by Franca Storm
So, as Preppy leaned in to press his lips to mine, I jerked my head to the side, grabbed the back of his head and smashed his face into the side of my car. As he cried out, I shoved out of his hold, then gripped his hair and tugged hard, hissing, “You don’t fucking touch what isn’t yours! Women aren’t your playthings, asshole!” I slammed his face into the side of the car again, then kicked at the backs of his knees, forcing them to give out instantly. He groaned as he crashed to the rough concrete in a heap, clutching his bloodied face in his hands.
Cursing and heavy footsteps behind me warned me that Sweatpants was stepping into the proverbial ring, gunning for me. I thrust my elbow backwards, driving it strategically up into his diaphragm to wind the crap out of him. It worked and he choked, stumbling back. But, as I spun around, I realized I’d underestimated his level of sheer rage. It was obviously enflaming his adrenaline levels and enabling him to push past the pain and discomfort.
And that was why, his mammoth fist came flying at me while my guard wasn’t up, my fists still down from my previous blow. Oh, shit. This is going to hurt.
It all happened in a rapid-fire rush.
I was so focused on the sight of the fist coming at me and the brutal blow I needed to absorb, that I didn’t even see anything else coming; my peripherals were locked down without me even realizing it.
A muscular, inked arm wrapped around Sweatpants’ torso and literally ripped him off his feet, tossing him off to the side, just a few inches shy of his fist connecting with my cheek. Holy hell.
To say I was shocked was such an understatement. I could barely draw in a breath. My whole body was trembling with an overload of exploding adrenaline, so much so, that I stumbled back against my car, desperate for the support.
Fucking hell. He stood there.
“You okay?” he boomed over at me.
“I…” My throat was too dry to get more than a monosyllabic pant out.
“Luce? You hurt?” he pressed.
I swallowed hard a couple of times until I finally found I was able to speak again. “No. I’m fine, Mason. Fine.”
“Hey! Thug-for-hire!” Sweatpants bellowed, his nostrils flaring, as he dug the heels of his sneakers into the sidewalk with a furor like that of a raging bull seeing nothing but the targets it was determined to stampede all over. A huge mistake on his part. He had no idea who he was dealing with.
Mason’s expression transformed abruptly from the endearing one of soft concern he’d gifted me with. As his gaze darted to Sweatpants, his features hardened to granite, a cold, unforgiving glare hurtling his way. Nervously, I watched his hand curl into a formidable fist, one I was aware from reputation was capable of dealing out so much punishment. Punishment that’d been known to be fatal in some cases.
“Mason,” I entreated.
I saw his fist unclench ever so slightly. Relief filled me. It looked like he was going to listen to me. Yet another thing that set him apart from my brother, who would’ve let his ego, or his rage completely take him over. He could never come back from it once something riled him up. Yet, Mason could. Logic and reason always took precedence instead of unruly emotion or any other destructive crap with him.
“Walk away,” he called out to Sweatpants.
The idiot squared his shoulders. Oh no.
Mason shook his head and reached out to me. “Let’s go, little darlin’.”
I thought we were home-free. Mason had calmed. Sweatpants hadn’t moved a muscle or said another word. But we’d barely taken a couple of steps past my car, with Mason trying to lead me away when the foolish college kid shot everything to hell.
“What’s your problem, Thug-Life? You want a run at the bitch, you wait your turn, because I’m first in line. I’ll let you watch, but it won’t be pretty after the way she hurt my boy. She needs a lesson. She might be all used up by the time you get your turn, but if you play nice, I’ll save some of the good stuff for you.”
The guy had a death wish.
Mason stopped short, his whole body stiffening. A snarl ripped from him, an actual animalistic snarl.
And then he was no longer beside me.
He was on Sweatpants before I had time to even blink.
I barely saw his first punch fly, it flew forward like a strike of lightning, producing a similar devastating effect the moment it made contact with its target, its true goal: to annihilate whatever solid element lay in its path.
