LUST: A Bad Boy and Amish Girl Romance (The Brody Bunch Book 2) (17 page)

Rubbing his ear, Ash frowned at me. “I can explain…”

“You made a bet?” I asked him, point-black, locking him in my stare. “You made a bet with your brothers, about
my
sisters, and you didn’t think to tell me?!” I threw my arms up. “What the fuck, Ash?”

“Look,” he said, taking my hands gently in his own, “I know you’re upset. I don’t blame you. It was a really, really bad idea. And I wish I could take it back. I really do. But my brothers… I’m sorry to say it, but they’re your typical alpha bros. They needed an incentive, and competition… it was a convenient one.”

From the other side of me, Wyatt scoffed. “Hey, speak for yourself. Some of us would’ve been happy to do a good deed right from the get go. Nice to know what you think of us, though.”

I shook my head at them both. “I can’t believe you did this. I mean, I
can
believe it, and that’s what’s pissing me off most—but shit, Ash, look what it’s done! Sarah is back there, right now, telling Beth everything. And if she finds out…”

I trailed off, glancing again at Wyatt. His adorable face was way more somber now.

“She won’t want anything to do with me,” he said, taking a sip from the beer in his hand. “Ever.”

Shit. The poor kid really did have it bad. He seemed so genuinely smitten with Beth. I saw the flash of hurt in his eyes just before he covered it up with a stoic scowl, averting his attention to the tree line where the girls had disappeared.

I looked up at Ash. “There’s gotta be something we can do.”

“We can come clean,” he offered, folding his arms with a shrug. “Try to tell Beth the truth before Sarah does.”

I shook my head. “I don’t even know how much Sarah knows. Did you ever get a hold of Reid?” Just saying the bastard’s name made me want to spit. “Did he have anything at all to say for himself?”

“No,” Ash said, producing his phone. I flinched with shame. It looked horrible, and it was all my fault. “Battery’s dead. I can try calling him, though, as long as I can use yours.”

I forked it over. It was only fair. “Hopefully he picks up. He didn’t even come outside to sit with Sarah or make sure she was okay. Can you believe that?”

“I can,” Wyatt muttered. He sounded none too pleased about it.

With a sigh, Ash dialed Reid’s number. He must have picked up, because a moment later, Ash hissed, “What the fuck, dude? What the hell happened between you and Sarah?” A pause, and then he huffed. “I would have, but my phone’s fucked.” A slight glance at me made me flush with embarrassment all over again. I mouthed
sorry,
and he continued. “This is Hannah’s. So you’re gonna have to tell me the story all over again: what the fuck, dude?”

They went back and forth like that for a while. Ash was pacing, ripping Reid a new one with such ferocity it was downright glorious. He didn’t pull any punches. He didn’t tell any more lies. He went after Reid like a shark in bloody waters, and internally, I reveled in the knowledge that the douche wasn’t getting off easy.

During one of the long pauses where Reid was, I assumed, doing his best to snipe right back at Ash, I let my gaze drift to the wooded area where Sarah and Beth were. I fidgeted with the neckline of my shirt, wondering what they were saying—wondering if maybe I should go in there and try to smooth things over. Wyatt certainly looked like he was ready to leap into action at any moment. There was a desperation that kept his expression taut, and I felt genuinely bad that he might lose everything he and Beth had shared over his older brothers’ pissing contest.

“I’m sorry,” I said to him, “for what it’s worth. You and Beth… it really seems like you have something special.”

Wyatt shifted his shoulders in the ghost of a shrug. “Had,” he corrected me. Then he took another pull of his beer.

I looked away from him just in time to see movement in the underbrush, not far off. I stiffened, expecting to see an irate Beth come charging out of there like a rhino at any moment, headed right for us as she spewed a wave of expletives Wyatt had probably taught her during their time together. I knew from experience what a spitfire she was, and I was dreading her wrath almost as much as I was dreading the heartbreak that would undoubtedly come after it.

As expected, Beth and Sarah did come out of the woods. But to my horror, they didn’t come alone.

I grabbed Ash hard, directing his attention to the trees. “Ash… look!”

Following close behind my sisters were three men I didn’t recognize, all of them tatted up, stuffed full of muscle, and looking mean as a pack of wild dogs. And at the head of them was one man I did recognize. His face brought a nauseating wave of dread to wash over me, leaving clammy hands and hairs that stood on end in its wake.

