Page 133 of Collateral Love
Because the closer he thought we were to the end, the closer he’d bring us to Cameron.
And when he did, I wouldn’t need him anymore.
A man hired to hold a gun, realizing too late that the job had changed. One of my soldiers shot him in the chest.
I heard a crash from inside, then I heard footsteps fast and uneven heading toward the side door where X, Miles, and I were waiting.
Charles stumbled out into the rain like a man escaping fire, coat half on, eyes wild, breath coming in ragged pulls. He froze when he saw us.
He was limping and looked wounded.
I saw terror on his face.
“Zay,” he croaked. “Listen?—”
X moved in, fast and precise. As much as I wanted to kill the smug bastard, I knew this was personal for X. That motherfucka used Channy, impregnated her, and abandoned his own seed.
As much as I wanted to escort Charles back to the war room and peel him open slowly, I knew this wasn’t mine.
This was Xavier’s.
Charles staggered, trying to reorient, rain slicking his hair flat against his skull. He took one step back, heel slipping on oil and water, hands lifting halfway, as if that might still work.
“X—listen, man,” he said, breath hitching. “This shit ain’t what you think. I didn’t?—”
X didn’t answer.
He didn’t rush either.
That was the part people never understood about my brother. Xavier never moved fast when it mattered. Speed was for panic. Precision was for finality.
He closed the distance one measured step at a time, boots splashing softly in the shallow puddles. Gun lowered at his side, not aimed yet. Not needed.
Charles’s eyes flicked past him to me, to Miles, to the soldiers melting out of the dark as if they’d always been there. Chanel was approaching, watching intently.
“No, no—Chanel, help me please,” Charles pleaded, turning toward me. “This is Cameron…this is her fault.”
X grabbed him by the front of his coat and slammed him back into the brick wall.
Hard.
The sound cracked through the alley like bone on concrete. Charles grunted, breath exploding out of him, blood blooming at the corner of his mouth.
X leaned in close. Too close.
“You don’t say my Angel’s name,”
Charles coughed, spat, and a red streak appeared down his chin. “Cameron told me Channy and
Kenya had to pay. She said?—”
That was it.
Xavier’s fist came out of nowhere.
A short, brutal arc that landed square across Charles’s jaw. The sound was sickening—wet and hollow. Charles crumpledsideways, shoulder scraping brick as he slid down, boots kicking uselessly.
I watched Miles flinch.
