I pushed the memories away, stepped inside, pushed the button for the ground floor. Willed the sick feeling down. I needed to chill. To unwind. To forget about Cam. What he’d done. What he wanted now. I'd burn off my anger on the treadmill in Gray’s gym since it got dark so early. I wasn't running by myself outside at night. Not this time of year.
Exercise always worked. I could do this, I could get over Cam's call, the greasy thoughts of those men, how one had held me as the other ripped my shirt. How I'd kicked and fought, broke a nose. The blood. The panic. The debilitating need to have the doors open to escape. The stumble onto the marble floor in front of the bank of elevators. The cry for security.
I remembered the feel of their rough hands. Heard their voices telling me what they were going to do to me. Smelled their cloying cologne, the cheap cigarettes.
The elevator doors slid open. I took one step, and my breath caught in my lungs when I saw him.
Him.
Big. Broad. Tattooed. Thickly muscled. Chiseled jaw. Angry eyes. A palpable energy radiated from him. He looked mean. Bad. Ruthless. His hands were clenched in fists, and he stepped toward me, then froze when he saw me. His look changed then, the fury slipping away.
Still, he scared the shit out of me. For a split second, I thought he was going to hurt me.
No. This guy wasn't planning on dragging me to a hotel room and raping me. He was… trying to go upstairs. I knew this. My brain processed that he lived in the building or at least had a key card to call the elevator. But no. That didn't matter. Run! Run! were my only thoughts.
No. I couldn't look like a complete lunatic, couldn't let my fear rule me. I let out a deep breath and murmured, “Excuse me.”
He stepped back, hands raised in front of his chest, and I pulled the dolly with the boxes into the lobby area.
I heard the elevator close, felt the keen sense of panic start to wane. I stopped just inside the exterior doors, stared outside through the glass. At nothing. Breathed. Tried to calm my racing heart. Cam had done this to me. Made me a quivering mess, scared of everything. Even my neighbor.
Of course, the intense man was my neighbor. I'd met Gray and Emory. They told me Gray's fighter, Reed, lived in the other apartment on my floor, but I hadn't met him yet. I'd been in the gym twice so far—Gray offered membership with the rent—and seen a number of fighters working out in the ring as I ran on the treadmill but didn't know which one was him. The number of fit guys, punching, kicking and rolling around on the ground trying to choke each other was enough to make any woman's ovaries perk up and take notice. I had no idea sweaty men could be so arousing.
But none of them had anything on Reed. Even through my panic, I was attracted. Perhaps that was why I was so panicked. In that split second, I shouldn’t have desired the man who could do me harm. If I took away the layers of panic, I’d remember his height, at least a half a foot taller than me. Jet black hair had been cut super short, as if he used clippers himself instead of going to a barber. His skin was olive toned, and the start of a beard made his square jaw rugged.
Then there were the tattoos. Swirls of color and shapes crept up his arms, and I had no doubt more were hidden beneath his shirt. The overall effect screamed bad boy.
His dark eyes had widened in surprise at the sight of me, then a touch more after that, probably because I'd stared at him in horror. With his nose that had a crook in it and the splotchy red marks on his left cheekbone, he looked like he'd been in old fights and new ones. A snug white t-shirt had been plastere
d to his skin with sweat, the collar slightly stretched as if yanked a few times, and a pair of black workout shorts rode low on his hips. He was a fighter not a rapist.
I pushed open the outer door with more aggression than needed and tugged on the dolly, wheeling it to the back of my car. No doubt Reed thought I was insane. At the least, deathly afraid of him. My heart still hammered. My throat burned with the need to cry, but there were no tears. Cam had done this to me. Even after two years, even from a jail cell, he held so much power over me. He was still fucking with me. My work, my life, my relationships. When he got out…
As I stuffed the boxes in the trunk of my car, I had to wonder if I'd ever be free. And a guy like Reed? I wasn’t a damsel in distress worth saving.
2
REED
I had no idea what the fuck happened with my new neighbor. I had women stop in their tracks and stare at me with a quick eagerness that said they’d get on their knees for me in the nearest bathroom. I’d never had a woman look at me with such horror. Yeah, I was dangerous, but not to women. Not to her.
I'd just finished up a few rounds with a kid who wanted to be an MMA fighter, so I was a little sweaty, a little pissed. He’d sworn he was the next big thing and wanted Gray, also known as The Outlaw—who was the best trainer around, perhaps one of the best fighters even after his retirement—to check him out. Gray had put him through his paces in the ring with me. He hadn’t done it for the punk. Gray had known he wouldn’t cut it because of his piss-poor attitude alone. He’d done it for Emory, his fiancée, who worked with the kid’s dad at the hospital.
Gray wouldn't do shit like that for anyone else. Hell, he'd handed her his balls the day they met last summer, but he seemed just fine with it. Emory was killer, and I didn't say that about too many women, especially the groupies who only wanted to be taken for a ride on an MMA fighter’s dick. They were good for a quick release, but that was it.
The kid was all attitude, no footwork, and I knew Gray wanted me to take him down a notch or two. I'd put him on the ground several times, which only pissed him off. He hadn't even landed a punch, not until after the bell, and he came after me. I was used to guys' egos, but this little fuck? Yeah, Gray wasn't going to work with him, and he'd have to deal with any fallout for Emory with the doctor. I didn't think there would be much because not many people crossed The Outlaw. And if I stood beside him? Yeah, the doc would piss himself.
I was angry about the sucker punch, so instead of hitting him right back—which was what I would have done a few years ago as a punk on the streets—I let Gray deal with him. I walked off, heading to my apartment to shower, to chill with a protein drink and some crappy TV. Not used to anyone being in the elevator—it had only been Gray and Emory who also lived above the gym until last week—I almost bumped into her. Her.
The look on her face stopped me cold better than a fist to the face from any fighter.
She hadn’t been just startled or surprised. No, she’d been fucking petrified. I swore I saw all color drain from her face when she got a glimpse of me. Her eyes had widened, then darted past my shoulder at her only means of escape. A shiver had gone through her as if she’d been exorcised of a ghost. Then, all of a sudden, she pulled herself together and moved past me, fast, lugging a moving dolly loaded with boxes. I'd held my hands up and took a step back, letting her know without words I meant her no harm. It didn't matter. The damage had somehow been done.
I knew I was pretty scary looking. Being six-three, I loomed over people. I had shoulders like a linebacker and tattoos covered my arms. My nose was crooked, and my jaw was a little sore from where the kid sucker punched me.
I’d been told I looked fucking mean. A lot of the time, I felt mean. I was dark on the inside. Angry, dangerous. I wasn’t the asshole I used to be. I wasn’t the fucked-up kid. The army and training with Gray had set me straight. Still, grown men gave me plenty of room on the sidewalk. But this? With Harper—Emory had told me her name—this was different. I didn’t like it at all. I didn’t want someone like her to fear me.
I didn't get on the elevator. I couldn't just ignore the fact that I'd frightened her. I stood there, watched as she walked quickly toward the outside doors. Stopped. She didn't know I was watching her, perhaps thought I'd gone upstairs. She looked down at the ground, her body shaking. Shit. I’d done that to her. I wanted to go to her, grab her in my arms and let her know she was safer with me than anywhere else, but that wasn’t going to work. Not now.