I drove my truck down our lane, and once I reached the end, turned right and right again into the entrance for the McAllister farm. It was practically a U-turn. Taking it slow, we rolled down the gravel lane that led to the McAllister barn. I knew we’d attract some attention, but I didn’t care. There was no way in hell I was leaving things shitty between the two most important women in my life.
“Oh, no. I can already see Everett up ahead.” She lifted her chin down the road. “Looks like he’s hitting the Jack again,” Ma mumbled as we slowly approached from down the lane. Even from this distance we could see him swaying where he stood. He dropped something and then out of nowhere reached out and grabbed Dakota, spinning her around like a top and dragging her to the ground.
Ma gasped at the same time as I spewed, “The fuck!” I smashed my foot on the gas, kicking up rocks in my wake, the back of my truck fishtailing with my efforts.
I watched as Dakota ambled up and pointed at the drunken bastard. When he grabbed her around the throat and slammed her into the barn, not once, but twice, I winced and raged, gripping the steering wheel as tightly as possible, needing to get to her immediately. Her golden-strawberry hair flew in the breeze as McAllister violently punched his own daughter in the face. I laid on my horn as loud as possible to get his attention. It screeched, echoing off the land making it sound even more imposing.
It didn’t work. He didn’t stop.
I was helpless. Even as I pressed my foot to the pedal, it wasn’t fast enough. Hatred, vile and putrid, sizzled in the air around me. All I could think was what I was going to do to the disgusting pig once I got my hands on him.
Ma screamed out the window as I watched horrified as McAllister punched my wife in the face a second time. She kicked out as I came to a screeching halt and flung myself out of the vehicle.
“Get the fuck off her!” I yelled as loud as I could, shifting my bulk to a dead run. My heart beat double-time. Sweat misted at my hairline and the back of my neck. Flames could have been flickering off my back at this point and I wouldn’t have known. I had one thing in mind.
Destroy him.
Protect her.
I watched her eyes roll back into her head the second my hands clenched around Everett McAllister’s scrawny shoulders. I ripped him off her and tossed him to the ground like he was scum beneath my boot. And when I looked into his sneering face, my vision blanked, and I saw nothing but red.
Red as the pressure in my entire body went nuclear as the vision of him hitting my wife repeated on a disgusting movie loop through my mind.
Red as his face turned, under my hold, while I cut off his air.
Red as the blood that poured out his mouth and nose as I punched him over and over until all I saw was wet meat.
Blood-red meat where his face used to be.
It took three men to get me off Everett McAllister, my knuckles tinged a sickening pink, some of them split and bleeding at the edges that’d broken against his face.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I lost it. Knew that all that mattered was giving back the agony this man had doled out for years to his family and mine. To make him pay for what he’d done. Flitting through my memory was the town talk about Carol killing herself because she’d been the victim of his violence her entire life. Leaving her girls behind with this waste of space because she no longer had anything left to give. Nothing left to live for. Broken in every way possible.
That man took away Dakota’s mother. He’d put their family farm in dire straits while he gambled and drank away their legacy. None of that could compare to the fact that he’d laid his hands on my wife. No one laid a hand on a woman in my presence and walked away from it.
“I hope you rot in Hell!” I growled and shoved my shoulders from left to right, breaking loose of the men who held me back. “Let me go! I need to get to Dakota!”
As I approached, I could see Ma bent down tending to Dakota where she was slumped against the side of the barn. Her face twisted in pain. At the same time, I saw the sheriff’s lights flickering as he rolled up the drive. I glanced at Jarod, who was pointing and gesturing to the fence that bordered our land. My father and brother had approached on horses and slid off, now tying them up to the fence as they hopped over. They were probably running the fence line and had heard the commotion.
“Sutton! Son!” my father called out, running to me, but I ignored him, needing to get to Dakota.
“Fuck.” I wiped at my face where blood dripped down my cheek. The pansy-ass motherfucker had scratched my face like a little bitch .