by Ranae Rose
“What about family?” He couldn’t help asking. “Friends? It’s not every day someone leaves it all behind and starts fresh in Riley County on her own.”
She shrugged and smiled. “I’ve got a few people I’ll miss, sure, but I have a feeling that with this kind of proximity to the beach, I can count on them coming to visit.
“I guess I can see why it might seem a little strange that I’d want to start fresh by myself out here—” she waved a hand at the pine forest surrounding them “—but the truth is, as soon as I saw the job listing at Wisteria and the photos on the place’s website, I knew it was right. Have you ever just had a feeling about something like that?”
He thought about it for a few moments, then shrugged. “Can’t say that I have. I was born and raised in Wilmington – moved down here for the job. I’ve more or less been a local my entire life.”
Alicia put her glass down on the floorboards beside her chair. It was empty, save for the ice. He’d barely registered that fact before his gaze was drawn to her legs, long and slim, bare all the way to the thigh, thanks to her shorts. Lust struck him, white-hot and hard-hitting. “Can I get you anything else to drink?”
Before she could reply, a melody started blasting from the vicinity of her short-shorts.
She pulled her phone from her pocket and glanced at the screen. “I should’ve known.”
“Trouble?”
She laughed. “There’s this bride getting married at Wisteria next month. She freaked out a little when she found out the old event coordinator was leaving. I gave her my personal number so she could get in touch with me whenever she wanted.”
“Regretting it?”
“You could say that. This is the fourth time she’s called me on my cell phone. I’d better get home and call her back before she has a meltdown.”
Disappointment stole through him. If only he could go back to the moment before her phone had rung. It’d been nice, sitting with her on his front porch, listening to the cadence of her words, admiring those long legs…
The only thing that’d be more perfect would be having them wrapped around his waist. “Listen, I know we’ve got that dinner coming up this weekend, but could I take you out sometime before then?”
He waited with his heart in his throat and his cock halfway stiff against his jeans zipper. For a second, he considered telling her everything – that her lack of bedroom curtains had left him with a near-constant hard-on for the past three weeks. That her silhouette haunted his dreams and that it was all he could think about every time – and there’d been a lot of times, lately – he wrapped his hand around his dick. That he wanted her, bad.
But that was no way to talk to a neighbor. If she wasn’t interested, knowing that he had a mental catalogue of times she’d undressed – having no idea he’d seen – was probably the last thing she’d want to know. Not that he could blame her.
“Out to dinner?” she asked, standing now, her sandaled feet scraping against the porch boards, toenails painted a pale shade of pink he’d expect to see inside a seashell.
“Yeah. There are a couple good seafood restaurants around here, or we could head to Wilmington if you’d rather do that.”
“I’ve actually only been to Wilmington once, and I didn’t get to see much. I’d love to go.”
“Really? Well, if you want we can make a day of it. See some of the tourist attractions.”
“Sure.” She smiled, looking so gorgeous that for a second, he seriously reconsidered telling her exactly how crazy she’d been driving him.
Her phone rang again before he could do anything so stupid.
“Just let me know what day would be good for you. Most evenings will work with my schedule.”
He agreed and she bid him goodbye, descending the porch stairs and crossing the property line, already lost in conversation as she returned to her own home.
He picked up her glass, and his gaze was drawn to the prints her lips had left on its rim, glossy kisses against the crystal-clear surface. Heat tore through him as he imagined those lips locked with his, or blazing a trail across his skin. The fantasy inspired an ache that stayed with him, settling into his bones, just like the satisfaction of knowing that he had a date with the hottest woman in Riley County.
If he was lucky, she wouldn’t walk back across that property line on the night of their date. Not until morning, anyway.
CHAPTER 6
“Whose dog is that?” Alicia leaned against the window in the ‘blue’ bedroom, her nose practically pressed against the glass. Her breath came in increasingly rapid bursts that fogged the pane.
