Zane (Alluring Indulgence)

by Nicole Edwards

  “And what makes you think you’re qualified to run the spa?” he asked, sounding slightly perturbed. Not that he ever sounded any different.

  “I don’t have the experience, but I have the desire to learn,” V stated defensively. “I promise you by the time the doors open on the resort, I’ll be fully up to speed on what it takes to make it successful.”

  There was no hiding the fact that she was nervous, nor could she hide the vexation she was beginning to feel.

  “How do you plan to do that?” Travis leaned back farther in his chair, tilting his head to the side as though he were studying her.

  “I –” Ok, so she hadn’t thought that completely through, but in her defense, V hadn’t anticipated coming to talk to Travis so soon.

  “Give her a break, Trav,” Zane interrupted, leaning forward and placing his elbows on his knees, his shoulders stiff, the cords in his neck straining as he stared back at his brother. “You know her as well as I do. She’ll make you proud. V’s a hard worker, anyone can tell you that.”

  V’s breath lodged in her chest as she stared at the man sitting beside her. Proud? Had he really just said that? Never in her life had anyone rooted for her – no one besides Zoey of course – and V had gotten used to going it alone. Hell, she worked for Zoey because it was easier than trying to make a name for herself. Not that she gave her job less than one hundred percent at any given time, but she hadn’t expected Zane to be in her corner on this one.

  “Ok, say I let her manage the spa and you the club. How do you plan to work together?” Travis asked, directing his question to Zane. “I heard what happened at Anderson Croft’s and look where that got you.”

  V sat up straight, feeling entirely too defensive at the moment. How dare Travis talk to Zane like that? The man stood up for her, when remarkably few people ever had. Granted, it also resulted in him damn near getting killed at the hands of a lunatic, but still...

  Oh, God. What would happen if V encountered another asshole like Jake Sanders? Would Zane go off the deep end every time? Maybe Travis was right. Maybe this wasn’t a smart idea.

  “It’ll work, Trav. You have to trust me on this,” Zane argued, and V could sense the tension escalating.

  Placing her hand on his arm, Zane glanced over at her, and she felt the way his muscles abruptly relaxed. That was interesting. Did she do that to him? Was she capable of calming him down rather than riling him up?

  “I don’t know if I’m onboard with the idea,” Travis began, but Zane unexpectedly reacted by shooting to his feet. V managed to grab his arm and pull him back down, although she knew he was giving in to her because there was no way she could’ve made the man do anything he didn’t want to do.

  When she looked back at Travis, he was grinning.

  “Let’s give it a shot,” Travis concluded, pushing to his feet. “I think this woman might just be the one who can keep that anger in check.”

  V wasn’t sure about all of that, but she couldn’t get over the fact that Travis had just given them the green light. Both of them. She wanted to jump to her feet and throw her arms around his neck, but she knew better than to do that. Travis wasn’t big on being touched. Not that she knew the reason, but she was smart enough to know not to push him.

  “Thank you,” she said, sounding much more confident than she felt. “I promise, I won’t let you down.”

  “I never had any doubts about that,” Travis tipped his hat and then walked out of the office. Moments later V heard his truck start up, and she turned to look at Zane. He wasn’t smiling.

  “What’s wrong?” V turned to face Zane directly, curious as to what he could possibly be thinking.

  “If I didn’t think one of my brothers would show up, I’d strip you naked and fuck you right here on Travis’ desk,” he said, that smoldering look in his smoky blue eyes reinforcing his statement.

  V needed to get away from him. At least for a little while. If she didn’t, she feared she might just do something stupid.

  Like take him up on his offer.

  Chapter Nine

  ♂♀

  After dropping V off at Zoey’s per her request, Zane called Beau. He needed to find a way to burn off the excess energy he’d stored up thanks to the anger he continued to rein in and he couldn’t think of a better way to do it than to go to the gym. Now he was on his way to meet him, and, hopefully, work on a plan to get his body back in top form.

