Page 85 of His Fury

“You’ve got the guns out. I don’t expect we’ll be getting up close and personal for this one.”

“I wouldn’t be so quick to assume.”

An hour later, I knew why I needed a change of clothes. My knuckles were split, my sleeves rolled up, and blood covered my shirt and face. My fist connected with a cheekbone again, and this time, I heard the snap.

The guy’s head lolled on his shoulders before dropping down to rest on his chest. I stepped back and looked at the guy from last night as he dropped in a heap at my feet.

“He passed out again,” I grumbled.

“Mmhmm.” Rye was behind me. “You done?”

I turned to look at him. He wasn’t as bloody, but he was still not walking down the street anytime soon.

“He threatened Isla.”

Rye waved his hand in a ”carry on” motion. “Then get it out of your system.”

He’d told me in the car. Isla had followed us into the meet last night. The younger guy had seen her, and she had run. Iknew she hadn’t stayed in the car. I knew she was in that building. Ididn’tknow that she was spotted. I wouldn’t have left the building if I had. Rye only saw it this morning when he checked back on the tapes.

We documented everything. We recognized the risks of it falling into the wrong hands, but in our line of work, sometimes—thoughrarely—one or both parties we mediated for would turn around and attempt to back out of a deal or proposal. Only once did I have to retrieve the tape and prove the terms were as I had disclosed.

I’d never been questioned again especially after I had extracted the truth from both parties in front of their peers. It hadn’t been fast. It hadn’t been painless.

Today, we had come to talk—only talk. But when he commented on her being a pretty girl and told me what he planned on doing withmygirl, I no longer wanted to talk to him.

I pulled back. The fight left me. “He stopped fighting,” I said, quickly unbuttoning my shirt.

“Yup. About ten hits ago.” Rye didn’t judge. He just stated facts as he saw them.

I thought about it. “You knew I needed to punch someone?”

He looked up from pulling off his pants, realized I was serious, and straightened. “It’s been bottling up too long,” he told me. “You needed an outlet, lucky for us, Barnie caught us one.” He wet his lips. “But…I’m not repeating myself here, I just want you to hear me say it.” He tossed his pants onto the pile, catching my shirt as I threw it to him. “This shithead?” He gestured to the guy lying unconscious at my feet. “Is going to be the first of many. You going to beat the shit out of all of them?”

“If I have to.”

He held my stare. “Then we have bloody knuckles for a long time before they get the message.”

“Ido.” I unbuckled my belt. “It’s my knuckles, not yours.”

When we were both stripped, he tossed the bag of spare clothes he brought me. It was sweatpants and another hoodie. I pulled them on as Rye dressed in similar clothes.

“They come for her, then they come for you,” he told me, pouring the lighter fluid over the clothes. He looked up at me as he lit the match. “They come for you. They die.”

“On that, we agree.” He dropped the match, and we walked out of the warehouse, leaving the clothes and the guy who threatened my woman behind to burn.

When we got back to Elixir, I went upstairs to change. Isla was sitting on the couch with a cup of coffee.

I hesitated as I closed the door behind me and saw the look on her face. She didn’t ask me to talk. She just waited.

Quiet.

Still.

I wasn’t sure if it was because I literally had blood on my hands or if it was the way she looked at me now that burned most—like she’d seen something she wasn’t ready to understand but knew she couldn’t unsee.

I owed her the truth. Or enough as I could offer.

“I need a shower,” I told her quietly. “Five minutes?”

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