noble and just, even when steeped in violence, blood and . . . murder. Some fights, regardless of impossible odds, were still meant to be fought because unless you fought back there really was no hope. And Ari had to believe that somehow, someway, she would prevail and save her parents. Even if she herself was forfeit in the process.

Some things were simply worth fighting for. Worth it to the bitter end, with the very last breath. And Ari could think of no better reason than . . . love. Love for her parents. Love for Beau.

Defeat was merely the absence of hope. And until she’d exhausted every last avenue of hope then she would not—would never—concede. It was a vow echoing through her mind, shutting all else out.

Until her mother’s pained scream broke through the dark shadow of Ari’s thoughts. Through plans for death and retribution. She froze when a thin trickle of blood slithered down her mother’s neck as the asshole holding her sliced a shallow cut through her delicate skin.

Her father went crazy, his bellows of rage, his promises of retribution echoing her own thoughts. He managed to break free from his captors, and he flung himself across the cell, prepared to take apart with his bare hands the man hurting his wife.

And then her father’s body arced, bowing backward, his face contorted with pain as his extremities shook and twitched violently.