Chapter 17 Keeley
SEVENTEEN
KEELEY
I don’t have time to throw out my hands before I’m shoved flat and Nic’s weight slams over me. My knees scream as they hit the floor and pain rips through my side as his body seals over mine like a shield.
What—? What the fuck?
“Stay down, sunshine.” His voice is low in my ear, a frisson of panic threaded through it.
That alone makes me freeze beneath him. I’ve never heard fear like this from him, and that fucking terrifies me.
What’s happening?
The girls?
I was sitting next to Dayna.
Did she get down in time? She’s pregnant.
The kids. Oh fuck.
I try to turn my head to look, but I can’t see anything beyond the patch of floor two inches from my nose.
More cracks punch the air in a staccato beat. One after the other.
Fuck.
Nic curls tighter around me, a human barricade between me and what’s happening around us.
I can’t think. Gunfire shreds the air, and the only thought I have is Nic. He’s positioned to take the brunt of whatever hits come our way, and the only coherent thought I have is him. Is he already hurt? Is he bleeding on top of me and I don’t know?
A cold, vicious terror snaps inside me. Not for me.
For him.
We only just found… whatever this is. A handful of kisses, stolen behind doors, and I want more moments with him. I want to figure out why my heart flutters every time he’s close and why he already feels like safety.
I want to prove that voice wrong in my head that says I don’t get to keep good things. Because I want to keep him.
I’m not ready to lose this yet.
You don’t get to die, even heroically. Not after kissing me senseless. Not after calling me sunshine the way you do.
That’s not the fucking plan.
But he’s covering me with his whole body like he’s disposable. He didn’t hesitate when I froze. He pulled me down. He protected me. He’s ready to take a bullet, so I don’t.
No. Absolutely the fuck not. If something happens to him—
My throat closes in panic. I can’t even think about it.
Please, let him be okay.
I drag in ragged, hot breaths, my heart kicking against my ribs as everything tunnels around me. There’s a dull roaring in my ears, distant but loud at the same time. My fingers brush his arm. He’s warm, solid, still here.
“I got you,” he murmurs against me, and it calms that raging panic blooming inside me.
Because I believe him when he says that. I don’t fight his hold. I lean into it and make myself as small as possible under him so he can curl in tighter, too.
Then I concentrate on the only thing I can control—breathing.
The seconds stretch.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
The noise is chilling. Heavy thuds vibrate the walls, glass shatters too close. It feels relentless, endless, a nonstop loop of fear-laced danger that slides sharply between my ribs.
Then the final cough of gunfire barks, and the only sound is the building settling around the damage.
The silence is worse. It feels unsafe.
It doesn’t last.
A high-pitched cry pierces the room—Seren, I think. I don’t know. I’m still crushed under Nic and my hearing is warped.
Nic stays on top of me, still, like he’s counting the seconds after the final shot to be sure it’s over.
I want to check on him, but I can’t move. His weight is heavy on top of me.
Did that really happen? What the actual fuck?
Eventually, the room exhales. Boots scuff the floor, groans and whimpers punctate through the quiet.
“Keeley? Fuck. Sunshine?”
He lifts off me, his heat disappearing with it. Cold seeps into my skin, needling along my arms and spine. Hands that are stupidly gentle wrap around my shoulders, carefully guiding me onto my back.
He looks controlled, but his gaze moves too fast over me, like he’s terrified of seeing blood or damage. There’s an urgency when his fingers grip my chin, angling my face toward the lights. I try to focus on him, searching for wounds, but I can’t focus when he’s pulling my face around.
“You hurt?” The words tear out of his throat in a rough rasp.
I try to answer, but I can’t speak. He’s okay. Fuck.
I cling to him, fingers tangled in his kutte. I want to fall into his arms, but my brain and body are lagging behind each other. Nic’s face blurs suddenly before he comes back into focus, mostly. His hand wraps around the back of my neck, the way it does when he’s keeping me grounded.
“Are you hurt, Keeley?” he repeats.
I shake my head, or I think I do. I’m not sure if my body is cooperating. “Are you?”
“I’m good.”
My brain acknowledges that and files it under things we’re going to ignore. I need proof. Real physical proof that he’s not leaking blood under his clothes while telling me he’s fine.
Letting go of his kutte is harder than it should be, but I unclench my fingers—only so I can shove his shirt up.
Before I can think better of it, I skim over his warm skin. He flinches in surprise then doesn’t move while I map every inch of him like I can’t breathe until I do.
His muscles are bunched, hard from adrenaline, but there’s no blood or cuts. His ribs, his sides—no wetness, no heat, no wounds.
