Invincible(35)

I turned and looked at the back of the cabin.

To keep Rose safe… I’d have to learn to kill.



~



I opened the closet and Rose winced and whimpered.

“It’s just me, sweetie,” I said. “Just me.”

I crouched down and she attacked me. I’d never seen a woman move that fast before in my life. She flew at me, hit me, and then I was on my back, Rose right on top of me.

“Did you get shot?” she asked.

“No. I didn’t.”

“Did you… kill…”

“No. I sent him with a warning.”

“Wes, who was it?”

I reached up and touched her face. “It wasn’t for you. It was for me.”

“Oh, shit.”

“Yeah. We’re both in some really hot water here. We can’t stay here forever. They’re going to keep coming.”

“I don’t know what to do or say right now.”

I felt Rose’s belly rumble against mine.

Christ, just having her this close was making me hard again. She was like beautiful voodoo to my cock and I was helpless to fight it off.

“You’re hungry,” I said. “I am too. Let me make us something. I’ll build a fire and we can relax.”

“How can we relax when people are coming to hurt us?”

I gently touched Rose’s face. “Hey. Nobody is going to hurt you. Ever. I swear on my life. Okay? Now, if you want to relax… grab a bite… have a stiff drink. Crash on the couch, sweetie. I’ll take care of everything. I promise.”

Rose had the biggest doe eyes I ever saw.

And here I was… making promises that I damn sure knew I couldn’t keep.





21.


(Rose)



The fire raged with snaps and pops. The flames licked to the top of the fireplace. The cabin was flooded with a comfortable heat. I rested on the arm of the couch, my legs across Wes’s legs. I had two glasses of some kind of whiskey and my world was rocked. Wes sat there, staring into the fire, the bottle in his hand.

I had to trust him.

“Wes…”

“What, sweetie?”

“Have you ever killed someone?”

“No,” Wes said. He looked at me. “Why?”

“We’re not going to get out of this, are we?”

“We’re going to fight until there’s no more fight left in us. That’s the only way I know how to live.”

“You’re going to have to kill someone probably.”

Wes drank from the whiskey bottle. “Yeah, I know.”

Silence.

The fire popped again.

“Wes… tell me about your first fight.”

“My first fight?” Wes asked with a grin. “Oh, I’m not sure, sweetie. Probably with a kid named Billy in second grade. He had flunked second grade twice. He was a giant. This massive kid would pound the shit out of everyone. Take their pencils. Their change. Anything. He one time stuck a frog in my pocket and punched my leg so hard he killed the frog and bruised my leg for a week.”

“You stood up to him?”

“No. Not quite. He cornered me once after school. I had two bucks in my pocket. I knew it was all me and Shane had. Christ, Rose, I stole the two bucks from my teacher’s purse. I wanted to show Shane, and then he and I would hit up the penny candy store and stock up. Shane loved the gum cigarettes. Remember those? He’d puff on them and shoot out that little cloud of sugar.”

I watched Wes smile. He was so beautifully handsome. So rugged yet he had a heart buried under all that muscle and scar.

“But Billy wanted the money. He forced his hands in my pockets and just grabbed. I’ll never forget that feeling. His f*cking chubby hands touching me. I felt like… I don’t know. Something then gave way. I threw my head forward and smashed my face against his. Both of our noses exploded. Then Billy let out a scream, touching his face. He turned his head and started to throw up. Turns out Billy didn’t like the sight of his own blood. I stood there, frozen, not sure what was going to happen. Then two kids showed up. Then two more. Then ten more. Next thing I knew half the school stood there and put two and two together. I became a hero. Then the teachers showed up.

“Billy was a pudgy kid with no parents. His uncle abused him in the worst ways possible. All of this I didn’t know as a kid, but the teachers knew. It’s why people put up with him. They felt bad. So I took the brunt of it. I was told that Billy was very poor and he didn’t know any better than to try and get money.”

“No way,” I whispered. “That’s terrible.”

“Well, Billy’s family… whatever. There was only room for one broken family in town. For me and Shane, we were outcasts. So that was my first fight.”

“What happened to Billy?” I asked.

“He brought a gun to school. Was caught, taken away. Last I heard, he was murdered.”

“Jesus.”

“Yeah,” Wes said. He rubbed his face. “Any other life questions?”

“Sorry I asked.”

Wes looked at me. “Don’t be, sweetie. It’s good to be distracted a little.”

Silence fell again between us. The fire burned. Something between me and Wes burned too. My body hungered for him and I couldn’t deny it. It started the first time I saw him. That night at the fight. Him facing the wall, his back rippling with muscle. His emotions right there.