Redemption Hills: The Complete Collection

30. Jud

THIRTY

JUD

“Where are you going?” Kennedy frowned from their bedroom doorway as Jud tossed a change of clothes into his duffle bag.

“Consult on a custom bike.” The lie burned as it fell from his tongue.

A dagger.

A blade.

He felt as if he were slicing right through the vows he had made even though a whole ton of them had been silent. The ones Kennedy had no clue he’d needed to make.

His wife’s frown deepened. “I thought you were booked out?”

Jud zipped the bag and strode across their bedroom. He pecked a kiss to her temple, trying to keep himself together, to act normal, like this was no big deal. Fought not to be so stupid to lose his cool and blurt where he was actually going.

Kennedy wouldn’t get it. Wouldn’t understand. Wouldn’t accept he had no other choice but to do one last job.

For Logan.

For his family.

The truth was, he’d protected Kennedy from the world he’d come from. Protected her with every fiber of his loyalty. He couldn’t burden her with who he’d been. With the inhumanities he’d witnessed and the atrocities he’d committed.

He’d turned a corner and planted a new life.

But the roots of that old, wicked life drew him. He was caught in the snare of the ghosts that dragged him back to the past.

Grim.

He gritted his teeth and forced a smile. “It’s an important client. I’d be a fool to say no. I’ll be back in a couple days.”

She pressed her hand to his chest. “Okay.” Then she tipped her head. “Be careful?”

“Always,” he promised, then he kissed her long and slow before he crept into his daughter’s nursery. She was in her crib, fast asleep, the tiny, sweet thing lost to her dreams.

Love exploded. Beat at his chest.

He splayed his hand over her belly, made the silent promise, “Just this once.”

Then he left the little house and climbed onto the back of his bike, and he rode through the night.

A monster. A wraith. A demon.

Grim.

And he swore this would be the last time he would be him .

Marcello waited at the meeting point, in the seedy part of the city that felt like Jud’s old stomping grounds.

Ground covered in blood.

He killed the rumbling engine of his bike, swung off, and approached him slowly, like he might be walking into an ambush, which knowing this prick, that’s probably exactly what it was.

Marcello quirked a satisfied grin. “You made it.”

“Told you I’d be here.”

His grin widened. “Always so amenable.”

Jud grunted. “Not always.”

It was a testament. This was the end. The last thing he would subject himself to.

Jud stared at the man he all but detested. Marcello and his family had been pulling Jud’s strings for years, and he was finished being anyone’s puppet. “Let’s roll. I want to get this finished, and then it’s done. Do you understand?”

Marcello smiled. “A deal’s a deal, my friend. We stand by our commitments.”

“What’s the score?” Jud asked.

“We just need to send a warning to an associate who’s gone off the rails. Remind him where his loyalties stand.”

“A warning?”

That wasn’t what he was expecting.

He’d thought he’d be getting his hands dirty. Forcing out information or maybe silencing a threat.

Marcello tsked, laughed a light sound. “You act like we’re horrible, unreasonable people.”

Hot air puffed from Jud’s nose.

Horrible didn’t even cut it.

They were wicked. Vile. Cruel.

Just like Jud had been.

His stomach twisted.

Something after tonight, he refused to ever be again.

I jolted from the memory when Salem touched my elbow.

I kept getting swept up in those old memories. I guessed it was because I never wanted to go there again. They were a reminder of the spiral I’d slipped into, of what I’d lost, of all the mistakes I’d made—and standing there, I felt this astounding internal declaration that I’d never repeat it.

I was going to live for these two.

Live whole and right.

“Are you having second thoughts?” Salem tilted her head, like she’d thought I might have changed my mind about wanting them there rather than the truth swimming out to the horizon of where hope waited.

That I wanted her here. In every way.

“Not even close, darlin’. I asked you here, didn’t I?”

“More like demanded it.” It was a tease, even though there clearly wasn’t a whole lot of easiness as she remained just inside the door to my place.

Like she was unsure of where she fit or belonged.

Looking around like she’d never stepped inside before.

Juni actually hadn’t been there before, and the little bee was buzzing around the living space with a pink backpack strapped on her shoulders. Her black hair was in pigtails, those blue eyes gleaming in excitement as she explored the main room of the loft.

