Dare To Run (The Sons of Steel Row #1)(32)

His grip tightened on his phone. I could hear a masculine voice calling his name from the other end. “You slept down there?”

My cheeks heated. Guess I hadn’t told him about that yet. Oops. “Later. Get back to your call,” I said, shaking my head. “And follow me.”

“Heidi—” The muscle in his jaw ticked. “We’ll talk about this later.”

No. We wouldn’t. “Yeah, sure. Whatever.”

He gave me a dark look while lifting the phone to his ear. “Dude, take a f*cking Xanax. I told you to hang on a second.”

I tuned out the rest of his conversation, tensing as the familiar smell of sausages and onions washed over me. Whenever I came to Fenway, a rush of memories and forgotten emotions always hit me. I’d run away from my foster home when my foster dad had decided that by taking me in, he owned the rights to my body. Rights no thirteen-year-old girl should have to give to a sweating, overweight, balding forty-year-old.

He’d been on the verge of raping me, so I knew I had to get out. One night of inappropriate touching sent me running. The feeling of that man’s clammy hands running over my skin still haunted me. He’d touched my thigh—way too high up to be appropriate—and then grunted before whispering, “I’ll be at your door tonight. If you tell anyone or don’t let me inside, I’ll kill you like I did the last one. They never found her body, and they won’t find yours, either.”

It hadn’t taken me more than five minutes to be out that window with all of my meager belongings slung over my back. I never looked back. To this day, I wished I’d castrated him before running. Lucas hung up and side-eyed me. He was obviously thinking about my earlier admission. I hadn’t meant to tell him about my past, because it didn’t matter. Everyone had a past, and chances were, they were never worth talking about. End of story.

“Don’t.”

He cocked a brow. “Don’t what?”

“Look at me like that.”

His bright green eyes locked me down. “How, exactly, am I looking at you, darlin’?”

“Like I’m something to be pitied. You don’t like when I look at you like a hero, and I don’t like it when you look at me like that.” I turned away and focused on the spot where I used to sleep, between two big black Dumpsters. “Got me?”

“Got you,” he replied, his grip tightening on me.

I couldn’t help but feel he meant it in more ways than one.

We fell silent, and I led him toward the end of the alley, my heart picking up speed when I saw a tag on the wall. It didn’t match the one on my bar, but it still sent chills down my spine. Lucas followed my line of vision. “It’s not Bitter Hill’s.”

“I know.”

“But even so . . . I don’t like walking down here.” He pulled me closer, scanning the shadows as we walked. A man grunted and rolled over, pulling his newspaper blanket higher. “We should have stuck to the main roads, and once we get out there again? We damn well are.”

I peeked over my shoulder. For the first time, I had to admit he was right. Considering the circumstances, we needed to stay out in the open. “It’s just the crowds . . . they don’t agree with me.”

He shrugged. “Well, suck it up, buttercup. We need them right now.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I rolled my shoulders and forced away the tingling sense of doom making the hair stand up on the back of my neck. “So, air filters, huh?”

He scanned the alley again. “Yeah. What of it?”

“Nothing. I just never thought I’d be dating a car parts salesperson, is all. Ugh, what a dull career to fake-have.” I forced a laugh. “Why not be an astronaut? Or a nuclear scientist?”

He chuckled. It came out raspy sounding and way too sexy. “Darlin’, that’s exactly why we picked it. I’m trying to sound inconspicuous, not intriguing or sexy.”

“Well, job done. I don’t find you sexy at all.”

One second I was walking, and the next, I was against the brick wall, the breath whooshing out of my lungs. He trapped my hands between one of his and the rough wall, dipping his face down to mine. “Excuse me?”

“What’s wrong?” My heart picked up speed, pounding so fast and hard that it hurt. “Did I hurt your ego?”

The smirk I was all too familiar with crept into place. “The only thing you’re hurting, darlin’, is your chances of me getting you off again.” Lucas slid his thigh between mine, pressing ever so slightly against me. “Tell me. Have you been able to stop thinking about that one minute we shared? I’ll be honest. I haven’t been able to.”

My core ached at the mere mention of the things he’d done to me last night, but I refused to show it. “Sorry about that. For me, it was entirely forgettable.”

“Is that so?” he asked, his Boston accent doing odd things to my insides. “So if I tell you how much I want to feel your wet * against my fingers again, to make you scream my name, right here?” He slid his hand over my core, cupping me through my jeans. “You wouldn’t be interested?”

Yes. God yes.

“Nope, not at all.”

He lowered his mouth to mine, not touching but close enough to do so with one small lift onto my toes. “Liar,” he breathed. “You want me. You want me so bad that you can’t think about anything but having me. One thing you don’t realize, darlin’, is that I know you. I know all about you.”