Sweatpants’s head whipped to the side and the blow’s power had his heels ripping out of their stabilizing dug outs. His sneakers scraped across the concrete as he was forced to stagger back several steps.
The next blow was the beginning of a ruthless rapid-fire assault that had Sweatpants doubling over within seconds. As Mason unleashed his fury, he bellowed curses and lessons at him, denouncing him for his disrespect towards me and a slew of other infractions, some I’d barely even had the downtime to acknowledge myself. No amount of screaming protests from me resonated, none broke through the dangerous headspace Mason was immersed in.
There was blood everywhere, spewing from God only knew how many nasty cuts all over Sweatpants’s face, arms and I could only guess how many other wounds hidden beneath his clothing. Holy shit. Mason was going to kill him if he didn’t let up!
I bolted forward, straining my voice to its limit with my screams for Mason to stop, that the foolish guy had learned his lesson many times over. Nothing. No indication that he’d heard me at all.
I knew what I had to do and I worried at the thought, because Mason was clearly so completely out of control. I had to intervene. Physically.
Just as that crossed my mind, Mason’s next actions confirmed that necessity, as he ripped his gun from its holster at his right hip, cocked it in one swift motion and stabbed the muzzle against Sweatpants’s temple.
“Mason! Don’t!” I yelled at the top of my lungs.
But the look in his steely eyes was one of a man already resigned to let another part of his soul decay in favor of wiping out the life before him.
I didn’t waste my breath again. We were way beyond that. His Desert Eagle was shoved against a guy’s skull, for goodness sake! Instead, I did something majorly dangerous.
As Mason stepped back, gave Sweatpants a kick that sent him rolling onto his back with a scream, I darted into the tight gap between them. Right into Mason’s line of fire.
Instantly, that killer’s fire that’d lit his eyes was snuffed out. It was as if seeing me standing down the barrel of his gun had broken the all-consuming spell that’d taken him over. He blinked hard and lowered his gun. It wasn’t lost on me that he didn’t flip on the safety though. He wasn’t ready to stand down and walk away.
“Luce, move,” he gritted out.
“No,” I said, strengthening my stance to make it clear to him that I wasn’t going anywhere.
“Do it freely, or I’ll make you move, lock you in your car,” he warned.
Giving him orders wasn’t working. I had to change tactics and I had to do it fast.
“Please, Mason. Don’t do this. The punishment doesn’t fit the crime. And it’ll be on me, okay?”
He jolted. “What?”
“This kill. It’ll be on me.”
He shook his head. “No. I’m the one pulling the trigger.”
“Because of me. I can’t live with the responsibility of that. So, I’m asking you, please don’t make me. Please just leave it now.”
Time ticked by. What felt like the quite real possibility of becoming infinite.
Until he finally breathed a heavy sigh, flashed me a withering look, flipped the safety on his gun and holstered it.
I couldn’t contain the relief that slammed into me and I threw myself at him, throwing my arms tightly around him. I wasn’t sure if it was all just relief, or if part of it was to make damn sure he remained waving the white flag and didn’t draw his weapon again.
His hands came up, circling my back, responding to mine, pulling me in tighter, holdin
g me to him with desperate urgency. “Fuck, Luce,” he breathed in my ear. “Fuck.”
The intensity of his words hit me deep down. Now he’d come down from his worked up state, he realized the true horror of the extent he’d very nearly gone to. He’d almost killed a man.
For me.
6
~Mason~
“Safe, huh?” I hissed through my teeth.
Nothing. I gave her a few seconds, cuz that was the kind of nice guy I was. I figured, maybe, she needed the time to get herself together. She’d been in a state when I’d shown up ten minutes ago.
Fuck, I couldn’t get the image out of my head of that overweight prick’s fist about to mess up her beautiful face.
