Page 69 of Waging War
The red flags have been there the entire time. Hell, he practically waved them in my face.
I don’t expect him to choose someflingover his duty, but at what point does Ben finally pick a side? How many people have to die? How many businesses does Diablo take or families does he destroy before Ben gets his belly full?
When is enough,enough?
Anger burns my gut as I rise.
Ben’s seduced me into breaking down my barriers, just to keep his own fully constructed. I’ve perfected the art of keeping my guard up, but somehow, I’ve allowed this twisted shit between us to cloud my judgment.
No sooner do I have the thought does the front door burst open.
My traitorous heart skips a beat. Only, it’s not Ben who’s come for me.
“Hazel!” Dad bellows with wild eyes, searching every corner of the room. The gun sweeping the living space glides over my head before he realizes how close I’m standing.
Cooper’s not far behind him, brandishing a second pistol like a modern-day John Wayne.
“Dad! Jesus, put your damn gun down.” My heart pounds in my throat as I watch the two of them make a full sweep of the place. I press a hand over my chest and roll my eyes.
Cooper places his gun on the center table before dragging me toward him. “Are you okay?”
The worried look in his eyes paired with the frantic way his hands roam my body paints guilt on my soul. “Everything’s fine, guys. No one’s here but me.”
My gut turns sour when I remember that Cooper hid my keys from me. I brush his hands off but wince when he snatches my wrist. “What the fuck is this?”
Wrenching out of his hold, I spin away from him. Ben’s mark on the inside of my wrist has formed two thin purple bruises.
I mumble a curse. “It’s nothing.”
Truly, it looks worse than it feels. In fact, even though I’d like to throttle him, it still turns me on to think of his teeth sinking into my flesh.
Cooper stalks around to my front. “I swear to God, Haze.” The threat lingers for a moment. “If that fucker was here with you, I’m going to hang him by the ankles in front of the garage.”
I scoff. “You’re unbelievable. Both of you.” I let my gaze burn through my father before stalking away.
“Get back here, Hazel,” Dad calls after me.
Never in my life would I have dreamed of speaking to either of them this way, but there’s not enough space in this damn house. The intimacies that Ben and I shared, followed by the immediate loss of him, is suffocating. And now my dad and Cooper are crowding me with their insufferable micromonitoring.
I pause midstep and whirl around. With my hand steady, I point directly at them. “I came here to get away fromyou.” My dad’s face falls. “The both of you are suffocating me.”
“We’re trying to protect you,” Dad says.
I gesture down my body. “Does it look like I need protecting? I’m a grown-ass woman, not the little girl you insist on treating me as.”
Forcing my arms to remain at my sides, I plead with him. “I’ve been fighting for my freedom for the last two months, only to realize that freedom doesn’t mean shit if I’m supposed to play dead. Bruce wants us at each other’s throats, don’t you get that? He’s playing us like a fiddle by using me to keep the gang quiet. There was a time you would have never backed down. You would have figured out a way to wipe this guy off the face of the earth.” I tip my chin at their scowls.
“It doesn’t work like that anymore, baby girl. We don’t have the numbers like we used to, or the resources. Diablo’s been wavin’ your life over me since the moment he found out you were my daughter. What did you expect me to do? It’s not worth the risk.”
I laugh. He sounds like a broken record. “Since when did I start determining the decisions you make?”
“What do you mean, Hazel? You’re worth more to me than all the treasure in the world. You always have been.”
The truth shines so heavily in those old eyes that, for a moment, I choke on unshed tears.
It’d be so much easier to accept Cooper’s offer, and even easier to marry him and fulfill their hopes for me. I’m not too proud to admit that I’d have a good life with Coop. But is that really what I want?
Cooper doesn’t push me to a breaking point that has me hauling him against me and kissing him until we’re nothing more than a tangle of limbs.
