Redeemed (The Dark Redemption Series Book 2) Read online

  REDEEMED

  A Dark Redemption Novel

  By Lane Hart

  COPYRIGHT

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue were created from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual people or events is coincidental.

  The author acknowledges the copyrighted and trademarked status of various products within this work of fiction.

  © 2016 Editor's Choice Publishing

  All Rights Reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator” at the address below.

  Editor’s Choice Publishing

  P.O. Box 10024

  Greensboro, NC 27404

  Edited by Angela Snyder

  https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAngelaSnyder

  Cover by vocaldesign

  https://www.fiverr.com/vocaldesign

  Warning: This book contains some dark, dirty and dangerous situations.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Epilogue

  “Oh, how the mighty Azrael has fallen.”

  Prologue

  Blair Lockhart, age eight

  A group of bubbles float through the air, all around me, as I laugh and try to pop each one before they touch the ground.

  “Make them bigger!” I tell Erica, the high school girl with long red hair. She stays with me Sunday afternoons while Mommy spends time with her friend and Daddy works. Daddy’s always working, and he never comes home until late on Sundays.

  “Okay, get ready,” Erica says with a smile before holding the stick to her lips and blowing more bubbles around me.

  A loud rumble coming up the driveway makes me freeze as it gets closer, louder until it comes to a stop in front of our house. The roaring sound dies down, and seeing her long blonde hair, I know who is sitting on the back of the big motorcycle.

  “Mommy!” I exclaim, running over to her.

  “Hi, sweetie,” she says with a grin after she sits back and removes her arms from around the man on the front’s waist. I don’t know who he is because unlike Mommy’s, the front of his helmet is covered. But when he lifts it up, I immediately recognize him.

  “Hey, kiddo,” Ben says with a crooked smile and then reaches out with his leather glove to pat me on the head. Turning to look at Mommy over his shoulder, I hear him softly ask her, “You sure you don’t want me to stay?”

  “No, we'll be okay,” she says as she holds on to his shoulders and throws a leg over to get off the bike.

  The two whisper to each other, but I can’t hear what they’re saying. I’m too busy watching the way the sun dances off the silver parts of the motorcycle. It’s so pretty that I reach out and run my fingers over the bright, red flames on the side. I bet it’s fun to ride on. Mommy looked happy when she was sitting on the back. Now, she takes the helmet off and hands it to Ben. Her hair is all messed up. She runs her fingers through the strands trying to fix it, probably because she knows Daddy doesn’t like for it to be messy. He doesn’t like any messes and yells at me if I leave crumbs on the kitchen floor or if Mommy doesn’t vacuum twice a day.

  “I love you, Val,” Ben says before he pulls Mommy to him for a kiss on her lips. I thought daddies were supposed to kiss mommies, but mine doesn't ever kiss each other.

  “Love you, too. See you tomorrow,” Mommy says before she steps away from him. She tells me she loves me, but she never says that to Daddy.

  “See ya, kiddo,” Ben calls out to me with a wink before he pulls the front of his helmet down and the bike suddenly rumbles so loud I jump back in surprise before he pulls away. Mommy reaches down and takes my hand. Then the two of us stand there and watch Ben until he disappears.

  “Erica, do you mind staying a little longer?” Mommy asks as we walk up to the front of the house, my arm swinging with hers. “I need to do some packing –”

  “Packing! Are we going on vacation? Can we go to the beach?” I ask, nearly bouncing up and down with excitement.

  “No, sweetie,” Mommy says, kneeling down in front of me on the porch. Her blue eyes look sad and worried. “Tonight’s the last night you’ll sleep here in your bed because tomorrow we’re going to live at a new house.”

  “A new house?” I ask in excitement.

  “Just you and me, but you’ll still get to come see your Daddy some on the weekends –”

  “I don’t want to see Daddy!” I exclaim.

  “But he’ll want to see you,” she says. “And it’ll only be a few days.”

  “I don’t think Daddy likes me because I’m always making a mess,” I admit, looking down at my blue Sunday school dress that has a grass stain on the bottom.

  “Your Daddy loves you, he just…he just doesn’t know how to show it. But Ben loves you too, and he wants us to come live with him.”

  “Really?” I ask. Ben is nice, and maybe he’ll let me ride his bike.

  “Yeah, and do you remember the two boys from the pool who look just alike?”

  “Uh-huh. One is mean and always splashes me, but the other one is funny. He pretends to be a shark and chases me around. I can hold my breath under water longer than either of them!”

  “Well, we’re gonna live in a house with them, so they’re gonna be like your brothers.”

  “I wish they were girls because I bet they won’t play with me and my dolls,” I reply sadly.

  “No, they probably won’t. But I bet they’ll play hide and seek with you and all kinds of other games.”

  “I can’t wait!” I exclaim.

  “Me either,” she says with a smile. “Now you go play with Erica a little while, okay?”

  “Okay,” I say before I run off to tell Erica about my new brothers.

