Redemption Hills: The Complete Collection

10. Salem

TEN

SALEM

I’d been working at Iron Ride for the last three days.

I’d been right.

Darius had been pissed.

But even though he’d been all surly and grumbly and annoyed, there was enough work to make him forget why he was upset at me in the first place.

Hell, there was enough work to keep us all distracted for the next five years.

After the interaction with Jud on Monday morning that had left me completely rattled? That was precisely what I’d done. I’d thrown myself into getting the office whipped into shape and tried to pay as little attention to the man who rocked my whole world every time he got into my space.

Stoically trying to pretend like each smile wasn’t driving me mad.

Like each smirk wasn’t making me contemplate things I had no business contemplating.

So, I dove into the stacks of receipts and contracts and unpaid invoices, doing my best to organize them, to make sense of them, inputting them into the accounting software and trying to get it to balance since there had been no less than fifteen unanswered emails asking for that information from Jud’s accountant.

Not to mention the number of late notices I’d sent out on Iron Ride’s behalf to customer accounts that had never been paid.

My spirit had both lifted and sank with the amount it was adding up to, and I’d barely made a dent.

It only made the man who owned these floors like a hunter more mysterious. His life beat clearly found in the pulse of the motorcycles and cars he restored. I peered through the glass door that separated the lobby from the shop to where he was at the far, opposite side.

He was knelt over, his big body this force as he worked the metal.

My stomach tightened.

I guessed I recognized it, why it would be so easy for this part of his business to slide.

He was an artist.

A sculptor.

A crafter.

His care wrapped up in the rugged, fierce beauty he had to offer.

He shifted, and his shirt stretched over the wide, wide expanse of his muscled back.

My mouth went dry.

Before I stared so long drool would drip onto the desk, I forced myself to return my attention to the computer where I was inputting his positives.

None of this mess appeared to be hurting him, anyway.

His accounts were plentiful. Enough that it’d taken me a moment to process the balances.

It was weird, he’d just given me access to it all, his trust so easy.

That was something I didn’t come close to understanding.

How to just…give.

Because giving was dangerous.

I forced myself to focus on the task at hand. Slowly but surely, I made my way through a box of receipts that had been stuffed in the corner. Lost in the work. In using my hands. In being a part of something that felt like it mattered. As if I were making a difference for someone else.

Someone who was making a difference for me.

Only I stilled when a sense whispered across my flesh.

An aura.

An innuendo.

It was close to chills lifting on my skin, though not quite as intense.

It was just this disquiet that gusted through the muted intensity of my focus.

Slowly, I pushed from the stool where I’d been sitting at the desk that ran off to the side of the main high counter. I eased closer so I could peer over the top and out through the windows that I knew were a shimmery pitch from the outside.

Because of it, there was no chance a soul could see through the tint.

Still, my heart thugged like lead when I saw a car sitting on the far side of the curb. It wasn’t directly across the street, but a bit farther to the left, mostly concealed by the thick foliage of shrubbery and trees.

But I saw it—the tail-end of the same black car I could have sworn I’d seen outside our house earlier this morning.

Again, up the street.

I’d barely acknowledged it then, where it’d sat up the road like any other.

But this?

Alarm sparked in the place where I would forever be on edge, and it sent a tremor rocking through my being.

A warning that blared.

My being buzzed, jumpstarting the fight or flight reaction it always did.

But me?

It was always flight.

I had to get out of here.

I had to get out of here.

Run. Run. Run.

I stumbled back from the counter as panic seized the air in my lungs.

In an instant, I felt as if I were suffocating.

The world spinning. The floor trembling.

It was the only thing I could do— flee.

Frantically, my attention darted for an escape route, only to scream when a hand landed on my shoulder.

I whirled around in shock, in fear, in a tiny bit of that fight , ready to battle through to the end.

“Salem.”

That rumbly voice broke into the frenzied paranoia.

“Salem, look at me, darlin’. It’s just me.”

I gasped and blinked and tried to reorient myself.

