Redemption Hills: The Complete Collection

23. Jud

TWENTY-THREE

JUD

Jud stumbled in his tracks when he saw Marcello push from the car he was leaned against in the parking lot of Iron Ride. Jud rushed a hand through his hair, half inclined to run, half inclined to grab his gun.

Take out the deviant before he became a threat.

Because Jud would never return to that life.

Because there was the past Jud was afraid would haunt him forever standing out in the snow-covered lot in Redemption Hills. A place this man should never be, should never show his face.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Jud grunted, hating that he was caught unaware. Being caught unaware in his past life meant you were dead. But considering it was that life he was trying to separate himself from, he’d let down his guard.

Marcello tsked. “You seem surprised to see me.”

“I am. Had hoped to never see you again.”

Jud had ridden for Marcello and his crew more times than he could count. A guard. A sentry. A deprived warden protecting all the wrong things. How many times had Jud pulled the trigger in the name of the treaty that had been made between their families?

Jud’s father had gotten a wide-open corridor to run his drugs through Los Angeles.

Marcello had gotten a killer.

Grim.

The tattoo burned like the scar it was on his side. He could almost hear the blood spilling to the ground. The bodies that’d fallen.

Jud gritted his teeth against the pain of the memories.

Marcello asked, “And why is that?”

Jud lifted his arms out to the sides. “My father is dead, means our deal is done.”

Marcello laughed a low sound. “I’m afraid you and I both know it doesn’t work like that.”

Jud’s heart panged in dread, his mind spinning to his wife and daughter who were across the small city of Redemption Hills. Tucked away in the little house where Jud was building a home. In this town where it was supposed to be safe. Where their past lives no longer mattered. Where no one was supposed to know they’d put down roots.

Jud cocked his head, refusing to give any sign that his knees were shaking as fierce as the shitstorm he could feel coming. A hard challenge lined his voice, “Yeah, and exactly how does it work?”

Marcello lifted too casual of a shoulder. “Well, you see, a job was left unfinished.” Jud’s chest stretched tight as Marcello took a step in his direction and said, “Your baby brother, Logan?”

Marcello phrased his name like a question, like he didn’t know full well he might as well have a knife pressed to Jud’s jugular.

“You see, he was working our books. He’s a smart one, that boy. Things had never been so profitable as when he was sitting behind our desk. And now that he’s gone…let’s just say things are a bit of a mess.”

Dread spiraled and heat flamed.

Jud seethed.

With aggression.

With hatred.

Fuck.

He should have known his father had drawn Logan into the life in some way. Manipulated him. Chained him.

Like he would have left any of them unscathed.

No doubt, their father had made a million threats to Logan to keep it hidden.

Sweat gathered along Jud’s brow even though the mountains around him were covered in two feet of snow. “The Iron Owls are dead.”

That fucking bike club where their father had led them to Hell.

“The Iron Owls still owe a debt. Your father guaranteed your services,” Marcello countered. He glanced around. “And even if he’s gone, it seems to me, a few of you are still alive and well. That doesn’t have to remain true.”

Jud edged forward one step, his voice a slow, controlled threat. “Are you asking for a war?”

Marcello wasn’t stupid.

There was a reason they’d wanted Jud.

He was a good fuckin’ shot.

And there he stood, itching to take another.

To put this remaining link in the ground.

Marcello smiled too bright. “Nonsense. We’re old friends, aren’t we? I’m here with a proposition. That is all.”

Bullshit.

Any proposition Marcello came to offer wasn’t optional.

Still, Jud asked, “Yeah?”

He crossed his arms over his chest.

“You personally do one last job for us. In and out. And your debts are paid. The Lawson brothers will be free to go on with their boring little lives.”

Marcello waved a deviant hand in the air.

“And if I don’t?”

“Then I’ll be having this conversation with Logan, and it won’t be as friendly.”

Smoke billowed. A heavy darkness that filled the air and choked out hope.

Consuming.

Disorienting.

A black plague that annihilated everything in its path.

Still, he rushed, searched, fumbled through the abyss from one room to the next.

Nothing.

Nothing.

Fear crushed, as suffocating as the smoke that filled his lungs. He pulled his shirt over his face, his eyes wide and unseeing, the world a blur of fire and white-hot pain.

It didn’t matter.

He pressed on.

Pushed.

Forever passed.

A second.

A moment.

Misery the time that ticked on the clock.

A roar rose from the depths of him. “Where are you? Please. Fuck. Can you hear me?”

The whooshing of the flames screamed back.

No, this couldn’t happen. He wouldn’t let it.

He was on his knees. Blind as he searched. A bed. No. A crib.

He felt along the spindles.

He gulped when he felt it. When he knew. When he curled his arms around the limp body.

