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“My dad told me,” Nate goes on. “He did some digging into your past. All judgmental now, but I hear you used to be quite the playboy. Turns out you got one of your sluts pregnant, and she was so depressed, she killed the kid.”
My thoughts swirl, my chest tightening. After all the baby talk with Ruby, this is painful. But I won’t let him distract me, especially since he could be lying, though my instincts make me believe he’s telling the truth. He seems too certain.
When I take another step forward, the man with the tribals raises his hand. “Hold up, big man. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“You’re the ones doing something stupid,” I snarl. “Protecting this rat bastard. I’m going to give you all one chance.” I look them in the eye, one by one. The man with the tribals smirks back at me. The others, at least, have the sense to look a little afraid. They’re probably wondering why I’m so confident, considering it’s five on one. “Leave Nate and me to handle this alone, or I won’t be responsible for what happens next.”
“Pfft, some tough guy, are you?” the man with the tribals snaps.
Suddenly, he throws himself at me. At least, he thinks it’s sudden and unexpected, but I saw him getting into the stance in advance. I slip to the side and hammer a vicious elbow into his nose, then another, then another. He gasps and falls like a sack of shit to the floor, and then two men launch at me, yelling like cowards.
The fury of war blazes in my head. The heat of battle. It feels right, defending my woman. It feels like the thing I should’ve done as soon as I learned what he did.
One of them catches me in the gut, but with all the adrenaline, I barely feel it. I headbutt him so hard he flies off his feet. Then I grab the other one by the ear and wrench his head sideways, slamming him into the wall.
Nate is gasping, eyes wide, turning for the door. I take out my pistol and shoot into the air, plasterboard flaking and falling around me.
“On your fucking knees,” I growl.
It’s obvious none of them have ever been near firearms before. They whine and cringe away from me. Nate stares, all his douchebag confidence draining away.
“Did I fucking stutter?” I aim my gun at him.
Slowly, he falls to his knees, his eyes filling with tears. “Please,” he whispers. “Please.”
I walk across the room and pistol whip him in the mouth so hard teeth fly from his mouth and land with a shockingly loud clattering noise against the floor. He gazes up at me, wide-eyed, blood dripping from his mouth. His friends start running from the house.
“Some pals you’ve got there, Nate.”
I hit him again, sending him sprawling to the floor. When he starts to crawl away, I step on his lower back and press down with all my weight. He kicks his arms and legs like he thinks he can swim away.
“What were you saying about little piggy?” Kneeling on his back, I push the gun against the side of his head, twisting the metal so the barrel grinds against his hair and digs into his flesh. “What were you saying about my woman?”
“Puh-puh-please,” he moans, his words difficult to make out, probably from the missing teeth.
“Where’s your phone?”
He reaches toward his pocket. I take my foot off him, letting him sit up, a steady stream of blood dripping from his mouth like red drool. His friends might be calling the cops, but I can’t care about that now.
“Show me the photo,” I growl.
When he shakes his head, I hit him again. He collapses sideways and makes a noise that makes me wonder if I’ve gone too far and killed the little prick. Then he blinks and sits up, looking dazed. Finally, he holds his phone up.
“Face recognition won’t work,” I tell him. “Your mouth’s already swelling.”
He groans and types in the code. When he starts swiping through photos, I snatch his phone from him, and then my soul turns cold. Turns to ice. The photos sear into my mind. They burn into my memory. Already, I wish I could erase them. I force myself to go on, past the ones that mean there’s no other choice—I’m going to have to kill this man—until I find the one of Ruby. She lies on a bed, the whites of her eyes just about showing through her drugged, narrow eyelids. The angle shows her legs and her underwear.
“Any copies?” I growl. “Lie to me, you sick bastard. Fucking lie to me.”
“One. In the Cloud.”
I delete her photo, then go to his Cloud app and find it there.
“I’m not deleting the rest,” I tell him. “Long after you’re gone, people will know what you are. You sick fuck.”