I realized I was pressed against a row of black file cabinets that ran the left wall behind the counter. There was a small wall that jutted out to keep them hidden from the lobby.

It left me out of view of anyone who would walk through the doors.

But Jud saw me.

Watched me carefully.

That obsidian gaze fired and flared and rushed over me in his own bid of panic.

“Not gonna hurt you, darlin’.” Those big, big hands were held out in front of him in a calming fashion, and I squeezed my eyes closed and attempted to swallow over the jagged rock that had lodged itself in my throat.

My lungs panged and my heart hammered and God…this was so embarrassing.

“Are you okay?”

My nod was tight.

“What’s going on? What freaked you out?”

My head shook and my body shivered. “Nothing.”

“Not nothing if it’s got you spun up like this.” The words cracked like venom.

Manic laughter tumbled from my tongue, and I waved a crazed hand toward the window, unable to stop the flow of words.

“I just…there’s a car out there sitting on the street, and I swore I saw the same one sitting across the street in our neighborhood this morning. It’s probably nothing.”

What was I doing? Giving this to him?

But a spec of that trust was there, offered into the air. Into his hands. Into his big, beating heart that battered at his chest.

His attention darted to the windows. I saw the moment he saw it, too. The way every bulky muscle in his body flexed in a bid of aggression.

“It’s nothing,” I reiterated, mostly trying to calm myself down.

Only Jud didn’t seem to think it was nothing because he grunted, “Wait right there.”

Then he turned on his heavy motorcycle boots, his giant body hulking around the counter and across the lobby, the man casting me a harsh glance as he slipped out the door.

He didn’t slow.

He strode like menace across the lot.

I watched in abject horror and awe as he slipped his hand around to his backside and under his shirt and pulled a gun from the waistband of his jeans.

His muscles vibrated with hostility.

With violence.

I’d known there was something about the man that whispered of his darkness.

Of danger.

Of bloodshed and barbarity.

But I’d never been so sure of it until then.

He was about three-quarters of the way across the lot when the black car suddenly peeled out, flying from its perch with a squeal of tires and a billow of dust.

Running from the monster set on savagery that clumped that way.

I saw it there, when he turned around.

The expression on his face.

A gnarl of wickedness.

A disorder of malice.

My stomach twisted.

My pulse flew.

I could feel the tumult blister through the air when he looked back at the spot where the car had disappeared. When it seemed clear, he reluctantly turned, stuffed his gun back into his waistband, and marched back across the lot.

My heart thundered, a careening stampede.

It hammered harder and harder with each step that he took.

Tremors rocked the ground.

Shockwaves of animosity and duty.

I didn’t know how to stand.

Didn’t know how to do anything when he tossed the door open and strode through, rays of bright sunlight streaking over him as he entered, lighting him up like some kind of unrighteous god.

Intensity cracked.

Snapped in the room.

An imposing force.

The man a wicked, wicked savior.

I was back to pressing myself against the cool metal of the file cabinet, unable to breathe, unable to process the thousand thoughts that spiraled through my mind.

I never should have come.

I never should have thought I could stay.

I never should have allowed myself to start to feel safe.

And most of all, I never, ever should have started to think of this place as home.

Jud edged forward, the colossal, beast of a man coming closer and closer.

Black hair and black beard and black eyes that I could have sworn fired red.

My chest squeezed tighter with each step.

My pulse thudded like a snare with each powerful stride that he took.

Though those steps were slowed.

Cautioned.

I fought for ground. To remain unaffected.

Not to whimper when the forbidding man suddenly towered over me with those eyes pinning me to the spot.

“They’re gone.” The words scraped like barbs from his tongue. His anger barely contained. “Probably a drug deal or some shit. Not exactly the best side of town over here.”

I gulped around the rock that pressed like razors to my throat. Warily, I tried to gather the fear and the panic, to be reasonable and not jump to the first horrible conclusion, the way I always did.

It was hard not to do that when I’d spent years running. When every sound and whisper and intonation had made me terrified someone was coming for us.

The worst part was knowing it wasn’t illogical. I had the holes carved out inside me to prove it.

