Black Dawn (8 page)

“Lex, sweetheart.” He kept Matt an arm’s length away. “Speak up. What do you need?”

Silence.

“You want me to go?” Parker tried again. But no matter her response, he wasn’t leaving. Not like this.

“This is between me and her.” Matt stepped closer. The ice in his voice sent chills down Parker’s spine. “Stupid, smart-ass motherfucker, think you’re so goddamn clever. Think you know everything. Not everything is about computers and shit, Parker. Get out of my damn house.”

It wasn’t the first time Parker had heard the smart-guy lines. When Matt was drunk, he got his shit in a tailspin and hated on everyone. That was Matt. A first-class asshole. But this, what Parker just saw, was past the line.

“God, man, shut up. You move an inch toward her, we’re going to blows.” Parker had height and weight on Matt, and his senses were in hyper-overdrive, ready to protect her, to care for her… carefully, he crouched without turning his back on Matt. “Lexi…” He put two fingers under her chin and lifted her face to his. “Tell me what you want.”

Her eyes locked on his, and he could’ve sworn her lips formed to say
you
. But she flinched as her gaze jumped. Parker spun up, countering the attack he saw coming in his peripheral, and he slammed Matt to the floor with a swift right hook. He enjoyed the impact that knocked out the guy.

“Fuck,” Parker growled and jumped up. He turned to her. The woman before him, lips rolled together, eyes squeezed shut, broke his heart. “Lex?”

Seconds ticked by until she gave him the most honest look he’d ever seen. The most scared one too.

“There was no one here. I don’t know what he’s talking about. Please don’t leave me with him,” she whispered.

Those last words were all Parker needed. He slipped his arms around her slender frame and carried her out the door. Right before they crossed the threshold, Parker snagged Matt’s keys to gain access to his own. Behind them, Matt rolled on the floor, waking and moaning. It took practiced restraint to keep from kicking Matt’s ass again.

“Don’t”—Matt pushed up to hands and knees—“you dare leave.”

Parker held her to his chest and glared with the open front door at his back. “I don’t know what’s been happening here, but fuck you.” Then he walked out the door with Lexi in his arms.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Parker held Lexi against his chest. The ease with which he lofted her against him and the moment when her tense body relaxed against his was trouble. Her hair tickled his neck, and there was something too intimate about the hold. She smelled like sweet citrus. Like sugar and lemons. His mouth watered. Couple his visceral reactions with the plain fact that he did
not
want to let go, and the situation was complicated. That was problematic because he wasn’t familiar with complicated.

Keeping her soft curves against him, Parker opened Matt’s truck, got his own keys, then opened his Range Rover.

As soon as he set her down, he regretted the loss of her weight in his arms. Instead of backing away, he leaned across her body and shoved his keys into the ignition. She needed a warm place to sit, but mostly he wanted to feel her close again. As he pulled back, blocking the door to keep out the cold, he studied her red neck and sad eyes that wouldn’t look at him.

Parker ground his molars, trying to contain the explosive energy that pooled in his fists. “Tell me not to go back in there and kill him.” Despite the growl in his words, he shook loose one fist and touched her chin, angling her face for a better look at her neck.

But her hands batted him away. “It’s nothing.”

“God, Lex.” He took his hand back, wanting to put it on her thigh but instead shoving it into his pocket. “We’ve got problems if you believe that.”

One slender shoulder shrugged. “I’m fine.”

The hell she was. She wouldn’t look up, wouldn’t say more than two hoarse words at a time, and his guess was her throat was bruised. Fuck that dude. “Don’t move. Lock the door. Just stay here.”

She didn’t respond.

“Lexi?”

Her near-vacant stare jumped to his, and surrounding her icy blue irises were tiny exploded blood vessels in the whites of her eye.

“Stay, sweetheart.” He locked then shut the door and charged back inside.

