Say It's Forever (Redemption Hills #2)(17)

But this sweet, sweet woman all but floated over to him and let him wrap his arms around her.

So opposite it was like they slipped into the other to form a whole.

They whispered below their breaths, their words only meant for the other.

Something familiar pushed at my consciousness when he looked at me with the darkest eyes from over her shoulder.

The way they pierced and flayed.

My pulse thudded.

Eden spun around with her hand wrapped in his. “Salem, I’d like you to meet my boyfriend, Trent. Gage’s dad.” Her voice deepened with devotion. “Trent, this is the new neighbor I was telling you about, Salem, Darius’ sister.”

The man looked me up and down, cautious, but still, he stretched out his hand to shake mine. “Nice to meet you, Salem. I didn’t even realize Darius had a sister. He works for my brother at his shop.”

I froze as I realized the familiarity.

The resemblance.

The way those sharp eyes held the power to slice me in two.

Jud Lawson was his brother.

The man in the rain. The man who sparked something inside me that I hardly recognized in myself anymore.

A want that had sizzled across my flesh. A need I’d all but forgotten.

A fire in my guts.

But it was the fire that burned.

The flames that ruined.

And I knew I needed to stay far, far away from the blaze.





FIVE





JUD





“Do we have an issue?” I stood behind Darius where he worked to install the gas tank to a 70s chopper that I’d finished painting last week. Thing was pure beauty, if I didn’t say so myself.

Turquoise and black.

Like someone’s eyes that I was having a damned hard time getting off my mind.

Same eyes responsible for the tension that had bound the shop for the entire day. Animosity fierce in the stone set of Darius’ spine.

Dude hadn’t even looked at me when he’d returned, but that didn’t mean I didn’t feel the malice radiating from him for the last four hours.

He barely cranked a glance at me from over his shoulder. But I saw it there. This fierce protectiveness that kinda pissed me off. He went back to working a screw while he mumbled under his breath, “Not if you stay away from my sister, we don’t.”

A low, hard chuckle rumbled out. “You have a problem with me stopping to help a woman stranded in the rain?”

“Have no problem except for the one where Salem came waltzing out of your apartment this morning.” He grunted that. The tattoos on his forearms writhed over his muscles that flexed with the words.

“She seems like a big girl to me.”

A fierce, hypnotic, gorgeous girl who’d kept me tossing through the night.

Didn’t think I’d point that out.

Before I could make sense of it, Darius flew to his feet, wheeling around with a threat in his stance and venom in his voice. “Stay the fuck away from my sister. She doesn’t need any more shit in her life than she’s already been dealt.”

My chest tightened with the confirmation, the sense I’d gotten that the girl might’ve only had a purse, but she’d been carting around a shitton of baggage.

At the same time, a disbelieving smirk kicked at the edge of my mouth. “I don’t think I appreciate the implication.”

His dark eyes flashed, and he leaned in closer, his voice grit, “You think I don’t know you? Kind of man you are?”

Unease gusted, blistered and blew through the scorched wasteland of who I’d been. Where my soul had gone dry.

My hands fisted. “I’m not sure who you think you are, Darius…” I bit out his name through clenched teeth. “But I’d suggest you watch what you say. Took a chance on you. Don’t make me regret it.”

I wasn’t one to fly off the handle. Had learned to play it cool. To keep the old demon that thrashed inside chained.

But this?

I was half inclined to toss him from my shop. The other part knew we both were overreacting. He was only doing what he thought was right.

Standing up for his sister before she got herself hurt.

I mean, fuck, could I blame him?

I took a step back, trying to put some space between us. Wasn’t like a thing had gone down between his sister and me, anyway, so every bit of this was misplaced.

Darius winced, finally catching up to the fact that he was out of line. He scrubbed a palm over his face, and he dropped his gaze to the ground. “I’m sorry, Sir.” He might have been apologizing, but his voice was hard.

“She’s been hurt, and I’m not sure I could stand aside and watch it happen again,” he admitted low.

“Not necessary, man. Just…chill. All’s good. I got her to safety to ride out the storm. She slept in my guest room. It started and ended at that.”

Left out the part where I’d felt chained.

Spellbound.

Truth be told, if the girl had wanted one of those wild nights that caught you unaware? Nothing but pleasure without any of the aftermath? I’d have gladly peeled her out of those drenched clothes.

But that possibility had sailed the second I’d realized she was related to Darius. I sure as shit didn’t need that kind of complication. Think more than that, though, was the fact there was something about her that felt like more.