Page 43 of Tempting Fate

While my thoughts whirl around my head, and my body rebels in the wake of Crystal’s touch, I waver on the spot. Sightless eyes show me a future I thought I’d escaped. Agonising pain flares within me; an indictment of the physical torment I recently survived. The pulse that pounds in my ears reminds me that I’m a hollow shell of the woman I thought I was this morning.

“Little Cherub. Fuck… I-I?—”

I thought Crystal’s empathy and alarm was the final straw.

I was wrong.

The way Slash enunciates my nickname is the final blow. My pride, the capricious shield that is supposed to protect me from their pity, disintegrates. Tears run from my swollen eyes. A pathetic whimper, one that comes from the bottom of my broken heart, erupts from my lips. His inability to offer me any words of wisdom is a bleak condemnation of my pathetic state.

Slash is never lost for words.

He has something profound to offer everyone.

“Come here,” he orders, even as he closes the distance between us instead.

Sweeping me off my feet, his strong body is comforting as he easily supports my full weight. I fist his cut, clinging to him as I press my face into his neck.

“Shit’s hard, right now. But it will get better. I promise.”

Lifting my tear-covered face towards his, my chin wobbles as I ask, “Promise?”

“Promise.”

That single word hangs in the artificial quiet that we’ve found in the midst of the chaos that is the Shamrocks compound on lockdown.

Then, the door is swept open.

Zeke steps in.

Chest heaving, fire breathing. He takes one look at me, and the anger evaporates. The intent in his step as he strides over to us is clear. Wordlessly, I’m pulled out of Slash’s grip and cradled against Zeke’s chest.

“’Preciate your help today, brother.”

Slash’s reply is strangled. “Always.”

The way he says that word is reminiscent of his conversation with Crystal. I peer at him over Zeke’s shoulder, but he turns away from me. He heads out of the opposite door to us.

Growling whenever anyone dares look our way, Zeke carries me through the bar and into the attached building that was added to accommodate the single man quarters. Because we don’t have kids, and we’re not married yet, my father hasn’t granted us a room in the separate building designed for families.

Normally, the snub upsets me.

Tonight, I’m thankful for it.

No one will hear our upcoming argument.

Three seconds after he lowers me back to my feet, Zeke asks, “You gonna tell me what really went down between you and that piece of shit?”

I suppress a grimace.

I knew this line of questioning would recommence the moment he got me alone.

Which is why I’m avoiding him.

“Treat everyone else like a mushroom, sweet thing, I don’t give a fuck.” Zeke runs his hands through his hair, an agitated exhale the only other sign of his frustration with me. “But you and me, we’re straight with each other. I want answers… I need answers.”

When I force myself to meet Zeke’s gaze, the blue ring around his multi-coloured eyes is pronounced. The hazel depths are clouded with love and concern, but the feverish gleam that demands reprisal illuminates the azure-blue ring and the green and gold flecks from within. The manic light warns me that he’s close to snapping, and the sight of Zeke’s pain and suffering makes the guilt I thought I could suppress engulf me.

“I don’t want to get into this. Not tonight, probably not ever.”

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