She touched about everything, not slowing as she went.

She skipped into the kitchen. “Wow, Motorcycle Man, you gots the biggest kitchen I ever seen.” She pulled open the refrigerator and poked her head inside, no shyness to it. “My mimi is gonna be the most jealous so we better nots tell her ’cause we only got a butt bumper over at our house.”

I eased deeper into my loft, a smile pulling at my mouth. Was impossible for it not to be there with this wild little thing filling up the vacancy.

“Butt bumper?” I hedged.

“Means we’re bumping our butts all the time we gotta go in and do the cooks.”

Amusement hummed in my chest.

Energy crackled, but it was different this time.

It was slow and sure.

A rumble of satisfaction as my chest pressed full.

My spirit singing that this was right.

Old guilt made a bid to drown it out. Ancient devotion that no longer quite fit.

That purpose fading at the horizon of my mind.

Grinning back at Salem who still wavered at the doorway, I carried the overnight bag she’d packed thirty minutes before. “Come on, let’s get you two settled.”

She’d refused to bring any more of her things. She’d insisted it was temporary, and she’d be back at Darius’ house soon.

Too bad every bone in my body shouted hell no .

Doubted there was a chance I would be able to let her go considering every part of me raced toward something I’d chalked up to loss.

A type of devotion pumping through my veins that I’d never thought I’d feel again.

But I guessed we’d cross that bridge when we got there. Think I was lucky enough to convince her to come here tonight for a sleepover , which was how she’d explained this little trip to Juni.

After what’d happened with Darius this afternoon, she was the one who’d started to have second thoughts. She’d tried to give me a thousand reasons why it was a bad idea.

I’d only had to give her one to change her mind: I have you.

I’d followed Salem to their house this evening to get their things. I had been wary of having another altercation with Darius, but he’d been nowhere to be found, so I assumed he was somewhere blowing off steam.

Mimi—that sweet thing—she’d been more than keen on the idea, even after Salem had flitted around, worried about leaving her alone.

“The heart knows when it’s time,” Mimi had whispered to her.

Emotion panged at the thought of it.

A void filling in the middle of my chest.

These walls no longer felt so lonely with Salem and Juni there.

I had to believe it was true.

That my heart was whispering it, too.

Juni was hot on my heels as I moved toward the bedrooms on the far-right side of the loft. I tossed open the guest bedroom door. “Here we go.”

Juni blazed around me. “What? You mean I even gets my own room? I loves it here.” She jumped onto the enormous bed, bouncing on her knees on the mattress. “I think I wants to stay for all the forevers. I thinks it’s a good idea because my best friend Gage only lives a little bit away and he can come here and play. Is that okay, Motorcycle Man?”

Warm laughter tumbled free as I edged in. “Well, since Gage is my nephew, and he likes to come over here and hang out with me every once in a while, that sounds like a pretty dang good plan to me.”

There I went, racing toward a destination I never thought I’d go.

“Jud.” My name was a plea coming from Salem where she’d edged up behind us. A warning filled her tone. Reservations she didn’t quite know where to place.

Be careful.

Don’t make promises we can’t keep.

I’m in no position to fall in love.

Turning around, I set my hand on her gorgeous face. “I have you, Salem.”

Thunderbolt eyes speared me.

Deep.

Intense.

Penetrating.

I brushed the pad of my thumb along her jaw, then I forced an easy smile. “Come on, let’s get you two fed.”

“Yes! I’m starvin’ like a martian, all the way up in the planets.”

I grinned back at Juni. “Seems like you’ve been spending too much time with Gage in the Cage.”

“No such thing, Motorcycle Man.” She hopped to her butt then slid off the side of the bed. “He’s my favorite friend, and we’re gettin’ married, and if you get married, you gotta spend always together.”

Right.

I cut an eye at Salem.

Joy washed through her expression.

Hope and belief.

Fuck.

I wanted to put that look on her face every day of her life.

“We’re gonna have to keep an eye on those two,” I said with a tease, angling down to drop a kiss to the side of Salem’s cheek as I passed.

“That’s your jobs, doncha know? You’re the adults.” Juni tossed it out, so pragmatic as she blazed back out to the kitchen.

A laugh tore free.

“I’ll be sure to remind you of that when you’re about fourteen.” I shouted it behind her as I turned in the direction of the master bedroom.

