Page 60 of Grim

I floundered, listening to Locke’s firm tone. It wasn’t playful. He didn’t find this funny in the slightest. Maybe it was because he was being insulted on his own turf.

I waited for the reply from the Mayor, but he continued to gaze around the bar. Taking in the full scenery, committing it to memory until he laid his eyes on the back corner of the bar where Delilah and I stood. His eyes widened, and a sneer fell on his lips.

“Well now, it seems I know someone here.”

My back hit the wall. His steel-blue eyes were cold as they bore into my skin. I felt dirty in his presence as he leered at me. He took slow calculated steps toward me. Grim made his anger known by grunting and pushing his friends out of the way.

“Yes, yes, I remember you.” He waved his finger.

But I couldn’t place him. I knew him from somewhere. The voice it was there, but…the face? I couldn’t remember his face.

An older woman—maybe in her fifties or sixties—sitting in the corner at an empty table, stood. She wore no vest, but if she was in the bar, I guessed she was safe to be here.

Her steps were quick as she reached me before the mayor did and tugged on my arm to pull me lower. Her hands cradled my face, and I gasped, feeling her warm touch.

“One eye, open. Two will be too much,” she muttered to herself. “Close your eyes, dear.”

Despite the movement around the bar, Delilah stood in front of me to block the onlookers. I stood still, listening to this woman who was touching me.

One swipe of her thumb over my right eye zapped the inside of my brain. The sharp prick waking up a memory I had long forgotten.

It was the Mayor, but he stood above me with a gleam of lust in his eye.“Shame she has to be so drugged up for this. I like them squirming.”The click of the belt buckle snapped me from the memory.

Just as fast as the memory appeared, it vanished, but his face remained. This man, along with many others, had ruined my body.

“Oh my God!” I screamed, backing away from the woman. Her solemn eyes of pity turned to glare at the Mayor. He didn’t make it very far into the bar. Hawke had drawn his weapon and pushed it into his side.

The bodyguards that stood near the mayor were already subdued, hands held behind their backs and their guns sitting on the bar.

My sob rattled me, my knees weakening. Hands rushed to cover my mouth as I began to collapse. But Grim was there, like he always promised to be, catching me before a fall.

“What’s wrong?” He clutched me, the gentle strokes of his hand in my hair steadying me. Everything was going to be fine. Grim was here. My protector.

“He touched me,” I rasped. “He raped me.”

Chapter Twenty-One

Journey

ItwasallIcould do to stand while Grim gripped me by the shoulders. His fingers tightened, and his fierce gaze made me tremble. Fire burned in the pits of his dilating pupils.

“What?” he growled.

It wasn’t his normal growl. This was laced with a fierce fire I’d never heard before. It wasn’t a growl that elicited pleasure from my body. It was deep and guttural, like an animal was living inside him. On instinct, I tried to back away, the fury in his face becoming far too intense.

This wasn’t Grim I was looking at. It was someone, something else entirely.

The flashing strobe lights near the band faded, with the music no longer playing, they rose from their stools in which they sat. They glared, setting their instruments into their stands. The mayor himself had been called out, by me. All eyes in the room weighed heavily on me, still processing my words.

My lungs constricted, my throat closing in on itself. The more air I tried to swallow, the more I needed.

The room darkened around me, all eyes focusing on me. I was in a crowded room with a man that had touched me in intimate ways I would have never agreed to. Whatever that woman did to me, touching me with her thumb crossing my eye, brought back what I thought was long forgotten.

“Grim, you’re gonna have to stand down,” Bones said as he stepped out of the private room behind me. “You’re scaring your mate.”

Bones reached out to pry Grim’s fingers from my shoulder.

Grim snarled and snapped his teeth, saliva drooling from his lips. His canines elongated with that snap, giving way to sharp points. I pushed away from Grim to get away from the sudden morphing of his face.

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