48. Wolff
My eyes land on the stupid fucking wolf mask taped to the outside of my locker. I rip it off, crumpling the cheap silicone in my fist before shoving it into the back of the locker.
“I picked that out special for you, and you were just gonna leave it behind.”
Graves leans against the row of lockers beside mine. Shirt half off, a fresh bruise blooming over one rib and dried blood crusted along the side of his jaw.
“Come on,” he says. “You used to love dressing up like a big, bad wolf and chasing pussy through the woods.”
“You’re a fucking idiot,” I grumble.
He laughs, pushing off the metal and yanking open his locker. “I saw the mission assignments. Two dogshit jobs in a row? That’s rough. At this rate, David’s gonna have you alphabetizing ammo in the basement.”
“I’m not having this conversation.”
“Oh, we’re absolutely having this conversation.” He strips the rest of the way out of his shirt and tosses it into the locker. “First, Russia fucks your head up, then you start moping around like some rejected wife, and now—”
Slam.
My locker door slams beside my head, rattling the entire row. I hear the footsteps half a second too late—too focused on Graves, too focused on not putting my fist through concrete—and then instinct takes over.
I spin around, my hand catching the wrist attached to the arm that slammed my locker, fingers crushing bone as I drive Gage backward into the metal hard enough to buckle it.
A knife is in my hand before I consciously reach for it.
One second, it’s at my side, and the next, it’s pressed flat beneath his jaw, the tip biting into the soft skin of his throat.
“Stay the fuck away from my sister.” He shoves at my chest. I pin the blade, pressing harder until a thin line of blood slides down his neck.
Graves lets out a laugh and drops onto the bench, unlacing his boots. “Jesus Christ, kid. You really picked a bad fucking day to grow a spine.”
Gage’s chest heaves against mine. His fingers lock around my forearm, trying to wrench the knife away. “Wolff,” he grits out, “I’m not fucking around.”
The blade digs deeper, more blood spilling over the steel and sliding down onto my knuckles. “Does this feel like I’m fucking around?”
“You need to stay away from her.”
“Or what?”
I twist his wrist until something in his shoulder pops. He hisses through his teeth, knees buckling for half a second before I slam him back into the locker. He jerks against me again, the stupid little bastard still trying to fight through a knife at his throat.
Graves leans back on his palms. “If you’re gonna kill the twink, at least make it fun to watch.”
“She’s fucking spiraling because of you,” Gage grinds out. “She thinks you love her.”
My grip tightens, cutting off more of his air. Fucking hell. The prick is turning purple, and he still won’t shut the fuck up. Must run in the family—AJ never shuts up either.
“She’s talking about leaving David. About destroying her whole fucking life. She’s convinced there’s something between you two. She’s ruining herself over you and you don’t even—”
I move before he finishes the sentence.
I lift him off the locker and throw him across the room.
His body slams into the cinderblock wall, hard enough to crack the plaster and send a metal folding chair skidding across the floor.
He hits the ground on one knee, coughing, but I’m already on him.
My hand fists in the front of his shirt and hauls him up, just to drive him back into the wall again.
When he takes a swing at me, I catch his fist mid-air, smash my forehead into his nose, the cartilage giving.
He chokes on a grunt, blood pouring instantly down over his mouth.
I don’t let him drop. I grab the back of his neck and drive my knee up into his ribs, feeling something shift wrong beneath the impact.
He folds with a strangled gasp.
I throw him face-first into the lockers.
Metal buckles. His cheek scrapes down the vents with a wet, ugly sound.
“Wolff—” he coughs, trying to twist away.
I hook an arm around his throat from behind and drag him backward into me, locking him there. My forearm crushes against his windpipe while his heels scrape uselessly across the concrete.
He claws at my arm, choking. His movements losing coordination as his boots kick against the floor. Graves strolls over at an annoyingly relaxed pace, a cigarette tucked behind one ear.
“Look at you, K9. Getting all territorial. I’m almost hard watching it.”
Gage makes a broken, choking sound.
Graves steps in front of us. “You really should’ve opened with something less suicidal, sweetheart.
Maybe a firm handshake. A nice fruit basket.
Not ‘hey, K9, I know you’re a violent, unstable asshole with zero social skills, so let me piss you off and mention the girl you’re psychotically weird about. ’”
“I’m not—” Gage chokes out.
