CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
Sean
I don’t know how long I just hold Layla on the floor.
But I do until her sobs stop and she’s not shaking anymore.
She looks back at Ramos in the corner. Kai is oblivious to the carnage in this room—the fucking guy lives for this shit.
He’s probably champing at the bit to shoot him.
He sits in the corner smoking and scrolling on his phone.
I won’t tell her what she doesn’t need to know, so I keep to myself that one of the things Ramos uttered to me, between us waterboarding him, was that he found Layla because someone left a note on his bike with her address, telling him that I was coming for him.
My head races knowing they’ve been watching us—and her.
Either that or someone from our circle gave intel to them, which seems impossible.
The only thing I’m sure of is that I’m going to make it my life’s mission to tear apart with my bare fucking hands anyone who was behind Ramos getting to her.
But first I’m going to look after her until she recovers from this.
“What will happen to him?” she whispers after a time.
“Whatever you want,” I tell her, stroking her tearstained face.
She looks back at him then up to me. “I don’t want him to hurt anyone again.
” She shrugs. “But she wouldn’t want me to take his life.
I know it.” I watch her red-rimmed eyes as she decides his fate.
“I want him to live and be reminded of her every day. I want him to regret his choice to kill her every single day until he dies. Can you do that?” she asks.
I nod and kiss her face. Layla has had enough trauma for one day, and I can make sure he’ll never shoot another gun or ride ever again.
It goes against everything in me not to make sure he’s put into the ground, but if that’s not what she wants I’ll give her that.
She doesn’t need this man on her conscience.
My girl is too good to sentence a man to death.
I kiss her and stand, helping her up in the process. Then I make my way to Kai, telling him quietly enough that she won’t hear what my plan is as she rips a piece of paper towel from over the sink and blows her nose.
Kai stops and squeezes Layla’s arm as she rejoins us. “We’ve got you now,” he says as she nods to him. “We’ll make sure he never hurts anyone else.”
“Will he come back or send his club to hurt you?” Worry lines her pretty face as she asks us.
“No, little dove. They wouldn’t dare.”
“They could try.” Kai grins. “It’d be the last thing they’d ever do.”
Layla nods, but as Kai moves back to the table, her eyes harden.
“Sean. I want you to know, your club life and this stay with me. No matter what it is you have to do.” She reaches between us and takes my hand, tracing the ink there, flipping my wrist over to trace the compass.
“I will never breathe a word of it, but I have some conditions if I’m gonna be your … ” Her face crumples up. “Ol’ lady.”
I chuckle, kissing her forehead. “And they are?”
She takes a deep breath and steadies herself, reaching her hand up to my face.
“Thank you for finding me the truth. But the details of this, what happened with my mother and him …” She looks around, her eyes landing on Ramos.
“Those memories stay here too. If I want to talk about it I will, but I never want to focus on why she died, only the positive.”
“The positive?” I ask, always trying to get a step ahead of the way her beautiful mind works.
“She lived, she loved, and even though he took her from me, he gave her happiness in those last months. That’s what I want to remember, and I’ll take her secret affair to my grave. I expect you to as well.”
I nod. “Of course.”
“As far as your club life … this sort of thing.” She waves a hand toward the blood on the floor.
“Unless I specifically ask, I want only you when you’re with me.
The things you have to do to be this man?
” Her eyes focus on Ramos’s battered body.
“You leave those things here, with the club, understand?”
Her words are full of command. A woman changed, a woman coming into her own.
Fuck, she’s breathtaking.
“I understand,” I say.
She looks at Kai as he comes back through the door, Mason behind him. She turns to him. “Thank you for caring about my parents. You’ve never even met them.”
Kai hits her with the grin that’s earned him his fuckboy reputation. “You’re with us now, pretty girl. Your boy here will have to get you your own official cut with his name on it.”
Fucking right I will. The thought of that makes my cock start to swell even in the midst of the devastation and carnage.
“And hey,” Kai adds as she looks at him questioningly. “Remind me not to get on your bad side when you’re holding a bat.” He chuckles, mocking a swing and clucking his tongue. “Fucking beast mode.”
Layla laughs, already looking less in shock after that ordeal.
Kai moves closer and shakes my hand. “I’ve got this. You guys get out of here.”
“Not a fucking chance in hell,” I retort.
Kai grins at me. “Always gotta ruin my fun.”
I shake my head. It’s not about ruining his fun; it’s my need to make sure this is done right.
Layla looks up at me for direction. “Go to my room, it’s right at the end of the hall.
” I pull my keys out of my pocket and hand them to her, holding the one to my space here at the club.
There isn’t much in there—just a bed, a dresser and a small bathroom.
“You can get cleaned up, then head out and find a prospect. They’ll all be sober.
Tell them I said to take your friends home,” I tell Layla.
“Nah, that I’m on top of,” Kai calls out from the other side of the room.
I smirk. “So fuckin’ helpful tonight.”
Kai sharpens his knife as he grins. “That’s me, Mister Helpful. Tell your friend I’ll see her soon, Layla.” He winks at her.
“What will you do to him?” she asks, curious.
“What you commanded. I promise he’ll live, and by the time you’ve asked someone to take Chantel and Amber home, I’ll be out there with you.”
She looks up at me, trusting but still curious.
“Need to know, little dove.”
She nods and kisses my lips, so soft and so sweet, and I fight the urge to kiss her deeper.
“Thank you, Sean,” she hums, reaching up to place her hand on my cheek.
Tonight, her world came crashing down around her for the second time—and if I can help it, it’ll be the last. But even though she didn’t take a life today, her compass is forever altered too.
I kiss her head, not saying anything as I open the door to let her out. The second I close it and turn to Kai he’s holding the ten-inch tanto knife with an even bigger grin on his face than before.
“Take this fucker’s hands?” he asks.
“You read my mind.” I nod. “Then get Mason, and dump him outside St Vincent.” I mention a hospital the next town over.
Kai holds the knife out to me but then pulls it back as I reach for it. “You take one and I take one.”
I chuckle. Fucking Kai.
I swipe the knife from his hand. Ramos is so out of it this won’t be as satisfying as I’d like it to be, but I speak anyway as I slide him downward on his tarp so he’s lying flat on the ground.
“You put your hands on my girl, so I should be slitting you from your guts to your mouth.”
He makes a garbled sound. Layla really did a fucking number on him already with the bat.
I pull his hand away from his body, laying it flat beside him.
He’s so weak he doesn’t even fight it as I admire the blade.
This fucker is sharp. I calculate the weight of it, as I’ve never used this knife before so I have to judge how hard I’ll have to strike.
Kai might take his time, humming himself a song as he saws through the small bones of Ramos’s wrist, but I’m eager to get back to Layla so I’ll do this as quickly and cleanly as possible.
“Every day after this, every fucking morning when you wake up and you can’t hold your own cock to piss, I want you to remember my face and remember the woman who allowed you to live.
” I line up my strike. “And if I ever see your face around here again, it will be your head that I take next.” I lean down so I know he can hear me.
“I’ll hollow it out and hang it on my fucking wall. ”
I raise the blade and tighten my grip before I bring it down, taking Ramos’s hand clean off. The monster in me rears its head, breathing deeply. Satisfied even without the kill, knowing above all else I’ve made her happy.