What Grows Dies Here

And he was in control.

Which meant the guy at the door muttering into his radio was probably talking to him.

I walked up to the bar, swaying my hips, the music thumping over my skin.

“Vodka,” I said to the bartender who immediately came to me. I looked that good. I knew it. People couldn’t see how dead I was inside.

“Straight up,” I added, leaning on my forearms, bending over slightly so my exposed back and legs were visible to all of the men staring at me along the bar and from the dance floor.

Yeah, I looked too thin, especially to Karson who wanted me healthy, who loved me. To these men, desensitized by the LA look and who didn’t give a fuck about me, I looked good.

I slammed my vodka then turned around.

It didn’t take long.

The length of a song.

He’d grinded up against me in a way that told me he did not respect me one fucking bit.

He was perfect.

And he’d come to the bathroom with me without hesitation, despite how visibly drunk I was.

Though I knew what I was doing, I lost a little time on the trip. We had been in a crowded hallway one moment then in a bathroom the next. It didn’t much matter.

Karson came.

Of course, he did.

The man I was currently locking tongues with barely had time to palm my ass before the door flew off its hinges, and a dark shadow descended on the room, ripping the man off me.

I didn’t jump. Didn’t move a muscle.

Karson’s fist crunched against the bones of his face, the one smeared with my lipstick. He would’ve crumpled to the ground if Karson wasn’t holding him by the collar.

“I see you in this club again, in this fuckin’ city again, I bury you alive,” he said quietly, his voice calm, deadly.

Despite how removed I was from reality, my skin chilled at the tone.

The man in question nodded rapidly, blood running out of his nose. He crumbled when Karson let him go, scrambling to get on his feet and out the door. I watched him leave.

I’d expected something of this variety to happen. It was the goal, wasn’t it? I’d come in here knowing that some innocent man—well, not that innocent, since he was willing to take advantage of a drunk woman—was going to get a broken nose at the very best. I couldn’t have been sure Karson wouldn’t kill him.

But I did it anyway.

The music was a low vibration as the door swung closed. Karson was looking at me. I was looking at the small splatter of blood on the white walls of the bathroom.

I finally found the courage to meet his eyes after a handful of seconds. Karson waited. He would’ve waited a fucking hour if that’s how long it took. I knew that about him.

“Not gonna work, sweetheart,” he said quietly. Gently. His rage had been savage mere moments ago, it had been a living thing. A viper let out of its crate, set on tearing the world apart.

Now it was nowhere to be seen. Now he was the man who loved me. Who adored me in a way that defied belief. In a way that couldn’t be damaged, maimed or killed, try as I might.

When he stepped forward, my body started shaking. I lifted my hand up in some feeble attempt to keep him away from me. “No,” I shouted, as if it would make a difference.

Karson did not stop walking, he did not give me distance, space, he did not scowl at me with disgust or anger. He did not grab my upper arms and shake me, scream in my face… Like I deserved.

No, he hugged me.