Page 118 of The Outsider

He snarled, “It is me. And this is why I don’t let myself get like this. But now it’s too late.”

“I’m her father,” her dad said.

“You didn’t do a damned thing for her. You left her to her own devices. She’s brilliant and smart and wonderful and it has nothing to do with you. And you,” he said, looking directly at her brother. “You are a petty, slimy, abusive coward. And if I squeezed my fist justnow and ended you nobody would miss you. Your mother wouldn’t even miss you, would she?”

Daughtry really had the guy going now. Terrified. Good. He had terrified his sister. And he deserved no less.

He was shaking now, the adrenaline really going. He saw red. He was at the edge of losing control completely. Even when he’d been his dad’s right-hand man he’d never been like this. This was different. Deeper. This felt so gut-wrenching, so personal.

Bix, all skinny and scabbed.

Bix telling him she’d been locked in her room for days. Left in the woods alone.

They’d had her all those years and they hadn’t cared for her. He hated them for that.

He hated them.

He heard splashing, and he looked to his right, and saw Bix running across the river.

“Don’t,” she said. “Do not do this because of me. Please. Daughtry, I care about you too much. I don’t want you to do this. It isn’t because I care about them. It’s because I know you. And I know this isn’t what you want. I know it’s not. Don’t do this. Not for me.”

“Who else would I do it for?”

“They’re not a danger to me. They’re going to leave.”

And she stood there, panting, her clothes wet. “Leave,” she said to her father and brother. “Because you better believe that he will do what he says. And he didn’t even tell you about all the brothers he has, and all the other ranchers on this ranch who will back him up. Who will make sure that he never faces any consequences.”

“Go,” Daughtry said, letting go of her brother’s neck finally. “If I ever see you on my land again, it’ll be the last thing you ever do.”

He took a step back, and Bix grabbed his arm.

“I never thought I’d see it,” her dad said. “A turncoat. Taken up with a cop.”

Bix rounded on her dad. “No, Dad. I’m a woman, and I’m making my own life. The choices I’m making are mine. You don’t get to decide what I do. What I believe. How far I’ll go. I get to decide that. All the decisions I made, I made them because you kept me just hungry enough. Just poor enough. Just scared enough. I’m not scared anymore. I have a bank account. I’m going to college. I’m on a payroll. I’m going to pay taxes. You can’t stop me. You don’t own me. And I don’t owe you anything. I’m proud of myself. And it has nothing to do with either of you.”

She looked at her brother and put her hands on her hips. “He’s mad about the stuff you did to me. I just laugh at it. You know why? Because you’re small. You always have been, you always will be. And you were always threatened by me. Because I’m smarter than you. Because I work harder than you. Because I will always be better. It isn’t because I was born that way. It’s because it’s what I choose. I choose to be better. Than both of you.”

That was when her brother lunged at her. Daughtry’s rage caught a light and burned bright. He stood between the two of them, cocked his fist back and punched him square in the face. And punched him again. And again.

Bix screamed, her dad ran. And Daughtry hit him, again and again.

“Please,” Bix said. Grabbing his arm.

That was enough. Enough to clear the haze, if only for a moment.

She put her hands on his chest, pushed him away. And he realized how far he had gone. And that he didn’t feel bad. Not at all. He felt powerful. He felt proud that he had defended her. His woman. His...

He was breathing hard, and it was taking time, but suddenly, bits and pieces of reality started to filter in.

He hadn’t been like this for so long. Hadn’t lost his temper. Hadn’t forgotten where he was or what he was doing. Not for a long time. And now he had. Spectacularly.

It wasn’t that it wasn’t deserved. That wasn’t the issue. The issue was realizing how much of that was still him.

He didn’t feel a great sense of honor over what he had done. A reluctant call to arms.

No. It had been easy.

“Go,” he said. He looked down at her brother. His nose was broken for sure. He had taken a step toward Bix, and Daughtry had been right to defend her. He knew that. He did. But it was all the other stuff, tangled up and messed up inside him.

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