JAXSON
The cuffs bit into my wrists and the metal vibrating at the other end felt like a fist around my guts. I stood there with my shoulders pressed up against the cold pillar, trying to breathe slowly. My hands were useless. My mouth tasted like copper. Watching Tessa get hit had hollowed something out of me I couldn’t name.
I had thought about using the gun when I pulled up. Hell, I had held it under my jacket and felt its weight like an answer. Then I saw the room, too many men, too tight a space, her tied up like some ugly prize and I swallowed the impulse. One wrong move and they’d make her pay. That thought stayed with me, colder than anything else. So I didn’t draw.
Before I walked in I’d texted Ryder the location. I didn’t want his help, not really, but I wasn’t stupid: this wa
