Severance (Entangled Series Book 2) Read online

  A man sits in the dark on a chair outside of his room, smoking a cigarette. As he takes a long drag, the cherry illuminates his dirty face and I catch him eyeing the car with ill-intended curiosity.

  Leaning forward slightly, I grab Stan’s revolver that I stashed under the seat and set it on my lap, just in case.

  It’s a shady ass spot and I don’t particularly care for this guy’s gaze fixated on the very car that I’m sitting inside.

  With my eyes trained on the man smoking, I don’t notice Kai as he walks up to the car. The door opens with ease and I jump in my seat, quickly pointing the gun at the intruder.

  “Well, hello to you too.” Kai smirks as he slides into the seat and pulls the door closed behind him.

  Sighing, I shake off the panic and put the gun back in my lap. “Sorry, I’m just on edge right now.”

  “You don’t have to explain shit to me, Dahlia,” he replies, turning the car back on. “Plus, I may or may not like the way your hand looks wrapped around the butt of a gun. It reminds me of how it looks wrapped around my cock.”

  Kai winks as I roll my eyes at him and subtly squeeze my thighs together, feeling the arousal as my imagination takes me where his is.

  Backing out of the parking spot, Kai puts the car back in drive and moves to the end of the building. “We’re two rooms in from the end,” he tells me as he kills the engine. “We’re probably going to get bed bugs, cuddle with some roaches and sleep in a bed covered in someone else’s bodily fluids, but it’s the best we can do for now.”

  I cringe at the thought, throwing a disgusted glance his way, but I know he’s right.

  Stop being so fucking high maintenance.

  “We’re probably safer sleeping in your car,” I retort as he reaches in the backseat and grabs his black duffle bag.

  He pauses and cuts his eyes at me. “You mean this bullseye we’re sitting in? We’re basically sitting fucking ducks as it is, Dahlia.”

  My eyes widen slightly at his hostility, but once again… he’s right.

  Kai brushes me off and gets out of the car and walks over and opens my door. “Come on,” he urges as he grabs my arm lightly. “We can’t risk being seen.”

  With a huff, I shake off his hand and get out of the car on my own accord.

  “By who? The fucking junkies living here?” I mutter under my breath as I follow behind him.

  Kai stops abruptly and I run directly into his back. He quickly turns around, leaning down in my face. “Keep talking your shit, bambolina,” he murmurs, stroking my bottom lip with his thumb. “I’ll fuck that pretty little mouth of yours until you can’t utter another word.”

  “What if that’s what I want?” I quip, leaning into him.

  “Then I hope you’re not too attached to the sound of your voice,” he says with a hint of indifference in his voice and turns back around. This time, he grabs my hand and leads me into our shitty room.

  Shutting the door behind me, I look around the tiny ass room, with a bed and a TV. It’s not much, with a small bathroom, but it will do for now.

  It’s exactly what we need to lie low until this is all over.

  Kai throws the duffle bag onto the bed and I hold my breath, waiting for any STDs to fly off of the sheets or any critters to come crawling out, but it’s surprisingly clean.

  “Dahlia.” Kai’s voice fills the room, demanding my attention. “You can actually come into the room. I know it’s not what you’re used to. Fuck, it’s not what I’m used to. This shit is as clean as it’s going to get anywhere.”

  Glancing around the room once more, my eyes find his, watching me and I shrug before walking over to him. Taking my chances, I drop down onto the bed beside the duffle bag as he unzips it.

  “We need to come up with a plan,” he says as he pulls out a stack of passports. He reaches back into the bag and I grab the first passport and flip it open, finding his picture.

  Caleb Martic

  “Caleb?” I question him as I grab the stack of passports. Leafing through them, each one has a different name, different address, but all with his picture.

  “I had them made a while ago.” He shrugs. “Precautionary measures… you never know when you might need them.”

  “And the stacks of cash too, right?” I ask, sarcastically. “Haven’t you ever heard of off-shore accounts?”