“Save it.” Graves pats his cheek. “I’m on your side in the sense that I’d also love to know what the fuck is wrong with him, but right now, your trachea is about to collapse.”
My arm tightens another inch. I’m one thought away from snapping his neck.
“Okay, fun’s over,” Graves says. “As much as I’d personally enjoy watching you fillet a Commander’s son on a Tuesday morning, it does make me look bad.”
I don’t move.
Graves sighs dramatically. “Also, if you kill him, Weston’s gonna blame me for not stopping you, which is bullshit because I’m clearly being very supportive.”
Gage coughs more blood across the floor as my hold tightens again.
“Wolff,” he says, more seriously, and my eyes lift to Graves. “Don’t be fucking stupid.”
Gage wheezes under my grip. Finally, I shove him to the ground and step back, my pulse hammering. He sucks in air, rolling onto his side and clutching at his throat. I stare down at him, blood dripping from my knuckles onto the concrete.
“If you ever come at me like that again, I’ll rip your fucking spine out through your throat.”
Gage coughs, spits blood, and glares up at me with murder in his eyes. Graves steps in before he can say something else stupid and drives the toe of his boot into Gage’s ribs.
“Get your ass up, rookie. Go ice your face.”
Gage groans and pushes himself up on shaking arms. Graves shoves him toward the door with a hand between his shoulder blades.
“And here’s a free tip—if you’re gonna threaten a Scab, don’t corner one in a locker room. We get a little twitchy in tight spaces.”
Wiping blood from his mouth with the back of his hand, Gage staggers toward the door. He’s almost through it when he stops and turns back like the dumb little bastard physically can’t keep his mouth shut.
“I know that dog came from you.” Gage’s split lip curls. “Jackal.”
My hands curl into fists.
“Jesus Christ,” Graves mutters.
“She’s going to destroy her whole fucking life over you, Wolff.”
Graves moves before I do, planting himself in front of me.
“Are you fucking stupid? What the hell did I just say? Saving your ass is already making me look charitable, which I fucking hate.” He jabs a finger toward the hall.
“Fuck off before I change my mind and let him finish caving your throat in.”
Gage sneers at both of us, then limps out into the hall. The door swings shut behind him.
Jackal…not Jack.
She named the fucking dog Jackal.
I bought her the dog because I needed her focused on something other than pills and parties and finding new ways to kill herself slowly. I didn’t buy her the fucking dog so she could name it after Russia.
Jackal.
The word lodges under my ribs like shrapnel.
She thinks you love her.
There’s no fucking love here. This is just a mission that went sideways. A girl I was sent to drag home and a long string of mistakes I can’t seem to stop making. So why do those words keep scraping around inside my skull like broken glass?
I drag a hand over my mouth and taste blood where Gage’s skin caught under my nails. I’ve shoved her away every chance I got. Ignored her. Hurt her. Gave her every reason to hate me. To forget I ever existed.
She doesn’t love me.
She can’t.
And even if some broken, stupid part of her thinks she does—
“Hate to side with the nepo baby, but he’s got a point,” Graves says.
I turn away and yank my sweat-soaked shirt over my head, dragging in a slow breath through my nose, trying to cool the violence pulsing under my skin.
“Whatever fucked-up thing is going on between you and AJ? End it.”
Grabbing the towel out of my locker, I wipe the blood off my hands. The split skin across my knuckles burns like hell.
“I’m not saying that because I give a shit. I’m saying it because I’m gonna get dragged on your path to self-destruction when David starts throwing his Commander weight around and Weston decides to chop the heads of all responsible.”
I scrub harder at the blood drying between my fingers.
Graves snorts. “And because watching you get pussy-whipped in real time is starting to make me embarrassed for you.”
With a suppressed growl, I slam the locker shut. “You finished?”
“Not even close.” He lights the cigarette hanging from his mouth, the tip flaring orange as he inhales. “Awards ceremony tonight. Wear the gray suit. It makes you look slightly less like a Scab.”
I shoulder past him toward the door.
“And K9?” Graves calls after me. “Fuck somebody else tonight. Somebody who doesn’t look like her. Get your dick wet and get her out of your goddamn head.”
I shove through the locker room doors and don’t look back.