It was a man my father had hired before. Hired to track me down, and hired for way worse things than that.

Revulsion nearly brought me to my knees. My biggest fear was coming true.

“
Y
ou sure
you can’t fix it?” I asked.

I’d spent the most infuriating couple minutes on the phone with Reid, trying to figure out just how much damage his stupid mouth had gotten us into now. He was already on his way back from the cabin as well, leaving shortly after the girls. Apparently, he’d been leaving me a voicemail telling me he was calling the bet off when Sarah walked in on him and heard everything. She’d been rightfully upset, Reid had acted like a jackass the way he always does, and now Sarah was on the warpath, determined to tell her little sister what giant fuck-ups the Brodys were.

Right then, that was exactly how I felt. After all, I had orchestrated this. It was my idea to come up with some “clever” ruse rather than just tell my brothers I knew some girls who needed a little protection. It was my exceedingly low opinion of Reid that had brought us to this point. If I hadn’t been so interested in taking him down a peg—if our years-long rivalry hadn’t influenced me in the childish way it did—maybe none of this would have happened. Maybe we’d all have ended up better off.

I had to take responsibility for my part in all this. Just… not right now. Not when Reid was, to my shock, so very close to a breakthrough of his own.

I’d started off screaming at him, obviously. It was how we communicated—through rage and mutual disappointment. But as our frustration escalated, Reid had said something to me I’ll never forget. Something that made him, in my mind, irrevocably human instead of the egotistical parody of a man I’d made him out to be.

“I ruined
everything,
” he’d said, his voice tight with emotion. “I fucked up Sarah’s life. I fucked up my life. I made the only good thing I had going for me slip away, practically kicked her right out the fucking door, because I was way more interested in being an alpha douchebag than a human goddamn being. She looked at me like I hung the fucking moon in the sky, and I
looked away
. I spat on heaven because I was so used to being in hell, and you don’t just come back from that, Ash. That’s a sin you have to live with
for the rest of your life
.”

There was nothing I could say to that. It had taken me so completely off guard I couldn’t even come up with a sincere reply, let alone an unduly snarky one. Reid Brody had grown a conscience, after all this time. I wouldn’t have believed it, had I not heard it with my own two ears.

After a few moments of silence, he’d added, “It’s not something I can fix. I get that, too. But the brotherly thing to do here would be not to rub that in my face, because I didn’t just screw up a stupid pretend bet. I screwed up that poor girl’s life—and my own.”

Knowing he was right—knowing that I needed to treat him better, if I was going to expect better from him—I’d merely asked, “You sure you can’t fix it?”

Reid heaved a sigh. He seemed so uncharacteristically despondent. When we’d started this thing, I hadn’t expected any of us to actually fall in love with these girls. But even so, the one I’d always suspected least capable of it was Reid. Yet right now, faced with the possibility of losing Sarah, I could hear in his voice that maybe he’d fallen the hardest of all. Maybe even for the very first time.

“I dunno, man,” he said. “I really don’t know…”

I was going to make an attempt to say something comforting when Hannah grabbed my arm, fiercely, and said, “Ash… look!”

When I followed her gaze to the tree line, I saw immediately what had turned her face such a pale shade. Sarah and Beth were being chased out of the woods by four hulking meatheads, one of whom I’d seen before.

It was the security guard from the carnival. The one who’d hauled Tanya away.

What the fuck?!

I didn’t have too much time to think about it. There were bigger problems—and how close those men were to Beth and Sarah was at the top of my list.

“Either way, bro, you need to get over here,” I said, adrenaline propelling me forward at a breakneck pace. “Fast!”

Before Reid could answer, I hung up the phone and shoved it in my pocket. I didn’t have time for niceties.

Wyatt wasn’t far behind me. I could hear him moving through the grass, charging ahead like a panther after its prey, the snarl in his breath distinctly feral. I wondered if these idiots had any idea the monster they’d provoked in him, or in me.

They were about to find out.

“The fuck is this?” I said, stopping a few paces away from the men. I held out an arm to stop Wyatt from jumping right into the fray; I didn’t want to risk Sarah or Beth getting hurt. I locked eyes with the security guard from the carnival. “What the hell are you doing here, man? You need to back off.”

