Page 122 of Queen of Anarchy (Dirty Broken Savages 2)

44

Gage

It’squiet in the library, which isn’t surprising since it’s so late. It has to be after one in the morning, and the entire house is silent and still. River and my brothers are all asleep, but I couldn’t make my eyes stay closed. I’m agitated and on edge.

The body of the shooter has been dumped in the woods, taken care of the way Knox does best, but that doesn’t calm me down at all.

We’ve never shied away from death, me or my brothers—from facing our own or causing others. But since River came to join us, there’s been more fucking death than ever. It puts me on edge.

I usually don’t believe in this kind of shit, but maybe it says something that we literally met her over a death. Over her killing someone in the alley behind our club. Maybe that’s why we can’t seem to shake it now.

It’s like destruction follows her like a black cloud, and all my brothers and I can do is try to keep her alive despite it all.

Now that I know her story and everything she’s been through in her life, I can tell she needs someone to protect her. She’d never agree to that or say she wants it, but I know. It gets exhausting being on your own, being the only one you can trust. The other Kings and I can all look out for ourselves well enough, but we’re stronger together. We all know that, and there’s no shame in relying on people to have your back.

River’s coming around to that, I think. She’s had to deal with things on her own by necessity for a long time, but things are different now. Now she has us to help.

We’re trying. We’re all going to keep an eye on her and do our best, but there’s so much we still don’t know. Ivan’s body being dragged back up, this newest shooter, whatever Julian has planned under what he’s telling us. I hate when I don’t have all the information. Even more when there’s someone counting on me to protect them and I don’t know what I’m protecting them from completely.

But anyone who wants to hurt River will have to go through us. All of us. Even at a disadvantage, we’re nothing to sneeze at, and River herself can fight like hell when it’s important.

If someone wants her dead, they’re going to have to really fucking work for it.

I draw in a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying to calm the almost frantic pace of my mind. I came in here to try to relax since I couldn’t sleep, and dwelling on this shit isn’t helping. There are only so many ways I can turn it over and over again in my head, and it’s not leading to any answers, so it’s really just a waste of time.

I do another deep, slow breath and then turn my attention back to the book in my hands. It’s been open to the same page for the last twenty minutes or so, the soft light from the lamp I turned on casting accusing shadows over the neatly printed letters.

It’s not a happy book, and the chapter I’m on is about the protagonist losing everything and being faced with his own mortality after thinking he was untouchable. I dive into the depths of his despair on the page, making little notes in the margins here and there about how he failed to see this coming and how the signs were there, but he was too clouded by his own arrogance to realize it.

It soothes my own feelings as I lose myself in the words, and gradually, I can feel the tension seeping out of my body as I start to relax.

As I turn to the next page, I hear footsteps coming down the hall. A moment later, River slips into the room.

I’m aware she’s there, but I keep reading.

It’s impossible not to be aware of her presence. Even when I didn’t want to be, it was as if she took up so much space in any room she was in. Like as soon as she came into our house, she was immediately a fixture there, impossible to ignore. Now that Iwanther here, I’m attuned to her on an entirely different level. I don’t have to look up from my book to know she’ll be tucking her silver hair behind her ear as she moves from the doorway to the bookshelves.

That little wrinkle between her brows will be present while she looks over the books.

“Hmm,” she murmurs, and I can just picture her tapping her chin with one finger, her nail polish probably chipped by now, while she tries to find something to read.

Or to pretend to read to get a rise out of me.

She pulls a book from the shelf and opens it. “Huh,” she says, sounding surprised. “Something must have happened to this book. The pages are all stuck together.”

I growl at her, because we both know exactly why the pages are stuck together. But it’s playful now, with no real anger in it.

River laughs softly. I look up at her as she puts the book back on the shelf and leans against it, facing me.

“Why are you still up?” she asks.

I shrug. “Couldn’t sleep. Too much on my mind.”

“Yeah.” She runs a hand through her hair, the strands parting like quicksilver around her fingers. “It’s been a fucking day, hasn’t it?”

“That’s an understatement, I think. A day and a half, maybe.”

That makes her smile, her gorgeous lips curving up a little.

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