Chest heaving, she looked up at him with big, determined eyes. She drank in the pity in his gaze, his sorrow at her utter weakness, all the while hearing Hope’s voice in her head.
“You know he was there that night, right?”
Baring her teeth, boxing gloves primed next to her head, she zeroed in on Linc and threw another punch.
He didn’t even wobble. “Harder.”
Veda groaned from the deepest bit of her stomach. She struck him again, right in his six-pack abs.
He sighed. “Harder.”
She pressed her lips together, frowning at the drawstring of his black sweatpants. They hung low on his hips.
“He was with Todd and Eugene all night.”
She felt the beginnings of tears prickling her eyes. Before they had a chance to redden them or make them water, Veda took Hope’s words and put every inch of the unease and anger they sent flying into her heart into her glove instead.
When she hit Linc that time, his scarred eyebrow jumped. “Better.”
That approval drove Veda, and she felt her body elevating to another place. She struck him over and over. A few of her punches actually forced him to plant his feet and her heart beat with excitement, turning her grunts to enthralled pants.
Then Jax Murphy entered her mind, his words joining Hope’s in the nightmarish swirl of voices that never seemed to leave her head.
“How do you find the stomach to date Gage Blackwater?”
Veda paused just long enough to take a deep breath before rearing back and hitting Linc’s lower abs as hard as she could. The deep V at his hips flexed.
“Yes,” he said, holding his hands out for more.
So Veda gave him more. She gave him all she had. Every shot of pain, every boom of retreat, and every shred of denial that flew through her brain as the voices in her head threatened to drive her mad.
When Linc actually stepped away, it lit a fire under her. She followed, realizing that now his gloved fists were raised, primed for battle next to his head.
“A’ight,” he said, bobbing and weaving around the ring, apparently having had enough of her abuse, especially since she appeared to be growing stronger by the minute.
“Where you going?” she taunted, bouncing around the ring while throwing a few jabs through the air. “I’m only getting started, baby.” And the voices in my head are too. “Why you running? Don’t tell me I’ve already scared you away. Not laughing so hard now, huh?”
“Don’t get too cocky on me.”
“Are you scared, Linc?” She poked her lips out and lowered her voice as if she were talking to an infant. “Is the wittle baby scared?”
“Okay.” He smiled.
Veda hated the condescending grin on his face. “Come at me!”
He seemed to realize that, by inviting Veda into that ring and teaching her a few basic moves, he’d created a monster. He couldn’t even be angry at her because he’d done it to himself.
Smirking, he flinched at her as if in the midst of throwing a punch.
She jolted and stumbled back, rolling her eyes at the soft laugh that escaped his lips, both irritated at the fake-out, and enamored with the rare sound of his laughter.
He reached out his long arm and playfully swatted the side of her head, making her stumble sideways and struggle to find her footing. Chuckling under his breath, he waited until she was steady and threw his arm out again, bopping her head from the other side.
Veda’s arms flew in an attempt to shove his arms away, but she was too slow, missing him every time. “Stop it!”
He backed away, licking his grinning lips. He waited for her to prime her fists again before he extended his glove toward her in a punching motion. “You rotate your wrist like a corkscrew when you hit. It’s a good technique if you want more power, but an impediment for someone who moves as slowly as you.”
“Screw you.”
His smirk grew. “Vertical punches require less strength, but you’ll still have the power of the elbow behind the fist.” He motioned for her to come closer. “Try it.”
Veda did, throwing a punch through the air without rotating her wrist.
He nodded. “Feel the difference?”
She nodded as well, back to bouncing on her toes.
Linc stopped bouncing completely, removing one of his gloves, reaching out between them, and taking hold of her arm. He tugged her forward, making her trip over her sneakers.
“Hey!” she cried, barely finding her footing.
“That fucking asshole who had your arm like this?” He raised his eyebrows down at her, both their chests heaving from the time they’d spent boxing. “It’s a coward’s hold, and the world has no shortage of cowards. Every woman should know how to get out of a hold like this.”
