I shifted my hips and moved my legs, the initial warmth I’d felt when I woke up now spreading to other, more intimate parts of my anatomy. I was sure the flush on my face was visible even in the pitch-blackness and the silence surrounding us made the sounds of my breaths rushing in and out between my parted lips obscenely loud. Wheeler made a noise behind me and his hold around my waist tightened and then immediately loosened. I was going to roll away from him so I could get Happy off the bed before he made any more noise, but before I could Wheeler’s tattooed hands reached around me and plucked the little dog off the pillow, where he was now chasing shadows across the fabric.
“I’ll take him outside and then set him up in the kitchen for the night. You go back to sleep.” His voice was rough and groggy and there was no room in it for argument. I had to sit up and scoot over to free the part of his coveralls I was lying on and he grunted a little when he was finally free to stand up. “Sorry for crawling into bed with you still in my work clothes. If I got anything dirty let me know and I’ll replace it.”
He scratched Happy behind the ears and set him on the floor so he could pull his discarded boots back onto his feet. I stared at his back, eyes tracking the way his plain T-shirt stretched across the span of his wide shoulders. I pulled my knees up, wrapped my arms around them, and rested my cheek on the bony surface as I continued to watch him. When he lifted his arms up over his head to work the kinks out of those long and lean muscles, I couldn’t hold back a sigh. He turned his head to look at me over his shoulder and I told him truthfully, “You can ruin every single set of sheets I have. You showed up and cleaned up a mess I made that was way more difficult to deal with than a few grease spots. If you can clean up after me, I have no problem cleaning up after you.”
He turned back to the bed, hands on his hips, and I noticed that the collar of his T-shirt was ripped and that fabric was hanging down over his collarbone, revealing what looked like part of a mountain range and some kind of animal inked on the center of his chest. I had a feeling I could see his skin a thousand times and each time I would find something new to look at.
“Everyone ends up a little bit out of place every now and then. I’ll put you back where you’re supposed to be, Poppy.” He grinned, and even in the dark I could see those twin dimples digging enticingly into his cheeks. It made my toes curl into the covers and had my breath moving faster and my skin tingling in a way that was impossible to ignore. “That’s what I do, ya know. I put things back the way they were supposed to be. I make things the way they were before someone didn’t treat them right.”
I scrunched up my nose at him and squinted as he turned on the small bedside light. “I’m not a car, Wheeler. You can’t find replacement parts for all the things inside of me that don’t work right anymore.”
He bent at the waist, put his fisted hands on the bed, and leaned over so that his lips could lightly touch the top of my head. It was a kiss that I felt all the way through my entire body. His care reached places inside of me no one had ever touched before, places that lit up and exploded like fireworks every time he did something nice. They were places that were growing and expanding, pushing out the other areas inside of me that had long been dark and scarred.
“Nothing about you needs replaced. What you got runs just fine, it just needs a tune-up and some proper maintenance.” His tone indicated he was the guy more than up for the job of getting me back in working order. I should tell him I’d never been a hot rod. “I’m taking Happy out and getting him settled; then I’ll get out of your hair so you can go back to bed.”
He started for the door, the puppy happily nipping at the heels of his boots. I called his name and waited for him to turn around before I asked him, “Aren’t you going to ask me what made me let go of the leash? Don’t you want to know why I was in such a sorry state when you found me?” Honestly, I didn’t know what to do with the fact he wasn’t blaming me, questioning me, accusing me. There was zero censure or condemnation from him and I had no clue how to navigate that. I had platitudes and apologies itching to crawl off my tongue but he didn’t ask for any of them.
“No. I don’t care what happened, I just care that it did happen. I hate that something upset you to that point and I hate that you feel like you owe anyone an explanation for feeling however you feel. Everyone made it inside safe and sound, so whatever bad shit happened, it didn’t win tonight and that’s what I think we should focus on.” He always made it sound so easy. His acceptance and reassurance settled around me like a velvety blanket.
