Page 10 of Double or Nothing
“I can’t wait any longer,” Jade says after a few minutes of silence. “Please tell me what happened tonight.”
“First, you need to tell me why you ran off again,” I say. “Kit went out of his mind when he returned home, and you weren’t there. What the fuck, Jade! Why did you leave a note saying you would be back if you weren’t coming home? How many times do we need to rehash this same scenario over and over? I never believed Vulcan when he said you would keep running, but he’s right.”
“I’m sorry,” she says quietly. “I knew Kit would be mad at me for returning to the club and I had every intention of being back home before he got there. Last night when I went to the club, I spotted Natasha. I wasn’t sure if it was her, but I had a pretty good suspicion that it was. I figured Kit wouldn’t want me going back to Platinum alone, and I also wanted to pick up my car. Then I underestimated how suspicious Natasha would be of me. When I walked into Platinum, the owner escorted me up to her office where Natasha held a knife to my throat.”
“Jesus Christ! Why didn’t you take one of us with you? We’ll never be able to keep you safe if you keep doing this!”
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I realize now how risky and stupid this was. Things are okay now with Natasha once she saw Ivan’s brother, Igor, in the club. She realized I was telling the truth about everything. You can’t blame her for being suspicious of me. For all she knew, I could be working with the Russians. Eva, the owner of Platinum, refused to let me leave the club until I gave them proof. I offered to download the hacked files of the Russians to her computer.”
“Meanwhile, we were all going insane, completely out of our minds wondering if the Russians had captured you,” I spit out. “Kit called us once he realized something was wrong. We went to his house and then rode over to Platinum to make sure your car was still there. When we arrived, we saw Ivan sitting in a car parked beside yours. While we were watching, he got out and used a Slim Jim to break into your car. Vulcan went absolutely bat shit ballistic. He dragged him out onto the pavement and started beating the living hell out of him. He tried to get him to tell us where you were, but the man wasn’t talking.”
“Were they following me?” she asks.
“I’m not sure. Or maybe they found out Natasha’s location and you being there was a coincidence. They knew it was your car, though. Otherwise, why would they have broken into it? It doesn’t matter now either way.”
“You said Ivan had been taken care of. What did you mean by that? Where is he now?”
I reach over to clasp her hand. There’s no easy way to tell her what happened tonight at Vulcan’s RV. “He’s dead,” I say. “We killed him. I’m sorry to drop a bomb on you without warning, but that’s what happened.”
As I recount the events of the ending, Jade listens intently, her eyes wide with shock and disbelief. The details are vivid in my mind, the images of the fight, the blood, and the ultimate demise of Ivan replaying in my thoughts.
“Is everyone okay? Is anyone else hurt?” Her grip on the door handle is white-knuckled, her eyes staring straight ahead as the reality of our situation sinks in.
“That would be according to what you mean by okay,” I say. “Miraculously, none of us were physically hurt or killed. It was touch and go there for a few minutes. There’s something important you need to understand about Vulcan. He did something tonight that terrified us, and it could’ve ended tragically. You’ve heard him mention before about how he can’t die?”
She nods back at me, her eyes wide.
“Well, he honest to God believes that because of things that have happened in his past. It’s not my place to tell you the details, it’s his. All I can say is that he truly believes it and isn’t joking. Tonight, he showed us all how truly fucked up in the head he is.”
She’s gripping my hand tightly. “What did he do? I’m terrified to hear the rest of this story.”
I blow out a long breath as I try to decide the best way to tell her. It’s hard to put into words how frightening the whole situation was, and how close we came to losing Vulcan for good.
“Vulcan beat the guy up bad. I mean, really bad. Broke his nose and several bones in his face. The guy is a fucking mobster. Of course, he wasn’t going to tell us shit, no matter what Vulcan did to him. We took him out to Vulcan’s RV and tied the man to a lounge chair outside. We found his identification and put it together that he was the Ivan on the boat that you told us about. The longer the questioning continued, the crazier Vulcan became. He began playing Russian Roulette using real bullets with the man.”
“What?” Jade exclaims. “Did he shoot Ivan?”
“No, that’s not what happened, and you haven’t heard the worst part. Vulcan took turns putting the gun to his own fucking head and pulling the trigger.”
“You and Kit let him do that?” she yells. “What the hell? How could you stand by and watch him do that?”
“We thought it was a trick at first. Or at least I did, and I’m sure Kit did too. We would never have allowed him to do something so stupid if we’d known he was playing for real. Vulcan had some insane idea in his head that Ivan would be more willing to talk if he believed Vulcan was crazy enough to play along with him.”
“What kind of trick did you think he was using?” she asks furiously. “How do you fake playing Russian Roulette?”
“I honestly believed Vulcan knew exactly where the bullet was in the chamber. But then he started adding more bullets. He did a round with two bullets for each of them and the gun didn’t go off. By this time, Vulcan was completely bonkers, and he stabbed Ivan in the thigh up to the knife handle.” I shake my head at the memory. “I should’ve stopped things, right then, because I could tell by the weird look in Vulcan’s eyes that he was losing his shit.”
“What kind of look are you talking about?” she asks. “Have you seen it before?”
“It’s hard to describe. You’ll recognize it if you see it, and I hope you never do. The look means he’s mentally unraveling and losing control. Once that happens, he’s a danger to himself and potentially to everyone around him.” I glance over at her. “After he stabbed Ivan, he loaded three bullets into the chamber. Three fucking bullets, which meant he had a fifty percent chance of the gun going off. Then he stepped back and put the gun to his own head.”
“Oh my God,” Jade says, her voice breaking. “Please tell me he’s okay.”
“Vulcan isn’t physically hurt, but he’s definitely not okay. I don’t know what it will take to make him okay. Time, maybe. Too much has happened to him. He’s fucked up bad in the head. By this time, we all realized things were going downhill fast. Kit started begging Vulcan to give him the gun. He offered to shoot Ivan in the leg himself. Vulcan just laughed at him. He knew Kit was trying to get the gun away from him. While Kit was talking to him, I moved slightly to shift out of Vulcan’s peripheral vision. Then without warning, Vulcan puts the gun to his temple, counts down fast from three and pulls the goddamn trigger.”
“Is he shot? He is, isn’t he? You don’t want to tell me because you’re afraid I’ll freak out. Take me to him now!”
“No, he’s fine. I swear to you. I wouldn’t lie about something as serious as that. As soon as he started counting down, I rushed toward him and hit him from his blind side. I crashed into him right as he pulled the trigger and knocked the gun out of his hand. If I’d hesitated a split second longer, or if the angle of the gun had been different, things could’ve easily ended tragically. I’m still shaken up by it. Seeing a man closer than a brother to me almost blow his brains out is life altering. I never want to go through something like that again, ever.”