Veda stopped bouncing, swallowing back the lump that rose in her throat as she searched his green eyes.
“You’re gonna be embarrassed how easy this is….” He trailed off, lowering his eyes to her forearm and tightening his fingers around it, appearing lost in his own world for a moment before slowly reclaiming her eyes. “Your skin is really soft.”
Her eyes widened, his callused fingers somehow feeling even rougher the moment he said those words.
He cleared his throat, letting his gaze fall back to her arm. He squeezed it. “When a man grabs you like this, it’s all about the weakness of the thumb.”
Veda nodded.
“The thumb will guarantee an easy escape every time. So when a man has you by the arm and he’s pulling you, all you gotta do to get out is yank your hand upward, in the direction of that thumb, while moving your elbow into his chest at the same time. Try it.”
She ripped her arm out, gasping at how easily it came out of Linc’s grip. He’d been holding her so tightly that she’d been fairly positive there was no way out. She gasped when she’d freed herself.
“See?” He smiled softly at the stunned look on her face. “And now that you’re out, you can take that elbow and shove it into his stomach, or even his balls if he’s still coming at you. Quick way to immobilize any man.”
You have no idea. She smiled at her thoughts.
He took her arm a few more times, in various different parts, with different levels of strength behind his hold, just to prove it worked every time.
“Wow,” she said, looking at her arm like it was a brand new, undiscovered limb of her body. “Thanks, Linc.” She smiled up at him.
He was in the midst of smiling back, but a female voice rang in from outside the ring and wiped the smile clear off his face. He threw his gaze toward the sound and cursed under his breath.
Linc’s ignore game was expert level, so Veda knew he recognized the voice; otherwise, he wouldn’t have looked. When his eyes didn’t just look but flew in the direction of that female voice, she couldn’t help following his gaze.
A tiny woman with shoulder-length dirty blonde hair, eaten alive by split ends, deep wrinkles next to her eyes, thin lips, and a random twitch to her brow—which jumped in every few seconds—approached the boxing ring. Her jeans appeared to be a size double zero but still hung from her hips too loosely. Even though she was skinny enough that a soft breeze could blow her away, she was also toned, her slim arms muscular like a weightlifter’s.
“Mom,” Linc started, his voice slightly exasperated. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Veda’s eyes exploded.
Mom?
Even though she knew he had one, Veda had never fully attached a mother figure to the giant, moody, temperamental man before her. Probably because most men who had moms were rarely as on edge as Linc.
He left her and began toward the bright red ropes that surrounded the ring.
Veda followed with a huge smile on her face.
“Linc has a mom?” She broke into a skip and pushed past Linc, beating him to the tiny woman. Of course she knew he had a mom—one whose sober chip hadn’t left her pocket in ten years—but Veda couldn’t let either of them know that.
She snuck her head under the ropes, giving all her weight to the rope in the middle while offering her hand. “I’m Linc’s friend, Veda.”
“Linc has friends?” His mom beamed, sharing a laugh with Veda as she accepted her outstretched hand, giving it a shake. “I’m Grace Hill.”
“You are so little,” Veda cried, distantly hearing Linc’s groan—what sounded like a toss-up between pain and annoyance—as he bent down, climbed through the ropes, and hopped to the floor. He towered over Grace like a gorilla next to a house mouse. “It’s always so adorable to see tiny women standing next to their gargantuan sons.”
Grace’s brown eyes went alight as she laughed, all while taking Veda in. She released Veda’s hand when Linc took hold of her arm, in much the same way he’d taken Veda’s just a moment earlier. Grace looked down at the hold he had on her arm and up into his eyes as if he’d lost his damn mind.
Unmoved, he pulled her away.
“Hold on now. Is that her, babe?” his mom asked, lowering her voice but still speaking loudly enough for Veda to hear everything as Linc guided her back toward the door.
