But I’d been the one feeding them, giving them treats, and doing endless belly rubs for the past several nights. I was probably the only kindness they’d ever known in his life.
I slowly moved to stand, feeling pain in all my joints from the drop, from the fight before then. But I’d be damned if he saw how much I was hurting. If he knew how much my heart was breaking. Because if Colter was alive, he’d be in here by now.
He was gone.
So were Saint and Syn if I was here alone.
My heart cracked straight in two even as I panicked about Sugar. Alone in a hotel room. No one to take care of her.
I bit the inside of my lip to keep it from quivering.
This wasn’t over yet, dammit.
I didn’t have to kill all of them.
I just had to get past Roach, get out the front door, and fucking run for my life.
“Stay the fuck down,” Roach snapped, making the female dog jump, like a strike usually followed a tone like that.
If I needed more reasons to want to kill the bastard.
I stood straight and patted my leg.
Then felt my own lips twitch as the dogs both moved to my side, making Roach’s brows pinch in confusion.
“Yeah, they love me more than you,” I said, reaching for a strip of chicken jerky and splitting it in two for them. “Imagine that.”
“You fucking—” Roach started, taking a step toward me.
Until the female dog let out a low, threatening rumble.
His step faltered.
“Seems like they don’t like you threatening me. Wanna see which one wants to rip your throat out more? My money’s on the girl.”
There was a crash somewhere toward the front of the clubhouse, but the rumbling of the angry dog beside me made it hard for me to tell what it could be.
“I’ll put a bullet in each of their heads while you watch,” Roach said. “Then I’ll fuck you on top of their dead bodies.”
His draw was fast.
The gun was out before I even noticed him reaching for his waistband.
Maybe my first thought should have been self-preservation. But I stepped forward toward the gun, trying to wedge my body between it and the dogs.
Because there wasn’t a doubt in my mind that he would be as heartless as to shoot them. Then follow through with his plan afterward.
Somewhere in the clubhouse, there was more crashing, cursing, and I vaguely wondered if they were trying to tend to their wounded. Including the guy whose eye I’d fucked up. I could still feel the blood and fluid sticky on my thumb.
No matter what happened to me, I hoped he and everyone in the club thought of me when they looked at that bastard’s face.
“Go ahead. Shoot,” I invited when I felt the dogs’ fluffy bodies behind me.
“No,” he said, his hand falling back to his side. “I’m not putting you out of your misery until you’re begging and crying for it. Even then… I might keep you around for a few weeks. Maybe keep you drugged up like all your girls. I’ve had my fun with them over the past year. So has everyone else.”
He was trying to provoke me.
It worked.
