Page 76 of Sunshine & Ink

“If he actually married you, he’s a bigger idiot than I imagined. He’s going to be the laughingstock of the whole county. Because all you’re good for is an open hole.”

Apostle backhanded me, sending me sprawling down and on my ass on the floor.

For a moment I felt only shattering fear.

Was that true? Did I harm Raker by marrying him?

No

No

Raker married me because he loved me, had defied the very Elders themselves to marry me.

My eyes darted around the kitchen, across Angel’s prone body. She wasn’t dead but she was going to be out on her ass with a big headache. Thank the Goddess I had landed onmyass. But I might not be so lucky again. I had to stop him.

Everything was put away neatly from dinner. Everything but the tea kettle.

I lunged to my feet suddenly, my movements pulsing with desperation, and I grabbed the tea kettle, swinging it with all my might at Apostle.

It wasn’t a square hit, but it glanced across his jaw, hard enough to make him to step back.

For only a moment I felt horrified by what I had done, then I hit him again, swinging up through his nose, hearing the sickening crunch as it broke.

“You little bitch,” he snapped, and his foot shot out, knocking me backwards into the cabinet.

But then Elise was there, a chair in her trembling hands, and she hit Apostle from the back.

“Go away!” she cried.

The tea kettle was still in my hand, and I swung for him again, putting all my rage at him, at how he would dare to come here and threaten us, how maybe because of him and the Elders Raker would never come back to me.

I connected with his temple and he went down in a heap on the floor.

Elise and I looked at each other, both breathing heavily, and to avoid bursting into tears, we trussed him up like a turkey.

I was tying his legs together with one of Raker’s belts when suddenly the door burst open and my husband charged into the room.

“Sunni? Sunni? Where are you?”

His voice was raw with fear in a way I had never heard before.

“I’m here!” I called out, my voice barely louder than a hoarse whisper.

I licked my lips and tried again. “I’m here, Raker!”

He took in Elise and me, both shivering with the adrenaline, and then Apostle on the floor.

Apostle was just coming to when Raker flicked out a knife.

“I should have killed you the moment you looked at my wife,” he said. “But it’s not too late to gut you like the miserable weak shithead you are.”

He struck like the snakehe was, not even giving Apostle a chance to beg for his life or protest, Raker’s knife slicing through his flesh and burying itself in my tormentor’s heart.

Apostle let out a guttural wheeze, but Raker had already turned to me.

“Is everyone OK? Did he hurt you?” my husband asked, clasping me in his arms and stroking my face with bloody hands.

But my shiver was from relief, not fear.

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