“I, uh, um, I …” The words came out in a breathless stammer as my face grew hot.

  I’d never been this close to an almost-naked man before and most assuredly not one who looked like Thatcher Shephard.

  He lifted his arm, and I watched him take a drink from my glass of ice water he’d saved from crashing to the marble floor. In the shadows, his eyes reminded me of black velvet, and I was mesmerized. I should be moving. Getting some distance. Rushing back to the safety of my room. Yet here I was, fighting the urge to bury my face in his chest and soak it all in.

  “Thirsty, little doll?” His voice was deep and raspy, causing me to visibly shiver.

  Now, I was covered in goose bumps. I hoped he couldn’t see it in the dark. I had already embarrassed myself enough.

  I nodded, not sure I trusted my voice.

  He stepped closer, and my entire body tingled with excitement as he placed the glass on the bar behind me. I wanted to touch him so badly that my hands were fisted at my sides to keep from doing it. He was so warm … and hard … and broad. The cedar and spice scent of his skin felt as if it were wrapping around me. My eyes fluttered as I inhaled. God, that was good.

  Strong hands grabbed my waist, and my eyes snapped open as I was lifted from the ground and placed on the smooth granite of the countertop behind me. I still had to tilt back my head a fraction to meet his gaze, but I was closer to eye level now. I could feel the warmth from his breath on my cheek.

  “You shouldn’t walk around with so little covering your body.”

  The threat in his tone didn’t frighten me, or perhaps it did, but that emotion paled to the crazed fever that was surging just beneath my skin. His hands moved to my bare thighs as he dropped his gaze to where my sleep shorts had ridden up.

  My lips parted as I began to pant while watching his fingers slide up the inside of my legs. I had experienced the ache between my legs before. I knew how to give myself an orgasm. But, holy crap, I hadn’t known it could feel this intense.

  “Will you go back to bed and play with your pussy?” he asked me, his gaze flicking up to meet mine.

  I swallowed, then continued to breathe hard.

  “Do you slide one of your dainty fingers inside, or is rubbing your clit enough?”

  I managed to blink as I stared at him, unable to speak. Trying to make words come out of my mouth wasn’t my biggest concern here. There was a good chance I was going to combust on the spot with just the sound of his gravelly voice and unrestrained carnal gleam in his eyes. Everything I’d ever been taught about sin, Satan, and hell all seemed less threatening in this moment.

  He lowered his head until his breath was hot on my ear. “Tell me, little doll, how do you like to touch your pussy?”

  A tremor ran through my body as my eyes fluttered closed. At any moment, the tight coil was going to snap, and I’d climax. If he kept talking, breathing, just simply standing here, I’d get there. How did he do that? I had never known a man could bring you this close to an orgasm without even doing anything between your legs. Maybe I was more naive than I’d realized. Not that I cared at the moment.

  “Do you think about having that pretty pink cunt licked? Is that what gets you off? Or do you want it fucked?” He pressed a kiss to my ear.

  I moaned, leaning into him. Ready to beg him to do something. If he just brushed a finger against me, I was sure I’d explode.

  “Whose dick is it? Hmm? Tell me, little doll. When you spread your legs and play, who are you fantasizing about? Who is taking this cunt? Slamming his cock inside your tight hole over and over while you scream?”

  The jolt startled me even though I had known I was close. A cry tore from my chest, and I grabbed on to his arms, burying my nails into his biceps as my body shuddered through the delicious shiver that raced through me. I fought to catch my breath as I held on to him.

  His sudden movement snapped my eyes open, and as my vision cleared, I let out a whimper at the sight of Thatcher’s bare back as he walked away. My eyes stung with disappointment. Had I done something wrong? I didn’t even know how to ask that. It had been him saying those naughty things. I hadn’t made him do that.

  The slamming of his door as he disappeared inside the room was the slap in the face I needed to break the orgasm haze that had been lingering over me. Now, I was just left with humiliation as it weaved its way into every pore of my body.