Grace smiled over her shoulder at Veda as Linc removed them from each other’s vicinity as quickly as his legs would allow. Grace’s beaming grin grew so wide that it made her mouth fall all the way open, her eyes gleaming with excitement as they ran over Veda’s body.
Veda stood tall behind the ropes, thinking Grace couldn’t be an inch over four foot nine. Probably a hundred pounds soaking wet. How a woman that small had created a man that huge was mind-boggling to her.
Still sharing secret smiles with Grace across the room, Veda took hold of the ropes and bent backward, giving the rope all her weight, deciding to give the two of them some alone time since Linc looked a little rattled by Grace’s appearance.
Grace snuck looks at Veda in the midst of a whispered conversation with Linc, only giving him all of her attention when he appeared to say something she didn’t like. They had a hushed verbal tussle, which Veda found all the more adorable. Soon Linc’s shoulders sagged, and he looked like he’d been reduced from a towering six-foot-five to about two inches tall.
“A’ight,” he said through clenched teeth, voice rising loudly enough to carry across the room.
Drinking in her victory, Grace took a deep breath, let her motherly gaze linger on Linc for another moment, and then looked past his broad shoulder and locked eyes with Veda. Her beaming smile returned. She waved.
Linc glared at Veda over his shoulder.
“Nice to meet you,” Grace called.
Veda raised a hand in good-bye with a smile, only bending over the ropes to leave the ring when Grace had exited the boxing room altogether, peeking at Veda the whole way out.
“Oh my God,” Veda said, approaching Linc where he was in the process of getting his duffle bag together in the corner. “If she’s not the most adorable thing I have ever seen. She’s so tiny. I just want to put her in my pocket like a shiny new penny.”
Linc laughed in his chest, but it didn’t make it to his lips as he slung his duffle bag over his big shoulder. “I gotta go. I forgot I made plans with her this afternoon.”
She crossed her arms, leaning on the wall. “Anything fun?”
He hesitated, taking a moment to search her eyes, as if contemplating whether he should answer. “If an AA meeting is your idea of fun, yeah, it’ll be a barrel of laughs.”
Veda’s eyebrows rose. She wanted to delve deeper, but knowing Linc, just saying that sentence out loud was as deep as he’d be delving today. She’d learned long ago to take the little shreds of information he accidentally indulged about himself with great patience and care. She was sure, in about a decade, she’d finally know enough about him to write a short paragraph.
“Well… thanks for teaching me how to kick somebody’s ass today,” she said.
“I think we’re far from anybody’s ass getting kicked. But you’re welcome for the basic survival skills most women learn by age five.” He turned to leave, giving her a soft smirk to show he was joking. Turning his back completely, he made his way toward the door, sneaking another glance over his shoulder. “I’ll see you later, a’ight?”
She watched him retreat, then nearly jumped out of her skin. “Wait!”
He froze, turning his body halfway toward her, raising his brows.
Veda leapt for her duffle bag and ripped it open, shuffling through it for only a moment before finding what she was looking for. She stood tall and closed the space between them, holding it in the air.
His eyes softened and his full lips fell open at the sight of the white keycard she held between her fingers. His face sobered completely as she came within arm’s length and he held her gaze, green eyes more vulnerable than she’d ever seen them. For a moment, he didn’t move. Then he reached up and encased her hand with his. His thick fingers nearly swallowed her hand whole, his warm touch lingering on the back. The callused ridges on the pads of his fingers scratched her skin softly as he dragged them up, drawing a slow path toward the card. He retrieved it, eyes never leaving hers.
Hesitating, his gaze fell to the card. He played it between his fingers for several moments before raising it in the air. Lifting his eyes back up to hers, he shook the card. “This means a lot to me.”
Veda felt her eyes expanding. She came to her toes. “No big deal.”
He searched her gaze. “I won’t forget it.”
