Page 45 of Unexpected Heroine

“Fuck.”

“You can say that again.”

There’s muffled talking in the background of the call. Her voice is fainter when she says, “I’ll be done in a minute.” Louder, she says, “Sorry about that, T.”

“You need to go?”

“Yeah, but before I do, I need to say something. Friend to friend.”

Tension squeezes the muscles surrounding my upper spine. “What?”

“I know you’re furious and out for blood. I’ve been in your shoes before. Just don’t do something stupid, okay?”

She’s been in my shoes? Not likely.

“Mia, I don’t know what you guys have figured out about my relationship with Lettie, but?—”

“Not much. Until Monday, I had no clue that you knew she existed,” she interjects, a hint of annoyance piercing her tone. “That said, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. I saw the pain in your eyes and heard the tremble in your typically steady tone.”

Through a tight jaw, I grate out, “Then you’ll understand that I will not fucking rest until the men who hurt her are punished. Painfully. Every. Single. Fucker.”

The phone line crackles with her heavy exhale. “I know, Tomer. I get that. I swear I do, and I want you to have justice. But I don’t want you to do something you’ll regret in a fit of rage. As your friend, I’m begging you to let us handle this. Just take care of her.”

I roll out my neck, trying to shrug off the mounting tension. “I am taking care of her,” I hiss into the phone. “I’m the one putting ointment on her cuts and burns. I’m the one rubbing cream on the fucking welts where they whipped her with a leather strap. I’m the one who has to look at the tears in her eyes and the emptiness where there used to be nothing but light. I hold her when she cries. I see her wince from taking a fucking breath. And so if the chance presents itself, I will take them out.”

“I can tell that what I say won’t stop you. Just promise me that if that opportunity does arise, you won’t go out there alone. Let us help you. You can’t be there for Lettie if you’re dead or in jail because you ran off half-cocked. We’ll have your back. Exactly the way we did the night we rescued her. We can stop them together.”

Her ardent plea gives me pause. I let her words bob and weave through my vitriol haze.

Aside from helping Lettie heal, my sole focus is to carry out this mission on her behalf.

To make it right.

To fix it, just like I promised her I would.

Mia must sense her words are sinking in from the stretching silence, so she doubles down. “I don’t want this to destroy you. She still doesn’t know who you are, right? Or about her dad? You’re on the verge of a serious life implosion. This is only going to make it worse.”

Concern echoes in her tone like a warm vibrato. I don’t sense she’s judging me, only leading me somewhere.

My vindictive side is still demanding I make them suffer. Like my sugar bear is suffering.

However, Mia’s words weigh heavy on my mind and in my heart, shining a single beam of light into my blinding rage.

“Mia, I need to make this right for her. I promised her I would.”

“I have no doubt Lettie wants justice. Vehemently. Yet justice and revenge aren’t the same, and you know that. Ask yourself this: if you cross a line and take a life, will she see you any differently? I don’t know her like you do. I don’t know her history. I don’t know if she’s as vengeful as I would be in that situation. But I do know she has an air of innocence to her. She has a pure heart. I seriously doubt she would want blood on her hands. And if she cares about you half as much as you care about her, she won’t want it on yours either.”

“Fucking hell,” I mumble through a frustrated sigh.

Closing my eyes, I turn over her words, trying to picture Lettie’s reaction if I came home stained in the blood of her tormentors.

Part of me thinks she would understand why I did it. Perhaps she’d even be happy, or at a minimum, she’d feel it was justified.

But what if she doesn’t?

What if she sees me differently?

Or worse, what if she can’t stand the sight of me, knowing I took another life? Sure, she understands what I did in the Army. But this isn’t the same.

---