Page 49

TWENTY-SIX
Wentworth
Where you going, Kaitydid? I thought you said you wanted it nice and easy.
The question, delivered on a hard, playful tone is instantly followed by a short scuffle not more than ten yards up the road, the sound of it coming from the stand of trees closest to the lake.
Pushing myself through the trees, I see the tail end of the truck I’ve been following, illuminated by the moonlight reflected off the lake.
On the ground next to it, crumpled against the tire, is Kait, the skirt of her dress pushed high on her thighs. Limbs limp and eyes closed. Out cold from whatever the man standing over her did to her.
“Oh no, you don’t,” he says, nudging her roughly with the toe of his boot. “You ain’t gettin’ out of it that easy.” Wiping the back of his hand across his mouth, he makes a disgusted sound in the back of his throat when it comes away bloody. “Fuckin’ bitch—you never learn.” Giving her another rough nudge with his boot, he turns away from where she’s on the ground, making his way to the back of the truck, so intent on carrying out whatever sick plan he’s got going that he doesn’t even see me coming.
“Always gotta do things the hard way…” Standing at the back of the truck, he reaches for the tailgate, intent on lowering it but I’ve got my hand fisted in his hair before he can get it unlatched. “What the fuc—”
Gripping the back of his head, I slam his face into the tailgate—once. Twice. Three times—each hard bounce punctuated by an animal sound so guttural and ugly that I don’t recognize it’s coming from me until I let him go and his frame crumples into the dirt at my feet. Resisting the urge to pick him up and throw him into the nearest tree trunk, I settle for delivering a vicious kick to his ribs, grinning like a savage when I feel several of his ribs snap against the blow and he lets out a grunt.
Half hoping he’s dead, I leave him where he is and make my way around the side of the truck. Hunkering down next to Kait, I brush the hair out of her face. She’s pretty banged up and still out cold but she’s alive.
Resisting that urge again, I stand. Pushing myself into the wedge of the open driver side door, I pull the keys out of the ignition before I take a look around the truck. Finding what I’m assuming is his cell phone, I throw both under the back seat, making them hard but not impossible to find.
Standing over Kait, I adjust her dress, pulling it down to cover her thighs before I pick her up as gently as I can. With her cradled in my arms, her head resting against my shoulder, I walk the length of the truck bed to stop at its tailgate. The man I dropped is still laying in the dirt, blood weeping from a gash in his forehead and running into his eyes, mixed with dirt and caking them shut. More from the nosebleed she gave him trickling from one nostril while the side of his face I rearranged is already swollen and showing signs of discoloration.
“Hey—dickhead, you awake?” I give him a rough nudge with the toe of my boot the way I watched him do to Kait after he dropped her in the dirt. As soon as my boot connects with his ribs he lets out a painful groan.
“Fuck… you…” The words come out slow and mashed together.
“Well, I was going to tell you where your keys and cell phone are,” I tell him in a conversational tone that is at total odds with the near blinding rage that’s swimming through my blood. “But, now I don’t think I will.”
Hand grappling in the dirt like he’s looking for them, he grimaces. “Pay for.. this… piece… shit.”
“That’s the spirit.” I give his ribs another nudge, this one hard enough to pull a garbled howl from his swollen mouth. “Remember this moment the next time you feel like raping a woman in the woods, asshole.” Staring down at him, I adjust Kait against my chest, feeling the back of my neck tighten when she lets out a soft, painful groan of her own. “You might want to roll over onto your side before you pass out again, if you can manage it—we wouldn’t want you to choke to death on your own blood,” I tell him, even though nothing would make me happier.
Leaving him, groaning in the dirt, I turn away to carry Kait back to the lake house.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Kaitlyn
No.
The word, loud and frantic, echo through my head on a scream and I come up like a shot, hands bunched into fists. Ready to fight Brock to the death if I have to.
Expecting to find myself in the woods, sprawled out in the dirt next to his truck, Brock standing over me, I’m confused by the feel of soft cotton against my cheek. The hard, thick muscled arms wrapped around me.
“Whoa, Sunshine…” Hearing his voice—feeling it—somehow gentle and rough at the same time, rumbling through his chest picks my head up and has me staring into a pair of bottomless black eyes while my stomach rolls and pitches against the nausea swimming through it. “It’s okay. You’re safe.”
Went.
Somehow, I’m not sprawled in the dirt next to Brock’s truck, waiting for him to throw me into the back of it. I’m at Northpoint, sitting in its dark living room, cradled in Went’s lap.
“Where is he?” I ask, absolutely hating the way my voice shakes because the sound of it tells the truth.
That Brock Morris scares me.
The corners of Went’s mouth tighten and his gaze hardens slightly. “Where’s who?”
The question confuses me. Lifts a hand to his chest so I can push myself away from it. “Brock.” As soon as I say his name, Went’s dark brows drop over his gaze, his beautiful face suddenly rearranging itself into a collection of features that would give a grown man nightmares.