Zeke

"When are you going to tell Kai that you two are married?" Caden asked once Kai retrieved to his room.

"He already knows," I replied and he looked up with a raised brow, "I gave him the letter his father left for him where it tells him about our arranged marriage."

"And how did he take it?" Was his next question and I sighed, "I'm guessing you two haven't talked about it yet."

"Hopefully when this is over we'll sit down and talk about it more calmly." I said and he nodded, "anyway, have Tony or Lorenzo got in touch with you?"

"Tony just messaged saying that he and his guys were in position and waiting for Lorenzo to make the first move. None of Rick's guys or him have left the warehouse in the last two hours since they've been surrounding it," he replied and I nodded.

"Alright, is there anything else?"

"Yeah, apparently Blaze and Rick are not blood brothers" now that was a surprise, "Blaze was taken in by Rick's father when he was 5 years old and Rick was 10. Rick and Blaze's relationship soon emerged and after Rick's father caught them in a very compromising position when Blaze was 13 and Rick 18, he sent Blaze away which angered Rick to the point where he killed his father."

"So what Kai was saying about them having a relationship was right?" I asked and he nodded.

"They saw each other for the first time 3 years ago when Rick and Kai got together and moved to Seattle," he said and I nodded.

"Anything else?"

"Not as o-" he began but cut off when my phone began to ring I took it out from my pocket and saw Lorenzo's name on the screen and quickly took the call putting it on speaker.

"Speak."

"Boss, we have a clear view of Rick's men, what do you want us to do?" He asked.

"What do you mean Rick's men? Isn't he with them?"

"No, he must've gone out through a secret door because we haven't seen him leave the warehouse." Lorenzo replied.

"How many men are there?"

"25 which gives me the impression that he took the others with him."

"Who was left in charge of the remaining men?"

"Blaze," Caden looked at me and knew exactly what I was thinking by the smirk on his face, "what do you want us to do?"

"Kill them, I want Rick to know exactly who he's dealing with," I replied.

"As you wish, Boss," and I could practically hear his smirk on the other end of the line before it went dead.

"Now what? If Rick is not at the warehouse, then where the hell could he be?" Caden asked and I ran frustrated fingers through my hair.

"I'm going to contact Ryder and tell him what's going on," I said and he nodded, "you keep looking at more leads that will help us find Rick.”

"Alright," he replied as I walked out of the living room and towards the kitchen as I dialed Ryder's number. Ryder Henderson is one of my most trusted friends and gang leader of the second-largest mafia in Denver, The Lions. That man is as powerful as me. We've been friends since we were children despite our fathers being rivals. He, much like myself, became the leader of his gang when he was 15 but his circumstances were different. His father had been killed during a raid gone wrong much like mine had when I was 23 and met Landon Jacobson, Kai's father.

Though I had wished to accompany him at his father's funeral, I was also dealing with my tragedy, which was the death of my mother and unborn baby brother.

"Hello?" The familiar British accent answered after the first ring.

"I'm starting I think you sleep with your phone taped to your ear," I teased my all-time friend who huffed and I could almost see him rolling his eyes at my comment.

"What do you want, Zeke?" He asked and I sighed, "what's wrong?" Ugh, I hated when he could detect things just by the way he speaks.

"Nothing’s wrong," I replied.

"Stop bullshitting, now tell me what's going on? It doesn't have to do with this Rick character does it?"

"Was I interrupting your and Cryler’s alone time?"

"Don't change the subject. Ezekiel" I hated when he calls me by my full name, "is he still being a burden?"

"Nothing gets past you does it?" I asked and he scoffed, I could hear a door opening and closing on the other end of the line

"No, now tell me what's going on?" He replied and so I did. I told him everything from the beginning not leaving anything out. How I had Tony and Lorenzo stake out Rick's hideout and kill everyone inside and how Rick had escaped. How Kai is shaken up with the thought of Rick coming back and potentially taking him away no matter how much I tried to reassure him that Rick won't get a chance to get near him.

