“Maybe it was drugs,” he said glibly.
“Please. You’re so in love with being in control, I bet you’ve never even tried pot.”
He shrugged, too proud to admit she was right.
She lowered her voice. “Was it women? There are plenty of those in Sin City. Exotic dancers, professional escorts …”
“Whores,” he finished for her, getting annoyed.
“So that’s it? You were fired for being a sex addict?” She shook her head, the lights above the bar making the golden strands in her hair shimmer. “I can’t say I’m surprised. I mean, every time I turn around you’re staring at my—”
“I didn’t get fired,” he ground out. “I got shot.”
Her eyes rounded with dismay.
Luke pulled his gaze away from her, smothering a groan. He hadn’t meant to say that. There was no admission guaranteed to soften a woman up more, and he needed Shay to stay mad at him. If she didn’t, he wouldn’t be able to keep his hands off her. He was a hair’s breadth from hauling her out of here and giving in to his baser instincts right now.
“Where?”
“Nowhere,” he said, cursing his own stupidity. “Never mind.”
“Where?” she repeated.
“In the back,” he admitted, feeling a phantom ache between his shoulder blades. “But I was wearing a bulletproof vest at the time.”
Her gaze wandered over him. She looked as though she wanted to pull up his shirt and rain kisses along the length of his spine. He remembered her fingernails digging into his skin last night and tightened his hand around the bottle, so wound up he felt like he might explode.
“It didn’t leave a mark?”
“Nothing permanent.”
“So that’s why you left?”
“No,” he admitted. “I’d been investigating some high-profile criminals. Casino guys with deep pockets. There was a hit out on me, I guess. The shooter was never caught, and the department decided I was a liability.”
“Oh, Luke,” she said.
He shrugged off her pity. “I was transferred to a ‘safer, less visible position,’ as they put it, so I tendered my resignation.”
She bit down on her lush lower lip, obviously feeling sorry for him.
Grinding his teeth, Luke downed the rest of his beer. “I think I’m done here. Are you going to catch a ride with Clay?”
Her soft expression and boo-hoo eyes hardened instantly. “Sure.”
Luke hated himself for hurting her, even though it was for her own good. If they slept together again, he wouldn’t be able to remain emotionally uninvolved. Hell, he was already stuck on her, and the intensity of his feelings rattled him more than he cared to admit.
Besides, he couldn’t do right by her unless he decided to stay.
Feeling like a lowlife, a user, and a jerk, he stood to leave, walking away from her at the same time Jesse Ryan came through the door.
Whenever Shay thought a situation couldn’t get any worse, her ex-boyfriend showed up to prove her wrong.
Jesse stopped in his tracks at the front entrance, feet braced wide. He looked from her to Luke, nostrils flaring, dark hair falling over one eye. The belligerent, combative expression on his face was one Shay knew all too well.
He was the last person she wanted to see right now, the last man she would use to make Luke jealous, and the last human being on earth she felt like putting her arms around. Even so, that was exactly what she did, for the alternative would have surely involved bloodshed.
“How’ve you been?” she whispered in Jesse’s ear, giving him a tight hug. This close, she could smell the alcohol on his breath. For a moment, she thought the ruse had worked, that he’d been placated by her embrace, but then he looked down at her feet and frowned, noticing something amiss.
In heels, she was taller than him.
Jesse moved his bleary gaze from her bare legs to Luke’s face. “I heard you’d been giving the new sheriff a helluva warm welcome.”
It was none of his business, and it hadn’t been for a long time, but Shay didn’t say that. She placed her hand on Jesse’s cheek, turning his head back toward her. “Don’t worry about him. He was just leaving.”
But Luke wouldn’t leave, and Jesse wouldn’t listen. He’d come to the Round-Up looking for trouble, and wouldn’t be satisfied until he found it. Annoyed with her for getting in his way, Jesse pushed her aside with more force than was necessary. Shay stumbled backward, none too steady on high heels and a bruised knee.
