Page 123 of Creed

His face pales before he looks back up, looking a little confused and a whole lot scared. “What the hell is going on here?” he asks, struggling to kneel down beside Tony to check his pulse.

I roll my eyes and shift my stance with my hands on my hips. “He’s not dead, Steve.”

“Well why the fuck is he bloody and unconscious?!”

I scoff shrugging with my hands, “Because I fucking punched him, why else?”

“What right did you have to put your hands on a bandmate in such a way?” He asks, trying for professionalism, but it falls flat when he glances at a stabby-looking Bear.

I take a few steps toward him and crouch down until we’re nearly eye to eye. He rears back at whatever he sees in my face. Good. “What fucking right did he have to take advantage of an innocent woman?”

Steve’s eyes bug out in shock as he asks, “What? Who?”

This fucking guy.

“Does it really fucking matter, Steve? He sexually assaulted a woman. He fucked up. Probably more than once. But don’t worry, we’re taking care of it.”

“Do you have proof?” He asks on a wheeze as he struggles to stand again. I could help him, but I don’t feel like it. He and Tony are tighter than a virgin asshole so he gets nothing from me.

I step back to where Bear is standing and lean against the little counter, carefully watching a still-unconscious Tony. “Security reported that he saw a video being played from his phone. A video that he showed to someone backstage. The video was fucking implicating and by the way he was speaking, he’s absolutely guilty of sexual assault.”

Bear freezes up beside me, no doubt finally getting the final picture in his head of what’s happened to Collins. Steve’s face pales and sweat beads on his brow. A really weird flash of recognition dawns on his face for a moment and he looks fucking scared. I narrow my eyes at him as he whips a tissue from his handy-dandy suit jacket and starts to dab at the moisture rapidly collecting on his face.

I notice in my periphery when Bear pulls out his phone and shoots off a text to god knows who before he goes back to looking murderous. Something’s changed in my friend and I’ve noticed he’s become more stoic and a lot angrier since finding Collins at Viper.

Both of our heads snap to Steve when he starts to wobble and mutter something under his breath. Something that sounded an awful lot like “I didn’t know”.

“What did you say?” I ask, my voice low and dangerous.

“Didn’t know what?” Bear demands. Okay, so I wasn’t imagining it.

A thought damn near sucker punches me. Steve couldn’t have…? We were all overseas during the European tour, but there were lots of nights before then that he and Tony would bail on the band outings to go to various clubs.

Collins didn’t seem to recognize Tony or Steve in passing but she also mentioned that the clients were required to wear masks in those rooms.

I fucking know. I just fucking know something isn’t right. The way that they both leered with familiarity at her anytime they had to be in the same space together, the way Steve insisted on knowing her real name. She told me how she disguised herself the best she could, but even I recognized her up close.

Then something clicks. He was fucking there, too. This motherfucker has gone to Viper with Tony at some point and he fucking touched my girl. Pain splices through my chest and I feel like I’m going to fucking puke and I can’t stop the anguished, angry sounding groan that escapes my lips silence for a moment while Steve starts wringing his sausage fingers together just as Tony starts to rouse.

“You motherfuckers!” I shout as I launch myself at the two of them and manage to heel-kick Tony in the ribs before he’s even lifted his head, flattening him out again. I cock my fist and hook Steve so hard in the jaw that I feel my knuckles split from the hit. His cries are music to my fucking ears. I rear back to hit him again but I’m yanked back by Bear at the same time the door to the bus busts open and Asher’s entire security team comes pouring in, the guy I spoke to earlier at the forefront.

That must have been who Bear had texted because none of them look surprised.

My fist throbs, one of my fingers is slightly numb but I revel in the feel of the blood running down the tips of my fingers. Every drop, every throb is a reminder of how I failed her. Every sting of split skin as I clench my fist is a fucking oath to keep her safe and happy for the rest of my life.

Shit. I’m gonna have a hard time explaining this to Collins, but I promised my girl and boy complete and total honesty, so that’s what they’re going to get.

I shake myself from Bear’s grip and take in the scene around me. This isn’t like your typical police raid where they bust in and read your rights before taking you out in cuffs. Knowing who the McTavish brothers are tells me that these guys come from some underground organization and they don’t give a fuck about morality or laws, especially when it comes to pieces of shit like Tony and Steve.

They’ve got Steve and Tony both zip-tied and gagged in seconds flat, each with a security guard behind them, guns to the backs of their heads. They both look like they’re going to piss themselves and I almost can’t appreciate it because these dudes are scary as fuck when they emerge from the shadows they’re paid to hide in.

Steve is stammering over his own words, stumbling over his own feet when they start to lead him from the bus. Tony turns his eyes on me before they shove him down the stairs, they’re wild and frantic, but also brimming with hate. Good.

Jones, the guard I’d spoken to earlier, approaches us, his face a mask of indifference, but you can’t miss the rage rolling off of him in waves. For half a second, he lets that mask slip. “Thank you for texting.”

Bear opens his mouth to say something, but Jones continues. “Everything I see, I not only have to report to you, but I have to report to Mr. McTavish and Asher as well. My team and I were planning to take down Tony on my boss’ orders after what I’d witnessed tonight, but Steve sealed his fate right along with him when Bear had texted me.”

All I can do is nod, because I feel like I’m in shock from these revelations and my brain is refusing to process that my girlfriend, my Stardust, my Collins was sexually assaulted by two people who were so close to me. In proximity. Not emotionally.

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