Page 18 of Cold Foot Revenge (Wreck’s Mountains #7)

“You have to put your pin number in,” the receptionist said, and Dylan realized he hadn’t been paying attention.

“Oh, yeah. Right,” he murmured, entering it on the keypad. He cast a look over his shoulder at his truck outside, wishing he would see Roxy through the dark tinted window. She’d stolen a Turn dose. For him.

So he could have a bear like Garret’s?

So he could be a part of the Cold Foot Crew.

He’d mentioned it a little, but she’d clearly listened and thought about it. Dylan was starting to understand Roxy. She paid meticulous attention when he spoke of his life. She was a grenader, sure…but she was also a carer.

He hated the absolution and acceptance in her voice when she’d told him Grave would hunt her forever.

No, he absolutely would not. By this time tomorrow, Wreck would be here with reinforcements, and they would burn the fucking poison right out of the Rabbit Hole.

He was going to set Roxy free in one day.

He had a plan. He hoped afterward, she would choose to stay with him.

Get to know him better, tether her heart to him, give him a shot at dating her, after her life calmed down and her nervous system reset.

That’s what he hoped for, but it’s not what he expected from her. Roxy would owe him nothing after tomorrow because that was the point, right? Setting her free? Giving her the opportunity to see what kind of woman she was outside of the cage of the Rabbit Hole?

He wanted to watch her rise. He wanted to be there when she figured out she was really safe.

Did she know? Did she understand men like him?

He’d spent years making sure his brother was good, and he was better with a purpose.

He was better as a protector. He was better if he had someone to care for.

It kept him out of trouble and just made sense to him.

Maybe he was doing this all wrong, attaching to her like this, but fuck it.

He liked her, and he didn’t like people easily. There was just something about her that felt important.

Whether she stuck with him or not after he cut her anchors tomorrow, he knew she was going to make him into a better man.

He took the key card from the receptionist and made his way outside, eyes downcast as his thoughts swirled around and around in his busy mind.

He needed the police to stay out of the Rabbit Hole after what had happened tonight.

He needed some luck on his side for his plan to come to fruition.

He needed those assholes to stay out of jail.

Hopefully, they’d gotten away. That would all depend on how much damage they caused.

If they hadn’t attacked anyone or caused too much damage to cars, they could stay out of jail.

He’d learned that with Garret’s accidental Change in this town years ago.

Changing into a shifter animal wasn’t illegal.

Frowned upon by humans, yes, because it could be jarring and terrifying, but it wasn’t illegal as long as the shifter was in control and non-violent.

Grave and his boys hadn’t caught up to Roxy, so… no blood on their paws.

He climbed into the truck and slid his hand to Roxy’s thigh. She was wearing his oversized T-shirt and nothing else. He’d had an extra hoodie in the back that he was wearing, but for Roxy, the hem of his T-shirt was hiked up, exposing the soft curves of her thighs.

There was worry in her still-too-bright eyes.

“There’s parking in the back of the building. I asked.”

She huffed a tremulous laugh. “Oh, so you’re a mind-reader now?”

Dylan shrugged. “I know you’re worrying about your Crew finding you. I think we’re good though. They’re going to be watching your place. I’m sorry we can’t go get clothes for you or anything. I think it’s too big a risk to go back there right now.”

She nodded but still looked uncertain. She smoothed wrinkles from the shirt. “This is comfortable, thank you.”

He didn’t miss the awkwardness that was building between them though.

“Are you okay?”

She forced a smile. He could tell it was an effort. “I’m great.”

Dylan pulled out of the parking spot and drove around the building to park out back. “I’m no shifter and I can’t hear a lie, but I can still sense a lie. It’s okay to not be great right now, Wolf Mask. Tonight was wild.”

“Yeah, but I’ve had wilder.”

He backed in between two trucks that were jacked up like his, and turned to her as he put it into park. “That’s okay.”

“What’s the wildest night you’ve had?” she asked, and there was combativeness to her voice.

“Ooooh I see. This is the part where we fight because you don’t know what to do with your fear, right?”

“Fuck off,” she muttered, ripping her glare away from him to give it to a blue dumpster across the small back parking lot.

