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His jaw flexes, irritation clear on his face. “I know.”
I shrug. “Consider it handled.”
I’m not close to any of these guys. We aren’t exactly the type of men to have planned jobs. More often than not, we don’t work well with others. I know calling him and offering this opportunity has more to do with Alani than it does anything else.
My skin is still too tight, the fucking gall that man had to touch her making my rage barely containable. I knew she was in danger, and as much as I warned her that her behavior was going to land her in some fucked-up situation, it didn’t happen until she made the decision to get her shit together.
“Ayla’s going to have questions.”
“I couldn’t get much out of him. I think he’s either new or extremely low on the fucking hierarchy.”
“Not about him,” he counters. “About her sister.”
I pull my eyes from his face, shifting some on my feet and angling my body further away. I don’t want to talk about Alani with anyone. I have a million questions, too, and I have zero answers for any of them.
“I’m not responsible for her.”
“Aren’t you though?” he asks, turning to look at me.
I keep my eyes locked on the street. If he tries to pull the older sister’s boyfriend and I’m just here to protect them both kind of shit on me, this morning is going to take one hell of a turn.
“She had a smile on her face when she cut that man.”
Just the reminder manages to turn me on.
“How long has she been doing this shit with you?”
I scoff. “Alani hasn’t seen me in months until last night.”
“She hasn’t seen you? But you’ve seen her?”
“I don’t have to explain myself to you, Nash. I called you over here for this guy because I didn’t know if it would help you with some form of fucking closure. I know a little about traumatic histories, but it wasn’t an open invitation for you to stick your nose in my business.”
“You need to ask her to leave.”
I clamp my lips closed. I dropped her off on his fucking porch several months ago, and all she did was turn right back around and get in the truck.
“No one tells her what to do. I’m sure you’ve figured that out already. She won’t listen to me. The best I can tell you is that I won’t ask her to stay.”
“She’ll read your silence as an invitation to stay.”
“And she’s still in fucking danger. She needs to be protected.”
“Like you protected her the first time you were asked?”
My fingers crack as I fist them at my sides. The night I met her was one of the most frustrating yet also rewarding nights of my life. It kicked off my obsession with her, and nothing else that I’ve tried has managed to calm that voice inside of me the way being around her does.
“I won’t ask her to stay,” I repeat before turning around and heading back into the house.
“I’ll be fine,” Alani says to her sister when I step into the living room.
Ayla looks at me, silent begging in her eyes. She wants me to tell her sister to leave, and I know Nash is right. If I don’t force her out of here, she’s not going to go.
My silence works in my favor, and Alani’s footsteps fall into line with mine when I head back down the hallway.
I expect Nash and Ayla to leave, but as I enter the blood-coated room, I hear them chatting quietly in the living room.
“Will you kill him?” Alani asks.
“Do you want him to live?”
Her eyes search mine, and I want to tell her that her answer shouldn’t depend on what I think.
“Would it make any difference?”
I give her a light smile and shake my head.
“I didn’t think so.”
“Do you want to kill him?”
Her eyes dart from me to the man. He’s silent now, his head hung low between his shoulders. He isn’t quite dead yet. His chest is still inflating some, but he doesn’t have long. He’s slowly bleeding to death. If we were to just walk out and leave him here, I imagine he’d be dead in an hour, but I have no intention of leaving him to die that way.
“He hurt me,” she whispers, her eyes locked on him. “I should want to, right?”
“I can’t tell you how to feel.”
She takes a step closer to him but doesn’t reach for any of the tools that would get the job done. I swear I’ll nut in my jeans if she wraps her hands around his throat and looks him the eyes as he struggles to breathe.
“I don’t think I want to kill him.”
“You don’t want to kill him or you don’t want him dead?” Just like she predicted, her answer won’t matter, but I’d like to know where her head is at.
