Silver Bastard (Silver Valley #1)(83)
Author: Joanna Wylde

Puck scowled.

“Do you usually think about your stepdad while I’m fuckin’ you?” he asked.

“No, it’s not like that,” I explained, rolling my eyes. “It’s just that he . . . well, he got off on that. Choking me.”

Puck’s face grew dark and I saw his finger tighten on the steering wheel. “Why the fuck haven’t you told me that before?”

“Um . . . It’s not really something I start all my conversations with, Puck. ‘Hi, I’m Becca. My favorite color is red and I hate being choked with cock.’ Um, no. That’s not how it’s done.”

His death grip on the steering wheel tightened.

“You started laughing in the middle of sex because I wasn’t hurting you,” he snapped. “If you’ve got shit that’s going to fuck with your head, I should know about it. What if I’d really scared you?”

“You won’t,” I said, smiling because it was true. “I finally figured it out. That’s why I was laughing—it wasn’t a bad thing. It’s wonderful.”

Puck glanced at me with something like pain in his eyes. I reached out to catch his biceps, squeezing it.

“I trust you, Puck. This may sound fucked up, but I just realized that and it’s kind of exciting.”

He didn’t respond for a while, then he dropped his right arm down and caught my hand.

“Not sure what to say,” he admitted finally. “I can tell you this, though. You’re my woman and I’m not going to hurt you. We can play all the games you like and I won’t lie—rough sex gets me off. But I’d never knowingly hurt you, Becca.”

“I know. I never thought I’d find someone like you . . . It means Teeny didn’t win. He beat my mom, but he hasn’t beaten me. I still hate him and I still want him dead, but he didn’t win. That means everything.”

PUCK

Becca was snoring.

Not loud, annoying snores. More of a soft, snuffling irregular purr. We were a few hours outside Las Vegas in some shithole little hotel that we’d found after sixteen hours of driving. The place was a dump but neither of us cared. We were wiped. Becca had passed right out, but I found myself wide awake, staring at the ceiling.

She’d started laughing because I hadn’t choked her with my cock.

I held her hand and said all the right things, but every time I thought about it, killing rage started pouring through me again. Becca’s stepdad was garbage—this wasn’t a revelation. I’d seen him beating her, known he’d raped her. Known he’d pimped her out to other men . . . I’d even known he still haunted her. I just hadn’t realized she thought about him during sex.

I wasn’t sure how I should feel about this, but I was pretty sure my actual feelings were wrong, because I felt jealous.

Becca’s mind should be on me when I was balls-deep inside her. Only me. Always me. I’d disliked the fucker the minute I met him, a dislike that transformed to hate when I found him beating her. When I’d offered to kill him for her, it’d been sincere. Teeny Patchel was using up valuable air, something that someone should probably fix.

Now, though. Now I had a whole new motivation.

I couldn’t wait to see the life drain out of that fucker’s eyes.

The burner phone I grabbed before leaving Coeur d’Alene buzzed next to the bed. I reached for it, finding a message from Diesel, one of the nomads I’d reached out to.

DIESEL: You awake?

Typing awkwardly with one hand, I replied.

ME: Yes

DIESEL: Call?

ME: Give me five.

Sliding out from under Becca, I stood and pulled on my jeans. Then I grabbed the phone and stepped out onto the covered walkway outside. The place’s glory days had been back in the ’60s, and nothing had been updated or repaired since, so far as I could tell. Only two other cars in the parking lot and the office had shut down for the night.

“Hey,” Diesel said when he answered.

“Thanks for getting back to me—got a situation I could use some help with. I heard you’re in the San Diego area?”

“Yeah, had some business down here,” Diesel replied. He was a Reaper and we’d met two or three times at different events. Not a friendly guy, but a solid brother.

“Picnic said you might be the man to talk to,” I said. “My old lady’s mom died. Now her stepdad wants money or he won’t give my girl the ashes. I think we may need to take action.”

Diesel grunted.

“What kind of action you thinking?”

“Could be serious.”

“I hear you,” he replied. “I can be around. When do you get into town?”

“Tomorrow,” I replied. “Guy lives in Santa Valeria. We’ll hit town around two or three. Figure I’ll get Becca settled and then we can go hunting.”

“Sounds good.”

“One more thing.”

“Yeah?”

“She thinks she’s coming with us.” Diesel gave a startled snort of laughter.

“Uh, no.”

“No shit,” I replied. “But she won’t see it that way. If we’ve got any allies around, I’d love to have someone keeping an eye on her.”

“I’ll see who I can drum up,” he replied. “Maybe call Shade—I know there’s some Devil’s Jacks in town. He could reach out to them for me.”

“Thanks.”

We figured out where to meet and then I hung up the phone, feeling better. I had no doubt I could handle Teeny on my own, but backup was always our friend. Becca needed a babysitter, too. If I’d learned anything, it was that she never did what I expected.

She was still sleeping when I slipped back into the room. I locked the door behind me and wedged a chair up and under the handle. I climbed into the bed and pulled her over my body like a blanket, soft hair feathering around my chest and under my chin.

Yeah, killing Teeny would feel damned good. Just needed to make sure Becca was protected, both from him and herself. If anyone went down for this hit, it wouldn’t be my girl.

Nope. I’d make damned sure of that.

BECCA

We reached Santa Valeria around three in the afternoon. Puck had been quiet for most of the day, his mood almost grim. Made sense to me—I’d never planned out a murder before, but it probably wasn’t something to take lightly, all things considered.

It’d seemed so simple up in Idaho. We’d drive down here, find Teeny, and shoot him. Now that we were here, though? All sorts of logistical questions kept bubbling through my brain.