Page 116 of The Heart Breaker

Pain explodes across my cheek when Chase catches me off guard and manages to land a punch. Blood fills my mouth, and I spit it out, letting out a laugh at his weak-ass punch. “That all you got?” I taunt. “Not so tough when it’s not a girl you’re hitting, huh?”

He comes at me again, but this time I’m ready. I dodge to the side, grab a fistful of his jacket, and drive him back into the truck hard enough to rattle it.

He grunts, trying to shove me off him. There’s yelling behind me. Could be one of his teammates, could be one of mine—I can’t even tell anymore. Can’t hear anything but my ears ringing. Can’t see anything but Aurora standing in my doorway in tears, looking broken, with his handprint on her face

My hand tightens in his collar as I slam him harder against the truck. “You’re never fucking touching her again.”

He shoves at my chest, but I pin him to the wall. “If you ever put your hands on her again, I’ll fucking kill you.”

“Fuck you!” he spits, blood trickling down his chin. “You’re a fucking psycho?—”

The wail of sirens cuts him off, blue and red lights flashing across the lot.

A cop comes out of nowhere, wrenching me off him. They twist my arms behind my back and handcuff me. Blood drips from my lips and I drag my shoulder across my mouth, wiping it off.

“They fucking attacked me out of nowhere!” Chase yells. “I want them charged. Look at me—look what they did.”

My hands curl into fists at the nerve it takes for him to stand there and play victim after what he did to Aurora.

A cop jerks me toward the cruiser, rattling off questions or rights or whatever the fuck he’s saying, but I barely hear any of it, my gaze drifting to my teammates in cuffs of their own.

“You got anything to say for yourself, tough guy?” the cop says.

I spit blood onto the pavement and look at Chase again, the corner of my mouth pulling up.

“Nope.”

I don’t know what’s going to happen next, but it was worth it.

If anything, the only thing bothering me is that I didn’t hit him harder.

The cop shoves me toward the back of the car, and I go with a smile on my face.

31

AURORA

My phone buzzes incessantly, dragging me out of sleep.

I frown and reach across the bed for Cole, but my hand finds nothing except cold sheets. My eyes snap open and land on the other side of the mattress and the empty space where he should be.

For a second, I just lie there staring at the twisted blankets and the dip he left behind, my brain still slow and heavy with sleep as my chest tightens with a familiar kind of dread. The last time this happened, he disappeared for a week, and I felt like an absolute idiot for letting myself believe what happened between us had meant more to him than it actually did.

I swallow hard, trying not to let that old panic climb back up my throat, trying not to jump straight to the worst conclusion, but then my phone buzzes again, and again, and again, and I push myself up and grab it.

The screen is lit up with missed calls and so many messages that my stomach drops before I even unlock it, and the second I read Isabella’s texts, it drops even harder.

Isabella:

Where are you?

Answer your phone.

You need to get to the station right now.

The guys got arrested.

My heart starts pounding as I stare at the words, trying to make sense of them through the fog still clinging to my head.