Page 10 of The Big Bad's Claim
“Is that your job? To kill me?”
“Of course it is.” He nods, and that unwavering smile makes my blood simmer in my veins. Every second is too long listening to him. “I was paid handsomely.”
“By whom?” I ask because everyone wants us dead nowadays. Every gang and every biker club in town, some politicians, and a whole lot of cops.
He mimics a zipper across his lips. “Secrets of the job.”
“Fine,” I roar, squaring my shoulders. “There are other ways to make you talk. After I’ve beaten you into a pulp for touching her.”
Doubt crosses Todd’s face, and I don’t think he sees it coming. He must think he’s so fucking powerful with that gun, unstoppable. He must think he’s unavoidable, scaring girls, threatening them. It just makes me want to see him dead.
I step closer, and the smirk disappears from his face. A grin stretches my lips, and I know he understands it now—how I am the fucking wolf, even weaponless. That I will not stop until I’ve made him pay. Until he’s so freaking broken the only thing he’ll be able to utter is an apology for Kenna.
One look at her, and I’m certain. One look at the tears down her face, and I know I would give my life to see her smile again.
Locking my gaze on the fucker who hurt her, I pounce. Even as the gun goes off. Even through Kenna’s scream. I don’t stop even as the pain starts a fire in my body.
7
KENNA
That’s something the movies don’t show. I thought silencers would mute the sound of a pistol, but no. The sound of Todd firing into Blaise still makes me wince, slamming my eyes shut, my hands coming up to my face. Someone screams. I think it’s me. When I bring my hands down, there’s blood and violence.
Blaise’s shirt is soaked in red, his side covered in the color to his hip. The blood flowing from the wound on his shoulder gushes out like a waterfall. Unstoppable. Rich, hypnotic. My heart stammers in my chest, another scream clawing its way up my throat. He’s hurt. He’s wounded, and it’s because of me.
Blaise isn’t on the ground. He jumped over Todd, and even after getting shot, he doesn’t pause. The blood means nothing, and the pain means nothing as he grips Todd by the wrist and punches his face, the inside of his elbow. Todd fires the gun again, and I scream once more, a deep, gaping certainty inside me that Blaise is going to die.
The bullet lodges in the doorjamb, and Blaise twists Todd’s arm up and away. From the wicked grin across Blaise’s face, I know he might be hurt, but he knows what he’s doing. A rage moves him and spells him on. He’s boiling with anger, and the feeling is across his face, obvious under the light of the day. Teeth bared, his forehead folded into a thousand creases as his eyes widen. He looks at Todd as if he was nothing but prey. The violence rattling across Blaise’s bones is because of me.
It’s because of me. The realization should make me fear him, it should make me want to step away, to escape this madness. Instead, pride swells my heart. It fills my chest and rises in my throat until my eyes tear up. Blaise doesn’t care about getting hurt, as long as I’m safe. He’s mad because I could have been wounded. He’s mad at Todd, for threatening me.
This is what it means to belong to someone. To be loved so fiercely they would face death for you.
My jaw drops as I watch Blaise prevail over Todd, no matter how well-trained the hitman is. A couple of well-placed punches force Todd to drop the gun. Blaise kicks it out of his way, toward my bedroom, then puts Todd down. My ex drops with a wince, but he doesn’t stop fighting. He reaches for something beneath his shirt, but Blaise is faster, even though he’s much bigger. A knife comes out and Blaise digs it into Todd’s shoulder. Todd cries out, but he eats up his sounds when Blaise punches him again, and again. The back of his head hits the floor, a bit too brutally, and in moments I watch him blacking out.
Todd blinks slowly, then stops blinking at all. Blood oozes out of the wounds on his face, and runs down the sides of his head, pooling on the ground beneath him. Blaise’s blood now drips onto the body beneath him, too. As an afterthought, I wonder how hard it’s going to be to clean this all up. My chest rises and falls fast, too fast. I think I’m hyperventilating. My knees quiver and I reach for the wall behind me, seeking balance.
Blaise must feel it, too, since I make no sound. He looks up at me, then shoots to his feet, ignoring Todd’s unmoving body. His meaty arms come around my form, holding me to his hard chest as he sits me down on the ground, his knees brushing mine.
He strokes my cheeks, wiping my tears off. “Are you hurt?” he asks, and God, how canthisbe the first thing he asks me? How can he worry about me first when he’s been freaking shot?
More tears slip down my face. “Blaise,” I mumble his name out. “You’re bleeding. You’re hurt.”
“It doesn’t matter, gorgeous,” he whispers, holding my shoulders and straightening my spine so he can study my body. “Did he hurt you? Did he touch you?”
I shake my head, the tears making it hard to see his face. “Blaise,” I mumble again, reaching up to grab his shirt. His blood stains my fingers, and I cry even harder, my shoulders shaking beneath his hands. “You were shot.”
The roar of bikes echoes up the street as they approach. A moment later, they go silent in front of my building. I ignore this, still shaking with pain, knowing Blaise could die because of me. The one person who ever treated me well, who ever made me feel like I belong... Dead because I’ve been a coward, foolish, easily used...
“I don’t care,” he says, tilting my face up. “Your safety is all that matters to me. I just need to know you’re fine, gorgeous. You’re the one thing that matters to me.”
“Why?”
His mouth opens and closes for a moment, then he shakes his head once. “Because I’m in love with you, Kenna. Can’t you tell? Isn’t it painfully obvious that I’m head over heels for you? Fuck, I would burn the world for you. I would set it on fire and watch it burn if anyone hurt you. You’re the single person who ever made me see good out there, Kenna. You are the one person who matters to me.”
His words shake me to my core. I bawl my eyes out, slinging my arms around his neck and pushing my body into his even when my brain tells me I shouldn’t. He holds me even with his shoulder still bleeding, he holds me through the tears even as an army of feet thunders into my apartment.
“I love you, too,” I murmur into his neck. “I love you, too.”
