by Shannyn Leah
“Patino, honestly.” His eyes shot up finding her watching him watch her. Busted.
Stone cleared his throat. “Your legs were wobbling.”
She rolled her eyes. “I bet. It’s nothing new that you haven’t seen before.” She didn’t shy away from his watchful eye, but he turned away when she bent down to pick up her jeans. The woman had no idea what her body did to his. She was a magnificent beauty. But only on the outside. He needed to commit that to memory.
When she finished dressing, he helped her unsteady steps up the hill and onto the four-wheeler. He climbed on behind her, nestling each leg snuggly on each side of her and reaching around her for the handlebars.
“I can sit on the back.”
“I don’t want you to fall off.”
She nodded, said nothing, but he felt her body ease against his.
Before he turned the key, he said, “And I’ve never gotten a blow to the head in the ring. Ever.”
HE DIDN’T WANT HER in his house. He didn’t want her on his property. Hell, he didn’t even want her in his town.
But his house, this house, which he’d gutted and rebuilt with his bare hands, had parts of their once planned future constructed into it. Including the three-season sun room, where he stood now, arms folded over his chest, eyes trained to the backyard, on nothing specific. He’d erected the gable roof above him and chosen the tempered glass panels he looked out now, all the while thinking about the woman he never thought he’d see again.
He was thankful now that he hadn’t hired the contractor to build the pond, rock paths and flower gardens around the gazebo in the backyard. Although the design she’d verbally mapped out was still imprinted in his head.
He left the sun room when a knock sounded at his front door. Dax walked in and wiped his black work boots on the front mat before stepping onto the hardwood floor Stone had laid piece by piece. He recognized the first aid kit Dax carried belonging to the shop. His friend wore his soiled pants and T-shirt work attire. He looked grumpy as hell at being disturbed, and Stone suspected Bowie being involved was the only reason.
He looked Stone up and down with a scowl. “Are you sure I’m not here for you?”
Stone was glad he’d struggled through the pain of putting a T-shirt on to hide the bruises from overworking his reps the last couple days. He didn’t need more flack from Dax when his dad was breathing down his back at the gym too. He didn’t have months to prepare for the upcoming fights. He had days.
Stone nodded at the swinging doors in the ranch style house. “She’s in the kitchen, icing where she hit her head when she fell out of a tree. She landed in the river behind my house.”
“Hmm...”
“She refuses to go see a doctor until she gets home.”
“Maybe you should send her home.”
“Just check her.”
“You can come with me. She’s already put a restraining order on you in the past and pressed multiple charges against you. I’m not setting myself up for drama I don’t need. I would’ve asked one of the girls from the fire station, but I didn’t want to put them in Bowie’s firing path.”
Stone only nodded and then led him through the swinging doors and into the kitchen. He couldn’t defend the woman standing at the sliding doors which walked out onto the sunroom.
How long had she been standing there? Had she been watching him struggle with her presence only minutes earlier?
He’d almost watched her die today. Had he not been there, she would’ve drowned in that river. The thought sat unsettled inside him. It scared the hell out of the parts of him that remembered her before the charges. But, as Dax pointed out, she’d pressed charges and filed a restraining order against him. She’d made it impossible for him to talk to her. And now she was back. For a favor. And he was putting his trust in her. His friends didn’t trust her, his dad didn’t trust her, hell, he didn’t trust her.
What had she been doing on his property? Was her visit actually about a fight?
He needed to set boundaries. Her showing up at his place was out of bounds. Now, every time he walked into his kitchen, he’d see her wearing his dry, oversized sweater and the sexy-as-hell way it fell off one shoulder. He’d see her touching the glass with her palm like she longed for something beyond the window, the sun room, their future.
She’d tainted his kitchen, just as her smell lingered down his hallway into his bathroom and where he’d sleep tonight. He’d lie in his bed and smell her, hear her, feel her. That was the last thing he needed. She’d invaded his space and he knew it would never be the same.
Boundaries were in order. This round he made the rules; he was in charge.
BOWIE ANSWERED DAX’S direct, brusque questions as he checked her over.
He checked her pupils. “Where are you?”
“At Stone’s house.”
His fingers moved down her spine. “How did you get here?”
“Stone drove us.”
He finished his examination of her back before asking the next question. “What were you doing before you blacked out?”
“I was taking pictures and I turned around to leave when I forgot my cell phone—”
Darn it. Her cell phone. She’d left it on the tree.
Dax’s fingers stopped. “What?”
She shook her head, and it pounded in pain. “Nothing. I lost balance and fell.”
Taking her wrist, he pressed two fingers against her skin for her pulse. “How do you feel now?”
“Fine.”
“Dizziness? Nausea? Do you feel strange or disoriented? Like in a fog.”
“No. My head hurts.”