At my assertion, the breath hitched in Salem’s throat.

I turned to look at her from over my shoulder.

Salem had frozen outside Juni’s door.

She stood in my apartment like she’d become a part of the makeup.

A fixture on the floors.

A stroke of the paintings.

Permanent.

So goddamn pretty she knocked the air right outta my lungs.

A fantasy wrapped in a black, decadent bow.

“Could look at you all day.” The praise rumbled free.

Warily, Salem glanced around, fidgeting and letting her nerves get the best of her.

I let go of a casual laugh to put her at ease.

“Come on, Wildcat. I see you getting ready to strike.” I strode the rest of the way into my room, set her things on the floor. Her presence was nothing but a stir that hedged me from behind.

Chaos and light.

When she still didn’t say anything, I turned around and took her by the face.

Kissed her deep.

A bolt of need punched through my body.

I pulled back to stare down at that stunning face. “Do you trust me?”

She chewed at her bottom lip before she admitted, “I’m scared of how much I do.”

“You think I’m not scared, too, Salem? That all of this isn’t fuckin’ with my mind? But that’s the thing about trust—it’s always a little scary to give. To rely on someone when we’ve only been relying on ourselves. And fuck yeah, baby, you are a fighter, a survivor. Fierce and determined. So goddamn beautiful you make my knees shake. But it doesn’t matter how strong we are, every one of us needs someone who is willing to fight for us, too.”

She reached out and scratched her nails through my beard, those eyes on me when she whispered, “What I’m really scared of is losing you.”

“Then stay.”

I said it like it was simple.

Like nothing else mattered.

“Are you two done kissin’ or what?” Juni’s little voice filtered from the kitchen and into my room.

On a chuckle, I took Salem’s hand and threaded our fingers together.

She looked at the knitting of our beings, feeling it, too.

The merging.

The meeting.

The way it was supposed to be.

I led her out the double doors and into the big main room. Juni had already made herself at home, digging through the pantry. “You ain’t gots much, Motorcycle Man.”

She said it with a disappointed sigh.

“How about we order pizza for tonight and we’ll get some more groceries in here tomorrow?”

“Don’t teases me.” Juni stared at me with her mother’s eyes.

My chest stretched tight.

Fuck.

I was done for.

I pulled out my phone. “No teasin’ to it.”

“Hallelujahs,” she sang.

“What’s everyone’s favorite?”

“Cheese!” Juni popped up at the countertop where I was resting on my elbows so I could scroll to my favorite pizza place.

I touched her nose. She giggled.

The hole Kennedy and Kye had left inside me felt fuzzy. An old haunting that I’d never quite shake. A blur that had begun to form into something else.

I slanted a questioning gaze at Salem. “How about you, darlin’?”

“Cheese is great, as long as we order a salad on the side.” She looked at her daughter when she said that.

Juni shrugged, so grown-up. “I gots no problems with the vegetables. Sheesh, Mommy, do you even know me?”

So much sass.

My head shook in amusement, and I punched in the number, set on taking care of these two the best that I could.

Only the blaring that suddenly screamed through the loft froze my fingers on the screen. The alarm was so loud, it was disorienting.

Deafening.

I heard it like a crash of lawlessness. A shearing of peace.

Everything seized for one shocked second.

Salem’s spirit frozen—frozen in terror—my heart frozen in the same.

Then she started to mumble, “No. No, no, no, my baby.”

Torment clouded her expression.

I shot into action when I realized it was the fire alarm from downstairs in the shop going off.

On instinct, I grabbed Juni.

The little girl curled her arms around my neck and buried her face in my beard. My attention shifted to Salem the second I had the child in my arms.

Salem.

Salem who was nothing but panic. Her face was a sheet of white. Like she’d run headfirst into a ghost that’d come to claim.

Her eyes filled with what I knew deep down she believed was inevitable—she thought she’d been discovered.

My own wounds throbbed. Curdled my senses into a wad of old disgust.

Bile rose in my throat, and I wanted to succumb.

But I had way more important things to protect than my past mistakes.

I grabbed Salem by the hand. “Follow me,” I shouted over the alarm.

The siren blared. Banging off the walls and amplifying. Blasting so loud it twisted the air into a daze.

