Sidney’s Triple Shot [Apache Crossing] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (2 page)

He hadn’t always been so harsh and unrelenting with Sidney. In fact, he had been romantic and sweet for the first couple of months they were dating. She had been swept off of her feet by his generosity, and his take-control attitude. When she needed something, he just went and bought it, without asking her or getting her opinion. At the time she took it as sweet that he wanted to take care of her, but before she knew it he was making all of her decisions for her. She wasn’t allowed to make choices herself, because he told her that it was his job.

She resented it, but that was just the way it was going to be if she wanted to keep him in her life. She loved him. Or at least that’s what she kept telling herself.

The woman finally bought Robert’s act of remorse, and left the room after instructing him that he only had five minutes before she sent security in. What Dr. Javier didn’t understand was that Robert only needed five minutes to make Sidney pay for getting herself admitted to the hospital.

Holding her breath as the door clicked shut, she waited for the shoe to drop. She waited for Robert’s temper to explode like it always did. She didn’t have to wait long. Before she could even whisper a word, he was there in her face, holding her by the jaw so that she couldn’t look away from him.

“What do you think you’re doing, Sidney? Trying to get my ass put into jail? Why would you call 911? You stupid bitch, you’re trying to ruin my life, just like with that fucking brat you’re carrying. You just want to fuck my life up.”

Tears leaked from Sidney’s eyes, and she tried to shake her head no. “No baby.”

His hand dropped away from her chin, and his eyes widened with shock. “What?”

“No baby. Miscarried,” she said through her tears.

“Oh my God. Shit. Shit! You miscarried?”

She couldn’t see him anymore as her eyes blurred with tears, and she thought to herself that the pain meds must be wearing off, because she could feel a burning in her chest suddenly. Her baby was gone. There was no pregnancy. There would be no late night feedings, no giggles and coos, and no one to love her completely and without question. It was nearly too much to bear.

“I’m sorry, Sidney. I’m so sorry. I never meant to hurt my baby. I just reacted. I mean, you sprung it on me! We hadn’t even discussed having a baby yet! How the hell did this all happen?” He paced the room and she could feel the barely restrained anger and grief vibrating off of him.

See, she thought, he didn’t mean to hurt me, or our baby. It was all an accident. Surely things would get better now. Robert loved her, and he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. She just needed to figure out how to approach him about his temper. If this kept up, someone would get suspicious.

A nurse opened the door and told Robert that it was time to leave, and he leaned over kissing her forehead. “I’ll be at the house when they release you. I love you, darling.”

Once he was gone, she sighed with relief. When Robert was nearby there was so much pressure on her to be perfect. It was daunting. That doctor would be asking more questions, and she had to figure out what she was going to tell her this time. No one seemed to understand that, without Robert Wicks, Sidney Rowe had nothing and no one. She needed him, and he needed her. It would all work out, eventually.

* * * *

It was hot in Greenville, South Carolina, ridiculously hot and muggy. The air hung like a thick, wet blanket, making it difficult to breathe, and impossible to enjoy being outside. Sidney Rowe tossed her purse onto the floorboard of the car and slumped behind the steering wheel, resting her head back against the seat. Her body ached unmercifully. It wasn’t just the pain from her stay in the hospital that she was feeling tonight. It was the ache of something lost that can never be found again. Her soul had a black hole in it that she wasn’t sure she could ever mend. Losing her baby had stolen something from her. Robert didn’t seem to understand. He hadn’t even visited her again in the two days that she stayed at the hospital. Of course, when she got home he was anxious enough for her to get back to all of her duties. He was belligerent and angry when she told him that she was supposed to wait two weeks to have sex again, but he did leave her be.

With a heavy sigh of regret, she started her small sedan, and backed out of the office parking lot. She tried to return the smile that the Security Guard flashed her as she passed, but she barely managed a lopsided grimace. She had just been released from the hospital yesterday, and had returned to her job at the accounting firm today. According to Robert taking three days off was plenty, and she needed to stop being a pussy about it all. A glance at her watch filled her stomach with dread. She was late. Robert was going to be pissed.

The street lights were just flickering on as she pulled into the driveway of their home. The small house looked pristine with its lawn service manicured grass, and flower beds. Robert wouldn’t have it any other way. It would be a crime to allow one of his business associates the opportunity to think things in his life weren’t perfect. She sighed with resignation as she let herself in the front door, and dropped her purse and keys on the side table.

Glancing into the living room she was surprised to find it empty and the TV off. That was very unlike Robert. He was always seated in his recliner with the news or a sporting event on, and a scotch in his hand. If he wasn’t in his seat, then he was waiting for her by the door pissed off over some new infraction of his rules. She had learned to enter her own home cautiously and braced for a beating. Her bruises hadn’t faded from the last beating, so she was glad to avoid one now.

A feminine cry startled her, and she spun in the direction of their bedroom. Questioning her own hearing, she took a nearly silent step toward the doorway. The sound came again, but this time it was followed by a sharp slapping sound. A shiver shot down her spine. She knew that sound intimately. Robert was hitting someone in the bedroom. No, not hitting. That was the sounds of skin slapping skin. He was having sex with someone in their bedroom.

She stood there for a moment just letting that sink in. The asshole that had consumed her life for the last year, taking away her friends, and every freedom she had ever enjoyed, was now enjoying someone else in her bed. Hurt rolled over her, and she forced her feet to carry her down the hallway to the bedroom door. Standing in the shadow of the hallway, she could see the whole scene in living color.

Betrayal should have cut deep, but her first thought was that her fiancé, and the supposed love of her life, was screwing another woman on top of her favorite bedspread. It was a really pretty one with lilac and blue hydrangeas on a cream-colored background, and the blonde Barbie with her fingers gripping handfuls of it right now looked very out of place. The smell of sex hung heavy in the thick air outside the bedroom door, and Sidney let it fill the hollow spot in her chest. Why was she worried about her bedspread and not her fiancé?