Jesse had never hurt her physically, and he probably hadn’t intended to this time, but if Clay hadn’t been standing right there, Shay would have fallen down hard.
Luke had seen enough. “That’s it,” he said, grabbing Jesse by the back of the shirt. Collaring him like a wayward schoolboy, Luke shoved him out the door. “You’re under arrest for being drunk in public, assaulting a woman …”
From the dark parking lot, she could hear the sound of shuffling feet on loose gravel, followed by a sharp knock and a heavy thud.
Shay and Clay, along with a few others, rushed out to see what had happened. Jesse was laid out on the ground, dead to the world. Luke stood over him, rubbing the knuckles on his right hand. He glanced up at the growing crowd. “He was resisting.”
Clay smiled, and everyone formed a circle around Jesse. Shay let out the breath she’d been holding, feeling shaky.
“Are you all right?” Luke asked, taking her by the elbow.
“Yeah, I was just … worried.”
Luke shrugged, looking down at Jesse’s prone form. “He’ll be fine.”
“Not about him, you idiot.”
Luke gave her an incredulous stare. “You were worried about me? He was drunk. And I’m bigger than he is.”
“He doesn’t always fight fair,” she murmured.
“So you thought you’d help me out by putting yourself between us? That was stupid, Shay. You could have been hurt.”
“I was trying to defuse the situation,” she said through clenched teeth. “Next time I’ll just let him have at you.”
“Good,” he said, as if he was looking forward to it.
Shay rolled her eyes heavenward.
The waitress brought Jesse an ice pack, cradling it against his jaw, and the rest of the patrons wandered back inside, deciding the show was over.
“You still want to arrest him?” Clay asked.
Luke deliberated, probably thinking Jesse wasn’t worth the trouble.
“We have a drunk tank on the rez,” Clay offered. “I could take him there for the night.”
“Thanks,” Luke said, nodding his agreement. “I’d like to ask him a few questions when he sobers up.”
They loaded him up in the passenger seat of Clay’s pickup, which took a lot of effort because Jesse was like a ton of bricks. When Clay pulled out of the parking lot, Luke said, “Come on. I’ll take you home.”
Shay snapped out of the daze she’d been in since Luke had knocked Jesse’s lights out. Situations like this often made her feel … disconnected. “No thanks,” she said, heart thumping with fresh indignation. “I don’t need you.”
Freudian slip. She’d meant to say, I don’t need you to.
Luke’s eyes darkened. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
In the space of five minutes, he’d rejected her, called her stupid, and told her she was ridiculous. If Shay wanted to be treated like this, she could have stayed with Jesse. Too furious to utter another word, she turned on her heel and stomped away.
When she heard him coming after her, Shay made a fist with her right hand. She’d been pushed far enough for one evening. If he grabbed her arm, she was going to deck him.
He caught up with her easily, because her shoes weren’t made for wading through gravel, but he had the sense not to touch her. “What are you going to do now? Strut down Main Street like a—”
“Whore?” she said, throwing the ugly word back in his face. “Why not? That’s what you think I am.”
> His mouth made an angry line, but he didn’t dispute her.
“You sanctimonious son of a bitch,” she said, stopping in her tracks. They were standing between parked cars now, his truck on her left side. “Haven’t you ever heard of saying no? If you didn’t want me—”
He moved so fast she didn’t have time to react. “Not want you?” he growled, wrapping his arm around her waist and bringing her body flush against his. “You know goddamned well how much I want you.”
Her hands, one clutching her silver purse, the other still clenched into a fist, rested on his shoulder, ready to push him away. Any second now.
“I’ve wanted you from the first moment I saw you. I just wasn’t interested in waiting in line to get to you.”
She gasped, shoving at his chest, but he brought her even closer to him, refusing to give her room to maneuver.
