Breathless (Merciless Book 3)
: Chapter 1

It’s been a long time since someone has dared try to kill me in my own home.

Even longer since someone has pointed a gun at me and lived to tell the tale.

I can barely hear a damn thing due to the ringing in my ears. I’ve waited for this moment, but this isn’t how I thought it would go.

She loves me, I remind myself. She fucking loves me. I know she does.

Aria’s face is flushed, and her hand trembles as she fights to hold the gun steady.

I take one step toward her and she cocks it. The click fills the room. Whatever remaining semblance of a heart I had shatters in my chest, the small shards shooting waves of pain through my body.

The sick grin on my face wanes even as I struggle to hold it in place, focusing on those gorgeous hazel eyes. Eyes that drew me to her, that begged me for mercy, that made me feel more than I’ve felt in years.

Eyes that fooled me.

“Drop your guns,” Aria demands, her voice shaky but clear and loud regardless. It’s fucking insane that in this moment she strikes me as utterly gorgeous. In her strength, she’s at her most beautiful.

“Drop them!” she calls out more strongly and the gun wavers. It’s obvious she’s never held one before, or at the very least, never fired one.

Yet, she’s pointing it at me. It could go off accidentally, killing me. Would she regret it? I question and feel a strong tug in my chest. A well of emotion threatens to break my composure. Every inch of skin is numb as I stare at the barrel, feeling everything crumble around me.

In front of the enemy.

In front of my brothers.

In front of her.

“Carter?” I hear Jase without seeing him, asking if they’re to listen to her or not.

Two of my brothers, Jase and Declan, are behind me with guns pointed at three men kneeling on the floor. Two of them are her cousins, and the third man is her former lover and friend. The name she prayed to while in the cell, the one name I’m tired of hearing her speak, belongs to him.

All three are men who wanted to kill us only moments ago. Men that Aria is protecting, and willing to kill me to save.

Those fucking shards dig deeper into whatever wound they’ve gouged in my chest.

Swallowing the knot in my throat along with the distress I’m feeling, I answer Jase although I don’t take my gaze from Aria. “Drop them.” Instantly, relief shows on Aria’s face, and she even relaxes her grip on the gun until I add, “But don’t let those fuckers have them. No one holds a gun,” I swallow thickly and add, forcing a smirk to my face, “but Aria.”

The control is still in my demand. They’ll listen to me, everyone who’s worth a damn in this room will… but as time passes, I can feel it slipping away. I can only imagine what her family thinks, but it’s what my brothers are seeing that fucking shreds me. They know I love her.

And now they’re watching her betray all of us.

“Let them go,” Aria commands in a weaker tone, one filled with a plea. Visibly swallowing, she finally breaks my gaze to look at them. Her startled, sharp intake of breath at what she sees destroys me. Her mercy and compassion for them are sickening.

They came to kill me. She fucking knows that.

She might kill me yet.

I loved her. I know I loved her, and that was my first mistake.

Anger rises and rings in my blood. My sanity finally comes back to me, hardening me and reminding me of who I am and everything I’ve worked for.

It’s all going to crumble. All because of her.

I would have done anything for her.

“Let’s go.” I hear Nikolai’s voice, low and riddled with pain. The blood is still bright red from the split on his lip and a bruise has already formed on his face. My knuckles turn white as my fist tightens. All I need is one moment to take out every bit of my aggression on him. I want to break his jaw for daring to speak those words to my Aria.

I’ve never felt rage like I do now as he reaches for her like he can take her away from me.

Because he can.

Because she’s willing.

“Go,” she says, and Aria’s voice is strong as she glances at him. Again, the gun is slack in her grip. She doesn’t seem to notice how loose the gun is in her hands. I could take it; I could chance it. But it would risk putting her in danger, and my gaze falls at the thought.

“Now,” one of her cousins hiss, tugging on Nikolai’s arm. The shirt tightens around his neck as the fabric is pulled. Peeking at him from my periphery, I’m disgusted, as is Nikolai, judging by his expression.

“Come with us,” Nikolai urges, raising his voice to command her, but also beg her, and I take my focus from Aria, staring at the man Nikolai is.

He reminds me of the boy I once was.

Foolish and reckless. But he never went through the shit I did. He was bred into this life, he wasn’t thrown into it and forced to fight to survive every fucking day.

Yet he thinks he can take her.

“I’m staying,” Aria says with authority before I can say anything. Her declaration makes Nikolai flinch. A small bit of hope flutters in my chest. My throat tightens, and my chest aches, feeling as if it’s on the verge of ripping wide open. She’s staying.

“We don’t have time for this!” one of her cousins yells out, glancing around the room as if any minute now, I’ll change my mind and kill them all.

He’d be right if it wasn’t for Aria.

She wanted them. She chose them.

“I’m not leaving without you,” Nikolai growls and stalks to Aria, ready to take her. That’s my cue to reach for my gun.

Their reunion has lasted long enough, and I refuse to let him take her. No one will take her from me. No one.

Adrenaline races through my blood, my breathing coming in heavier as my jaw clenches. The gun is hot in my hand. Hotter than it’s ever felt before. It’s pointed at Nikolai; Aria’s is pointed at me.

My voice is deep and rough as I tell the three of them, “You have two minutes to run.”

“Carter,” she says, and Aria’s voice is a desperate plea, but she has no room to bargain and I have no mercy remaining, not even for her. I ignore her, feeling the rage from what she’s done seep into the marrow of my bones as I finish stating, “and then we’ll open fire.”

