Keaston doesn’t come over to me, instead, he rushes out the only direction the stranger could have gone, leaving me alone on the floor. I’m okay with being alone though, I prefer it right now. I don’t need him to comfort me, I just want to be left the fuck alone.
It doesn’t take long for a breathless Keaston to return. I’m still sitting on the floor, my back against the wall and staring at absolute nothingness ahead of me. I can’t speak, can’t force my body to move, all I can do is stare.
“Avah,” Keaston rasps, sinking down on his haunches in front of me.
Tilting my head back slightly, I look up into his eyes. “He was right here. I was working and he was inside here,” I whisper.
He nods his head. “Back door was unlocked,” he mutters. “How could everyone here leave and not lock up knowing you were alone?”
Shaking my head, I search his gaze with my own. “I don’t know.”
“C’mon,” he grunts, holding out his hand for me.
Lifting my arm, I slip my palm in his and allow him to help me to stand. He doesn’t tug me closer to him, he doesn’t try to touch me anywhere else, as soon as I’m stable and on my feet, he drops his hand from mine and turns around.
Following behind him, I lock the front door and stick close to his back as he makes his way toward my car. “Tomorrow you’re on my bike, no more driving separate cars,” he growls.
“Keaston,” I warn.
He turns around quickly, his intense gaze focused on mine. “You know what it means, I know what it means, and soon that’s exactly what will happen. But tomorrow you’ll be on the back of my bike for nothing more than protection purposes.”
“Why don’t you just drive my car?” I offer.
He shakes his head, lifting his hand he cups my cheek, sliding his thumb across my bottom lip. “It’s going to be your place anyway, Avah. Just accept that shit and we can move forward.”
I don’t tell him that I don’t have to accept anything, because that isn’t going to happen. He’s protecting me and I know that I’m using him by allowing him to continue to help me, by not shutting him down more forcefully when he says things like this, but I’m terrified.
“Let’s just go back to your place,” I rasp. “I’m tired.”
He hums, dropping his hand, and thankfully doesn’t say anything else. Instead, he jerks his chin toward my car door and stands with his hands crossed over his chest as he watches me open the door and slip inside. Once my car is started, only then does he turn toward his bike.
I follow him to our building, then I follow him inside and into his apartment. My entire body trembles with each step that I take. By the time I walk into the apartment, I almost don’t make it to the couch before my knees go out beneath me again, for the second time tonight, and I fall on my ass but this time onto the cushion.
HAWK
Sitting just outside of the border agent building, the same one I dropped Avah off at just a few months ago. The same building, she walked in and allowed her body to be used to protect the club.
I wait.
I fucking wait for the man who touched her. Permission or not, it was the single biggest mistake I’ve made in a long fucking time, really, the biggest since leaving Trista.
I wonder if I’ll remember him, if I’ll even recognize him as he makes his way toward his car, but I do, instantly. I watch as he slips into his pickup, starts the engine then drives off, oblivious to me following behind him.
He doesn’t live far from his station, just a few miles down the road and in a suburban area. This doesn’t surprise me. I watch as he slams his car door closed, gathers his things, then begins to make his way inside of his small home.
Normally, for a mission like this, I would have done some research. I would have figured out his homelife, if he had a family or roommates. Being angry and impulsive, I did no such thing, so I lie in wait.
Riding down the street, I park a few blocks over and dismount from my bike before I go back to his home. Slipping into his backyard, I decide this is where I’ll end him. I don’t plan on going inside and being surprised by anyone or anything.
Thankfully, I don’t have to wait long, just a couple of hours, which is good because each hour that passes, the less chance I’ll get caught. Leaning against a tree trunk that sits to the left of his back door, I wait.
He walks out, cigarette dangling from his lips and I snort. His house has been quiet, indicating that he lives alone and that’s the best-case scenario for this moment. He doesn’t say anything, but shifts his head and his eyes come directly to meet mine.
