Page 97 of Breaking Sanity
“Em, do we have to?” Mak whines. “If Gunner shows up, he’ll raise hell.”
“Yes, we have to.” Emily pulls Mak to her feet. “Fuck Gunner and his psycho ass family.”
Emily says that loudly while pushing Mak towards the exit. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him stand, twirling his pocketknife in his hand. Wish he would fucking try honestly, but before he can charge at us Carson comes to his side, and he sits back down.
“Okay, bye, I’ll see you tonight babe,” Emily blows a kiss as Makenzie leaves, then turns to me.
“What,” I ask, getting in her space.
“We have four hours until Mak comes over to get ready.” She wiggles her eyebrows.
Am I fucking the girl? Absolutely. Should I be? Probably not, but here we are. There is something about her that I can’t stop myself from wanting. Whether that is to be around her or inside of her depends on the situation, but nine times out of ten, it ends up being both.
“I’ll need every minute of them.” I push her bangs out of her face and place a kiss on her cheek. It drives her crazy when I do that because I have never fully kissed her, and she knows it will stay that way. But like the typical basic girl she is, she holds out hope.
“You know,” a voice says from behind us. “Speaking ill of my family, Em, never ends well.”
“Go away,” Emily snaps, looking behind me.
“Leo.” Gunner eyes me when I turn around.
“Gunner.” I nod. He is probably a half foot taller than me, so I have to tilt my head a little up. The fucker smirks and my fist itches to be put through his face.
“Did you know Emily here was my first,” he asks, putting his hands in his pockets.
“Do I care?”
“Gunner stop,” Em barks.
“All I am saying is watch out for this one. She stabbed her best friend in the back just to know what my cock tastes and feels like. Wouldn’t put it past her to do the same to you. Never satisfied by just one dick, are you Em?”
Gunner doesn’t even give her a chance to defend herself as he walks past us with his little brother hot on his heels.
“What did he mean by that,” I ask.
“Nothing. Let’s get going, we only have four hours before Mak comes over,” she giggles.
Present- 3 months later
The more time I spend here, the more it makes me think of Emily. She was a busy body and considered a bitch. One on one, she would talk to you and have in-depth conversations. I think that is where I really started to fall for her, plus the girl truly knew what she was doing when it came to sex. Taught me a lot, but that abruptly ended two months after the day at the food court.
It takes me a lot to stay in the present after that, especially with women. I kept with the no kissing rule, and it took me only a shower to get over any girl I slept with. Well until Alley, she took me by surprise. She is feisty and playful, but she is not afraid to show her vulnerability, unlike Emily who never showed it. They were vastly different, which is a turn-on I didn’t think existed.
Alley has this spunk to her that really showed through when we chased her, then locking Shadow out of the room, and when we danced in that kitchen. Alley was full of life and laughter even when her life was a complete mess. That came crashing on the day of the funeral. I watched her finally breakand let it all out. Going from never hearing someone’s heart split into pieces, except for my own, to listening to Alley’s shatter revived something in me that I thought died a long time ago. As terrible as it sounds, being there with her and watching her unravel was the best. She let me in those three days, and I was fucked afterwards.
Did I want her to be here? No, when I saw those contracts, I wanted to burn them. This whole new approach I knew was probably going to end up in a fucking dumpster fire. But like I was taught, I pushed that to the side and went along with it. The Underground assignments always come first. Hence how I ended up in the military with Shadow and now here. Handler and enforcer till the end type deal. I am not complaining about being paired with Shadow since we were in diapers. He is the best, except when he brought Alley into my life. She flipped it upside down and backwards, so getting away from her was the best option. Or at least that is what I convinced myself when I left that night after she was asleep.
I thought I could handle seeing her again, because much like Shadow, I thought those feelings would be long gone. We both were being fucking idiots. You don’t just let go of a girl like Alley. She never went anywhere, instead she is engraved into every molecule of our being. There is no wayto get her out besides death, but even then I think I would still be tethered to her. The craziest thing is she doesn’t even know it. Alley will never understand the hold she has on all of us.
I keep my position by Gunner’s door as I watch him stare at Alley’s sleeping form, though I would rather drive my knife through him repeatedly. He shouldn’t be able to be anywhere near her, not after what happened with Emily. In all honesty, he should be in the ground next to the bag of bones I had to bury. Maybe then, Alley would’ve had a chance to escape The Fallen.
Gunner pushes her hair onto the pillow that was covering her face, and I feel my whole body hit its boiling point. I want to rip him away from her like I should’ve done the last time I saw Emily. I need to be able to save Alley, before it’s too late.
Shadow must hear my thoughts or feel the hostility rolling off me because he clears his throat. Like the fucker is clearly warning me to stay put. I would like to believe that it’s more of a warning to himself to stay put and not kill the bastard. Almost like he wanted to kill Caine when he repeatedly fucked Alley in the car.
“Good morning, Little Devil,” he whispers, tenderly kissing her temple before getting off the bed.
“Sir,” Shadow nods as Gunner comes up to us. I keep my mouth shut as much as possible around Gunner, so he doesn’t figure out who I am.
