Yes, Masters (Book 2 of Desire's Den)

Chapter 30 - Gideon

The police tried to give me a hard time for beating up the son of a motherfucker, but because I was a white successful businessman, they wouldn't do shit to me. They had wanted to talk to Emma about what had happened, but I didn't promise anything. If she didn't feel like going to the station and rehash her experience, then she won't need to. I would send them the security videos from the hallway if she didn't want to meet them.

Before I left the club, I made sure there were someone behind the bar, taking over for Emma. I also let Mark know he had to stay behind and lock up tonight.

My knuckles stung as I drove towards my girl's apartment. I'd washed my hands free of the guy's blood, but I had managed to rip open my own skin when giving him some...correctional punishment.

While I had calmed down some, there was still too much energy left in me—and the ever so present anger was at an all-time high. Hitting the guy a few times had done little to satisfy the urge to punish him more. Just the thought of someone wanting to abuse my girl made me tighten my grip on the steering wheel, and I had to force myself not to go down to the fucking station to end his ass.

The drive lasted about forty minutes, and I'd managed to get control over myself before I parked the car by her building.

I found her name on the building's intercom and pushed the buzzer. I didn't get an answer, but I figured they would know it was me. Who else would've showed up at her door in the middle of the damn night? My eyes narrowed as I thought it. Baby Girl needed to pray to fucking God if it turned out that she'd had any nightly visitors that weren't us, because if she had, she wouldn't be able to sit on her ass for a week.

The door opened to the building opened, and Callan stepped back to let me in.

"How is she?" I grunted, worried she was scared after what happened, but also anxious about how she was reacting to my...action back at the club. Emma had never seen me in that state, and it wasn't something I had ever planned on her seeing either.

"A little shaken up, but better than I expected," Callan answered, a hint of worry in his voice.

"She's a tough girl." And she was, though, maybe not in the traditional sense. She was shy, and struggled with social anxiety, but what made her tough was that she pushed through them. She'd done it when she visited Desire's Den. She did it when she agreed to be a submissive to three guys. She definitely had done it when she participated in a public scene.

I started to walk up the stairs, but a hand on my arm stopped me before I made it more than a few steps. I turned around, looking at Callan. "What?"

His brows were pinched together, and a look of both puzzlement and concern. His eyes moved up the staircase, as if he was making sure Emma wasn't here to overhear us, before turning his attention back at me. "There's something going on with her, but I can't figure it out."

My body tensed. "What do you mean?"

"She...she has set up two cameras in her apartment, one pointing at the entrance and the other directed at her window. There are motion sensors at the door and window too, and she also uses a portable door lock along with her normal lock and door bolt. I asked her what it was about, and she told me there had been a break-in in the neighborhood last week." By the sound of his voice when he told me what she'd said, he seemed to think that wasn't it.

Hearing that she'd taken so many measures so that she could feel safe in her own home, made me both proud and offended. She should've known she could come to any of us if she didn't feel safe alone. Our girl was one stubborn woman. "You don't believe her?"

He shook his head. "She's acting strange, and she doesn't lie very well."

"Then what is it about?" The same feeling of protectiveness that had taken over my body earlier tonight when I'd seen that motherfucker with her was now back in full force. By the looks of it, Callan was feeling it too.