  Sleep should have come for me easy last night. It normally did after a race day. However, I’d lain in bed for hours before finally falling asleep. Replaying everything that had happened with Thatcher. Trying to understand why he’d walked away. If I had done something to anger him.

  As I stood in the suite with the handle of my rolling suitcase clutched firmly in my hand, my eyes slowly scanned the empty space. Thatcher’s bedroom door was open, but the lights were off. I knew without looking that he wasn’t in there. I was alone. When had he left? Last night? This morning? Would he be waiting in the plane? Maybe he had stepped out to get coffee … or he was checking out downstairs.

  A knock at the door broke the silence surrounding me, and I swung my gaze to stare at the double doors. Was that him? No. He had a key. He wouldn’t knock. Letting go of the handle on my suitcase, I walked over and opened the right door. The familiar face of our driver stared back at me.

  “Miss Jewel,” he said with a nod of his head. “Are you ready?”

  Thatcher had left. The heavy disappointment settled over my chest. I gave him a nod and forced a smile. Perhaps he’d be on the plane, but that was hard to truly hang on to. Why would he leave early to just go sit on a plane?

  “Let me get my suitcase,” I told him.

  “I can get it,” he said, stepping inside, and I moved out of his way so he could go retrieve it. “Is this everything?” he asked.

  “Yes, thank you.”

  He gave me a kind smile, then headed back to the door that I was still holding open. He waved a hand at me to go first. Leaving the place where I’d made memories, however small they were, with Thatcher made my throat tighten. This might have been the only time I would get with him.

  His leaving without a word meant something, and it wasn’t good. He might have started whatever we had done last night, but I shouldn’t have allowed it. That did not give him a right to be mad at me, and maybe he wasn’t. Perhaps it was just him worried I would think it meant something more. I wasn’t stupid. I was aware that he had many different females in his bed. What he’d done to me was nothing compared to what he did with them.

  Was it that he thought I would get clingy? He had run so he didn’t have to deal with me? I was so inexperienced that I’d orgasmed without him even touching me, so clearly, I must have believed we were now headed down the aisle.

  Clenching my teeth, I stepped into the elevator. Even if he thought I would misunderstand what he’d said to me last night, I didn’t deserve him running off without even telling me his plans had changed.

  The next time I saw him, I would act as if last night had never happened. It would be business as usual. Then, I’d keep my distance from him. That was what I should have done to begin with.

  • Nineteen •

  “Who made you cry?”

  Capri

  Nine Years Ago

  My mother was never going to let me live my own life. She was determined to control everything. My feet pounded on the pavement as I ran along the path that circled the lake at the park. The rage and frustration burning inside me felt as if it was going to drown me. I’d had to get away from that house. From her. Running was my escape.

  I wished I’d been able to go away to college. Get distance from her, this town, the church. She did not understand that I had no desire to be her. I didn’t want the life she had for herself. It was boring and tedious just to watch it. Much less live it. My dad seemed to get that I wasn’t like her. Or like him. The church wasn’t my future. Sure, I’d attend to make them happy, but I didn’t want my world to revolve around it.

  There was a world out there I wanted to see. I wanted to explore. Taste foreign food, learn another language, have a passport full of stamps. Yet every time I took a step in any direction other than one she deemed appropriate, she stood in my way. If that didn’t work, she got nasty.

  Today, she’d done the latter. I’d saved fourteen hundred dollars over the past seven months with full intentions of moving into an apartment of my own. I had made sure to find a place that I could afford, that I had enough money to cover first and last months’ rent, pay to have my utilities turned on, and that my income could handle the monthly bills. I had even met with Mrs. Bellhaven, the landlord at Baystreet Apartments. She’d shown me the available studio apartment that was up for rent, and I had signed the paperwork and handed over my debit card to secure it.

