Chapter 31

Cole: So…Olivia being kept in an ivory tower yet?

Me: What?

Cole: I just assumed that your beastliness will have gotten even worse now that she’s pregnant.

Parker: How can it get worse? He was already insane.

Me: No, I haven’t locked her in an ivory tower…

Me: I don’t think high altitudes are good for pregnancy anyway.

Cole: I don’t like that you seem to have already looked that up.

Parker: It’s the hotel basement moment all over again.

Me: Pot meet kettle. I’m still convinced you’re having your own basement moment, Parkie, and there’s some poor girl locked in your dorm room as we text.

Parker:…

Cole: Why do you keep doing that? Just say no.

Parker:…

Me:…

Cole: My brothers are both psychopaths.

The thing about evil people…is that they always messed up eventually. At one point or another, they lost the ability to think rationally. They start to think that they’re untouchable, that they can get away with anything…

And luckily for me…Jolette and Marco had reached that point years ago.

It’s just that there hadn’t been anyone in Olivia’s corner that had been looking for the evidence of it.

But now she had me.

And I guess Jeff.

Which was still a really weird name for a P.I.

I would someday have to tell him that.

After he finished his job for me, of course.

Freezing the accounts had been easy actually. Jeff had gotten a look at the books, so to speak, and there was basically nothing being spent that had anything to do with Olivia. Jolette spent all her money on botox and massages and lavish vacations that Olivia obviously wasn’t a part of. And while California law allowed that to a certain extent, the sheer amount of money she was spending pushed her way over the edge.

There was also her gambling addiction that was fair game. She’d been jetting off to Vegas almost every weekend since the conservatorship began, and her debt was astounding.

Jolette was truly an awful gambler.

She was paying it off in small amounts to try and keep it under the radar…but the hotel casino accounts did no such thing. It was an astonishingly easy thing to get the full balance sheet of her debts to multiple casinos in front of the judge. And of course include proof that the bank account and credit cards being used in the casinos were all tied to Olivia’s accounts.

Marco was an even bigger idiot, and I was a little surprised that he was still alive…or that his dick hadn’t fallen off yet. Between the drug addiction and the hookers, he couldn’t have been doing very well. The fact that he was making Venmo payments to high end escorts with the money from the fund was like shooting fish in a barrel…

And when we found out that many of those girls were underage….

It just made it that much easier to submit the evidence and have a judge do an emergency order for everything to be frozen.

“You’re paying me triple for this,” Jeff growled through the phone. “My eyes are never going to recover from what this sick bastard does on a nightly basis. Watching hookers snort blow out of his ass crack is not my idea of a good time, Davis.”

I grimaced at the mental picture and replaced it with Olivia’s face.

Instantly better.

“Aww, come on, Jeffrey, you’re doing it for the greater good,” I cajoled.

“For the millionth time, it’s Jeff,” he snapped. “And if you think that watching him get fucked by a big purple dildo was ‘for the greater good’…” He stuttered a little. “Well, you’re wrong.”

That was fair.

“So Sharbrooks and Wrench have all the files for the hearing?”

He sighed impatiently. “How many times you going to ask me that?” he asked.

“As many times as I want since you’re charging me triple.”

“Alright then,” he said. “Fair point…yes, they have all the files. You should have updates in your email…”

I was already reading through them, satisfaction hitting me right in the gut.

I loved when a good plan came together.

“Alright, keep me updated,” I said needlessly, since I would most likely text him ten more times tonight to make sure everything was going smoothly.

He grumbled something and I hung up, taking a deep breath before I stepped into the locker room.

“Everything good?” asked Lincoln as I walked in, still making me fucking shake like a giddy schoolboy because he was watching out for me.

“The lawyers have all the stuff. They said this was enough to get another emergency hearing to examine the conservatorship,” I explained, worrying for a second that I was missing something.

“What about the…mental illness claims,” Ari said quietly, uncharacteristically serious in the moment, which only made me love the guy more.