  Kai chuckles as he grabs the passports from me. “I have my ducks in a row. We will get you set up with a few too. Just in case this shit heads south, we need an exit plan.”

  “So, what’s our exit plan?”

  Zipping the bag closed, Kai puts it on the floor and sits down next to me. “That’s when we run. I have it covered, with my private jet and pilot on standby.”

  Staring at him, I feel like I’m looking at a man that I don’t even know. “And you have that always? As a fucking precautionary measure for what?”

  “For when shit hits the fan… whether it be with the business and the millions of dollars that are being embezzled or for when something like this happened, because it was bound to happen one day.”

  Jesus Christ.

  I thought I had everything planned, wanting these fuckers dead.

  This whole time Kai had a plan for the bigger picture, a much bigger picture.

  “How do we get to them?” I ask him as I slip out of my shoes and tuck them underneath me.

  “We’re going to need help.”

  “From who?”

  Kai’s jaw clenches and he takes a deep breath. “Anthony.”

  Kai

  “It has nothing to do with Aliana, before you start overthinking shit.”

  Dahlia cuts her eyes at me and stares at me hard as her cheeks become flushed. “I wasn’t fucking going to.”

  “I’m not going to go into the specifics, because it’s not important anymore. He was supposed to keep you safe, so long as I stayed away. I fucked up, so he doesn’t have to uphold his end of the deal. He can bury me so fucking far underground with all the shit he has on me, but he’s my lawyer. That shit stays confidential. All of the dirt he’s been involved in though… there’s nothing that keeps me from revealing anything.”

  “From the farm?” Dahlia asks quietly.

  I nod. No other words are needed, we both know more than enough to be able to take him down because of that place.

  Standing up, I kick off my shoes and step out of my pants before pulling my shirt over my head. Dahlia watches me as I strip down to my boxers.

  Moving in front of her, I slowly part her legs as I lean down and grab the hem of her shirt. She lifts her arms up as I pull it up over her head, leaving her in just her bra. Lightly pushing her back on the bed, I grab her waistband and pull her shorts down her lean legs and drop them onto the floor.

  Climbing over her, I lie down on the bed and pull her close to me. With my arm around her, she rests her head on my chest as I lazily drag my fingers across her naked back.

  “Who else is left?” she asks quietly as she wraps her arm around my waist.

  Taking a deep breath, I breathe in her scent, mixed with dirt and blood, before exhaling lightly. “Cade took the fall for them and another inmate killed him. They don’t seem to be too fond of men who condone the shit he did in his life.

  There’re only three people left who were involved. Dex, Anthony, and Luca.”

  “And we need Anthony to get to them too?”

  I nod lightly against her head.

  “Sleep, bambolina,” I whisper into her hair. “We’ll figure out all of the specifics tomorrow. For right now, we sleep.”

  She nods against my chest and nuzzles in closer. Dahlia lies silently against me, lost in her own thoughts, as I am in mine. Her breathing slowly evens out and I press my lips gently against the top of her head.

  “I love you, Kai,” she whispers against my skin. “No matter what happens, I always have and always will.”

  “Shh,” I shush her. “Nothing will ever happen to make me love you any less. You got me,
and I got you. Remember? Fuck the rest of the world. I dare any motherfucker who wants to try to come between us.”

  “No one can keep us apart anymore.” She smiles.

  Nuzzling the top of her head, I breathe in and kiss her again. “No one.”

  Wrapping my arms around her a little tighter, I hold her against me as she slowly falls asleep. Listening to her breathing, I pray to whatever fucked up god that floats around in the clouds that this shit doesn’t go south.

  I can’t lose her again.

  I won’t survive

  ◆◆◆

  Rolling over in bed, I reach out for her warm body, only to find the bed empty. Sitting up, I rub my eyes as I squint them against the bright light shining in from the window.

  What the fuck?

  Jumping out of bed, I quickly pull the curtains shut and glance around the room for Dahlia. Her clothes are still on the floor next to mine, the door is still locked, but where the fuck is she?

