Feathers and Thorne Series Books 1 - 3: The Complete Collection

Chapter Forty-Six

Carter

I pace inside the lobby, checking my watch and the clock on the wall, wondering why she isn’t down here yet and ready to go. I have roses sitting in her seat in the car, and I can’t help but picture her in a stunning gown tonight at the gala.

If we have time, I’ll take her to a special place at the mayor’s office tonight and give her a proper orgasm. Picturing the fun we will have tonight sends me into a frenzy, and I find myself growing angry as she surpasses the agreed-upon time to meet up.

I click the elevator button, and it opens moments later, my cousin’s eyes widening when he spots me in the lobby. I glance around the carriage, confused to see him alone.

“Where is Isabella? We’re going to be late for the fundraiser tonight.”

He comes into the lobby, hands stuffed deep into his front pockets. “She’s going to be late. I had to send her out on an errand. She should meet you at the gala.”

My brows knit as he tries to stalk away. It takes my hand to snatch his arm and stop his trail, just for him to turn and look at me again. He has been difficult to be around since being shot, and we haven’t discussed it at all.

He did a stupid thing, going after a lead without much proof and no backup for support.

His injury was most definitely his fault, but somehow, I think he blames me for it.

Or worse, he blames Isabella for Jacob’s involvement in our world in the first place.

“Where did you send her? It’s dark out already, and it’s not safe for her,” I snap.

Tristan rolls his eyes, dismissive and rude. “Will you relax? She’s a big girl. She can handle a simple drop-off of paperwork. You hired her to work, so that’s what I’m doing. Giving her work.”

“Where the fuck did you send her?”

“Why are you pissed off at me?” he bites back, still avoiding the question at hand. “You brought her in, and I wanted to be supportive—I really did. But she is drawing all kinds of horrible attention from Jacob.”

“She isn’t the reason we have problems with Jacob Lacey, Tristan.”

“Fuck that,” he snarls. “She is the first reason. The rest came afterward, just because he was pissed with you for taking her away from him.”

I roll my eyes, flabbergasted by his sudden shift of attitude toward Isabella. “She is harmless! I know you stepped in when Jacob came after her, so why are you acting like any of this is her fault?”

“Because that’s what he fucking told me before he shot me!”

The lobby goes silent, and I am somewhat amazed by that confession. I didn’t ask for details before because it was Tristan’s blind rage and stupidity that led him to get shot.

But this little piece of information is interesting.

“Explain. Now.”

Tristan admits defeat at last. “I confronted that fuckwad, and when I told him he killed our family member, that he declared war on us directly, then he laughed and said we started it.”

“Bullshit,” I breathe.

“That’s what I said, Carter. But he said if he got her back, then he would stop the bloodshed, and he wouldn’t even come after Frances and the election anymore. He’s got some kind of jealous rage about you taking her from him, and he wanted her back.”

“What did you do?” I snarl.

“I told him to fuck off, and we got into a stupid little pistol fight. I really didn’t care about what he said, but you know what, I think he’s got a point. You’re too damn deep into that woman, and it is starting to show. I got shot, and you’re more worried about your cock inside of—”

He doesn’t finish his sentence. I have my forearms pinned over his chest and throat, his back slamming into the nearest wall and cutting off that derogatory sentence in the middle.

Fuck his opinion on my focus lately.

Fuck everyone’s opinion about my priorities. I will have that dove whenever I want as long as she wants me in return, and I’m not going to let anyone, even my own blood relatives, get in the way of that.

Tristan growls through his clenched jaw, unhappy with this pressuring position he’s found himself in.

“Tell. Me. Where. She. Is.”

He caves at last. “I gave that little brat what he wanted. To protect our family. The Blackthorne family comes above all else, and if you won’t uphold that, then I will.”

I release him at last, left reeling in shock. “If you sent her back to him and she’s hurt when I find her, I’m going to put a bullet in your back, and I won’t help them pull it out again.”

I look away from my cousin, a man more like my brother for all my life, and I run outside to hijack this night back into my control.

I wouldn’t have thought Tristan would betray me like this, especially after going to help her in the past, but it seems his loyalty to our last name surpasses the personal loyalty he owes me.

If she’s hurt, a Blackthorne and a Lacey will die tonight.

I cut through side streets and even a few sidewalks, throwing my SUV down the road that leads to the docks. At this hour, it’s nothing but a few struggling construction workers and some of our lucrative prostitutes working the night shift.

If that wasn’t reason enough to keep my precious dove out of this area, then I could reference the fact that Jacob’s job site being out here certainly doesn’t help, either.

I spot her classic car parked beside Jacob’s work trailer, confused and angry as to why she would ever follow through with a task like this. She should have called me, and I would have stopped Tristan from derailing everything!

