Respect

by Jay Crownover

  Her eyebrows puckered in confusion and I could see her trying to figure out why my voice shook with barely checked fury when I talked about her soon-to-be brother-in-law. Race was her hero.

  Too bad he was my goddamn nightmare.

  “How can you have nothing to do with Race? Don’t you work for him?” Her head cocked to the side, curiosity evident in every word, chasing away some of her anger.

  I grunted and ran my fingers over my scar again. “I work for Nassir.” I refused to take orders from that golden-haired asshole after he pushed me into a very tight corner and orchestrated the breaking of Karsen’s heart. Luckily, I didn’t have the same issues with his business partner, Nassir Gates. In fact, I liked working for the man they called the Devil. There was no question Nassir was a killer and a crook. What you saw was exactly what you got with him—not the case with Race. The fair-haired criminal was much more unassuming and insidious. I hadn’t seen his attack coming, and I hated being blindsided. If Karsen didn’t look at him like he was her saving grace, I would’ve put the former rich kid down without a second thought. He had it coming.

  “Nassir and Race work together. How can you work for one and not the other?” She was asking questions she didn’t want the answers to.

  I sighed and swore under my breath. “Nassir needs shit done; I do it. I spend most of my time running security for his clubs. That’s it. He pays the bills, not Hartman.” But sometimes things needed to get down and dirty . . . and bloody. I didn’t mind those times, as long as they didn’t benefit the golden king of the Point in any way. I didn’t care if his part of the kingdom burned, but it would devastate Karsen, so I stayed away from the fire and refused to be tempted by the flickering flames.

  “Did Race do something you find morally objectionable?” She snickered at me, like she found it unbelievable there was actually a line I wouldn’t cross.

  I shook my head and let my hands drop. I didn’t want to talk about her hero, but I should have known it was going to be impossible. “No. Race and I just don’t see eye to eye on a lot of things.” Namely her. I always believed she was smart enough and strong enough to know what she wanted. He insisted on insulating her, protecting her by taking her choices away. He manipulated her the same way he manipulated the people he did business with, and he was so damn charming and slick, no one ever realized they were being hustled. Including Karsen. “It’s better for everyone if we keep our distance.”

  She made a noise. “I wish you would’ve kept your distance from me.”

  That made my gut twist. Not too long ago she wasn’t allowed to get close. Now she could, and she wanted to be as far away from me as possible.

  “Karsen,” I wasn’t good with words. I was an action guy. That’s why I was here. Race was going to kill me as soon as he realized I was gone, but she mattered too much for me to stay away. She had to know how much I cared about her when she was still living in the Point—even when I wasn’t supposed to. I was trying to figure out what to say next when the tension popping back and forth between us like a live current was broken by Karsen’s phone trilling with some obnoxious pop song.

  I bit back a groan. The peppy, catchy song I didn’t have a hope in hell of recognizing was a reminder that no matter how much history existed between us, she was still so much younger than me. Still so harmless and untainted. I needed to see her again to prove to myself I did the right thing by letting her go all those years ago.

  She pulled the device out of her pocket, eyes flickering to me before turning her back and answering the call.

  “Hey, Ari. What’s up?” The genuine affection in her voice for the roommate made me smile. I knew all about the bubbly brunette with the cop for an older brother. She was a good match for Karsen. She helped bring her out of her shell, and she was fiercely protective of her friend. The pint-sized firecracker had terrible taste in men, but as long as her choices didn’t bleed onto my girl, I didn’t worry about them rooming together.

  Suddenly, she stiffened and a new kind of tension started to swirl around her. “What do you mean, he hit you?!” Her shriek made the hairs on the back of my neck lift. She stalked out of the room without looking back to see if I was following, her raised voice echoing around the empty walls of her apartment. “No. You stay right there. I’m coming to get you. I understand why you don’t want Dom involved, but you need to call him.”

  There was chatter on the other end of the phone and I could distinctly hear the sound of a woman crying. Whatever was going on wasn’t good and there was no way I was letting Karsen get in the middle of it without someone at her back.

  “Ten minutes. I’ll be there in ten. If I see Troy I’m going to kick his ass. How dare he put his hands on you.” She swore and shifted gears faster than I could keep up. Suddenly soothing, she muttered, “I know, sweetie. You do deserve better. He absolutely should go to jail. Call your brother.”

  She was at the front door slipping on a pair of fuzzy looking boots when I caught up with her. I grabbed her elbow and she gasped like she had forgotten I was there. She looked down at my fingers and then up at my face. Her jaw was locked and her eyes were blazing with emotion. I was sure she was going to shake me off and tell me to go to hell, but she didn’t.

  “Since you’re here, make yourself useful and come with me so you can do the only thing you’re good at.” She jerked her arm free and stormed out the door.

  I followed behind her, eyebrows lifted as I asked, “What exactly is it that I’m good at?”

  “Hurting people. I want you to hurt him so bad he can’t ever put his hands on anyone ever again.” She sounded serious and cold.

  Those first two words hurt me more than they should have . . . but she was right. Hurting people was all I’d ever known. But hearing her say that out loud, yeah, that sucked and forced me to realize that while I’d needed to see her again. She really had done her best to shove me so far down in her memories she couldn’t recall how careful I’d always been with her.