  …

  “Blair, come on in for dinner,” Mommy yells from the front porch, so Erica and I head inside. Once my hands are free of grass stains and dirt, Erica leaves; and I skip into the kitchen where it smells like yummy roast is cooking.

  “Daddy will be here any minute, so can you set the table as fast as you can?” Mommy asks, handing me the stack of plates.

  “Sure,” I tell her, and I start sitting them in their places and then adding the napkins folded just like Daddy likes beside them before finally putting out the forks and knives. I’m almost finished when the front door opens. My shoulders instantly tense, and I’m worried I didn’t set the table right. Mommy drops something, and it makes a loud clang.

  “Is dinner ready yet?” Daddy barks when he walks into the kitchen still wearing his suit and tie.

  “Almost, just one more minute,” Mommy says without looking at him.

  “You knew I would be home at six, so what the hell have you been doing all day that you couldn’t have dinner ready in time?” h
e asks.

  “Sorry, time got away from me,” she murmurs.

  “Mommy got to ride on a motorcycle,” I say.

  Daddy stares at Mommy and she hangs her head, using her hair to hide her face.

  “So you’re the slut everyone was talking about seeing on the back of Ben Rawls’ bike?” Daddy asks, stomping over to Mommy. “Answer me!” he yells, spinning her around to face him.

  “Our bags are packed. We’re leaving in the morning. But if you touch me again, we’ll leave tonight and you’ll never see her again,” she says before she storms off into the living room and picks up her cell phone.

  “You’re not going anywhere!” Daddy shouts, following her and grabbing her by her arm to jerk her to a stop, sending her phone clattering across the floor.

  “Yes, we are. You can’t make us stay.”

  “Is that a challenge? Because I can, and I will make you stay. I’ll ruin that asshole and make him wish he were dead while he rots away in a jail cell!”

  “No! Please. He has two sons –”

  Whap!

  I jump when Daddy slaps Mommy across her face. He looks so angry.

  “You can hit me all you want, but that doesn’t change the fact that I love him!”

  Whap!

  After that hit, Daddy walks away, back into the kitchen where I’m still standing. My breath blows out of my mouth in relief, thinking he’s done. He won’t hurt her anymore. But then he grabs a big knife from the kitchen counter.

  “No!” Mommy screams when she sees the knife. “Blair, run!” She tries to run toward her phone on the floor, but Daddy catches her, holding the knife to Mommy’s throat.

  “Please let me go. I-I’m…I’m…” She tries to tell him something with her hands over her stomach.

  “Don’t fucking say it,” he growls in her face. “Because I know it’s not mine.”

  Daddy’s hand moves in a blur, and then the knife is slammed into Mommy’s belly. Her scream is so loud that it takes my breath away, just before my mouth opens with my own cry of horror when I see all the blood staining her shirt.

  Chapter One

  Aden

  Knowing my brother was an assassin, and seeing it firsthand, are two entirely different things.

  Brede looks murderous, driving like a maniac in the SUV that we stole. The DA’s neighbors shouldn’t have left the keys inside it.

  “Head for the highway,” I tell him. “She’s a smart girl. She was probably trying to leave Davidson County.”

  Brede doesn’t reply, which means he’s really upset. Otherwise, he’d probably be swearing up a storm.

  We make it to the highway exit a few seconds later, and it doesn’t take us long to find the blue lights. There are at least three police cars but no ambulance yet, because that’s how fast Brede was driving.

  “Let me handle this,” I tell him when we both jump out of the parked car and head toward the uniforms casually standing around. They’re not in a hurry, so that’s a good sign, right?

  As we approach them, Brede’s cracking his knuckles like he’s gonna beat the shit out of someone. I quickly scan the area, looking for the stolen Audi but don’t see it. Maybe Blair wasn’t in a wreck…maybe it was someone else and we jumped to the wrong conclusion.

  When Brede’s shoulders relax, I know he’s thinking the same thing. We overreacted and thought the worst. He still approaches the group of officers, intent on making sure she wasn’t involved.

  “What the fuck’s going on?” he barks, stopping the uniformed men’s conversation in mid-sentence. I jump in front of Brede, pull out my badge and hold it up for the officers to see.

  “FBI, Special Agent Aaron Burroughs,” I say trying to ignore Brede’s eyes burning into my skull after hearing the alias. “I’m looking for a young girl, dirty blonde hair –”

  “Butterscotch,” Brede interrupts, now standing next to me.

  I raise an eyebrow in question.

  “Her hair’s butterscotch,” he mutters quietly before shoving his fingers through his own hair and giving it a tug.

  “Right. Butterscotch hair. Tall and lean. Driving a red Audi. Have you gentlemen seen her?”

  When the three men exchange silent but loud looks with each other, I, unfortunately, know that they have.

  Fuck.

  “Where is she?” Brede asks, trying to get closer to them. I throw my arm out in front of his chest to hold him back. If he beats them to death, we won’t get any answers.

