Chapter 7 #2
Kruk is immediately perfect at this, because of course he is. He moves with steady, measured steps, and I try desperately to keep up. His arm locks around my waist, practically carrying me, and for a few glorious seconds I think we might actually have a chance.
Then I trip over nothing.
Kruk catches me before I hit the ground, hauling me upright with one arm while maintaining forward momentum. We crossed the finish line in third place, which is honestly a miracle.
"Not bad!" Monica chirps. "Next up: egg toss!"
This goes about as well as expected. Which is to say, disastrously.
The first toss is fine. Kruk catches the egg like he's defusing a bomb, careful and precise. He tosses it back to me in a gentle arc and I catch it through sheer dumb luck.
Second toss, we step back. The egg wobbles in the air. I lunge for it, bobble it between my hands like a very fragile, very breakable ball, and somehow manage to hold on.
Third toss, I throw too hard and Kruk has to dive to catch it. He succeeds, rolling smoothly to his feet with the egg intact, and several people actually applaud.
The fourth toss is our downfall. I step back, trip over a decorative rock, and the egg hits me square in the chest.
Yolk explodes across my light blue dress.
There's a moment of stunned silence.
Then Derek laughs. It's loud, obnoxious, the same braying sound that used to make me shrink during our relationship. "Classic Lettie! Still a disaster!"
The old nickname hits like a slap. He's the only one who ever called me that, usually right before explaining how I'd embarrassed him at some work function or dinner party.
Kruk goes very, very still beside me.
It's not the absence of movement that's terrifying, it's the quality of it. Like a predator who's just spotted prey. Every muscle in his body has gone taut, coiled tight with barely restrained violence. The air around him feels different, charged with the promise of imminent danger.
I touch his arm, and it's like touching warm steel. "It's fine," I say quickly. "Really, it's fine. Let's just—"
"No." His voice is quiet, almost gentle, which is somehow worse than if he'd shouted. There's absolute certainty in that single syllable. "It is not fine."
"Kruk—" I tried again, my fingers tightening on his forearm, but I might as well be trying to hold back a freight train with a silk ribbon.
But he's already moving.
He crosses the lawn in three long strides, and Derek's laughter cuts off abruptly as six and a half feet of solid Orc muscle plants itself directly in front of him.
"You will apologize," Kruk says. His voice is calm, conversational, which somehow makes it infinitely more terrifying.
Derek's face goes pale, then red. "Dude, it was just a joke—"
"Apologize to Colletta." Not a request. A command.
The entire lawn has gone silent. Monica's mouth is hanging open. Trevor looks like he's trying to remember if his wedding insurance covers Orc-related incidents.
Derek glances at Madison, then back at Kruk. He's trying to decide if his pride is worth getting dismembered at his best friend's wedding rehearsal.
"Fine," he mutters. "Sorry, Colletta."
"Look at her when you speak," Kruk growls.
Derek's jaw clenches. He turns to me, and for the first time since we dated, I see actual fear in his eyes. "I'm sorry."
I should feel vindicated. Triumphant. Instead I just feel tired.
"It's fine," I say quietly. "Let's just move on."
Kruk doesn't move for another long moment, staring Derek down like he's memorizing his face for future targeting. Then he turns and walks back to me, his hand immediately going to my waist.
"You have egg on your dress," he says, matter-of-fact, his gaze dropping briefly to the yellow smear spreading across the pale blue fabric at my hip.
"I'm aware." My voice comes out flatter than I intend, exhaustion seeping through every syllable.
"I will find you something else to wear." It's not a suggestion. It's a statement of mission objective, delivered with the same gravity he might use to announce he's commandeering a vehicle.
"Kruk, it's fine—" I start, but I can already see the determination settling into his features, the slight narrowing of his eyes that means he's already mentally cataloguing potential clothing sources within a three-block radius.
"It is not fine." His eyes meet mine, intense and serious. "He does not get to mock you. Not while I am here."
My throat goes tight. I nod, not trusting my voice.
Monica clears her throat nervously. "So! Last activity before lunch: the sack race!"
Oh god. The sack race.
They hand out large burlap sacks and I stare at mine like it's a death sentence. Kruk takes his without comment, stepping into it like he's done this a thousand times.
We line up at the start again. Derek is conspicuously on the opposite end of the row, as far from Kruk as possible.
The whistle blows.
I jump. Kruk powers forward in smooth, impossible hops that make him look like some athletic kangaroo. I try to match his pace but the burlap tangles around my ankles, and three hops in, I feel myself going down.
The ground rushes to meet me.
Except it doesn't.
Kruk drops his sack and catches me mid-fall, one arm banding around my waist, stopping my momentum entirely. I dangle there for a second, suspended in his grip, staring up at his face.
From somewhere behind us, Derek laughs again. "Jesus, Lettie, you couldn't even—"
Kruk sets me down carefully.
Then he abandons the race entirely and starts walking toward Derek with a single-minded, terrifying purpose.
"Oh shit," I breathe.
Monica grabs my arm. "Colletta, your boyfriend is going to murder the Best Man."
"I know," I say, my voice coming out thin and reedy, barely audible over the sudden nervous murmur rippling through the crowd of wedding guests. My eyes are locked on Kruk's broad back, watching those massive shoulders roll with each purposeful stride across the manicured lawn.
Monica's fingernails dig into my forearm. "Stop him!" she hisses, her voice climbing toward panic. "Colletta, I'm serious, if he hurts Derek, my mother will lose her mind. She's already on edge about the ice sculpture!"
I swallow hard, my mouth suddenly dry despite the three mimosas I've had.
"I'm not sure I can," I admit, and even as the words leave my mouth, I know how utterly pathetic they sound.
What person brings a bodyguard to a wedding and then can't actually control him?
The kind who hires said bodyguard while drunk on tequila, apparently.
"I mean, have you seen him when he gets like this?
He doesn't exactly take constructive criticism well in the middle of a perceived threat scenario. "
But I'm already running after him, still tangled in my stupid sack, hopping frantically across the lawn like some deranged rabbit.
"Kruk!" I called. "Kruk, wait!"
He doesn't wait.
Derek sees him coming and actually backs up, hands raised. "Dude, seriously, it was just—"
Kruk reaches him.
And the entire rehearsal lunch holds its breath to see if there's going to be a murder before the actual wedding.