“First of all,” I whispered as I searched his eyes. “We get them to apologize.”
“I ain’t…”
I pushed the two fingers harder into his throat, making his eyes pop wide and his mouth drop open as he tried to breathe. One hand came up to hit my arm, but I batted it down with my free hand and grabbed hold of his wrist, squeezing it hard and crushing it in my grip.
“I’ll repeat that bit for you.” I raised a brow. “We get themto apologize.”
My fingers twisted, pushing harder and cutting off his air supply.
“And when they don’t apologize of their own free will, we press harder, encouraging them to seek any drop forgiveness we might have to offer.”
I could feel every lump in his throat as I crippled his airways. He gargled and choked out his next words.
“I’m… sorry…”
I relieved the pressure instantly, giving him just enough freedom to drag in some harsh breaths and choke up more blood.
“Good boy,” I started, bringing the hand I was holding up between us. “Do you know what we do next?”
“S-stop…” he wheezed, his eyes popping wide open.
“Not exactly. Next, we make sure they can’t ever touch another a girl again without remembering something.”
“Drew…” He gasped for air as his eyes studied mine with fear.
Without even blinking, I manipulated his hand, pulling two fingers back on his right hand until I heard the snap of the bones being broken in my grip. His eyes bulged, and his scream was just about to break free from his throat when I shoved those two fingers back into his Adam’s apple, causing him to choke on his own agony as he gargled and spat and suffered in the same silence he’d forced upon Sloane Sutton.
His eyes turned bloodshot. The veins in his neck popped. His nose began to bleed, the sweet dark crimson path of his misery pouring down over his top lip so he could taste it on his tongue.
“We break off the thing that touched the girl withoutpermission. Whether that’s a dick, a finger, a tongue, a thumb, we don’t care. Then we shove it up their ass or their mouths, and we make them understand how it felt when they forced themselves on someone with something they didn’t want. Do you understand me, Hove? I’m about to fuck up your whole life. You’ll never move on from this, just like she can’t.”
Revenge felt good when it was served to those deserving.
That night, I preferred to call it retribution, and I was nowhere near done.
The second I pulled away, freeing him from my grip all at once, he fell to the ground in a crumpled heap and sobbed like the wounded lamb he’d become. I turned my back on him and paced, walking in a slow circle and straightening the cut on my shoulders. I took a breath, inhaling so deeply, I had to tip my chin up to the sky, close my eyes and appreciate the beauty and the calm I felt when I became this man. Jacob was high on some kind of drug. I was high on his pain.
When I turned back to face him, all I saw was a coward. A boy. A disgusting excuse for a man who’d used his power over a sweet girl whose innocence had forever been ruined because of his arrogance.
And I suddenly wanted to smash every part of his face in.
For everything he’d done to her.
For everything he’d done to Ayda.
For the disrespect he’d shown my brothers and my club.
All restraint had gone. Within a heartbeat, I was charging toward him, grabbing him by the scruff of his neck and making him stand on his weak ass legs again.
“This is for Sutton,” I growled, driving a powerful right fist into his stomach.
“This is for Sloane.” I did the same again.
“This is for Ayda.” I drove that one into his ribs making sure that stung the most.
“And this one is…”
The cock of the gun at my head had me freezing.