“You’re right,” he said, struggling to keep his hold on her. “I am a sanctimonious son of a bitch. I’ve judged you unfairly from the start, and I’m sorry.” His gaze moved from her trembling lips to her tousled hair. “I never thought you were a whore, but that first morning, you looked so … sexual. I assumed you’d been with a man the night before.”
Hot color flooded her cheeks. “You’re such a jerk. The only man I’ve been with in the past year is you.”
That statement gave him pause. “Really?”
“Yes. And I’m this close to kneeing you in the groin.” She held her thumb and forefinger an inch apart to demonstrate.
He loosened his grip by a margin, never taking his attention from her face. “At the time, I guess I was projecting my own thoughts onto you. Blaming you, because I wanted you so much I couldn’t control myself.”
Shay stared back at him, wavering.
“I still can’t,” he said, his eyes locked on her mouth. “I can’t stop thinking about the way you feel. I can’t stop remembering the way you taste.”
Tears blurred her vision, because she was in the same boat. How she wanted to hate him! But every time she looked at him, she felt … something else. “Damn you,” she whispered, lifting her lips to his.
With a low groan, he pressed her back against the side of the truck and covered her mouth with his, kissing her senseless. She dropped her purse and threw her arms around his neck. Their tongues met and tangled, hearts pounding, hands seeking. She threaded her fingers through the short hair at the nape of his neck and held on tight. It was the least graceful kiss of her life, and the most exciting. There was a lot of panting and groping and straining. Their bodies slammed into the passenger door. At one point, she may have bitten him.
When his hands found her bare bottom beneath her skirt and his button fly met the front of her thong panties, she whimpered. A little more friction and she’d explode. He put his lips to her throat and she moaned, wanting to wrap her legs around his waist and forget who she was, where they were … how he’d treated her.
The parking lot at the Round-Up had seen this kind of action before, but she hadn’t. Although Shay had made a lot of bad choices in her life, screwing a guy up against the side of a pickup truck in a public place wasn’t one of them.
“Stop,” she gasped, bracing her palms on his chest.
He paused, breathing hard against her neck. Slowly, reluctantly, he let his hands fall away from her.
Pushing her hair off her forehead, she bent down, retrieving her discarded, discount-quality metallic purse from the gravel at her feet. When she straightened, he was watching her, awaiting her decision. Feeling torn, she twisted the cheap fabric in her hands, wanting to tell him to go to hell.
“Take me to Dark Canyon,” she whispered instead, squaring her shoulders, meeting his eyes.
17
Dylan sat across from Angel, who was perched on the edge of his rumpled, unmade bed, and tried not to think about what they’d been doing the last time they were here together.
He was punchy from too little sleep and too much Mountain Dew, the muscles in his forearms ached from cleaning tools, and his brain was overloaded with the calc problems he would have to finish during lunch tomorrow. But his hormones were on full alert, proving he was never too tired to think about sex.
“My dad said you called.”
Oh. Right. Her reason for being here had nothing to do with jumping his bones. “Yeah,” he said, giving himself a mental shake. “It’s kind of important.”
“There’s no privacy at my house. I hope you don’t mind that I stopped by.”
“Of course not.” Clearing his throat, he told her about his interview with Luke Meza. Angel already knew about Yesenia Montes. Apparently, her dad had found the body.
“You told him I was there?” she asked, her eyes widening.
“No. Travis did.”
A crease formed between her brows. “That’s weird. You’d think he would want to keep that part quiet.”
Dylan shrugged. “I thought you should know, in case the sheriff came to question you.”
She studied him from beneath lowered lashes. “There’s another reason I came over.”
His heart rate kicked into overdrive. “Yeah?”
As she reached in her front pocket, he tried not to notice how snugly her jeans fit, or the way her tank top molded to her chest. Why was she wearing such figure-revealing clothes? Did she like torturing him?
“I was going to ask you something … and you can tell me to get lost, if you want to, but …” She let out a frustrated breath, running a hand through her hair. It was down around her shoulders tonight, a cascade of black silk. “Will you help me?”
