Page 90 of The Reaper
Service was in full swing, Meghan and her staff moving like a well-drilled unit, their motions sharp and seamless, as if last night’s smashed window and chilling note—You don’t deserve their praise—had welded them into something tighter, a crew bound by a shared mission to hold the line.
But I saw the tension beneath, the cracks no guest would catch, my eyes honed from years of spotting threats in crowded souks and shadowed backstreets. Meghan was mine—her fire, her fight, her world—and I’d burn everything to keep her safe, my possessiveness a live wire sparking with every glance, ready to ignite at the first hint of danger.
Meghan commanded the kitchen, her knife flashing as she plated a dish, her voice cutting through the hum with crisporders, but her shoulders were a fraction too rigid, her jaw clenched a beat too long.
Finn worked beside her, his hands steady but his eyes darting to the boarded window, a faint twitch in his brow betraying his calm.
Alba glided between tables, her smile warm but her fingers lingering on the menus, knuckles whitening as if gripping a lifeline.
Michael moved with his usual charm, but his laugh was a shade too sharp, his steps hurried, like he was outrunning a shadow.
Carly, refilling water glasses, kept her head down, her movements precise but her shoulders hunched, as if bracing for a blow.
They were a unit, but the strain was there. It fueled my rage—someone had breached her world, and I’d find them, end them, before they touched what was mine.
I ate the food—I can’t tell you what it was, a glass of red Meghan had paired—but it turned to ash in my mouth. I didn’t taste the rich fat, the peppery greens, or the wine’s tart bite; my focus was on the room, the staff, the exits, my senses wired for any tell.
My mind drifted to Mom, her strength a beacon in my memory, tough in the ways her seven boys needed, loving in a way that held us through chaos. I was twelve, maybe, in Montana, a night that carved itself into me. A blizzard had hit, the ranch buried under snow, the power out, and I’d snuck to the barn to check the horses, thinking I was tough.
I’d slipped on ice, cracked my head, and woke to Mom’s hands pulling me up, her face fierce in the lantern’s glow, the air sharp with frost and hay.
“You don’t get to be reckless with what’s mine,” she’d said, her voice low, teaching me to check a horse’s pulse, her callousedfingers guiding mine. “You fight smart, Caleb. You keep what’s yours safe.”
That memory hit hard, Mom’s strength echoing Meghan’s—her fire, her refusal to bend, her empire built from grit and loss. Mom would’ve loved her, seen the same steel in her spine, the same heart that burned for what she’d made.
She’d never let go of her dream, and I’d never let go of her. I wanted to lock her away, keep her safe, but I knew she’d fight me tooth and nail, her empire as vital to her as she was to me.
Service wound down, the dining room thinning, the air softening with the scent of cooling plates and melted wax. Guests lingered, some asking about the boarded window on their way out, their voices polite, curious. Meghan or Finn explained—just city life—and the guests nodded, their sympathy grating on me like a dull blade. This country should be safe, a place where a woman like Meghan could build her empire without fear. I’d fought for that across deserts and jungles, spilled blood to keep threats at bay, and yet here, in her own restaurant, someone dared to touch what was mine.
My jaw tightened, the injustice fueling my rage, a possessive fire that demanded I end this threat, no matter the cost.
My eyes caught movement at the back of the kitchen, a shift in the rhythm that pulled me from my chair. Meghan was talking to Michael, their voices low, not the usual banter of service. Something in their body language—her arms crossed, his head bowed—sent a jolt through me, my footsteps silent on the hardwood as I moved fast through the dining room.
I rounded the pass, the kitchen’s heat hitting me, the air sharp with remnants of the night’s fare. Michael was crying, his face streaked, his hands trembling as he held out something to Meghan I couldn’t see.
Her face had gone pale, her eyes wide, and as I closed the distance, I recognized what was in his hands, those papers—cream-colored, precise, the same as the notes that had haunted her.
Him.
Here the whole time.
My blood roared and erupted like a volcano, the animal uncaged. I pounced, my hand shooting out, gripping Michael’s throat, the scent of impending death thick in my nostrils as I pinned him against the counter, rage blinding me to everything but the thudding heartbeat in my hand.
30
MEGHAN
Caleb’s hand was around Michael’s throat before my brain could catch up with my eyes. One second, Michael was stammering, holding out that cream-colored paper like a guilty offering. The next, he was pinned against the stainless steel counter, his feet half off the ground, his face flushed crimson under Caleb’s unyielding grip.
It should have horrified me.
It didn’t.
It sent a molten rush through me—low, deep, primal. The kind of instinct that didn’t come from logic or lists or all the carefully reasoned rules I’d kept about the kind of man I should want.
If you’d asked me a week ago—hell, yesterday—what I valued in a partner, I would’ve said kindness, shared ambition, loyalty. Humor, maybe. The ability to cook at least one decent meal. I wouldn’t have saidcapacity for violence.
But God, help me, in this moment, it was at the top of the list.
