The mine seems to tilt, the lamp swaying gently on the hook not helping, as the shadow behind him stretches and shrinks.
He takes a step closer to me, then, another. The mine shaft wall feels rough and cold against my back, a solid reminder that there is nowhere left to go.
Garrett jerks against the ropes and ties holding him. The sound he makes isn’t human. It’s an animalistic growl ripped straight out of his chest, and I feel the pain of it so greatly that I can’t help the tears that form.
“Oh, look, Shade. She’s crying for you, tied up like the beast you are.”
“I will kill you,” Garrett shouts, as spit flies from his mouth in fury. “I will force feed you your own dick. I’ll make you sit on my knife and fuck you with it if you touch her.”
“Don’t,” I beg, lifting my hands. I don’t recognize my own voice, as the word is choked with tears. Whatever happens next, I’ll survive, but I don’t know if Garrett will survive watching.
Paltrow tilts his head, studying me, then looking to Garrett with a desperate grin. “You want him to stop hurting,Isla?” His tone is conversational; he’s immune to the emotional exhaustion Garrett and I feel.
My pulse reverberates through my body. It’s in the whooshing in my ears, the dull throb in my temples, and the steady thud of my heart.
He gestures lazily with his gun toward Garrett. “I can make it stop. Right now. If you let me touch you.”
Garrett thrashes against the rope again; this time, the beam creaks. “Isla, don’t you fucking?—”
Paltrow stamps toward him, gun raised. “You can’t stop this now, while you’re alive, so you definitely won’t be able to if I put a bullet through your skull. I’ve a feeling Isla might cry seeing you dead, but I won’t care about that.”
He turns back to me, and I force myself to lift my chin and hold his gaze. I need to follow Garrett’s example and not be afraid.
“If you let me touch you,” Paltrow says calmly, “I won’t hurt him anymore.”
Everything in me goes still. The cold, practical, former club girl in me knows the answer to this equation. I can close my eyes and mentally remove myself. I can pretend he’s every biker who never cared. I can switch off the part of me that understands the horror of this deal, if it keeps Garrett alive.
I look at him. He’s wrecked. Blood dripping down his chin. His face swollen, his eyes bruised. His body is bent in shapes that make it hurt just looking at him as he fights to stay conscious.
He shakes his head ever so slightly, begging me to not do what I’m considering. “Fight,” he says hoarsely. “You fight like your fucking life depends on it.”
Paltrow laughs sharply. “You don’t get to give orders.”
“I do,” he says, then looks at me. “To her.”
I study him, this man who would put himself in front of me without question. I could do this. I could survive until Kai comes.
Something shifts.
Not the fear. That’s still lodged in my gut. But it’s a series of fast realizations.
I’m not the woman who flinches from bikers anymore.
I’m not the woman who thought them all interchangeable.
Kai trusts me to care for Garrett. Garrett trusts me to fight.
My hands curl into fists in the ropes.
“Fine,” I say. “But I want your word, you won’t touch Garrett.”
Paltrow smiles; his shoulders loosen. “Well, now, that was easy, wasn’t it?”
I step away from the wall a few inches.
“Don’t do this, Isla. It’ll kill me,” Garrett cries.
I look to him, wishing I could tell him what I’m thinking. “I think it’s going to happen one way or the other, love. Have faith in me.”
