Page 105 of Older

What a waste.

Because at the end of the day, when faced with real fear, I was going to succumb. I was going to drown in it.

Reed gave my arm a squeeze, his eyes skimming over my white-as-chalk face. “Tell me what happened.”

He knew this wasn’t about him; it was something else.

But I was too much of a chickenshit to tell him the truth, so all I did was shake my head.

Frown deepening, Reed swallowed hard and released my arm. Then his eyes trailed up and over my head, flitting from the parking lot to the adjacent building, until settling on something directly behind me. His jaw turned to stone, his eyes like crushed emeralds. “Who is that?”

“Nobody,” I said, frazzled. “I need to go. I left my purse inside?—”

“Is that your father?”

How?

How did he know that?

My father only somewhat resembled me, donning the same golden-blond hair chopped into a jagged mullet, a smaller-sized nose, and full lips that sneered instead of smiled. But his eyes were not the same, being ten shades darker than my own, and his hands were huge and punishing, with a burly frame to match. He was terrifying, and I was terrified.

Reed glanced at me, his gaze meeting with mine for a tension-filled beat, as if he were making a decision. Analyzing the data. All in the span of a single breath.

And then he was storming past me.

Oh, my God.

My eyes rounded with horror as I whipped around. “Reed!” I shouted, disbelief sinking into my gut and weighing me down.

I sprinted after him, but his strides were long and his intentions were unflappable.

He’d crossed the sidewalk before I could reach him, and I watched as his arm reeled back, his fist meeting my father’s jaw as I cupped a hand over my mouth and screamed.

All hell broke loose.

Smokers scattered.

Blood sprayed, misting Father’s sweat-stained white tank.

The woman beside him jumped back with a screech.

People gawked from the parking lot, some fleeing into buildings and calling for help, while I watched my father get a single clumsy hit in before Reed overpowered him.

There’d been a time in my life when I’d thought that my father was the strongest person in the world.

Indestructible. Unbeatable.

But Reed was smarter, swifter, and he knew exactly how to take down a monster. He unleashed a barrage of powerful strikes on my popeyed father, each blow landing with careful precision. Father staggered backward, stunned by the unprovoked assault.

Every move was calculated as Reed seized my father’s arm and twisted it behind his back, forcing him to his knees with a guttural cry of pain. Father’s face contorted in agony as Reed applied pressure, his grip unyielding.

Ignoring my father’s pleas for mercy, Reed drove a knee into his back, pinning him to the ground with bone-crushing force and smashing his face to the pavement.

I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

We were in public. He was defending my honor in front of openmouthed bystanders, but it wasn’t an honor he was meant to defend.

No, no, no.