Through a Glass, Darkly (Assassins of Youth MC #1) by Layla Wolfe Page B

what the trucker’s bill of lading stated he was hauling. It was going to be avocados until we realized those might spoil and smell up the joint. Plus, I’d actually found a buyer for the tools, and he actually was in Cedar City. Chiles wanted some of them, too.
    Mahalia flitted in and out of my brain while I mulled over all these business details. Kissing her had been one of the highlights of my admittedly selfish life. Sure, I knew I was giving her the thrill of a lifetime so it was good for my ego, too. But the fact that it was so spontaneous on my part told me a fuck of a lot. My feelings for her were so powerful my brain couldn’t override my body. My reflexes had a mind of their own, and I’d leaped on her like a panther.
    She was soft and smelled of clean powder. So fragile and yet so sturdy underneath my hands. She was probably more shocked than I was, but she melted into it and kissed me back. I probably could have pushed her further, but did I really want to? Allred Lee Chiles was basically my boss out here, in this place I used to call a wasteland. Like when I had hooked up with Chelsea. Was it really the smartest thing in the world to be doing?
    Could I help myself? Mahalia was a serene goddess with haunted eyes. Her face glowed with the sincerity of her beliefs. And she wasn’t one wave short of a shipwreck, like most of those Morbots I’d seen in and out of Cornucopia. She stood head and shoulders above them for her intelligence, beauty, and depth of her convictions. She would succeed without me, but…should she?
    So I was sort of sidetracked when I went into the kitchen to get a bottle of water. Breakiron was there, leaning his stupid dirty ass up against the clean granite counter, eating directly out of my carton of Cherry Garcia. I sort of bumped into him as I went by, and he immediately slammed the carton down on the counter, the spoon twirling on the tiled floor.
    I spun around. “What the fuck—”
    He was on top of me.
    He got me in a fucking headlock with his stupid brawny arms. He tried to do that movie thing where you put the heel of your hand against the guy’s forehead and press, allegedly breaking the guy’s neck.
    What that moron didn’t count on was my self-defense skills. I hadn’t done two tours in Afghanistan for nothing, and I gave him a backward thrust kick to the kneecap. Yowling like the Cro-Magnon man he was, he staggered back with his arms pinwheeling in the air. This gave me an opening to form my hand into a rock-hard U shape and jam it up against his windpipe, slamming his tailbone sharply against the counter. I dug my fingers in while pinning his right wrist to the granite slab, but his palm slipped and slid in the ice cream, forcing us to lunge back over the counter like two fucking lovers.
    Pure animal bloodlust overcame me when I saw his tongue start to protrude from his mouth, his eyeballs bulging. I held on and waited for that subtle change in skin coloring from white to blue.
    I snarled, “You fucking gangbanger. You fucking had to rape another guy up the ass with the help of a bunch of Hellfire Aryans? That’s the fucking lowest of the low. I don’t want you in my fucking chapter, and I don’t even want you in my fucking club.”
    But the sturdy Breakiron still had life in him. He had enough gumption to make a desperate elbow drive into my abdomen, sending me staggering back across the floor. I stepped on the stupid fucking spoon—I guess it was better than stepping on a fork—so I was completely off balance by the time I slammed into the fridge. Breakiron had the advantage now, landing a resounding uppercut to my jaw that had me seeing stars. A box of Dingo’s Froot Loops must’ve been knocked over on top of the fridge because the sugary rings sprayed all over my head harmlessly.
    “And I’m not gonna be Veep in a new fucking chapter underneath you ,” he roared goonishly.
    All the wind had been knocked from me, so Breakiron started pummelling me in the