My brothers move slowly, reaching for their guns as Aria’s expression crumples with pain and she rocks backward toward the wall, with her nervousness evident.

Nikolai’s jaw is tense, his light blue eyes sparking with hate. “Come with me,” he says beneath his breath. “Take her!” he commands his allies.

But they run, leaving him alone and leaving her behind. “She had her chance!” one of the men yells behind him. Their sneakers squeak as their footsteps pound on the freshly polished floor. Cowards. Talvery men are cowards.

“Aria, please,” Nikolai begs her as if it breaks his fucking heart. Fuck him.

“One minute,” I grit between my teeth and he finally looks at me. My grip tightens on the gun. One squeeze of the trigger and I’d be rid of him forever. I’m so close to pulling it, just to end it all. He looks me in the eyes and I wish the look I give him back was enough to kill him.

“Go,” she whimpers, her eyes flickering from my gun to him. “Get out of here!” she screams at him.

“I’ll come back for you,” he tells her as if she’s his long-lost love.

I hope he does come back for her. My nostrils flare and my chest aches as she gasps for breath watching him leave. Come back for her, Nikolai. Come back, so I can break your fucking neck. I bite my tongue, tasting the metallic tang of blood in my mouth.

I will kill him if it’s the last thing I do.

He’s still running away from her. My blunt nails dig into my palms as my fists tighten and the anger and jealousy mix into a deadly concoction. Red bleeds into my vision and it’s all I can do not to pull the trigger as it follows his movements.

“I wanted to tell you,” Aria sobs as the sound of Nikolai running away fades in the hallway. “I didn’t think–”

“Tell me what?” I ask her.

“That they were coming,” she says with a pain in her voice that matches the one swirling in her eyes. She’s breaking apart, barely breathing and I can see the regret, the remorse. But only one thing resonates with me.

“You knew?” I question her and feel a chill rush through my body that sinks all the way to my bones.

She never loved me. She never did. You protect the ones you love. Always. And she didn’t protect me.

I was a fucking fool and she isn’t the woman I thought she is. She’s a fucking liar.

“Are we really letting them go?” Declan’s question slices through the haze of disbelief and treachery.

“You knew?” I ask her again, my temper coming back anew.

“I, I…” she stutters over her words, her gaze darting over my face, fear and pain causing her hazel eyes to glass over with tears. She lowers her gun all the way down, not daring to point it at me anymore and I drop mine as I move closer to her, each heavy step sounding more foreboding than the last.

“Carter?” Declan yells my name, demanding an answer.

With each step closer to her, she takes one in reverse until her shoulders hit the wall.

I holster my gun before ripping hers out of her hands, although she doesn’t put up a fight. “Carter,” Declan calls out again, not caring at all that the woman I loved set me up. She knew they were coming to kill me, to kill all of us, and she did nothing. “Are we letting them go or not?” Declan asks.

With one hand braced on the wall above Aria’s head and the other pinning her hip to it, I look her dead in the eyes, ignoring everything about her gaze that draws me in. She can’t have that anymore. I’m taking that power away.

Feeling the dominance of hatred flow through me and wanting to hurt her as she’s hurt me, I answer Declan in a deep voice that’s barely audible. “Kill them all.”

Jase

I’m quick to follow Declan out of the room, even though I know it’s a mistake to leave Carter alone with Aria.

I’ll be fast. I have to do something to stop this.

“Declan.” Raising my voice, I call out to my brother and the sound of his footsteps echoing in the hallway stops instantly. He turns to me, anger and tension still rolling off of his shoulders.

He can barely look me in the eyes.

“Yeah?” His voice is tight as I make my way to him, closing the distance as quickly as I can.

I keep my voice as low as possible and ignore the banging of my heart against my ribcage as I look over my shoulder to make sure no one followed, to make sure no one can hear me defy my brother’s orders.

“Don’t tell them to shoot to kill.” I start to talk before I’ve even fully faced him. My words are mixed with my tense breath from the adrenaline flowing through my blood. “If they shoot, tell them to make sure they miss.”

Declan hears me; I know he does by the shock on his face. The roar of anger coming from the foyer behind me reminds me of how unhinged Carter has become. He’s going to do something stupid. Something he’ll never be able to take back.

“I’m going back to them,” I tell Declan and turn away only to have him grip my arm and pull me back to him. He doesn’t say anything at first, but I can see the question in his eyes, the feel of betrayal from him.

And it shreds me.

“You know he loves her,” I tell him, feeling the ache of sadness rising inside me. It hurt Carter, but it’s more than that. She betrayed us all.

“Not after that,” Declan nearly whispers. Shaking his head slightly with a defeated expression on his face, he continues, “Not after she–”

“It’s not her fault she had to choose,” I push the words through my clenched teeth, knowing in my gut that she’s fighting with what’s right versus where her loyalties should lie. “She never should have known.”

The tension in Declan’s gaze wavers, and he looks behind me before reaching my eyes again.

“She made a choice to stay. Let Talvery know that. She chose to stay. It’ll fucking kill Nikolai and make the crack in their factions that much deeper. Nikolai has to live.”

I know Carter will be pissed at me, but he’ll get over it. He’ll thank me when it’s all said and done. It has to go down like this. I can’t let him ruin everything.

With a tight nod, Declan runs his thumb over his chin but doesn’t say a word.

“Tell the guards to let them go back to Talvery. But make sure they all know she chose to stay. She chose Carter.”