I closed my eyes and rubbed my cheek against my knee. “My mom called. I haven’t spoken to her or my father since Oliver took me. She’ll occasionally send an e-mail to make sure I’m alive and to tell me that Salem and Rowdy need to stop living in sin, but I haven’t heard her voice in months and months.” I let out a shaky sigh, and when I pried my eyes back open I saw that he looked angry enough to spit nails. He understood that my safe space had been breached, that hearing from my mom brought back memories of more than just Oliver. The tenuous hold I had on my sense of safety was ripped away by that voice with its soft Texas drawl and thinly veiled accusations.
“I erased all my social media after everything that happened when Oliver took me. I couldn’t handle strangers trying to pry into my life. But Salem must still have hers up because Mom knows she’s pregnant. That’s why she called.” I let out a sharp laugh. “She was crying. Can you believe that?” I didn’t expect him to answer, so I kept the words coming. “She was crying. She was sobbing because she didn’t know that she was going to be a grandmother because Salem hasn’t spoken to her since she was eighteen other than to threaten her to stay the hell away from me.” I sighed and hugged my folded-up legs more tightly to my chest and started to rock back and forth a little. “She called me because she knew I would listen. She called me because she knew I was the one that would hear her out.” I blinked back tears and dug the sharp points of my fingernails into my skin. “She called me because she knew I understand what it’s like to be trapped in a marriage that might very well end up killing you.”
I choked a little on the emotion that was clogging my throat, so it took me a minute before I could finish telling him everything that was crowding my mind and punishing my heart. “She told me she missed me. She’s alone in that house with my father, suffering through the gossip of everything that happened with me and Oliver, and you know what? … I feel bad for her.” Like the sap that I was. My stupid heart couldn’t stop caring about the wrong people. “I worry about her bearing the brunt of my father’s wrath, about her having to shoulder the blame he no doubt levels on her for both my and Salem’s failures. That’s enough to crush anyone.” I sighed again. “Somewhere in all of that, I went numb and let go of the leash. I was so caught up in feeling bad because I was hurting for someone that previously hurt me that I let go of the one thing in my life that actually needs my constant love and attention. I got swept up in what was and forgot all about what is. That’s a dangerous place for anyone to be.” I could get lost in the dark and lose all the ground forward I’d gained.
Wheeler stayed by the door but the intensity shining out of his baby blues was strong enough that I felt it like a touch as he stared at me from across the room. His voice vibrated with unidentified emotion as he told me, “Like I said, it’s easy to get a little bit misplaced, honey. It didn’t take you very long to get back to where you were supposed to be. Cut yourself some slack. I told you what happened to me when I was little.” He’d been left, callously dropped like he was lost luggage when he was too little to understand what was happening to him. That hurt to think about as much as imagining my mother living alone under my father’s rule. “We all need someone to bring us in from the cold.” He would have died if someone hadn’t been there to take him in, and chances were I would have been in a similar situation if all the people that had been there, holding the door open for me to places that were warm and safe, hadn’t pulled me in out of the cold when
I was ready to freeze.
Wheeler disappeared out the door. Watching him go, I realized he’d been at work all day, with very little sleep, and had dropped everything to come to me the second I called. He brought me inside and we collapsed. All of it was a little hazy and a lot fuzzy but I knew that in all of it there had been no time for food. He was always feeding me, making sure I had fuel to keep going, so I figured the least I could do was return the favor.
I climbed off the bed, took a few seconds to pull my hair up in a shifty topknot, and detoured to the bathroom to splash some cold water on my face so that I looked a little less like a train wreck. I wasn’t any kind of gourmet chef, and since my appetite was iffy at best I didn’t keep a stocked pantry. I had the basics and the staples, so I decided breakfast for dinner was going to have to do. It was creeping up on midnight according to the clock on the microwave but my suddenly growling tummy didn’t seem to care.
I was scrambling eggs in the pan and jumping around by the stove to avoid popping bacon grease when Wheeler came in through the front door. He paused for a second, eyes locked on me as I moved around the kitchen as if the sight of me doing something as normal as cooking was some kind of modern marvel.