The truth that I would be a fool to take the chance.

On a jittery nod, I faked a smile. “Probably.”

Jud’s brow pinched, and those eyes raced over my face like they could see through to the very depths of who I was.

To every secret.

To every fear.

He leaned closer, and his warm breath whispered across my skin. “But that’s not what you were thinkin’, was it, darlin’?”

This.

This was why I’d been diverting. Why I’d been trying to distract and pretend and ignore that I’d revealed a piece of myself I shouldn’t have at the beginning of the week.

“Who are you running from?” I could have sworn his words were underlined with murder.

My head shook, and my eyes found the intensity in his. “Please, don’t ask that of me.”

I didn’t know him.

Couldn’t trust him.

Fury flashed through his features.

He took my hands and threaded our fingers together.

Vibrations zapped through the connection.

Palpable and real.

His growl was menace. “Want to destroy whoever hurt you. Just need a name.”

A gasp ripped up my throat when he suddenly lifted my arms above my head and pinned them against the cabinet.

“Just a name.” It sounded of sex and coercion.

My eyes squeezed closed. “I can’t.”

His big hands slipped down my quivering limbs, as if he were gathering up every ounce of terror that I possessed. Taking it into his hold. Caressing away the panic.

“I have you, Salem.” He grumbled it, and those eyes never left mine as he ran his hands all the way back up my arms to my hands and then down again.

Though that time, he didn’t stop.

He ran them over my shoulders and down to my sides.

My lungs squeezed tight, and our hearts raged in the bare space that separated us.

Need spiked in the dense air.

His wide, wide chest jutted and heaved, and every muscle in his body strained.

I knew we were concealed behind the wall, but there was something about this that made me feel exposed.

As if there was an audience watching as I slipped into recklessness.

As I tiptoed into sin.

My stomach twisted in want, and my nipples hardened beneath his stare.

Jud groaned as if he felt the desire ravaging my flesh, and his hands were splaying wider at my ribs, so big they nearly wrapped all the way around.

Harsh air puffed from his nose when he brushed his thumbs over the rock-hard peaks of my breasts.

A whimper fled from my lips. “Oh, god.”

“Beautiful. Losing my fuckin’ mind over you, Salem.” He rubbed harder, watching me like he wanted to devour me as he stoked that long dimmed flame.

He seemed to war, his body rocking in indecision, lost to his own battle before he snapped.

In a flash, the last bit of oxygen remaining in my lungs was gone.

Because his mouth crushed against mine.

As if any barrier between us had been floored.

I couldn’t do anything but give. No control but to open to the demanding ferocity of his kiss.

Desperate to feel anything different than the constant fear that raged.

To feel supported.

Seen.

Held.

Real.

For just a moment, to touch on something that might feel like hope.

It was wrong. So wrong. But I couldn’t stop.

I wrapped my arms around his neck in a desperate play to feel.

I opened to his kiss.

Surrendered.

Gave.

His tongue stroked out and swept over mine.

Hot and warm and sending a crash of lust blistering through my blood.

A moan got free, his or mine, I wasn’t sure.

He pressed closer, that giant body eclipsing me.

Every inch of him was hard.

The muscles that bunched his arms.

The crash of the beating in his chest.

His huge cock that begged at my stomach.

Sounds climbed my throat. Needy and wild.

Our breaths turned ragged as our mouths clashed and demanded and fought for possession.

Reckless.

So reckless.

Jud took more with every lick of his tongue. Raw, rough rumblings rose from his soul. “Sweet. So sweet. What are you doing to me? Blowin’ my mind.”

Desire consumed.

Blinding.

I ached in a way I wasn’t sure I ever had.

Like maybe if I let myself fall deeper into him, things might not hurt so bad.

But I knew better.

Knew better.

I tried for resolve, for clarity, for restraint.

I made a vain attempt at slowing the kiss, but the man just licked down to kiss along the scar on my jaw.

He moaned before he ran his nose along the mangled flesh.

The gentlest caress.