  You could take the girl out of the Point, but you could never take the Point out of the girl. Her verbal combat skills were sharp and deadly.

  I grunted and followed her out of the apartment. I was good at hurting people, I just had to figure out how to convince her I never wanted to hurt her again, that I’d never wanted to hurt her in the first place.

  Karsen

  I was having a really hard time keeping all of my emotions in check. I was furious at Booker for showing up out of the blue, disrupting what had been a pretty idyllic life. Granted, I had no idea what my next moves were going to be, but still, how dare he? I was mad at myself for reacting to him. The sound of his deep, raspy voice still sent chills down my spine, and the sight of those haunted, tormented, slate-colored eyes still made my heart skip a beat. On top of all my anger, I was about to explode over Ari’s hysterical phone call. I was a bomb of fury ready to blow and the fuse was lit. It was easy to forget the need for blood and vengeance ran so close to the surface under my skin. I hadn’t allowed that bloodthirsty response to rear its ugly head in years, but when I did, it was so easy to slip back into my ruthless skin. There was no way Troy was going to get away with putting his hands on Ari. He was a creep, had been from the beginning. Now I had a solid excuse to send him packing from my best friend’s life for good.

  Logically, I knew the best course of action was to call Dominic. Ari begged me not to. She was embarrassed about the situation, even more so since her brother was the one who hoofed all her stuff to Troy’s over the last couple of days. She was stunned that as soon as Troy got home and saw all her belongings scattered over his apartment, he lost it. She didn’t want Dom to get in trouble if he lost his temper. He was her brother and a cop. If anyone could handle Troy the right way, it was him. But there was a part of me, a huge part, that was elated Booker had shown up when he did. Troy deserved to be handled in all the wrong ways for hurting my friend. For thinking that hitting a woman was ever an option. The law moved slowly and tended to be bias
ed and skewed. Street retribution was swift, exact, and unforgettable. That’s what I wanted Troy to experience. Booker was the man to make that happen. A slap on the wrist and a stern warning wouldn’t do. I wanted broken bones and blood. The man sitting next to me in the snazzy SUV Race bought me to get around in the snowy Colorado winters excelled at both of those things. His entire life was built on broken bones and blood . . . add heartbreak to his repertoire and he was the perfect trifecta of doom. But the sorrow I saw reflected back at me in his eyes was something new. I recognized it in his gaze, because I saw it in my own every time I looked at myself in the mirror.

  I had no idea what Booker’s agenda was, why he was here after all this time, but there was no way I was falling into the trap of believing he deserved redemption or any more of my time. Been there, done that, still had the broken heart to show for it. No, he was a bad guy, one who did bad things, not always to bad people. He’d told me that from the start; it was well past time I started believing him and let him go for good.

  “Tell me about the boyfriend. He get handsy with your girl before now?” I was so lost in thought I almost forgot he was taking up most of the available space in the front of the SUV. I looked at him out of the corner of my eye and realized he wasn’t wearing a suit. He was always dressed impeccably back home. Tailored suits cut to fit his massive frame and conceal his shoulder harness were his go-to. Today, he was in faded jeans, a well-worn leather jacket, and a Led Zeppelin t-shirt. He looked like a biker on vacation, complete with heavy black boots instead of his usual polished wingtips. If it wasn’t for his imposing figure and the unmistakable scar, there was a chance I would have walked past him on the street without a second glance. I wondered if this was his attempt at blending in. If it was, it didn’t work. He still put out some hardcore, badass vibes on top of an unmistakable don’t-fuck-with-me attitude.

  “He’s weird. Kind of a lurker. He glommed onto me and Ari at orientation and has been hanging around ever since. Ari is nice, she likes everyone, so she never told him to get lost. He wore her down over the last couple of years, until she agreed to date him. I can’t imagine she would have agreed to live with him if he’d hit her before. But he was really sketchy when she started pressuring him to move in together. I always got the feeling he was trying to wiggle his way out of it, but never could find a way to do it without hurting her.” I frowned. “I don’t like him. He asked me out in the beginning and I turned him down. He took it hard, like really hard, which was weird since we just met. He moved onto Ari pretty quickly after that. I don’t like to be alone in a room with him, but I play nice for her.”

  Booker made a noise and started to tap his fingers on his thigh. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed his hands still looked gnarled and abused. He had scars all over the backs of both of them, some little, some big and silvery, like the one on his face. His knuckles were wide, the middle one on each hand sitting at odd angles from repeated fractures. They were ugly hands, used to doing terrible things, but they had always been achingly gentle whenever he touched me. When I was in high school, a crazed terrorist with a vendetta against the Point and most of my family planted a bomb in my school. It was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life, but Booker came in and got me out. I was too shaky, too scared to walk. He picked me up in those massive arms, cuddled me to his chest, and carried me to safety like I was the most precious thing he had ever touched. Those ugly hands could kill, but they could equally soothe and comfort, as well.