  He still felt weak, sometimes more than he thought he should. The physical therapist’s words still rang loud and clear in his brain, but Zane doubted that taking it slow was going to get him where he needed to be. Three months were plenty of time for his body to recover from the dreadful punishment it had been dealt, and now it was time he proved it.

  Walking into the small gym, Zane nodded his head in greeting at the few people he recognized, not stopping to talk to anyone though. He found Beau warming up on one of the treadmills and Zane jumped on the empty one beside him.

  “You think you can handle that bad boy?” Beau joked as he increased the speed until he was jogging at a slow pace, making Zane laugh.

  “I think I’ll manage.” Zane walked for a couple of minutes, not wanting to overdo it in the first few minutes, but he was soon setting a reasonable six miles per hour pace. Not nearly what he’d been capable of before the attack, but he had told his mother he’d take baby steps.

  Half an hour later, Zane felt better than he had in a long time. He slowed his pace until he was once again walking, as he waited for Beau to finish up. When he did, they moved to the back near the free weights.

  “How’s it feel to be out?” Beau asked, dropping onto one of the benches, wiping the sweat from his neck with a towel.

  “I can’t even begin to describe it,” Zane replied, grabbing a couple of the weights from the rack and turning to face the mirror. The amount of weight the PT had allowed him to lift was child's play, but since he hadn’t picked up anything relative in recent months, he was beginning to wonder how much pain he was going to put himself in.

  “You see V lately?” Beau moved to his side, grabbing a set of weights that was significantly more than Zane had picked up.

  “Yeah.” Zane thought about V and how she looked just that morning in his shower. He’d definitely seen her all right. Every single inch of her. “Why didn’t you tell me that bastard was texting her?” he asked his friend when the vision disappeared.

  Beau’s head snapped over so he was looking directly at Zane, a confused look on his face. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  Zane spared his friend a glance in the mirror, but he didn’t stop his repetitions. “Jake,” he answered, figuring Beau would drop the act if he realized Zane already knew what was going on.

  Beau set the weights back in the rack and turned to face Zane. “Jake’s been texting her?”

  Zane knew Beau well enough that he recognized his friend wasn’t bullshitting him. Zane had known Beau Bennett his entire life. They’d grown up together, and they knew every last secret each other had. It was clear Beau had no idea what he was talking about. Zane dropped the weights back into the rack and grabbed the water bottle he’d brought with him. Taking a swig, he kept his eyes on Beau. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he sighed. “The fucker’s been texting and calling her. Don’t think he was all too happy to hear from me last night though.”

  “You talked to him?” Beau asked incredulously.

  “Not much, but yeah. I dialed the number he was texting her from. He answered, and I told him to leave her the fuck alone.”

  “Does Travis know where he’s at yet?”

  Zane and Beau spent hours talking about what happened while Zane was in the hospital. Beau had been at Anderson Croft’s that day and he saw the whole thing play out, but according to him, he hadn’t known about the assault for a couple of days after it happened. At some point, Zane’s mother had called him.

  “If he does, he’s not telling me.” Zane had no idea w
hether Travis knew where Jake was. It wasn’t likely that he did because Zane knew his brother. Travis wasn’t keen on forgiving and forgetting and as far as Zane was concerned, Jake had likely signed his own death warrant for what he’d done. At least as far as Travis was concerned. Of all his brothers, Travis and Zane were the ones with the explosive tempers. Somewhere along the way, Travis had learned to keep his under wraps, but Zane was still working on it.

  “Why the hell didn’t she tell me?” Zane knew Beau’s question was rhetorical.

  While he’d been confined to the hospital, Beau had taken to watching out for V. Considering what had transpired between the three of them – twice – just a week before Zane was attacked, he’d initially wondered whether that was a good idea or not. But, other than his brothers and his parents, there wasn’t another person Zane trusted more than Beau.

  Based on what Beau had told him, V wasn’t happy about him hanging around, but she’d gotten used to it. Especially after Beau refused to go away.