The world in confusion.

Salem clamored along behind me toward the set of emergency steps that ran out the backside of the laundry room. I flung the door open and bounded down the stairwell that crisscrossed three times.

Juni curled her arms tighter and burrowed her face deep into my neck, like she trusted me to silence it, keeping her harsh, hard breaths silent, like she’d been taught how to hide.

All while I could feel the crush of Salem’s heart. The desperation in her steps.

I held them tighter, shouting, “I have you. I have you,” over the clatter.

We busted out at the bottom and into the waning day. Twilight hung over the earth, slipping behind the trees and casting the world in a kaleidoscope of golds and purples and deepening blues.

Salem heaved a breath as soon as we were outside, and I tightened my hold on her as I raced us around the side of the building toward the woods that separated Iron Ride and Absolution.

Where it was secluded.

Where neither of them would be seen.

Salem was gasping, choking over her fear.

Wanted to wrap her up. Promise she was safe. That I would never let anything happen to her. Instead, I spun her, passed her daughter into the well of her shaking arms.

“Do not move!” I told her. I grabbed her by the outside of her upper arms to emphasize it. “Wait right here. It’s going to be fine. I promise you.”

Her nod was jerky, Salem in shock as she clung to her daughter.

I warred, not wanting to move, but the alarm was still screeching through the coming night.

I ran back that way, hitting the button on my phone that controlled the garage bay doors.

All five of them began to lift.

A small strain of smoke billowed out of the one closest to the lobby.

I ran along the front of the building. My heart seized when I realized where it was coming from.

Salem’s piece of shit car that was still on the riser smoldered, the barest smoke wafting out from the driver’s-side window that had been left down.

Dipping inside the shop, I grabbed the fire extinguisher from the wall, fighting a war of my own fear, my own regrets.

Felt like the ugliest, dirtiest parts of me had found their way free and were taunting me.

The small fire a jeer that threatened to erupt to an all-out inferno from Salem’s car.

I hit the button to the riser to lower it, and I jerked out the pin on the extinguisher and sprayed the foam over the flames.

It was out as fast as it’d started.

Strain heaved and shock clutched my chest, this crazy-ass billow of relief mixed with the disorder.

Sweat dripped from my forehead, my blood a boil of aggression and adrenaline.

I swallowed it down and looked inside the window of the old car.

The remnants of a charred, oily rag were on the seat.

My gaze whipped around, searching for a reason.

An explanation.

Dread curled and trembled the ground beneath my feet.

The extinguisher slipped from my hands and clattered to the concrete. It rolled under the car while bile throbbed in my throat.

A warning.

A hiss.

Nothing added up.

I moved through the shop, hitting the stop button on the alarm as I passed. The silence roared. A ringing in my ears as I began to search every nook.

Every cranny.

Any possible spot someone could hide.

I came up short, nothing else out of place.

I scrubbed both hands over my face before I dropped them to peer through the empty shop.

My stomach was in knots. Nausea burned through the middle. I swallowed around the ball of razors in my throat.

It had to be an accident.

A slip up.

A misstep.

That rag left in the wrong place.

But what would have sparked it?

“Fuck,” I spat then I inhaled, trying to get my head on straight as I barreled out of the bay and toward the only destination I knew.

To where Salem and Juni were hidden in the cover of the dense thicket of trees.

My heart battered and crashed, and every single muscle in my body bowed in possession.

Salem was there. Her daughter in her arms, hiding her face but still peeking out as I approached.

“It was just a small fire caused by an oily rag. Alarm is super sensitive to protect the shop.”

It was true, but it still felt like bullshit.

Salem knew it, too.

She was shaking. Shaking and shaking.

She spun a circle, her black hair whipping around her shoulders like a darkened, chaotic storm. “No.”

Panic built, and her fear compounded.

“No,” she said again before she darted around me and took off running. With Juni held in her arms, she headed back toward the side stairway.

I kept up behind her. “Salem. Wait. Let me check it out to make sure it’s safe before we go back inside.”

I might as well not have said a thing because my words didn’t penetrate the wall of her panic.

She never put Juni down the entire way up to the loft, her feet banging the stairs and her distress clawing the white bricks.

She burst through the laundry room door, ignoring me as I tried to stop her.

