Page 86 of Honeyed

“Yes. What happened?”

“I walked up on him attacking her, backing her up and she looked terrified. He’s been following us, we told you this, but something in him was unhinged this time. He came at me, got me by the throat. Alana tried to intervene, and he slammed her head into the …”

Nausea sweeps over me, cold and dreadful.

“Okay, okay. I get the picture. I’ll need your full statement, but let’s get her checked out and you can go with her for now,” Billy relents.

The ambulance pulls up at that moment, and they rush to us to attend to both Alana and Mason. We’re swept up in it all, so much so that I can’t think about what Alana said for the next half hour as I’m poked, prodded, and questioned. I watch as Billy escorts a now conscious Mason to the back of a squad car, the former protesting and griping the entire way.

“We’re going to take care of this. He will never be able to get close to you again.” Billy nods at me, trying to reassure me, man to man.

One of the EMTs checking Alana out lets me know they need to transport her to the ER for further tests and some stitches.

I don’t hesitate to jump into the ambulance, and my eyes catch Patrick’s as I do.

“Go, we’ll take care of this. I’ll be by in a little to update you. Take care of her.”

The rest of the Ashtons present seem to echo his sentiment because no one else volunteers to come or follow us. They realize I am her family now, the two of us are a unit that comes first.

From here on out, I’m in charge of protecting her. It’s the only job I’ve ever wanted.

One I’ll never fail at again.

* * *

Three hours, six stitches, and one concussion diagnosis later, I sit next to Alana’s hospital bed, clasping her hands in mine as she sleeps. She’d been awake no more than half an hour ago, but between the pain meds they gave her and the exhaustion of everything that went on today, I told her to rest.

If not, just so she can get some relief, so I can be alone with my thoughts for a moment.

The doctors wouldn’t let me in while they were running tests, concussion protocols, and stitching her up. That’s when the entire family arrived and held me through the waiting in a conference room the hospital staff let us occupy. And that’s also when Cass let me read the email from her private investigator.

I couldn’t help falling back into a rolling chair as if the breath had been knocked from my lungs when seeing the detailed words on the screen.

Mason had nearly the same childhood as I did. A murderer for a father, being so young when it happened, going into foster care. But unlike me, he was groomed to think that what his father did was right. Needed. Justified. He thought that something so out of the realm of normality was normal. Then he bounced around the foster system and never found a forever family. No one cared for him or showed him the error of his father’s ways.

That stoked a poisonous streak in him, one which he had hidden well up until now. Under my father’s tutelage, he became a real monster, seeking revenge on my family and me for something he went without.

Shock, cold and terrifying, grips my throat as I read. As I realize what could have happened had I not had a gut intuition and gone to find Alana. I was standing in an empty Lily when this need to see her arose. I didn’t want to let her go to Hope Pizza without me that morning, but I had to relent. She’s an independent and fully capable woman. We trust each other.

What neither of us was expecting was an unhinged man to attack her. Even now, as I hold her hands, knowing she’s healthy and going to be okay, mine shake with the reality of what could have happened had I not been there.

Patrick showed up with the rest of the Ashtons about an hour into my wait and told me that Billy had booked Mason on charges of stalking, assault, and harassment. He’s currently in a cell at Hope Crest PD but will be transferred to the country at some point to await trial. Leona and Thomas’s lawyer is already setting up everything we need to mount a defense and protect us, and again I can’t repay how much this family has helped me and always has my back.

Alana stirs and sighs, those baby blues blinking open.

“Warren.” She says my name like it’s her lifeline.

“I’m right here.” I sit up a little straighter.

“Mmm. I love you.” She seems a little hazy still, but hearing those words unlocks the tension in my chest.

“I’m so sorry, baby. So sorry I couldn’t protect you.” My heart is crestfallen, devastated.

He hurt her because of her ties to me. This ugly past of mine brings about all kinds of unwanted people and attention, and for the first time, it was taken out on someone other than me. Someone who I love more than anything on earth.

We haven’t had a chance to talk about any of this, to have a moment alone, and now that we are, I’m breaking down. All the panic and fear that has been weighing on my shoulders seems to break, and my forehead meets the bed as I take deep breaths.

“Stop it,” Alana demands, just like she did the morning I tried to make her divorce me. “I have three brothers, I don’t need any more protectors. I need someone to love me. And not just someone, you. The guy I fell head over heels for somewhere along the way when we were pretending to be best friends.”

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