Page 49 of Obsessive Cravings

“From the asshole you let in your ranks, then let close to her. That shit wouldn’t have happened on my watch.”

“No? Looks like he got to her after we made our deal and while you were on watch,” Mason said. “Riley.” He held his hand out, and she walked to him, taking it. Mason gestured to Tyson to drive and opened the door for her, his gun still on me.

“Riley, don’t do this,” I said, my chest berated with pain like I’d never experienced. I lowered my gun as Mason climbed into the seat next to her. She leaned into him, and Tyson tore from the lot. I stood there, feeling as if part of my soul had been gauged from my body. The ache in my chest was almost too much to handle.

I didn’t know how long I stood there, my eyes on the spot where she had been, before I finally put my gun away and took my phone out. Hardening myself to the pain, I called Den.

“I need clean up behind Frank’s, and there’s a car through his window. Take care of it and get someone to fix the damage.”

I hung up before he could respond and walked back to my car, knowing there was nothing to do but bury myself back in my work, pretending Riley Brinks had never entered my city or my life. Removing the traces of her until she faded from my heart like the essence of a spirit long gone. I didn’t know if that was possible, but I had no choice but to believe it was. Thinking otherwise would be akin to dying. Although I felt like I’d died, my heart ripped from my chest and riddled with a thousand bullets.

Chapter Twenty-Two

RILEY

Sobs rocked my body so hard I thought it would splinter into a thousand pieces. Mason held me tight, and I could feel the tension, the worry that sat in his frame. I didn’t think the agony that was wrenching my heart, severing it until there was nothing left, would ever fade. The truth of Greyson’s life and the lies on which our love had sat so precariously gnawed away at the fragments that were holding me together.

Mason rubbed my back, his hand coming up to run over my hair as he kissed my head. As much of an ass as he could be, he had always been my rock and, in that moment, he was the only thing keeping me together.

“Ri…” I buried my face further into his chest, not wanting to talk. The ache was too raw, and I wasn’t sure if it would ever heal. I felt like Greyson had ripped out my heart and ravaged it after I’d handed it to him, trusting that he’d protect it, that he loved me just as much as I loved him. The truth was something I should have seen. The clues had been there, in plain sight. The sneaking into my apartment, the stalking, the key he had…all signs I chose not to see as anything more than an obsession that was driven by the attraction and love he had for me. But it hadn’t been. It had been driven by revenge against Mason and a need to use me. To devastate me and lure my brother to his death.

He was no different from Clint Randall. That pain had been nothing but a dull ache compared to this. What Greyson had done had left me wounded to the core, my soul damaged, my heart mangled.

Another sob tore its way through my body before it broke free, loud and ugly.

“Shit, Mace. Is she okay?” I heard Tyson ask from the front of the car.

“I don’t know,” Mason answered, and I could hear the pain in his voice. I had hurt him, run from him and his protection, and now he was rescuing me again. Left picking up the pieces from my mistakes. Only this time, I didn’t think he could put them back together.

“Ri, please tell me you didn’t fall in love with Greyson Tides,” he said, trying to lift my face.

I couldn’t answer. Couldn’t admit that I had and that I’d handed him my heart, not knowing the disastrous effect he would have on it. Not expecting the consequences. Even in the short time he’d held it.

“Dammit, Riley. Tides is my enemy, and you walked right into his trap.” Another rupture splintered my heart, sending more tears soaking Mason’s shirt. “Why would you go to Bridgeville? Of all the places to run. Fuck, I should turn around and kill him.”

“Want me to, Mace?” Tyson asked. But I gripped Mason’s shirt, picking my head up and meeting his green eyes. The worry that sat in them, mixed with the hurt that remained from the damage I’d done when I left him, only added to my agony.

“No,” I choked out between the tears.

Mason brought his thumb up to brush them away. “Why not? He hurt you, Ri. He…” His eyes darkened, his jaw tightening below the stubble that sat upon it. “He fucking touched you. Just like that asshole Randall. He used you and you…dammit, Ri. Why did you run? Why couldn’t you have just stayed with me? I could have protected you.”

I didn’t need his anger or his lectures and I tried to turn away from him, but he grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at him.

“Let up on her, Mace,” Tyson said. “She’s not in the condition for you to guilt her. Let’s just get her home.”

My love for Tyson increased with his support. He’d always been like a second brother to me, but it was usually Mason who kept him in check.

Mason’s features softened, his eyes looking for something in mine, answers I couldn’t give him. Explanations and apologies I owed him but couldn’t provide because Greyson had left me too damaged to even try.

“Did you fall in love with him, Ri?” he asked again.

More tears fell, his words like a knife shredding what remained of the strands that were holding my heart together. I nodded, my chest so tight with the sob I was restraining that it was agony.

“Fuck,” he said.

“I thought…” I started, my cry coming out so raw it burned my throat.

Mason pulled me back into his chest, his arms so tight around me that it was like he never wanted to let me go. I held onto his shirt, my tears a waterfall that wouldn’t stop. My external injuries were minor this time compared to when Clint had hurt me, but my inner wounds were ones I doubted would ever heal. They riddled my soul and my heart so badly that there was no repairing them.

---