Chapter 14 #3
Over Bricks’ arm, I see Saint. I thought I understood why people feared him.
I had absolutely no idea of the truth. The monster Tally warned me about is quiet.
That’s what makes it worse. Saint doesn’t roar or curse or make a show of what has been unleashed.
His face goes blank, stripped of every human irritation and every private calculation, leaving something merciless underneath.
The man with the broken wrist tries to swing with his other hand.
Saint catches him, drives him backward into the table, and brings his knee up so hard the sound that leaves the man doesn’t resemble language.
The other men move as well, though when Saint turns on them, it’s clear who’s going to be walking out of here.
The warehouse devolves into violence. A fist drives into a throat.
A head slams against the metal table, once, then again, blood spraying across the scattered vials.
Someone fires and misses, the bullet cracking into concrete near the roll-up door, and Saint crosses the distance before the man can correct his aim.
He breaks the man’s arm against the edge of the table, takes the gun from his ruined grip, and uses the butt of it to cave in the side of his face.
Cade takes down the man near the door, and Bricks releases me only long enough to shove me behind a support beam before he puts two shots into the one trying to crawl toward a fallen weapon.
But Saint is the center of it. He moves through the panic with a brutality so focused it feels less like fighting than judgment.
There’s no wasted motion, no flourish, no anger spilling loose in sloppy swings.
Every strike lands where it will end something.
Ribs crack. Teeth scatter white across the dirty floor.
The man who grabbed me tries to pull away, and Saint drags him back by the collar before driving him into the concrete hard enough that his head bounces once and leaves a wet mark behind.
“Saint,” Moth pushes out. “Fuck, Saint, he’s down.”
Saint doesn’t look at him. The man under him is barely moving now, hands fluttering weakly at Saint’s wrist, and still Saint’s fist rises again.
Bricks steps forward. “Saint.”
For a second, I think Saint might turn on him too. Then the man makes a sound through broken teeth, a wet little gurgle that draws Saint’s attention back down. Saint grips him by the front of the shirt and hauls him up enough to speak directly into his ruined face.
“You put your hands on what’s mine.”
The man tries to answer, but the words drown in blood. Saint kills him with a clean, brutal motion that has Cade muttering a curse under his breath. The warehouse goes still afterward, Moth and Bricks both relaxing a little.
I’m still behind the support beam with one hand pressed to my throat and the other gripping the edge of the concrete so hard my fingers hurt when Saint strides toward me.
There’s blood on his hands, his shirt, and along the side of his jaw.
His eyes are black with whatever he hasn’t put back behind the lock yet.
For the first time since I met him, I understand that his control isn’t the opposite of violence.
It is the thing giving violence a human shape.
Every surviving instinct I have tells me to move, to get out of the path of whatever still owns him.
He catches the front of my neck with one hand, claiming the space the other man touched.
His fingers spread beneath my jaw, thumb pressing along the place where my pulse is beating a little too fast. He tilts my face up as his eyes move over me with a fury that has nowhere to go. Then his mouth crashes into mine.
The kiss is brutal enough to steal the last of my breath.
It isn’t soft, a sort of proof of life, punishment for being taken, possession stamped over the fear before anyone in the room can mistake what just happened.
My hands lift without my permission and catch in his shirt, fingers curling into blood-wet fabric as a broken sound slips out of me.
Saint’s grip tightens for one second before he drags his mouth away. “Mine,” he mutters against me.
He releases me so abruptly I have to catch the support beam again to stay upright. Then he turns and stalks outside, leaving blood behind him in dark marks on the concrete.
No one stops him and I just stand there with my hand half-raised to my mouth, shaking so badly I can feel it in my teeth. Moth lets out a hearty laugh near the door. “I was going to say you’ve made him less scary,” he muses. “But I guess that only works when people keep their hands off you.”
Bricks steps into my line of sight, blocking the worst of the room behind him. His face is grim, but there’s no cruelty in it. “You better catch up with him before he kills someone at the clubhouse.”
I stare at the door Saint disappeared through. “Me?”
“Yeah, you.” Bricks looks me over, taking in the cut, the blood that isn’t mine, the mark already forming on my throat. “And for what it’s worth, I pray for your ass tomorrow.”
I swallow, but my throat hurts too much for it to help.
Outside, an engine roars to life, Bricks nodding toward the exit. “Go on, little Rogue. He’ll either calm down when he sees you breathing, or we’ll all have a really shitty tomorrow.”