Ben? Was she hearing correctly?
And then she saw him. The most welcome sight in the world.
He stepped from behind Bataar, grabbed her arm and, yanking her past his body, decked Vince, who had come up behind her.
Bataar caught her and spun her behind him. He then pulled Claire out of the house, his gun trained on Vince. Ben turned and saw Jake, who was halfway up the stairs, and chased him back down.
“Kimani!” Bataar yelled when she ran after Ben.
She entered the basement in time to see Ben throw Jake against the wall.
“I was just—” Jake objected before Ben slammed him into the wall a second time.
“Ben!” Kimani shouted.
Jake slid to the ground.
“What are you doing?” she asked, racing over.
“Beating the shit out of him for you,” Ben said between heavy breaths.
“I don’t need you to do that,” she said. She handed him the gun. “I’ll do it myself.”
Kimani kicked Jake as hard as she could in the ribs. “That’s for all the cunts in the world.”
She aimed her next kick at his groin. Jake curled his body and grabbed his crotch with an agonized groan. Kimani glanced over at Ben.
He stared at her intently. “God, I’m in love.”
Turning back to Jake, he delivered a swift kick to Jake’s face.
“Fuck! My nose!” Jake screamed as blood gushed over him.
Ben aimed the gun at him.
“Ben!” Kimani screamed, grabbing his arm.
“You want this fucker to live?” Ben asked, his tone icy and serious.
“I don’t want you to go to prison.” She pleaded with every nerve in her body. “Jesus, I still owe you two days.”
His expression softened. “Yeah, you do.”
He lowered the gun. With his thumb, he wiped the blood from her bottom lip. She hadn’t even realized she had sustained a cut there till now. His gaze swept over the rest of her, noticing the bruise on her forehead.
His pupils constricted, and his eyes darkened. “What did he do to you?”
Not wanting to go into detail for fear that Ben might take justice into his own hands, she said, “Nothing. You came just in time. How did you know we were here? I thought you were in Vancouver?”
“Bataar had a guy on Jake...and a bodyguard on you.”
“A what?”
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah, but maybe we should check on Claire.”
They left Jake in the basement and locked the door. Upstairs, another car had pulled up. A man emerged, whom Kimani recognized as the man who had given her a lift back to the campaign headquarters the day she’d found out Ben was behind the closure of the Tribune.