After applying some fresh makeup, I pulled my hair up off my face and into a high ponytail, realizing that I looked almost normal again, like I hadn’t gone through hell in the past twenty-four hours. That I hadn’t had my heart broken and my life shattered over and over.
It was time to take account of my actions and make some things right. Because if Mateo and Carlos did kill me, I needed Jenna to know that none of this was her fault. That I loved her more than anything or anyone else, and that she was more than enough. If I could have picked anyone to be my mom, it would always be her.
I picked up my purse and opened my bedroom door, passing through the small kitchen to find Beast sitting topless, his burn cream soaking into his skin. He looked like he was in pain, and the nurse in me wanted to ask him if he was okay, but I couldn’t—not if I wanted to keep my self-respect.
He looked up at me as I got close, his eyes widening as he looked me up and down. His tongue darted out to lick his lips and I watched his chest heave on a deep sigh.
“You calmed down now?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at me.
I ignored his comment, because it was only said to irritate me further and I was sick of his games. Sick of him, even as my heart longed for him. That was the thing with love: even when you knew it was bad for you, that it would likely be the death of you, you couldn’t help but feel it. Love wasn’t something you could turn on and off like a tap. It was a broken dam that wouldn’t stop flowing. It burst its banks and touched every part of you, destroying parts of you in its path.
“I need to go see Jenna,” I replied coolly.
“Thought we were going to get your mom from the slammer.” He scowled.
“We are, but first I need to see Jenna. You can stay here if you want, I don’t care.”
I did care.
And I hated him even more for that.
Beast stood and picked up his T-shirt and cut, pulling his tee over his head and then sliding his cut over his shoulders. I watched him wince with every movement.
“Not that I care because you are an awful human being, but have you taken your meds today?” I popped a hand on my hip and feigned indifference.
“Trying to cut back on them,” he grunted, picking up his bike keys.
I pointed a finger in his direction. “First, I’m not getting on that bike of yours—we’re taking my car, and second, that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Your body is still healing and you’re still in pain, so take your painkillers.”
Beast stood there staring at me like I had not one head or two, but maybe a whole orgy of heads just popping up out of my shoulders. He stared at me like he didn’t quite know who I was, and I didn’t blame him because I hardly recognized her either. But that’s the thing when you have nothing left to lose: you become someone else.
“If I need medical advice, I’ll go ask a doctor or nurse,” he replied curtly after a long moment of silence.
Ouch, that hurt.
I glared at him and he glared right back, neither of us willing to back down. It was like we both had so much to say but neither wanted to be the first to say it. There was a line between love and hate and once you stepped over it, it was hard to recover from that pain. That’s where I felt I was now, and yet with that biting comment I realized that Beast still had the ability to hurt me. The threat of him putting a bullet in my head hadn’t turned it all the way off, but his mean comments brought me closer. It was ridiculously messed up.
“Whatever, are you coming or not?” I asked as I opened my trailer door and stepped outside.
I heard and felt Beast stand up and come toward me, the trailer rocking and creaking as he walked to the door and down the steps. He slammed the door and barged past me and I locked the door—not that it seemed to keep anyone out these days—and headed to the driver’s side of my car. Beast was standing there, leaning on the hood like he owned it.
“Keys,” he barked.
“I’m driving,” I snapped back.
“Like hell you are. I’m not being driven around like some little fucking husband, now give me the damn keys, Belle, before I come and get them from you.” He glared at me over the roof of the car and I stared at him with resentment and hate in my eyes before throwing them to him. I purposefully threw them wide of his position, but his long arms had him still easily catch them and I glowered at him harder before getting in the car and sitting down.
Beast sat down and started the engine. “You throw like a girl,” he chuckled nastily.
“I am a girl, idiot.”
His smile widened. “No, you throw like a little girl. Like a child. Now put your seatbelt on and sit quietly.”
My mouth gaped and my vision blurred with anger. Is this what people felt like when they said they saw red? When their world throbbed with anger? Beast chuckled and pulled away from my trailer and I turned away to glare out the window because it was obvious that whatever I said would only encourage him further.
“You need to take the next left,” I said, directing him to Jenna’s apartment.
“You think I don’t already know where she lives? That the club doesn’t know everything about you?” he drolled, like that was perfectly normal.
“You realize that you and that club of yours is super weird and stalkery,” I replied, still staring out the window, because maybe if I didn’t look at him he would just disappear.
“You realize that my little club isn’t filled with the most lawful of society and that we make it our business to know everything about our enemies, right?” he retorted, like I was as dumb as a box of rocks.
I finally turned to glare at him. “So I’m your enemy now?”
For some reason, that hurt more than anything he’d said previously.
All those months ago, I’d wanted to save Beast, and now it turned out that all I’d done was make myself a target and become the enemy of a notorious motorcycle club. It was stupid, really, to even think that I could save him; I couldn’t even save myself.
“When you decided to spill club secrets to our biggest rival and the men that put my brother in the ground, to the men that tortured me to the brink of death but never let me fall over it, then yeah, you became an enemy, Belle.” He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world—and it was. But it also wasn’t.
“It wasn’t like that and you know it,” I mumbled.
“So tell me, what was it like then? Because I’m real fuckin’ confused how little mousy Belle could have turned into such a hardass bitch that would willingly risk other people’s lives! People that would have done anything to look after and protect her!” he yelled, his anger and resentment getting the better of him.
I stared at him in shock, not sure if he was done and not sure, even if he was done, what I could say to that. We drove in silence, my gaze on the side of his face, watching his jaw ticking and his teeth grinding, his knuckles going white on the steering wheel as he gripped it tighter than necessary.
I realized, with sudden shame, that I owed him an apology too. Him and Shooter. Hell, the whole damn club. They had trusted me—he had trusted me—and I’d abused that trust. It didn’t matter that I had been scared or threatened; in their world, trust was godly and I had blown that trust into a thousand pieces.