by Khloe Wren
I’d had no clue what was going on. Mom was crying. Tears flowed down her pale cheeks as she kept a palm clamped over her mouth to contain the sounds of her sobs. There were three big men standing in the middle of the front room. All three wore suits, but the one in the middle was the one to watch. Even at sixteen, I knew Antonio Sabella owned the streets in this part of L.A.
I’d asked my father what was going on and he’d shaken me and told me to shut the fuck up. That I was Sabella’s problem now, and he was deadly serious about me doing as I was told without giving any lip. That my mother and brother would pay the price if I didn’t. Aaron was ten years my junior. At six, he was nothing more than a scared little boy clinging to our mother’s skirts, trying to hide from everyone around him.
The sound of Bank’s Harley rolling up out front pulled me from that memory and by the time he’d dropped the bags of stuff at the bathroom door and joined us, I knew what I had to do.
Rapping my knuckles on the table, I waited for Mac to look me in the eye.
“You want me to come back to Texas with you? Well, I’ll do it, but only if we take her with us as well.”
Mac could take the girl home to his wife and I’d stay at their clubhouse. That way, I limited the risk to his family, and that girl crying in the bathroom because she had a bag of new shit from fucking Walmart would have a nice fucking life. I vowed I would see that girl have a better life than either Josefina or I ever had.
Chapter Two
Veronica
After checking each window and door of my small house was locked—twice—I made my way out the side door to the attached garage. Before starting my car, I pulled my phone out and checked the feed from the cameras I’d set up around the outside of my home. Once I was certain no one was anywhere near the front of the house, I hit the button to lift the garage door, started the engine and drove forward. I stayed in the driveway, watching everything going on up and down the street as I waited for the garage door to close again.
Once it shut, I headed to the hospital for my shift. At least once I was within the hospital I could relax. Security was tight, and I knew if I got in trouble all I had to do was call out and I’d have all the help I needed.
At work I was safe. No way would he be able to get to me here. But on the drive in was another story. Every car I didn’t recognize had my heart rate speeding up and my paranoia reaching epic proportions.
I was used to the routine, though. For the seven years I’d been living in Bridgewater, I’d done the same thing. Always vigilant. Always careful. It was a lonely way to live, and there were times when it got to me. Whenever it got too bad, I’d head out with two of the other nurses, Sophie and Laura, to Styx—the local bar—to have a few drinks and ogle all the hot biker eye candy none of us would ever be brave enough to try to touch. One of the older nurses, Donna, was married to one of those bikers we ogled. Even though Keys had to be in his sixties now, he was still a damn fine looking man. A little rough around the edges, but life did that to a person. I wouldn’t trust someone who didn’t have a few scars by the time they’d made it that far through life. And I was sure the external ones weren’t the only ones he’d have. Heaven knows I had more scars on my soul than anywhere else.
Relief poured through me as I made my way through the hospital’s doors. It was always like that. And as I took my first deep breath of the day, I made my way toward the staff locker room to drop my bag off and get ready to start my shift in the ER.
Bridgewater was your typical mid-sized Texan town and had the usual daily injuries. The Charon MC, the bike club that ran the town, kept it mostly clean, so thankfully drug-related shit wasn’t common. Although there were a few patients we saw who clearly had an issue with prescription drugs, the illegal kind didn’t make an appearance very often at all. That suited me just fine. My first nursing position had been in Dallas and I’d learned fast that drugs made people extremely unpredictable and very fucking hard to treat.
I’d lasted about five years there, but then I’d seen one of his men in the ER and knew I hadn’t gone far enough from home. I’d made sure he hadn’t seen me and as soon as he was gone, I handed in my notice and started looking for a job in a smaller town, that was further away.
It’d been nearly twenty years since I’d seen him, but I’d never stopped looking over my shoulder. Never let my guard down. Because I knew, deep down, I was certain the moment I let my guard down, he’d be there, waiting for me.
With a sigh, I pushed those thoughts aside before I got lost in my past, closed my locker and headed out to start my work day. Everything about the morning was utterly normal, until he came in. Flanked by two men wearing Charon MC vests, the most beautifully broken man I’d ever laid eyes on came in to the ER’s waiting room. I wasn’t sure if the bikers were his friends or his guards, but the man didn’t look happy.
The trio came up to the desk and Rhonda took his information. I was close enough to overhear. He had burns that needed checking and redressing. I rushed forward so I could be the nurse in charge of his case.
I grabbed the board, skim reading what Rhonda had written in case I hadn’t caught everything he’d said before I walked out into the waiting room.
“Mr. Walker?”
He stood, along with the bikers, and I held my palm up. “Just Mr. Walker.”
The bikers both looked to Mr. Walker with a raised eyebrow and when he nodded, they both sat back down, getting as comfortable as two big guys could in the small plastic chairs the hospital had installed in the waiting room. Guess they were friends, then. Either way, I didn’t need two huge men taking up space back in the treatment bays. I turned and strode over to the doors into the ER, not needing to check if Mr. Walker was following me, because I could feel his presence behind me the entire way.