“That doctor evidently lost his license a year ago…for falsifying documents. He’s already admitted it on other cases, so the lawyers will be dragging him into this one, and somehow they’ll get him to talk. Hopefully,” I added with a frown, hating that every part of my plan depended on other people.

It felt a little bit like having really bad teammates and trying to win.

“We’re here for you, buddy,”Ari said, lightly clapping my back before he walked over to grab his stick for practice.

Lincoln stared at me for a second. “And she’s happy…about the pregnancy?” he murmured, so softly there was no way that any one could hear him.

“Fucking ecstatic,” I told him with a grin, my mood brightening just thinking of the ever present smile Olivia wore lately…when she wasn’t throwing up, of course.

“And she still doesn’t know?” he pressed, and I smiled at the reminder of another good plan that had also come together.

“Nope. And that’s one secret I’ll carry to the grave,” I told him.

“Good boy,” he said with a blinding smile that had me feeling a bit woozy for a moment.

That praise kink may have become a praise addiction…

Something to think about later.

Lincoln fucking winked at me as if he knew how glorious he was, and Ari came back up to me shaking his head. “Fucking simp,” Ari muttered with a smirk.

And for the first time, I didn’t deny it.

How could I?

Olivia

I wanted ice cream.

Actually, it wasn’t a want. It was a need. And if I didn’t get some soon…well, I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. It seemed dramatic to say that I might die without it.

But that was kind of how I was feeling at the moment.

Walker had promised me tubs of it the second he was home. But I didn’t have that kind of patience.

I needed it now.

Long shadows stretched across the garage as I walked out of the house and pressed the garage door opener.

Let’s see…did I want mint chocolate chip or moose tracks?

Or did I want both?

‘I’ll definitely get both,’ I muttered to myself, slipping into the driver’s seat. The familiar scent of leather and gasoline enveloped me as I turned the key, a sense of freedom accompanying the revving engine. After years of never driving myself, I still got a thrill every time I did it now.

I reached for my seatbelt and my door was suddenly yanked open.

“What?!” I froze, fear clogging my throat.

‘Hello, princess,” Marco grinned.

“What are you doing here?’ I demanded, my voice betraying my rising anxiety. “I heard you were having some…legal problems.”

He chuckled darkly, ignoring my comment.

Marco looked nothing like the smooth and polished man I was used to. He was disheveled, his usually immaculate hair in disarray and dark circles etched beneath his eyes. There was a wildness to his gaze…a desperation. His clothes were rumpled and unkempt, and the scent of stale alcohol and cigarette smoke clung to him like a second skin.

‘I just wanted to catch up, Olivia,’ he replied.

My gaze darted around, looking for some kind of escape route as my hand drifted towards my Apple watch. If I could just get to the SOS.

Right before I could get to my watch, he grabbed my wrist and yanked me out of the car.

“Your little boyfriend thinks he’s so smart,” Marco said mockingly as he pulled me against him. “Tell me, princess. Does he know that I’ve had this cunt?” His hand darted between my legs, pushing against me as I began to struggle. “Does he know that I know what you sound like when you cum?” He pressed harder against my core, and I sobbed as I continued to thrash, rejecting everything he was saying.

I hated the reminder of how many times my body had betrayed me.

“He thinks that he’s got me all pinned down. That a little thing like an ‘investigation’ is going to do anything to me.” He laughed, no semblance of sanity in his voice. “I’m Marco fucking Davine. I’m untouchable.”

I was suddenly yanked away, falling against the car as Walker threw himself at Marco with a roar, slamming his head against the garage wall with a loud thump.

“I’m going to fucking kill you,” Walker breathed, smashing his fist against Marco’s face.

Blood sprayed through the air as the crunch of Marco’s nose shattering filled the garage.

Marco feebly tried to hit Walker, but Walker laughed, as if he’d been tickled rather than punched.

“Did you touch her here?” he asked, slamming his fist against Marco’s lips so blood dribbled down his chin.

“How about here?” he continued, pointing at Marco’s ribs. He struck at Marco’s side until at least some of his ribs snapped.

Marco was moaning and tried to push him away, but Walker punched him in the gut and he fell back against the wall.

