Page 18 of Fastlander Fighter

“I am Crew too!” Wreck roared, turning on him. He blurred to him and stopped inches away from Captain.

Captain steeled himself to Change. He would die, but this motherfucker needed a lesson in manners. He could at least rake a claw down his torso before he burned Captain to ashes. “You don’t act like Crew,” Captain growled.

“Maybe that’s because you assholes do shit like build firepits as a Crew, and fail to invite me.”

Unable to come up with any coherent response, he waited until Wreck turned and headed back for the woods, and then looked at Hallie and mouthed, What the fuck?

She looked horrified. She shook her head and murmured into the phone at her ear, “Wreck is here. We need you boys back at the trailer park now.”

At least she was useful for something—calling her stupid mate, Gunner. He wouldn’t be able to stop Wreck’s destruction, but at least Captain could throw his useless brother in the path of the monster and buy himself some more time for survival and stuff.

An image of Sloane’s face smiling up at him so sweetly at Moosey’s flashed across his mind. She was human, and her little boy was human, and she’d spoken of complicated as if she understood. She didn’t. Captain’s life was so much more complicated than he could ever explain.

A good man would leave them alone.

A good man would delete Sloane’s number and never seek her out again.

A good man would let her move forward with her life in safety.

Even standing here watching a true monster walk out of the territory, knowing Wreck was attached to his life, Captain knew what he would do. He would go to Ruger’s game and tease Sloane, because he liked the hunt. He liked hunting her forgiveness.

A good man would leave Sloane to live a life of peace.

He wasn’t a good man though.

Or was he?

Chapter Seven

“He didn’t come,” Ruger said, pouting through the chain-link fence of the dugout.

“Buddy, I told you that was a possibility, but look. Your dad is here.”

Ruger looked over at Ryan and Naomi and the fifteen-friend entourage they had brought for reasons Sloane couldn’t even guess at. It was a kid’s baseball game, not a party. Ruger didn’t even know most of them. The entire first inning they had been loudly talking about how they were all going to go to a bar after this.

“Dad doesn’t watch.”

“Look, I’m here, and I am your biggest cheerleader. And you know, baseball isn’t about who is watching you. It’s about how it makes you feel. When you hit the ball, how do you feel?”

“Good.”

“And when you run the bases real fast, how do you feel?”

“Also good.”

She nodded and grinned. “That’s when I’m most happy, is when you feel good.”

Sloane could tell he wasn’t completely sold, because he looked longingly at his dad and then searched the bleachers again, but Captain really wasn’t showing up.

It was okay. It was okay! She’d mentally prepared for this.

But as she sat down on the edge of the third row of the bleachers, she couldn’t help the feeling of utter disappointment that swirled inside of her chest cavity.

The simple truth that she would never admit out loud—she had counted down to today in hopes of seeing Captain again.

Ruger was on deck, practicing his swing with his coach. God, he was so cute in his little baseball pants that were a size too big, and his batting helmet that kept sliding over his face if he moved too much.

Her brothers had played baseball all through high school, and she was hoping Ruger would choose this as his sport.

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