Page 68 of Gunner
“Sweetheart, give me the gun.”
I glanced over my shoulder to see he was getting closer, and I remarked, “Don’t come any closer, Kade.”
He stopped moving and looked at my brother. He was staring at me, his blue eyes showing the depth of his pain and anger. Briefly, he closed his eyes, and when he looked at me again, he gave me a subtle nod. I exhaled and turned my attention back to the man.
“What’s your name?” I asked, and his eyes darted over my shoulder to Kade and Dalton. “Don’t look at them. They aren’t going to save you.” He swallowed thickly, and I raised the gun to point it at his head as I growled, “What is your fucking name?”
“Wilson. Wilson Craft, but everyone calls me Skeeter,” he replied.
“Let me ask you something, Wilson.” I sneered his name. “What was it you said? That you didn’t hurt me? That it was all your brother’s fault?”
He shook his head, and I stepped so close, I could smell his rancid breath as I pressed the barrel of the gun to his forehead and gritted out the words, “Tell the truth.”
“I swear. It was all my brother’s idea.” He screamed around his tears, and I aimed the gun down at his foot and pulled the trigger.
The bullet tore through the top of his foot, and he howled into the dense woods as blood poured onto the ground. Kade and Dalton approached, and I muttered over my shoulder, “Stop.”
They stopped moving closer to me, and I used the hot barrel of the gun to lift Skeeter’s chin until his gaze came back to mine. His head lulled to the side, and I smacked his temple, encouraging him to look at me.
“Why don’t you tell them how it was your idea to ‘go first’,” I yelled. “Or how you thought it was a good idea to carve up my back while your brother violated me on the dirty floor.” I stepped as close as I could to him. “Or how you laughed as you urinated on me when you were done.”
A growl came up from behind me, and suddenly, Kade wrapped his arms around my waist and tugged me away from Skeeter. Dalton stepped up to him and cut the rope from around his waist, allowing him to fall onto the dirt. He cried and tried to push himself into a sitting position, only to have Dalton shove him back down with his boot.
I struggled against Kade, and he pried the gun from my hand before whispering into my ear, “I don’t want you to live with that man’s blood on your hands. Please, baby. Let us handle this.”
I met his watery gaze with my own and nodded as he tucked the gun into his waistband. “I want him to suffer,” I whispered back to Kade.
He spun me around and pulled me into a quick hug before grasping my arms and pushing me back. “I need you to go back to the clubhouse and act like nothing is wrong.”
“I’m not leaving until I see him die,” I grumbled, and my brother turned his attention to me.
He stepped away from Skeeter and up to me as Kade moved back. “Sadie, you have my promise he will suffer every moment of the rest of his life. But I need you to leave the compound and let me take care of this. Uncle Mick wanted me to be the one to end him, and I owe it to you to carry this burden. His death shouldn’t be on your conscience.”
“I can’t let you do that for me.”
Tears fell from my eyes, and my little brother pulled me into a bruising hug. My face was pressed against his chest, and he kissed the top of my head and replied, “His life won’t be the first on my conscience.”
I met his gaze and could see the truth of his words in the cold dead expression he was giving me. I knew that meant Skeeter wouldn’t be his first kill and I had to come to grips with that. I glanced one more time at the sick rapist lying on the ground in a puddle of his own urine and blood and nodded. Kade came up behind me and tugged me away from the clearing, leaving Dalton and Skeeter alone in the dense patch of woods.
“I’m going to take you back to the trail. I want you to go straight to your van and leave. Try not to talk to anyone and don’t tell anyone you saw us or him. I promise I’ll explain everything when we get home.” Kade’s words filtered around me as he tugged me by the hand through the woods, moving us closer to the lake. I was in a state of shock, with anger coursing through me, but I would honor his request.
When we got to the edge of the trail looping around the lake, he tugged me to him and kissed me softly. Numbness filled me, and he grasped my cheeks, looking deep into my eyes as he explained, “I love you, Sadie. I promise everything will be okay.”
“I love you too,” I replied with a flatness to my voice that shocked me.
I felt the walls closing in on me, forcing me into that box of safety I survived in for many years. It was a safe place where no one could hurt me, and it gave me comfort when the memories bombarded me from every direction. Seeing Skeeter, hearing how my own mother allowed this to happen to me, was pushing me closer and closer to the box. I couldn’t let them win. Not again, so I forced myself to smile at him.
He pursed his lips, and a scream echoed through the woods. My head snapped in the direction of Dalton, and I looked up at Kade through my lashes. He was watching me, but the anxiousness of the situation was pressing down on him.
“I’ll see you at home,” I remarked and turned onto the path.
Just as I rounded a corner, I looked back to see Kade watching me, and I lifted a hand into the air before I walked out of his sight. The entire walk back around the lake, I thought of what that man encouraged, what he engaged in, what he did that irrevocably changed me. His faint screams and cries grew softer and softer, and by the time I was on the walk path leading back to the cabins and clubhouse, his voice blended into the noises of the forest.
I wanted to smile, but it somehow felt wrong to celebrate the death of another, even if that person was a raping piece of shit. The cabins came into sight and I forced myself to keep my pace steady and my eyes forward, when all I wanted to do was run. A few of the brothers lifted their chins as I walked by, and I gave them my best fake smile as I continued to Kade’s cabin.
The bag I left was still sitting there, and as I moved around the side of the clubhouse, I saw Smokey step outside. I wanted to confront him, but what I learned wasn’t my business and all that would do was get myself, and maybe Dalton and Kade, killed. He approached me, and I shoved my hands into my hoodie to hide the shake in them.
“Where have you been hiding?” he asked, and I shifted from one foot to the other.
