Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 72154 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 361(@200wpm)___ 289(@250wpm)___ 241(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72154 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 361(@200wpm)___ 289(@250wpm)___ 241(@300wpm)
And Kayla had just smacked him in the face with it. Showed him what his attitude toward me had done.
Regardless of how he treated me—and I still wasn’t sure why or what I did to make him hate me so fully other than not approving of his lifestyle—he was a good man. Mostly. He’d retired from the Army. He’d legitimately been nice to everyone but me. He treated his wives like gold. I’d heard everyone attest to that.
What he didn’t do was like me.
“Parker…” Ennis tried to intervene.
Kayla’s hard eyes turned to her. “And you’re just as awful for condoning it.”
Ennis’ mouth snapped shut.
Marica’s, however, didn’t. “You don’t know us or what we’ve been through with him.”
She pointed at me like I was a slug.
Kayla’s mouth turned up at one side. “I know. He’s told me everything. What confuses me is why you think nobody ever makes mistakes. His mistakes were years—years—ago. When he was a young kid. Can you say the same?”
“He got Jett killed.”
“He most certainly did not,” another voice from behind me snarled.
I turned to find Gunner standing there, looking so freakin’ mad that I took a step toward him.
Gunner being here was a huge step in the direction of healing for him. Absolutely huge. Massive.
However, I wished he hadn’t heard what had been said. Gunner wasn’t aware of exactly why my father and I didn’t get along…but he was now. Because my father was a douche.
“Parker brought the man that shot my child to justice. Did you know that? He went out, hunted that animal down, and made sure that my baby didn’t perish knowing his killer was still free. And he found him justice in hours. Do you have any idea what that did for me and the other parents?”
Nobody said anything.
“I felt so much better. I took a breath for the first time since the shooting took place when I found out that man had been found,” Gunner snarled. “I wanted to kill him with my bare hands. I wanted to mutilate him, Grandfather. But, Parker made it happen. He hurt him. For me. For Jett. For Kyle, Allen, Jacob, Merena, Rainie, Marren, Carly, Alex, Honor, Nevaeh, Darren, Peter, Paul, Alcede, and Corrine. We buried our babies, and we did it knowing that man couldn’t do it to anybody ever again.”
Nobody said a word, but at that point, we’d not only had my father’s harem’s attention, but also the attention of gathering family members to the other victims.
“I’ve been avoiding coming, but had I known you were subjecting a goddamn hero to this, I’d have been here sooner,” Gunner continued. “Did you know that he cut off the shooter’s hands?”
I looked up at the sky.
I had done that.
Accidentally, of course.
The machete had slipped. Really, it had.
That was a lie.
The man had been pointing a gun at my face. Sure, that gun hadn’t been loaded any longer, but the police, FBI, and whomever else had been curious didn’t need to know that.
I’d leapt forward and swung the machete I’d picked up off the ground near the man’s foot and had taken off both of his hands at the wrists.
“I looked at the man in the hospital,” Gunner continued. “Went to the room his body was being held in. I wanted to kill him—but he was already dead. I almost maimed his corpse.”
“No,” my father said.
“Yes,” Gunner said. “Parker stopped me from ruining my life. He made sure that I understood that there were some things I couldn’t fix. That Jett wouldn’t want me to wreck my life—to ruin my career.”
Jett had loved watching his dad play baseball. LOVED. And when I say loved, he idolized him. Gunner was Jett’s hero.
For Gunner to give that dream up, it would’ve broken Jett’s heart. Absolutely shattered it, and without Jett there to convey that message to his father, I’d done it.
I hadn’t realized that it’d been that impactful to his life, though.
“Every single one of us should be thankful that Parker was there that day. That he was able to catch that murderous bastard before he did what he did to anybody else’s kid. He walked in there, and without thought, without anything but adrenaline in his veins, went after the man. Do you know how fucking thankful I am that he did that?”
Nobody said a word.
“Not a day goes by that I don’t think about Jett. But even more, not a day goes by that I don’t think about who’s helped me take a deep breath every single day. Why I’m able to breathe easy. And that’s Parker. He’s the reason. And for you to say that he was the one who was responsible? I shit you not, you are the most evil person in the world for thinking that. You probably spread those lies, too.”
I didn’t know if he did or did not.