When Luke visited me today, agitation seemed to drift from him. His bad mood practically suffocated me, and I wanted it to. He picked up one of the wooden chairs and slammed it against the wall. It broke in several pieces. He knocked over the table and tried to tear the room apart with his bare hands. I didn't dare say a word. He was in a dangerous place, and I didn't want to get caught in the middle, but I knew the crosshairs were already on me.

He breathed deeply, his chest rose and fell from the force he used to destroy every piece of furniture in the room. Pieces of wood lay around in scattered piles. I stood there with my arms crossed, waiting for him to speak.

"We will soon become one. I'm going to fuck you, and you'll beg for more of me. Maybe then you'll finally realize what you've been missing."

I swallowed as he stared at me with crazy in his eyes. I kept my mouth shut for once. He walked toward me, and I backed against the wall. His body stood inches from mine, and I wanted to push him away, but didn't want to light the fuse to a ticking time bomb.

Luke ran his fingers through my hair, wrapped strands in his fist, and tilted my face up to look at his before he forced himself on me. Forcefully, he gave me several lip-numbing kisses. I struggled from his mouth, but when I did, he pushed his lips harder onto mine. Then his tongue was down my throat, and he kissed up and down my neck. I pushed him, but he roughly pinned my body between his and the wall. His breath was hot on my skin.

"Why do you fight it? I know you want it."

He ran his fingers up my dress and held my breast in his hands. He moaned, and it disgusted me. With forceful hands, he grabbed the material and ripped it open. The dress fell to the floor around me.

I stood in bra and panties in front of him, and he smiled. He really frightened me. If he wanted to have sex with me up against this wall, I wasn't strong enough to stop him. I knew that I had no choices, and the thought of that pissed me off and scared me. It sickened me to look at him, so I turned my head away.

His lips swept across the softness of my neck. He moved down my body and kissed the tops of my breasts, then dropped to his knees in front of me.

I took myself from the situation, from it all, and forced myself void of Luke's hands and lips on me. There were memories I wanted to erase from my mind and this was steadily climbing the list of things to forget. Luke hooked the lace of my panties with his index finger, and before he inched them down, the door slammed open and drew me from the abyss.

All I could see were red high heels and skinny jeans.

I wrote dark poetry on a napkin at the bar as I waited for the men that watched over the underground sex ring to arrive. My thoughts had skulked in a dangerous place for weeks. But no matter, I had to make sure Jennifer hadn't been seen where the darkness of the industry roamed freely. It was no place for her.

Everything had polar opposites. Where there was a positive, there was a negative. Where there was The Elite, there was prostitution, sex slaves, pimps, and whores. Where there was Finnley Felton, there should have been Jennifer Downs, but someone decided to fuck it up, and for that, I would return the favor. I didn't get back, I got even plus ten.

I popped my knuckles as I waited, my patience waning.

To keep my mind busy, I finished scribbling my thoughts and downed the Maker’s Mark. When two bulky men sat on either side of me, I tucked the napkin in my pocket and snapped for the bartender to bring us a round.

"Gentlemen," I said coolly. I wasn't intimidated by them, especially not after dealing with men worse than them for half of my life. I knew the gangsters on the other side of the spectrum, and they knew me. We agreed to stay out of each other's way, which we did easily, but they owed me, and it was time to pay. If I hadn't bailed their boss out of jail, they wouldn't be where they were today. After saving their asses more times than I could count, they agreed to stay underground and away from me and The Elite. With that, I agreed to leave them the hell alone. Money talked. Always had and always would. Luckily, I had enough to have conversations for days.

The two guys didn't respond, but I didn't expect them to. I pulled the photo of Jennifer, the one that was in her Elite file, from the inside of my coat pocket and slid it to my right. He picked it up and narrowed his eyes, then handed it to his buddy. I continued to look forward and sipped my drink calmly, though my insides blazed with a need-to-know so strong that it almost made me sick. One thing I was good at: poker face.

The man beside me sucked in a deep breath and scooted the picture back to me. I placed it inside my coat pocket. It had been with me since I came home.

"I've seen her," he said.

My breath hitched in my chest, and that's when the violent rage almost consumed me. I had to count to ten, fucking twenty, to calm down and evaluate the situation.

When I was a teen, heavily involved with the gangs of London, I almost killed a group of men with my bare hands after losing control. A screaming girl in a dark alley stopped me in my tracks. Four sick fucks had kidnapped and proceeded to have their way with her, but I caught them with their pants down before they could do any damage. I beat the lot of them to a pulp and left them for dead. A piece of me wanted to burn them alive for being the bottom-feeders of the city, but I didn't. Instead, I told them if they ever fucking touched or kidnapped another person, I would hunt them down, chop off each of their dicks, then proceed to shove them down each of their throats, one by one, as they watched each other choke. To this day, Abbot watched them. Those men never tried anything like that again, and if they did, a sharp knife would be waiting for them.

The unstoppable force I slowly transformed into in London was not the person I wanted to be. That wasn't the life I wanted to lead: always watching my back, fighting for my rights, and killing. I was intelligent, practical, talented, and I had street smarts. Don't get me wrong, I was still unstoppable, but I didn't want to be known as a fucking murderer. Monsters didn't care or have a conscience. I was different.

I needed a change from it all, and Columbia had offered me a full scholarship. It helped that my father was an alumnus. The Felton name became a free pass, almost. Columbia kicked my ass, made me into the businessman I was, and for that, I would forever be grateful.

I finished my drink and so did they. They waited for me to speak though very little would be said between us.

"She’s alive. Make sure she stays that way." I didn’t say it as a question, but as more of a conviction. I knew her heart still beat, and that would keep me temporarily satisfied. If any woman could be slung through the mud and make it out alive, breathing and snarling, it would be her. I hoped she wasn't giving them to much hell, but a little piece of me knew she was. If she acted out too much, Jennifer would get hurt. I couldn't have that. Fucking firecracker.

The leader nodded his head, and I wanted nothing more than to demand he bring me to her, but that's not how deals like these worked. I knew that. Instead, I continued to stay disinterested in them, and the whole conversation, and they returned the gesture.

After they finished their drinks, they swiveled from their stools and stalked out the front door. Although I contemplated following them, it would have done me no good. They could be trusted, especially considering the amount of favors that were owed to me. If they fucked this up, the two of them would be dead, and not by my hands, but by their boss.