Page 140 of Caution to the Wind

And Mei had already killed one of my lives stone dead. I wasn’t a fuckin’ cat, and I couldn’t afford to take a risk with what I had left. Not for me and sure as fuck not for Cleo.

So why did I want to?

Why did I want to step into the brutal wind of the storm and hold her tight so the shape of her small form would stamp itself on me like a notice of return to sender?

“Oh fuck,” Wrath grunted as he slid onto the stool beside me at the bar. “I know that fuckin’ look.”

“Eagerness?” I countered. “Been waitin’ eight years to get my hands on the man who ordered Kate’s murder.”

“I don’t doubt it, brother. But this…eagerness is ’bout sex, not violence.” He shot me a sidelong glance as he began loadin’ his gun with the bullets we had lined up on the bar.

I shrugged it off. “Never realized before now there seems to be a thin line between hate and sex.”

Wrath’s perpetually unsmilin’ mouth twitched into somethin’ like a grin. “The quote’s ‘a thin line between hate andlove,’ man.”

“Lovin’ Mei would be the stupidest move I ever made.”

“Why?”

I snorted, frustrated by myself, by Wrath, by the fact that this club was a group of noisy fuckin’ meddlers. “’Cause she broke my heart eight years ago in a way I’m still not fuckin’ over. I’d be sentencin’ myself to a shit ton more pain if I actually fell for her this time around.”

It was crazy that I was even at this point when a couple weeks ago I’d been sure I never wanted to see her face again. Now, that very sentiment made me want to punch my fist through a fuckin’ wall.

Even though I tried not to examine the reason I’d tattooed “Property of the Off-White Knight” on Mei’s sweet ass, I knew some of the reason lay with my fear of her leavin’ us again. This way, even if she abandoned us, she’d always carry a piece of me around with her.

It was overly possessive and totally fucked in the head.

But I couldn’t deny even thinkin’ about my mark on her skin gave me some kinda primal satisfaction as she stood across the room from me. Settled somethin’ in me that’d been seethin’ for eight years.

Wrath was quiet for a minute, loadin’ his Taurus and then his backup Glock. I’d finished gearin’ up already, a bulletproof vest over my tee and beneath my cut, my axe freshly sharpened, my own handgun loaded and ready in its shoulder holster, extra clips attached to my belt. Around us, the other brothers were preppin’ for the showdown, too.

It was finally the night we were ambushin’ the White Snake of the Red Dragon triad.

After Mei relayed the information Jiang Kuan had given her, Curtains went to work on verifyin’ it and expandin’ on the idea of ambushin’ his convoy on their way up to Whistler to check on distribution up there. The kid was a grade A hacker, but he’d been thrown for a loop when Mei told him her friend, Obsidian Swan, could lend a hand, too.

Apparently, they’d known each other at some point, but whatever their history, they succeeded in gettin’ us exactly the information we needed.

The White Snake would be travellin’ in a three-car convoy for Whistler leavin’ from Vancouver at one thirty in the mornin’. It’d take them about an hour to hit the most deserted stretch of the Sea to Sky Highway just north of Entrance, where a group of brothers would be waitin’ to take them out. Another group would come up from behind, cagin’ them in. Curtains would be in a car trailin’ so he could work on hackin’ the systems, but the rest of us would be on our bikes.

We’d done similar manoeuvres before, but the Red Dragons were notoriously hard to pin down, and we needed to be ready for shit to hit the fan.

“’S been three years since I lost Kylie,” Wrath said abruptly, jarrin’ me ’cause the man never talked about the lost love of his life. “Seems like a long time and such a fuckin’ short one simultaneously. I can tell you straight up, brother, the only reason I could get up every mornin’ after that was ’cause I knew when I had her, I relished every fuckin’ moment’a lovin’ her. And when she was at risk, I twisted myself into knots tryin’ to protect her. In the end, it wasn’t enough,” he admitted on a broken sigh, lookin’ at his empty hands like they were to blame. “But at least I tried, ya know? Even though you could argue it was stupid to love her when it was so fuckin’ unlikely we’d ever find peace together, I was brave enough to try.”

He looked me dead in the eye then, his blue eyes more animated than I usually saw them. “Sometimes, sayin’ somethin’s stupid is just a cowardly way outta takin’ a chance on bein’ brave.”

My fist spasmed on the bar as I struggled to digest his words. I got him, I did, but our situations were totally fuckin’ different.

“Kylie never hurt you,” I noted, tryin’ to stay calm when I felt like climbin’ outta my skin. “Mei had her reasons, and she’s explained them, so I get why she did what she did, but it’s more than that.” I closed my eyes for a second, thought of the knock-out fight we’d had just that mornin’ when she’d fuckin’ insisted on comin’ with the club for the ambush ’cause it washerfuckin’ mission and her fuckin’ intel. I’d lost my shit. There was no way she was puttin’ herself in danger two weeks after taking a beatin’ from Seven Song triad. There wasn’t even a fuckin’ need to ’cause we had it covered.

But she’d yelled at me ’til she was blue in the face, sayin’ she’d do it herself if she had to ’cause she’d made an oath to avenge Kate and hadn’t spent the last five years fake datin’ a Chinese crime lord just so a misogynistic asshole could sweep in and save the day.

“You have a white knight complex,” she’d accused. “Why the hell do you think I based a character called the Off-White Knight after you? I don’t need saving. In fact, maybe I should be there to saveyourass in case you need backup.”

I’d given in, but not gracefully.

“I know you’re not used to followin’ any rules, but you gotta know, Mei, you wanna stay alive, you followmine.”

In response, she’d tried to turn on her heel and storm out, but I caught her by the wrist and wrenched her into my chest so I could punctuate my orders with the stamp of a bruisin’ kiss.