  “She’s gone,” one of the younger, light haired guys finally says.

  Thank fuck, she got away. Brede exhales beside me, apparently thinking the same thing.

  “We’re just waiting for the ambulance to remove her body,” he says, nodding to the right side of the shoulder. In the darkness it looks like a car is sitting at the bottom of the embankment, the front end caved in thanks to the rows of trees.

  Ah, fuck.

  “No!” Brede shouts before he hurdles over the guardrail and takes off running.

  “Stop him!” one of the officers shouts, but I pull out my piece from the back of my pants and cock it, pointing it in a two-hand grip at the one giving the orders.

  “You might want to reconsider that order,” I tell him. It’s stupid, I know, since I’m outnumbered three to one. “If any of you goes down there or tries to pull out your own weapon, I will shoot to kill.”

  Jeez, Brede is a bad influence on me. We just reunited half an hour or so ago, and here I am ready to kill three uniforms for his dumbass.

  “Hands up,” I tell them just to be safe when their twitching fingers linger near their holsters.

  Fucking Brede. I can’t even spare a glance at him without giving these men a chance to take me down. My teeth grind together as I imagine him pulling Blair’s lifeless body from the car. I was wrong. He actually cares about her, and now he’s gonna be crushed…

  “Where the fuck is she?” Brede suddenly bellows from less than five feet away, making my finger nearly twitch on the trigger.

  So she’s not here? She’s not dead?

  Thank fuck.

  I lower my gun a smidge to look at Brede, who’s holding a big book or maybe a photo album underneath one of his arms.

  “There wasn’t any blood. She’s alive…or was,” he tells me before attacking one of the uniforms, grabbing him up by the collar of his shirt. “Now tell me where she is!” My brother has balls, I’ll give him that.

  “Um, on the way…to the hospital,” the cop tells him, right as the sirens of an ambulance can be heard off in the distance, coming this way.

  “He’s lying,” I tell Brede. “We beat the ambulance.”

  “I-I don’t know where she is!” the cop stammers when Brede shakes him. “We were told to make it look like she’s dead.”

  “Who told you to do that?” I ask.

  “Roger Lemons.”

  “Fuck!” Brede shouts before pushing the cop away from him. “Let’s go,” he tells me, already on the way to the car.

  “Ah, a little help here,” I say to him, still holding my gun on the cops as I start to walk backwards. Brede takes out his own gun and turns around, shooting one round after another, nearly making me jump out of my skin.

  I let out an exhale and a thank you, Jesus, when I realize he blew out their tires and not their heads.

  We both slip into the SUV; and after Brede tosses the book onto the floorboard beside my feet, he burns rubber out of there. Once we’re in the clear, I put my gun down and pull out my phone to load up the live audio feed from Roger’s house, hoping he hasn’t yet figured out he’s been bugged. He’s a known accomplice to the DA and a huge drug dealer for the entire state. It’s how I kept an eye on Brede and Blair without having to bust in to see if she needed help. I knew by the sounds she made that day with Brede that she was just fine. More than fine as he ate her out. My binoculars showed me that much, and with the sound accompaniment, well, I couldn’t wait to see her that night and get my hands on her.

&nb
sp; Now, as the audio feeds through, hearing what’s going on is both a blessing and a curse. We at least know she’s alive.

  “Good morning, sleeping beauty…no, you should rest,” Roger says.

  “Brede?” Blair asks, sounding so small and delicate. My brother glances over at the phone in my hand when she says his name; then his grip tightens on the steering wheel.

  “Now that he’s finished with you, it’s my turn.”

  “W-what?” Blair asks.

  “Brede had a job to do for your father. And since he didn’t do it, now I will.”

  “A job?”

  “To take care of you.”

  “We’re gonna be too fucking late!” Brede exclaims before flooring the gas even harder. At least the road is mostly empty this time of night with no traffic to get in the way.

  “Just a few more minutes and we’ll be there,” I assure him, hoping I’m right.

  The longer we listen to the live feed, the more apparent it becomes that Blair is a smart girl. “She’s playing along, buying us more time.”

  “She shouldn’t have to…no telling what he’s…” Brede can’t finish the sentence, and his knuckles are so white on the steering wheel it may break off soon.

  “You love her,” I say in understanding and surprise.

  “I’m gonna kill him,” he replies coolly as we take a sharp right, turning off for the empty highway that leads to Roger’s dirt road. No more than five minutes at this speed. Hang in there, Blair.

  “Suck me good. Oh God, yes,” comes over the feed. Brede growls and drives even faster, maxing out the speed on the SUV.

  “He definitely deserves to die,” I agree. In less than a minute, we’re pulling onto the final dirt road. “But slow down,” I warn my brother. “You’ll spin out on the gravel.”

  “No, I won’t,” he grumbles, right as a scream comes over the feed. Brede even slows down a smidge when he glances over at the phone in my hands.

  “I don’t think that was her,” I tell him proudly with a smile. “I’m pretty sure she just –”