Chapter 19
Azriel’s POV
My phone suddenly buzzed in my hand. I walked out of the club to answer it, the noise was making my head pound.
“Did you find her?”, I say into the phone.Property belongs to Nôvel(D)r/ama.Org.
“No, sir. We’ve been combing the streets for the past hour but there’s no sign of her or the man whose description you gave me sir”, Ross informed me, making my temper rise a few more degrees.
Gripping the phone to my ear, I commanded him through my teeth,” Get more men on the job. Find her. You have one hour to report back to me,” Ross affirmed what I’d said.
“More men won’t be necessary, sir. The number of men we have now are enough to find Miss Dawson. And it shouldn’t take long for us to find her, how far could she even have gone?” Ross says, angering me even more.
“Get more men on the job. Now!” Ross gruffly agrees, not daring to argue with me further. “If your men would’ve done their job right, there wouldn’t have been the need to get more of them involved.” I ended the call, anger lacing through my veins, ready to burst out of my pores.
I had a very strong gut feeling that Dennis was with her. If that scumbag does anything to her…… I was gonna burn him alive in front of his entire goddamn family! That motherfucker!
I’d lost my mind when I got to the bar counter only to find the both of them gone. Searching the club like a madman, when I couldn’t find her, I phoned my bodyguard to get all my men placed in Paris to search for Claire. And that son of a b***h. Dennis!
I was going to bury him alive if I found out that he laid a hand on my girl! Yes, she was my girl…..either with or against her will.
Making my way to the parking lot, I revved up the engine of my Porsche which I’d asked one of my men to drop off. And then I sped away onto the streets of this ridiculously pretentious city as I simultaneously shuffle out of my coat. It was just getting too goddamn hot in the car. Me feeling ready to burst up on anyone I could find to blame for losing sight of Claire. But it was my mistake after all.
f**k!
Gripping the wheel tight, I max out on the speed of the Porsche which I’d only driven a few times even though I’d had it with me for about 7 years.
I should never have left her alone, I can’t help but hate myself for being careless with her. She was mine! No one could take her away from me! The speed of the Porsche goes past 200 and even then I can’t stop.
I had to find her. I grind my teeth in anger for not being able to reach her.
She could not slip from between my hands! Never.
Turning past numerous street corners, I once came close to crashing into a driveway but I couldn’t care less. I really had lost my mind. The dazzling, bright shops and lights of Paris fly by me in a blur.
I don’t know for how long I’d been driving around like a maniac but I needed to keep going…..if I had any hope of not doing anything very monumentally stupid, like killing a random person by putting a bullet through their head!
My phone then again buzzed, making me push hard on the brakes to bring the car to a stop.“Sir, we found her”, Ross hurriedly told me as soon as I answered the phone.
“Where is she?”, I grit out, impatient as to know her whereabouts.
“They’re at the Pont Marie bridge, sir.” Ross’s voice sounds increasingly concerned.
“They?”, I almost whisper into the phone, not able to breathe through my anger.
“The man is also with her.” My worst nightmares had been confirmed.
“Don’t let them see you. Hide in plain sight. Don’t do anything until I get there.” I tell him, not willing to trust Ross with the responsibility of getting Claire to me safely. Dennis could easily slip away from him and my men and possibly take Claire with him.
HE WAS NOT GOING TO TAKE HER AWAY FROM ME!
I ended the call once Ross had made me aware of their position and formation.
Looking around, trying to figure out where I was, I realized that I was actually quite close to Pont Marie.
Taking a left at the intersection, I was already at one end of the bridge in no time. Ross and the men being led by him were at the other end like he’d informed me with eyes on Claire and Dennis.
I leave my car at one end of Pont Marie. It would be much easier to hide in plain sight if I was on foot. A flashy Porsche wasn’t exactly hard to notice, even though it was relatively dark.
Hiding in the shadows, I stealthily make my way onto the bridge. My feet stop of their own accord when I spot them sat on a bench too f*****g close.
I tell Ross to tell his men to hold position through the earpiece.
I needed to see what that sleazebag Dennis would dare to do! Could he have the courage to betray me? I was almost sure he wouldn’t hesitate a second to betray me if there was a lady involved. That man thought of nothing when it came to fulfilling his s****l appetite.
I move in closer to them to get a better view until I find a pitch dark spot very close to the bench they were sitting on, close enough to observe their every move.
I text Ross to tell him to get here as soon as possible as I sent him my exact location. The reason I wasn’t letting Ross handle the situation was that this operation needed to be covert. I did not want to attract more attention than I already had. Tancredi’s goons could be keeping an eye on me right now so I needed to be as slick as I possibly could.
Just as I raised my head from my phone, I saw Dennis crash his mouth on the unaware Claire. She flinches away but then starts to respond to him. And that’s when I really lost it! I really f*****g saw red.
“You motherfucking bastard!”, I screamed, lunging for him from my spot in the dark. I roughly shove him off her as he yelps when he realizes that it was me who shook him off her!
