“I’m your huckleberry,” he growls, his voice so low and dangerous that goosebumps ripple across my skin.
Before I can blink, Bane drives his fist into the man’s face. The crack of bone is sickening. Blood sprays across the shelf of Funko Pops, and the man staggers backward.
Bane doesn’t give him a chance to recover. He slams his knee into the guy’s stomach, then grabs him by the throat and hurlshim into the shelving unit. Boxes tumble to the floor as the man crumples.
But Bane isn’t done.
He pounces on the fallen attacker, straddling his chest. His fists rise and fall like pistons, each blow landing with a sickening thud. Blood spatters across Bane’s face and knuckles, but he doesn’t slow.
“Bane!” I scream, clutching Saylor against me, pressing her face into my stomach so she can’t see. My hands shake violently as I try to shield her. “Bane, stop! You’re going to kill him!”
He doesn’t hear me.
Terror claws up my throat. “Please,” I beg, my voice breaking as tears stream down my face. “Bane,pleasestop.”
Finally, something in my voice reaches him. He freezes, fist raised for another blow, and looks up at me.
I flinch backward, instinctively pulling Saylor tighter against me.
For a moment, I don’t recognize the man staring back at me. His eyes are cold, empty, void of anything human. Blood covers his hands, his face. He looks like something out of a nightmare.
He blinks, and I see the moment clarity returns. His gaze drops to the man beneath him—face swollen beyond recognition, unconscious or worse.
“Fuck.”
Bane climbs off him, his knuckles raw and bleeding. Without a word, he grabs the unconscious man by the collar and drags him toward the end of the aisle.
“What are you doing?” I call after him, my voice high and thin, but he doesn’t answer.
I watch in shock as he hauls the limp body into the men’s bathroom on the other side.
Saylor trembles violently against me, her small body shaking with silent sobs. I stroke her hair with trembling hands, murmuring nonsense words of comfort, but my eyes stay locked on Bane as he disappears around the corner. My whole body won’t stop shaking.
A minute later he reappears, his face grim, blood still smeared across his knuckles. He marches over to the first man I’d kneed who’s still curled in a fetal position, clutching himself and moaning in pain.
“Please,” the man whimpers as Bane approaches. “Don’t?—“
Without hesitation, he delivers a savage kick to the man’s head, silencing him instantly.
I stand frozen, holding Saylor, my mind screaming at me to run. To grab this little girl and get as far away from this man—thismonster—as I possibly can.
But my feet won’t move because I know this is all my fault. He did this for me. To protect me.
I don’t know which scares me more—what Bane just did, or the part of me that’s grateful for it.
When he returns, I tense. My breath catches in my throat as he crosses the distance between us in three long strides.
For a split second, as his blood-covered hands reach for us, every muscle in my body screamsrun.
But then he pulls us both into his arms, and despite the blood, the violence, and the terror still coursing through my veins, I don’t pull away.
“Are you okay?” he asks, his voice rough and his breathing ragged. “Did they hurt you?”
All I can do is nod, my throat too tight to speak.
“Saylor?” His hand cradles the back of his niece’s head. “You alright, squirt?”
“I’m okay, Uncle Coopy,” she mumbles against his chest. “Frankie saved me.”
