Page 134 of Wild Sanctuary

“Stanley, please⁠—”

“And then you told me there was no other way with Bill and Tom. And I believed you, Marcus, God help me.”

Stan’s face is mottled red as tears spill down his cheeks. “This time, you’re gonna see just how much it costs a man, Marcus. ’Cause I’m sick of bein’ the only one to pay the damn price.”

Marcus can’t hold his nephew’s gaze. He looks at the floor, his own jaw trembling, crumpled hat still clutched in his hands.

Neither of them is looking at me.

Under the table, I tap the screen to end the recording, then slide the phone into my pocket.

I have what I stayed for. Now I just have to live to use it.

I plant my feet against the floorboards.

Tom Monroe didn’t raise a daughter who gives up and dies in a kitchen.

My fingers close around the handle of my coffee mug.

And I stop thinking, and start doing.

My free hand finds the saltshaker on the table. I hurl it past Stan’s back into the hall, where it cracks against the far wall and shatters on the floorboards.

Both their heads snap toward the sound, while I launch from the chair and close the gap between us, driving the mug into Stan’s face with every pound of me behind it.

The coffee is still hot enough to scald, and the mug breaks on impact, ceramic splintering across his cheekbone, carving a deep gash. He’s yelling before the shards finish hitting the floor, his free hand flying to his face as his gun hand swings wide and blind.

I pivot on the ball of my foot, knowing that Marcus is between me and the mud room door.

He sees me coming, and his arms come up, half to grab and half to ward, his face still gray and slack from Stan’s accusations. He’s a man who has never had to use force on a woman in his life, figuring it out in real time.

I don’t give him long enough to work it out. Instead, I break into a sprint, and when I’m a hairsbreadth from him, I drop.

My hip hits the waxed floorboards first, then my shoulder, and I slide hard under the reach of his arms. Marcus grabs at air where my shoulder was a heartbeat ago.

I clear him in a breath, and when my hand finds the mud room doorframe, I haul myself upright against it.

His mouth opens to call to me, but I’m already through the mud room and shouldering the back door open so hard it cracks against the outside wall. The afternoon sun hits me like I’ve been immersed in cold water, and I’m running before my feet remember they’re bare.

31

WYATT

June’s got her feet up on my dash and her phone face-down in her lap, which means she’s watching me instead of scrolling, which is never a good sign.

“What?”

“Nothin’.”

I side-eye her. “June.”

“I was just thinkin’ it’s nice she’s at the house.”

I keep my eyes on the road.

“Mm.”

“You do remember how to have a conversation, don’t you, Wy?”