I push the thought away and focus on my current predicament. I’ve reached the point where it’s going to be completely obvious that something’s wrong if I keep stalling. I take Lennox’s hand because I know that’ll get me on my feet faster and save me from rising myself and looking like an eighty-year-old grandma with bad joints.
Lennox’s warm fingers close tightly around mine, and he heaves me to my feet in one go. The pain is blinding, so white hot my vision goes out for a second, and I sway on my feet.
When my eyes clear, Maddox is frowning at me, icy rain tracking down his sculpted face. He jerks his chin at me. “You good?”
“Yeah,” I say, forcing a laugh that comes out breathy from pain. “Head rush.”
The guys exchange a look, like they’re deciding whether to believe me. Then Maddox steps in and yanks up my shirt.
“Hey!” I yell, trying to jerk my hand from Lennox’s and slam my elbow down so Maddox won’t see the bruises blooming like poppies across my ribs and torso.
Lennox’s hand tightens, and I suck in a gasp when another spasm of pain slams into me as I tense, trying to wrest control of my arm from him.
“What…the…fuck,” Maddox says slowly, his sexy voice going low with a growl that’s pure animal, something made to go with the soundtrack of thunder overhead and the pelting of freezing rain on the world around us. The way he’s looking at me sends a shiver of instinctual terror through me, freezing the blood that throbs in my hot bruises. His gaze rises to mine, and in that moment, I see exactly how far apart we are. I may belong to his neighborhood, but he’s a man in every way, and like he says, in comparison I’m just a little girl.
I already knew we were different. He fucks girls like it’s no different from playing a video game or swimming in my pool. I’ve barely ever even kissed a boy.
But I’ve never let myself think about what they do in their gang.
Looking into his burning eyes, though, I realize how deep his affiliation goes, how serious it is. He’s capable of murder, and right now, he looks it. This isn’t about him fucking lots of girls. Our differences go so much deeper than sex.
I’m just a girl who likes to read and run and talk to a crow.
Heisa Crow. He’s an animal, one with another beast inside him, something primal and simple. Something godlike.
He lowers my shirt without a word, his dark gaze holding mine through the curtain of icy rain. “Who did this to you?” he asks quietly.
“No one,” I say, forcing a laugh. “It was an accident.”
“Fell down the stairs again, did you?” he asks, his tone laced with cruelty.
I gulp, hot tears stinging my eyes.
“Come on,” Lennox says. “You can stay with us.”
“I can’t,” I say, my throat thick.
“You can,” he says, pulling me to his side and sliding an arm around my shoulders. “Our mom’s cooking. She made friends with a couple Mexican ladies at church, and now she thinks she can cook tamales. Granted, you’ll be eating a melted pile of cornmeal mush, but once she goes to sleep, we can order Little Caesar’s.”
I shake my head, glancing back at the house. “I can’t. I’m grounded.”
“Bullshit.” Maddox is the one who speaks this time, his intense gaze still boring into me, his dark green eyes like onyx in the dark.
“Vení,” Lennox says, giving me his pleading puppy dog eyes and the smile that shows his dimple, with his lips closed. “I said we should hang out during the break. Let’s start tonight. I’ll be good—I promise. Maddox?”
“I’m not going to fucking make a move on a girl who just got used as a punching bag,” Maddox snaps. “What the fuck, parcero?”
Lennox snaps back at him in Spanish, and for a minute, they argue heatedly. I’m totally lost, but I know it doesn’t matter what they decide. They don’t understand. I’m not going home to protect Lee. I’m going to protect themfromLee.
“I can’t go to your house,” I interrupt, shrugging out from under Lennox’s arm. “Thank you for the offer. But my stepdad’s a cop. He’ll arrest you if you mess with me. Just go home, okay? Can we just pretend you didn’t see anything? It’s not even that bad. I’m fine. It’s just a couple bruises, and most of them are from the stairs anyway.”
“Take her home.” Maddox isn’t speaking to me, he’s speaking to his brother, but the command in his voice leaves no room for argument.
Still, I try as Lennox takes my arm and pulls me across the lawn, through the gap in the fence where so long ago, I stepped through and went for a run. Someone pulled all the broken boards from the hole, so it’s easier to climb through now. I got so used to the guys using it that it just seems like a gate now, the normal passage from one yard to the next.
“What’s he going to do?” I ask, twisting to look behind us. Maddox stands unmoving by the pool, the rain falling around him, each drop turned silver by the back porch light. For one moment, he’s standing in a spotlight, his huge imposing figure like a king waiting to be worshipped, every drop of rain racing to bow at his feet.
Then Lennox pulls me away, wrapping an arm around my shoulders and guiding me into his house. “He’s going to talk to your dad, that’s all,” Lennox says. “He’ll take care of him, and I’ll take care of you.Si?”