His lips curve up into a grin, but he doesn’t say a single word, in fact, he doesn’t even make an indication that he’s seen me. There’s a moment of silence, neither of us says a word, then he turns his back to me.
Walking up behind him, I grunt. “Turn around, fucker.”
He spins around, his eyes widening in surprise and he opens his mouth, but no sound comes out, instead I slide my knife across his throat. He falls to his knees, his mouth moving open and closed, words trying to come out, it doesn’t happen, nothing but gurgling escapes his lips.
I watch as he bleeds out, not willing to walk away until he’s completely lifeless, totally without breath in his lungs. When he doesn’t even twitch, that’s when I walk away, careful not to get any blood on my shoes.
Leaving him in a pool of his own blood, I sheath the knife and calmly make my way toward my bike. Nobody watches, nobody sees a thing and even if they did, good luck proving a goddamn thing.
Climbing on the back of my bike, I ride toward Avah only stopping at a truck stop well outside of the city, in the middle of nowhere, to shower the blood from my body and toss my ruined clothes in the bottom of a dumpster, never to be seen again.
It only takes me a few more hours to make it to Avah’s. It’s dark when I arrive in town, but if I know her, she’ll still be at work. It’s not too late, yet. Guiding my bike toward the dealership where I know she’s been selling cars the past few months, I’m careful not to get too close.
I see her almost immediately after I park.
That cunt.
I knew something was up. I knew it, but I didn’t want to believe it, not even when I saw it with my own eyes. After the meeting with everyone this morning, I packed a small bag and left knowing that there is a plan in place now, I can deal with Avah before that plan is implemented.
It took me nine hours to ride to the border agent’s place, to deal with him, nine hours on my bike of thinking about her. Then I park outside her work just to watch her walk out of the building with another man. To watch him touch her face, tuck her into her car, then watch them walk into her apartment together.
I have no right to be angry.
She’s not claimed, she’s not branded, she’s not mine.
But she is.
She is fucking mine, even if she’s none of those other things, she’s still mine.
Clearing my throat, I continue to watch, wondering when I’ll be calm enough to make my way up to her apartment. Then I decide, I could wait a lifetime and I wouldn’t be calm enough to confront her, especially because some fuck is sticking his dick in my cunt.
Parking my bike, I climb off of it and head inside of her building. A building that isn’t secure by any fucking means. It doesn’t take me long to climb the stairs to her floor, marching down the hall, I growl to myself as I approach her door.
I’m pumped. I’m ready to beat this fuck’s face in. I will too, beat the fucking shit out of him for even looking at her, let alone touching her.
Another big mistake that I made was allowing her to be with that goddamn border agent, because she’s mine, she’s off of the fucking table to all other men, has been since I laid eyes on her the first fucking moment.
Chapter Nine
AVAH
I hear a loud banging out in the hall. My entire body jerks at the sound and I stand up, running toward the peephole. Placing my hand on the doorknob, I don
’t turn it or even make a move to open it as I stare at the back of the figure banging on my door.
“Don’t go out there,” Keaston says, shoving me to the side. I watch as he presses his face to the door and growls at the sight of the man banging against the door.
I can’t make a move, not a single one, because although I didn’t see his face, I saw enough of him. The Savage Beast emblem and name emblazoned on the back of his leather cut told me everything that I need to know.
Daddy’s home.
Keaston growls, wrenching the door open and I watch as he stomps out into the hallway. Then I hear him shout, and that’s when my feet start to move. I’m still wearing my clothes from work, my shoes have been kicked off, but my skirt and blouse are still perfectly intact.
“Who the fuck are you?” Hawk barks as he spins around.
“You don’t need to shout down the whole goddamn floor. Christ, what the fuck, man?”
Keaston knows who this is, he has to. I hide behind his frame, waiting to hear what Hawk has to say. He makes a low growl in the back of his throat before he speaks again.
“Where the fuck is my woman?” Hawk asks.
