Page 98 of Vengeful Guard

“I’ll take over.” I kneel, and she shakes her head at me with wild eyes. “It’s okay, Paige. I got you. Let me do it.”

She slowly moves her hands, and I press mine over the wound. It squelches, which makes my stomach sick, and Patrick has gone almost gray he’s lost so much blood already.

Paige puts her knees to her chest, rocking back and forth and trembling, and god, I wish I could go to her. I wish I could pull her in my arms and tell her everything is going to be okay.

But that would be a lie. I don’t know if anything will be okay ever again.

The paramedics arrive after what seems like an hour, and they have to pull me off Patrick to help him.

I stand up and pull out my phone with my bloodied hand. Declan and Gray are my first calls. It kills me to admit that I failed to protect Patrick and Paige, but they need to know what happened here by me, by one of us.

When that’s done, I start making calls to the guys in the force that Patrick has in his pocket, telling them what happened so that they’ll be able to make this all go away.

Declan and Gray burst into the restaurant while I’m still on the phone with the cops, and I hang up immediately, going to stop them from getting to their father.

Gray fights past me, but I manage to stop Declan, looking into his eyes. “You have to let them help.” I shake my head once. “It’s bad, Declan.”

“God.” His hand’s in his hair, pulling, as he paces. When he stops, there’s a dead body next to his feet. He leans down and spits in the corpse’s face. “This has to be Murphy’s work.”

I nod once. “I already arranged with the paramedics to get your da to All Saints.”

“Thanks, man.”

Patrick’s put on a gurney and wheeled out.

Declan runs after them, hopping in the ambulance, and I look over to see Gray comforting Paige, pulling her into his arms.

Gray stands with Paige hiding her face in his chest.

“I’ll take her to the hospital,” Gray says, and I nod, heading outside to follow them.

On my way to All Saints, I can’t stop thinking about Paige’s wide, terrified eyes, how fierce she’d been when I tried to take over. It’s going to take a long time for her to heal from this traumatic event, and I hate it for her. She’s already been through so much.

And Patrick… God, he’s been more like a father to me than my own father, and I can’t imagine him not being around anymore.

Niall Murphy wanted a war, he's got one.

Lara, Paige, and Bree huddle up next to each other in the waiting room. The other girls showed up about half an hour after the ambulance.

Declan and Gray pace around the room.

Gray’s eyes are on the floor before him as he goes. Hands behind his back. “It’s Murphy.”

Declan’s a mirror of his brother as they cross each other’s paths over and over again. “Of course, it is.”

I take a deep breath. “I’ve already called the cops, told them what’s going on. There shouldn’t be too much of an investigation. I also called the cleaners on the way here. I don’t think Ricardo, the owner, will have any trouble letting them do their job.”

Declan looks at me, clapping a hand on my shoulder. “Thank you, Kael. Your quick thinking has helped the whole family.”

My breath catches in my throat.

Declan can’t know how wrong he is. How tonight is my fault. I shouldn’t have been so distracted. Hell, I was fighting an erection as I watched Paige’s ass jiggle when she walked away from me instead of paying attention to our surroundings.

She rattled me, and it was enough for all this to happen.

I hate myself. I will never make that mistake again.

But I can’t say any of that to the Burkes.

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