Kerry stood behind her, a stack of linens in her arms. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen it before.”
“It must have a death wish.” Her nails bit into her palms as she clenched her hands into fists. “Look how close it’s getting to Brutus!”
The little dog – not even big enough to reach her knees – was darting around Wisteria’s back lawn, barking at the hefty gator lying stretched on the stream bank. Already, he’d come within several yards of the reptile.
Kerry shuffled closer to the window.
“Do you think it belongs to one of the guests? Because I foresee some really nasty reviews coming our way if their pet gets snapped up by Brutus.” A sense of dread crept over her as she imagined the havoc such an event would wreak on Wisteria’s reputation, especially online.
“None of the guests staying here this week have brought pets,” Kerry said.
“Still, that dog belongs to somebody.” Alicia leaned back from the window. “I’ve got to do something.”
Kerry raised an eyebrow.
“From a distance,” Alicia amended, and left the room, taking the steps downstairs in a hurry. She almost tripped at the bottom of the flight, but managed to catch herself.
“Where’s the fire?” A familiar voice echoed from across the room.
“There’s a dog out back harassing Brutus,” Alicia said to Faye.
“I’m pretty sure Brutus can handle himself,” Faye said. Still, she followed Alicia.
“Wait for me.” A voice echoed from above – Kerry’s. The petite woman took the steps in surprisingly long strides. “No offence Alicia, but I’ve seen how accident-prone you are. I don’t think you should do this alone.”
“Neither do I,” Faye said, pushing her glasses up on the bridge of her nose. “If I lose another events coordinator, I’ll have a dozen panicking brides calling here day and night.”
They swept outside together, with Alicia leading the way. Her sandals’ modest heels sank into the soft lawn, causing her to step awkwardly, no doubt reinforcing Kerry’s past observations about her clumsiness. When they rounded the house, Alicia stood for a moment, arms crossed, as her gaze was drawn to the stream bank. Even from a distance, she felt compelled to keep an eye on Brutus.
She cleared her throat as the dog trotted across the lawn, oblivious to their presence. It was brown and white with ears that flopped every time it took a step. Some sort of terrier mix, maybe?
“Here, boy!” she called, feeling a little self-conscious as she realized that her only plan was to call to the dog and hope that it would listen. Whenever she’d first caught sight of the animal endangering itself, she’d just sort of panicked.
The dog froze in its tracks, and its floppy ears perked up as it swiveled its head in Alicia’s direction.
“Here!” she called again.
It worked. The dog bounded toward them, and was soon sniffing Alicia’s ankles, its tail whipping furiously back and forth.
“Thank God,” she breathed, kneeling to scratch the creature between its ears.
“He’s cute!” Faye said, standing with her hands on her hips. “Who does he belong to?”
“We don’t know,” Kerry said. “Like I told Alicia, none of this week’s guests brought pets.”
“Maybe he’s a stray,” Alicia said. The dog had apparently passed judgment on her already – it climbed into her lap, w
riggling with the effort and planting dirty paw prints on her khaki pants.
“No collar,” Faye said. “And he does look a little thin. Why don’t you see if Sasha has any kitchen scraps to spare?”
Alicia nodded and stood, holding the dog against her chest. It seemed happy to be there, and although she felt a little ridiculous as she glanced down at her dirty clothing, she didn’t dare put him down. Not so close to Brutus, anyway. “Okay.”
When she reached the restaurant, Sasha was happy to contribute a handful of meat and vegetable scraps. The dog wolfed them down like it hadn’t eaten in a week. She couldn’t tell if that meant anything – so far as she knew, dogs always ate like they were half-starved.
“What are you going to do with him?” Sasha asked.
Alicia watched as her rescue sniffed around the back of the restaurant, honing in on a trash can he was way too small to access. “I guess I did say I was thinking about getting a dog. Maybe this is fate. I can’t just turn him over to an animal shelter after rescuing him from an alligator, can I?”
