by Jo Raven
Crap, if it isn’t Ross himself. Just my luck.
He’s giving me a once-over from the shadows inside the shop, wiping his hands on a filthy rug. His icy blue eyes make me shiver. They’re cold—but at the same time way too interested in my barely-there cleavage.
“I want to talk to Jasper,” I say through clenched teeth, planting my feet on the sidewalk and not balking even when he comes out and smirks at me. “About a job.”
“There ain’t no job for a chick here,” he drawls. “’Specially a whore-spawn like you.”
“Says you,” I counter because I won’t let him have the last word.
“Says I,” he agrees and steps closer. Too close. “Got a problem with that, B-Slut?”
Oh joy. Ross’s favorite nickname for me. Short for Bastard Slut. I guess since I took out the braces he has nothing else to work with.
“Look, Jack Martinez at the gas station said Jasper might have a job for me.” This is true, by the way. I wouldn’t be standing here otherwise. He said Jasper mentioned needing a secretary for a temporary stint.
If not, Jack said he could find me a job in Springfield.
So this is it. My last chance.
“Jack knows jack shit,” Ross says smugly, preening at his cleverness. “We ain’t got no jobs. And especially not for you, you little—”
A growly voice rumbles, “Ross.” A dark, tall shadow falls over us, and Ross lurches sideways as if shoved from the back. “Leave.”
“What the fuck?” Ross mumbles, shoving blond hair out of his face and puffing out his chest. “What the hell’s your problem, man?”
I open my mouth but no words come, because right there, in front of me, stands Mr. Jerk himself.
Matt Hansen. Most unlikely hero ever, although I suddenly remember how he saved me from falling in the drugstore the other day, and wasn’t that something.
In any case, he’s really here, scowling, mouth flat behind his beard, hands clenched at his sides.
Standing between the blond creep and myself.
Tension hums in the air.
And I can’t keep my gaze off him.
His dark eyes have narrowed to slits, and his broad shoulders are hunched up, his biceps bulging, stretching the short sleeves of his T-shirt until they look about to burst at the seams. The dark lines of tattoos are barely visible on his chest and shoulders under the thin cotton.
He looks ready to fight. He looks… dangerous.
And frigging sexy.
Jeez, I should really stop thinking these kinds of stupid thoughts. The kinds of thoughts that get good girls into bad trouble.
“You’re that new guy, aren’t you?” Ross says, his stance subtly relaxing, a disdainful smirk curling a side of his mouth. “Hansen. You’re a fucking newbie. The order of hierarchy—”
“Shut your pie-hole.”
The growl seems to catch Ross by surprise. Or maybe it’s the fact that Matt—and since when he’s Matt to me?—hasn’t relaxed, or backed away, or acknowledged anything Ross has said.
Hasn’t given him one inch.
Ross chuckles like there’s something funny, then the smile slips off his face. “Back the hell off. This ain’t your turf, motherfucker.”
Matt doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t move a muscle.
“Jasper will have your balls on a spit if you think you can throw your weight around here,” Ross goes on, hissing out the words. “This ain’t your backyard, you fucking—”
“Cool your guns,” a familiar voice says, and Jasper Jones walks out of his garage, wearing a scowl to match the one on Matt’s face, seeming to fill the whole street with his big-boned, muscular bulk. “What’s going on here?”
“This son of a bitch,” Ross stabs a finger at Matt, “thinks he owns this place.”
“I own this place,” Jasper says coolly, his pale gaze, so similar to Ross’s, settling on Matt. “What’s the problem?”
Matt glares.
A few passersby stop, staring at us. Great. With the way this is going, soon we’ll have a big audience watching us.
Watching me, with three guys arguing over my head. If that doesn’t get those wicked tongues wagging, I don’t know what will. Not that there’s much else happening in this sleepy town, while the heat rises off the asphalt and the mosquitoes buzz.
I take a step back, wondering if I can make my escape while they are still arguing, but Jasper turns to me.
Crap.
“You started this?” he accuses.