“Angel, did he touch you here?” he asked me, pointing to Marco’s forehead. I nodded, and Walker punched him so hard in the eye, the ridge of his eye popped open, showing all the way to the bone.

Marco’s howls filled the garage, and Walker laughed again.

I made no move to interfere, or tell him to stop. This felt like cosmic justice, like Superman had come to life and was saving me for hopefully the last time.

“And I know you touched her here, you fuckwad,” Walker seethed, right before he kneed Marco in the dick. Marco screamed and a giggle slipped from my lips.

Marco fell to the ground, writhing in agony on the concrete floor as blood poured from his face. I stared at him, memorizing the moment and every cry he made.

Just like I’d bet he’d done whenever he’d touched me.

Walker calmly walked over to the toolkit that was on a shelf in front of my car, and he grabbed a hammer.

“What are you going to do with that?” I asked, wide-eyed, finally realizing that Walker really couldn’t kill him—as much as I wanted him to.

“Making sure he pays for what he did to you for the rest of his life,” he told me, pressing a fierce kiss against my lips before he slammed his knee into Marco’s gut, holding him flat while he lifted the hammer in the air…

And smashed it against Marco’s dick.

Thwack, Thwack, Thwack. He hammered away until blood had soaked the front of his pants. And still he continued.

“Holy fuck, Disney. His dick is gone,” I heard Ari’s voice comment, right before he grabbed Walker around the waist and pulled him off of Marco’s limp form.

I wasn’t sure at what point he’d passed out.

Walker kept struggling, his breath coming out in heaving gasps as he tried to lunge back to Marco.

“Walker, it’s done. You got him,” Lincoln said, a grin on his lips as he stared down at Marco’s destroyed body.

“I’m good,” Walker huffed.

“You sure?” Ari asked, still holding him around the chest. “Because one more crack with that hammer, and I’m pretty sure he’s dead. And you’re too pretty for prison. They would like you too much.” Walker scoffed and Ari slowly let him go, watching him closely like he expected Walker to lunge back at him at any second.

It was me that did the lunging though. I fell to the ground besides Marco and started slamming my fists anywhere I could reach, tears suddenly streaming down my face.

“I hate you! I hate you! I hope you die, you worthless cunt!” I screamed, my body racking with sobs.

A strong pair of arms wrapped around me and I turned and threw myself into Walker’s chest, hysterically crying as I gripped at his shirt.

“Shhh. It’s okay, angel. It’s done. You did so good. You’re safe. He’s done,” Walker murmured, over and over again until my sobs finally quieted.

Police sirens sounded in the distance.

“Fuck! Walker, tear Olivia’s shirt,” Lincoln ordered, wrapping the bottom of his shirt around the hammer and carefully moving it into Marco’s hand, closing Marco’s fingers around it.

“What’s going on?” Walker asked, confused.

“Just do it!” Lincoln snapped. “The police are about to be here. There’s a little legal term called ‘reasonable force’ and I’m pretty sure we’ve flown way past that here. Like Ari said…you’re too pretty for prison.”

I swear I felt Walker preen at the compliment, and I locked eyes with Ari for a second. He shook his head and mouthed, “fucking simp.”

It almost made me smile.

“Sorry, sweetheart,” Walker muttered as he took my shirt and ripped it down the front.

“Mess with her hair,” Lincoln continued. “Make it look like he got farther than he did. Tear her shorts too. They need to see that more…force was necessary.”

“Fuck, Golden Boy. You’re a fucking genius,” Ari commented as Walker messed with my hair before ripping my shorts open and the top of my underwear. “Put a lot of thought into these sorts of things?”

Lincoln scoffed. “Olivia, sweetheart. Keep crying, okay? Don’t let those tears dry up.”

I nodded, thinking that request was at least easy.

The sirens got louder, and a minute later two squad cars were pulling up to the front of the house, officers leaping out and rushing towards the garage.

“We got him!” Lincoln said. “He’s over here!’ I stared at Lincoln in shock because of the change in his voice. He was perfectly executing the part of someone who was scared and a victim.