“I’m not here for your bitch, Ash,” he said, spitting on the ground at the mere mention of Hannah. Already, I could feel something dark uncoiling inside me, threatening to spring at him and snap its jaws right around his throat. “I’m here for these two.”

“Like hell you are,” I growled, pushing him hard on his chest. Hannah had caught up to us and was trying to pull the girls away, but this asshole looked ready to go after them. “Leave them the fuck alone.”

He pushed me in return, his pack of thugs stepping forward to remind me we were outnumbered. “This ain’t your fight, Brody,” he said, ugly teeth bared beneath a nose that looked like it had been broken a dozen times before. “Let it go.”

“The fuck we will!” Wyatt chimed in, advancing to get in the asshole’s face. I almost pulled him back. If anyone was going to beat this bastard to death, it was gonna be me.

But we were in one hell of a spot. Four of them, all made out of muscle and hate, against the two of us? Shit. This wasn’t going to be easy. Maybe not even doable. I took a breath and prepared for the worst, summoning my deepest, darkest anger to give us an advantage.

There was no alternative. I couldn’t let Hannah, or Sarah or Beth, suffer any more than they already had. I steeled myself for the pain, squared my shoulders, and got ready for the worst.

And that’s when Reid showed up.

“The fuck is going on here?” he roared as he approached, nearly shoulder-checking me out of the way. I narrowed my eyes at him, but now was not the time. He was not my enemy, and shit, part of me was even glad to see him. “I know you, fuckface. You’re the bastard who grabbed Sarah at the carnival. Is this what you do, huh? Creep around, grabbin’ girls? You some kind of pervert?”

I stared at Reid. The same guy had tried to grab Sarah?

How long had he been stalking them?

And then I realized… this guy was obviously responsible for some of Hannah’s pain. The only reason he could be tracking her and her sisters is if he knew them, and the only ones that knew them were people involved with their life back home. Which meant this guy wanted to inflict more pain, and not just on her, but on her Sarah and Beth. This guy was going to try to take them back to a place where fucking rapists ruled. I thought of what Hannah had endured and my stomach rolled with bile, but it was enough to give me purpose, to make me believe that no matter the odds, I could at least take
this
asshole down.

And when I did, he wasn’t gonna get back up. I’d make sure of it.

“I’m here on business,” Asshole gritted. He didn’t even bat an eye when Reid got in his face. “But what that is, is none of yours.”

“When it comes to my woman, you bein’ an asshole is definitely my business,” Reid replied, shoving him back. Asshole stumbled, just barely, but it looked like Reid had flexed pretty hard just to be able to move him. “The hell could you want with her? She’s Amish, for Christ’s sakes!”

Asshole scowled. “I’m well aware of what, and who, she is. That’s why we’re here. And if you don’t get out of our way, we’re going to have to stop playing nice and
make
you.”

“Tough talk, coming from a man whose momma should’ve swallowed,” Wyatt snapped. “Beth—dial 911 on your phone.”

I saw Reid give him an incredulous look. Wyatt was the hothead out of the three of us, and hearing him suggest getting the police involved must’ve confused the hell out of Reid. It was a stark reminder of the divide I’d placed between us when I made this stupid bet. All the trouble it had caused since then. All the misery.

Beth flipped her phone open. The moment she did, Asshole was lunging at her.

“You’re not calling anyone,” he snarled.

Before he got anywhere near her, I grabbed the back of his shirt and yanked. Hard. “And you’re not fucking touching her.”

Asshole threw an elbow at me. It connected with my teeth, splitting my lip and filling my mouth with the taste of my own blood.

After that… things get a little blurry.

I remember sounds. Sarah screaming. Reid and Wyatt yelling. The sounds of a scuffle, of fists landing on flesh, of swearing and kicking and grunts of pain. I don’t remember getting hit again after that first time, but in retrospect I must have, because I came out of that fight with way more going on than just a busted lip.

That was fine. I’d take whatever injury I had to as long as I could make this asshole pay. That thought consumed me like a flame, and the darkness inside me was suddenly in my hands, and my hands were fists burying themselves in the fact of the man who was responsible for all this pain and terror.

