Page 30 of Monster

Not that I wasn’t fucking thankful for her involvement. Braxton was alive and safe at home, thanks to her.

Fuck.

She should have never crossed my path. Should have lived her life without my interference.

The girl was just too fucking innocent to be thrust into club’s life—intomylife—but it seemed fate had other plans and placed the little wildcat right in front of me.

And I didn’t know what to do with her.

I just… I had to keep her safe, no matter the cost.

Something told me she wouldn’t like what that cost was.

My phone rang just as I got to the house.

The lights were on in the living room. Braxton was probably asleep now, or I hoped he was. I fucking hoped the nightmares would stay away.

But Kai was still here.

I imagined he might be there for a while, not wanting to leave Braxton out of his sight for too long.

I felt the same fucking way.

I picked up the phone and held it to my ear. “Yeah.”

“Prez, you were right,” Axel said. “Her entire place is ransacked. Whoever those bastards are, I think they got her information from the registration in her car because that was missing. And they got to her apartment and looked through everything.”

“Fuck. Thanks for letting me know. Did they leave anything behind that might tell us who they are?”

The slight silence before he answered me told me everything before he did. “No. I’m sorry, man. They’re either skilled, or they got lucky. There’s nothing here. And everything in her place is ruined.”

“They’re not fucking skilled. They couldn’t even catch a small woman and a child.”

Not that I wasn’t fucking grateful for that, but I didn’t know who the fuck they were.

Who would be stupid enough to mess with the MC? Mess with me?

“Go home and rest,” I said. “I’m calling church early tomorrow morning at the compound. Make sure you gather all the men. Call Roman and Micah and tell them to stop searching for clues and go home as well. I’m sure Roman wants to get back to the woman waiting up for him, warming his bed.”

Axel’s gruff laughter hit my ear before he hung up.

A plan formed in my brain, and I wondered if this plan was really as chivalrous as Iwasmaking it out to be, or if there was a darker intent hiding in the fucked-up recesses of my mind.

What was it about this girl that brought out all of my protective instincts?

Was it because she’d saved Braxton, and now I felt a need to ensure nothing and no one could ever get to her?

And I could do it, too. There wouldn’t be a better protector for her than me.

The world was filled with monsters, but I was the biggest, meanest one of them all.

Or did I feel this need to protect her because she had made my dead heart tremble, and I fucking hated the feeling and was addicted to it, all the same?

I put my hand on my chest, rubbing at the small ache there.

I shouldn’t feel anything for her.

Most of my humanity was fucking beat out of me by my parents, and what was left was reserved solely for my boys.

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