He glanced down at the crumpled piece of paper in her other hand.
“If I ever summon up the nerve to send my song lyrics to a record label, no one will take me seriously.”
Dylan felt a stab of disappointment. He wanted to be her boyfriend, not her tutor. Although he’d looked up some information about learning disabilities at school today, he wasn’t all that interested in helping her. He was sick of being treated like a brain. Nor could he ignore the fact that she’d put him out like a wet dog last night, after moaning in his mouth and tangling her fingers through his hair.
“What about your brothers? Can’t they read?”
Her mouth thinned with hurt, which made him feel better and worse at the same time. “Juan Carlos used to help me out a lot,” she admitted, a faraway look on her face. “School was so easy for him.”
Dylan nodded, remembering her brother’s devious mind all too well. Juan Carlos had been almost too smart to get caught. Or perhaps getting caught had been his plan all along. He’d always wanted to leave Tenaja Falls. Right now he was probably running cons at juvenile hall, treating his counselors like marks.
“Daniel is a good student, but he’s only eight. And Ricardo can’t sit still to save his life. He’s almost as hopeless as I am.” When she ducked her head in embarrassment, her shame cut through him like a blade.
“Give it to me,” he said, holding out his hand.
Unable to meet his gaze, she shoved the paper at him. “I looked up some of the words in the dictionary, but I couldn’t find them all …”
Her handwriting was careful and deliberate, each letter painstakingly formed. She’d obviously put a lot of effort into refining her work, and although it was an improvement over the unintelligible jumble of symbols he’d seen last night, the lyrics still didn’t make sense. She’d switched some words and letters around, and omitted others altogether.
“Do you know what an article is?”
She frowned. “Like, in a newspaper?”
“No, like before a noun.” He pointed to the page. “Here you wrote ‘She took trip to no were.’ Do you mean ‘She took a trip to nowhere?”
Her lips trembled, but she nodded.
He couldn’t bear to go over every mistake. There were too many. “Just sing it to me,” he said, getting out a new sheet of paper. “I’ll rewrite it for you.”
She took a deep, shuddering breath. “Fine.�
�
“Haven’t you ever been tested?”
“For what?”
“Learning disabilities. Dyslexia.”
Her shoulders stiffened. “You think I have that?”
“I don’t know.”
She deliberated for a moment, and said, “I started school late, and I was … very quiet. The teachers thought I was having trouble learning English as a second language. They kept me in ESL for five years.”
Dylan couldn’t hide his surprise, because he hadn’t known. They’d gone to the same elementary school, but she was a year ahead of him and they’d never had the same teachers.
“By the time I moved on to regular classes, Mama needed a lot of help at home. I was absent more and more, and able to follow along less and less. In high school, I couldn’t do anything without Juan Carlos. I never turned in my homework unless he rewrote it for me.”
He was floored by her admission. “That’s—crazy,” he sputtered. “You should have told someone. They could have helped you.”
Storm clouds gathered in her dark eyes. “Who could have helped me? The teachers who assumed I couldn’t speak English because of the way I look? The ones who kept passing me into the next grade even though I wasn’t ready? Or the ones who didn’t care if I got a good education because I’m just another poor Mexican girl, destined to end up barefoot and pregnant?”
He wasn’t indifferent to her plight, nor was he naïve enough to think teachers treated all of their students equally. Tenaja Falls was no Mecca of enlightenment.
And yet, her willingness to play the martyr rankled.
“But you do speak English,” he countered, “and you could have said so. If you didn’t get a decent education, you have only yourself to blame.”
Glaring at him, she crossed her arms over her chest, which made her breasts swell enticingly above the neckline of her top. If she hadn’t continued, he might have forgotten what they were discussing altogether. “I made sacrifices,” she hissed, “for my family. I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”
He pulled his gaze up to her face, too pissed off now to be distracted. “Why not? Because I have such an awesome home life?”
Set the Dark on Fire Page 20