“I didn’t start anything.” Like every time, unfairness is a red flag waved in my face. I straighten to my full five-feet-two and stare him dead in the eye. “I only came to ask for a job.”
“Told you when you asked two weeks ago: I ain’t got no job for a chick. So go away. Shoo.”
Anger and embarrassment burn through my blood, flushing my cheeks. My ears burn. “Jack Martinez said you might have a position for me.”
“And what position might that be?” he asks mildly.
Ross grins.
I open my mouth, not sure what to say to that, too angry to think straight, when Matthew again steps between me and them, interposing his impressive frame between me and the jackass of Jasper.
“Enough,” he says quietly.
My mouth remains open.
“That so?” Jasper asks darkly. “Maybe you want to be looking for a job along with her, huh?”
“Told you,” Ross says smugly. “This chick is trouble.”
Jasper is glaring knives at us.
“You’re lucky we’re short on good mechanics,” he spits at Matt. “Go back to work, boy, and let me handle this.”
Boy?
Even in this mess I’m in, I can’t help but steal another look at Matt’s face with the shaggy beard and the dark eyes peering through a tangle of messy hair, then let my gaze wander down his tall, muscular body. He’s no boy, he’s a grown man.
Grown in a stable, or a cave, most probably, but grown nevertheless, unlike Ross.
I suddenly wonder just how old Matt is. A single dad, arriving at a town in the middle of nowhere.
“And you,” Jasper turns to me, his gaze icy-cold. “Come to my office.”
I half expected Matt not to step aside, to ignore Jasper. But he obeys and heads back into the shop without a backward glance, leaving me strangely disappointed.
Why? No clue. I mean, his brief stint as my knight in shiny armor was more than I’d have expected of him. Maybe he wasn’t feeling like himself for a moment there.
As his broad-shouldered form disappears in the gloom and Jasper lifts a brow at me, I brace myself.
“Coming?” Jasper asks.
I follow him inside the car bay, Ross a dark presence at my back, sending an itch between my shoulder blades.
Jasper’s office is a tiny room, the shutters of the window open to the car bay. He leans back against his cluttered desk and nods at me.
“So what did dear Jack say?”
“That you need a secretary,” I reply, flinching when Ross brushes by me to go stand beside his dad, crowding the already cramped space.
“Jack is a dumb fuck.” Jasper tilts his head to the side, looking me over like I’m a strange critter he found skulking in his office. “I don’t need no secretary.”
My heart plunges, although I can’t help a small flicker of relief as well.
“I just need a job,” I say, not sure why I’m still trying. Why I haven’t walked away. Their stares are those of predators, cobras or rattlesnakes, nailing me in place. “Any job.”
“Any job? Hear that, Ross?” Jasper licks his lips, and my stomach curdles.
I finally manage a step back. “Screw you.”
“I’d screw you,” Ross says, flicking his tongue in and out of his mouth. “You’d want that, wouldn’t you, B-Slut? Like your mommy did.”
“Shut up.” A sick feeling rolls inside me, twisting my stomach. Ice slithers up my spine. “Don’t talk about her like that.”
“O
r what? What will you do, huh? It’s only the truth. Who do you think your daddy is?”
Jasper isn’t telling his son to shut up. He doesn’t look surprised by what Ross said, either. He is observing me, as if looking for something. God knows what.
Then he snorts as if he’s failed to find it, and that pleased him.
I can’t stay here a second longer. The spell is thankfully broken, and I might puke if I stay a second longer.
But as I step back, Ross grabs my arm in a hold of steel. “We’re not done talking.”
“Yes, you are.” The low, gravelly voice from behind me makes me jump a mile in the air.
I spin around, grateful for anyone coming to my rescue, and as I do, I already know who it belongs to.
Matt is back, his shoulders filling the narrow doorframe, his gaze hot with something that looks like fury.
“What the fuck?” Ross hisses, his hand clamping harder around my arm, forcing a whimper through my lips. “Are you that stupid?”
