Sinful Southern Hero: 2 (16 page)

Lucy knew this wasn’t a good way to deal with her mental
state, but she needed to clear the fog from her mind now, not wait who knew how
long until she finally felt fully herself again. Though she’d retreated to this
safe place inside her mind many times before, she’d never once wanted to break
free of it and the only way she knew how was to shock her system, hoping the
adrenaline would kick her to the surface.

It took ten long, red, raised lines on the inside of her
tender arm before she was able to pull in a deep breath, blink her eyes and
look around, seeing the world like she should. Totally present instead of
experiencing her surroundings as if viewed through a screen covered in a thick
film of Vaseline.

Fuck, her arm hurt.

Then she remembered Dalton. The cheating asshole! They may
not have had a verbal agreement of exclusivity, but it was sure as hell more
than implied. Well, she didn’t need him. She wouldn’t go as far as to say she
didn’t need anyone, but she didn’t need another man who made promises he
wouldn’t keep.

More determined than before, she pulled back into traffic.
All she needed to do was get those pictures from the house she used to share
with Ross and in which he still lived. She was sure he’d kept them. The sick
fuck probably took them out each evening, spread them across the bed, rubbing
his hands together like a cinematic villain while enjoying all he’d
accomplished. Lucy shuddered at the thought.

It would take around six hours to make the drive from
Clifton to Cincinnati. With her right hand, she reached onto the passenger seat
and dug through the purse she’d tossed there, searching until she felt the
familiar weight of her cell phone. It was turned off for now, she had no desire
to listen to it ringing for the next six hours while she drove and no doubt
Abbey and Dalton would be calling, maybe even Dez, to try to change her mind.

Thinking about her new friends, people who cared for her—not
Dalton, the bastard—but Abbey, Jed and Dez, warmed her heart. Lucy hadn’t had
friends in years, so long she couldn’t remember the last time she’d been
shopping with a girlfriend or had someone she could call if her car broke down
on the side of the road. Maybe, regardless of what happened with Dalton, Lucy
could settle in Clifton permanently.

After merging onto the interstate, she set the cruise
control for a few miles over the speed limit, flicked the radio on, tuned in a
rock station and prayed Ross would stay put in Clifton. She needed to get in,
get the evidence to end the threats against her and get the hell out unnoticed.

Dalton yanked open the back door to Hart’s Inkand
strode through, the cool air inside barely registering against his heated, damp
skin. The usually calming scent of antiseptic, ointment and ink didn’t comfort
him now with his focus solely on finding out what the fuck happened with Lucy.

Damn Rachel and her stupid games.

Dalton should have been here, keeping an eye on Lucy
himself, instead of playing “How to Top from the Bottom” with a woman he used
to screw. The low murmur of voices drew him to Abigail’s studio where he found
a trio of people looking as if they’d divided his feelings equally between
them. Pissed, worried, determined.

“What happened?” he asked the room at large without
preliminaries.

Three sets of eyes swung to the entrance where Dalton stood.
He shoved his hands deep inside the front pockets of his jeans to keep himself
from hitting something or strangling one of the people standing before him who
had let Lucy walk away unprotected.

“Lucy had a flashback followed by some kind of mental breakdown
that made her eyes look dead and haunted at the same time. Most fucked-up thing
I’ve seen in a while. Like she just…shut down all her emotions. Just turned
herself off but kept her body moving.” Dez related this in a disturbing, calm
tone at odds with the words.

At least Dalton knew why she ran, though he worried about
her mental state and the fact she was alone with a madman on her tail. “All right.”
He rocked back on his heels then took a step farther into the room. “Where’d
she go? I’ll go get her.”

“Not finished, yet.” Now Dez’s voice punched out at Dalton
with a harshness his friend and foreman had never directed at him before. “After
she freaked out, she overheard my conversation with Anderson. She realized you
weren’t at the job site, where you said you’d be, but somewhere with Rachel, a
woman who Lucy has had the displeasure of seeing naked and knows you’ve fucked
on multiple occasions.”

Not liking where this was going, Dalton moved to place his
hands on the leather-covered table in the center of the room and leaned toward
Dez, who stood on the opposite side, mirroring his position. “Whatever you’re
thinking, you’re wrong. You think I’d do something like that to Lucy? Or any
woman?”

He watched Dez’s gaze flit over his face, then pause and
narrow, focused on a corner of his mouth.

“Son of a bitch!” Dez growled, furious. Dalton’s stomach
clenched, bile rushing toward his throat with the knowledge of what must have
made his friend so angry.

With a rough hand, Dalton scrubbed his mouth, then pulled
his hand away to stare at the rose-colored glossy evidence of his earlier
mistake.

“You son of a bitch!” Abigail yelled, repeated Dez’s
sentiment. “Why? Why did you even bother with Lucy if you wanted to keep
fucking Rachel? You knew Lucy was fragile.”