Parker knocked the door open, ready to go to blows with the asshole he’d known for years in the house that he’d been to a number of times. Matt was leaned back on the couch, beer in one hand, remote in the other hand, surfing the television as though what had just happened hadn’t. He didn’t look up as Parker crossed the room.

“What the motherfuck?” Parker’s fists were balled, his muscles ready.

Matt leaned back, not a care on his face. “It was nothing. Forget it.”

“Are you out of your damn—”

Matt raised his beer. “Have a drink or get out.”

“Dude, you had your hands around her neck.”

“It wasn’t what it looked like.”

“Are you fuckin’ on crack?”

His head tilted. “You got a thing for my fiancée?”

“Jesus fuckin’ Christ. I’ve got a thing for common decency.”

“I’m not gonna fight you over her. She’ll come back. Tell her one simple word: Bacon.”

“What?”

“Tell her I’ve got Bacon.”

Screw it. Parker didn’t care. He slammed out the front door and headed back for Lexi. His muscles shook from wanting to crush Matt. Parker’s mind ping-ponged over a million memories. What had he seen before, what had he missed, why had Matt changed—really changed—for the worse? Growling, Parker jumped into his seat after Lexi unlocked the doors then he threw the SUV into reverse and peeled out of the driveway without looking at her. He couldn’t, because shit, if he did, there was no telling what would come out of his mouth.

They slowed through stop signs. He didn’t know where he was going, but they were working through the maze of suburbia hell.

“Sorry,” she whispered. “He’s your friend. I didn’t mean to put you in the middle of that.”

“No friend of mine would ever hurt a woman.” Parker’s grip strangled the steering wheel as though he was trying to force himself not to turn back. His knuckles went pinkish white, and he still hadn’t stopped jamming his molars together.

“Just sorry,” she said again, even quieter than a whisper. Her voice broke his goddamn heart.

“Tell me that hasn’t happened before, Lex.”

Again with the silence.

He heard her sniffle, then he looked over. Fuck him—fresh tears. He was so far out of his league with the last fifteen minutes that he didn’t know the right move. “Has that happened before?”

Silence.

“Jesus. Fuck.” He slapped the steering wheel. “Are you kidding me?”

“Snapping at me won’t make a difference,” she mumbled.

He’d never felt his heart before, but at that second, he did, and it was shredding. Matt had laid hands on her more than once, and Parker hated coming to terms with knowledge he should’ve already had.

Finally, she shrugged. “I’m not me with him anymore. Maybe I never was. I shouldn’t have put up with it. It’s on me.”

Parker yanked the steering wheel over and shifted to park. Everything he did with Titan, everything he’d done in his life hadn’t prepared him for the anger and helplessness churning deep inside. “I don’t know what to say.”

“There’s nothing to say.” She shifted her gaze out the window.

“Why not?”

She looked back, obviously believing whatever she was about to say. “What’s the point?”

“So—”

“Can we stop this?” Lexi’s face pinched. “It’s humiliating, and I just want to—I wish you hadn’t seen that.”

“Why?”

Her head hung lower, her eyes closed. “Doesn’t matter.”

“Does to me.”

“It’s done. I’m not going back, and he doesn’t want me back. End of story. Nothing left to talk about.”

The air around them felt thick. The winter sunlight shone through the window, highlighting her softness, making her vulnerabilities stand out. He put the SUV back into drive and maneuvered onto the road. Tension hung between them, and his chest ached. Parker cracked the window, letting a slip of cold air rush against him.

He still had no idea where they were headed, and he wasn’t ready to admit that out loud. The thing about Lexi was she was always the one he liked to be around. Yeah, Matt had been his boy since they were kids, but Lex was the fun one. The one with the smile, the one who made him laugh, even if it had been a while.

“Hungry?”

“Kinda.” She picked at her nails when he made a turn.

His mind ran the gamut of options. His place wasn’t too far. “I’ll swing by somewhere, grab some takeout, then you can figure out whatever you want to do along the way.”

