Page 37 of Unleashed
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Just think, Isaia.” He taps his temple. “We don’t know what we’re up against with whoever is crawling out of Micah’s grave.”
“What?” I narrow my eyes, and I swear to God I’m two seconds away from punching him. “My wife is in a hospital, and you’re thinking of some motherfucking ghost? Un-fucking-believable.” I’m about to get into the driver’s seat when Nicoli grabs my jacket collar, swings me, and slams my back against the car.
“Stop!” he shouts. “Just stop and listen to me.”
I swipe at his arms. “Get your fucking hands off me.”
“You walk into that hospital, and you put a goddamn target on her back. And right now, you have a chance the rest of us don’t have.”
“And what’s that?”
“To make sure the woman you love doesn’t get caught in the crosshairs.”
I still, and Nicoli grabs my shirt, pulling me closer, his eyes flint and fire. “Out of all of us, you have the best chance to protect your wife by staying…away.”
“No. Not a?—”
“Take it from someone who has to live with the guilt,” Nicoli bites out, his jaw tight, his voice shaking with fury and something darker. “With the pain of knowing I couldn’t keep the love of my life safe. Take it from someone who would do anything, fucking anything—stay away from her, stay away from my daughter, give up my entire damn life—if it meant I could’ve spared Mira what she went through.”
The words hit like point-blank fire. Holes and blood everywhere. “Don’t—” I choke. “Don’t ask this of me.”
He presses his forehead against mine, his hand squeezing the back of my neck. “Forgive me, brother. But I have to.”
“I have to be with her, Nicoli.”
“I know you do.”
“I can’t breathe without her,” I whisper. It’s not drama. It’s anatomy.
“I know you can’t.”
Hot tears burn like acid. “She…needs me.”
“She needs yousmart. She needs you to protect her, and right now, you do that by staying in the shadows and making damn sure nothing touches her.”
I fist his collar, eyes squeezed shut, breath jagged, hands shaking. “She’s carrying my child. How the fuck am I supposed to stay away?”
“By keeping your shit together. And whenever you feel like you can’t anymore, you think of that baby. You hear me? You think of that life growing inside your wife, and you push harder, further, and you do not fucking stop until they are safe.”
Every instinct screams at me to get in the car, carve the city open, lay myself down at her side and dare the world to try me. But his words carve back—Mira’s screams, my brother’s guilt, the fragile beat inside Everly, my love turned into a weapon if I wield it wrong.
“I’ll lose her,” I rasp, voice torn from the rawest part of me. “If I don’t go to her, I’ll lose her. She already hates me. She already thinks I’m the monster.”
His grip tightens, voice dropping to a blade. “Better she hates you and lives than you hold her hand while some sick fuck lines up the shot. You want to risk that, Isaia? You want to gamble her life—your child’s life?”
Air vacates my lungs like he cut me open. Rage and grief and need crash like waves, battering against ribs that can’t hold. “I can’t?—”
“Yes. You. Can.” He doesn’t blink. Doesn’t soften. “And you will, goddammit. If you love her, you don’t get to be selfish. You don’t feed your fucking needs while she bleeds for it. You put her first. You put that baby first. You stand in the dark, and you choke on it. Okay? You let it kill you if it means your family is safe.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, jaw clenched so tight I taste blood, tears scalding as they spill. My fists tighten in his collar, then release like I’ve lost all strength. My body shakes, trembling with the war between what I want and what I know I can’t have.
Nicoli cups the back of my head and pulls me in, my forehead to his shoulder like we’re boys stealing breath in a world that never gave any. “Breathe,” he orders, low and guttural. “You’ll see her again. You’ll hold her again. But not tonight. Not like this.”
And it kills me. It fucking kills me.
Because for the first time in my life, I understand what it means to love someone so much that the only way to save them is to stay…the fuck…away.