Dalton fisted his gloss-smeared palm and slammed his fist
onto the table. After turning away, he stomped to the sink and washed his hands
with a violent intensity on par with his feelings about the entire incident.
Abigail continued to rant as he let the hot water scald his skin, removing all
traces of Rachel’s lip gloss. He shut off the tap and looked over his shoulder
when he heard Jed speak.

“Babe, put it down.”

Abigail had snatched a heavy wooden sculpture of a rock-‘n’-roll
style cowboy boot off a nearby shelf and now held it with both hands at
shoulder height like she was wielding a baseball bat. “No. I’m gonna knock this
stupid motherfucker over the head until he comes to his senses.”

Dalton turned around slowly, knowing Abigail really would
try to bash him over the head if she was pissed enough, which she was.

Jed released a loud, put-upon sigh before wrapping one arm
around his fiancée’s waist, pulling her back to his chest, and using his other
arm to retrieve the wooden Dalton-basher before placing the statue back on the
shelf. “Babe, Rachel is a conniving bitch, which it looks like our boy here is
just now realizing. Let’s hear his explanation. If afterward you’re still
pissed, I’ll beat the shit out of him myself.” He placed a kiss on her temple
then looked toward Dalton.

The heavy ball of guilt coiling and snaking through his chest
told Dalton he wasn’t going to come out looking like a hero when he relayed his
story. Still, he wouldn’t lie.

“I went to the Elegance Suppliedoffice to see
Harris, not Rachel.” Dalton settled his gaze on Dez. “We ordered the right
marble tile for the job but that’s not what was shipped. When I called the
office, Rachel told me I needed to speak with Harris in person since it was
such an expensive mistake.” He laughed without humor. “I should have known
something was up. When I got there, Harris wasn’t there, Rachel made her play,
I fell for it for about five seconds, kissed her back, then realized the tongue
in my mouth wasn’t Lucy’s and I wanted nothing to do with it. I set Rachel
straight, for good, hopefully. She dropped the bomb that Ross was in town and I
got the hell out of there. Now it’s now. So, yeah, I did wrong, but it wasn’t
planned and it didn’t get far before I realized I was about to make a major
fucking mistake.”

Abigail huffed, uncrossed her arms and leaned back against
Jed’s chest.

Dalton felt a grin tug at his lips. “Still want to bash me
with that ugly-ass statue?”

“Well, I didn’t, but then you had to insult my style, which
everyone knows is awesome, so now I’m reconsidering.”

Jed’s shoulders shook as he tried to contain his laughter.

“I’m happy I don’t have reason to remove your nuts and make
a necklace of them for Lucy, but the fact is she’s still gone and Ross is still
here in Clifton. I’ve got eyes on him now, 24/7, his cop skills got nothing on
my guys. He won’t know he’s being watched and he won’t take so much as a piss
without me knowing.”

Another feeling altogether rose up inside Dalton. The sharp
tang of jealousy he felt at Dez’s interference and interest in Lucy was
unexpected. He studied Dez, trying to determine his motivation for going to so
much trouble for a woman he barely knew. Dez met and held his stare.

“Lucy remembered something,” Jed said, ending the staring
contest. “Ross Vance is a psychopath. The sick fuck took pictures when he hurt
her. She said he set up quite the little photo shoot when he left those burn
marks on her. He keeps the pictures in a box and Lucy knows where it is. She’s
driving back to Cincinnati to get the evidence she needs to put him away or at
the very least, keep her from being locked away in a psych ward by those
assholes she calls parents.”

Dalton was moving toward the door before Jed finished
speaking but was stopped when Dez moved around the table and placed a firm hand
on Dalton’s shoulder. “Wait.”

Dalton shook his head. “I’ve got to find her. I don’t want
her walking into that house alone. She could be walking into a trap, and
besides, I need to explain about Rachel.”

“My man, she’s got a head start and she’s determined to do
this on her own. You don’t think we begged her to take one of us with her?” Now
it was Dez who shook his head. “I don’t like it either but I’ve got
confirmation Ross is in Clifton so this might be her best chance to get that
box and bury a few of those demons that were born inside that house. If someone
is waiting at the house to grab her, which I doubt, you won’t make it there
till they’re gone anyway. If that happens, the best place you could be is near
Ross because he’ll lead us straight to her.”

Dalton’s heart pounded and his breathing was labored enough
to make his nostrils flare with effort. Just thinking about someone grabbing
his Lucy made him want to tear the world apart in order to get to her side.

A soft, feminine hand landed on his arm as Dez moved back.
Abigail looked up at him, her eyes filled with concern. “She needs time and I
think this is something she wants, needs, to face on her own. The waiting sucks
but it’s our best bet. She said she’d be back tonight. You need to give her the
freedom she’s never had, to make mistakes or prove to herself she’s strong
enough to face her life. Our girl is trying to put herself back together. It
hurts like hell, but we’ve got to give her room to grow.” A devilish glint
flashed in her dark eyes and twin dimples popped on her round cheeks. “Besides,
if anything happens to her, Dez’s guys will grab Mr. Vance, we’ll string him up
inside Jed’s barn and Jed will give him a couple of free piercings. I’m
thinking a Jacob’s Ladder would be a good start,” she continued, speaking of
the procedure where several barbells were pierced through the penis in a row to
create a ladder effect. “Of course, once a person has his dick pierced too many
times, it’s pretty damn useless, so we’d have to be careful. I’m thinking a few
hundred shiny accents to his manhood should soften him up, figuratively and
literally.”