  This morning, I had walked into the kitchen, fully prepared to tell my parents. I was going to tell them last night, but I left work and went directly to a babysitting job. When I got home, they were both in bed. What I hadn’t been prepared for was my mother already knowing. But how was I to know my mother would run into my new landlord? Mrs. Bellhaven didn’t attend our church. She was Presbyterian. Furthermore, she was twenty years older than my mother. They did not run in the same circles anywhere.

  My eyes stung as I circled the far corner of the lake. I had been so close, and she’d taken it all from me. Not once allowing me to explain, plead my case, anything. She’d told me that when Dad got home from work, we’d discuss my punishment. I wasn’t a child anymore. How was this cause for punishment?

  Reaching up, I wiped at the tear that had broken free and slowed my pace, wanting the peace that came with the secluded area on this bend. If I was going to cry like a baby, then at least I could do it in private. God knew if someone saw me crying, they’d call Momma, and I’d get in trouble for that too.

  I was a legal adult. How did she get to just take my money from Mrs. Bellhaven and cancel a lease her name wasn’t on? That just seemed wrong. It was unfair, and she had told me she wasn’t giving me my money back until I was mature enough to handle it. That was my hard-earned money.

  A small sob filled the silence, and I wiped my face off with both hands this time.

  “Running always make you cry?” a familiar deep voice asked.

  I spun around to see Thatcher Shephard leaning against a tree only a few feet from me. Where had he come from? I’d been running out here for over an hour and not seen him once. How had he suddenly popped up way down on this end of the lake, where there was no way he could get here without being seen walking this way?

  He stuck a cigarette between his lips and flicked the lighter in his hand. I watched him inhale and puff as he held the flame to the tip before closing it and slipping into his pocket. Those dark eyes never once leaving my face. I didn’t feel like breaking down into a fit of sobs anymore, but my chest was all weird and fluttery.

  “Tell me, little doll,” he said, then took the cigarette from his mouth. His eyes were almost black now as he narrowed his gaze. “Who made you cry?”

  I blinked, reminding myself to breathe. He was just very distracting. I needed that right now. If only he could come home with me and distract me from the life I was being forced to exist in. The idea of taking him in my house caused a laugh to bubble out of me, and I covered my mouth to muffle it. He was going to think I was insane. Running and crying, now laughing. Maybe I had lost it. My mother had been the cause of my mental break. I could see that happening in the future if I didn’t get out of that house and out from under her thumb.

  He raised an eyebrow as he placed the cigarette back between his teeth.

  I cleared my throat. “Sorry. I must look crazy. I just … thought about something, and it was funny.” I shook my head. That hadn’t made sense at all.

  “I’m listening,” he drawled.

  I glanced around, mostly so I didn’t ogle him like a weirdo. “Where did you come from?” I asked him, wanting to change the subject.

  “Hell,” he replied. “Now, answer my question.”

  I stared back at him, and his eyes held me there. It was a simple question—or so it would seem to anyone else—but telling someone like Thatcher Shephard that my momma controlled my life was humiliating. I licked my lips, wishing I had some better answer. One that didn’t make me sound so pathetic.

  I decided to answer the reason I’d laughed instead of explaining why I had been crying.

  “I was thinking about the fact that you seem to show up when I need a distraction, and then I thought about needing a distraction from my mom and taking you home with me. Seeing her face …” I trailed off then, not sure I should have said that either. “I mean, my mom is just real religious, and she’s a gossip, so she would think—I mean, she’d—I didn’t mean for that to sound so offensive.” I was rambling, trying to make this better. My entire face had to be as red as an apple.

  “Doll, if your momma liked me, then I’d be offended,” he replied as the corner of his lips quirked, like he just might smile, but didn’t. He shoved off from the tree he’d been leaning against and took a few steps closer to me. “Who made you cry?” His tone dropped a notch, and the threat in it made me tense.

  Why did he care so much? What was he gonna do, go take up for me like he had at the ice cream shop? My stomach turned as I thought about why those guys would never bother me again. I tried not to let my head go in their direction. Dad was right, and bad choices caused tragedies. It wasn’t my fault.