Keaston sucks in a breath, but before he can respond, I step out from behind him.
“Your woman?” I demand, placing my hand on my hip, my trauma from earlier somehow gone and replacing my terror is straight-up anger and rage. “What the fuck?”
He starts to make his way toward me, his face turning red with his anger, but I don’t make a move, not a single one. He can fuck himself if he thinks he’s going to intimidate me. Although, I can’t deny that my thighs shake a bit as he gets closer and his scent washes over me.
He smells like leather and cigar smoke, he smells like oil and man. He smells like he should throw me against the wall and fuck me until I’m screaming his name.
“Yeah,” he barks, reaching out and wrapping his hand around the side of my neck. “Mine.”
Everything around me completely vanishes, it melts away at the sight of this man. This beautiful man in front of me. I have wanted to see him right here, claiming me, wanting me, needing me just as badly as I need him, but now that he’s here, he’s pissing me right the fuck off.
I open my mouth to tell him to fuck off, but Keaston beats me to it. He wraps his arm around my chest from behind and tugs me backward. I’m pulled off balance and fall back against his chest.
My gaze doesn’t break away from Hawk’s and watching his eyes turn completely black at the sight of Keaston’s arm around me, it makes my entire body stiffen. His cheeks turn bright red and he takes a step toward us, his hands balled into fists at his sides.
“She ain’t yours, if she was, you’d have been seeing to her,” Keaston advises.
Hawk shakes his head once, slowly, too slowly. He takes another step forward, then another, before he leans forward, his gaze focused on mine. “Step aside, Avah,” he rasps.
“You don’t understand,” I say in a pleading tone.
“I don’t give a fuck, you can explain that shit to me when you’re done sucking my dick as your apology.”
“Hawk,” I snap at the same time Keaston growls.
There is a moment of silence while the two men stare one another down in their pissing contest of sorts. Rolling my eyes, I pull down on Keaston’s arm and he releases me, but I don’t make a move to the side the way that Hawk demanded I do. Instead, I take a step up to him, too close for my own good, because his scent washes over me again.
“We’re all going to go into my apartment and we’re going to talk about what is going on,” I calmly explain.
I watch as a muscle jumps in Hawk’s cheek, but he doesn’t refuse. Without turning my head, I ask Keaston to grab my purse from his place.
Hawk’s gaze narrows and his eyes darken even more at the mention of my things in Keaston’s apartment, but I don’t really care about Hawk’s feelings right now. I just want this spectacle to be taken out of the hallway and behind closed doors so that I can explain everything to Hawk.
Once we’re inside my place, Keaston closes the door. The room is bathed in tension and silence, both make me supremely uncomfortable.
“What are you doing here?” I ask as I turn to Hawk.
He shakes his head, crossing his arms over his chest, but doesn’t answer immediately. He tilts his head to the side, his gaze never leaving mine as he just watches me, silently. It’s a bit unnerving and I press my lips together before I bite the inside of my cheek and wait for him to speak.
“I came here because you didn’t return my calls or my texts. I wanted to make sure you were okay, now I see you were busy being your normal whore self.”
I gasp at the same time Keaston growls somewhere behind me. Taking a step toward Hawk, I reach back, my palm slicing across the air and landing on his cheek with a crack that bounces off of the surrounding walls.
“Fuck you, Hawk,” I grind out. “Fuck you.”
“Been there, babe.”
“You better just walk the fuck out. You’re making a goddamn fool outta yourself,” Keaston mumbles.
Hawk’s eyes flick behind me, then come back down to meet my own gaze. He doesn’t say anything right away, his silence is deafening though and my legs start to tremble, threatening to give out on me for the third time today.
Keaston and Hawk are in yet another pissing match. I’m tempted not to tell Hawk anything, to force him to leave and walk away from me once and for all, but the thought of seeing his retreating form makes my heart squeeze in pain.
“I’m being stalked,” I blurt out.
