Page 37 of Storm
I still live with every single kill in my head. Even as a kid, I knew what the fuck I was doing and at the time I didn’t care. It meant nothing to me to watch the life drain out of someone else. It meant nothing to me to see the blood on my hands, but as I grew up, there was something heavier sitting on my chest. Something deeper to what I’d done, and now I can’t get past that. I see it. In my dreams mostly, but I see it. And when I look at the guys and now at Kenz, I can’t imagine losing one of them the way someone else lost someone to my hands. I know who I am, don’t get me wrong. I’m a killer, but I guess you could say I’m a killer with a conscience now. The kill needs to mean something, something more than it did back then.
“So now you’re going to take away my right to kill them?” I shove off the bed and move to stand in front of her, watching her.
“You think your heart can handle that? Takin’ a life?”
“For him, yeah. For my dad, I can do it.”
“You think that’s what he would have wanted? You out there killin’ people?”
“It doesn’t matter what he might have wanted. This is what’s going to happen, Storm. I need some kind of closure. Don’t you get that?”
“I do get it, but I also know what that comes with. Holdin’ that shit inside, knowin’ what you did. It fuckin’ kills you, Kenz. Bit by bit, piece by piece. It will fuckin’ eat you alive.” She doesn’t care. I can see the look in her eyes, she doesn’t care. At least not right now.
“You tellin’ me you’re good with what you saw me to do, Kristy?” I ask her. She looks up at me and slowly shakes her head.
“No.”
“But you think you can handle killin’ someone else?” I ask her. I see the tears in her eyes, and it breaks a part of me. I hate to see her like this, but I get it.
“Storm,” she whispers. I reach for her, cupping her cheek in my hand as I look her in the eyes.
“The club will handle them. I can promise you that much. Not a single fuckin’ one of them will walk away from this, Kenz.” She blinks rapidly, trying to keep the tears from falling as she looks at me.
“Okay.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I’ll let the club handle it.” I lean down and press a kiss to her lips before grabbing her hand and dragging her out of the room and down to the living room.
“What are we doing?”
“Eatin’. I’m starvin’.” She laughs as I pull my phone from my pocket, ready to call and place an order. But we don’t get that far.
Chapter 14
Kenzee
Have you ever had a sense of deja vu? Where everything that’s happening has already happened before? Where the past hits you right in the face, and all you can see is the events from that day playing out again?
Bullets tear through the front of my house as bikes rev up outside. My heart drops to the floor when I see Storm go down. It’s like seeing my dad all over again. This isn’t happening. It can’t be. But it is. And here I am standing in the middle of it once more.
“Get down!” Storm yells as he pulls his gun and drags himself off the floor. He rushes toward me as more shots are fired, knocking me to the ground.
“It’s happening again,” I whisper as tears fall down my cheeks.
“You gotta run, Kenz. You gotta go hide,” he tells me. I can hear my dad’s voice coming from Storm’s mouth, and my insides shatter. This isn’t supposed to happen again.
“Dad?” I cry as his voice assaults me.
“Kenzee! Listen to me! Take my phone, call Patch and hide. Shut the phone off so they can’t hear it, yeah? Go!”
“I can’t…I can’t leave you!”
“You don’t have a choice. They’ll kill us both, Kenz. Go,” Storm roars as he shoves the phone into my hand.
“Storm,” I say his name softly, but I know he heard me. I can’t do this. Not a second time. I scream when glass shatters around me, and Storm growls.
“You have to go, Kenzee! Goddamn it! Go hide!” He’s dragging me up with him now and shoving me toward the stairs. I stumble a few times before I start moving. But something causes me to stop and turn back to him just as another bullet pierces his leg. Storm roars before dropping to the ground once more and looking over at me. The pleading in his eyes is almost enough to kill me on the spot.
