Lachlan turned, saw the man hunched over by the wall, and fury twisted in his brow for a split second. But when he looked back at me, he was soft again.
“Of course. Let’s go, baby,” he offered gently.
That word, that stupid, fake, affectionate endearment, undid me.
Tears spilled down my cheeks before I could stop them. I turned away, brushing past him toward my car. I didn’t want him to see me fall apart.
He didn’t follow.
But he watched me drive away.
And I hated how badly I wanted him to come after me anyway.
Chapter 14
Lachlan
Logan was scared. And fuck, watching her walk away from me with her arms wrapped around herself like she was holding in everything about to break made something rip straight through my chest. I wanted to chase after her. Climb into my truck, speed down that dark road, pull up beside her, and beg her to look at me. To see me. To let me hold her and promise I’d never let anything hurt her again. I wanted to pour it all out—the truth of how she’d infected every damn inch of my mind like a drug I couldn’t kick. How she’d taken the breath from my lungs and replaced it with a hunger I didn’t know how to satisfy unless it was her.
She was everywhere in me.
Her laugh haunted my dreams. Her voice lived in the hollow of my throat. I was so completely, utterly obsessed with her, I was borderline feral. I was falling for her. Not in some sweet, boy-next-door kind of way. No. It was all-consuming. Dangerous. Addictive.
I loved everything—the fierce way she worked, the way her smile lit up a room like it had no right to, the way she cracked jokes when things got tense.
I hated watching her leave. But I couldn’t go after her. Because the bastard slumped against the bar wall, still trying to catch his breath, hadtouched her.
He’d touched my girl.
And I was going to fucking kill him.
As her taillights disappeared into the distance, the world seemed to dull. Her absence blanketed the night like a storm. Even the stars dimmed. My chest ached so badly, I could barely breathe, but I forced the grief down. Compartmentalized it.
There was a job to do. I hadn’t killed in a while. But men like him—they’dearnedthe pain.
What was it about these basic fucking white guys that made them think hurting a woman made them powerful? That it proved anything other than the fact they were already small and weak inside? It made me sick. But I’d enjoy every second of tearing him apart.
Because Logan . . . she’d never wear that look again.
Never flinch. Never shrink.
Not while I was breathing.
I grabbed him by the hair.
“What are you—” he stammered, but I didn’t let him finish. I slammed his head into the wall. The sickening crack of skull on brick satisfied something primal in me. He slumped, and I caught him, slinging him over my shoulder like a sack of garbage.
I tossed him into the back of the truck, looked around—no one. The cops had cleared out earlier, but I seemed to always be looking over my shoulder since Logan had come into my life. Then I slid into the driver’s seat and dialed Suzie, the bar owner, as the engine roared to life.
“Hey,” I said, my voice calm, “that pumpkin pie was amazing. Just wanted to let you know before I left.”
“Thanks so much,” she replied like we were just old friends talking. “I’ll make extra next time. See you around, Lachlan.”
Pumpkin pie was the code word. She knew to check the cameras and delete anything involving me and my little friend in the back of my truck. That dive bar had seen things most people wouldn’t survive over the years since she’d known me. Her boyfriend had been one of my first kills when all of this had started, and since then she was always willing to help me when I needed it for the cause.
Like now.
I peeled out of the lot, tires kicking up gravel. I drove fast.I needed to get back to her.