Hawk’s entire body jerks, his head swings down and his eyes find mine. “What?” he shouts.
“I’m being threatened and stalked. Keaston figured it out a few days ago and he’s been protecting me.”
Keaston grunts behind me, obviously not happy that I admitted my problems to Hawk, probably wanting me to force him to leave, to walk away and never look back. I don’t know if I could sleep at night knowing that I did that to Hawk though, knowing that I didn’t tell him the truth.
HAWK
Anger immediately evaporates from my entire body in one single second. I stare at Avah in surprise. Stalked. Who the fuck would be stalking her? Shaking my head, I try to get the images of someone harming her out of my mind, I need to get the details of what the fuck is going on here and I need them without this jackass breathing down her neck.
“You can go,” I grumble, flicking my gaze from her to this fucker behind her.
He smirks, tilting his head to the side and shakes it once in denial. “Don’t think I will,” he drawls.
Avah sucks in a breath, sinking her teeth in her bottom lip, then slowly turns around to face the fucker. I watch as she walks up to him, lifts her hand and places her palm against his chest as she tilts her head back to look up into his eyes.
“Keaston, I need to talk to Hawk and it’s obvious we can’t do much talking all together this way.”
The fucker looks at me, then smiles softly as he shifts his gaze down to meet hers. My entire body tenses as he lifts his hand and curves his fingers around the side of her throat.
“Yeah, babe. You come on over when you’re done, okay?”
She nods her head, but doesn’t verbally agree, the only reason I don’t absolutely beat the goddamn shit out of him right here in her living room. His hand falls from her neck, but not before he jerks his chin toward me and gives me an eat-shit grin. I watch as he spins around and walks out of the room.
Avah flips the door locked as soon as he’s out of the room, then spins around and her heated gaze meets mine. I know when she wants to fuck and there’s no doubt, she’s pissed off at me, but beneath her layer of pissed is a layer of desire and I smile just thinking about being inside of her soon.
“He callin’ you babe for a reason?” I ask, keeping my voice low.
She rolls her eyes to the ceiling, then brings her gaze back to meet mine. “Hawk, why are you really here?”
> “I told you. Called you several times, you never answered or returned my calls or texts.”
“I’ve been stressed,” she rasps. “I honestly haven’t even looked at my personal phone much the past few days.”
Nodding my head, I dip my chin, my gaze finding hers and holding it. Those green eyes, fuck me, but I’ve missed them, I’ve missed everything about her. Every goddamn thing.
“Come here, Avah,” I softly demand.
She shakes her head. “We need to talk, Hawk, and then you’re going to leave.”
I let out a snort. “Honey, if you think I’m leaving you here, letting you walk into another man’s arms and bed, you’ve lost your goddamn mind.”
“He’s who I want,” she lies.
“Bull’s ass, Avah.”
She bites the inside of her cheek as she watches me, her lies consuming her. I’m not stupid. He wants her, but nothing about her body language or the way she looked at him suggested she wanted anything to do with him.
“I’m not a whore anymore, Hawk,” she breathes. “I want someone who doesn’t think of me that way and you always will.”
Shaking my head, I rush toward her. She stumbles backward, her body slamming against the locked front door. Dipping my chin, my gaze connects to hers and I don’t break contact, not at all, not eye or body.
Pressing my front against hers, I lift my hand between us and cup her cheek. “Baby,” I rasp.
My thumb slides beneath her eye, collecting the tear that begins to fall. I feel like a complete asshole for saying that to her in my anger, I shouldn’t have, but it came out and I could apologize now, but it won’t make the words disappear.
She lifts her hand, her fingers wrapping around my wrist as she stares up at me. I watch as her lips part and her tongue peeks out, wetting her bottom lip, begging me to taste her.
Patience, I tell myself, at least for a few more minutes. Until I get to the bottom of this shit.
UnWreck Me (Savage Beast MC Book 7) Page 8