Dalton began to relax as the others joined in the torture
fantasy.

“I can wire a battery pack to those lovely piercings and
shock the shit out of him whenever he says something we don’t like.” Leave it
to Dez to bring something electrical into it.

Jed slung an arm around Abigail. “And Abbey here can give
the ’ol boy a few free tattoos. Mighty generous, my woman. He left permanent
marks on Lucy, it’s only fair we share the love. Maybe a tramp stamp on his
back that says ‘Free Rides, Line Starts Here’. I hear cops have a tough time in
prison, but that should help.”

The bell over the front door of Hart’s Ink sounded and the
group inside Abbey’s studio dispersed as she went to greet her next client.

Dalton asked Dez to keep him updated on Ross’ movements via
text and took off for the job site he’d visited earlier, figuring hours of hard
physical labor in the scorching summer heat would be the only way he’d survive
the wait until Lucy’s return.

* * * * *

Lucy pulled her car to a halt atop the same cracked cement
driveway where she’d parked hundreds of times before but hoped never to again.
She sat frozen behind the wheel, peering through the windshield at the line of
neglected flowers along the walkway leading to the front door of the house that’d
once been her own personal hell. The ticking of the engine and the sound of her
breathing seemed to overwhelm the small space.

It’d begun to rain when she’d crossed the city limit line
into Cincinnati and was now trickling a steady stream of misty wet drops. She
had the odd thought that she was glad she kept her car clean and free of old
food wrappers and the other detritus which could be found taking up floor space
in most vehicles. It was nice to breathe in the scent of wet ozone and fresh
rain instead of stale trash.

You’re stalling…

While Lucy was relatively sure Ross was still in Clifton and
far away from this house, she couldn’t afford the risk of sitting around
wasting time. With a hand she refused to acknowledge was shaking, she removed
the keys from the ignition and opened the door. After scanning the neighboring
homes, the street and sidewalk, she stepped outside. She narrowed her gaze on
the house closest to Ross’ and a flicker of anger began and grew inside her
veins.

Why should she care if someone saw her going inside a house
she no longer lived in? What were they going to do? Sure as hell not intervene.
No, they’d mind their own damn business just like they did every other time… “Assholes,”
she muttered, head held high as she strode up the walkway to the front door.

She flipped through her key ring, instinct telling her Ross
would not have changed the locks after she left. He was too arrogant, both
about her eventual return and the probability of a break-in. Her old key
slipped inside the lock with ease and though she didn’t know why she’d kept it,
she was glad now that she hadn’t thrown it into the river along with her
wedding band.

The heavy door opened inward and Lucy braced herself for
stepping inside by taking one last lungful of clean rain scented air. As she
moved to stand in the middle of the living room, the first room she came to,
she looked around and wasn’t all that surprised to find not much had changed.
There was an accumulation of dust on surfaces she would have been beaten for
not cleaning on a daily basis and the carpet looked as though it hadn’t been
swept in weeks, but the place was otherwise free of clutter.

Wanting to get out as quickly as possible, Lucy turned and
jogged down the short hallway to the bedroom she used to share with Ross. The
door was closed and when she laid her hand upon it, a terrible sense of dread
filled her core. She pushed it open and stepped inside to find herself facing a
sturdy four-poster bed which still haunted her dreams.

This room, the bedroom, pulsed with more malevolent energy
and memories than anywhere else inside the small house.

As a child, Lucy had once visited the Alamo in Texas. She
remembered standing on the spot where so many lives had been cut short and
feeling as though the stain of violence and death still clung to the ground.
The harsh essence of such a traumatic event still lingering in the atmosphere,
making the air thick enough to press against her senses and warn of danger,
even though the war was long over.

Lucy felt the same way standing inside her old bedroom as
she had standing in the center of an old battleground. She knew it was only in
her head, but the air seemed somehow oily and sharp at the same time,
threatening to slide its black energy over her pale skin, wrap her up in
memories until all her old wounds were reopened.

She ran a fingertip over the tattoo on her thigh revealed by
her denim shorts to ground herself and remember she wasn’t stuck here anymore.
This room was no longer her prison, she’d made it out alive.

Trying to swallow past the lump of fear, new and old, which
had lodged in her throat was impossible and saliva began to gather under her
tongue like it had a tendency to do right before she found herself puking up
her guts from the flu. Refusing to leave any more of herself inside this den of
evil, even it was only her vomit in a toilet, she ran to the closet, jerked
open the door and stood on tiptoe to reach the large box on the top shelf.