* * * * *
The prison bus was hot as hellfire, a metal shell stuffed full of men in chains, sweating like pigs. Troy tried not to breathe too deeply as sweat ran down the ridge of his nose, dripped off the end and fell onto his jumpsuit.
He hated this part more than he hated being kept penned up in a cell. Looking out on the world, all but pressing his nose up against the glass pane that was all that lay between him and freedom, was about fucking unbearable. There were bars over the glass, of course, but that wasn’t the point.
It wasn’t right to do that to a man – show him the free world, a world he’d never walk through again, and force him to just sit there and watch it pass by. It’d almost be worth the bite of a bullet between his shoulder blades to taste that freedom for just half a second.
The Carolina country swept by in a blur of gold and green, high grasses, pines and cypress trees. This close to the border, it was just like South Carolina. Just like home, except the ocean was closer. Troy could smell the salt on the wind as air streamed in from the driver’s cracked window at the front of the bus. It’d probably be the last time he ever caught scent of the water; all he’d be smelling for the rest of his life would be the stench of other men.
He knew they were close to the prison when a mechanical pop and an accompanying groan came from the front of the bus; he could see Riley on the horizon, a big square shape rising up from the flat earth. No mountains this close to the water, just flat land and trees that could stand the heat.
The bus groaned again, louder this time, with a sound like tearing metal. Maybe it couldn’t stand the heat, or the endless miles put on it, shuttling prisoners from jail to prison. Troy didn’t give much of a fuck, only had thoughts for the sense of opportunity rearing up inside him, sharp and demanding.
It was like a sign from heaven when the bus rolled to a halt and the officer driving said ‘fuck’.
That was all Troy needed to hear. The bus was broken – they never would’ve stopped along the road like this otherwise. He turned in his seat, just enough to catch his brother’s eye.
Nothing was said, didn’t need to be said. Troy turned back around as the noise of a radio came from the front of the bus, then more swearing.
He needed kindling if he was going to start a fire. Luckily, there was always plenty of it wherever you forced people to be locked up together like animals.
He’d already taken mental inventory of the prisoners on the bus, knew the seats were filled with eight white men, four black. He also knew what people saw when they looked at him: a redneck with a hick accent and jailhouse tattoos, white trash to the bone. South Carolina backwoods born and bred, prejudice written into his genetic code.
He opened his mouth and said something guaranteed to inflame the crowd filling the seats, pitting the men against each other.
It worked like a charm. Everyone was miserable on that bus, spoiling for a fight because fighting was a distraction, a rush – and rushes were few and far between when you were living your life in shackles. Men twisted in their seats, chains clinking, eyes flashing, mouths running. In no time at all, the uproar coming from the seats had drowned out the noise of the bus’s hissing engine.
A man rose from his seat. Big black guy, wanted to snap Troy’s neck for what he’d said, by the look of it. Didn’t make it far, of course. The second CO – the one who wasn’t busy cussing up a storm over the broken down bus – rushed to him, knuckles white against the stock of his rifle, told him to get back in his seat.
Just like that, both guards were distracted up near the front of the bus. There wasn’t a single mouth on that vehicle that wasn’t running, and no one heard Troy’s chains rattling as he began to twist, trying his damndest to shimmy the chain looped around his waist down over his body.
He’d never been big, had spent his childhood as a little slip of nothing, in possession of just enough flesh and bone to be beaten black and blue on a regular basis. Now, he was taller, but years in and out of jail and prison, eating the slop they called food, had kept him slim. What muscle he had was roped to his bone, lean and flat. It was fucked up that that should save him, in the end, but it did – the chain came down, and he slipped it over his feet.
His hands were still cuffed in front of his body and his ankles were still connected by a chain, but damn, he felt almost free already. The ankle bonds would be a pain in the ass, but he’d be able to run with ‘em on, so long as he took care not to fall. His heart swelled with the taste of victory, sending each heartbeat slamming through him, painful with urgency. He heard his brother moving his chains behind him, knew they were both on the same track.
