Page 46 of Crash
Thinking about Sydney, I paused, holding the weight I was pumping in the air.Violet and Sydney.There was a piece of the puzzle I hadn’t quite thought through.
“What the fuck did you do to Violet?”
Oh, fuck. I hesitated at the sound of Ash’s voice before setting the weight back into the bracket. Turning, I found him staring at me in full-on rage mode.
“What are you talking about?” Better go for plausible deniability on this one.
“She likes to think she’s tough, but I can recognize a broken heart when I see one.”
Broken heart…Fuck.
“Don’t fucking stare at me like you have no idea,” he went on. “Violet has a crush on you. Has since she was a kid. If you’ve taken advantage of her…”
Vee had a crush on me since we were kids? I knew I was staring like a moron, but I’d had a crush onher. Never in a million fucking years, as a horny teenager, had I thought that Violet Fuller had looked twice at me.
Ash snorted, crossing his arms over his chest. “Fuck, by the looks of you, the only thing you’re guilty of is being a clueless cunt.”
Swallowing hard, I said, “I looked after her while you were away. Just like you asked.”
“Did you touch her? Because I love that kid more than anything—”
“I didn’t touch her,” I snapped.But I wanted to. We kissed, but I didn’ttouch her. Did that count? Yeah, it counted.
Ash jabbed a finger against my chest. “You better not be lying to me Hayes.”
“I would never disrespect Violet like that.” I squared my jaw and pushed into his finger.
He narrowed his eyes and stared at me, waiting to see if I would crack. When I didn’t, he snorted and backed away. “If I find out you’ve done something to her, you’ll have more than that fucking shoulder to worry about.”
Ash Fuller was not a guy I wanted to go up against in a fight.In or out of the cage.He had a bad reputation for taking things too far, losing his cool and breaking every rule known to man. There was a reason he was able to win a Championship at The Underground. He had no fuckin’ off switch.
I watched him back away and turn, striding back across the mats and up the stairs, no doubt to go into the office to drill Violet about us. I didn’t know what was going on, we hadn’t exactly had the time to talk about it, but I hoped we would soon.
The one thing I knew for certain was Violet Fuller wasn’t a kid anymore. She was a beautiful fucking woman.A woman who’d been through a lot and was scarred from the inside out, who needed someone to care for her and to help her heal.I wasn’t sure I was the right man for the job.
That’s why we had to talk about it.
Nineteen
Violet
I knew it was only a matter of time before things imploded between Ash and Lincoln, but when my brother barged into the office, I knew he’d already had a go. It had to be some kind of new world record.Ash Fuller,whirlwind of destruction.
I jumped as the door swung inward and collided with the wall, almost knocking my cup of coffee all over the keyboard.
“Fuck, Ash,” I cried, holding my hand against my chest.
“Did he touch you?” he barked, his expression full of anger.
Oh, fuck.
“I told you to leave it alone,” I snapped.
“Violet…did he fucking touch you?”
“Ash—”
“Violet.”