I feel his back, leaning against his chest to reach around him, but all I feel is his heat.
The relief that claws up my throat chokes me. I didn’t realise how tightly I’d been holding my breath until my lungs burn trying to fill them.
He’s okay.
He’s not hurt. Fuck. I skim over his belly again, needing to be sure, needing something solid to cling to in the middle of the panic.
Nic lets me. That’s the part I should be focused on. He doesn’t move or stop me. He just… waits for me to finish, like it’s perfectly normal for hands to be all over him after a gunfight.
My fingers tremble against his stomach, and I soak in the warmth of him beneath my palm. He’s alive and uninjured.
That’s when his muscles shift under me and his voice drops into annoying calm. “Sunshine, you done feelin’ me up or you want another minute?”
My mouth snaps shut and my cheeks heat so fast I nearly combust. Of course the man survives a drive-by shooting and immediately starts flirting.
“I was checking you weren’t bleeding out,” I hiss and yank my hand back, pretending that seconds ago I wasn’t trying to crawl inside his kutte to make sure he wasn’t dying.
Nic grasps my wrist before I can go too far, his hold firm but gentle. I’m trembling, but he lifts my hand and kisses over my knuckles.
“Uh-huh.” His lips twitch. “Ain’t complainin’, sunshine, but I’m good, I promise.” He brushes his mouth to the side of my head and I lean into it without meaning to.
He’s fine. I’m fine. I’ve never been more relieved in my life.
I take a breath. Then another until the clamps around my lungs loosen.
He didn’t hesitate when I froze.
He pulled me down.
He protected me.
Oh, fuck. What about the others? The kids, the women? I didn’t even think to check. I was so focused on Nic.
Shame curls through me and my throat clamps shut as my eyes dart around the room.
Makenna’s sitting close by with a blood-soaked towel pressed to her head. Diesel is in front of her, murder in his eyes. Her fingers trail over his face, calming the storm brewing inside him.
The other women are in one piece, pale and shaken, but breathing. Dayna, with her bump pushing against her sweater, Seren whimpering into Riot’s neck while Ivy rubs her back uselessly.
Maylie rocks Theo while trying to comfort her little brother, Toby. He’s all long limbs and messy hair, still in that awkward boy phase, but his eyes are scared and wide.
There were children in this room. Small defenceless babies. Teens barely starting their life. Women who didn’t deserve to get dragged into my shit.
My throat is so tight I feel sick. I’m the reason they were hiding from bullets. Babies were shielded under their mothers because of me.
This is because of me.
The thought slides through me so sharp and fast it’s dizzying. Of course this is about me. I’m the only person here who is part of some fucked up transaction.
No one else is payment owed.
This was a warning, a message because Nic won’t hand me over to whoever my brother made that deal with.
I did this…
This is the cost of keeping me safe.
I’m putting everyone in danger.
I take in the mess left by bullets tearing through the building. There’s glass, plaster, wood—debris scattered everywhere. Holes punched into the walls like wounds are brutal proof of what happened.
They’re head height.
Close enough that if anyone had been standing there, they would have—
I stare at the tiny baby pressed against Maylie’s chest and I can’t breathe. Blood fills my vision, staining his little white onesie crimson.
I blink, and it’s gone. Theo’s fine, squirming in his mother’s arms. There’s no blood, no marks. He’s fine this time.
But what about next?
“Keeley? Hey, look at me.”
I wish I didn’t, but I can’t stop myself. The softness that hits Nic’s eyes every time he catches my attention shouldn’t be mine. He should fucking hate me. I do. He told me I wasn’t a problem, but this—?
This is a nightmare.
“Is anyone—” I swallow and try again when my voice cracks. “Is anyone dead?”
“No. Everyone’s fine.” He grips my nape, like he did that day in the courtyard when my chest got tight like this and my breath got trapped.
I nearly fold in half as the relief hits me. Then the guilt slams right through it.
“This ain’t your fault,” he says, like he already hears the spiral starting in my head. I don’t know how he reads me so well. “Sunshine, you didn’t cause this.”
My laugh is thin and ugly. “Didn’t I? Maybe I didn’t pull the trigger, but this—” I gesture to the fucking warzone we’re sitting in. “This is because of me. I’m the reason bullets tore through a room with babies in it.”
His jaw tightens. “No. You ain’t takin’ this on. Ain’t yours to carry.”
“Really?” I snap, the adrenaline dump making my panic sharp. “You got a whole queue of insurance policies tucked behind clubhouse walls that I don’t know about? That shooting was for another asset waiting to be collected?”