Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 154379 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 772(@200wpm)___ 618(@250wpm)___ 515(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154379 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 772(@200wpm)___ 618(@250wpm)___ 515(@300wpm)
Bullets pinged, spitting against the ground around me.
Crashes and gunfire echoed from the back of the building where Silas and his brothers had gone.
Shouts and cries.
My heart battered.
Fuck.
I didn’t know who was down. Could barely make out anything in the disorder.
But I had one purpose in all of this.
One job.
And that was to get to Piper.
Adrenaline stampeding through my veins, I crawled across the ground as Otto and Cash continued to battle it out with the bastards who were firing from the two rooms on either side of where Piper was being held.
Dust and smoke clung to the air, and I gritted my teeth as I rose up so I could deliver a shot to the lock.
Then I lifted my boot and kicked in the shredded wood with one blow.
The door clattered open to the inside of the dingy, dark room.
Horror slammed me like a fist to the jaw.
Piper was sitting in the middle of it.
Fucking tied to a chair with blood smeared all over her gorgeous face.
But it was those arctic eyes staring up at me from her drooping head that pierced me through. The way they’d always done. Like this woman had the ability to see to the depths of me the way I’d always been able to do with her. No question, she was silently begging me to protect what was most important to her.
While I swore with everything I had that I’d protect what was most important to me.
All of them.
Toga scrambled upright, jumping behind Piper like he was shocked that I’d made it through the waiting assault.
Motherfucker should have known me better than that.
I had my gun pointed at him while he had one pointed at Piper’s temple.
Fury clamored through my body. Flames licking at the underside of my skin. The hate I’d carried for this piece of shit for so long boiling my flesh.
But it was different now.
This feeling that swept me. Something more than just bare duty.
“Step away from the girl and put your gun on the floor and I might let you live,” I spat through clenched teeth.
Nah. It wasn’t going to happen. I was going to peel this monster’s skin from his body and feed it to him.
Toga laughed that deranged sound that had haunted me forever. “Now why would I go and do that when Piper and I were just about to have a little fun together?”
I knew what he was taunting. What he was implying.
Rage pumped like venom through my veins, all while I tried to wrap my head around what had happened back then. How Piper had been with him, and it’d led to Scarlett’s death.
I’d heard about the slaughtering of that family, but I had no clue that Toga was responsible.
“She’s such a good fuck, isn’t she?” He ran a tender hand down the back of her head, the gesture so bogus and menacing that it made me sick.
Piper whimpered, her eyes wide and pleading.
“Guess you and I have the same taste in women.” A taunting smirk pulled to his face as he sneered across at me.
Knew what he was doing.
Trying to set me off kilter.
Goading me into making a mistake.
“No, you’re just the disgusting prick who likes to prey on the innocent.”
“They both knew exactly what they were getting into.” Still hiding behind her, he wrapped his free hand around to her front and stuffed his fingers into Piper’s mouth. She garbled a strangled, mortified cry. Saliva and blood dripped from her mouth. “Think this one liked it.”
I nearly broke.
Charged him.
But I had to play this smart.
It was fucking brutal forcing myself to act like what he was doing wasn’t driving me to insanity.
To my breaking point.
“Did you like hiding for the last ten years because you were scared of me? Scared of what was coming for you? Scared of what is standing in front of you right now?”
I did a little taunting of my own, wanting to direct his malevolence toward me instead of Piper.
More gunshots and shouts echoed from outside, and a siren whirred in the distance.
“Sounds like your time is just about up,” I told him.
“Piper was there.” He shrugged like that made her guilty. Implicated her. Something I was pretty sure he’d held over her head. “What do you think is gonna happen to her once they finally catch up to her? The police have been looking for her for years.”
“Come on.” I tried to keep the tremoring out of my voice. “You really think a judge is going to buy that? We all know who’s guilty here. Except the only judge you’re going to stand in front of is me.”
A spurt of vengeance busted free.
Toga kept the gun pointed at Piper’s temple as he dipped down and grabbed a knife from the floor, his eyes pinned on me as he sawed the blade through the ropes at her wrists and feet.