  “Did you know she was having panic attacks?” Zane figured he’d go for broke. This time Beau looked away, breaking eye contact, which was a telling sign.

  “I didn’t know exactly what it was. I followed her home one night from Moonshiners. I noticed she sat in her car for an unusually long time, so I got out and checked on her. She was shaking, pale, and gripping the steering wheel for all she was worth. It took me a while to coax her into the house, but once I did, she seemed to calm down. You know V, she wouldn’t talk to me about it.”

  Having known wouldn’t have made a difference, Zane knew, but he still hated that she’d been going through this alone. Everyone had been so focused on his recovery, and it pained him to know that V had been left behind. She’d endured just as much that day. Maybe not the broken bones, or the cracked ribs, or the head trauma, but the emotional effect was just as devastating. If not more so.

  Looking at his best friend now, Zane wished like hell the man had been around the day he’d been attacked. Zane was a big man and before the attack he’d been even bigger, but Beau Bennett almost made him look small in comparison. At six-foot-six-inches, Beau had been their claim to fame in high school. He’d been the star quarterback, and up until their senior year, everyone thought Beau would be in the NFL one day.

  An unfortunate car accident ended that dream after Beau’s throwing arm was crushed. The doctors managed to repair it, using metal plates and screws, but Beau had never been able to throw the same after that.

  “Mother fucker.”

  Zane smiled. Beau was just as temperamental as Zane, but it was almost comical to hear him curse. He was a good ol’ boy in every sense of the word. The girls referred to him as an oversized teddy bear, but Zane never understood that one. There wasn’t a damn thing soft or cuddly about Beau.

  Zane dropped to the bench and laid back while Beau instinctively moved over to spot him. “Why don’t you stop by my house tonight?” he asked his friend as he lifted the weight from the rack and down onto his chest.

  Focusing on his set, Zane didn’t expect Beau to answer until he was finished, and that didn’t take long. Damn his body. He knew it was going to take some time to get back to his former strength, but shit, he hated how weak he was.

  Rather than making it worse, Zane waved Beau off rather than starting another set. He stood up, grabbed his water bottle and his towel before turning back to Beau. “What do you say?”

  “Sure.” Beau smiled. “I’ll stop by.”

  Zane knew Beau didn’t need further clarification. Ever since the last time, he knew Beau had been looking forward to the next invite, and although he didn’t say that V would be there, it was clear.

  “I’ll see you later then.” There was no way he’d be able to do much more and Beau probably had another hour or two on the weights.

  “See ya.”

  Zane almost laughed at the broad grin that split Beau’s face. The man was something else. But hell, Zane couldn’t blame him. Thinking about V put that same smile on his own face. Every damn time.

  Zane decided to stop by to see his mother before he went home. He’d texted V, and he learned that she and Zoey headed into Austin for the day, taking advantage of having the day off. He didn’t question her. He simply told her to let him know when she was back.

  “Hey, Dad,” Zane greeted his father when he walked in the back door. Curtis Walker was sitting at the kitchen table, a laptop and a cup of coffee in front of him.

  He didn’t get a formal response, just a wave in the direction of the living room and a grunt. Zane laughed as he made his way past him, slapping him on the back as he did. “Good to see you too.”

  Zane found his mother sitting in the living room on the couch, an e-reader in her hand.

  “Mama.” He tried not to scare her, so he kept his voice low, but she jumped anyway.

  Then she dropped her e-reader and flew up off of the couch, throwing her thin arms around him. His mother was the touchy feely type, unlike the men in the family. She was always hugging and kissing them, and being the good sons they were, not a single one of them gave her shit about it. She complained that she had to spend the last fifty years being the only source of estrogen in the house, and she insisted that she be granted that one reprieve.

  “You’re sweaty,” she scolded him, taking a step back, but cupping his face with both of her small hands. Zane looked down, meeting those sparkling blue eyes and waiting for her to let go. No one rushed Lorrie Walker.

