Every muscle in my body tenses, and I stride across the kitchen in silence, part of me thinking it’s Corey or Brody sneaking in after seeing me with Claire. Jealous bastards.
Before I reach the door, the handle turns slowly. Then the lock mechanism clicks from the other side.
Instantly, I grab the handle and rip the door open.
The force drags him forward. He stumbles over the threshold, one foot catching, body pitching toward me, and for one split second, all I see is black fabric, a half-open backpack, and the glint of something metal in his hand.
Not Brody.
Not Corey.
Louis.
My blood turns cold before the rage hits.
He freezes with eyes wide, mouth parted around a breath he doesn’t get to finish. I seize the collar of his hoodie and drive him back against the doorframe hard enough to rattle the hinges, holding him there.
“What the fuck,” I growl, low enough that it barely sounds human, “are you doing here?”
15
JAKOB
Louis is smaller than I remember.
Skinner, uglier, and currently dangling from my fist by the collar of his hoodie with his feet barely touching the ground and the stink of cheap aftershave coming off him in waves. His eyes are bulging, mouth working but only gargled sounds coming out. I’m standing in Claire’s back doorway at two in the morning with lock-picking tools at my feet, and one thought pounds through my skull like a war drum: What would have happened if I weren’t here?
What if I’d stayed in bed, ignored the sound? Or if Claire had come to the kitchen alone and found this piece of shit letting himself in through her back door?
My grip tightens until his collar cuts into his throat.
“Didn’t take you long to move in on her, did it?” Louis chokes, his face twisted, half fear, half the arrogance of a man too stupid to read the room. “Must be nice, fucking your way into her?—”
I shove him outside and slam him against the exterior wall, hoping Claire doesn’t hear. His head cracks against the stone, and his mouth snaps shut. Now the sound that comes out of him is a whimper so pathetic it turns my stomach.
“You have no idea,” I snarl, my face inches from his, my voice so low it’s barely audible, “how much I want to rip you apart right now.”
He wrestles to break free, but my fingers don’t budge. I’ve got a hundred pounds on him, as well as years of rugby training and a fury that doesn’t burn hot. It’s cold and venomous.
“You trash her online. You gaslight her in front of a hundred people at a wedding. And now you break into her home at two in the morning.” I lean closer. “What’s in the bag, Louis?”
His eyes dart sideways. The backpack is lying on the ground where it fell, half unzipped, and I spot the edge of a coiled rope and the glint of a blade.
My blood goes arctic. “What the fuck were you going to do with that?”
He’s shaking now. “She just needed to be scared, as she’s getting all fucking cocky.” Yet his voice cracks. “But I didn’t know you were fucking her. Let me go and I’ll stay away. I swear.”
I snort. “Yeah. Like hell you will.”
“I mean it?—”
“You don’t mean shit,” I hiss, the night breeze blowing past with a whistle. I glance inside and no sign of Claire yet, thank fuck. “You never have.” I think about Claire baking at two a.m. because his words got under her skin again. Her hands shaking when she’s overwhelmed. How she apologizes for existing in rooms she has every right to be in. Damage done by this asshole and his cruelty.
“Jakob?” Claire’s voice, muffled, from inside the house. “All good out there?”
My jaw locks. I swallow the rage, shove it down into my chest, where it coils and waits. “All good, gorgeous,” I call over my shoulder, keeping my voice easy, relaxed, the opposite ofeverything happening inside me. “Just getting a drink. Make yourself comfortable.”
I turn back to Louis, whose gaze is darting between me and the door, then around the side of the house, and I see the moment he decides to run. His body shifts, his weight drops, and his fist swings into my ribs before I can block it.