Page 37 of Riordan's Revenge

She’d done it to help them, not herself.

Cassie continued, “I’m scared of heights so I put myself in perilous situations to deal with it. I refuse to be afraid of men like Piers so?—”

“You took a knife to his dick.”

Her lips curved into a dangerous smile. “Exactly. Then I kidnapped the guy I wanted because I was scared for us both.”

“Wanted, as in past tense?”

Her smile faded. “That’s the real reason behind my offer. I know it isn’t real so forcing it would make it go away.”

My fucked-up heart wished it was real. That odd sense of jealousy I’d been struck down by when she’d chatted so easily with Tyler, fucking Ty, as she’d called him, wouldn’t stop burning inside me. Memories of her tied hands and her lithe body flexing against the constraint of the rope hit like bombs. In that moment in the gathered dusk, burrowed in together on her sofa, desperation nearly stole my breath.

Wanting her was as real to me as breathing. Nothing had changed.

“I’m sorry I tied you up,” I finally managed.

Unaware of my pain, Cassie sighed. “Don’t be. Can I ask ye something? Before I go further down that why-ye rabbit hole of an explanation.” At my chin lift, she continued. “I think I know the answer to this, but have ye killed anyone yet?”

“Of course I haven’t.”

“At some point, if ye stay working for Arran, you’ll have to. You’ll want to. I already know you’ve accepted the place for what it is. Your sister went through the same mindset shift, with a bit of coaching from me.”

I hesitated, because I’d thought about it but dismissed it. Arran had his enforcer in Shade. He didn’t need another. “I don’t think I’d kill someone without extreme circumstances. How would I be sure that person really deserved it?”

She held up a finger then a second and third, counting them off. “If they try to kill ye. If they hurt someone ye care about. If they commit a crime so awful the world deserves the peace of them being gone. Easy.”

The man in my dream deserved to die. For killing me. For taking the life I was trying to protect. “That’s got to be a tiny amount of people,” I muttered.

“Wrong. Shade has a revolving door of men to dispatch. They just keep on coming.”

I watched her, poised to frame the question but almost unwilling to ask. “Who does he kill?”

“Rapists. Paedophiles. Men released from jail and allowed back in the community. He watches them until he’s sure they aren’t reformed then disappears them for the good of everyone else.”

As much as I thought I’d understood Arran’s crew, new pieces of the puzzle kept being revealed.

Cassie wasn’t done. Something gleamed in her eyes. “They’re the tip of the iceberg. There’s nearly seventy thousand adults on the sex offenders register in the UK. Over ten times that who are deemed by the cops an active risk to kids. Nearly a million actual or potential paedophiles. Amillion. Then there’s far, far more who are a risk to women—the police estimate around four million men.”

Her lip curled. “Maths was never my strong point, but there’s sixty-eight million people in this country. Twenty-six million of those are adult male. Which means one in every seven men is a serious predator or an abuser. Fifteen percent. Even if a tiny portion of those predators are women, ye can’t make those odds much better. Swing a bat around any public place and chances are you’ll hit at least a few of them.”

Fucking hell. “I had no idea.”

“Right? Because the focus is always on the women and how many suffer. It needs to be on the problem. The perpetrators. Abusers aren’t rare. They’re common. Think about the men ye know. Most people won’t associate with the worst types, but how many would laugh off a friend sharing porn containing an obviously underage girl? Or ignore them referring to a passing woman as a bitch or a slut? Or turn a blind eye to a drunk buddy acting like a predator in a nightclub? I see it and I know that there’s a decent chance one among them is hiding a darkness and that they’re the one-in-seven. That’s why I want to be part of Arran’s crew. The closer I get to the problem, the more I want to be a part of battling it. I want to avenge those women and kids.”

Emotion flared inside me. Deep and fierce heat that had kindled with seeing her take on Piers. She’d been fearless. From her explanation, that had just been the start of her mission.

“You want to deal with them in the same way Shade does.”

She pretended to polish her sparkly nails. Gold, too. Her accent colour, it seemed.

“A worthy goal, no? Which brings me to my point. I consider myself a good judge of character. I saw ye step up to protect your sister. Since then, I learned all you’ve done to support her and keep her safe. Ye did the same for Everly and went up against Shade who’s scary as fuck to the average person. Is it any wonder my mind took a little jaunt to wanting to ride ye like a cowboy? I found the one good man and decided to keep him.”

Sinking my eyes shut, I dropped my head back to the cushion, overwhelmed. Hard again. Luckily, I was lying at an angle she couldn’t feel. Her ruthless edge, her certainty over her calling, it was all so deeply attractive to me. Almost as much as when she’d claimed me.

My words formed of their own volition. “Back to the proposition. Would you ask Tyler the same question?”

“Oh my God, are ye jealous? Please say yes.”

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