God.

If I let him, he could do me in.

Then he was lobbing for a breath, like I’d somehow affected him the same way he’d affected me.

He eased back when I finally found the strength to roll my head against the metal to stop this madness. That smile tweaked beneath his beard, his sexy lips red and wet, his words a rough scrape that rumbled my spirit. “Black-fuckin’-magic.”

He was right.

It had to be.

This spell that curled and whipped and bound us together.

I blinked through the stupor and tried to push at his chest. “Jud, we can’t do this.”

I might as well have been pushing against a boulder.

“Yeah, and why’s that?”

“Because I work for you.”

“Huh. Weird. Didn’t see you on the payroll.”

A frown pinched my expression, regret coming in fast. “That’s not fair.”

He softened, and he ran his thumb across my scar.

A tremble rocked me through.

That wasn’t fair, either.

His touch.

His charm.

His charisma.

This tenderness that butted up against all his bad.

This call that made me feel like I was where I was supposed to be, when I knew letting my guard down was the most foolish thing I could do.

He stared down at me, searching.

Looking for the answer to this unspoken question that ravaged between us. I figured after everything, I at least owed him a little bit of truth.

“I’m in no position to fall in love, Jud.”

His hand was still spread across my face, the thumb caressing along my jaw doing that thing that twisted through me like agonized comfort.

“Who said anything about love, Salem?”

His response might have stabbed if I didn’t see the stark, gutting pain slash across his face.

The way those obsidian eyes went dim with grief.

My heart panged.

And I wondered if it were possible that he might be as broken as me.

That was a big, big problem.

The truth that it only made me like him more.

This rough, sweet man who could so easily rip me apart.

“Then what are you—” My words clipped off when a door slammed. We jumped apart, Jud flying back to the opposite counter while I hopped away from the file cabinets deeper into the recesses of the lobby office space.

Anxiously, Jud roughed his fingers through the longer pieces of his hair, doing his best not to look my direction when Brock sauntered in, all smirking grins and salacious smiles.

His gaze darted between the two of us. Glee lit on his face. “Well, hell. I was just comin’ in to see if Salem here would like to grab a drink after work, but it appears I’m a few minutes too late.”

Jud actually growled.

Massive hands curled into fists, and I was a little scared he might actually rip a limb or two from Brock’s body.

Brock just cracked up, no care in the world, his voice packed with suggestion as he pushed his hands out in surrender. “Down boy. No need to get up in arms. A man knows when he’s been outbid.”

He backed away with a smirk dancing over his face.

“Not sure what you think you’re talkin’ about, Brock, but I suggest you get your ass back to work and don’t come sniffing around in here again. Hear me?”

Brock swung his attention to me, and his eyes raked down my body.

Jud’s lie hung in the air.

The falsity of it was clear in my mussed hair and disheveled clothes, my blouse untucked on one side of my dress pants.

Crap.

I tried to inconspicuously readjust things.

Apparently, that made things worse because Brock’s smile only grew. He looked back at Jud. “Loud and clear, boss, loud and clear.”

He dipped back out through the door, and Jud was coming my way again, and I was pushing out my hands like I could protect myself from the impact of him. “No, Jud. I don’t think I can do this.”

He was in my face, dipping down, a heated whisper at my ear. “I’m taking you home tonight. Want to make sure you get there safe.”

I could feel the refusal curl between my eyes, every reason we shouldn’t do this pouring out. “I ride with Darius, and you know it’s a bad idea, anyway. I think we should just leave it at that. You don’t know me and I don’t know you and?—”

Jud leaned in and softly smoothed the wrinkle out, cutting off my refusal. “Don’t get those pretty panties in a twist. It’s just a ride.”

Then he started to saunter away, only to pause at the organized stacks I’d made, his index finger jabbing at the papers. He looked back at me. “And for the record, you’ve already earned me far more than the cost of your car. You’re off the hook, darlin’, but I sure as fuck hope you’ll stay.”

Then he strode out, tossing open the single door that led to the shop, leaving me there gasping in his wake.