Page 43 of Damascus & The Wildfire
I hesitated. “Don’t worry about that right now, doll. You did good. Real good.”
“That’s not an answer,” she said, looking up at me. Her eyes were still wide and glassy, but there was a spark of defiance there, too.
I sighed. “It’s not a question you want answered. Not right now.”
She wiped her face with the back of her hand. “I know you’re trying to protect me, but I’m not stupid. And I should be horrified about what I’m imagining. I should beg you all to show mercy. But maybe I’m not that good a person. Because right now, I want him to hurt. I want him to feel a fraction of the helplessness I just felt.”
I pulled her close, kissing her forehead. “You didn’t look helpless to me. You defended yourself. But it’s not something you need to worry about. Tyler was already in trouble. His fate is sealed. But after that trick back there? Now we’ll spend every last waking moment making him wish he was dead.”
She looked like she wanted to ask a question, but then she just nodded, leaning into me again. I held her close, listening to her breathing slow.
Eva busted through the door, her face sharp with concern as she searched the room. Kenna stood as their eyes met.
“What happened?” Eva demanded.
I stood, guiding Kenna forward with my hand across her lower back. “Tyler used her as a human shield.”
“Our Tyler? Why the fuck would he do that?”
“I can’t explain right now. Just take her home and stay with her,OK? It’s going to be a late night. Reaper probably won’t be home until morning.”
“Let me guess: club business?” Eva muttered before wrapping an arm around Kenna’s shoulders. “Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”
“Hatchet?” Eva called out to me.
“Yeah?”
Fire danced in her eyes. “Make him fucking pay.”
I gave her a savage grin. “We will,” I promised.
I looked forward to what Merrick had planned for Tyler, and I had a few ideas of my own to make sure he’d regret ever touching Kenna.
Chapter Fifteen
I took each corner a bit harder than I needed to, reveling at the sound of Tyler’s body bouncing around in the bed of my truck like a sack of potatoes. But every jolt, every muffled groan from the back, did little to soothe the fury still boiling in my veins.
The image burned behind my eyes. Kenna’s face pale with fear, her eyes wildly darting between me and Hatchet with a plea for one of us to save her. Her throat reddening under Tyler’s grip. His fucking gun aimed at her temple.
I insisted for weeks—to myself and Reaper, when he pressed—that Kenna was just a friend. But watching Tyler threaten to end her? It wasn't rage I felt first. It was fear. Cold, gut-churning fear. In one horrible moment, I realized what I stood to lose.
I’d lied to myself since the moment I met Kenna. And when she ran to Hatchet, it stung. Not because I wanted her to run to me—OK, maybe a little—but because it reminded me how much Hatchet cared for her, too. And I’d seen the way she looked at him. The way she trusted him. The way her eyes lit up when he walked into a room.
But what stung worse was the way she’d looked at me after I’d beaten Tyler to a pulp. The flicker of horror in her eyes. I’d seen itbefore, in the faces of men who realized too late what I was capable of. But Kenna? She wasn’t supposed to see that side of me. She wasn’t supposed to know how deep the darkness went.
I gripped the steering wheel tighter.
If Hatchet hadn’t yelled, if he hadn’t pulled me back with her name, I might’ve killed Tyler right there. She’d have seen the monster I kept chained up.
She might not trust me for a long time. Hell, considering what she saw, that trust might already be shattered beyond repair.
The rusted junkyard gates loomed ahead. I killed the headlights and rolled into the shadows of the warehouse, the tires crunching over broken glass. Tyler’s whimpering grated on my last nerve.
I threw the truck into park and stormed to the bed, yanking him out by his collar. He hit the ground hard, blood dripping from his busted face and the bullet wound in his leg onto the concrete.
The warehouse swallowed the sound, the air thick with the stink of decay. I stared down at him, my hands still trembling with adrenaline. Not from the violence—that was easy. From the truth I couldn’t outrun anymore.
I was falling for Kenna, and I wasn’t sure what that meant. For me or Hatchet. I’d seen the way he looked at her, and I wouldn’t get between my brother and a girl—especially since she might be the only one who could get him to settle down. I’d have to bury my feelings for her beneath my loyalty to him and the club.
