How long have I been here?
What happened?
I watch their lips, only catching half of what they’re saying, because their faces are turned, hidden from me as they face off against each other.
“Weren’t there to protect her…”
“Because I was chasing after your sorry, piece of shit ass…”
“Fucking bastard, this isn’t the life I want for my girl. I wanted her to get out of here, go see what the world has to offer…. Drag her down…”
“I didn’t want this for her either, but I love her… would fucking die for her in a second…”
My father turns his head just a little, angling in on Edge, and I can read all of what he says.
“You’ll never have her. I won’t let you break her and ruin her. You know nothing about loving a woman. You couldn’t protect her tonight. You won’t be able to in the future. If I have to take her to the ends of the earth, I’ll make sure that she’s safe from you. Wish I’d have put a bullet in your brain the second I saw you. If I had, my girl would still be safe and well. None of this would have happened.”
I can’t bear to see the terrible devastation and wretched vulnerability ruining Edge’s face, the pain slashed across there, opening him up. I draw in a shallow gasp, struggling for air, because my father’s words are like a knife in my heart. I can’t bear to see the doubt shimmering in those dark copper eyes. I hate the way his massive shoulders and his proud chest deflate under his leather like he’s a balloon that has a slow leak, like he’ll fade away to nothing because of those words.
Words.
Words from a man he’d have died for. A man he’s served as a leader, his brother, for over a decade. A man we both love.
I have to save them. Save them both from what they’re about to do to each other.
I summon all the strength I have left. “Stop!” I rasp, my voice rusty and croaky, scraped out like boots over a rough wood floor. I don’t hear it, of course, but that’s what it feels like, in the deep recess of my terrible dry throat and aching chest.
Two sets of eyes turn to me. My father freezes, his gray eyes widening in shock, his shoulders falling with the tremendous relief he obviously feels. A visible tremor sweeps through him. His stormy eyes shine with a sheen of moisture and his jaw clenches up. He’s so overcome with obvious emotion, that he can’t move.
Suddenly, Leah’s head swims into view as she leans over the bed. She takes my hand in hers and squeezes it hard, like she’s willing life back into it.
“Oh god, Harley! Oh my god, you’re going to be okay. It was just a graze. Your arm. You needed twenty-two stitches, but it’s fine. It’s fine, honey. You lost a lot of blood. They gave you a transfusion, but you’re… it’s going to be okay.”
Her lips keep moving, but I can’t make out what she’s saying, because the tears flooding down her face, leaking out of her huge liquid blue eyes, distract me. I breathe out a harsh breath, so thankful that she’s okay, that it brutalizes my insides, like I’ve taken another lethal kick to the chest or swallowed a bag of crushed up glass.
“Harley…” my dad takes a step towards the bed, but he stops when I shake my head violently against the pillow propped behind me. It’s hard and lumpy and hurts my skull just by existing.
“No…” I breathe, but on an inhale, I force my voice to be stronger, to come out whole, even if I can’t hear the words, I know how much pressure to put behind it. “Don’t! I’ll always be your little girl, I know that. I know you love me more than anything and I love that about you. But you can’t say that. Edge is like your brother. He has nothing to do with why I’m here.”
It hurts, but I incline my head in Edge’s direction. I keep my eyes locked on my dad’s face, watch as his expression hardens into something fierce and unforgiving and my heart aches. He’s a stubborn bastard, and I am just like him. Fierce. Wild. Stubborn. Born with a spirit to be feared and a thirst for justice.
With each word, my voice gets stronger. I feel stronger, because I’m not just fighting for the man I love, I’m fighting for all of us, trying to stitch us back together the way they closed the wound on my arm, give us a blood transfusion of love to save the only family each one of us has ever known.
“I love you, dad, but I’m not your little girl anymore. My heart, my soul, my body—belongs to Edge. He might forgive you for saying what you did because he’s a good man with a far more generous heart than even he knows, but I won’t. I won’t forgive you. I’ll remember what you said to him for as long as I live. Someone shot up our place. Someone tried to kill us. You shouldn’t be in here, fighting with your brother when you should be acting like the leader you are, trying to figure out who did it and get vengeance. Edge wasn’t here to keep me safe because he went out after you!”
I blink hard against the brutal pain on my father’s face, against the way he flinches back, the regret already storming in his eyes. Tears leak from the corners of mine, burning their way down my cheeks, bitter and acrid as coals, branding me.
“Edge…”
He stands trembling at the foot of the hospital bed, trembling with rage and suppressed emotion, with fear and something far more dangerous.Hope.
I meet his gaze, that beautiful copper hued iris. The bruises on his face are already fading, because he’s tough as stone, but his eye is still swollen shut.
He takes one halting step forward than another and another, then my warrior, a man brutal, huge and unmovable as a mountain, a man as tough and wild as the last untamed lands out there—drops to his knees at my sides. He takes my hand and knits our fingers together.
He bows his head, laying it across my stomach, and it takes me a full minute to realize why his powerful shoulders are shaking, because I can’t hear the sounds.
Edge. The man who has always been a mountain to me, a man whose soul is so thoroughly stitched up with mine that I can’t separate it without shredding both of them into ruined tatters, my fearless man who soars free on his wild chrome horse, who has looked death in the face and stood tall, who has lived through the neglect of a painful childhood, who waded through danger and hardship. That same man crumbles before me.
