Page 13 of They Break Beauty

He looked almost as shocked as me.

“Fuck me! Lev?”

Levi finally took his intense gaze off me and turned.

In the next moment, Mason was there, slap-shaking with him, then pulling him in for a tight hug.

“You didn’t give us a heads-up or anything. No one knew you were coming back. Not even me and Colt.”

“Let’s get you both out of here,” Levi responded in an eerily calm tone.

“What?”

Levi gestured to the sprawled-out guy. “This place is done. There are five more around the east side who’ve been put down.”

“You took care of some of those fuckers?”

“I had time.”

“I’m more concerned with how you even knew about it.”

“How do I know anything, Mason?”

“Lev, what’s going on? What are you doing back here?”

“I have my reasons. Pack up, get Colt, and come with me. Then we’ll talk.”

As Mason tried to dig for more information, I’d heard enough.

I slipped out while they were talking and took the meandering, out-of-sight route to my car.

Holy hell. This had been a complete nightmare of a night out.

And, with Levi Knight now here, I didn’t doubt that this was just the tip of the iceberg.

A brief nightmare was about to turn into an absolute hellscape.

4

~Mason~

I didn’t like it.

Not the way Lev had shown up back in Stonewell.

Not how he was being evasive and less than forthcoming.

The calm coming off him was definitely also a chief concern.

He didn’t do composed and rational as a rule, and I certainly wasn’t fool enough to think that had changed for him in one single year.

He was up to something.

He had big plans.

And with him that meant danger and a mammoth headache for me.

Keeping the likes of Colt in line was no small feat, but Lev was several levels beyond that. At least Colt was capable of listening to reason, of being talked down. At least he could recognize when he was out of line or headed down a dangerous path.

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