Micah gave Kenna a funny look. “How do you know that?”
“Kenna’s the tagger,” Grayson informed.
Micah blinked, cracking a grin. “Respect.”
Fynn shoved him in the arm. “Not the appropriate response, bro.”
What was the appropriate response? I mean, the six of us were hanging around the Academy parking lot in the middle of the night with our adversary tied up in the football field.
“Give me your keys, Kenna,” Grayson demanded. “I’m driving.” He didn’t wait for her to protest and tossed Brock his. “Make sure you get her home,” he advised, nodding toward me. Obviously, this little arrangement had been prearranged.
Brock gave a small jerk of his head, acknowledging that he heard Grayson. “Let’s go, Firefly.” As if he didn’t trust me to get to the car on my own, his hand slipped under my arm.
“I can get myself to the car,” I said, attempting to tug my arm out of his grasp, which only provoked his frown to deepen.
“Sorry to get you guys up,” Brock rasped to Micah and Fynn as he guided me to the Jeep. “I appreciate you helping.”
Fynn gave me a sympathetic look that said he knew exactly how uncomfortable my car ride home would be. “Anytime, man. We’re family.” He waved us off, Micah shaking his head beside him.
Silence strained between Brock and me during the miles he put between the Academy and us. I didn’t know what to say. He’d never been this mad at me before. I think I’d prefer it if he screamed at me.
“Don’t you want to know what we did?” I asked, breaking the awkward void. I couldn’t stand it anymore. “You came all this way, and you’re not even curious what Kenna and I were up to for the last hour?”
Kenna’s car was already in the driveway when Brock thrust the Jeep into park. “Nope. It will only infuriate me more.”
I didn’t want to take our spat inside where we might wake up Chandler or Liana, so I made no move to get out of the car. I ripped off my seat belt and turned toward him. “I don’t get why you’re so pissed at me. What did I do that is any different than the shit you’ve done yourself?”
Brock snorted. “It’s not what you did. It’s how you went about it. I don’t expect you to tell me every detail of your life, but something like this… it doesn’t just affect you.” He flung the Jeep’s door open. “We’re involved too,” he said right before he got out.
Okay, skip staying in the car. I followed, jumping out of the car after him. I intersected him in front of the Jeep. “Are you saying that you’re upset that you didn’t get to help? You would have stopped me.”
“Damn straight.” He grabbed me, slamming me against his chest. “Do you know why? If he had hurt you tonight….” Anger caught in his throat, along with something else. Fear? “I would have killed him.” Multiple times he had threatened to kill Carter, but this time, I believed he would have carried through with the threat. The pure fury in his eyes swirled like a violent storm.
I wrapped my arms around him. “I know what I did was reckless, and I’m sorry if I scared you.”
His body was stiff against me. “How many times have I told you not to be reckless?”
“I lost count.”
Tension, thick and achy, hovered between us. “You’re too important to me. You’ve rattled the hornet’s nest. Do you have any idea how ugly his retaliation will be? Carter won’t let what you did tonight go. He will find a way to hurt you back. I can’t let that happen.”
My eyes searched his. “Are you saying that I made this vendetta between you and Carter more difficult?”
Brock frowned at me. All he had done tonight was frown at me. “It doesn’t matter to me. You’re worth it.”
When he said shit like that to me, my heart couldn’t help but melt. Tonight had been long, and I was too exhausted to argue. All my energy had been used on Carter. “I don’t want to fight with you,” I said softly.
“We’re partners,” he tipped my chin up with his thumb. “You should have told me. You’re one of us. What you do affects us. We would have been there for you. Kenna too.”
I dropped my forehead onto his chest. “I know,” I whispered, slowly raising my gaze. “Do you ever think that maybe I was protecting you?”
His brows bunched. “Elaborate. And this isn’t me being sexist.”
“You have a lot more to lose than me if something went wrong. If Carter decides to go to the cops and try to press charges against me, I didn’t want your name to cross his lips.”
“Do you think that would stop him? Whether I’d been there or not, Carter could still name-drop me to the police.”
True. It would be just like him to take advantage of an opportunity to hurt Brock. “It looks like we both go to great lengths to protect the other.”