  Grabbing my pants, I pull them back on in haste, just as the bathroom door opens. Dahlia steps into the room, wrapped in a towel with her wet hair hanging in perfect ringlets down her back.

  “So, the water is cold as fuck and there’s practically no water pressure, but there was soap in there and clean towels,” she says with a shrug as she walks past me.

  “I thought you were gone,” I admit, slowly turning around to face her. She stares at me absentmindedly as she runs her fingers through her hair. “You can’t do that shit.”

  She narrows her eyes as she stops brushing her hair. “Can’t do what? Take a fucking shower?”

  “How was I supposed to know where you were? Someone could have easily come into the room and taken you.”

  “As if they couldn’t have done that with me still in bed?” she retorts as she crosses her arms over her chest defensively.

  “No one will get to you with me there.”

  Dahlia huffs as she throws her hands up. “Jesus fucking Christ, Kai! Do you hear how paranoid you sound? What am I supposed to do, wake you up and tell you I’m getting a goddamn shower? Do you need to come hold my hand when I pee too?”

  “Dahlia,” I start, but she interjects.

  “No. You want to protect me, and I’m more than fine with that, but we’re not fucking invincible, Kai.” She shakes her head, brushing back past me, just out of my reach. “If they want us, they’re going to get us.”

  With my feet glued to the ground, I don’t turn around as she storms off. I don’t turn around when she slams the bathroom door behind her. I stare straight ahead, with my eyes focused on the floral wallpaper, knowing damn well that she’s right.

  We’re not untouchable.

  It was merely a figment of our imagination.

  The realization hits me hard and I take a seat on the bed as Dahlia finishes up in the bathroom. How could I have been so foolish? I’ve been setting us up for failure all along.

  Dahlia isn’t gone long before she’s marching back into the room with her towel on.

  “I have no clean clothes,” she declares. “I’m down to get dirty and shit, but a girl needs a clean pair of panties.”

  Shit, of course she does.

  I always keep extra clothes in my trunk, just in case, but hers were never a thought.

  “I have a bag in my trunk with clean clothes,” I tell her as I grab my keys. “That will have to suffice for now.”

  Dahlia opens her mouth, probably to argue, but I slip out of the room before she gets a chance. She may not like it, but she’s going to have to get the fuck over it.

  Dahlia

  Eyeing the door, I quickly glance over at the phone sitting on the nightstand beside the bed. I have a minute at best before Kai comes back through that door.

  Moving quickly across the room, I pick up the phone and dial a number I weirdly know by heart.

  “Hello?” her groggy voice comes through the speaker.

  “Tierney, it’s Dahlia, but I can’t talk long.”

  She gasps through the phone and I hear her rustling, probably sitting up in bed. “Dali, where the hell have you been? I saw Kai last night and he was freaking out.”

  “Look, it’s a long ass story, I’ll tell you when I see you. For now, I need you to cover for me with Vin… make up some believable bullshit excuse for me.”

  “Are you in trouble?” Her voice is louder and worrisome. “What’s going on?”

  “I can’t talk about it right now, okay? Just please cover for me. I don’t need anyone looking for me or knowing where I am right now.”

  Tierney sighs. “I’ll cover for you, but for the record, I’m not cool with this shit.”

  The door suddenly opens and Kai pauses in the doorway as I freeze.

  “Is Kai with you?” Tierney asks, breaking through the silence.

  “Yes,” I admit, staring back at Kai.

  “Did he hurt you?”

  Kai slowly moves closer to me, dropping his bag on the bed beside me.

  “No.”

  “Okay,” she says hesitantly. “Just check in, okay? And be fucking safe.”

  “I will.”

  Dropping the phone back onto the receiver, the call disconnects before Tierney has a chance to keep asking questions.

  “Did you at least block the number first?” Kai asks as he continues to bore holes into me with his hardened brown eyes.

  “I’m not that stupid,” I scoff. “I needed to have all of my bases covered… make sure no one comes looking for me.”

  Kai stares for another moment before giving me a curt nod, but his eyes are understanding. “You really shouldn’t have called her, but let’s hope for the best and that it works out for us.”