“Get your fucking hands off her,” Matt says, his voice so low it’s like the distant roll of thunder. “Back off, now.”
He doesn’t wait for Ross to obey, instead getting into his face and pushing him until my arm is released.
I stumble backward, rubbing at my bruised flesh, my heart hammering.
“What do you care, boy?” Jasper drawls, a flicker of interest passing over his wrinkled, leathery face, although he doesn’t make a single move to help his offspring.
Matt glares at Ross who looks ready to jump and pummel him to the ground before he grinds out, “She works for me.”
Chapter Seven
Matt
What the fuck am I doing?
What in the fucking hell am I doing?
And it gets worse, because as I stalk out of Jasper’s office and into the car bay, certain I’ve lost my job due to my unbelievable stupidity, she follows me.
“Thanks,” she says quietly. “I know you didn’t mean what you said. About me working for you. But I’m grateful—”
“Be at my house at eight AM,” I say and march off to finish fixing the Toyota I’d been in the middle of repairing when I saw them enter the office.
If Jasper doesn’t kick me out today.
Goddammit, yeah, of course this is much worse. Something’s wrong with me. Why did I tell her to come to my house? Why did I come out to tell Ross to shut up in the first place? Why did I follow them into Jasper’s office?
Why do I keep noticing her, why am I so aware, so protective of her? She’s none of my business. She can’t ever be.
But her wide eyes keep flashing in front of me, full of questions. Shocked. Afraid.
So damn pretty they won’t let me focus on the task at hand. My hand slips in engine oil, and I slam my head into the underbelly of the car because I try to sit up while still wedged underneath it all when my cell dings with a message.
So fucking distracted.
It’s just a line from Dolly the neighbor looking after my kids, reminding me that I need to pick them up earlier today. Something about a bachelorette party. Or a birthday? As if I give a fuck.
This is why I came here, to this town. To escape humanity. To avoid people and the impact of their miserable little lives on mine. I should have gone for a cabin in the woods, but that wouldn’t work with the kids.
My kids mean the fucking world to me. Although the world has lost its shine, they’re part of me.
And part of her, of Emma, so even as the reminder hurts, I’d never give up on them. I only hope they won’t give up on me.
Over the next hours, I have plenty of time to consider my idiocy—for instance as I ask Evan if I can take off earlier to pick up my kids, and he glances nervously at the office.
Evan runs the shop in all but name, especially when Jasper isn’t around, and he isn’t around much, unlike his dick of a son.
I hate to put Evan in a spot. He’s is the closest to a friend I’ve made in this godforsaken town. He doesn’t annoy me, mostly because he’s so quiet. And he doesn’t seem annoyed by my usual silence and dark moods.
Yet he hesitates. “Old man ain’t too happy about you right now, buddy. What he wants is to make your life harder, not easier, at least for a while, until his anger cools. He’ll have my balls if I even hint at giving you preferential treatment.”
I shove my hands in my pockets. “Look, man, I get it. But I need to go.”
He sighs. Glances again at the office. “Your kids. That’s important, I know. Can’t you tell your nanny to, I dunno, keep them busy half an hour longer?”
I scowl at the stains on the floor and say nothing.
“Look,” he tries again, “I heard what happened in there. Hell, I saw how Ross grabbed her arm, how he has always treated her. You did the right thing. But the boss is pissed today, okay?”
I shake my head. “I’m going.”
Another sigh, more heartfelt this time. “You need this job, don’t you? It’s good pay. Christ, Matt.” He paces in front of me, two paces in one direction, two in the other. He stops. “I’m gonna regret saying this, but yeah, okay. Go.” He waves a hand at me, shooing me away. “I’ll cover for you.”
Shocked, I just stare at him. Can’t remember these sorts of small kindnesses, although I’m sure I’ve experienced them in my life. I’ve been sitting in the dark for so long, the memories have sunk deep, like stones, all the way to the bottom of my mind, and are gone.
“Go before I change my mind,” he says darkly, and this time I don’t have to be told twice.