Stepping out of my car, I look over the job site, everything in eerily calm silence.

A sharp, feminine scream breaks the serenity at once.

I pull out a gun for each hand and kick the door open to Jacob’s office.

There is where I find Isabella, crouching in the corner of the office with blood staining her tight, white skirt and dripping down her chin, coming from her nostrils.

Jacob is standing over her, clenching a bottle in his fist, and I fire a shot with precise aim, shattering it in his hands and spraying glass and alcohol over the floor.

Isabella screams again, retreating into a ball in the corner of the office while Jacob stumbles to turn and face me, looking instead to the dark glass bottleneck he still keeps in his grasp.

“Drunken fool,” I mutter, aiming the barrel of the gun toward his left eye.

I want him to see the bullet that will kill him.

“Car-Carter,” Isabella pants, trembling all over in angst. “We need… need to go right… right now.”

“Not until he’s dead.”

Jacob smiles pompously. “No, go ahead and do it.”

My trigger finger is happy to oblige, but Isabella rushes across the room and almost tackles me in an effort to get me to stand down from shooting him. I holster one of the guns for now, the other still waiting to fire off in Jacob’s direction.

“You can’t,” she cries breathlessly into my chest. “He said… he said that if he dies, he has a family member instructed to go to the hospital and kill my father, Carter. You can’t shoot him, please.”

Jacob grins with a drunken edge and is happily pacing in a staggering fashion back behind his desk.

“Look at my receptionist, sticking up for me,” he jeers. “She is wise to do so, Carter. She always wanted me to fuck her and show her a good time. You just didn’t see her flaunting her body all over this worksite like one of the cheap hookers at the dock.”

“Ignore him,” she begs and pleads, pushing me toward the door. “Please, we have to leave. My… my father can’t get hurt over this business, please!”

I holster my other pistol and wrap her in my arms lovingly. “Shh, it’s okay. We can leave, but I’ll have someone look into his threat. If he’s lying, I’ll come back and kill him with my own hands, dove.”

Jacob barks a laugh.

I already regret sparing his pathetic life.

“You just can’t help yourself, swooping in like some sort of savior to the poor, helpless little slut!”

Isabella shivers in my arms and holds me tighter. Her dedication to keeping her father safe and well is the only thing keeping me from murdering a man in her presence.

Again.

“Jacob, if I find out your threat is real, I’ll wipe out your entire family until you’re the last one staring at my pistol again,” I say simply, escorting Bella out of the office quickly.

She trips, threatening to stumble forward, but I catch her promptly, eyeing a binder on the ground that seems to have caught her footing. I recognize the binder at once, a paper trail of our work with Jacob Lacey as a legal precaution about why our businesses were ever intertwined.

Not only was Isabella not supposed to be here, but Jacob was never to have this binder. With it, he could easily prove our backdoor agreement to fund the election.

Seems like Tristan is trying to undermine my new relationship with Isabella and the one I released with Jacob this week. I ignore my ferocity and grab the binder, managing to get Isabella in the passenger seat of her car.

“Wait, no,” she groans, trying to crawl out the window when I ensure her door is locked. “You can’t leave your SUV behind, Carter. I can drive. I can—”

“You will stay in that seat,” I snap, more abrasive than I would prefer with her fragility, but my irritation with Jacob has taken over my body and mind in unison. “Fuck my car; I have twelve others I can use. Jacob can blow mine up or whatever, but first…”

I reach through the door and snatch the bouquet out of the front seat and then hurry back into her car before speeding us away into the moonlit city.

She covers her face with the roses I hand to her when the job site is no longer visible in the mirrors.

“Let me see, dove,” I whisper, pushing the roses down ever so slightly.

She goes taut but stays still, staring at her ruined white skirt in disbelief. The red welp of a smack is left imprinted on her cheek and temple. Her nose has stopped bleeding recently, the blood streaking down her face and neck still fresh but not progressing further.

“Don’t worry. He’s a dead man now.”

“Please… just don’t, Carter,” she begs in a meek, mousy whimper. “He said he would kill my father. He told me that’s how Donovan knew where I was when he was going to hurt us in the hospital. Jacob Lacey was a step ahead. I don’t want my father to be involved.”

“He won’t,” I snap, pulling my phone out as we rest at a red light. I shoot off a text to a few different numbers and finish up before the light clears green and the traffic moves forward. “I just made sure your father’s room has constant vigil and protection. He will be okay.”

She weeps into her hands.

I need to know what else Jacob had done to her, what he may have said in threat all the way to what he could have possibly done. Her skirt is tight all the way below her knees, thankfully, and it doesn’t seem torn in any places specifically, just splattered with her blood.

He didn’t get the chance to rape her tonight.

There’s not a doubt in my mind that he will try again, though.