  “Just came from the gym,” he told her, then thought better of it.

  “Did your doctor release you to go to the gym?” she questioned, sounding just like she did when he was a kid and he did something he knew he wasn’t supposed to. Before he could answer, she backed away, sitting back down and patting the couch cushion.

  Zane dropped down beside her, leaned back and propped his feet on the coffee table. That was one of the reprieves the men in the house had earned. They didn’t give her crap about the hugs and kisses, and she didn’t say anything about their feet on the furniture. Although, she’d probably given up on that all on her own.

  “They released me from the hospital. That’s all the permission I need.” Zane had talked to his mother twice since he’d been home, both times by phone and she’d begged him to take it easy. He promised her, as much as he could promise anyone that he would try.

  “How’s Vanessa?” Lorrie asked.

  “Good, why?”

  “Just worried about her.”

  His mother’s comment got his attention, and he turned to look at her, still resting his head against the back of the couch. “Why’s that?”

  “Zoey seems really worried about her,” Lorrie replied, glancing down at the floor. That was an obvious partial truth and Zane sat up, turning to face his mother.

  “What’s going on?”

  His mother sighed dramatically and then met his gaze. “Kaleb told your dad about the phone calls and texts she’s been getting from that Jake person. I don’t know what I’m going to do about you boys.”

  Zane bit back the urge to curse. That was one thing his mother didn’t approve of and all eight of them, his father included, had a hard time controlling themselves from time to time. He wasn’t interested in being scolded, so he didn’t say anything until the anger passed.

  “What’s Dad doing?” Zane knew there was a reason his father was on the computer. His father wasn’t fond of technology. At least nothing past his beloved television and satellite. The man didn’t even have a smart phone because he said there was no need. If anyone wanted to talk to him, then they would call his basic, easy-to-use, cell phone.

  “He’s been emailing back and forth with Sheriff Endsley.”

  “Shit.” Zane couldn’t keep that one in if he had to.

  “Zane Michael Walker.” His mother’s stern tone and the way she used his full name made him laugh.

  Standing up with every intention of going to speak to his father about what he was doing getting th
e sheriff involved, his plan was smoothly thwarted when his mother pulled him back down to the couch. Relenting, he dropped back down, huffing his defeat in the process.

  “Why is he talking to him?”

  The last thing Zane needed was for the law to be breathing down their necks. He’d just gotten out of the hospital, and as far as he knew no one had seen or heard from Jake, aside from Zane’s brief phone call with the man the night before.

  Zane didn’t want the law involved with this. Hell, he didn’t even want his brothers involved, and now his father had gone off and invited the damn sheriff into their business.

  “Everyone’s worried about her,” Lorrie stated, her face lined with concern. “And you.”

  “I can take care of myself, Mom,” Zane answered a little more carelessly than he intended.

  “Honey, we don’t want anything to happen to you.”

  He understood that. He really, truly did. Zane was well aware of the hell his entire family went through when he was attacked. He knew they were all trying to make sure he didn’t end up dead somewhere because of Jake and his homicidal tendencies. “Mom, I’ve got it handled. Please don’t let Dad get involved.”

  “Too late for that, boy,” Curtis’ voice boomed through the living room, and Zane closed his eyes and dropped his head. This was the last thing he needed.

  Just when Zane was going to chastise his father for getting involved, the screen door opened and then slammed shut, and Zane turned around to see Travis storming through the kitchen.

  “What the hell is going on?” Travis barked the question and Zane had no idea who he was talking to. From the look on his mother’s face, she didn’t either. Surprisingly enough, his father looked sheepish, but true to form, he crossed his arms over his chest and stood up straight. At six-foot-five-inches, he was a formidable man, even at sixty seven.

  From the look on Travis’ face, he didn’t care much for whatever their father had to say.

  “I’ve got the fu – uh... the damn sheriff breathing down my neck. What did you do?”