“Salem, please. Calm down. Let’s take a deep breath. A minute to think this through.”

The distress radiating back was her only answer.

Seeping from her pores and burning from her flesh.

“Salem.”

She was already in the guest bedroom, snatching up Juni’s bag, then she blew out and into my bedroom. The only thing she took the time to grab was her purse.

She didn’t look at me as she rushed back out the door and across the loft.

“Salem. Fuck, please. Stop. Look at me.” I fumbled behind her. Trying to break through. To climb over the barriers and find my way to her. To where it was me and this girl who’d changed everything. One who’d rearranged every loyalty.

I didn’t make a dent.

Without slowing, she darted back through the laundry room and into the stairwell, her footfalls frenzied as she careened down the steps.

“Salem…please. Listen to me. I have you. I have you.”

“Please, Jud, don’t.” It was the first thing that came out of her mouth, and she tossed it out without looking back as she banged through the bottom door and out into the deepening night.

She ran for the SUV she’d left parked right outside.

“Salem. Don’t.”

I tried to grab her arm. To hold her. To let her know it was going to be okay.

Shaking me off, she pushed the button on the lock and set Juni into the backseat. Her movements were frantic as she strapped the little girl into place.

She slammed Juni’s door and slipped by me while my heart lodged in my shredded throat.

“I’m sorry,” was all she said as she jerked open the driver’s door, refusing to look at me as she did. She started to climb inside.

I took her by the shoulders and spun her around to face me. “I know you’re scared, but I need you to remember right now what you promised—if you get scared, you run to me. Remember, darlin’. Run to me. I’m right here. Right here.”

She squeezed her eyes closed like she couldn’t look at me when she said it, the words ragged when she forced them out. “I’m sorry, I can’t stay, Jud. I can’t. I need to go before it’s too late.”

Agony whipped through the atmosphere.

My guts screamed. But it was my heart shouting louder.

Taking her by the face, I forced her to look at me. Begging her to see. To hear. “I’m in this with you, Salem. You’re not alone any longer. Don’t you see? I have you, darlin’. I have you.”

Her eyes just pressed tighter, girl closing herself off, regressing back to the place where she couldn’t trust. Where her fear reigned, and her hopes didn’t matter. “You have to let me go, Jud. I can’t do this. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

Desperate, the confession I’d been trying to deny to myself came blundering out. “I can’t let you go. I can’t. I love you. I fuckin’ love you, Salem.”

It was true.

So fucking true the verity of it nearly dropped me to my knees.

But I had to remain standing.

Hold up this girl.

Because she choked on the agony, and Salem nearly bent in two, falling apart as she surged forward and pressed her face to my chest and curled those hands in my shirt. Clinging to me as if I were a buoy in the raging, toiling sea, she frantically kissed over my heart. I felt the grief and lost dreams leave her on a sob.

She inhaled, breathed me in, then she pushed her hands against my chest to push me away. “Who said anything about love?”

I staggered back.

Salem swayed. Caught in a torrent of sorrow. Her arm shot out to catch herself on the door before she fell, then she swallowed, built a fortress around herself, and jumped into the driver’s seat.

“I’ll figure out a way to repay you for the car. Both of them.” She was facing forward when she said it, cool and robotic and like she wasn’t tearing me apart. Reaching out, she grabbed the door handle and slammed it shut.

My palms pressed to the window. “Salem. Baby, don’t go. You don’t have to do this.”

Could see her frenzied movements as she fumbled to start the car. I banged at the window. “Salem. Don’t. Don’t run away. Run to me.”

My pleas didn’t penetrate, or maybe they made her fight this harder, the way she refused to look at me as she threw the car in reverse. She peeled out as I flew back and stumbled out of the way.

The SUV jolted forward when she put it in drive, tires squealing as she gunned it on the loose gravel.

Like a fuckin’ fool, I ran behind her. “Salem! Salem! Please.”

Salem.

My entire being writhed.

Writhed in fucking agony because my entire world was fleeing.

Running, the way she did. The way she’d promised she would do.

I was a fool.

I had known it in an instant.

The way this girl’d had me tangled in a beat.

Need.

Possession.

Black. Fuckin’. Magic.

Nothing but pure, utter devastation.

And my sweet enchantress’s spell? It finally brought me to my knees.