“Shit,” one of the officers said, grimacing when he saw Marco. His hand went to the front of his dick, like he was trying to protect his balls from the same fate.

I held in my grin like a champ.

“What happened here?” another officer asked, frowning as he stared at the four of us. “Hey, wait a second, are you guys Knights players?” His voice got excited. “Holy shit. You’re Lincoln Daniels!”

Lincoln’s smile was polite but he was still holding back his usual alpha energy.

The officer’s gaze fell to me, no recognition in his eyes—just how I liked it. “Ma’am, are you alright? Do you need an ambulance?”

For some reason, that question led to another round of hysterics as it hit me what really could have happened if Walker had been just a few minutes later. My hand went to my stomach, cradling it instinctively as Walker pulled me back into his arms.

“I came home from practice and he was trying…” Walker’s voice choked up for a second. “He was trying to rape her.”

The officer’s gaze dipped to my torn shirt and pants before flicking respectfully away. Walker pushed his hair out of his face, a faint grimace on his lips. “I might have gotten a little carried away,” he growled, staring down at Marco. “But my fiancee’s pregnant. I—might have lost my head.”

“We don’t tolerate rapists here in the state of Texas,” one of the officers said, prodding Marco’s body with his foot in disgust.

“Is that what happened?” the first officer said, rubbing his pot belly as he scrutinized Lincoln, Ari, and Walker. He didn’t seem as convinced as the others. “What happened to the man’s—” he gulped, “the man’s groin area?” He gestured to the blood soaked mess Walker had made of Marco’s dick.

“I grabbed the hammer to defend myself and I hit him there,” I said through another sob. “I just wanted him to stop. He’d just taken the hammer from me when Walker came home.” I wiped at my eyes, feeling shaky as my adrenaline began to crash.

The officer stared us down for a few seconds longer as the other officers lifted Marco’s upper half off the floor and cuffed his arms behind his back.

Somehow, Marco began to come to, his eyes slowly blinking until he finally opened them all the way. Walker slipped me behind his back even though there was no way that Marco was in any condition to come at me.

His eyes were hazy and confused as he glanced around, taking a second before he seemed to remember where he was. His gaze met mine as I peeked out behind Walker’s body. “Why—” he spit, an inhuman cry coming out of him as he laid there, seemingly unable to move at all. “Don’t you..ask him about…the deal.” His garbled words cut off as he passed out once again.

What had he said? A deal? I shook my head, confused.

The officers stared at Marco in disgust as an ambulance barreled down the street, its sirens going off. “Get him out of here, boys. Try not to let him die on the way to the hospital,” the first officer said. He turned his attention to me, his gaze gentling. “Ma’am, do you need medical treatment? Did he–”

I shook my head, the effort making my head pound. “No,” I whispered. “He was stopped in time.”

The officer breathed out a relieved sounding sigh and nodded. “We’re going to need to take your statement then, if that’s alright,” he said.

“Later. After she’s checked out at the hospital,” Walker growled.

The officer startled, staring at Walker’s face…a faint flicker of fear in his eyes.

“Later,” he agreed. Walker and the others gave him their contact information and finally…what seemed like forever later…he left.

“Thank you,” I murmured to Lincoln and Ari, taking a step towards the house.

“Not so fast, sweetheart. We’re going to get you checked out at the hospital,” Walker said anxiously, scooping me up into his arms before I could take another step.

“I’m fine. I just need a nap,” I insisted, my words sounding weird in my ears.

He paid me no attention as he carried me to the passenger side of my car and set me down on the seat.

“Let us know how she is,” called Ari as Walker hopped into the driver’s seat and threw the car in reverse.

Walker waved at them as we drove away.

I was shaking in my seat, a full on crash happening. “You’re okay, sweetheart,” he murmured soothingly, flipping on the heater and rubbing his hand over my leg as he drove.

I was faintly aware of him continuing to speak to me, but the words sounded like he was muttering them underwater.

And eventually…I couldn’t hear them at all.