  “The cop didn’t get a bad vibe off the guy?” Unaware I was obsessing about his hands and all the ways they had touched me throughout the years—and all the ways I’d wished they’d touched me—Booker’s question sounded bland and almost bored.

  I shook myself back to the present and blinked at the traffic in front of us. I needed to get my head in the game and out of the past because Ari needed me, and she’d never let me down or hurt me like the man sitting next to me had. I owed her everything. Booker didn’t get anything from me anymore, especially not my forgiveness or understanding. He was only here because I needed him to teach Troy a lesson. Before I left the Point, he tried to drill it into my thick head that he was only good for one thing: causing pain. Right now, that was exactly the kind of man I needed. One with no heart or soul.

  “If he did, he never said anything to me. Dom and Ari are close. He practically raised her, but she’s been doing her best to prove she can stand on her own over the last few years so he can move on with his life. I don’t know that she would’ve listened if Dom did tell her to be careful with Troy. She’s stubborn like that. Troy really wooed her. It wasn’t until he got her that his true colors started to show. He was never violent, just acted disinterested and like kind of a douchebag.”

  He made another noise and did the thing where he cracked his neck. The noise was terrible and I noticed he was holding himself in a way that kept his weight to one side. He always seemed to have injuries that were healing, and it looked like nothing had changed. “You think he’s armed? Do I gotta worry about bullets flying when we storm into the apartment?”

  He turned to look at me, and I hated that his gaze made me flush. I always felt like he was looking inside of me. He was seeing things I tried to hide from everyone else. Sometimes I worried that he would reveal all my secrets, that he would unveil the fact my soul was several shades darker than all the people who loved me believed it to be. On the outside, I might look like I was filled with sunshine and shimmer. On the inside, I often felt like I was made up of every disappointment and heartache I’d suffered at the hands of others. There were a lot of shadows and secrets I kept buried deep, but Booker never seemed to have a problem finding them.

  “Troy’s a computer science nerd. A gamer. I don’t think he’s ever seen a real gun. Before tonight I would have described him as totally non-threatening. But what do I know? I guess you never know what someone is capable of.” I cut him a look out of the corner of my eye and was pleased to see my pointed words elicited a cringe from the big man. I was glad he still reacted to me, the way I still responded to him.

  “No, you don’t. When a man is pushed into a corner and can’t see a way out, there is no end to the horrible things he will do. Even a timid man can be dangerous when his choices are taken away from him.” His rasp was still sexy as hell. The thread of remorse inside of it was unsettling. He was trying to tell me something but not giving me the words. I’d spent my impressionable youth trying to figure him out. I wasn’t going to waste any more time on the puzzle who was Noah Booker. Not when I knew I was never going to have all the pieces to complete the picture. He never gave anything away, and I always gave him too much.

  “He wasn’t backed into a corner, Booker. His girlfriend wanted to move in with him and he wasn’t ready. He could have told her no or broken up with her. He could have explained it wasn’t the right time. There were a lot of other options besides hitting her.” And breaking her heart. Booker just looked at me, an expression I couldn’t distinguish passing over his features.

  We lapsed into a stony silence after that. Luckily, Troy’s apartment was only around the corner. When we pulled into the complex, I immediately caught sight of Ari. She was sitting on a curb, a stuffed suitcase next to her. Her dark hair was a wild tangle around her pale face, and her makeup was smeared in garish lines from the tears steadily rolling down her cheeks. She jumped to her feet when she caught sight of my car. I was barely parked before she started running toward me. I met her at the hood, sucking in a breath and releasing it with a torrent of swear words as I noticed her blackening eye and the bruise blooming on her cheekbone. White-hot anger on her behalf had my blood boiling. I wanted Troy to suffer. I wanted him to hurt twice as badly as he had hurt her. The burning need for revenge was scalding the back of my throat and laying bitterly on my tongue.

  “Oh, honey. Come on, let’s get you in the car.” I hooked an arm around her neck and towed her to the SUV, stopping when she jerked to a halt, wide eyes l
ocked on Booker as he unfolded from the front seat.

  “Who is that?” Her voice was shaky and weak, but the curiosity was strong.

  I sighed and gave her a reassuring squeeze. “Don’t worry about him. He’s going to make sure Troy doesn't touch another woman—or anyone else—in anger, ever again.” No one forgot the lessons Booker taught.

  “What’s going on, Karsen? Seriously? Where did you find that guy?” She sounded nervous and unsure. “You didn’t call Dom, did you? I swear I’ll call him tomorrow and press charges. I just need to get out of here.” She bit her lip and blinked back a fresh wave of tears. “I need to figure out what to do with all my stuff.”

  I shushed her and pressed my lips to her temple. “I’ll help you figure it out. Don’t worry. I didn’t call Dom, but he needs to know.” I didn’t mention anything about the charges, because anything Booker was going to do to Troy was more fitting than whatever the legal system would dole out. “Is Troy inside the apartment?” I met Booker’s gaze over the top of her head. I hoped he could read the message in my eyes clearly. I wanted him to unleash every level of hell he was capable of. If one of the Devil’s own was going to come knocking on my door, the least he could do was punish his demons for wreaking havoc on innocent victims.