Page 25 of Diesel
His gaze lifts to the ceiling, heaviness sitting on his shoulders. “I left you alone while I sat in a prison cell for five years.”
The anger I’ve held in my heart for months evaporates, leaving only the ash of flames behind. He still blames himself for that?
I grab his face, forcing him to look at me. There’s no walls between us. Neither one of us hiding anymore.
“You didn’t do anything wrong. Baby, you protected me. If you hadn’t—” I break off, the words sticking in my throat like broken shards. I don’t want to remember that night, I don’t want to feel those dirty hands holding my wrists over my head?—
Fuck.
Zane watches me, like he knows where my mind went. Pain swims in his eyes as he covers my hands and brings one to his mouth, kissing my knuckles.
“I fucked up,” he repeats. “Once again, I brought a storm into our lives. I couldn’t go forward, I couldn’t go back, so I did the only thing I could. I hoped it would turn around. I could see there was quiet pockets of resistance and I watched them grow. Clung to them, thinking maybe one day I could bring you in, but weak leaders leave cracks in the foundations. We were hit by a rival gang who saw a chance to take what was ours. And things got worse. I knew then I could never bring you in. Knew I’d probably die for a cause I no longer believed in.”
I thought he was pulling away, that he didn’t love me anymore, but all those nights I lay crying myself to sleep he was out there waiting to die. My stomach twists like something is rotting inside me.
“You have to leave,” I blurt the words. “We’ll disappear. No one will ever find us?—”
He shakes his head. “I’m not going to drag you around the world like a fucking fugitive, firefly.”
“But… I don’t want to lose you to this.” I stare at him, feeling small and useless. And fucking terrified.
“Things are turning,” he says slowly. “I can feel the shift. It’s going to get messy and I don’t want you near that.”
It wasn’t distance. It was armour and he wore it so well I thought he was rejecting me.
“If you think I’m going to sit here safe while you risk your life, you’re out of your mind.”
“That’s exactly what you’re going to do. The only ace I have to play is that no one knows about you. And if they don’t know, they can’t use you against me.”
“I don’t care. I’m not letting you do this alone anymore.”
“The club’s at war with itself. You know what happens in civil wars, firefly? People die in the crossfire and I’m not letting you become a casualty.”
“Nothing’s going to happen to me.”
His eyes darken as he studies my face like he’s reading every part of my soul. “Another brother thought that. Though he could keep his wife safe. She was shot in the head. They were aiming for him, and she was just… wrong time, wrong place.”
I blink and the chair beneath me feels unsteady. “She was killed?”
“She was pregnant.” His hand tightens on my knee. Not enough to hurt, but to tell me what he thought about it. “They cut her baby out of her while she was bleeding out.”
My stomach churns violently at the horror behind those words. I can’t even imagine how that would havefelt, looked—oh, fuck. I can’t breathe, can’t think. The room rolls around me in a frantic wave.
He grabs my face between his hands. I blink frantically, trying to push that image aside. I can’t. It’s etched into my mind now.
“I shouldn’t have told you that. I’m sorry.” He kisses my forehead, so soft compared to the seeds he’s planted inside me.
“They cut…” My breath hitches. What kind of strength does it take to bleed like this and come home to me like nothing happened? The reality of this situation is crashing down around my ears. He left me in the dark, but now I’m scared of what it took him to keep the light on at all. “Are you in danger?” He doesn’t answer, which is an answer. “No.No. They don’t get to have you.”
“I took a vow?—”
I shove his chest and he rocks back a little in the chair. “What about the vow you gave me when you made me your wife?”
“I’m not breaking that either.”
“You can’t do both, Zane.” I can’t breathe. The air’s too thin. My heart is racing too fast.
I push out of the chair, the way it scrapes across the tile jarring. “I’m not going to watch you die for this.”
