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He wasn’t juston him She was now the eneot his hands on her This guy didn’t care who his victihis point to another level He was all about the iets he chose to leave as calling cards were getting younger and younger

The woman had been sliced across her chest ht she was abducted Only Dovie had survived and had the scars to prove how hard she fought to live This girl just had the wounds She also had burns across every surface of exposed skin, a bullet hole in her forehead, and none of that was as gruesos Roark had done to the parts of her that should never be treated with anything but reverence and appreciation There was rage and hatred acted out upon this girl like I had never seen before and it was eerie because she did bear a reer and much smaller

“Is it okay if we take her now, Detective?”

I glanced up at the young tech and nodded I hadn’t been aware that I had zoned out and was just staring at the body like she was going to wake up and give o arrest hi ever worked that way

“Yeah Do we have an ID on her yet? She’s just a baby Someone needs to notify the family”

“Not yet The only lead we have is that she may have been a dancer over at Spanky’s She was found with a whole lot of cash in her purse and not much else”

Oh, great Nassir was already on the edge and close to going over because of what had happened to his club When he found out that one of his girls was in the worst place at the worst tiuy who torched the club was responsible, he was definitely going to go over There were some men that I could care less if they decided they wanted to do battle on her, I was faster, I was smarter, and when I had to be, I was more brutal None of that was the case with Nassir Gates I wasn’t a hundred percent sure what his background was but I knew training and cunning when I saw it Hebut I knew better Nassir was the Devil, and if he dropped off that thin ledge of civility he was holding on to, the bloodbath that would ensue when he fell would drown us all

As they put the girl in the coroner’s van I stared out over the industrial ay and felt the weight of one more unnecessary death settle deep into that part of my soul where they collected and filled hts wondering how exactly I was going to fix this particular mess, when a heavy hand fell on my shoulder

I didn’t think

I reacted and had un out and pointed at the offender before my next breath We both swore as Race took a step back and lifted up his hands in a gesture of surrender

“Whoa, Titus”

I narrowed un back in the holster “What are you doing out here, Hart nu with all the dark shit that has to be in your head knowing your old ot smoked?”

I wasn’t being tactful or kind I didn’t have it in me anymore and I think Race saw it because he just sal and unruffled as ever He was a different man from the one that had been in ood woman, a woman that understood hie of jealousy that I had to struggle to choke down