“Got somethin’ for ya, little brother.” He felt the hot rush of Randy’s breath against his ear, smelled the stink of prison food and mild decay on his breath. Twisting in his seat, he met his brother’s eyes.
Randy slapped something against his hand.
Goddamn. At the feel of the metal against his palm, his heart slammed against his ribs. “Where the hell did you get this?”
Randy raised his brows. “Been savin’ it for a special occasion. The fuck do you care. Just use it.”
Troy didn’t waste any time. Ducking down, he used the cuff key to unlock the shackles on his ankles, eyes going wide as he watched the chains fall away.
There was no undoing his handcuffs for now – the black box they’d been secured with prevented it – but he’d worry about that later. For now, he could run easily, and he had a weapon: the chain he’d unlooped from around his waist.
“Let’s go,” Randy said.
Troy popped the cuff key into his mouth and slipped it under his tongue. He could use it later to undo the cuffs, once he got the black box off.
They ran like bats outta hell, charging down the bus aisle. As they shoved past the officer arguing with the prisoner, Troy swung that chain, whipped the CO across the face as hard as he could.
The guy went down, swearing and bleeding, as Troy and Randy rushed past.
The second officer turned and saw what was going on just as Troy pushed past him, toward the bus door and freedom. “Hey!”
He reached for his gun, face twisted up in anger.
Before Troy could so much as blink, Randy had his chain around the guy’s neck, right above the collar of his uniform shirt. He pulled, twisted. The CO’s eyes bulged like a fish’s, and his face turned purple.
The other officer couldn’t get to him. None of the prisoners on the bus gave a flying fuck about what Troy had said anymore; they were trying to get free, too. The big guy the CO had been arguing with was out of his seat again and wrestling with the officer. A skinny white guy tried to jump on the CO’s back and bounced off only to have his face kicked in, stained with dirt from the officer’s boot heel.
Troy pulled a lever, grunted, fled the bus.
Randy was on his heels, leaving the driver crumpled in the aisle.
Their chains rattled as they fl
ed, sprinting through knee-high grass like they hadn’t run in a year – which they hadn’t.
“We’ll meet at the blind,” Randy said, panting already, face shining with sweat.
“The blind,” Troy agreed, his speech slurred by the key in his mouth. “Fuck yeah, we will.”
They took off in opposite directions without another word. They’d be harder to follow that way, harder to catch. They’d been operating this way for years, knew fear was what kept people together when splitting up made more sense. Going their separate ways had saved them many a beating throughout their lives; their old man had always had to choose one to chase down.
The sun beat down on Troy as he ran alone, lungs on fire already. His muscles ached and sweat stung his eyes, but it was the sting of freedom, and he’d never felt anything better.
* * * * *
Despite a day spent fielding calls from a bride so egotistical she deserved her own reality TV show, Alicia was feeling optimistic. So optimistic, in fact, that she threw all her work clothes in a pile, stripping down to her birthday suit. It was Wednesday – the day she and Liam had agreed upon for their trip to Wilmington. The occasion warranted not just a change of clothing, but a change of lingerie.
She’d gotten home ten minutes ago and had banned herself from the kitchen, refusing to allow herself to spy on Liam’s after-work shower. The last thing she needed was to get herself so hot and bothered that he mistook her body-blush for a sunburn again.
“Holden, stop that!” she said, twisting and nearly tripping as she stepped into a pair of lacy panties. She winced as she eyed the dresser she would’ve toppled face-first into – that would’ve been more embarrassing to explain than a faux-sunburn – and yanked her underwear up. “Give those here!”
The little brown and white dog she’d brought home from work had the cotton panties she’d just peeled off in his mouth. He wagged his tail, then leapt out of reach as she tried to take them back. She scrambled after him and managed to grab ahold of his brand new collar just as he raced for the stairs.