“Take a seat on the bed and let’s get this ball rolling.” In one, smooth move, he slid his lean frame up onto the bed until he was sitting on the edge of it, facing me. His crystal blue irises that were so filled with pain caught my gaze, and for a minute I was struck mute and dumb. I’d never seen such arresting blue eyes before. What would they look like heated with lust? Or laughter? Agony was currently reflected in those pretty baby blues and my chest ached in response. Which had me frowning as I looked away, breaking the connection between us. What the fuck was wrong with me? Hopefully it was just an indicator that I was overdue for a girls’ night out. I’d never had, or wanted, a boyfriend. I’d seen what a man could do when he thought he owned a woman. That shit wasn’t for me.
I cleared my throat and forced myself back on task.
“So, you had a whoops with a fire, huh?”
He gave me a nod and a smirk that I did not find sexy. Not at all.
“Yeah, I was over in California. Was a little late evacuating and got caught. Got lucky and just have some burns on my right arm.”
He was shrugging out of his button down shirt before I could ask anything else. Doing my best to ignore the glorious sight of his muscles rippling beneath the tight tank that stretched across his torso, I peeled the previous dressings from his wounds carefully, grateful when they didn’t stick at all.
“How many days ago did you receive the injury?”
“Three days. I went straight to the hospital after it happened. When I got released, I came to stay with some friends here. The nurse in L.A. told me to come in to get the burns checked after a couple days, so here I am.”
I gave him a nod as I took a good look at his burns. They were healing well, but still had a way to go.
“Do you need to wear long sleeved shirts for work?”
He gave me a suspicious frown. “I don’t understand why you need to know that.”
I nodded toward his arm. “It’s healing well, and if you can stick to wearing tanks, it won’t need another dressing, but if you’re going to keep wearing button downs like the one you have on now, I’ll redress it so it won’t stick to your clothing if any of those blisters burst on you.”
H
is big body relaxed and his expression cleared. “You’d best redress it. Does that mean I get to come in and see you again to redo the dressings?”
With a grin, I shook my head at his flirty tone. It was nothing unusual to have patients try to charm me, but it was a first that I was affected by it. There was something about the sorrow in this man’s eyes that had drawn me in the moment I’d looked into them.
“I’m sure you can handle it from here. Just head into a pharmacy to get another burn dressing if you need to redo things. Leave it open to the air as much as you can. Give nature a chance to do its thing.”
It was a few minutes later, as I was taping down the last edge of the new bandages, that he reached out with his good hand and touched me. My entire body went stiff and on alert, my breath stuttered as his fingertip lightly traced over my cheek, tucking a lock of hair that had escaped my bun behind my ear before his hand dropped away from me. I licked my lips, trying to get my heart rate to lower and my fucking brain to start working again.
I couldn’t have a panic attack at work. Not just because a man startled me by touching my cheek. Especially when the man couldn’t know my past, couldn’t know what I’d suffered under gentle hands before.
Blade
Fuck, I’d not only scared her but hit some kind of trigger for her. The lovely nurse who had been so carefully tending my burns was the prettiest thing I’d seen in a long time. She had thick, dark brown hair that she’d pulled back into a knot thing at the back of her head, but a few strands had come lose and hung around her face. I’d been so damn curious as to whether her skin was as soft as it looked, that I’d reached out to her without thought. My fingertip had met pure silk when I’d run it over her cheekbone, before I hooked those strands and tucked them behind her ear. Mesmerized by her, I hadn’t realized until then that my actions had scared the hell out of the poor woman. Her body was still as a stone as her breath stuttered in and out.
“Shit, I’m sorry. That was way out of line. I shouldn’t have touched you without asking.”
Her body was frozen still, midway through taping down the last of the dressings over my burns. I frowned as she stayed that way. I ran my gaze over her until I saw her name tag. Veronica Jones.
“Veronica? Are you okay? I vow to you, I mean you no harm. Your hands are busy and I figured having hair in your face must be frustrating. I’m truly sorry for touching you without permission. What can I do to help you?”
It was a small lie, but I wanted to make her feel safe, not freak her out even more by admitting how I’d been curious about how soft her skin was. She was having some sort of episode, and I wished like hell I knew who made her fear such a simple touch. I’d go after the fucker and make him pay for hurting this beautiful woman. I mentally shook my head. What the hell was I thinking? The last thing I needed right now was to get involved with a woman. What I needed was some down time where I could process everything that had happened. Wrap my head around that Josefina had been held and abused by Sabella for over a fucking decade thanks to me trying to fucking help her. The last thing this woman needed was my help. I barely held in my scoff. Just look at the damage I’d already managed to inflict on her.
She sucked in a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment before she opened them. Without another word, she finished taping me up.
“Let me just grab the paperwork for you to sign, then you can be on your way.”
Before I could say another word, she was gone. What the fuck?
