Axel

VIII

VIII

The Loyalties

T R I N I T Y

The minute I saw him, I knew. I was drowning in memories, particularly the one of me being taken to the hell I escaped. I was in the back of the black van all over again, forced to sit there with next to nothing covering me up. He was one of them, one of the men that helped bring me there. I remembered him.

How could I forget? I scoffed internally.

I remembered him sitting directly in front of me, his eyes burning with lust as he took in every inch of me. He was disgusting, I had thought at the time, as he ripped away the trench coat I had been so generously given to cover up my nakedness. He wore that same cocky grin now as he laughed with Sharp, his hands buried deep in his front pockets.

I straightened, my eyes locked on his movements. Anger pulsed through my veins as the thoughts kept coming in.

No need to cover up, senorita, he said.

In this world, we are your superiors, he said.

I got out of the car and walked around slowly, keeping my eyes on him. Each step I took meant something. The anger in my veins coursed my steps, a need for vengeance guiding my steps. I had all this built-up rage for Hector, for the cartel, for this life I had been forced into because of lies and betrayal. Sharp glanced at me for a split second before turning back to his conversation. He did a double-take though. I hadn't realized there was a knife at my fingertips until I felt my hand rising and the sound of the blade cutting through the air.

"Trinity!" he shouted. It didn't matter. The blade had already left my fingers and was sailing directly to my target - him. Or it would've been him if Sharp had minded his own business. He pushed the asshole to the left, allowing the blade to hit the off-white brick wall instead. Before I could grab my other knife from my waist, an arm enclosed me and pulled me back into a firm chest.

"What the fuck, Trinity?" Axel whispered in my ear. He managed to have my arms in a deadlock behind my back before he spun me around and trapped me in the car.

"Move," I growled.

"No," he growled right back. "Look at me right now."

I glared at his shoulder for a minute before looking up to meet his gaze. We spoke a different language when we looked at each other. He could see the anger, he could probably see the pain too. He saw it because I made sure he did.

"Mind telling me just what the fuck was that?" he asked anyway.

"He was there," I spat, trying to move from his hold so I could look at the asshole directly. "He was there when they brought me to... to that place. He was there. He's working for Hector, he always was. He practically ripped my clothes off when they were taking me to that hellhole and mocked -"

"Trinity, he had a job to do."

"A job?!" I shrieked, "he was a cocky son of a bitch who wanted nothing more than to see me naked - or worse, dead. I still remember the words that asshole said to me. Every single word."

"And now he's here with us, fighting the same fucking war as we are. Day and fucking night. We're on the same side. Now quit behaving like a fucking child."

I glared at him hard. I knew if this were a cartoon, there'd be steam coming out of my fucking ears at how angry I was. He matched my gaze though, refusing to back down like the stubborn bastard he was.

"We've got limited people on our side as it is. We all need to get along -" he tried to reason with me, but I didn't care.

"Yeah, that's easy to say when he's your fucking people. Where was that attitude when we were back on my turf?"