Page 17 of Beautifully Shattered (Secrets & Scars #3)

T he loud crack of the gun rings out like thunder, echoing far longer than it should as I stare at my wife. She’s completely unhinged. Tainted far more than I fucking thought.

My chest rises and falls in sharp, panicked bursts. I wanted to stop her, but the look in her eyes down in that dungeon fucking terrified me.

That wasn’t my wife. That was someone else entirely.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a strong woman. But this? This is something else. Something I know she’ll never recover from once the veil of her fury lifts.

“JD,” I rasp, keeping my voice low so I don’t startle my Angel, standing in the centre of the yard, still holding my gun.

“Yeah?” he asks, standing by my side, shoulder to shoulder.

“What’s Smitty doing?” I ask him to look because I can’t .

I won’t take my eyes off my wife. I can’t let her suffer through this alone, and this brutal, fucked-up moment is the only way she’s letting me be a part of it.

Watching on helplessly. Letting her do the one thing I know will leave a permanent scar on her soul.

“He’s, uhhh… grinning.”

I blow out a relieved breath, because fuck, I didn’t know how this would go down.

We’ve got a code. No killing on the day we honour a fallen brother.

And yet, here she is. My wife. Not just killing the woman who set this whole nightmare in motion, but doing it right out in the open for everyone to see…

on the day we remembered eight of our own.

She just murdered a woman in front of over sixty witnesses.

Fuck.

“I need you to do damage control for me,” I mutter. “Please.” I add, because fuck, if he were a smart man, he’d distance himself from me right the fuck now.

Smitty might be grinning, but that doesn’t mean it’s good.

“Of course.” JD claps a solid hand on my shoulder before leaving my side to try and get a handle on how this shitshow is landing with Smitty. With the crowd.

Abbey’s arm is still outstretched, the barrel of the gun still locked on Wendy’s head, but I spot the weakness to her hold. She’s starting to fade, and fast.

Moving up behind her, I clear my throat to let her know I’m there.

“Angel. I’m here. I’m going to touch your shoulders now,” I say quietly, but she still tenses the second my hands gently land on her .

She starts trembling, and her shoulders sag, yet she doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Doesn’t tear her eyes off Wendy’s bloodied corpse.

“I’ve got you,” I murmur into her ear, pressing my front to her back, and sliding my hand down the length of her outstretched arm. “I’m going to take the gun now.”

This time, she nods, the tremors wracking through her increasing.

The moment my hand wraps around the gun, she releases it, spinning, and burying her face in my chest, her hands fisting my cut in desperation like she’s drowning, and I’m the only thing keeping her above water.

She’s back. My Angel is back, but I’ve got no idea how she’s going to react when it hits her. When she realises she just killed Wendy.

Somewhere behind me, someone starts clapping, and then more join in as it spreads through the crowd. Shoving my gun into the back of my pants, I keep my hold on her with my free hand, never wanting to let her go.

She stiffens in my arms as the applause builds, like she’s only just hearing it now, and then, Smitty’s deranged laugh cuts through the noise.

“Now that’s justice,” he cackles, striding up to us as Abbey pulls back just enough to glare at him.

I shift so I can see him too, and his grin is fucking huge and obnoxious. He looks like a fucking proud dad who just watched his kid win a fight.

“I always thought there was a feisty killer in our little charity case,” he snickers, winking at her. “How does it feel? ”

Stepping out of my arms, Abbey levels a death glare at my Prez, her top lip curling in disgust like she’s seconds away from spitting in his face.

“How do you think it feels?” she snarls a rhetorical question.

“I just beat another human within an inch of her life, dragged her out here, and killed her in front of everyone to get justice for my little girl! And you know what?” She steps right up to my President and sneers in his face.

“It hasn’t changed a damn thing. My baby is still dead! ”

She’s still wearing the spiked knuckledusters when she shoves him, daring to lay a hand on a man who doesn’t take kindly to disrespect. A man who on more than one occasion, hasn’t thought twice about throwing fists at an unruly woman.

Smitty staggers back a few steps, and gasps spill from the Doxies’ lips as Abbey continues to glare at him like she’s daring him to do something.

My body fucking tenses, ready to move, ready to throw myself between my Prez and my wife, consequences be fucked.

But then Smitty starts fucking cackling like a goddamn lunatic.

“She’s fucking delightful!” he practically sing-songs, throwing his head back with laughter.

A few of the drunker brothers cheer, while others just shake their heads and laugh at our unhinged king.

