The club had made up their mind.
It was over.
Chapter Sixteen
~ BEAST~
Belle pulled away so suddenly she stumbled backwards, and this time I let her go. The look in her eyes was one I knew well. I’d seen it on many a man’s face once they realized that their time was up. That their brief moment on this earth had come to an end. She stared at me, naked, chest heaving, hair wild, cheeks damp, and I thought that she was going to crack—to break down and start begging.
There were two things in this world that I hated more than anything: cowards that begged for their life, and traitors. She’d checked off one of those boxes, and I was just waiting for the other. But she didn’t. Belle smoothed back her hair and reached for her clothes, putting those beautiful tits away behind her lacy bra. She pulled on her T-shirt and slipped on her skirt, all the while her eyes darting between me and the door.
I’d seen that look too, and I already knew she was going to try to run, but she wouldn’t get far.
Belle sat down on the edge of my bed, reaching for her sandals that had slid under it. As she pushed her foot into one, I noted how pretty her feet were. Small, like really small, perfect pink nail polish, and a small ankle chain, and as ridiculous as it sounds, I thought to myself how sad it was that she wouldn’t ever get to use those pretty feet to walk on a beach again. Or to let the sea wash over her toes. Or how she wouldn’t paint those toenails any other color. They’d just be pink, forever, until those toes rotted away.
“I’m ready,” Belle said, suddenly standing in front of me, looking up into my face. She seemed smaller than normal. Her shoulders rounded, her back hunched, like she was trying to curl in on herself. She’d wrapped her hair up in a knot thingy on top of her head, and I thought about how I’d never wrap it around my hand again. I’d never feel how soft it was against my chest or move it from her neck so I could kiss a path to her collarbone.
I turned to the door, pushing all of those thoughts away. It didn’t matter—none of it mattered.
She was a traitor to the club, and to me. None of this was real. I’d been played because I’d been weak, but that would never happen again.
“What happens next?” she asked, her voice so soft it sounded like a whisper in my head. I turned back to her.
“We’re just going to talk,” I said, my words devoid of emotion.
To her credit, she didn’t cry, even though she knew I was lying. She knew what was coming and she was trying to make peace with it. Fuck, I hadn’t realized how strong she was. I’d had grown men on their knees begging for their lives by this point. But I could see by the look on her face that she was done crying, and she was not going to beg.
“Beast.” She said my name, and I realized that I’d been looking over her shoulder instead of at her. “Look at me,” she said, so I did.
I looked at Belle, summoning the man I used to be. The enforcer. The human weapon. The Devil’s best friend. I summoned him to help me through this as I looked down at Belle, and then she did something I hadn’t expected.
She fucking smiled at me.
Not an aha, fuck you kind of smile either, but a smile that said she understood.
“Don’t do that,” I growled, hating her for smiling. Hating her for not begging. Hating her for putting me in this position in the first place. “Why the fuck did you get yourself mixed up in all of this, Belle? Why couldn’t you just do your job, get me healthy, and then go back to your life?”
I felt the rage that had lived inside of me for the past year crawl out of its hole, breathing new life into me. She stared up at me helplessly, her eyes wide, her smile falling, and I just wanted to fucking shake her. Hit her. Slap her. Fuck her. I wanted her to know what a fucking waste her life had been because of all of this. How she’d screwed everything up for herself. Everything that could have been, and everything that should have been.
The anger grew and grew, wrapping tendrils of fury around my heart with every breath I took until I couldn’t look at her anymore, I had to get away, but the moment I stepped outside that door it was over, so I just stood there, burning away in a vat of boiling rage as she stared up at me, looking fucking perfect.
“It’s not how it seems, Beast,” she replied, a frown pulling between her eyebrows. She shrugged and looked away. “It’s not always so black and white.”
I grabbed her then, one hand on either arm, and I shook her, my fury bursting at the seams. “It is always black and fuckin’ white, Belle. Always!” I roared, infuriated by her naivety. “The fact that you can’t see that is exactly how you got yourself in this position in the first place.”
I shoved her away from me, her skin under my hands feeling like fire. Like I was being burned alive all over again. My body itched and ached, my muscles throbbed and my head pounded. And the gun in my waistband felt like molten lava as it touched my skin.
She was fucking stupid. So motherfucking stupid.
“Beast,” she started, but I glared back at her and her jaw snapped shut.
“We need to go,” I bit out, hating her for making me do this.
I wished she would beg so I could hate her some more.
I wished she would plead with me so I could tell her no.
I wished she would cry so I could laugh in her face.
I wanted her to hate me like I hated her right now.
But she didn’t do any of those things, despite the fact that I could see her jaw was clenched as she tried to stop her teeth from chattering and I could see that her knees were knocking together as she tried her best to contain the tremble in them. No, Belle took a deep breath and looked down at the ground and I turned from her and opened the door, ready to take her to meet her maker.
Out in the clubhouse, my brothers were sitting, waiting.
There was no anger or resentment with them. If anything, there was sadness in all of them. None of them liked this outcome any more than I did, but it was the way of our world and it had to be done. Traitors had to pay.
Shooter stood up when he saw us, and Gauge and Rider and Dom all did the same. They had beers open in front of them, but no one had been drinking. The sweetbutts and the old ladies had been sent home and told not to come back, and most of my brothers were out on jobs. So it was just us and Belle and no way out.
I heard her stop momentarily and I thought, This is it. This is where she freaks out and tries to run, tries to fight back. She’ll start begging and crying and pleading. She’ll try to explain her way out of this, but there’s no explaining. She’s a fucking traitor and she’s going to get what’s coming to her.
Death.
It comes for us all in the end.
Death was inevitable.
Belle started to walk again, passing me and heading toward Shooter. Gauge watched her, his dark eyes full of the same coldness I no doubt held in mine.
“So,” Belle said to Shooter, “what happens now?”
Shooter looked at her calmly before taking a deep breath and sighing. He glanced over her shoulder at me, holding my gaze momentarily before looking back at Belle.
“We need you to call Lorenzo,” he said. “Tell him to meet you at an address at a certain time.”
“And then?” she pressed.
“Then we’ll make it quick.”