With a nod of thanks, I turn about and go.
Cole is having a hissy fit, writhing on the floor and screaming his lungs out—and I don’t even get what the hell is the matter with him.
“It’s just the terrible twos,” Dolly says consolingly, and I step back before she pats my arm, because fuck no. “You know how it is.”
Not really. “He’s three. When will it stop?”
She shakes her head.
Right.
“Why is he crying now?” He keeps wailing and thrashing on the floor. An attempt to pick him up earns me a kick in the stomach, but I hold on to him, determined not to let go.
“He hasn’t had his nap.”
“Why not?”
“He was crying. Wanted his mommy.”
Hell. I suck in a breath and it sticks in my throat. “Where’s Mary?”
I want to grab both my kids and get the fuck out of here right now, before my brain starts properly processing what Dolly said about why Cole was crying.
The same reason why Mary has bad dreams, and why I can’t sleep at night.
We find my daughter in the next room, a messy kitchen. She’s under the table, sucking on her thumb, rocking back and forth, tear tracks on her cheeks.
“What the hell happened?” I grind out, a hammer pounding inside my temples, as I try to ignore the stab of fear in my chest.
“She gets like that sometimes,” Dolly says dismissively. “Sensitive little girl. Maybe one of the other kids said something to her? I don’t know. I can’t keep an eye on them every single moment, Mr. Hansen, it’s—”
Cursing under my breath, I go to my knees, Cole firmly held to my side, and tug on her arm. “Mary. Come here.”
She sniffles, looks away, pulls her thumb from her mouth and lets her hand drop to her lap. She looks tiny under the Formica table, her blond hair tangled, her sky-blue dress, the one she selected so carefully this morning to replace the clothes I’d chosen for her, rumpled and stained.
My chest is so tight I can’t fucking breathe.
“Come on,” I say. “Let’s go home.”
“To Grandma?” she asks in a tiny voice, fucking killing me.
“No.”
“I want my grandma,” she wails softly, and for the millionth time this month I ask myself what I thought I was doing, bringing them along with me in this dark spiral I’m in, in this desperate escape from something I can’t name.
“We’ll
call her,” I promise with sudden inspiration, shocked to realize I’m gonna do it, even though I’d promised myself I wouldn’t call home for a while longer.
Not until I found a way out of hell.
“She doesn’t get along with the other children very well,” Dolly goes on behind me. Maybe she was talking all along. I didn’t notice. “She’s a bit difficult.”
“My daughter isn’t difficult,” I say through clenched teeth as I finally manage to tug Mary out from under the table and haul her to my right side, my arm tight around her.
“Hm,” is all Dolly offers, clearly disagreeing.
I kiss the top of my daughter’s head, her soft hair with their scent of shampoo and talcum, fierce protectiveness rising through me like a burning flame.
There’s so much more I could have said. We’ve been through some tough times. We’re still not ashore, still drifting, trying to make it out of the wreck.
Mary isn’t difficult. She’s wounded, and I have no idea how to heal her. I hope she’ll forget the pain one day, find trust in the world again. In the people around her.
But how could she, when she barely had me these past few years, then her grandfather passed away, and I took her away from her grandmother?
All my fault. All my goddamn fault.
I hold both my kids to me, feeling their slight bodies pressed to my sides, and breathe in deeply, not sure if it’s them I’m trying to comfort, them I’m trying to save, or myself.
Which is a fucking useless thought.
Nothing can save me. That much I’ve known all along.
I just don’t know why I haven’t given up yet, and that’s the only truth I’ve allowed myself to consider all this damn time.
When the doorbell rings the next morning, I drag myself out of the armchair where I spent the night, feeling like something scraped off the bottom of a barrel. I frown as I try to remember who it might be.
And when I open the door and see who it is, the image of her hits me like a hammer to the solar plexus, cutting off my breath.
Big blue eyes, glossy dark hair pulled back, the delicate arch of her neck over her light coat and her elegant legs over prim black pumps…