"Right now I have Caden looking at all the security c-" I began to say when I was cut off by a loud explosion coming from upstairs

"Zeke? Hello? ZEKE!?" I dropped my phone and ran out of the kitchen and into the bell where smoke covered the entire space. I could hear yelling from upstairs and quickly made my way toward the noise knowing that Caden will be okay. With my gun drawn and ready to fire, I snuck upstairs and into the real war zone.

John had Kai behind his back who was shaking and silently crying as Rick stood in front of them with a gun pointed in their direction.

"I always knew you would betray me," Rick stated as he began pacing the hall in front of them, John held Kai behind him as Kai held onto his jacket.

"I only worked for you because of Kai," John said making Rick pause and look toward them, "It was my job to make sure that nothing happened to him while he was with you. Do you think that I was loyal to you like the rest of your little ants?"

I made my way towards them, Rick oblivious to my approach but Kai saw and widened his eyes. I lifted my finger to my lips to keep him from making any noise and he subtly nodded.

"We've been trailing you since you followed Kai and me here, Rick. And if I'm correct then your hideout has already been ransacked and the people you left behind are most likely dead," John said freezing Rick in his pacing, "you didn't think that your little hideout wouldn't be found did you?"

Rick clenched his jaw as he took his phone out of his pocket while still holding his gun towards John and Kai, "Come on, come on, pick up" I heard him whisper as he began pacing again his phone to his ear which gave me enough time to move through the shadows to stand behind him when stopped, "Damn it, Blaze, pick up"

"You've reached the voicemail of Blaze, I am unable to answer your call right now but if you leave your name and number after the beep I will return your call as soon as possible...BEEP!"

"Damn it Blaze what's the point of having a phone if you're not going to answer? Call me back as soon as you get this," Rick snapped when the call went to voicemail

"He's not gonna answer, you know" I stated from behind him causing Rick to swirl around to face me, "I gave my men an order to kill every single person in the warehouse that you left behind,"

"You bastard" he snarled launching at me throwing a punch to my cheek that I easily dodged while John grabbed Kai and pulled him down the hall to a safer place.

"You left your men wide open to mine," I taunted him still dodging his every punch, "you call yourself a leader when you abandoned your guys to their demise"

"If they dare lay a hand on him I'll fucking kill you" he snarled panting as he was getting worn out due to not being able to lay a blow

"Why do you think he won't pick up your call? It'd be a miracle if he managed to escape unharmed and left his phone behind but I doubt it" I replied with a shrug, "but I won't count my luck just yet seeing as it's been a little over half an hour since I gave the order,"

A phone began to ring gaining our attention and Rick quickly pulled his phone out but to his annoyance, it was mine that had rung. I pulled out my ringing phone pressed the answer button and put the call on speaker. It's always a good thing to have more than one phone in case you lose or drop one when you're in a hurry like I was.

"Hello?"

"Boss," Lorenzo's voice echoed through the speakers making Rick clench his jaw as he held his gun towards me and I smirked, "all of Rick's men are dead"

"All of them?"

"Yes, we checked the entire warehouse to see if any of them have gotten away but no, all 45 of his men are accounted for. Turned out he didn't take any of his other guys with him as I thought. They were further away in a secret room going over their weapons and drugs. Tony is doing one last sweep but there's not much that can be searched."

"Good, now get back to the house we've got a situation" I replied

"Roger, we should be back in an hour the latest, so do me a favor and don't get yourself killed" he stated making me roll my eyes

"As if" I replied and he chuckled before ending the call. A second later I received various messages with images of Rick's men all dead including Blaze who had his phone in his hand and eyes wide open with blood pooling from his mouth and between his eyes, "awe what a shame"

"You sick bastard!" Rick growled before pulling the trigger on his gun and a moment later I felt a sting on my stomach and heard a loud scream from down the hall, "rot in-"

I didn't hear the rest of his words as my world began to tilt and blood began to bubble up to my throat as I coughed and fell to my knees a hand over the wound then everything went black.

******

I could hear voices on the distance making me frown. Where the hell am I? Last I remember I was standing face to face with Rick before everything turned black. I began to even think that I was falling to hell.