“I figured you didn’t get a chance to eat dinner.” I waved a hand around the mess I was in the middle of like it was self-explanatory. “You’re always feeding me. Now it’s my turn.”
He blinked and those bright eyes of his got heavy-lidded and dangerous looking. “You didn’t have to do that.”
I shrugged and started shoveling hot food onto plates. “I didn’t have to, but I wanted to.”
He made a noise low in his throat as he took the plate from me and sat down on the opposite side of the counter. We ate in companionable silence and I didn’t bother to argue when he offered to do the dishes when we were done. I took my time setting up Happy’s bed and blankets in the kitchen after Wheeler put his doggie gate up across the opening and I realized I was stalling because I didn’t want him to go.
My mom’s call had resurrected a lot of bad memories and old ghosts, and I knew once I was alone with them they were going to do more than haunt me. When I woke up with Wheeler wrapped around my back, with him holding me so tightly that there wasn’t any room for anything to get between his skin and mine, I felt protected. It felt like all the sharp and pointy things that pricked at my vulnerable places were going to have to get through him before they could lodge into me. He wouldn’t let them draw blood. I wanted to be the kind of woman that could face all the things in the dark that scared her, face them alone, but I wasn’t, at least I wasn’t yet, but I was slowly getting there.
Wheeler was wiping his hands on a dish towel and watching Happy turn circles on his bed. There was a grin on his face and those dangerous dimples were flashing, and I knew I was about to say something I would immediately want to take back. It was one thing to be in bed with him when I was practically catatonic and unaware of my surroundings. It was another to ask him to be there when I was wide-awake and in full control of my actions.
“It’s late. You can just stay the night here if you want.”
His head turned toward me so fast I was sure he gave himself mild whiplash. His dark eyebrows shot up and his hands curled around the edge of the sink. “Thanks for the offer but I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
I was surprised how disappointed I was by his answer. Teeth sinking into my bottom lip, I was petulant when I asked him, “Why not?”
His eyebrows danced up even higher, if that was possible, and his dimples cut even deeper into his cheeks when his grin turned into a full, blinding smile. Holy hell, was he pretty.
“Because I’m wearing what I wore to work all day. I’m covered in grease and grime. I was exhausted when I showed up, so nothing could have kept me on my feet. I’m not going to crawl into bed with you and get you all gross and nasty.”
I looked him over and didn’t find a single thing that I would consider either gross or nasty. “Take a shower and stay.” I hated that I sounded desperate and needy but they were honest emotions. Ones that seemed to be stronger than the fear that was always hovering right behind them. “Please, Wheeler. Stay.” He was wavering, I could see it in his eyes.
After a minute of silence, he caved. He gave his mahogany-topped head a shake and turned his gaze up to the ceiling. “All right, I’ll crash for tonight, but if it gets to be too much for you I’m moving to the couch.” He lifted up the dangling arm of his coveralls and let it fall. “I’m ditching these if I stay, Poppy. You sure you really want that?”
I felt my eyes widen and my heart kick hard at the uninvited image of him sprawled out across my bed wearing nothing but all of that ink and a smile. I swallowed hard and gave him a jerky nod. “I think it’ll be fine. I’m tired and it’s been a rough day. I’ll probably be asleep by the time you get out of the bathroom.” Lies. All of it lies. I’d never felt more awake and energized in my life.
He knew I was lying. I could tell by the smirk on his face and the way his shoulders shook with silent laughter. “Okay. I’ll be in shortly, then.”
I gulped and practically ran toward the bedroom. I had no idea what I thought I was going to do in there but it felt like I needed to get ready for some kind of momentous occasion. I remade the bed and noticed he had indeed gotten smudges of black on the light green fabric, but I really couldn’t have cared less. I liked seeing the smudges there. It was like he had left a mark, a sign that he was the first man I had let willingly into my bed, a reminder that he was the only one I woke up next to unafraid. I picked up a few stray articles of clothing that were tossed around, moved some of Happy’s toys out of sight, and generally made the place as presentable as I could now that he wasn’t dead on his feet and would notice that I tended to be kind of a slob when left to my own devices.