“Forget it,” she insisted, lifting a casual shoulder.
He slipped the card in the pocket of his sweats. His chest rose and fell a little faster. The deep lines of his abs and pecs clenched a little tighter. “I haven’t forgotten about those prototype names, either.”
Even as his breathing continued to pick up, Veda’s came to a rapid halt.
He hadn’t forgotten about the names, but for some small moment in time, she had.
And now that he’d brought it up, she felt her world crashing in all around her once more.
“Been focused on The Chopper. Hands been a little full,” he continued, appearing taken aback by the rapid change in her demeanor. “But I didn’t forget you.” His eyes fell to her lips, watching as she pressed them together into a hard line. “A’ight?”
Clamping her lips tighter, she nodded.
He stepped toward the door, all while keeping half of his body angled toward her. He hesitated in mid-step, held her eyes, and then finally turned away, moving to the door and pulling it open. He snuck one last look over her shoulder before leaving the room.
The door swung closed and Veda sucked in the breath she’d been holding. Her eyes singed with the tears she’d been fighting back.
The names.
She’d forgotten all about the names.
And for the first time since she’d asked Linc to look into them for her, she realized she almost didn’t want to know the full names of the six men who’d purchased the sneakers her number ten had been sporting the night she’d been attacked.
She almost didn’t want to know who her number ten was at all.
She sucked in a breath.
Almost.
22
A week later, Veda decided that maybe she did.
She did want to know the names.
If only to keep the hope alive.
The hope that his wasn’t one of them.
“You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known,” Gage whispered, his loving words drowned out by the music of their skin slapping together, filling the master bedroom of his mansion. The bedsheets and duvet had been uprooted and rumpled by the passion of their lovemaking, exposing the mattress below. Their sweaty bodies writhed atop the plush softness of the bedding, which they’d climbed out from under when the heat of their joining became too much to bear.
Veda found it difficult to complete a deep breath facedown, lips and nose buried in the tousled duvet. Her strangled gasps came harder, faster, more desperate with each moment his hardness pounded her slick walls. But she didn’t care. She
powered through the shortness of breath. She bared every inch of his incredible weight from where he lay on top of her, buried as deep as he could go, his thrusts coming short and fast now that she’d already come twice.
She took each delicious strike of his hips with a whimper, tightening her grip around his fingers from where he’d clapped their hands together over her head. The soft hairs of his chest tickled her back, his lips warmed the crook of her neck, and his fingers tangled themselves in hers as the evidence of his own approaching orgasm made itself plain in the strangled moans teasing the skin of her neck.
“I can’t wait for you to be my wife, Veda,” he panted, laying every inch of his body on hers, having lost control of every bone but the one filling her to the hilt, utterly unable to hold himself up as he came. “God, you feel so fucking good.”
Veda lifted her face from the bed and craned her neck, meeting his eyes over her shoulder. She moaned into the instant kiss he sealed on her lips. He spread his mouth wide, letting her taste every scream that ripped from his throat as he shot his warmth inside her, his hips twitching uncontrollably, his fingertips digging tighter into her palms with each unconscious hit.
“Yes,” she cried, gasping into the warmth of his mouth and slicing her tongue desperately against his as his warm load filled her, letting the beautiful sensation spread across her glistening skin and help her forget.
But even as he filled her with his love, she couldn’t forget.
She still heard the words she’d been hearing all night, through two orgasms, through his whispered words of love, and even through his dick as he spilled inside her.
“He was there.”
She jammed her eyes shut, unaware that she’d bit down a little too hard on his bottom lip until he pulled his mouth away from hers with a hiss. Her eyes flew open and met his, still hooded with desire, still coming, shrinking with delight as he gave her a playful smile.
She drank in that smile with desperate eyes, still bouncing underneath his ardent pumps, hoping the sight would finally silence the voices.
It didn’t.
“He was with Todd and Eugene all night.”
Purr (Revenge Book 3) Page 16