Parker let off the brake and headed down the street. For being in suburbia, there wasn’t a single drive-through. What the hell?

A pizza place’s sign caught his attention, and he pulled in. “Pizza?”

“Sure.”

He shifted into park. “What do you like on it?”

“Whatever.” She studied her fingers knotting and re-knotting.

“Lexi, toppings. What do you want on your pizza?”

She looked up. Her innocent, blood-speckled eyes seemed so surprised that he cared. “I’m not the girl this happens to.”

Except she was… and he wanted to rain hell. “But you are hungry, sweetheart.”

Her forgotten smile came out for a second then disappeared. “Sausage and banana peppers.” Then her cheeks heated, and her eyes dropped. “But cheese is totally fine.”

“Sausage and banana peppers?” It was a sliver of the girl he had known before, full of personality and unexpected answers. “Alright then.”

“Thanks.”

“Hey, does ‘bacon’ mean anything to you?”

Her color faded. “Oh, crap.”

“What?” Maybe he should’ve kept that to himself. What was it, a code for him finding her, hurting her? “Never mind. Just ignore that.”

“I shouldn’t have dragged you into this, Parker. I’m really sorry.”

Parker cupped a hand over her fidgeting, nervous fingers. The simple touch made electricity shoot up his arms. “If you recall,
I
carried
you
out.” She blushed, bringing some of her color back, and that surprised him, adding warmth in his chest to go with the shock of electricity. “Be back in a minute. Okay?”

“Okay.” She nodded, and her shoulders shivered before she tried to hide it.

“Warm up.” He’d been so fired up from wanting to pummel Matt. It had to be forty degrees outside, and he had the window cracked open. Parker pulled a jacket from the backseat for her, cranked the heat to full blast, then jumped out into the cold.

Sausage and banana peppers. As though she was too lost to realize it was okay to order what she wanted. Maybe he should call Matt and tell him to get his ass off the couch, whether he wanted a fight or not. Parker pushed into the pizza place and bounced on the balls of his shoes as he waited in line to order and pay.
Bacon, bacon, bacon. What the fuck did bacon mean?

“Ten minutes.” The cashier handed him the receipt and change. “They’ll call your number when it’s ready.”

“Thanks.” Parker dropped the change into a jar then headed to his Rover to wait.

It was empty. No Lexi.

Concern hit him hard in the gut. Matt? No… right? He pivoted, looking for her. Nothing. Just the sprawl of a shopping center on both sides of the street. Maybe she needed something from the grocery store? Had to hit the bathroom? But she didn’t have a purse and would’ve gone into the pizza place. This didn’t make sense.

He walked by a few storefronts. Nothing she would likely go into. A blinds store, a pet food store. Where was she? Parker circled back to his vehicle, and still she was nowhere to be seen. He saw his jacket abandoned on the passenger seat. Finally succumbing to the dread that prickled at him, Parker pulled out his phone and dialed Matt.

“Hey,” Matt answered.

“Where is she?”

“Lexi?”

Rage made Parker’s muscles bunch. “Yeah, you dickhead.”

Matt chuckled. “You told her about Bacon. Nice job. She called from a convenience store. I’m on my way to pick her up.”

“Pick her up?” What the fuck had just happened? Parker hustled to his still-running SUV and gunned the engine, pulling out and leaving tracks. “Where?”

“Good looking out for my girl. Thanks, buddy.” The call ended.

His girl
? Parker stared at the blinking screen then looked up and saw the sign for a convenience store. Matt’s truck was ahead with Lexi, head down, shoulders slumped, making her way toward it from the wall full of lotto and phone card advertisements.

Parker honked, and her head snapped up. She saw him,
had to have
, but she didn’t give him any more acknowledgment as she dragged herself toward Matt’s truck and got in the passenger seat. Matt had to have heard him too. The asshole barely waited for her door to shut before he took off. As he passed Parker, Matt stayed facing forward, but his left hand went up, shooting him the bird.