Monday, August 5, 2019
I wasn’t big on the social scene. Didn’t matter which city I was in, the parties and gatherings were all the same: boring, predictable, and just plain exhausting.
Not to mention, full of horny twentysomethings looking to sate those irritating urges and find their happily ever after in the process. Wasn’t any different for the young and hip here in Telluride, Colorado. In one night, I’d witnessed more than enough Let’s get it on and God, please spare us to last a lifetime, thank you very much.
Netflix and chill—by my damn self—was more my jam. Which was exactly what I’d be doing if it weren’t for the fact I was on a mission. One that was about to calendar flip into year seven.
Yep, six years of searching, traveling, and questioning every Tyler, Brandon, and Jacob—face it, no one named their kids Tom, Dick, or Harry anymore—with absolutely no luck. Now I was just plain tired. And perhaps a bit downtrodden. After all, the only thing I had to show for my efforts was a resumé that proved I was an utterly uncommitted jack of all trades.
Thank you, Fate. Or Karma. Or whatever mystical power that kept the universe aligned. Oh, and I couldn’t forget my sister. Thanks, Amber. For nothing.
Had it not been for my older sister taking off for parts unknown all those years ago, I would’ve been back home in Texhoma, Oklahoma, vegging on Cheez-Its and Mountain Dew, watching reruns of America’s Next Top Model. Instead, I was strolling the streets of Bumfuck, Colorado, looking under every rock I could turn over to see if my sister was lurking.
Unfortunately, Amber’s last known sighting was proving to be another dead end.
But there was one more place I had to look before I could call it a night. A few more minutes and I could get back to my crappy motel and chill. Tomorrow, if I were lucky, I would be making like dust and scattering.
“Well, look who it is,” a gruff voice sounded behind me.
I kept walking, peering into storefronts, knowing damn well Amber wasn’t hiding out in a dusty old antique shop, but wishing she’d appear, nonetheless.
“Hey, bitch!”
Curious, I cast a quick look over my shoulder, wondering who the asshole was talking to. Whoever it was, I hoped like hell the woman gave him what for. No man would ever talk to me that way. Not if he wanted to keep his twig and berries intact.
“Yeah. I’m talkin’ to you. Come back here.”
Instinct had my legs slowing, though I probably should’ve been moving faster. Single woman out late at night wasn’t the smartest move, but I had long ago learned my sister was a night owl, and if I was going to track her down, it would likely be when the creeps were trolling.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. Where you been, Amber?”
I came to an abrupt halt, spinning around to study the man who clearly thought I was my sister.
“I been waitin’ for you to show your face. You lookin’ for Daddy Dearest?”
It wasn’t the first time I’d been mistaken for my sister. Since we both had blonde hair and blue eyes, I could see how someone might think I was Amber.
From a distance.
In the dark.
Without their glasses.
Truth was, I looked nothing like my older sister aside from our fair coloring. While Amber was short, I was all leg, clocking in at five foot six. While Amber had a round face and a cute button nose, mine was all angles. Then again, if I wasn’t ten pounds underweight, perhaps I’d have full cheeks, too.
Good news was, I seemed to be in the right place. Maybe. I should’ve known Amber would be hot on Erik’s heels. Chasing our deadbeat father to the ends of the earth was Amber’s favorite pastime. My older sister had been following his breadcrumbs since she was old enough to drive.
“I was wondering if you’d ever show your face here again. It’s been a long time, sweetheart. You find him yet?” the asshat asked.
Assuming he was talking about my father and unsure how to answer, I kept my expression blank, waited for him to get closer. As soon as he did, I realized how foolhardy my curiosity was. Before I could ask him how he knew Amber, the asshole pounced, throwing one skinny arm around my neck and jerking me backward.
I shrieked, attempting to keep my feet beneath me as he cut off my airway in his effort to drag me into a dark alley. My mouth opened, lungs filling as I prepared to scream when he rammed something into my kidney.
“Don’t you dare scream, Amber,” he hissed, his foul breath wafting into my sinuses. “I’ll shoot you where you stand. Dear old Dad won’t be too happy about that, will he?”
Nor would I, but that was moot, I figured.
Rather than punch him in the balls and elbow him in the nose, I whimpered, effectively swallowing the scream before it escaped. Clearly this was a case of mistaken identity, but I got the feeling he didn’t care if I was Amber or not. As long as I was a McKay, he would likely be happy.
“I figured for sure Daddy would keep a better eye on his little girl, so imagine my surprise when there you were.” He dragged me back a few more steps, then shoved me away, snagging my wrist, the momentum sending me spinning around.
My back hit the wall, my breath escaping in a whoosh as his hand locked onto my throat. The matte black gun shifted from my midsection to the center of my chest.
Of course the idiot was holding the nine mil like a gangster, all crooked and at the perfect angle for the shell casing to hit him square in the face. Not that it would matter. The bullet would no doubt hit its target—me—from this close.
“Not sure why he never mentioned how pretty you are,” he crooned, his calloused thumb grazing my chin.
Okay, so he didn’t know Amber? If not, why the hell did he think I was her?
What the fuck?
If it hadn’t been for the fact he was the only lead I had on my sister, I would’ve laid waste to the bastard. Instead, I feigned an innocence I’d long since shed.
At twenty-four, it wasn’t like I’d lived a long, haggard life, but considering the shit I’d endured, that warped sense of expectancy and faith had long been sucked right out of me, replaced with a heaping helping of pessimism and disappointment.