When there was no busy work left to be done, I dug through my purse for any kind of minty breath enhancer. I didn’t want to breathe bacon and eggs all over Wheeler, not that I assumed I would be close enough to share air with him. Still, I thought it was better to be safe than sorry.
Once that was done, I had no option left but to crawl under the freshly tucked covers and wait. I could hear my heartbeat thudding between my ears and couldn’t keep my limbs still. My arms moved over and under the comforter a hundred times while my legs thrashed and kicked like I was trying to swim to the side of a pool. I wanted to turn the lights off, to hide and pretend like I hadn’t been the one to set this all in motion, but then I would be in the dark, alone with my ghosts and demons, and that was exactly why I’d asked him to stay in the first place. He kept the monsters at bay.
I was silently calling myself all kinds of names and telling myself to grow up and act like an adult. I’d been married, for goodness’ sake, I’d been pregnant. Surely I could handle one night sharing a bed with a guy I was attracted to without falling apart.
That theory went up in smoke when the opposite side of the mattress suddenly dipped down and the scent of my shampoo and freshly washed man invaded every sense I had. I turned my head just as Wheeler was reaching over to click out the light that was on the nightstand and couldn’t stop the gasp that ripped from me at the sight of all that taut, colorful skin spread out before me.
He hadn’t just ditched the coveralls; the torn T-shirt was also gone, leaving him in nothing more than a pair of yellow boxer briefs. No boring white or black for Hudson Wheeler, he was full of color from head to toe. Even the red in his still-wet hair seemed brighter and more vibrant against the plain white pillowcase behind him. Looking at him was enough to cause a sensory overload, and when he asked me if I was okay all I could do was nod. He reached for the light again and the word “stop” rushed out from my lips before I could think about why I wanted him to leave the lights on.
The tattoo on the center of his chest was mountains; I would bet good money they were the Rockies. People born and bred in Colorado took an inordinate amount of pride in being local and native to the
state. In the center of those intricately detailed peaks that matched the ones painted on his garage was a massive, angry, snarling wolf head. The ears were cocked; teeth were bared and blood dripped artfully and meaningfully in scarlet ink all the way down his torso. He had the word “Cadillac” and the famous logo that went with the car company tattooed across his stomach. Across his side, the one closest to me, he was inked in a manner that looked like all his skin was peeled and ripping away, only to reveal a complex network of gears and wires. It was meant to look like his insides were mechanical, like he was part machine, and it did. I noticed that one of his arms, the entire sleeve, all the way down to the tips of his fingers, matched that biomechanical design. Peeking out from either side at the top waistband of his boxer briefs were heavy, black designs that didn’t seem to have any rhyme or reason. They matched each other perfectly and crawled up over his sharply defined abs like they were some kind of map to the promised land. There wasn’t a single part of him that didn’t have some kind of design or marking on it. It was all beautiful and my hands were reaching out to touch it before I stopped to consider that he was practically naked, in my bed, by my invitation, and that putting my hands on him might be construed as something more than utter fascination.
My fingers skimmed over the wolf and his entire body shifted and coiled tightly next to mine. I traced the line of dripping blood all the way down his sternum, stopping only when it turned into the petal of a realistic rose that hung below a scary-looking skull. I saw his body move, watched as the fabric of his underwear stretched and tightened, but I couldn’t stop touching. I wanted to memorize it all and learn the story behind every drop of ink.
“Why a wolf?” The eyes of the animal stared at me, angry and hostile. That was no house pet. Wheeler’s spirit animal was wild and feral.
His fingers lifted and circled my wrist. I flattened my hand so that it was pressed against his stomach. He held it there, still, even after I wiggled my fingers, letting him know I wasn’t done touching.
Salvaged Page 13
