She’d thought it might be difficult to finish this business with Peter. It wasn’t going to be hard at all. She couldn’t believe she’d wavered for even a moment yesterday.
“Is it him?” Peter gestured at the truck with a disdain-filled flick of his hand. “Have you heard what they’re saying about him, Alex?” He gave a disbelieving laugh. “No. You have better taste than that. Alex—” His grip on her arms became a caress, the sort he’d always been so expert at. “What kind of life is this, here in this backwater town? With rednecks like him for company?” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I want to make it up to you. Let me, Alex. Come home.”
She focused on him slowly. “You never did understand, Peter.”
“I understand that you ran away from everything you could have had, and you’re still running.”
Alex looked over his shoulder into the truck. Kieran’s gaze met hers—fully awake, lucid. And dangerous. Just as he had looked in the cafe.
“Alex, listen to me—”
“Let me go, Peter.”
“Oh, Alex.” His eyes held the illusion of yearning tenderness. He lifted his hand and gently, deliberately touched her scarred cheek.
It was as if he’d pulled the trigger of a gun. She froze. The truck’s passenger door swung open.
“Get your hands off her,” Kieran snarled.
Kieran wasn’t drunk now; he was in deadly earnest. His face was all harsh lines and bared teeth. The gentle man he’d been at Julie’s, the vulnerable boy struggling to make sense of his life was gone. He was a force of nature, a wolf on the hunt, a man pushed to his limit.
Peter dropped his hand from Alex’s cheek but didn’t release her. He half turned toward Kieran, eyes narrowed. “Call off your dog, Alex,” he said contemptuously.
Kieran had circled the truck and stood mere feet from Peter, He lifted clenched fists.
“Let—her—go!”
Peter never had another chance. Suddenly he was sprawled on the street, an expression of astonishment on his face. Kieran stood over him. Though he hardly moved, made no threatening gestures at all, Kieran radiated stark and absolute hatred.
Peter gathered himself to his knees. “You son of a bitch,” he hissed.
Alex forced her legs to function and plunged between them. “Stop it!” She put her back to Kieran and stared down at Peter, breathing hard. “I want you out of here, now. This isn’t going any further.”
Peter was no coward. He managed to hold Kieran’s’ inhuman gaze, flexing his hands with angry jerks. “He started it.”
“And I’m ending it! You’ve said what you wanted to say, Peter.”
He barked an incredulous laugh. “You’re not taking his side, Alex? This Neanderthal lunatic?”
“Bastard,” Kieran snarled. “You—”
“Shut up, both of you!” Alex yelled. Kieran and Peter were backing her into a corner. Between the two of them, they’d destroyed whatever peace she’d made for herself. In that moment she hated them both.
Peter scrambled to his feet without dropping his guard and drew close to Alex. “All right. I don’t want more trouble for you, Alex.” He reached out. “But you haven’t given me a chance to prove—”
“If you touch her again, I’ll kill you.”
The impact of Kieran’s words was unmistakable. From any other man they would have been a meaningless, overheated threat. But not from Kieran Holt. Even Peter sensed it; his jaw dropped in astonished comprehension.
“That’s enough ”
The terrible moment shattered. Peter stepped back, his head swinging toward the voice. Alex could see Luke Gévaudan over the top of the truck, his expression set and grim. Two loiterers from the bar stood behind him, staring in avid fascination.
“I think you should leave, Mr. Schaeffer,” Gévaudan said. He gave Peter a long look. Without so much as a mutter of protest or another glance at Alex, Peter turned and walked away.
Gévaudan turned to Kieran, who met his impenetrable stare. Alex remembered when Kieran had faced the wolf pack; the silent confrontation had exactly the same quality.
Alex stepped between them. “It seems I owe you thanks again, Mr. Gévaudan.”
He turned his attention to her. “Do you need help getting him home, Ms. Warrington?”