For more than a year she had been his punching bag, and his crutch. He had stolen her smile, her happiness, her friends, her security, her pride, and now her baby. Her hand spread over her abdomen as she stared at the erotic tableau in front of her. Even now the ache of her miscarriage burned in her gut, reminding her of how deep his controlling hand had reached into her soul. She had no family to protect her, or help her find an escape, and thanks to Robert, she had no friends she could turn to either. Sidney Rowe was on her own now, because her fiancé was fucking another woman in her bed.

Robert was completely oblivious to her. Now was the moment she had been waiting for. She had to make a run for it, before he barked out his release as he came inside of his new fuck-mate. On silent feet, she turned, and walked back into the living. Her hands were steady as she dug out the sugar canister in the back of the cabinet. Unscrewing the cap, she took out the money she had been hiding from Robert, and shoved it into her pocket. Then she scooped her keys back up, and walked out the front door.

A few minutes from the house she stopped her car at the edge of the Reedy river. Walking calmly to the center of the lit bridge, she ignored the traffic behind her, and slid the small diamond ring from her finger. She had no need for reminders of the life she was leaving, so she threw it as hard as she could, and without waiting for the sound of it hitting the water, she headed back to her car. It didn’t cross her mind until she was nearly eighty miles away from Greenville that she had no clothing, no destination, and very little money.

When it clicked in her brain, she stopped at a gas station to fill up her tank and let herself cry. She wasn’t crying for the lost relationship. God forbid she ever mourn the hell that she had been living. She was crying for herself. For the last year she had been consumed by Robert, and now she was alone. She didn’t think she would ever find a way to be normal again, and in her heart she knew that Robert would never let her just walk away from him. It wasn’t over. No matter how much she wished it was.

Seven weeks later….

Sidney looked around cautiously at the quiet dance floor. Other than the neon lights behind the bar and the security lights over the two exit doors, it was completely dark, and thankfully empty. She held her breath, listening for any hint of noise. Reassured that she was alone in the building, she sighed heavily. It had taken longer for everyone to get cleaned up and clocked out tonight. The bar had been crazy busy with the local country-and-western band playing. The band, Texas Knights, was fantastic, and it helped business that the lead singer was one of three owners of the bar they were playing in.

Tyce Dawson was one of the sexiest men she had ever seen in her life, and when he sang it was like a soothing balm to her soul. She snorted as she thought to herself, me and every other woman within hearing range. Tyce was a ladies’ man that could work a bar room over in a minute and never failed to have a whole pack of ladies ready to rip their clothes off and kneel at his feet with just a quirk of his eyebrow. His brothers Xavier and Noah were just as hot, and just as available. She sighed again as her blood heated just thinking about her too-hot-to-handle bosses.

They were power and charm all wrapped up into jaw-droppingly sexy, muscular bodies. Just sitting through the interview process with the youngest brother, Noah, had left her face flushed and her panties dripping. And when middle brother Tyce handed her the miniscule uniform for the bartender job, giving her his trademark cheeky grin, she almost melted to the floor and begged him to take her there.

She didn’t meet the oldest brother, Xavier, until her first night tending bar by herself. She was in the back stockroom trying to get a bottle of tequila from the top shelf. Perched precariously on the top step of a step stool, she had bobbled, nearly face-planting on the floor. She was startled when two large hands gripped her hips to hold her steady. Xavier huffed when she squealed, but he apologized for startling her. Then he reached up and pulled the bottle of liquor down, handing it to her with the directive to ask him or his brothers for help reaching the top shelf and stay off of the step stool. It had been almost a full minute before she could slow her heart rate enough to walk back out to the bar, and she had decided then that she should be avoiding all three men as much as possible.

With piercing blue eyes, hard, muscular bodies, and matching black tribal tattoos banding their right biceps, they were three heart-stoppingly sexy men that attracted supermodel-gorgeous women. They were constantly surrounded by friends and seemed to know everyone. Her coworkers Kara Holt and Anna Pine had explained that they all served in the Marines prior to buying the bar, which they renamed Triple Shot and brought back from the brink of extinction. Each member of the trio was very different in personality, but they were fiercely loyal to each other.

She chided herself for thinking about her bosses and walked quickly toward the manager’s office. This wasn’t what she needed to be focused on right now, and it wasn’t helping her situation. She had no idea where she was going to go when she left Apache Crossing, but remaining in one place for too long was dangerous. Robert wasn’t happy that she had left him, and he wouldn’t stop trying to get her back under his thumb.

He had left repeated messages on her cell phone, starting a few hours after she left Greenville, and continuing until just a few days ago. At first they sounded irritated, but they quickly grew angry and nasty. His last message had promised to kill her when he found her, and she knew in her heart that he meant it. She refused to answer the phone when it rang, period. She even considered throwing it out the window as she drove down a long, lonely highway, but she was afraid she would need it to call 911 if Robert managed to catch up to her. Blinking back tears, Sidney shrugged off her fear and hurried through the empty manager’s office, her eyes still darting around her for any signs of life. She couldn’t risk getting caught. Not now, when she had finally lost Robert, and found a job. She needed at least a few more weeks to save some money.

Silently, she wondered what she would do if someone walked in and found her in the bar so long after hours. The private bathroom was supposed to be for the three owners only, and she had never seen any employee dare to use it, but she was desperate for a hot shower. How would she explain why she was here, and why she wasn’t showering at the motel up the highway that she had listed as her residential address to get this job? She would be screwed if someone tried to verify her home address, because she had never actually even registered as a guest at that motel. She had just picked one from the phone book for its local address.