The stove he understood, with a white-hot jolt of hope. A big pot of something, yellow flames licking at the bottom.
Her lips moved over the words again, and she smiled. Smiled.
With a single, calm blink of his lids and a slight tightening of his lips, Clay gave it right back to her.
I love you, he tried to say with his gaze. I love you and I’ll die for you.
And then she moved, his kamikaze girl. She became a dead weight and dropped, unexpectedly heavy in Ape’s arms. The asshole fumbled, his eyes following her for a second or two before flicking back to Clay, then back and forth, and while he vacillated, George made her move.
With a pull and a yell, she wrenched her arms back, and fuck if she didn’t bust through that flimsy little piece of plastic as if it were nothing. She darted for the water—his baby was fast—grabbed it and flung. The splash wasn’t as wide as Clay would have wished, but it got Ape in the face.
With a scream, the fucker staggered back as George scampered away, and Clay was on him. An elbow to the face jarred Ape, and Clay followed it with an uppercut that flung his chin up and sent an arc of blood through the air.
With a groan, Ape put his fist into Clay’s belly, full of brute strength, and fuck, the guy was huge. It took a beat for Clay to get his breath back, another for him to stand up again and get some space. He’d forgotten how powerful the fucker was. But he wasn’t fast. With a bellow, Ape came at him again, going for his face, but Clay sidestepped, part of him sucking in the near miss, letting it drive him back and then forward, his whole body in this one. A strike to the temple—surgical in its precision—and another to the monster’s kidney, and, oh yeah, that connected. He felt the man’s pain in the breath he spat out, the groan he couldn’t get enough air to put a voice to.
Fuck, yes, this was it. Taking advantage of Ape’s doubled-over position, Clay reached for the back of his head, gripped the greasy hair, and jerked him down to his knee. Ape’s nose broke. The crunch of bone was audible. From there, Clay’s inner beast took over, pummeling flesh and breaking bones like he’d never done in his life, his training a thin veneer over the savage animal inside.
Another strike, this one laying Ape flat out on the ground, where he rolled into a defensive little ball. But fuck, he deserved this. Deserved to be beaten into oblivion. Deserved a horrible, bloody, shattered death. He kicked the man, wanting to tear Ape apart, to make him suffer on the floor of this room. This house that had never seen violence before.
He paused, breathing hard, blinking past the sweat that poured down his face. Running a hand over his eyes, he was surprised to find blood there. Had Ape gotten a hit in?
He blinked again and focused back in on Ape.
You’re no better than him if you finish him off, came the voice that had led him to this place.
He shook his head, exhaled on a hard, painful puff of air, and took in the rest of the room. George was nowhere to be found. Good. He needed her gone, out of harm’s way.
Another swipe of Clay’s arm cleared the blood from his eyes and the confusion from his soul. Ape was still alive, but he was down for the count. It was better this way.
He listened for a split second, hoping to hear some kind of backup but getting only the not-so-distant roll of thunder instead. Then came a soft scuff of a boot. Clay whirled toward it, ready, only to come face-to-face with Jam. Jam. Fuck, in all the confusion, he’d almost forgotten he was here. Jam lifted his hands and backed away from whatever he saw in Clay’s face, a .38 pointed down between them.
Everything stopped.
“Got an offer to make, Indian. One-time deal,” Jam said, gun trained at the floor.
Clay waited, muscles tense.
“I clean this mess up, and you’ll never hear another thing from the Sultans. Nothing. Ever.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Never liked how the brotherhood was run. Never. But I need it, man. Can’t go back to being a civilian. Not after…” He swallowed. “Not since Afghanistan. Got a record now too, so…I need this. I need the life. You get that?”
“Fuck,” Clay said, because he understood, more than he could ever explain. “Yes.”
“I take care of this, and we’re gone. Done. You go to trial against Handles and the other assholes you got inside. You win your medal or whatever the hell it is you’re gettin’ outta this or… Oh, fuck. Right. Carly.” He shook his head, and Clay tightened up, ready for anything. “ I didn’t know she was your sister. I didn’t know.”
Clay pushed the image of his sister away and glanced around George’s home, this place they had desecrated with their stupid club filth. “How do I know you’re not coming back?”
“Don’t give a shit about you. Or your woman. You did me—did us all—a favor, gettin’ rid of the guys you put inside.” Jam’s eyes flicked down to Ape. “And him. I’ll clean this up.”
“I can’t let you do that, Jam.”
“Look, you fuckin’ asshole. Don’t you give me that holier-than-thou crap. I didn’t know she was your woman, okay? I thought she was just some snatch and—”
“Shut the fuck up.”
Jam raised his gun and took a step back, pointing it toward Clay. “I was a sniper in Afghanistan. Did I ever tell you that, man?”
