Page 65 of Making Choices

Still the motherfucker has the audacity to look peaceful.

I spin on my heel and march out into the hallway. “Fucker’s lucky he’s already dead.”

At the sound of my voice, Cherub startles. She opens her eyes and peers up at Venom. “Take me… home.”

In her voice, I hear defeat.

She’s shattered.

Autopilot kicks in and I’ve got my phone pressed to my ear before I’ve decided to make the call. Our normal doctor will be busy dealing with the rest of the club. That means it’s time to call in the marker Bebe owes me.

Whether she wants to or not, the good doctor will be fixing my duchess tonight.

“Heya, doll,” I say as soon as the call connects.

“Slash.” She’s avoided me as much as possible since I came all over her back and ditched her post-fuck, so her voice shakes with unconcealed anger. “What can I do for you?”

I launch into my request without hesitation. “You know that marker you owe me? Well, I’m callin’ it in tonight.”

“Can’t,” Bebe tells me in a clipped tone. “I’m at dinner with my parents and my…” A sharp inhale fills my ear before she adds. “And Jack.”

“I don’t care if you’re havin’ dinner with the fuckin’ Pope... I need you to hop your arse into that luxury car of yours and head up to the hills as fast as you can. I’ll send you the address. Bring every medical supply you have on hand… blankets to protect your seats… and a closed fuckin’ mouth.”

“Fine,” Bebe snaps. “But, once this is done, you need to either reciprocate or lose my number.”

Ending the call without acknowledging her ultimatum, I type out the address of the safe house and shove my phone into the back pocket of my jeans.

“Bebe?”

“Yep,” I tell Venom.

Gazes locked, he asks, “Think she’ll come?”

“If she doesn’t, I’ll make sure she loses every single fuckin’ thing that’s good in her life.” The harsh timbre that resonates from my declaration comes from the heart. I don’t want to see Bebe any more than she wants to see me, but beggars can’t be choosers. Like it or not, she owes me, and the time to pay up has arrived. “Told her when she asked for her favour that she wouldn’t like the terms, not my fault if she proves incapable of listening.”

My legs collapse out from underneath me when I sneak another look at Cherub. The blood. The bruises. The pale cast to her skin. With my back braced against the wall I just slid down, I let Venom know the other thing I discovered in the bedroom. “She’s seen the photos. The prick had them blown up for her.”

His response is full of rage. “How? It happened less than two hours ago.”

“How the fuck do I know?” I shrug like I’m not stressed as fuck at what Cherub saw in the pictures. She’s going to be disgusted with us both. My tone is brittle, the words like ash on my tongue as I sarcastically offer, “You want me to go get them off the floor so you can see for yourself?”

“No.”

Like a pussy, I punt my guilt onto Venom’s shoulders. “You’re gonna have some explainin’ to do.”

“Least of my problems right now.” His touch is tender and his gaze is full of worry as he runs his fingertips over Cherub’s lips. “She keeps losin’ consciousness. Maybe we should take her to the hospital?”

“If you do that, she’s goin’ to jail. That room isn’t only covered in his blood… pretty sure some of it is Cherub’s.”

My uneasy assessment of the situation seems to spur him into motion. He struggles to his feet and picks Cherub up. I can’t watch them together, not when my conscience is screaming at me for being stupid enough to fall into this carefully laid trap. My job is to see the patterns. To calculate the odds. And I got this so wrong that when he carries her into the living room, I decide to dip out. “I’m gonna call Cub… check in on the others.”

Venom hardly glances my way, instead using his chin to gesture to Cherub as he says, “I know I should, but—”

“Leave it to me.” I allow him to leave our present reality unspoken. He can’t be our VP right now because he’s holding his life, beaten and bleeding, in his arms. Nothing else matters to him right now. “Should I tell anyone about this? Or wait until she’s been looked at, and we can start the clean up?”

“Let Cub and Hunter know. Tell ’em they should keep it to themselves for now. If too many find out, it’ll be harder to cover up.”

With Venom’s orders ringing in my head, I step outside and light up a smoke. Every nerve ending in my body is jangling. I feel electrified in the worst possible sense of the word. My adrenaline isn’t pounding in a way that energises me. Instead, it depletes me. Drains me fast. I’m unravelling. Lost between blame and anger. Caught within a web of my own making. I want to knock Venom out of the way and take care of Cherub myself. Yet at the same time, my feet burn with the need to get as far away from her as possible.

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