Page 96 of Riding the Pine

Should be easy, right?

Except we have connections in the police department and beyond. It would be only too simple to find out the names of who did this.

We also have connections to people who could easily make them go away.

Artemis leans over and kisses Athena on the one piece of her face that doesn’t have a mark, or paper stitches, and she cups his face. “I’m okay.”

He must scrunch up his face because she giggles. “I’ll be okay.”

When he gets up, Ares takes his place and gives her a cautious hug her eyes say hurts like fuck, but from the way she clutches him tells me she needs it.

He flees the bedroom quicker than we came in, he clearly needs a minute to regroup, I can’t blame him. All we can seeis her face, her arm in a cast, and the discarded boot next to the bed. If we’d seen everything Scott has seen, I doubt we’d be functional right now.

It’s my turn to kiss her, or hug her, but when I sit down, I find it really hard to do anything but cry at her. She wipes my tears with her thumb. “I know,” she says. But I’m not sure she truly does.

There’s a not-too-small part of me that feels like I should have prevented this, I should have stopped them from doing this to her. I kiss her cheek, help get her settled lying down so she can nap, and sweep her hair from her forehead. “You’re not alone, hermana. We’re all here for you, and we’ll help you fight when you feel like you can’t.”

She’s probably already asleep, her eyes are closed, and Scott is lying about a foot away from her staring at me with grateful eyes.

I watch over her for a moment, waiting until her fractured breathing becomes more regular, and my heart settles into a steady pattern.

I know she doesn’t want us to retaliate against the men who did this to her, but whoever they are should rest easy tonight, because regardless of what happens next, they’re going to rue the day they ever crossed my family.

CHAPTER 39

Ares

I’m going to fucking kill them.

CHAPTER 40

Artemis

When I leave Athena’s room, my body sags. I’d been holding myself upright against my will for the last few minutes. Ares is already gone from the room—that’s going to be problematic, and Apollo is still in there with her.

I close the door leading into the living space, brace myself against the back of the couch with one hand, but I’m not sure that’s even strong enough to hold me up right now. It feels like my insides are crumbling like a sandcastle that’s suddenly devoid of the liquid that’s been holding it together, and all that’s left are tumbling grains of sand.

My heart hurts. Like, it tangibly hurts, more than any injury or physical pain I’ve ever sustained in my entire hockey life. My heart is so sore I want to plunge my fingers into my chest, rip open a rib or two, and cast out the offending organ.

Who the fuck thinks it’s okay to do this to another human being?

I grip the couch with my second hand, but still, I’m not sure it’s enough. The room spins.

Who would do this to someone?

My stomach churns.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and my full stomach of food is threatening to make a reappearance after having seen my sister’s beaten face.

I bend over the back of the sofa in a bid to slow the thundering pulse in my veins, or help the nausea swimming in my gut, but nothing’s helping. All I can see is the image of Athena’s traumatized face, her distressed features, the way she stroked Scott’s hand with one of hers, even though it was in a cast, and the other pulled at imaginary lint from the comforter on her bed.

I don’t envy Scott. What he saw must have been so much worse, so much fucking worse than seeing her tucked up cozy in bed with a banged-up face.

How am I supposed to be okay with this? How am I supposed to go to classes knowing that my sister is lying here having escaped a fucking brush with death? Because let’s face it, the list of her injuries tells me those fuckers weren’t at all concerned with her wellbeing or whether she lived or died.

Scott says she bit one of their dicks, and that sent them running. If she hadn’t been able to retaliate as she did, would they have stopped this side of death?

My head spins, stomach lurching at the thought of losing Athena. We never say it out loud but she’s the one we all aspire to be, our leader in a way, and our protector in many others.

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