My eyes didn’t stay on the dead man long. Lifting my gaze back to Max, I was just in time to see him turn the gun on Navarro, and he pumped his trigger finger twice, putting a bullet in the man’s chest and then his head.
He moved like lightning, popping my uncle in the head so quickly, I barely had time to take it in before the floor was littered with dead bodies. And all at the hands of the man I loved.
The whole thing took less than five seconds. Not giving Uncle Tony or Navarro time to react or defend themselves before they were dead at Max’s feet. If I had blinked, I was sure I would have missed the entire incident and would have questioned who was responsible for their deaths. Even though I’d watched everything as it happened as if it were a movie played in super-slow motion, I still wasn’t completely sure I’d actually seen what I had.
Dropping his hand that still held the gun, he turned those metallic blues on me, his chest heaving with each breath he took as the house filled with other people, all of them with their guns drawn. Ben, then Theo, and several men I didn’t recognize in suits were shouting, from what I could tell with how their mouths were moving, but I barely paid them any attention as I kept my focus on Max.
He’d killed all three of those men like it was nothing. He hadn’t flinched, hadn’t even hesitated as he pulled the trigger over and over again with such confidence, I knew he’d killed before.
I’d thought my Max was sweet and kind, gentle.
Now, I saw that he had been hiding a totally different side of himself. One that I couldn’t wrap my head around.
There was blood on his face from where he’d blown not one, but three men’s brains out. It made his face look wilder, almost feral, as he stepped toward me. Reflexively, I took a step back, unable to fully accept what I’d just witnessed firsthand.
Had I been blind during the entire time I’d known Max?
Or was he just that good at hiding this part of himself?
And more importantly…
Why wasn’t I even a little scared of him now that I knew what he was capable of?
22
Max
I couldn’t fucking breathe.
The drive back to Creswell Springs had taken half the time with how fast I drove, but it felt like it took forever. During the drive, Ben called ahead, telling Lexa to be ready in case someone showed up to take Delaney. Once my sister knew the possible danger, he’d called Dad, and they were supposed to watch the house, but from a distance.
They knew I wanted to deal with Garcia myself. Dad promised he wouldn’t intervene unless they tried to take Delaney or someone started shooting. I knew my sister and Ryan would protect those in the house if it came down to it, but just the idea of Delaney being in harm’s way was enough to steal the air from my chest.
Putting an end to whoever the fuck the supplier was, then the guy I suspected was Navarro, and finally, the fucker who was supposed to protect my treasure for all those years but never had, gave me an all-too-brief moment of satisfaction. And then I took one look at Delaney, realized what I’d just shown her about myself, and knew from the expression on her beautiful face that it was very possible I could still lose her.
I took one step toward her, and she backed away, practically cowering against Ryan as he steadied her.
My heart lifted into my throat, choking me as I took a chance and held out my free hand to her.
She looked down at it, then at the one still holding the gun that only moments before had fired the bullets that took the lives of three men right in front of her. Her forehead wrinkled with how tight her brows pinched together, as if she didn’t know what to do.
I didn’t breathe—couldn’t fucking breathe—as I waited to see if she would take my hand. I’d never wanted her to know about this part of me, and there was no way of hiding it or even taking it back now. Not when some motherfucker had been there to snatch her away from me. I would have done it again, over and over, if it meant she was safe and still standing there where she belonged.
Not where she belonged, I reminded myself.
Where she truly belonged was in my arms, and she had yet to move so much as an inch in my direction.
But then she inhaled sharply and launched herself at me. I dropped the gun, catching her with both hands as she locked her legs around my waist and wrapped her arms around my neck. I was finally able to draw in a deep enough breath, and I sucked in one lungful after another, filling my senses with her sweet scent as she sobbed into my neck.
“Max,” she cried my name, her small body trembling.
I rocked her in my arms, trying to reassure myself that she was safe now. Garcia was no longer a threat. No one was ever going to try to take her from me again.
While I held my treasure, everyone else was moving around quickly, already cleaning up the mess I’d made. Behind me, the flashing lights of other cop cruisers filled the driveway. Smartly, Dad and the rest of my MC brothers stayed in the shadows of wherever they were positioned, keeping watch over my sister’s house. Ben spoke to one of his deputies, telling him whatever story he had come up with to explain away the dead bodies at my feet.
It wasn’t the first time he’d had to come up with something on the fly to cover for a dead body I was responsible for. And given that the dead men were all known felons, the deputies didn’t really look too hard to see if what their boss told them was the truth or not.
Lexa walked over to me, untucking the Glock she must have stuffed into the back of her pajama bottoms when Ben had called her earlier. Handing it to her husband, she kissed him long and hard before touching her hand to Delaney’s back.
When my girl lifted her head, Lexa gave her a small smile. “You okay?” she signed.
Delaney paused for a moment before nodding.
“Good,” my sister said with a sigh. “I was scared I was going to have to put a bullet in those bozos myself if Max hadn’t gotten here in time. You were going to go with these creeps to save us, but sweetheart, you need to understand that we never would have let anything happen to you or anyone else. You are one of us now. Understand?”
“I’m starting to,” Delaney responded, releasing her hold on my neck, trusting me to hold on to her as she signed. “Maybe if someone had let me know what he was really like, I wouldn’t have questioned everyone’s sanity around here. I mean, I thought you were all just these sweet but kind of gullible idiots for thinking you could take on Uncle Tony. I had no clue you were all badasses with your own arsenal.”
Smirking, Lexa winked at me. “I guess someone thought he would scare you off if you knew the truth.”
I glared at her, but I kept my mouth shut. She wasn’t wrong, so I didn’t have a good enough defense to fire back at her.
Delaney’s soft fingers trailed over the back of my neck soothingly. I leaned into her touch, needing it more than anything else right then. “Maybe he would have,” she signed after a moment, her eyes caressing over my face. “If he hadn’t shown me the softer side of himself first.”
Having her reassurance that I hadn’t scared her off eased a little more of my tension. I didn’t know what I would have done if she hadn’t wanted anything more to do with me after seeing what I was capable of, but I knew my world would have been dark without her.