Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 56651 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 227(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56651 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 227(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
“That son-of-a-bitch.”
“You are mad.”
“Not at you,” I said, pushing away from the tree. Putting some space between us. “Never at you.”
And then I strode across little beach and punched a massive oak tree so hard it cracked.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Jack
“Calm down,” I said, watching as Drake wore a groove into the goddamned floor. He was pacing around the cabin like a caged tiger. He was so furious he was actually vibrating.
Drake wasn’t just mad. Drake was dangerous.
Thankfully, the girls were outside so none of them had to see him like this. I knew he would never hurt any of the people on the compound. But I was still uneasy having him so close to the women and children.
“Calm down, or I will remove you,” I added.
All I had gotten so far was that something more had happened with the creep who broke into Dana’s apartment. That Drake was furious that Cain’s team still hadn’t found anything. That he had lost his temper and punched a tree. Cracked a tree in half, apparently.
The worst part of it, from what I could gather from his ranting, was that Dana had stopped talking to him.
“He fucking touched her!” He growled at me. My eyebrows shot up. Nobody dared to raise their voice to me. Not even Lucky, back in his wild days. Not even Callaway at his drunkest and highest. Not even a crazy ass motherfucker like Drake.
Not even Dev.
But Dev wasn’t the sort to yell at anyone. I could only think of one circumstance under which he had lost his shit. And it was a doozy. It was the time another man had touched Dev’s woman and he had been stuck in jail by the same fucker who dared lay hands on sweet little Kaylie…
I sighed, feeling the echo of a similar helpless rage rise up in me. I understood the feeling. I had torn through a rival club with my bare hands when they had messed with Jan.
That club didn’t even exist anymore. I had ended them. And Cain had cleaned up the remnants of the club after we uncovered their human trafficking operation at the massage parlor.
The only difference was, I had known who the target was. Drake had no idea. And so far, Cain hadn’t come up with squat. There was nowhere and no one to focus his rage on. So it was going everywhere.
Not good. Not good at all.
“You are dripping blood all over my nice newly finished floor, buddy,” Devlin said mildly.
Drake froze, looking down at his hand and cursed.
“Sorry,” he muttered, grabbing some paper towels and wrapping it around his knuckles where he’d split them open.
“Next time, try hitting something less solid than oak,” Whiskey offered helpfully, but he was grinning. It was kind of funny. But unlike the rest of the guys, I wasn’t laughing.
“Yeah, like a tank or something,” Lucky joked.
Tank raised his eyebrows but said nothing. He’d already squabbled with Drake. They had squashed their beef right away like true brothers, but they were kind like of oil and water. Total opposites in terms of temperament and personality. So another fight always seemed to be brewing.
Wisely, today Tank chose to keep his mouth shut.
“Hey man, I didn’t say ‘Tank’ I said ‘a tank’,” Lucky guffawed. “Next time I will say ‘an armored combat vehicle’.”
Nobody else laughed.
“You are all way too touchy,” Lucky said, looking disgruntled.
“Bad choice of words,” Donnie said in warning. Right before Drake barreled into Lucky and started beating him senseless.
“Outside! Outside,” Dev roared, raising his voice just short of a shout.
The two men ignored him, already locked in tangle of arms and fists.
Whiskey and I exchanged glances, then each took one of the brawlers by the neck and lifted them out of the house and onto the porch. Then we dropped their asses so that they fell down the stairs into the gravel parking lot.
They were up on their feet and fighting again in less than ten seconds. Thankfully the cars and motorcycles were parked far enough away that the two of them had plenty of room to rumble.
Tank and Drake might be opposites, but Lucky and Drake were two peas in a pod. Loud, rude, and fucking hilarious. As long as neither one was taking aim at you.
They were both good guys, loyal to the bone, but both were pains in my goddamn ass.
“Two gladiators in the fucking arena. Fighting each other instead of the real fucking enemy,” Tank said disapprovingly. I gave him a look and murmured to him how I remembered him getting into a brawl with Drake not that many weeks before. In my workshop, in fact. He nodded and cracked the tiniest sliver of a smile.
“Point taken. But he is a pain in the ass.”
“Drake, you are a jackass,” Mac called out.
“Lucky, you are a jackass, too,” Nick added amiably. Nick was pretty much always in a good mood. With Melissa by his side, how could he not be?