Page 82 of Death Rydes Shotgun

The mention of Blaire and Noah in his mouth feels dirty, malicious, and entirely manipulative. He doesn’t have the slightest clue of what either of them mean to me.

My fingers tighten violently around the leather hilt of my knife, pulling the blade two inches out of its scabbard, ready to drive the steel directly into his dick if he takes one more step toward me.

“You don’t get to speak their names. Not ever. You haven’t earned the right.” My voice shakes with pure, unrestrained venom.

With a quick motion, Xander reaches for my wrist, trying to yank the knife away before I manage to pull it free.

Xander sees my hand move toward my boot, and his eyes narrow in dangerous annoyance. “Oh, come on, don’t be like that. Don’t play the crazy victim routine with me—give me that damn blade before you hurt yourself.”

A low, rustling sound shatters the quiet behind him.

It isn’t the soft patter of drizzle or the gentle sway of pine branches. It’s the heavy, deliberate crunch of wet moss beneath a massive, predatory weight.

The air in the clearing instantly drops twenty degrees, plunging into a suffocating, terrifying stillness that makes the hair on my arms stand up like needles. The fog parts slowly, swirling like white smoke around a towering, monstrous silhouette stepping out from the shadows of the ancient oak trees.

My breath locks in my throat.

Ryder.

He stands in the mist, towering, broad, and terrifyingly silent. His chest and arms are streaked with rain and dried blood, his dark curls are once again plastered to his forehead. He’s managed to get dressed since I last saw him at the cabin.

He’s wearing the same bloody clothes from when he slaughtered that masked man. He even changed out of that skin-tight grey shirt. In his massive right hand, he holds his knife, the four-inch steel gleaming wickedly in the dim light. And in his left hand, he holds the officer’s police issued side arm.

His pitch-black eyes aren’t looking at me.

They are locked entirely on Xander.

A cold, psychotic fury radiates off Ryder in waves so intense it’s as if a physical force is pushing against my chest.

I stare as his jaw clenches so tight the muscles dance beneath his skin, and his menacing eyes flare with a lethal, absolute intent that makes my blood run cold and hot all at the same time.

Xander, oblivious to the nightmare standing five feet behind him, takes another step toward me, opening his mouth to speak. “Harmony, just give me⁠—”

“Xander…” I whisper, my voice hardening with raw, primal satisfaction as I stare past his shoulder. “Behind you.”

Xander frowns, annoyed by my reaction. “Nice try, Harmony. I’m not falling for that⁠—”

Click. Click. Click.

The sharp, metallic snap of Ryder flicking his blade open and closed against the knife’s cold metal casing rings out through the darkness like a gunshot.

Xander freezes.

The color instantly drains from his face as he registers the heavy, scorching heat of a massive predator breathing down the back of his neck.

The fog parts slowly and eerily, swirling around Ryder’s feet as he advances, the silence broken only by his measured steps closing the last two feet between them.

He towers over Xander like a fallen angel of pure death, his shadow completely swallowing the smaller man whole.

Ryder tilts his head, a slow, soul-sucking grin spreading wildly across his face—the look of a monster about to carve up his prey.

“You’re in my woods, you fucking coward.” Ryder’s voice comes out in a low, terrifying growl that vibrates straight through the earth. “And you’re touching what belongs to me.”

Twenty-Six

Just Between Us

RYDER