Page 167 of Deacon

We’re a dozen feet from the back wall of the barn. On either side are shadows. The outside light cuts through and hits Aiden like a spotlight. Blue light, black shadows, and red blood drench his body.

“She’s all fucked up,” I say, voice dropping.

His eyes dart over me. “Who?”

“Freya,” I say. “She’s all fucked up from the shit you did.”

“No one laid their hands on that girl.” His jaw flexes, pushing out defiantly.

I take a step closer. “So if it didn’t leave a bruise, she’s alright, huh? You think she’s okay after what you did, smashing all her shit?”

I take another step. He doesn’t move back this time. He drops his hands, letting them hang by his sides. His shoulders go back, squaring. I get closer, until we’re a few feet apart. Eye to eye.

“You want to bully somebody, bully me, motherfucker,” I say, voice dropping. “I’ll bet you won’t because I’m not half your size.”

He lurches like he’s going to skirt around me and make a run for it. In that millisecond, I think of Freya in tears, in my arms, trying to cover all her wounds because, deep down, she’s still afraid she’ll be punished for reacting to her pain. I know that doesn’t go away. I can give her safety for the rest of her life, but she’ll still always cringe inside every time she messes up, expecting to be abused.

She can sort it all out. She can go through therapy.

She can put it in boxes with the right labels.

But she can’t change that it happened.

Not any more than I can erase my past and make myself anyone but Deacon Ryder. Our pasts are set in stone. I’ll be picking up the pieces of what Aiden did for the rest of my life. I’ll sleep beside it, hold it in my arms, talk around in circles about it past midnight.

I love her enough to hold her pain forever, but that doesn’t mean I can’t get some good, old-fashioned revenge for it.

My arm shoots out, blocking Aiden. Before he can move, I pull the metal stake from my pocket and body him so hard, we both smash into the barn wall. It shudders with a colossal bang.

Our eyes meet, his wild. Our faces are inches apart.

“You’re getting off easy with this,” I whisper. “This is just for fucking with her bugs.”

All the rage in my body explodes into inhuman strength. My hand comes up, and I drive the stake into his chest, stabbing halfway through and ripping it out.

His eyes widen, his body convulsing.

I’m right back where I was twenty years ago. Blood on my knuckles. Life draining away in front of me. This time, I don’t have regrets. Aiden needed fucking put down. After what he did to my woman, I’m happy to be the one to rid the world of one more asshole.

I bring the stake down as hard as I can. It rips through his chest, going between his ribs, and sinks into the soft wood, pinning him like one of the bugs in her collection. Satisfaction floods me.

Justice tastes good.

Chest heaving, I step back. He hangs from the wall, eyes glazed. He’s gone. Maybe I went too easy on him, maybe it was too painless, but it’s done.

I stand, bloody chest heaving. Aiden and I were similar, Freya was right about that. But somewhere along the way, our paths broke apart. I don’t know what makes that happen. It’s not fair. It’s an unbalanced world.

A part of me is sorry for him.

But not sorry enough for mercy.

Exhaustion hits me like a freight train. Limping, I leave the barn and start across the yard. My body aches. I’m wet from head to foot with blood. There’s a soft, hot heartbeat in my nose. Now that I’m calming, I can feel the icy air biting at my bloody skin.

It smells like something new, like the eve before a new year.

Morning after a long night.

I’ve walked a hard road, and it made me a rougher man than I set out to be. But if she’s at the end of it, I don’t mind what brought me here.

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