The guy was a kid compared to what I was used to dealing with, for fuck’s sakes. But for the first time ever, I’d felt fear. Real fucking fear. It wasn’t for me, though. Nah, it was all about Luce. Then, as soon as I’d ripped him away from her, a surge of rage had caught me off guard. That fear and rage… they were so raw and overwhelming. I never brought emotion with me into a fight. It was dangerous. It made you short-sighted and led to mistakes. Like the fact that I’d pulled my gun on the guy, cocked the damn thing and been seconds away from shooting him at point blank range—a surefire kill shot—until Luce had snapped me out of it. I’d had to call Billy in, one of my brothers who was at the house party backing up Liam, to finish up dealing with the situation for me, while I got Luce out of there.
Jesus Christ. That was what her being in danger did to me. Made me a fucking madman.
“Well?” I pressed, cuz she still hadn’t responded. I tossed a look over my shoulder to where she was dragging behind me, as I pulled her along by her wrist. She wouldn’t walk beside me and she kept fighting my hold on her, but she wasn’t strong enough to break my grip. No way was I going to let go of her. She could be as stubborn as she wanted.
As I took her in, I couldn’t believe it. She was rolling her eyes at me. I’d been holding back my temper with her, trying not to lay into her, cuz I knew who was really behind this shit show of a night. It had Abi Heeley written all over it. House parties weren’t Luce’s scene. She’d obviously been coerced into it. But she’d still put me through hell tonight by breaking our agreement. I knew her too well to expect an apology out of her mouth, but the disrespect she was firing my way wasn’t on.
It had me fucking snapping. I stopped walking suddenly, causing her to jolt to a stop with me, as I thundered at her, “Do you have any idea what you put me through tonight, woman?”
“What you put yourself through, you mean?”
“WHAT?”
“I had the situation handled.”
“The hell, you did. You would’ve taken that hit.”
“It wouldn’t have taken me out of the fight. I had it. Without your help.”
I scoffed. “The guy had two hundred pounds on you. You’re delusional, Luce. That hit would’ve knocked you out of the fight and broken your pretty little face.”
More eye rolling.
“How did you even know I was around here?”
“GPS tracking.”
Her eyes shot wide. “Excuse me? You have a… tracking device on me?”
“If you want to call your phone a tracking device, yeah.”
“Shit, Mason.”
“A last resort I didn’t want to have to use, Luce. But you broke our deal today. You went out of bounds.”
She fixed me with that fierce look of hers I’d seen far too many times. Her eyes narrowing, her top lip curling and baring her teeth with a vicious hiss. “Out of bounds?” she shrieked. Jesus, that was some high-pitched shit. “You mean, I actually lived my life? I didn’t stay inside the jail cell you and Cole want to keep me confined to?”
“That’s a real low blow, especially with the deal we struck. I’m nothing like him. You know that. I’m all about living free. You can do whatever the fuck you want on my watch. The only condition is you let me know where you’re at. You broke your end of that deal tonight, Luce. That’s on you, not me, so don’t try to turn that shit around now.”
She tugged violently against my hold on her wrist. “Let go, Mason! Let go of me!”
I did the opposite, tightening my grip. “We’re almost at the truck. Keep fighting me and I’ll put you over my shoulder.”
“Don’t be such a caveman.”
I’d reached the end of my patience. I couldn’t take another second of bullshitting with her. I leaned down, getting in her face as I growled real low, “Fucking test me. I dare you.”
Luce was stubborn at the best of times. Fiery was what I liked to call it. So I expected some resistance. But not this much.
I knew why she was giving me such a hard time. I could see it there, swimming in her bright blue eyes. She might been good at hiding things from most people, but never from me. I could always see into her, down deep. Just like she could with me. It’d been that way since we were teenagers.
She was pissed at me for leaving after we’d slept together.
“Let go, you asshole,” she seethed, giving another firm tug.
That was it!
I snagged her around the waist, lifted her clean off her feet and hauled her onto my shoulder.
“Mason!” she cried. “Put me down!”
She flailed her arms and legs wildly, trying to fight and squirm out of my grasp. Not happening, babe.