  The way he was studying me so intently made me believe he wasn’t going to let this go. I had to make something up that was half truth and half lie. I didn’t want him to know how sheltered I was. It was too embarrassing to think about.

  “I’ve been working a lot to save up so I can get my own apartment. I thought I had found one, but turned out, I didn’t get it. That one was the only thing available that was in my budget.” There. That was the truth. I’d just left out a lot of details.

  He took the cigarette from his mouth and let out some smoke as he glanced back toward the park, then at me. “You’re ready for freedom, I take it? Done with living in the minister’s house?”

  I nodded, feeling the heaviness settle back over me again. He had no idea how done with it I was or how smothering my mother could be.

  “That’s the only reason you’re crying?” he asked me.

  The urge to blurt out the entire truth to him was tempting. I wanted to. I wanted to tell him everything, and if it wasn’t that his older, sexy, possibly dangerous guy would think I was pathetic, then I would. But I liked him showing up in my life. It was always brief, but it made the bad stuff fade away. Which was ironic since most people I knew were terrified of him.

  Instead of spilling my guts, I just nodded.

  He smirked, almost as if he didn’t believe me. Was I that bad of a liar?

  “All right then,” he replied, dropping his cigarette to the ground and covering it with the toe of his boot. “If there is no one I need to kill, I’ll leave you to your run.”

  I frowned as he turned and walked away, but not toward the park. He walked to the woods behind us. Had he come from the woods? Was that why I hadn’t seen him? But why would he have been in the woods?

  Better yet, what I should really be questioning was … had that been a joke? The killing someone thing? Yeah, it must have been. He was probably making fun of the fact that everyone in town thought he’d murdered a guy or that his family was in the Mafia.

  The little house was perfect. I stood outside in the front yard, smiling like an idiot. This could actually be where I lived? I shook my head in disbelief.

  Please, God, don’t let me wake up and this be a dream. I was going to be really upset if it was.

  And it was three times the size of the studio apartment I was going to pay three hundred dollars more a month for. That seemed very unreal.

  “Just need you to sign here,” the older lady who had shown me the house said, holding out an iPad toward me.

  The lease. She wanted me to sign the lease. I had to get my money back from my mother first. I couldn’t pay for this without my money. I couldn’t lose this house.

  “Um, Ms. Ma—”

  “Maeme. It’s just Maeme,” she replied with a kind smile.

  I liked this woman. I had no idea how she’d found out I was searching for somewhere to live or how she had gotten my number, but I was thankful. But that oddity also made me fear this was a dream. How had a deal like this just fallen in my lap?

  “Maeme,” I corrected myself. “This house is amazing. I would love to lease it, and I can afford it. But I need to go get my money back first. My, uh … well, I have it, but my mom is holding on to it. As soon as I get it from her, I can pay this month and of course the deposit or last month’s rent—whatever is required. Just … could I get it to you later?”

  Maeme held out a set of keys to me. “Take the keys,” she said. “When you are ready to move in, give me a call. I’ll stop by with the lease for you to sign. No rush.”

  If I wasn’t asleep, I was hallucinating. I held out my hand, and she dropped the house keys into it.

  “Those two keys are to the front and back doors. The smaller one is for the bolt on each door. Now, there is a locked metal door you’ll find behind the house on the other side of the porch if you go looking. But it’s covered by a rose bush for the most part. It’s got some paints for touch-up in the house, maintenance equipment, and the like. There ain’t a key to unlock it. It’s not available for use. Inside, there is a similar door that will be locked up. Just more maintenance equipment. But everything else will be yours.”

  I nodded as my fingers wrapped tightly around the freedom in my hand.

  “I … thank you. I am just … you don’t know,” I gushed, not finding the right words to say. “Thank you,” I finally blurted. It didn’t feel adequate enough, but I didn’t think there were words that would be.