  Reaching into the bag, Kai pulls out a pair of boxer briefs and throws them at me, followed by a pair of black basketball shorts and a black t-shirt.

  “Unfortunately, I don’t have a spare bra for you, but the rest of that will have to do for now,” he declares with a ghost of a smile.

  “I feel like I need a ski mask and a pair of gloves and my look will be complete,” I tell him, looking at my all-black outfit.

  Kai shrugs indifferently. “I like black. Is that a problem?”

  “Nah.” I smirk. “You’re all black everything.”

  “And you are high maintenance as fuck,” he quips.

  It’s my turn to shrug. “Comes with the territory.”

  Kai rolls his eyes and walks to the head of the bed, dropping down beside the nightstand. He rests his hand next to the phone and stares at it. Scooting across the bed, I move closer to him and stop as my thigh brushes against his.

  “What are you doing?” I ask him hesitantly as his hand creeps onto the phone receiver.

  Wrapping his hand around it, his body stills and his face is pained as he squeezes his eyes shut. Kai inhales deeply, slowly exhaling as he opens his eyes.

  Turning to look at me, Kai’s chocolate eyes are tormented and dangerous.

  “I need to make the call.”

  “Anthony?” I question him as my eyes search his, looking for an explanation for the curveball full of emotion that he just threw at me.

  Kai nods, turning his attention back to the phone and picks it up. Pressing the receiver to his ear, he takes another deep breath and dials Anthony’s number with a heavy touch.

  He hesitated.

  What isn’t he telling me?

  I watch as Kai’s knuckles grow white from his tight grip. His body grows stiff when muffled sounds come through the speaker of the phone. There’s a shift in the air and in his demeanor as soon as Anthony begins to talk.

  “Anthony.” Kai’s voice is distant and cold. He pauses for a fraction of a second as he turns to face me, staring at me with his brown eyes as cold as his voice.

  “We can’t meet to talk… not now.”

  He stares at me harder as he listens to Anthony on the other end of the phone.

  “It had to be done. We both knew it would come to this in the end.”

 
Is he talking about Stan?

  With the way he stares at me, I feel like I should be included in this conversation. I don’t even know who this Anthony guy is, yet Kai’s going to spill all our secrets to him. I know he trusts him, that Anthony protected me for him and did more than I know, but that’s just it… there’s too much that I don’t know.

  I can’t trust any of the men that Luca had his claws in.

  “Yes, I realize that Luca is going to retaliate.”

  Kai’s unwavering gaze remains trained on mine, and I struggle to keep eye contact. He stares so intensely, but I can’t be the weak one. I won’t be intimidated by him, even if that’s not what he’s trying to do.

  “Where can I find Dexter?”

  Kai’s brow furrows and he clenches his jaw as Anthony speaks into the phone to him. His knuckles grow white as he makes a fist, digging his cut nails into his palms.

  “I don’t fucking care, Anthony!” Kai barks as he hammers his fist onto the nightstand. “What happens to him doesn’t concern you. You’ve been anticipating this for the past ten years, so cut the bullshit, acting like you really care.”

  The room falls silent and Kai continues to assault me with his desolate eyes. Time slows down to a halt as neither of us talk and Anthony doesn’t respond.

  “Anthony,” Kai demands in a low voice and his tongue is as sharp as a razor blade. “Give me Dexter.”

  Another moment of silence hangs in the air as I watch him and search his eyes for any hint of the other side of him. The cold, hardened Kai was lost in our past and now he’s lost in our present, with an insatiable need for blood.

  This isn’t only my revenge… it’s Kai’s too.

  These men stole everything from him and it was time for them to pay up.

  Kai’s body relaxes slightly as Anthony’s voice comes through the speaker. Closing his eyes, he slams the phone down, abruptly ending the call.

  Leaning forward, I gently grab Kai’s hand from the phone and pull it onto my lap. His eyes open and meet mine instantly before he glances down at his hand in mine. He laces his fingers with mine and squeezes them lightly as he looks back up at me.