“You don’t want to be doing that, Luce,” I warned, tightening my hold on her, as I turned down the street leading around the back of the party house. The place where I’d parked my truck and done recon, before giving the boys the go ahead to move in and shake things up.
“Hurting you, am I? Put me down and I’ll stop.”
“It’s going to take a hell of a lot more than you to hurt me, little darlin’. I’m talking about you flashing the whole fucking street every time you flail around.”
“Sounds like it’s bothering you more than me,” she shot back, refusing to stop.
Damn woman was right about that. She’d called my bluff. Yeah, it was bothering me just thinking about some fucker seeing up her skirt or down her top. The outfit she had on was bad enough as it was. I knew it wasn’t hers. Luce didn’t dress like a club whore normally. Another thing that was Abi’s doing. It made me sick to my stomach seeing her put it all on display, knowing she’d been that way for hours around other men, letting them see that much of her. Knowing we were coming up to the rear of that damn house full of horny college pricks any second had me on my last nerve. And, the next thing I knew, I was taking matters into my own hands. Literally.
I gave her ass a firm slap, hard enough to leave a sting.
Expecting her to shriek or curse at me for spanking her and right in the middle of the street too, I was stunned when, instead, a short gasp burst from her. Her whole body went stock still and she moaned. Fucking moaned. In pleasure.
It shot me straight back to that night when I’d had her body at my mercy. Goddamn, the sounds she’d made had driven me out of my mind. I’d never heard any woman moan like her before. It wasn’t just a noise of pleasure with her; it was so much more. Like she was unleashing the wild woman within, the one that’d been caged for so long. She’d surrendered that part of herself to me. And, as I now knew, just me. Nobody else had been there. Had her. Tasted her. Felt her.
Just thinking about it sent an intense wave of possessiveness surging through me and, instead of pulling my hand back like I should’ve after slapping her sweet ass, I was stroking it over her tiny skirt. Back and forth. Slow and sensual.
“Cross!”
I jerked my hand away and spun with Luce in my arms to see Liam signaling me. He was standing over by the rear entrance to the party house. The back gate to the yard was now open. The fence beside it was warped thanks to me. I’d jumped it earlier when I’d gone in to do some solo recon before sending the boys in. The second I’d landed in the packed yard full of partying college pricks, one asshole who’d been wasted and high
off his ass hadn’t been down with me crashing. He’d made the mistake of picking a fight and I’d thrown him into the fence, knocking him the fuck out and almost taking the whole fence with him.
Liam looked pissed. I wasn’t sure if it was all down to me. We were supposed to be dealing with the house party situation together, but I’d stepped out to deal with Luce. Instead of wrapping that up quickly, I’d got into it with her and even stopped to argue, delaying getting back to Liam and the boys further. Fuck, she really messed with my head and my priorities. No wonder Liam was pissed. Although, I had a feeling it wasn’t just about me. I was betting it had a lot to do with Abi and whatever she’d been getting up to inside that house when he’d shown up.
I signaled him back, letting him know I was just gonna finish up dealing with Luce and I’d be right with him.
Then I turned and jogged with Luce in my arms towards my old Chevy pickup truck a few feet down the road. I shifted her in my arms as we reached it, pulling my keys from my jeans pocket and unlocking it. I hauled the passenger door open and dropped her onto the seat. She scrambled to right herself and started cursing me out.
It gave me the opportunity I needed to open up the glove box and snatch up what I needed while she was distracted in her rage. Quickly, I snapped one part of the item to her wrist and the other to a secure area just beneath her seat.
She froze and stopped cursing, her eyes darting down to her wrist. It didn’t take her long to realize what I’d done, and her shocked eyes met mine. “Mason!” She tugged hard at the restraints. “You’re cuffing me to the seat?”
“I know you. Asking you to stay here nicely won’t work.”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me!”
“It’s the only way I can be sure you’re safe and not getting yourself into more trouble. I have to deal with some club business. Can’t be worrying about what you’re up to.”
“Mason!”
“Be back in a few, little darlin’.”
“Don’t you dare leave me here like this!”