Total pages in book: 16
Estimated words: 14546 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 73(@200wpm)___ 58(@250wpm)___ 48(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 14546 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 73(@200wpm)___ 58(@250wpm)___ 48(@300wpm)
“It’s not a good time right now, Iron. I’ll catch up with you another time. Okay?”
“Open the door or I’ll knock it off its fuckin’ hinges.”
There’s no way I’m going to keep him from coming in apparently. I know I look like shit with a very blackened eye, a swollen, busted lip, and bruising on my chin. I pull my ponytail holder out and shake my hair down around my head, hoping to hide what I can. I open the door just as Iron is preparing to knock it down. He storms into my apartment and walks through it, opening my closets, and I have no idea what he’s looking for.
“Something I can help you find?”
“Just making sure we’re alone here,” Iron says, and turns his gaze on me. “Ran into your dad. Sounded like you were hiding some asshole in here.”
Still in the role of the protective older brother, I see.
“Nope. I’m here alone. Now you know so you can go.”
He watches me as I sink down into my couch, but I’m looking straight ahead instead of at him. I’m sure he’ll leave, wanting to be able to report to my dad that there’s no man here, but he doesn’t. He sits down on the couch at the other end. He doesn’t say a word, but he keeps looking over at me.
I pretend to watch TV, but I’m fully physically aware that he is in the room.
His gaze gets more intense. “What happened to you?” he asks after a while.
Reluctantly, I look at him, giving a view of my whole face for the first time. “Would you believe that I ran into a door?”
He slides across the couch and puts his hands on my shoulders. He carefully touches my chin, moving me gently so he can get a closer look. I avoid his eyes because I know I can’t lie looking at him.
“No! I know you didn’t run into a door. Now tell me the truth.” The fierce look in his eyes tells me that I can’t not tell him. He looks as if he’s ready to kill. “Who did this to you?” he demands.
I take a deep breath, knowing I have to tell him the truth. He won’t leave until I tell him the whole story. I have to tell him anyway because of Tara being a traitor to him and the Guardians.
I curl my hands together on my lap. I tell him about the bakery and hearing Tara and the other woman talking about the party. I tell him that I asked them to take me to the Exiled Guardians’ party with them. And I tell him about driving to the trailer park… when he finally loses his shit.
6
Iron
“What the fuck were you doing at the Fallen Kings’ trailer park last night?” I want to know. “Since when do you mix with them?”
She shakes her head and then winces as if she’s in pain. “I was meeting Tara there. And you know I didn’t know she was with the Fallen Kings. I’ve seen her around the Guardians. I thought she was one of you all. When I got there, she was talking to a guy named Crater, and I figured out he was from the Fallen Kings when they were talking about spying on the Guardians. I… uh… left as soon as I realized she was tangled up with them.”
That long pause in the middle of her story was the sound of her leaving out some pretty fucking important details. I scoot closer to her. I push the hair off her face and tuck what I can behind her ears. I can see her bruised eye, swollen cracked lips, and the bruises on her neck. I gently pull her to me, letting her rest her head under my chin. I’m vibrating, I’m so mad. I don’t want her to see how angry I am. In the quietest voice I can muster, I ask her, “Please, finish the story.”
And she does. Detail by detail she tells me about Crater grabbing her and hitting her. My arms tighten around her, and she trembles. I hold her tighter, wishing that she hadn’t seen how cruel the world could be.
I remember last night and finding Crater on the ground when we pulled in. He couldn’t get up fast enough to get away. We captured him and that lying, spying skank. We warned her and took Crater to an abandoned factory building outside of town where he was beaten and then warned to stay away. There’s a part of me that knows Crater is scared of power. He knows what we can do to him, but now, knowing that he has even more reason for revenge, and it includes Maddy, there’s no choice but to end him.
The thought of Crater putting his hands on Maddy makes me see red. I’m ready to murder the fucker. I pull away from her and bring her chin up to look at me. “I have to go and take care of this, Maddy. I need you to stay put.”