The Marked Men Series Books 1–6: Rule, Jet, Rome, Nash, Rowdy, Asa. Jay Crownover
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took a solid twenty minutes for the deluge to stop and by then Rule was frantic and threatening to take me to the nearest emergency room.
“No. It’s fine, just give me a minute.” He was rubbing my back and his blue eyes were crystal like frost. I pressed my forehead against his and pushed up the sleeves of my coat. Angry red welts and ugly purple bruises were encircling my entire wrist. “Gabe ambushed me in my room when I was grabbing my stuff. He shoved me around and threatened me. He said I needed to get on board with this, whatever that means, before it gets ugly. He really hurt me, Rule, and he scared me. I don’t know what’s wrong with him, but it’s getting really bad.”
He went still as a statue underneath me and he lifted one of his hands to grab my injured wrist. He turned his head to press a soft kiss against my pulse and breathed out in a tone that sent chills up my spine, “I’m going to kill him.”
“I know.” I let him soothe me for a minute before climbing off him and settling back in the passenger seat. “I have to go back to Brookside and get my car tomorrow.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll take Rome and we’ll go get it.”
“Don’t you have to work?”
“Not until one. I think I want to call Mark and ask him about getting you a restraining order.”
“I can’t believe this is happening.”
“I can’t believe you let us leave without confronting him. You should have raked his ass over the fire in front of his parents and all those people he was trying so hard to impress.”
“I was freaking out and I just wanted to escape. I just wanted you.” My voice trailed off in a whisper and he reached over to haul me up next to his side. Having bench seats in a big truck was nice.
“You have me, Shaw, any way you need me, any way you want me, you have me.”
I pressed my face into the curve of his neck and exhaled. I think that was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me. “How about you being the belle of the ball today? I bet that made my mother furious. She looked like she was going to have a coronary.”
“I have a lot of clients who are out there in the business world. More and more of the general population is sporting some serious ink. She shouldn’t be so judgmental.”
“No, she shouldn’t. I don’t want you to get into trouble over Gabe. I just want him to leave me alone.”
He gave me a one-armed hug. “Don’t worry about me, Casper. I promise not to do anything overtly stupid. I just want him to leave you alone as well and I will make sure that happens. In the meantime, I don’t think you should leave work alone so have Lou walk you out, and if we can figure something out with our crazy schedules I want you to stay with me or I’ll be with you.”
“You don’t have to do that. I don’t want you to rearrange your whole life because some guy is being an asshole to me.”
“Yes I do, and not because I have to but because I want to. He isn’t getting his hands on you again, Shaw. Not ever again.”
It was a nice thought, so I didn’t want to argue. Instead I let him snuggle me into his side and absently ran my hand up and down his leg while he drove. I didn’t ask if he was taking me home or to his place and I honestly didn’t care until I remembered Rome was crashing on his couch.
“Hey, are we going downtown or to my place?”
“I figured mine since I need to get Rome to help me with your Beamer in the morning. Is that okay?”
“Uh … is it going to be weird walking in together with him there? I’ve had about enough drama for one day.”
I felt him shake his head. “Naw, we talked about it yesterday. He knows we got something going on and it’s cool. He did say that he would break both of my legs if I kept acting like a jackass though, so there is that.”
“Hmm … Why did you do it?” I knew he would know what I was asking about without explaining.
“Because it’s what I do.” He swore under his breath. “Girls have always been easy and they usually smell good and taste good, so for just a second, things are simple and nice and all the crap doing battle inside my head goes quiet. I knew I didn’t want someone who wasn’t you, but I was pissed off and confused so I just did what I always do, and thought maybe it would make me feel better. It didn’t, it made me feel like absolute shit and made me see pretty clearly there is no substitute for you. I made a mistake but it could have been so much worse and I hope you can sincerely forgive me.”
It made my heart hurt, but I understood it because I understood him. “I don’t like it, but I get it. It just can’t be your excuse for stepping out on me every time we fight. I don’t have it in me to just look the other way every time you use another girl to work out your hurt feelings.”
“I told you no more. I’ll figure this out, Shaw, I swear.”
“I hope so, because we’re going to disagree, Rule. We argued before we started sleeping together so you know we’re going to probably argue more now.”
His hand stroked up and down my arm. “That’s cool because I bet make-up sex with you is going to be out of this world.”
I didn’t deny it so I just stayed quiet and let him soothe me while he drove; he even picked Straylight Run to listen to instead of his normal blaring punk rock or heavy metal. By the time we parked in front of the Victorian I was back in control. He took my bag from me and led me into the apartment. Rome and Nash were on the couch yelling at the TV, and I assumed the Broncos were losing. They both looked up at me with twin faces full of relief.
“Thank God. Now maybe he’ll stop acting like a cranky toddler who skipped nap time.” Rule smacked Nash on the back of the head as Rome got up and wrapped me in a bear hug.
“Glad you gave him another chance, little girl.”
When I was back on my feet I grinned sheepishly at both of them and turned back to Rule. “I need to call Ayden and my phone is trashed, can I use yours?” I expected him to spend a minute erasing texts or clearing his search history but he just handed it over. I tried to hide how happy that made me, so I bit my lip and motioned down the hall. “I’ll just go in your room so I can hear her over the game.”
“Go ahead. I want to talk to the guys for a second anyway.” The grimness of his tone let me know he wanted to fill them in on my situation with Gabe. “I’ll be there in just a minute.”
I resisted the temptation to scroll through his contacts and look at his text conversations and dialed Ayden. I didn’t know if she would answer since she wouldn’t recognize Rule’s number, but she ended up picking up on the third ring.
“Hello?”
“Hey, it’s me.”
“What number is this?”
“I’m using Rule’s phone because I’m a genius and threw mine against the wall.”
She snickered at me. “It was because I told you about the girl at the club, wasn’t it?”
“Yep.”
“But now you have his phone so you must have worked things out somewhere along the way.”
“He came to Brookside to apologize and then he crashed my mother’s brunch and ended up being the star attraction. It was impossible not to forgive him.”
“Good for you. Something tells me that one comes with a whole truckload of drama, so you might as well get used to it.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not short on drama of my own.” I went into the bathroom and leaned against the sink. The image looking back at me in the mirror was startling. I looked agitated and even paler than usual. “Gabe grabbed me and shoved me around. He cornered me in my room and threatened all kinds of crazy stuff. I just don’t know