You do not fuck with what’s mine.
It was a lesson he was going to find out the very fucking hard way.
King
Stable.
It was the word I was waiting for before I could finally let out a long held breath. The nurse who’d finally said it left the room. I sat next to Pup, holding her hand. Making promises to her that I’d never thought I’d utter to anyone. I promised her a home, a life, a family. I promised her a safe place for our kid to grow up. I told her how much I loved her and how much she meant to me.
“Grace is here, in the waiting room,” Bear said, coming into the room. He was speaking to me but his eyes never left Pup. He stood over her with his hands in his pockets. “She’s watching the kid.”
My phone vibrated in my pocket. I pulled it out and was about to hit ignore until I saw who it was on the other end. I pressed talk and held it to my ear. “Got him,” Jake said. “Barn out on 86 past the We Are God billboard.” The line went dead.
“Jake?” Bear asked.
I nodded. “Stay here with her in case she wakes up. I’ll be back.” I kissed Pup on the forehead, and although they’d given her medications to keep her sedated, I hoped she could somehow still hear me when I said, “I love you, baby.”
Blow by blow I reigned down my fury upon the sick fuck who dared lay hands on my Pup. His pale white skin swelled and ripped open, spraying red from where my fists connected, over and over again until his features morphed into something unrecognizable.
His deceiving all-American boy bullshit good looks were gone.
The motherfucker now looked like the piece of shit monster he was.
This wasn’t a controlled rage. Far from it. This was me unleashing the pent up anger and frustration I’d been feeling ever since that bullshit fake cop tried to take me to ground.
I looked down at my hand, coated in the sticky red, and smiled.
I wanted more.
I needed more.
“Stop. Please. I beg you,” Tanner moaned, revealing bright white teeth coated in even brighter red blood. He rolled his head from side to side, choking on the blood that had pooled in his throat.
“You started this, motherfucker. You can’t rein it in now just because you’re fucking pissing yourself. This is on you. You lay your filthy fucking hands on my girl, burn her skin, try to fucking kill her, and I’m supposed to show you mercy?” I shook my head. “You don’t fuck with what’s mine. Unfortunately for you, you’re about to learn that lesson the hard way.”
I looked up at Jake, who was standing to the side. His eyes were black and intently focused on Tanner. At first I thought he was almost bored, and waiting for me to end the kid and get it over with, but when I looked closer, I realized his expression was not bored at all.
It was lust.
And not for the boy, but for his blood.
“You can’t kill me,” Tanner said, gasping for breath.
“I believe I can, and I believe…I will.” I ran the barrel of my gun down his nose and pushed it into one of his eye sockets, while he squirmed underneath me. “It’s been a long time since I’ve killed anyone for the pure pleasure of it…too long really,” I said whimsically.
“You think Ramie is going to stay with you?” the little twat said. “She’s a fucking teenager. She doesn’t know what she wants. She could leave you tomorrow when she realizes that you’re just a pedophile with nothing to offer her. She’ll remember soon that she’s better than you, and she’ll fucking leave.”
“That’s where you’re fucking wrong,” I said. “You obviously don’t know me very well because her leaving me isn’t an option.”
“Then you’re just as much of a monster as I am. You and I aren’t so different after all,” he quipped, his pupils as big as his eye sockets.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” I corrected.
“Neither of us are willing to take no for an answer. Doesn’t sound much different to me.” His breathing became more and more labored, his words took great effort to choke out. Jake was growing restless, passing his gun from his right to left hand over and over again, his focus on Tanner unwavered.
I chuckled and ran my hand over my head. “Well, for starters, tomorrow I’ll be breathing…and you won’t be.”
Jake nodded and tilted Tanner’s head, pressing the heel of his hand against his jaw, he cracked the bones in his neck.
Tanner’s eyes darted from me to Jake, his strained voice turned to panic. “Ramie would never forgive you if you killed me. I fucked up, I admit. I totally fucked up, but she still wouldn’t want me dead. I’m the father of her son for Christ’s sake!”