‘A powerful man doesn’t use his bare hands like a nomad, he lets his dogs do the dirty work for him.’ I suddenly remember my father’s words and stop myself from acting on my raging self.
Dennis was on the road, his nose bleeding from the punch I’d thrown at him. Horror writ on his face. He was scared out of his mind, not even able to get himself up.
I look to Claire, her expression indifferent and bold! She isn’t scared of what I’d just done or relieved to see me. It irritates me to no end. I did not expect her to throw her hands around me in joy but she could’ve shown me some kind of gratitude for protecting her from this creep.
“Stand”, I simply tell her, staring down hard into her deep, hazel eyes. She turns her head away from me, not making a move to obey my command.
Running out of patience, I roughly pull her up from her seat on the bench, making her gasp out in surprise as she struggles to free her hand from my grip.
“Let me go!”, she screams at me, fury flashing in her eyes.
“You should be thanking me”, I scoff at her petulant child-like behavior, maintaining a tight grip on her arm.
“For what?”, she asks, oblivious to the present evidently.
“Him, obviously. Who knows what else he could’ve done to you?” I exasperatedly tell her.
“Maybe I wanted him to k**s me”, she c***s her head up at me, grinning a sardonic grin. Dennis stays on the ground, intently watching us converse.
“Don’t lie to me”, my jaw tightened as she gasped when I pulled her even closer to me, glaring fire into her eyes but nothing made her afraid.
“Maybe I did want him to take me. Right here, hard and fas…..”, she goes on, mockery laced in her words and I swear to God she almost made me combust. I grip her jaw tight, my breath on the side of her face as I whispered to her through my teeth with her trembling body in my arms,” Baby girl, you really shouldn’t have said that.” I stroke her lower l*p with my one finger and she almost swoons right then and there before I let her go.
Claire’s POV
Eight SUVs suddenly pull up not far away from where Dennis was lying. All I can do is see the scene unfold in front of me, staying frozen in place. The cold breeze failed to numb me even just a little bit.
Ross, Mr. Clarke’s driver steps out of one of the nearest Suvs and walks over to Azriel who’s standing over Denni’s pathetic self sprawled on the ground. The i***t couldn’t even pick himself up from the ground.
I don’t know what my stupid mind was thinking when I suddenly started to mock Azriel, angering him even more. He’d already been pretty mad.
I am close enough to where Dennis was lying on the ground to hear what Azriel was saying to Ross.
“Finish him”, that was all he said. Wait, finish what? Ross nods as another man who accompanied him out of the SUV hands him a gun.
Wait…..what are they even doing?
A couple of other men step out of their respective SUVs with a body bag and other equipment.
Mr. Clarke walks back to my shivering body, I was ready to collapse any minute now for unexplainable reasons!
“W….what are they doing?”, I gasp out, struggling to breathe, trying to deny what I eventually knew was going to happen. A screaming Dennis tries to scramble to his feet and sprint away but three other hefty men with huge build held him down whilst some other men, laid out a plastic type of thing on the ground and made him kneel in the midst of it.
He relentlessly tried to fight them off but he was no match to these trained military-like men.
I shudder when I feel Azriel roughly wrap his hand around my waist and pulls me to him, my back to his front. “Now you’ll see what happens to people who betray me”, he whispered in my ear, making my whole body shiver in his arms.
“You can’t possibly….”, I start but am silenced by a gunshot. Dennis’s body drops down on the plastic-like coffin, his head splattered on the plastic sheet. His b***d forming a red pool around his body as he lay there…..just lifeless.
“Clean this up”, I hear Azriel’s voice boom through my haze suddenly making me realize just how close he was to me right now, our proximity making me feel nauseated.
All I can do is watch the men roll the man’s lifeless body into the plastic…..his decaying, dead body.
I wrench myself out of his arms to distance myself from him before turning back around to face him. He doesn’t make a move to cage me in again as he stands there, cold and unaffected.
“H….how could you?”, I gasp out, trying to make my voice appear strong but that was hard to do when my lungs refused to breathe.
Crossing his arms, he indifferently answers me,” He tried to initiate s*x with you even though he knew you were mine! That’s a good enough reason for me to put a bullet through his head.”
Aghast by his response, words refuse to tumble out of my mouth, my body and soul too shocked to function.
I try to keep my head held high as I shoot back at him,” But he was your friend, why would you kill him just for……something so stupid. And I’m the one who gave him the signs to initiate the k**s. You f****d his wife and still he did not do anything. But you killed him just for initiating a k**s with me that I myself asked him to initiate!” I scream at him, the pain numbing me. I couldn’t comprehend how someone could kill someone in the blink of an eye……without giving it another thought.
“You’re such a f*****g hypocrite!”, I did not have it in me to scream at him any further for I was choking on my own tears.
“He tried to take what was mine! So he paid the price”, he calmly tells me, cool as a cucumber as if we were talking about the goddamn weather!