Page 118 of Truck Stop Tempest

He paused, hands to hips, bare chest rising and falling, water sluicing down every ridge of muscle. Tilting his head, he blinked the darkness away, and whispered, “Tuuli.”

“Just give me the keys.” I held out my palm.

Eyes worried and body taut, he tugged his car keys out of his front pocket.

I snatched them from his fingers and ran into the diner to grab my purse. Without looking back, I tucked myself into the driver’s seat. Fired the engine. And drove into the night.

The night sky collapsed around me. Falling. Falling. Crimson stained drops. Drip. Drip. Drip. I watched until my headlights disappeared, dragging my guts behind.

She wasn’t supposed to come outside. She wasn’t supposed to witness my final act of savagery.

Fuck.

I scooped Erik’s bloody digits off the ground.

“The hell you gonna do with those?” Baldy asked, sneering at the mangled flesh in my hand. “Make a necklace?”

“Nah. Fish food.”

I didn’t regret taking my two pounds of flesh. Men said desperate things when death came knocking. Erik, however, knowing he was on his way to a miserable, bloody end, had only laughed, telling me, “I had her first. My fingers were inside her first. You’ll think of me every time you touch her. I win.”

He’d practically begged me to follow through on my promise. I didn’t regret taking his fingers. I regretted the look on Tuuli’s face.

“Sick fucker.” The bald man laughed. Wasn’t sure if he meant me or Erik. Didn’t fucking care. I’d made a promise. I kept my promises.

“We good?” Dane asked.

I nodded. “All good.”

“See ya on the flip side.”

I waved him off, waited for the men to make their exit, then drudged through the rain, across the lot, and down the steep incline to the beach.

The storm was farther away now, lighting the sky behind the mountains in the distance.

I stood ankle-deep in the black water. I wasn’t a praying man. Far from it. But I was beginning to believe there was a higher power pulling my strings, guiding me toward redemption, deserved or not.

Death’s claws no longer pierced my blood and bones, her grip loosening, surrendering my destiny to the woman more deserving of my soul. Tuuli led me out of the dark. I never wanted to go back, and I feared if she didn’t return, if I’d broken her for good, I’d fall deeper into that vile pit and give myself wholly, completely, forever to Lady Death.

I tossed the bloody appendages one by one, trusting the current to carry them far away, waded deeper into the murky water, then deeper still, until my lungs constricted and my muscles locked tight. I sucked in oxygen and submerged myself completely, the cold bite consuming me, washing me clean.

When I came up for air, Tango waited on the shore. “The fuck’d you do now?”

I only laughed, lifting heavy, water-logged legs toward the shore. “Great timing, cousin. Great fuckin’ timing.”

After we’d cleaned the diner, leaving no trace of Erik, Riley, or the Slayers, Tango let me into Tuuli’s apartment. I showered, slid between her sheets, and sent a text.

Bunny. Comehome.

I waited three hours. No response.

She would come back.

I love a girl.

No response.

Fuck. What a fucking day.

I loved her. She loved me.

I laid back on her pillow, phone in hand, and engaged the tracking app connected to my car.

She would come back.

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