It stung. He gritted his teeth against a response and shook his head. He wasn’t going to do it. Not when she was raw and emotional like this. He got out and saw her move to open her door out of his peripheral vision.

“Stop,” he ground out. “Wait for me.”

“What?” she snapped.

He blew out a steadying breath. “A little patience, Roxy. Let me get your door.”

“You don’t have to do that, Dylan. You don’t have to be a gentleman with me. I’m just a stripper you met a few days ago.”

Whoo, she was looking for a way to burn it down right now.

“That’s not what you are to me,” he said low. “Wait.”

Roxy searched his face, and whatever she saw there, she took her hand off the handle and did wait for him to come around the front and open her door. She even let him help her down, after a second of hesitation to touch his hand.

She was going to figure him out eventually though—her damage didn’t scare him. Not even a little.

He’d been built to weather storms, and that’s what was building now.

He was comfortable in the chaos. He wouldn’t choose the chaos, but he was comfortable in it.

She moved to take her hand from his grasp as he shut the truck door, but he held onto it tight. Nope. She wasn’t going to do the dumb distance shit.

Thank God for tiny blessings, that woman let him lead her to the first-floor motel room, her hand soft in his. He felt her looking around while he beeped the key card on the door and let them in, and he hated that. Hated that she felt hunted.

One more day.

When they were inside and the door closed and locked behind them, he rounded on her and pulled her against him.

“Stop,” she said, pushing against his chest.

He released her and leveled her with a look. “Won’t work, so you stop it.”

Roxy’s eyes were glowing with defiance, and she crossed her arms over her chest, staring at the pattern of the outdated floral wallpaper. Her lip trembled and he hated it.

“I watched my brother die,” he said softly.

She glanced at him, and then back to the wallpaper.

“I searched the damn bar, texted him half a dozen times. It wasn’t like him to disappear.

I was always the one who ran off and found a group of strangers to buy random shots with.

It was me who would go home with a random girl and forget to text him that I was leaving.

I was the problem child, Roxy. I was the chaotic one who couldn’t hold down a job, and my taste in relationships was shit, and I drank too much, and I didn’t give a fuck if my friends had to spend half their night tracking me down, as long as I was having fun.

Garret never, ever did that. He was the one who kept everyone together, and made sure everyone was good.

He was the good one, Rox. He was good. Fuck,” he muttered as the vision of Garret’s body by that dumpster flashed across her mind and he knew he would tell someone for the first time ever what it was really like.

“When Garret disappeared at that bar, I just had this feeling something was wrong. I panicked. I asked everyone if they’d seen him.

I went to the bars next door and looked for him.

Checked that his truck was still parked out front twice.

Called his name down the street. I walked the long way around the building looking for him.

Looking for anyone who could tell me where my brother was.

” He cleared his throat and sank down on the edge of the bed, and cracked his knuckles.

“I found him by that dumpster out back, where the cameras are dead. Leech or Grave, or whoever had injected that shit into his body weren’t around.

Or if they were, I couldn’t see them. The alley was dark, but I could still see him good enough.

Garret was having a seizure when I found him.

There was foam on his mouth and his eyes were rolled back in his head, and I was yelling for help.

‘Somebody help my brother. Somebody call 9-1-1,’” he said softly.

Screaming at the top of my lungs and no one came.

No one heard me. No one helped. I’d left my phone inside—.

” His voice cracked on the last word and he swallowed hard.

“Do you know how many times I’ve kicked myself for not having my phone with me?

Who does that? Who goes on a search for someone and leaves their phone in the damn bar?

Me. The fuck-up. The chaotic one. Garret would’ve done it better if it was the other way around, and Roxy…

do you know how many times I’ve wished it was me instead? ” He nearly choked on the admission.

She relaxed her arms to her side now, and her eyes had lost that spark of defensiveness. Understanding swam there now.

“I didn’t want to leave him because I knew he was dying.

I felt it happening. Felt the life draining out of my brother, and so I held him, you know?

I didn’t want him to be alone, so I sat in the dark alley by that damn dumpster, rocking my brother’s body as he passed.

He went still, and I was yelling not to leave me, and that… Roxy…was my wildest night.”

“What happened to him next?” she whispered, sitting on the bed next to him.