It was Kayden's hand.
Impossible.
This had to be a hallucination.
From the drugs.
I blinked, lashes sticky with tears from the struggle, my vision blurred like looking through a layer of mist. The whole world spun, the car's interior lights stretching into twisted lines. I couldn't see clearly, couldn't distinguish what was real from what my desperation had conjured as salvation.
Lucas's scream tore through the night.
He was yanked from the driver's seat by an immense force, his collar ripping with a sharp, crisp sound as the fabric gave way under brute strength. His body flew out like a rag doll, his skull thuddingagainst the concrete in a sickening impact that twisted my stomach into knots.
"You fucking dare touch her?"
The voice was low and furious, each word a growl ripped from the depths of his throat.
It was Kayden. Really him.
I struggled to sit up, desperate to see what was happening outside, but the drug's effects wrapped around me like invisible vines, pinning me to the seat, my limbs soft and melting like wax.
Outside, fists pounded into flesh.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Each blow heavier, more vicious than the last.
Dull impacts mingled with the sharp crack of breaking bones, Lucas's screams growing weaker. "Stop! Stop! Please!"
"Stop?" Kayden's voice grated from his chest, hoarse and terrifying. "You touched her!"
Another punch, the nasal bone snapping with a crisp crack.
"You drugged her!"
Another, ribs fracturing like snapping branches.
"What the fuck were you going to do to her?!"
The final punch landed, and Lucas's groan cut off abruptly. Dead silence followed, broken only by Kayden's heavy, ragged breaths, like a beast fresh from the kill.
I slumped against the seat, tears streaming down my face without me realizing when they'd started, silent and unending.
He came.
Even after I'd said such harsh things to him, telling him to disappear... why save me? Why not just leave me be?
Footsteps approached, quick and tense.
The door was yanked open.
Kayden appeared before me.
His suit was a wreck—sleeves rolled up to his elbows, revealing muscled forearms dotted with blood. A couple of shirt buttons had popped open, the collar gaping to expose his solid chest. His hair wascompletely disheveled, strands plastered to his forehead, whether from sweat or blood, I couldn't tell.
But those eyes...
Burning with golden flames, they locked onto me, piercing right into my soul.