I scrubbed my good hand over the un-singed side of my face, then I reached for my shirt and slowly put it back on. Probably for the best she was scared of me. I was in no shape to be in a relationship with any woman, let alone one who clearly had issues with men. Nope, if I got an itch my palm couldn’t handle I’d take it up with one of the club whores that hung around the Charon MC clubhouse. Assuming I would be allowed to, anyway. I wasn’t really part of the club, so I wasn’t sure how many liberties I could take.
Veronica returned with my paperwork and by the look on her face, she had no intention of discussing what happened earlier. I decided to let it go and just followed her instructions to the letter. Before I knew it, I was discharged and walking out of the ER, back into the waiting room.
Mac and Nitro stood as I entered.
“How’d it go? Get the phone number of that nurse?”
I shook my head at Mac’s question. “I wish, brother. Let’s get outta here.”
Nitro rubbed his chin as we made our way outside. “She was a strange one. Generally locals see the Charon MC colors and relax, but her first thought was that we were holding you against your will or something. It’s the only reason she’d keep us from going back with you. Did you chat with her at all? If she’s in some kind of trouble, we need to tell Scout and get Keys investigating it.”
I shrugged a shoulder, not sure if I wanted to tell him my suspicions.
“Blade, man, we’re not about poking our noses where they’re not wanted, but after all the shit that’s gone down over the past few years with women who’ve been new to town, we’re paying more attention to the females here who might be in trouble now.”
I didn’t know much about what had gone down. It wasn’t like Mac and I spoke all that often, and when we did, it wasn’t to shoot the shit about life in general.
“She was fine until I stupidly touched her.” Nitro and Mac both stopped walking and turned on me with matching glares that would take down a lesser man. I raised my hands in surrender. “Nothing like that! Damn, what do you think I am? She had a lock of hair hanging in her face and I tucked it behind her ear. I did it without thought. But she froze up and was cold toward me after she ignored my attempts to apologize.”
We started walking again, both men no longer glaring but frowning.
Nitro was the first to speak. “I’ll let Scout know. With that kinda reaction, there’s a good chance she’s been through some shit. Get her name? I didn’t get a good read on her name tag.”
“Veronica Jones.”
“Maybe get to Donna, see what she knows about her.”
I looked to Mac. “Who’s Donna?”
“Keys’ old lady. She works as a nurse here. Kinda surprised she didn’t look after you. She normally jumps on any Charon cases.”
Nitro nodded to Mac. “I don’t think she’s working the ER at the moment. And Blade’s not wearing colors, so no one would have grabbed her for him.”
Yep, I wasn’t wearing a leather vest with a winged skull on the back so I wasn’t one of them. I appreciated Mac giving me a safe place to heal up, but I wasn’t sure how long I could take this “You’re welcome, but hey, just remember you’re not really one of us” thing. It got old fast. As I slid into the rear of the car, I decided I was going to grab a bottle of Maker’s Mark from the bar then head up to my room for the rest of the day and night. I wasn’t in the mood to smile and chat with a bunch of men who didn’t know a fucking thing about me or what I was going through.
Blade
A knock on the door had me slowly waking up. Fuck. My brain felt like it was being jackhammered. In the past ten days, the only time I’d left my room here at the clubhouse was to get another bottle of Maker’s. If I stayed drunk enough, I could get through the day without my thoughts being filled with Josefina. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to matter how much I consumed when it came to my nightmares. Even if I drank until I passed the fuck out, I still spent the night trapped in a horror show.
A knock sounded again. “Blade? You still breathin’ in there?”
I rolled my eyes, then winced as pain flared through my poor, abused brain at Mac’s words.
“I’m breathin’.” Barely.
He opened the door I hadn’t bothered to lock and barged in. His whole body shuddered before he put a hand over his mouth and nose.
“Fuck, man, it’s rank in here.”
He went over and opened the blinds, making me wince again as the light sent another dagger through my brain, then opened t
he window.
“C’mon, get your ass outta bed and in the shower. I’m taking you someplace. You got fifteen minutes to meet me downstairs or I’m coming back in here with a fucking hose to wash the stink off you.”
With that, he spun and left my room, the breeze from the open window catching the door and slamming it behind him.
“Fuuuck.”
Knowing Mac well enough to know he would really bring a damn hose up here to spray me with cold water, I dragged my ass to the edge of the bed. Forcing my body to sit up, I swung my legs over the side and with my head hung low, gave myself a few moments to adjust to being almost upright.
With a groan, I pushed up to my feet and stumbled over to the small bathroom that was attached to my room. I’d fallen into bed still wearing half my clothes, so it didn’t take long for me to strip what was left off. Then I stood in front of the mirror and slowly peeled the dressings off my arm. Probably should have changed them a few days ago and I hoped like fuck the burns hadn’t gotten infected or anything from my lack of care toward them over the past week.
Once the dressings were nothing more than a wad in the trash, I rotated my arm and looked at the healing wounds. Nothing looked like it was infected. The blisters were nearly all gone and the areas that had only been scorched rather than burned were almost back to my normal skin color. Thank fuck.
I turned on the water in the shower and made the temperature as cool as I could take it. Figuring, like sunburn, the last thing my burns needed was a hot spray of water.
