Page 48 of No Good Fight

Ryder moves so fast I barely process it.

One second he’s beside me. The next, he has Preston pinned back against the booth by the front of his shirt, the table scraping against the floor loud enough to turn every head in the bar.

“Say one more thing to her,” Ryder says, and his voice doesn’t rise. “I fucking dare you. Give me a reason. Because all I need is one.”

Preston’s face flushes, but his eyes cut to the room. People are watching now. The bartender has already started around the bar. The server is frozen near the kitchen doors with one hand at her throat. None of them move to call the police. Not against Ryder. He might as well be part of Birch Harbor’s royalty.

I touch Ryder’s arm.

“Please,” I whisper. “He’s not worth it.”

He goes still beneath my fingers.

For a terrifying second, I don’t know if he heard me. Then his grip loosens. He steps back with the kind of control that looks painful from the outside.

Preston straightens his coat and smiles at the room like Ryder is the unreasonable one.

Of course he does.

Ryder takes my hand, not my wrist, and leads me toward the front door.

I let him.

Outside, the cold hits hard enough to make me gasp. Rain falls in a thin mist over the sidewalk, turning the streetlights fuzzy. Ryder keeps walking until we reach the recessed doorway beside the closed florist two storefronts down. He sets my bag on the ground, then turns to me with his hands held at his sides.

Not touching.

Waiting for me. For my decision. For me to make a move to either crumble from the pain or accept what just happens. .

That almost breaks me.

“Alex.”

My name sounds different in his mouth than it had coming from Preston. Gentle without being soft. Careful without making me feel breakable. God, how is this man as perfect as he is? I don’t deserve him.

I never will.

“I’m fine,” I say automatically, covering for the pain and exhaustion and embarrassment of the situation in a way that feels both comforting and perpetuating the lie.

His eyes go to my wrist again, and I wish I were able to keep him from seeing everything. Red marks already circle the skin where Preston grabbed me.

I look down at my own arm like it belongs to someone else. “I’m not fine.” The truth doesn’t hurt as much as I thought it would.

Ryder’s hands flex, then stop. “I know.”

“He hurt me,” I say. “Again.” The words come out flat.

I hate that. I thought if I ever said them out loud, they would sound dramatic enough to match what they cost. The pain and humiliation I’m being forced to wear because my words don’t just expose Preston…I’m the one exposed. My weakness. The words should be huge. They should suck all of the air out of my lungs. Instead they’re small. Plain. So much

Ryder’s face changes, and this time he can’t hide it.

“He hurt me for years,” I add, because if I stop now, I don’t know when I’ll ever start again. “He grabbed me. He hit me. He used a belt once because I embarrassed him at dinner. He made me apologize afterward for making him so angry.”

Ryder turns his head away.

Only for a second.

When he looks back, his eyes are wet and furious, and that does something brutal to my chest.