Page 41 of Something Like Sugar (Pine Forest Something #2)
DUSTIN
M y fist smashes into Thomas Remington’s face, knuckles vibrating with the impact, pins and needles surging through them as I clench tighter and swing harder for the second, then the third time, when my arm is yanked back.
Before I can stop the motion, I’m pulling them forward, but they drag their feet, and I pull back the weight of my punch just as the sirens sound and blue and red light the field, reflecting in his blood.
“You don’t have to do this,” Shana shouts, shoving my body in place as it prepares to lurch forward.
At Thomas fucking Remington. “It was Lawrence that brought me here. Thomas was…” Her eyes fall to her former attacker.
One I thought I taught a final lesson to stay the fuck away from her over ten years ago. But he’s back.
With my girl, bloodied and beaten.
“He helped abduct you!” I grind out. It’s all I can do not to scream in rage and fury. The man I swore to kill is right here, and I could end it now. I could fucking end his life.
For all of them .
“It’s not the same, Dustin. He was a kid.”
“He knew not to fucking rape people, Shana, do not defend this piece of shit!” I snap at her, and she shuffles back. “Shay…I’m not going to hurt you,” I say, horrified she’d even flinch at me. “I love you.”
Her eyes find mine and hold me there, her captive. How ironic since she’s the one with ropes cut at her wrists and feet.
“I love you too, Dustin. And you’re here. But so is he. And I know what you want to do, and I get it. I know what he means to you. What he’s done and how that’s affected every one of us in this room. But I am choosing to move on from all of it.”
Lawrence, lucid now and groaning on the floor, tries to push up.
Fuck! My eyes widen to the real predator.
One I knew I could smell from a mile away, and I hate myself for not following my instincts then .
I begin to panic, assessing the closest route around the table to restrain the fucker and keep Shay safe from Thomas at the same time, but she’s there before me, already punching and kicking and sending him back down in a defeated whimper.
“You’re going to so much jail, Lawrence. But don’t worry, I bet there’s plenty of sixty-nine in the state penitentiary.” She clicks her tongue in triumph, and damn if that confidence isn’t the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.
Her fight.
That’s what she’s been saying all along, isn’t it?
This is her fight.
“You don’t want me to kill Thomas?” I ask, getting my answer with one look.
But it helps to hear it anyway.
“No more dragon slaying.”
I nod, offering her my arm and throwing Thomas one of the discarded ropes at my feet to use on Lawrence’s wrists.
“Tie him,” I command, insinuating with altogether disdain, that I will skin him if he so much as looks at my girl, despite what she wants. He takes the rope and does as I suggest, securing Lawrence’s wrists behind him and tying him to the table legs.
With all the restraint I can bear, I spare Lawrence Lawson a single glance before we leave, wishing I’d broken his other hand.
But Shana doesn’t want that.
I don’t want that.
Not if it costs me her.
I follow her out, cursing the one who scraped up her back, wrists, and God knows what else, but forcing my body to move forward.
Not behind.
I cover her shivering shoulders with my jacket, recognizing the torn fabric of her shirt as one of my own, and a warm sense of satisfaction settles in, knowing she chose to wrap herself in something close to me.
Even through the darkness, before she was taken, I’d been forgiven. And she didn’t need me to save her, either. She may have wanted me close, but she didn’t need me to lift her up at the gala. Not for her business, her honor, certainly not for her pride.
She saved herself with the strength of the moon, the power to move tempestuous oceans and light the darkest of skies.
“I really can’t slay your dragons anymore?” I frown.
“No, but I do know something else you can slay for me.”
“What’s that?”
She smiles, bringing my hand to her womb, and shining so brightly, I can do nothing but beam right back.
“Fatherhood. Turns out the mini pill doesn’t always work.”