"How long do you think until he wakes up?" I heard a familiar voice ask

"He should be waking soon,"another familiar voice replied and I tried to figure out where I am as everything was still fuzzy. The only thing I could hear and smell was a constant beeping and voices talking around and the smell of chlorine and other cleaning products, "luckily the bullet missed any major organ and had minor blood loss,"

"If Caden hadn't gotten there on time, I can't even imagine what would've happened," the first voice whispered and I could hear the fear in his voice and I tried to get my muscles to move but all I could feel were pins and needles as if I've been laying on the same spot for hours.

"I did what I had to do. He would've done the same had our roles been reversed," The voice of my brother said

"I wish I could've done something to stop Rick from shooting him,"

"You couldn't have stopped him no matter what, Kai. Rick already knew what he was going to do when he shot Zeke. Besides Zeke wouldn't have wanted you to be in any more danger than you already were" Caden said making Kai sigh, "look on the bright side, Rick is dead and Zeke will recover and will be back to being his old stubborn and asshole-ish self again soon enough"

I blinked my eyes before cursing at the brightness which earned the attention of everyone in the room because soon a few shadows fell over me as the lights were dimmed down.

"Welcome to the land of the living, Boss," The doctor said making me groan, "How are you feeling?"

"How do you think?" I huffed opening my eyes seeing Nicolas, the doctor, Caden and Kai surrounding me with Caden at my left, Kai at my right and the doctor at the foot of the bed,

"Right, anyway, like I was telling Master Caden and Mr. Kai, the bullet didn't hit any major organs or arteries, which you're pretty lucky by the way, so you should be discharged without the next 48 hours as I want to keep you in the infirmary for observation," Nick said and I raised a brow at his statement and struggled to sit up before Caden and Kai helped me to sit up and Caden quickly filled a glass with water to quench my throat due to the fact it felt as if sand had been poured down it, "and don't give me that look, Boss. I know how much you hate being here but it's necessary"

"The hell I'm going to stay here for two days" I retorted

"Yes, you are, Zeke, and don't even try to argue. You nearly got killed and if the doctor says you're staying then you're staying, do you understand?" I raised a brow in surprise at Kai's words and he raised a brow and crossed his arms waiting for me to argue and I sighed, "that's what I thought"

I glared at Caden who snickered but he only laughed even more and I shook my head, "I'm going to go and bring you your pain medicine and something eat" Nick said with a grin before leaving Caden, Kai and I alone on the room.

"So what exactly happened?" I asked and both Kai and Caden exchanged glance before Kai nodded so Caden took a deep before recounting what had happened after John and taken Kai to a safe location leaving Rick and me alone. Turned out Caden had been in the living room looking through the security cameras trying to figure out where Rick had gone to when he saw him on one of our security cameras before the explosion happened and was able to hide as the living room had been blown as well as the top floor where Kai's room was located.

"I heard you and Rick arguing upstairs and that's when I saw him shoot you," Caden said

"I had run out of the room that John had taken me when I saw you fall and when Rick was about to shoot you for a second time when Caden got there on time and shot Rick killing him instantly," Kai added and I sighed running my fingers through my hair before wincing and lowering it back on the end as it had stretched my left side where I had been shot, "it scared the hell out of me when I saw you laying lump on the floor with blood all around you"

"I'm going to inform the others that you're awake," Caden said before leaving us alone.

"I'm sorry you had to see that," I murmured holding my hand towards him and Kai laid his on top of my mine before I gently pulled him towards me, "I wish you didn't see that"

"It's something I'm going to have to get used to seeing as you're my husband, right? This is going to be a constant thing that's going to happen whether I like it or not" he whispered as he sat on the edge of the bed and I wish I could lie to him but I knew he'd see right through it so I nodded, "I only hope that it doesn't happen so often because it don't think I could deal with it if it happens every day"

"It won't happen every day, I can assure you" I replied pulling him towards me before softly pressing my lips to his and he smiled before kissing back, "so you don't mind that your father married you off to me?"

"No, but I wish things would have been different. I wish that I had met you before I met Rick because then my life wouldn't have been so shitty from the start and I'd be able to be with my family" he replied and I nodded

"I know, but now that Rick is out of the way, you can reconnect with them and have the bond you missed during your time with him" I stated

"And I can't wait"