The Seduction

Attraction I can handle. It’s a bonus considering what I want from her. But I didn’t anticipate liking her so damned much too. There’s no guile inside her. Not a deceitful bone in that sexy body. I’ve learned to read people, and she’s special. It took me too long to find an opening to approach her because I didn’t want to find one. And when I did, my first instinct was protection, not payback.

Then she bent over my hand and blew her soft breath across my knuckles.

The almost kiss. Her breath warm and sweet against my mouth.

When I mentioned my sister — a stupid, stupid move — she was all compassion.

In a way, she reminds me of Grace. The girl she used to be before that bastard used, abused, and smashed not just her spirit but her mind, body, and soul. I don’t care if my sister, Grace, had turned down a wrong road, he still broke her.

I clench my fists and i

mmediately release. I can’t afford anger now. I’m in the parking lot of South Oaks, the mental institution, and I need to walk into the hospital with a clear head and only positive vibes.

As it is, I never know what I’ll find when I go inside. A vacant, empty shell staring into space or a hysterical, wild woman who needs to be sedated. I press hard against my temples and the growing headache. I caused the hysteria the first time Grace broke her silence. We were walking in the garden. She tripped and fell. I leaned over her to help her get up, and she lost it. Shrieking, screaming. Fucking screaming at the top of her lungs.

Get off me. No. No. No. Her hands over her head as she curled into a tight ball. The memory made me gag. So did her long, rambling recounting of what he did to her. Those had been the first words she’d spoken in years. Nothing since. And they were enough to drive me to make things right.

Somehow, he will pay. I will make him suffer the same pain I’m in every time I think about my beautiful sister. I know I need to break someone he cares about, but those people are too few and far between. His fiancée is protected. I can’t get near her. There’s only Chloe, who doesn’t deserve what I have planned.

A nice guy would stay away.

I can’t.

But Chloe’s strong. She handled me pounding that bastard into the ground without too much female hysteria. Which makes me believe somehow she will bounce back from what I have to do.

Chapter Four

The next night at work, Tank gathers the waitresses together for a talk. “We had an incident in the parking lot.”

I tense. Tank knows about my car since it stayed in the lot overnight. I play it off. He asks if I saw anything or anyone and I deny it, telling him that by the time I walked outside, my tires were slashed. It’s the truth as far as it goes.

“Just want you girls to be careful. If you need me to walk you out, say so,” he says in his gruff voice.

He doesn’t mention the guy we left in the parking lot, and neither do I. I’m sick about it but let it go.

That same night, I ask Zach, and he assures me it’s been handled. There won’t be any blowback on him or me. I don’t know how that’s possible, and I don’t want to know. He obviously knows how to handle himself … and other things. It’s something that makes me feel protected when he’s with me and nervous about him when he’s not.

He’s with me often.

Over the next few weeks, Zach steps up. Just not in the way I hoped. He’s my bodyguard. My shadow. I’d even call him my friend. He meets me at my dorm before work and follows me in his car. After a couple of times, I gave in, and now he just drives me to The Tavern. He walks me inside and sits at my station now, and I serve him drinks. He always waits for me to get off work and escorts me to his truck, his hand warm and sure on my back, setting off fireworks everywhere in my body.

I want him to make a move, but he never does.

Does he not want me? It’s easy to think that’s the reason, but I see how he looks at me, like he wants to devour me. At this point, I wouldn’t say no.

I sigh and bend to retie my sneaker.

“What’s wrong?” Callie asks. “You seem distracted and down tonight.”

Am I that transparent? I lean against the bar. It’s halfway through the night. I have hours to go, and I’m feeling frustrated with him and with myself. “I don’t understand what’s going on with him.” I refuse to look over at Zach. Callie will know who I mean.

“Problems with your shadow?” she asks.

“Why does he do that? Hang around and not make a move?”

She shrugs, but her perceptive gaze rakes over me. “Maybe you and your sweet self intimidate him?”

I blow out an annoyed puff of air. “Why do you say that?”