“Tell me, Charity,” he grins, eyes wild as ever. “Shall we burn her corpse on the bonfire?”

My fucking brows hitch, my eyes cutting to my wife as she glares back at Smitty.

“My name is Abbey. Stop calling me Charity,” she hisses through clenched teeth, stepping back and glancing down at the woman she just killed. “I’ll let Celina decide what to do with the body. I don’t believe in desecrating the dead.”

With angry tugs, she frees herself from the metal weapons on her hands and lets them fall to the ground with a heavy thud.

Her tear-glazed eyes dart up to me, and fuck, the trauma in her eyes is hard to miss, but there’s also something harder. Strength.

The tough woman she’s had to become in the blink of an eye is mixed with the sweet submissive soul who walked into my life a few months back. They’re at war inside her, and neither one is winning.

“I’m ready for that punishment now.”

Fuck.

I was furious with her before. For pointing a gun at me. For defying me. For making me feel like I’d lost her for good.

But now, all I want to do is pull her into my arms and kiss the weight of the world off her skin.

My gaze scans over the blood smearing her face, like painted evidence of what she’s done.

I need to clean her up. If we were to leave now and get pulled over by the cops, she’d be totally fucked.

And then I’d have to kill them, too.

Giving my Angel a nod, I mutter a quiet “excuse us” to Smitty, then start leading her away. Shielding her from the whispers and stares. From the aftermath.

Finding JD on the fringes of the crowd, I lean in as we pass. “Give me a couple of hours in the bungalow.”

He nods, saying nothing, as the crowd parts, not for me, but for my wife .

Once we break free through the thick of it, I scoop her up in my arms, cradling her to my chest as I carry her off into the night.

She doesn’t protest, snuggling into my chest, her body limp like she can no longer bear to function. She doesn’t ask me where I’m taking her. She doesn’t need to. She trusts me, even after the showdown we had minutes ago.

And fuck… when she had that gun on me, I didn’t know if lunging for it would end with a bullet in my chest. I couldn’t read her. Couldn’t be sure. There was a very real chance she would’ve pulled that trigger.

So I didn’t move. Didn’t push, because this unhinged version of my Angel is uncharted territory, and I needed her to know I meant what I said. That I wouldn’t stop her. Even though everything in me was fucking screaming to.

Fuck.

Carrying her down the dark trail that weaves through a tree-lined path before opening up to a small clearing, I find the row of shipping containers that have been converted into small bungalows with two double beds and a tiny bathroom in each.

Climbing the steps of bungalow number three, the one JD and I share when we’re on the compound, I gently lower my wife to her feet.

She stiffens a little, like she’s only just noticed we’re somewhere new, and I reach over her head, my fingers feeling along the top of the door frame until I find the key.

I quickly unlock the door, putting the key back before I push the door open and reach in to flick on the light.

She doesn’t say a word, stepping over the threshold, her eyes tracking everything from the two beds, only a few feet apart, to the open door at the other end that leads into the bathroom .

“This is where you were staying,” she says quietly, moving further in, recognising the familiar space I showed her on one of our video calls.

“It is, yes.” I shut and latch the door behind me before shrugging out of my cut and hanging it on the hook by the door.

Abbey’s eyes fall to the two beds, and she studies them for a moment before pointing to the far one by the bathroom entrance. “That one is yours?”

“It is,” I rasp, toeing off my boots, and her eyes find me over her shoulder before she frowns.

“I can’t have sex yet.”

I smirk. “I know, Angel.”

Her frown deepens as she turns to me.

“Then what’s my punishment?”

“There’ll be no punishment tonight.” I start lifting my shirt, watching her track the motion.

“But…” her voice wavers slightly, her caramel eyes flicking up to mine. “Why?”

Pulling my shirt over my head, I toss it to the side, enjoying her eyes on me as they track down my bare chest, and even after everything we’ve been through, how her cheeks still flush like it’s the first time she’s seen me this way.

“Because, Angel.” I step closer, my voice dropping low. “When I punish you, I need you strong. I need you healthy. I need you to be able to take it.”

She visibly gulps.

“Now, be a good girl and strip for me.”

She shakes her head, worry flickering over her face. “But I can’t—”

“You’re covered in blood, Angel.” I cut her off, and her lips part in an O as the realisation hits. “We’re going to clean you up.”

Her eyes widen, flicking towards the open door of the bathroom, worrying her lower lip between her teeth.

“I can wash myself.” She glances back at me with a half-arse smile.