“Ash!” Hannah was screaming, but she sounded so far away. “Ash, you have to fucking stop!
You’re killing him!
”

And I was. I was sure I was. Asshole was down on the ground and I was on his chest, and I just kept hitting him, again and again. It felt so good. So right. It felt like every blow I landed might heal Hannah just a little, might take away some of the anguish she’d lived with all these years because of him. Because of her father. Because of everyone who’d ever taken advantage of her. Everyone who’d ever made her afraid or made her cry.

I was doing this for her. And I knew it’d be a long damn time before any of these punches made up for even a fraction of what she’d been through. No way Asshole could withstand that. Hannah was right. I was going to kill him.

And all I could think was:
Good.

I have flashes of what I did. That’s it. Small memories that blink in and out of the fog of rage that consumed me. I remember breaking Asshole’s nose in more ways than one. I remember loosening teeth, feeling them rip into my knuckles but not giving one good goddamn. I remember, distinctly, the way one of his cheekbones caved in, and the wet sucking sound he made as he tried to breathe through all that blood pooling in his throat.

And then I remember Reid grabbing my shoulder. “Dude. That’s enough, man. Get off him.”

I pushed him off and hit Asshole again, this time in the skull. I wondered how many punches it would take with my bare, bloody knuckles to crack it. I was willing to find out.

How many hits will it take to get to the center?

“I’m gonna fucking murder you,” I told him. I remember there was no affectation in my voice when I said it. This fury was cold. I just wanted him to know he wasn’t getting out of this. This was the end of the line for Asshole. He’d never hurt anybody ever again.

But then Wyatt and Reid were grabbing me, hooking their arms under mine, around my chest, and bodily pulling me off. Real quick, that icy hate bloomed into an uncontrollable fire.

“No!” I screamed, kicking at Asshole’s broken body, flailing and trying to rip myself away from my brothers. How could they betray me like this? How could they keep me from doing what I was supposed to do? “No, you stupid fuckers! He has to die!
He has to
!”

“He’s not worth it, man,” Wyatt said, ducking under my arm as I swung wildly, determined to claw my way back to Asshole lying ever so still on the ground. “You really wanna spend your whole life in jail?”

“Well, actually,” Reid said from my other side, “I’m pretty sure he could plead self-defense.”

“Oh my God,” Wyatt hissed. “You are not helping!”

It took what seemed like an eternity to get to a place where I could think of anything but murder. Longer still until I could speak like a human being and not like the animal I’d become for Hannah. My muscles were tight, threatening to burst from my skin if I tensed any harder. I’d quit smoking when I got custody of my brothers, but damn, I would’ve sold my soul for a cigarette right about then.

“We got ‘em,” Reid said as I paced, raking my bloody fingers through my hair, pushing it out of my face and hoping that would help me see straight again. “All right, man? We got ‘em.”

“Yeah, Ash,” Wyatt agreed, holding up his hands in a disarming gesture. “Breathe, okay? Calm down.” That was rich, coming from him.

“I can’t,” I panted, spitting blood to clear my aching throat. I turned from both him and Reid, pointing to Asshole’s body still unmoving near the trees. “I can’t fucking calm down while that
piece of shit
is still breathing.”

“You’re gonna have to,” Reid said, putting his hand on my shoulder and directing my attention to the girl. “Look at her. Jesus, you scared the shit out of her.”

Slowly, I dragged my gaze to Hannah’s. She had her arms around her sisters but she stared at me, wide-eyed, that pretty jade color looking pale even in the sun. And just like that, she took the fight out of me. Just like that, I realized how far I’d gone. How much farther I was willing to go. What a goddamn monster I’d become.

“I made her a promise,” I whispered so only Reid and Wyatt could hear me. “I said I’d protect her. Keep her safe.”

“I don’t think you gotta worry about that anymore,” Wyatt said, jutting his bloodied chin at the men once more. “Look at them, Ash. They’re toast. We did a number on ‘em. We
won.
”

Funny how it didn’t feel like a victory. Even as I watched the trio of thugs start picking themselves up from the ground, covered in blood—most of it their own—dirt, and bruises, there was no sense of triumph for me. There was just emptiness, a hollow void that made me feel like, regardless of how hard I’d tried… somehow, I’d failed Hannah. And the girls.

“Shit,” I said, turning and looking at my brothers in the face for the first time. I noted their many injuries, including the deep gash over Wyatt’s eyebrow that was definitely going to leave a scar. “You two look like hell.”