He eyed me as I stood away from him, my arms going around my waist. His cum started to slip down my thighs, a reminder of what we’d done. That might be washed away in the shower, but I’d feel him, my pussy sore, for days.
“Who hurt you, Summer?”
The question took my breath away. I swayed on my feet, dizzy from standing up too fast. Or maybe from the bluntness of the question. How it hit so close to why I was freaking out.
Boone got up, too. Slowly. Carefully. He stalked toward me. “Who?” he repeated.
I swallowed hard, licked my lips. “My husband. I’m not a cheater, us being together. He is. We’re… separated, and as soon as he signs the papers… if he does, then, then I’ll be single.” The words came out in a big rush.
His fists clenched once then opened. Relaxed. “I know, baby. I didn’t think anything like that about you. Not once.” He cocked his head, reached out, and gently took one of my hands.
His eyebrow winged up. “He the one who hurt you?”
Tears rushed to my eyes, and he knew the answer without me saying anything.
They weren’t over what happened with Marty. That was over. I left and would never go back. But I burned with the shame of it. Of what being with him for so long turned me into. I didn’t want to be that person ever again. I didn’t want Boone to see me as that person. I didn’t identify as a woman who would put herself in a domestic abuse situation.
But I was. He saw it.
I wanted to be the spunky young country singer who won best song at the state fair six years ago. The one who still had her whole life ahead of her. Not a washed-up, married to a controlling cop who got violent at the end version of that young woman. Not the fool who let her husband convince her to quit her job pursuing her music full-time without realizing he was picking off her resources one by one. Isolating her from her friends. Making her weak and dependent, so it was harder to leave.
But I was.
Boone, as if trying to keep from scaring a skittish horse, reached out slowly, oh so slowly, and wrapped me up in his arms. “Easy,” he whispered. “That’s it. My good girl.”
This time, when I felt comfort in his hold instead of fear, I didn’t mind. I loved the fierce bear hug that lifted me right off the ground.
“I’ll kill him,” Boone growled, switching from gentle to fierce. Not at me, but for me. “Give me his name.”
9
BOONE
* * *
My wolf snarled, ready to eviscerate her ex. I needed to kill him. Summer was scared of me. Me! After what we’d done, how she’d trusted me with her body so beautifully and now was retreating, these ingrained fears that were brought about by another? It was blatantly obvious someone had hurt her.
Sure, I was big as fuck, but I’d learned long ago that I had to be careful. That my size could be used as a weapon. My father had wanted me to challenge Rob Wolf for alpha after his parents were killed in that horrible car crash. He and I fought about it for over a month. With words and then fists and then a full-on fight. I’d won, but the cost was a ruined family. I’d disobeyed and then almost killed my father.
Because of that aggression, that level of destruction, I fled the mountain and headed to college, the only option I knew at the time. I’d been sixteen, too smart to stay in high school. Too smart not to get a full ride to several Ivy League colleges.
I’d planned to turn them down, stay in Cooper Valley, and start a business with my brothers. Instead, I’d packed my bags and left for the East Coast. The further I was from the pack, the safer they’d all be from a monster like me who beat up his own father.
I knew my strength, and now I knew when to use it. For Summer, it’d be to finish her ex.
Nobody hurt my mate and lived to tell about it. I didn’t know the extent of what he’d done, but it was enough that she was afraid of me because of him. She had my cum dripping down her thighs. I saw it. I scented it. Yet, she still trembled and not from the orgasms.
“No.” There was a firmness in Summer’s voice, and she tried to push away from me.
I cursed inwardly. She’d made me promise to honor her no. A rule that was going to be a hard oath to keep because I wanted blood.
So did my wolf. It was our job to protect her and removing him from this earth should give her the peace of mind to move on, that no one would touch her or spew shit to make her feel anything less than perfect.
She didn’t know shifter justice.
I reluctantly freed her, scrubbing a hand across my beard, licked my lips, and got her sweet taste. “No, you won’t give me his name, or no, I can’t kill him?” I looked for wiggle room in the rule.
Her brows knitted together in confusion, probably because no one had ever said they’d finish someone for her. “No. To both.”
