Stay With Me (She's With Me #2) - Jessica Cunsolo Page 0,29

in Aiden’s.

The wind is biting and I bundle my scarf close to my chest. The streetlights illuminate the parking lot clearly, as well as the huffs of our breath. Groups of people are gathered in the parking lot of the arcade across the street, and we can hear their animated conversations from here. From the other side of the parking lot, there’s a screech of tires and doors opening and slamming.

I look at Charlotte as we walk toward the cars. “I’ll call Anna after she’s had some time to collect her thoughts and see how she is,” I say.

Aiden suddenly pulls me behind him with our attached hands and simultaneously steps in front of me, at the same time a malicious and familiar voice yells, “There you are!”

I peek out from behind Aiden’s tense back. Mason steps in front of Charlotte, and since Noah and Chase were walking in front of us, they’re the first ones greeted by Ryan and his friends. But Ryan isn’t even looking at them. His venomous gaze is locked solely on Aiden, the hate in his eyes plain to see.

“You’re a fucking murderer!” Ryan yells.

Before I even notice Ryan lunge, Aiden gently but firmly pushes me farther behind him and simultaneously steps forward toward the action. At the same time, Chase and Noah, being the closest to Ryan, grab him on either side, stopping him from advancing any farther.

Noah and Chase push him back, and Ryan fixes his jacket. Dave and another Silver who they’re always with, Ian, I think his name is, stand beside him. I can’t help but notice the remnants of a black eye Dave’s sporting haven’t completely healed yet. A small, victorious smile spreads involuntarily on my face. Is that from Aiden? I hope so.

My smile disappears, however, when Kaitlyn emerges from Ryan’s Mustang and hangs back a bit behind them, a scowl etched on her face. She looks tired and drawn, as if she hasn’t been sleeping properly.

“Calm down, Simms. I had nothing to do with Greg’s death,” Aiden explains evenly.

“Like hell you didn’t!” Ryan counters, looking less and less composed. “I know you were arrested! I know where his body was found. I don’t know how many officers you had to blow to get released, but I know you did it!”

I scoff out loud, and I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one either.

“Aiden is a thousand times smarter than you, Ryan.” I can’t help but interject, ignoring the warning glare Aiden’s shooting me and taking a few steps closer to Ryan. “Do you think if he was going to murder your father he’d be stupid enough to get caught? To leave the body in front of his own house as if showing off a prize?”

“Well, Parker’s whore, let me explain something to you.” Ryan takes a step closer to me, and I sense more than see Aiden also moving toward me. But I don’t care, all my attention is focused on squaring off with Ryan.

“Parker is trash,” he continues. “He’s a product of his filthy, trailer trash whore of a mother. He keeps company with you fuckwits because scum is attracted to other scum. It’s practically his destiny to get shanked and die in prison because that’s all he’s good for anyway. Those bastard brothers of his are better off jumping off a roof than continuing to live with him. They’re probably little incest babies anyw—”

Red. All I see is red. My mind shuts off and instinct takes over as I raise my fist and punch him with all I have, harder than during training, harder than when I practice on the punching bag, hard enough to cut him off midsentence and make his head snap to the side and throw him off balance.

“Fuck!” I hiss as I pull my hand to my chest. I forgot how much it hurts to throw that kind of a punch, especially when the target is a human face.

Before anyone even has time to process what happened, strong hands are on my shoulders, practically throwing me back into a hard body with open arms, as if they were waiting to catch me. The arms wrap around me, both familiar and comforting, but they’re not the arms that I basically know by heart, that belong to the man who takes my breath away.

Aiden now stands in the place I was, and in the second it took him to pull me out of the way, Ryan straightens up and swings without looking at the