Page 106 of Lavender Moon

The pathetic little bitch lets out an agonizing moan from behind his hand, and I try again to quiet him.

“I mean it, Carter,” I chide out a warning. “Come on, you can be tougher than that, right? After all, you can beat up on an unsuspecting woman,” I remind him.

His moan turns to a slight whimper as he makes no move to get up. “What’s the matter? Did that give you a headache?” I taunt. “Really, Carter, it’s no worse than what you did to my wife. Man the fuck up.”

“Wh- who?” he whines out painfully. “I don’t… get what’s happening.” His words come out between gasps of air as he tries to compose himself.

“You’re getting what you deserve,” I supply low and adamant. “Since that didn’t happen in the court case where you were accused of putting my wife in the hospital – with a concussion.” I tap my fingers against his forehead to indicate what I just did to him, and he cries out.

“His cousin’s a sleazy lawyer who also happened to play golf with the judge,” Ben conveys, looking helpless. They were able to convince everyone it was an accident.”

“I didn’t do it, she just fell!” Carter stupidly protests. “I was trying to catch her – ugghhh!” he yelps as I grab onto his shirt with both hands and pull him to his feet, his legs scrambling.

“Stop fucking lying!” I bark out before delivering a haymaker to his ribs and feeling them give a satisfying crunch against my fist. Carter lets out a long grunting sound, followed by a couple of gasps and wheezes. “No one's here to save your sorry ass with bullshit probation,” I add, taking hold of his wrist in my grip. “And since you wouldn’t pay with jail time, you’re going to pay with pain, you piece of shit,” I inform him while taking ahold of his fingers and clenching them in my fist until I feel them crack. This makes him scream out in agony, and I reflexively snap my other fist forward, hitting him in the windpipe, cutting off his voice.

The impact makes him stumble backward and fall to the ground again, his screams caught in his throat.

“I told you to quiet the fuck down, didn’t I?” I spit as I lower myself down to his level again. “You know, I may not have been there, but I already know my beautiful badass wife handled all these things endlessly better than you are.”

My eyes squeeze shut briefly, as I painfully remember how my Luna never made a sound… ever.

Carter’s focus is mainly dedicated to trying to get any kind of breath down his airway, but a good portion of it is still trained on me, as he looks at me with his eyes wide and petrified.

“Now…” I begin, leaning my knee into his chest. “From what I understand, my wife went pretty damn easy on you. You’re not going to get that from me. Time to talk about where you and I go from here.”

“We were going to try again, and this time get him with that rejection letter he forged,” Ben had also informed me. “But Luna just wanted to be done; to not waste any more of her energy on him when she had you coming home to her.”

Carter gives a jerk from my ominous words, still trying to pull in air.

“Did you know our family lawyer was ready to take your carefully crafted rejection letter you forged up to the federal level?” I raise my brows. “We still can, actually, and your slimy little cousin won’t be any good to you there. You’ll be on your own, and with violating a restraining order on your record, I don’t think you’d get off so easy this time.”

“Wh– whuuu…” Carter tries to get out, but his voice is hoarse.

“What am I going to do?” I try to fill in for him. “That depends on you,” I reply and cock my head at him. “When I leave here tonight, you can call the cops and tell them everything that went down, and they’ll come and arrest me.” I raise a shoulder as if I couldn’t care less. “Which is fine, seeing as how it’d be my first offense, I’m a veteran, and have a pretty decent lawyer myself. A couple of them actually.” I don’t know how much I really have the Isaak’s lawyer, or the place I drew up those infernal papers, but he doesn’t need to know that. “But the thing is, if you do that, the Isaaks will move forward with pursuing the feds, and I’m pretty sure you don’t get another free pass. Federal prison is a whole different animal than local jail, and I’m pretty sure I’ll be out before you are.”

Carter’s given up talking, it looks like. Instead, he just lays there, trying to breathe, eyes still holding mine as if they’re afraid to look away.

“Or you can just be a big boy and consider your lesson learned, and you can forget that I and Luna exist.” I lean in, pinning him with my fiery gaze, silently warning him to make the right choice. “What’s it going to be?” When too much time passes by that he wastes wallowing in his pain, I get impatient. “Look at me, you fucking asshole!” I snarl, wrapping my hand around his jaw and gripping tightly. The action makes him jerk and startle again, and I bring my face within an inch of his. “You touch what’s mine again, and one way or another, your life is over. Are we clear?”

After a few moments tick by, Carter finally squeezes his eyes shut and nods before relaxing back on the cold concrete floor. I stare him down another few moments, giving him the look from hell so he knows how serious I am.

When I’m confident he’s not going to go back on his word, I finally rise and walk away.

Once my headlights reach the highway, I take the time to mentally prepare for what comes next. The drone of my tires spinning on the asphalt actually calms me as I recall the last thing Ben said to me as I left Luna’s childhood home earlier tonight.

“Kaleb,” he calls to me as I reach my truck on the other side of the street. I turn and let him catch up to me, eager to hear what he has to say.

“When it comes to Luna, you’re going to have to allow it time. The truth is, you guys got married recklessly at a young age, and now you need to get yourselves back in a good place. But if you’re able to do that, I want you to know that you have a family with us, Kaleb.”

We stand in there in the street a moment as I let that heartening prospect of that settle over me.

“Thank you,” I finally say with deep sincerity and he nods back, conveying the same.

“That said,” he adds with a lifted eyebrow, that I know is meant to be admonishing. “I know I took an oath to do no harm, and you’ve had training I can’t even fathom. But if you fuck this up, I’ll fuck you up.”

“Yes, sir,” I respond with a firm nod, taking him seriously as a heart attack.

I feel one corner of my mouth quirk into a smile as I recall those last words and tuck them away into a special pocket of my heart.

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