Keeping with the facade, I let my eyes go wide, ensured there was a slight tremble in my voice when I said, “What do you want?”
“To warn your father,” he snarled. “He owes me quite a bit of money, sweetheart. Makes me angry when he tries to hide from me.”
His gaze dropped to my chest, and I didn’t need to be a mind reader to know what he was thinking. There was evil in his eyes, highlighted by the sneer on his mouth and punctuated by the fowl stench of his breath.
“Though a conversation could cover it, I’m thinking something a bit more … tangible.”
He squeezed my throat and I had to force my arms to remain at my sides. The asshole had no idea how vulnerable he was right then. It would’ve taken little effort to relieve him of the gun and put him flat on his back, balls lodged somewhere in the vicinity of his sinus cavity. After all, Krav Maga had been the only class I’d paid much attention to in high school.
Except I needed answers, so I would handle this. Easy peasy. After all, I’d found myself in worse situations before.
I added wild-eyed terror to my expression. “I don’t know where he is.”
“No matter. Once I’m done with you, he’ll find me.”
I glared at him, two seconds away from putting him out of his misery when his hand shifted from my throat to my jaw. I saw stars momentarily when my not-so-thick skull high-fived the brick at my back. The move rang my bell enough to have me losing my edge, my brain rattling inside my head, white lights flashing behind my eyes.
“Bet you’ll be nice and sweet, huh?”
He leaned in, sniffed me.
Could he be any more cliché?
“Fuck you,” I snapped.
His laugh reminded me of a hyena. “Got some backbone in there, do ya? I look forward to beating it out of you. But first, perhaps we’ll have a little fun.”
When he shoved his hand between my legs, my muscles tensed, my weight shifting to my heels, arms bracing to send him flying, but before I could, he jerked away, stumbling in his cheap-ass loafers as though pulled by some invisible force.
From deep within the alley, a man appeared, his larger-than-life body stepping into the halo of light cast by the streetlamp. He walked with the grace of a jungle predator and the menace of death. I couldn’t see his eyes because they were shielded by dark shades, but I knew he was focused on my attacker.
“You better back off, man,” the gun-wielding asshole warned. “I won’t hesitate to shoot you in the face.”
“Too late.” The stranger’s deep baritone echoed through the alley. “You already hesitated.”
I considered my options. Flee the scene and risk losing the best opportunity I’d had in months of finding my sister or wait it out. I opted for the latter, continuing with the terrified routine even as I admired the beast of a man who had seemingly come to my rescue. He was massive, his shoulders so broad I wasn’t sure he was real. But to be fair, I was most impressed by the mohawk. There was something innately sexy about a man who could rock it the way this guy did.
“Last chance,” the asshole warned.
My attention was divided between the two men until the midnight-haired stranger’s head canted slightly, as though he was looking my way. Something happened in that moment. I felt it deep inside me. A connection, perhaps. I had never seen this man before, but there was something strangely familiar about him. As though I’d met him in a previous life or something.
I flinched when a shot rang out. I was still staring at the newcomer when the bullet slammed into him, the force sending his shoulder lurching back. He staggered but didn’t go down, white teeth flashing as he turned his attention to the asshole with the gun. My breath lodged in my throat.
Were those … fangs?
“I warned you,” the gun-toter screamed, his voice quivering. “Back off or you’ll get another!”
Everything happened so fast after that.
The next thing I knew, the big man was behind my attacker, the asshole’s head bobbing before there was a hideous snap and his lifeless limbs were falling to the ground, limp and … dead.
Well, hell.
Later I would be worried that my disappointed sigh likely wasn’t the appropriate response to seeing someone killed only a few feet away. For the time being, I would have to deal with the fact I would not be getting answers from this one.
Now that the dead guy was no longer a threat, my full attention went to the man standing just a few feet away. He was even bigger than I’d thought, clocking in a good foot taller than me. Not sure what he wanted from me, I kept with the frightened woman routine, locking my stare on his face. It would’ve been smart to take off, but my feet were rooted in place, palms flat against the scratchy bricks.
“Are you okay?” I asked, noticing the slight hitch in my words. Okay, so maybe I wasn’t as unaffected as I pretended. But it had nothing to do with the dead asshole and everything to do with the fact this man had been shot, and he was acting as though it wasn’t a BFD.
His head lifted, attention on me once again.
I couldn’t seem to move, but he wasn’t having the same problem. Before I knew it, he was only a breath away, his big body surrounding me. There was a strange detachment, as though I was watching this happen to someone else as he lifted his hand. His fingers were gentle where they swept over my temple, then around to the back of my head. I flinched, pain blooming. When he pulled his fingers away, I realized there was blood. Likely from my little headbutt with the wall.
He hissed softly, the sight of my blood evidently bothering him.
“Go,” he growled, his voice a dark rumble. “Run far and fast.”
This time my feet got with the program. I palmed the brick, moving sideways along the wall, keeping my eyes on him. Regret shot through me when I peered down at the dead asshole one more time. I’d wanted to question him, but now I needed to get gone or risk the police taking me into custody. Didn’t matter that I was a witness, I had no desire to mix it up with the cops.
When I reached the end of the alley,
I peered back once more. The enormous man with the sexy mohawk was still standing there, head turned, following my every move.
I could feel his eyes on me even when I finally turned and fled.
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