So light. So small.

He took it into his arms, pushed to his feet, stumbled through the flames.

A window.

He lifted his boot, kicked it, busted through.

Glass shattered and rained and tore his flesh. But he didn’t slow. He lumbered out into the night.

Refusing the pain.

Refusing the agony.

The fire raged behind them, and he ran to the edge of the yard hedged by the trees.

Cradling the tiny frame, he dropped to his knees and gently set it on the ground.

His arms shook.

Shook and shook.

While the flames roared and wood crumbled and the structure gave.

No hope for life from within.

Torment wailed.

As loud as the sirens he heard coming in the distance.

Frantic, he breathed against the child’s mouth. Breathed and breathed. His hands too big and clumsy against the tiny chest.

I jolted awake. Disoriented. Blinded by the old pain that would forever rage. Sweat drenched my flesh and my body shook out of control as I gasped for air in the darkness of my room.

Hands found me in the night, shocking me out of the stupor.

Tender, sweet hands.

Heart battering at my aching chest, I sat up on the side of the bed.

I felt her crawl onto her knees behind me, and she pressed her face to the scars that burned at my back, her lips soft where they caressed the flesh.

“Jud.” Salem whispered it with all the understanding she shouldn’t possess. “What’s wrong?”

I wanted to tear at my chest. Rip out my heart. Maybe give the mangled thing to the girl before it fully bled out.

“It’s okay,” she whispered to the charred, marred skin.

My head dropped into my hands. “It’s not, Salem. It’s not.”

She curled her arms around my waist, held me while I struggled to breathe.

“I see you, Jud. I see you for who you are and not what you’ve done.” She uttered the words like they were truth.

My fucking eyes stung while agony ripped through my body.

Ghosts screaming.

Demons wailing.

“Yeah?” It came out on my own spite. She had no idea. No fucking idea. She would run. Turn her back when she knew what I’d done.

Just like Kennedy.

“I was responsible for an entire family dying, Salem. A fucking mom and her two little kids. Me.”

Horrified shock rasped from her mouth. But she didn’t loosen her hold. She just squeezed tighter.

Agonized comfort coiled in my stomach.

Her lips continued their soft assault.

Sweet encouragement.

Steady annihilation.

Because I couldn’t shut the fuck up. Couldn’t keep it in. “I tried to stop it, Salem. When I realized what was going down. I tried to. But I was too late.”

She tightened her hold, burrowed her face into my back. “I’m sorry, Jud. I?—”

“Don’t, Salem.”

Don’t.

Don’t make me want something I can’t have. Don’t make me feel this way.

Like I was grounded. Like in her eyes, I could be better. Like I might stand the chance of being the man I’d wanted to be.

Blasphemy.

“I can’t stop, Jud. I can’t stop this, either.”

Her hands spread out over my front, over the rampage thundering at my chest, this heart that no longer knew what was right.

We were held for a beat.

For a moment.

“I need you,” she finally whispered.

It only took those three little words for a frenzy to hit.

I spun and had her pressed to the bed in a flash of greed. Movements were frantic as I yanked my shirt that she was wearing over her head and tore her underwear down her legs.

She was pushing mine down my thighs as I went.

Wild.

Fevered.

Our hands everywhere.

Touching. Gripping. Needing.

“Please,” she begged.

In the room pitched in black, I drove into her. No thought. No reason. No sight.

No purpose in this moment other than this girl.

Bare.

Our hearts and bodies and spirits divulged to the other.

My hips snapped and her nails grappled for a place to take hold. To sink in. To get into those places I wasn’t sure I could keep her from.

I rolled us, this girl on top, her hair fisted in one hand and the other stroking her clit.

She rode me.

Watched me.

Thunderbolt eyes strikes of lightning in the night.

The need was too much.

Too much.

This frenzy that had lit.

Every move erratic.

Every touch volatile.

I rolled us back.

Drove. Fucked. Pushed. Compelled.

We toppled.

Chaos.

Tumult.

This storm that’d made landfall.

We were on the floor, her back to the rug, her hips jutting from the floor as I slammed into her.

“Jud,” she whimpered. “Oh, god, oh god.”

I gripped her, took her, devoured her.

She came, and I soared.

My cock pulsed. Poured into this woman who I was terrified was going to steal every bit of me.

Panting, I flopped down, rolled us to our sides, and I stared at her in the darkness.

Fingertips found my face. “I am scared that I need you, Jud. That with you, for the first time in my life, I feel safe.”

“I’ll kill anyone who even thinks about hurting you, Salem. I will.”

It should have scared her.

But this girl? She snuggled into my side.

Grim.

And I guessed for the first time in my life, I was thankful I was him.