Page 69 of Shattered Obsession

“Xander,” I whisper to myself, a prayer disguised as a name.

“Run, baby!” Xander’s roar shatters the air, a command laced with urgency and power. It cuts through the chaos around me, compelling me to move.

I can’t waste this chance.

I have to escape.

-Xander-

The second she breaks free, I’m on him. Rage takes over, a pure, blinding fire in my veins.

My father taught me how to throw a punch.

He also taught me when not to.

“Use your fists for the people you love,” he’d tell me, “not against them.”

Those words echo through me now as I slam Damian into the floor. My fists aren’t fueled by pride or ego. They’re fueled by love.

Every strike is a promise.

Every hit is a vow.

“You don’t get to hurt her again.”

I slam into him, the knife clattering to the floor as we crash into the coffee table, splintering wood beneath us. Pain explodes across my jaw as Damian’s elbow connects, sharp and brutal. I barely register it. All I see is her, knees pulled to her chest, shaking, sobbing, eyes wide with terror. My body becomes nothing but movement. Strike. Block. Pin. I don’t think. I just react. Rage is my oxygen.

“Don’t you ever touch her again!” I bellow, driving my fist into his face. Blood gushes from his nose. He laughs through it, sick bastard, but it just fuels me more.

Then I feel it: the cold press of steel against my side.

The gun.

He grins through the blood. “You think you’re winning? You’ve got nothing. One pull of this trigger and she’ll be mine again.” He thinks fear equals control. He thinks power is the ability to harm. He has no idea that real power is choosing not to become the monster who created you.

I grab his wrist, slamming it into the floor once, twice, until the gun skitters free. He snarls and lunges for it, but I’m faster. My fist slams into his temple, and he crumples, blood pooling from a cut above his eye. My chest heaves, sweat and blood dripping into my eyes.

I grab the gun, my finger brushing the trigger.

For one heartbeat, I imagine ending it here. One shot, and she’s safe forever. But then I hear her voice, shaking, broken, but clear.

“Xander, don’t.”

And it’s enough.

I lower the gun, every muscle shaking with restraint.

“Get out,” I snarl at him. “Before I change my mind.”

Damian stumbles toward the car door, bloody and grinning with a vile promise.

“This isn’t over,” he hisses before disappearing.

The worst part isn’t that I almost killed him.

The worst part is that I wanted to.

I stare down at Damian through the window, bleeding and broken but still smug. A voice inside me whispers that I should have pulled the trigger. That men like him don’t stop. That monsters only understand fire.