Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 60848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
In prison, I’d learned there are ways to end conflicts before they start. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, centering myself. This wasn’t about me. This was about the women and children behind that door. About the woman with the cast on her arm who’d gone white as paper at the sound of his voice. About Penny and her girls who’d already fled one monster.
I stood perfectly still, hands loose at my sides, blocking the path to the door without making any aggressive moves. Waiting.
“Who the fuck are you?” he demanded, his voice slurred but still carrying the crisp consonants of someone who thought themselves important. “This is between me and my fucking wife. Get out of my Goddamned way.”
I didn’t answer immediately. Instead, I took one step forward, letting my shadow fall over him. Another prison lesson. Sometimes, silence unsettles more than words ever could. When I finally spoke, my voice was soft, almost gentle. “You need to leave. Now.”
He puffed up, indignation overriding his initial wariness. “You can’t tell me what to do, motherfucker. She’s my fucking wife. I have a right --”
I took another step forward, quicker this time, a threat there was no way he was too drunk to miss. The bastard instinctively backed up, though his face flushed with anger at his own retreat. His eyes flicked to my patch, recognition dawning. “You’re with that motorcycle gang. Heard every fucking one of you guys done time. You’re holding me against my will. Bet that’ll buy you a one-way ticket back to prison.”
“No.” I shook my head slowly, deliberately. “It won’t.”
His face contorted, and I could see the moment his anger overrode his caution. “You don’t know anything about my marriage! She’s lying about everything. She always does this, makes me out to be the bad guy when she’s the one --”
“Don’t care.” My voice remained calm but raised so I could be heard over him. “My job is to keep you out and them safe. Not to make judgments one way or the other.”
“Ain’t leaving without her. I’ll get the police down here and you’ll be on your way back to prison.”
“You’ll leave. And you won’t come back.”
“Or what?” He tried for bravado, but his voice wavered.
I smiled then, not a friendly expression. “Or you’ll regret it. For the rest of your natural life. However short that might be.” I leaned in slightly, just enough to let him feel how much bigger I was than him. “The sheriff’s already been called. And when they get here, they’ll find either an empty parking lot, or they’ll find whatever’s left of you. I might go back to prison, but you won’t be alive to gloat.”
Something in my eyes must have convinced him because the blood drained from his face. “You’re insane,” he whispered, but he was already stepping back.
“No,” I said softly. “I’m restrained. Stick around. I’ll show you what I’m like when I’m not restrained.”
His retreat was almost comical, backing away with his hands raised as if I were pointing a weapon at him. In a way, I was.
Once he was outside, Griffin and Inferno could make sure he didn’t come back. Griffin would keep him engaged until the cops got here to take his ass somewhere he could sober up before he tried to drive.
The rage that had built inside me during the confrontation needed somewhere to go, so I channeled it into deep, measured breaths. In prison, uncontrolled anger was a one-way ticket to solitary -- or worse. Out here, it wasn’t much different. The last thing these women needed was to see me lose control, even in defense of them.
When I was certain my face showed nothing of the storm inside, I turned and re-entered the common area. The shelter coordinator gave me a small nod of thanks before disappearing down a hallway, probably to check on the woman with the cast. But it was Zelda’s reaction that caught me off guard.
She stood apart from her mother and sister, her small frame tense but her eyes alive with something I hadn’t seen there before. Now in addition to her wariness, a kind of fierce curiosity showed in her expression. She studied me openly, her gaze tracking from my hands to my face and back again, as if looking to see if I’d fought the guy. While anyone in this room could see out through the large picture window, it was one-way glass. The front was blacked out and looked decorative instead of what it actually was. If she’d watched, she knew I hadn’t fought the guy, but she still looked like she didn’t quite believe I hadn’t settled the problem without violence of some kind.
Across the room, Penny’s gaze met mine. The fear that had shadowed her expression earlier had shifted, not gone but different now. There was gratitude there, yes, but something else too. Maybe a reassessment of me. The look of someone seeing past the surface to something familiar underneath. Story of my life, except most people didn’t bother to look deeper.