Page 16 of Mended Souls
Annika’s hands brushed gently through my hair. “I know. Love might be beautiful, but it can also be a cunt at the worst times. It makes excuses for the pain because you want the love.”
“My heart is making up a whole lot of excuses,” I admitted.
“And what is your brain saying?”
I laughed. My brain was not the right thing to listen to either, right now. “My brain needs quiet before I give myself a three day grippy sock vacation.”
Annika fretted, irritation in her voice. She hated Blaize now. “Kadence. Don’t hurt yourself because of her.”
“I’m sorry, that was a bad joke. I’m not going to hurt myself, but I can’t keep dealing with these emotions. I’m not mentally sane for this. I am fighting myself because a part of me wants to forgive her and the other part wants to forget she exists. I just—I deserve consistency. I deserve love, but Blaize doesn’t deserve my forgiveness…not this soon.”
Annika rested her hand on my arm. “You can forgive someone, but still make them earn a place back into your life. I have a feeling you’ll forgive her, but that doesn’t mean you have to make it easy.”
She was right. Why should I make it easy for Blaize? Why should she be the only one who got to hurt someone? She wanted to be this badass so she could take the consequences of her actions. Blaize hurt me. So I needed to hurt her back.
Blaize was already cracking. I was ignoring her, making her writhe in her guilt. Now I could do something that would completely shatter her. Or at least hurt a little more. I didn’t think a woman like Blaize could be broken. If she knew I didn’t need her, then it would be perfect.
CHAPTER 14
BLAIZE
“We have a problem,” Damon said. I straightened my back as I swapped my phone to the other ear. “Meet me on the border of Bellevue and Roseridge. Jethro is pissed.” I didn’t want to deal with anything else when I was still trying to mend what I did to Kadence.
“I’m on my way.”
Roseridge was two hours away from Westhaven, and I was not ready to see what this bastard did this time. After what I did to Kadence and the shipments getting destroyed, he’d been quiet. I should had known there was always a quiet before the goddamn storm. It always happened. This person knew me, knew how to hurt me, and this was just to make my people falter against me. They wanted me broken, and they knew hurting me was not the way to go.
My people. My territories. They were all things that mattered to me. I might loathe the ground Jethro walked on, but he was a leader of one of my territories. An attack on him was an attack on me. I needed to find out who the traitor was and kill them before they ruined anything else or hurt someone I cared about again. Losing more people because of this person was not what Iplanned on doing. I would protect my territories, even if I had to rain down hellfire again to do it.
The wind whipped through my hair as I focused on the road. I was sick and tired of dealing with this. Elijah West was dead. No one should want to bring him back. He was not worth it. He abused innocent women, killed men for no reason, and trafficked kids. Why would anyone want to remember him? His reign was nothing compared to mine. His mark was meaningless. The night he killed Olivia and Charlee showed me the man he was. He was nothing. Heartless. Callous. He got off on other people’s misery and lived on the destruction he caused, even if it affected his business and everyone around him.
Being the woman I was, if I couldn’t have power, I agreed to be allies with him. But that was before I realized what he did. He was the type of man who believed women had no place other than on their knees. After I witnessed his first trade on the docks, I made a promise to myself and my girls that I would get rid of him and make sure they had a safe life in this city. It backfired, but the city was safe. I was just alone.
Over the last five years, I’d maintained a reign that put the fear of God into the men in the surrounding territories. Sex work was validated within reason—the women consented and were happy using their bodies. Regardless of one’s opinion, sex work was work, and I wouldn’t shame anyone who used their bodies for money. When someone was forced into sex work, it was a different story. I saved hundreds of girls before I finally killed Elijah. Since my hotel was open, I made more profit with consensual sex work than he ever made selling women and children on the docks.
A hustle was knowing what made profit, and he wasn’t worried about his. He just enjoyed inciting fear into this city and the other territories. My people feared me, but they also knew I would help them. If they messed up, I would deal withthe problem, and if they needed assistance with a shipment or commotion in the territory, I’d be there.
Once things calmed down again, I would open my hotel. The girls who work there either took a vacation or they went to work at Hades. Lennox was in Vincent’s territory with him, working on a hotel together. With this threat, there was no point in rebuilding and opening my hotel again when it could get burned down again or busted by the feds. I was losing profit, but my people mattered more to me than money.
I pulled up to the border of Bellevue and Roseridge, seeing the reminisce of burned buildings. Jethro was fuming, but the old man was always pissed about something. I hit the kickstand and slid off my bike, walking to the two men and taking in the scene before me. Jethro and Damon had an agreement for a few businesses on the border of their territories to make money and build a community, but both areas were burned to the ground.
“Was anyone hurt?”
Jethro glowered at me. “Three of my people were burned. This was done while people were shopping.”
“I’ll take care of the medical expenses,” I told him, looking at Damon. “And you?”
“Just some smoke inhalation, but everyone is fine. The Vandals symbol was left behind.”
I nodded. “We will figure this out.”
“This is your goddamn fault, Blaize!” Jethro hissed. “You killed Elijah, and now look what’s happening!”
I glared at him, lifting my hand to stop Damon. I could handle Jethro. “If Elijah was still alive, you’d be dead. Shut the fuck up and deal with your territory, Jethro. I’m working on it.”
“If you?—”
“Shut the hell up. If Blaize said she is going to deal with it, she will. I’m still working on getting information for you. This person is smart,” Damon said.
