Page 7 of Full Throttle

“You think I don't know that?” he snapped. He shook his head again and shot up from his chair, pointing down at me. “You wanted her off the fucking streets and kept her car in the bays, Cain.”

I glared up at him, remaining silent, because he was right. The second I heard that she was having car trouble, I took my sweet as time fixing her engine. She didn’t belong on the streets. This wasn’t her fucking world. It was mine. She belonged in a big city, working a big corporate job, living in her perfect sky-rise. That was where she belonged, somewhere good and clean.

“You didn’t have to give her the fucking car,” I growled.

“Oh, I regret it now, believe me,” he spat. “It’s eating me alive knowing Kavi had that fucker strap the C-4 to one of mine, but in the moment, Cain, I didn’t. That girl is fucking good—great, even. She has so much potential."

“She doesn’t belong—”

“Only in your eyes, but from where I’m standing, along with everyone else, behind the wheel is exactly where she needs to be,” he cut me off, his words firm.

“Cain!”

Leon moved, giving me full view of his kind-hearted sister, Mina, running towards me. I stood up just in time to catch her in an embrace, her body crashing against mine. I smothered my grunt, my arms instantly tightening around her.

Mina, like me, was a stranger to Oasis and the Crew. When she first came here, St. Louis was the last place on Earth she wanted her daughter to be. Even though her life was crumbling, she was nice to me. Fuck, she considered me a friend, and after spending years of wandering across the country, it felt good.

“Hey, Mina,” I whispered in her ear.

Her hold tightened on me. “Don’t you ever—and I mean ever—scare me like that again,” she hissed, sobbing. “I know she’s okay—are you okay?”

“Yeah,” I told her softly, lying. I was far from okay.

I pulled her away, noticing Dontell standing beside Leon now, his eyes on Mina’s back. I looked into her cinnamon-colored eyes and gave her the harsh truth, despite everything I’d just told Lee.

Despite all the hate I had for Dominique now.

“I had no choice,” I told her. “I had to save her.”

“We understand that,” Dontell added, coming around to Mina’s side, a hint of suspicion in his eyes.

They had the wrong idea.

“I was in her debt,” I explained, looking at the three of them. Leon’s brows furrowed as Dontell’s lips thinned.

Mina’s eyes widened. “What are you talking about?”

My eyes found hers again. “I owe her my life.”

“It’s a long story,” I added, looking to Dontell and Leon before they could get a word in.

Judging by the looks on their faces, we were going to need to have another graveyard meeting. The last meeting nearly ripped whatever was left of my soul apart.

November. St. Louis, MO.

I followed Leon, Jer, and Dontell out of the city in my Silvia. With each mile, my unease grew. It’d been a few days since I told them I used to work for Kavi.

Once, I’d been a part of the fucking Bratva.

Once.

Never fucking again.

Ever.

“Everything comes full fucking circle, Cain,” I muttered, shifting again and pulling up in the middle lane, between Dontell’s Porsche and Jer’s Challenger. Leon was in front of us, leading by a few hundred feet. I shook my head; the bastard always had to be in the lead.

A few minutes later, we pulled off the interstate into a little town in Missouri. About a mile and a half later, Leon turned into a cemetery and, one by one, each car followed him. We parked in a circle on the far end, away from the graves, and the sun was rising over the hollow ground, warming up the fallen souls. I got out, bracing for our next conversation.

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