Page 103 of Kings Fear No One
More proof that this girl has gotten to me.
I wouldn’t be so pissed otherwise. She put herself in such a dangerous situation. She might as well have strolled into a fucking lion’s den…
All because she refused to return home. All because she wanted to go off wandering where she should’ve never gone.
She flinches as if struck. “I’m sorry.”
“That also seems to be a theme.”
“It’s not what you’re thinking.”
“Then tell me, Teysha, what the fuck is it? ’Cuz from where I’m standing, it looks a lot like what I’m thinking.”
“If you’re going to raise your voice?—”
“Do you understand what you did? How damn lucky you were I came by when I did? You get what was gonna happen at that bar? You know what an initiation into a gang means? You know what women have to do to get in?”
“You don’t even know my side of the story!”
“I don’t need to know it to know it was a fucking stupid decision!” I’m up on my feet, the veins throbbing in my neck. My pulse kicks up all over again like we’re back at Zapote.
I’m an intimidating man. Six-two, two-ten pounds of muscle.
When I’m angry, everybody knows about it. They hear it in my booming voice and feel the hot pulse in the air.
For someone as sheltered and naive as Teysha, I might as well be some barbarian from another world.
She shrinks like a violet where she’s seated on the edge of the bed, blinking at me with those damn big, expressive eyes of hers. Eyes the color of coffee. Eyes that carry a shine in them like no other when she’s happy and content.
Things she deserves. Things she’ll never have if she keeps fucking around where she shouldn’t be…
“Don’t you get it?” I growl, throwing my hands up. “Don’t you see how I’m trying to protect you from all the shit out there? But you can’t do what I tell you to do—you’ve gotta run off and make trouble and then expect me to bail you out. I didn’t sign up for this. I didn’t ask for you or your baggage!
“You think you can play house and expect me to just go along with it! You’ve got no damn clue what it means to be married… let alone married to a guy like me! Why can’t you just listen and do what’s best for yourself? Why can’t you go home and heal so you can find somebody who can give you the things you want!?”
By the time the last word in my rant rumbles across the room, I’m breathing hard. I’ve taken several steps toward the bed where she’s seated. I’ve waved my arms in sharp, aggressive movements like I’m at my wit’s end.
And I am.
I don’t know how else to get her to understand.
I’m not the man for her.
I’m not the knight in shining armor she’s looking for. Why can’t she want better for herself?
Teysha’s fallen quiet, though her misty eyes and trembling chin speak for her. She’s doing her best to hold in her cry. She’s succeeding at making me feel like an even bigger piece of shit the second silence fills the void and I realize I didn’t listen to a word she had to say.
Instead I yelled at her. I ranted and told her she was baggage.
The girl’s still clammy from her bout of sickness. She doesn’t feel well, yet I’m being an asshole.
Guilt saws through me to the bone. I bite down on my jaw, closing my eyes and counting backward from ten.
This girl will be the death of me. This girl means… something.
Something I’m not sure I’m ready to face.
“Tell me,” I grind out seconds later, coming to my senses. “Tell me your side of the story.”