He sat back on the chair and rubbed his hands on his pants. “I don’t see any obvious trauma. You may have a mild concussion and I would treat it as such. But I also recommend you go to the hospital for a CT scan. Now.”
She wondered if little Willow Valley’s hospital was even equipped to handle scans. If she were in Oakston she’d arrange an appointment with her private doctor, but sitting in a waiting room wasn’t appealing.
She glanced at Stone, but he had his tense back to her.
Dax shut his first aid kit and looked at her, like a person and not the friend of the man she’d hurt. “At least have someone check on you through the night.”
“I will. Thank you.”
He nodded and glanced over his shoulder to Stone who remained unmoved. When he turned back to her, he set a jar of ice on the table. “He saved you. Return the favor and make sure he uses this.”
“I will.” She reached for the jar and Dax’s hand covered hers with a light squeeze. “Do not string him along. Don’t hurt him again.”
Nothing she said would convince Dax that had been her plan, so she said nothing.
“I’m done.” He stood, not waiting for Stone’s reply, and marched straight out of the kitchen like he couldn’t get far enough away from her.
Stone turned, briefly acknowledged her and, without a word, he followed.
When they were both out of the room, she bound to her feet and took a deep breath. The cool air stung her nostrils and she felt it trail down her lungs. She shook her hands as she walked around the kitchen counter to the telephone hanging on the wall. Duke had no doubt texted her to check in and without her reply he’d be going ballistic. She dialed his cell number.
“Where are you?” His unwavering straightforwardness gave most people discomfort, but Bowie was used to his frankness.
“I’m okay. I’m at Stone’s.”
“I texted you to check in.”
“I’m sorry. I was ... distracted.” She didn’t want to get into details about the danger she’d put herself into knowing Duke would overreact. He’d blame himself and drive straight to Stone’s house, leaving her brother alone. Since the accident, she left her brother alone as little as possible. The way he viewed his life scared her. She wished she didn’t think he’d inflict pain on himself, but she did.
However, Duke’s silence made her
realize he was getting the wrong impression. Her small headache seemed to increase when she tried to think of a cover that wasn’t exactly lying.
“I’ll explain later,” was all she could come up with. “I’ll be home shortly.” She hung up before he could drill her further.
“He’s not coming to get you?”
She stilled at Stone’s cold tone. His new bitter disposition would take some getting used to.
“I’ll call a cab.” She turned to face him only then noticing the swelling of his shoulder, the bags under his eyes, and his bruised knuckles covered in dried blood. “What did you do?”
He lifted a single eyebrow. “Don’t you recognize fighting wounds when you see them?”
She crossed the room and lifted his hand. “Some of these are old. The blood’s dried. Why are these not bandaged? Or at least washed. Have you been fighting All day? All yesterday?”
Effortlessly, he slid his hand away and folded his arms over his chest. She caught him flinch in pain. “Why are you the one asking the questions? I’d like to know why you’re here.”
“Those couple knocks to your head shake your brain a bit? You all but kidnapped me.”
His stare darkened, turning his emerald green eyes almost black. He didn’t have to voice what he was thinking. The deafening silence between them and his unwavering stare communicated his anger of her kidnapping jab after she’d pressed trespassing charges against him in the past.
At the time, without her father alive to step in and help her like he always had in the past, she’d been left with no other choice. If she’d attempted to break up with him in person, she’d have failed. Stone had been her person, her one true love, and she’d divulged everything to him and he’d never left her wondering. No secrets and no lies had sat between them. She knew he would’ve seen straight through her breakup, questioned her motives until the truth came out, until she’d told him she knew who’d been responsible for Walker and his goons cornering him in an alleyway. That option would’ve put him directly back in harm’s way and after seeing him from the safety of her second story window the day he’d been arrested, the bruises and cuts, she’d denied her heart—her soul—and voted to keep him safe instead. Years of mapping the bandaged and stitched gashes, and the swelled purple and blue bruises, had prevented her from ever contacting him again. They’d been one-hundred times worse than today. His right eye had been so swollen then, she doubted he could have seen out of it. And he’d gotten into a ring bruised, cut, and bleeding only hours after that fight and had fought for them—for her.
“We have an arrangement and you haven’t returned a single call from me.”
“I’m doing my part of the arrangement.”
She slid him the bottle of ice rub Dax had left. “I see that now. You need to ice those bruises.”
“I know how to take care of myself.”
“It doesn’t look like it.”
“Well, that’s not your problem. Why are you sneaking onto my property?”
“What?” A calloused laugh escaped her. “I wasn’t sneaking onto your property.”
“You parked on a side road down from my house.”
“I didn’t know it was your house. Or that I was even near your house.”
“Bullshit.”
“I’m not going to lie about it, Stone, and I’m certainly not going to sneak around. I planned on locating you in town since you were eluding me, and, trust me, it was going to be to your asshole face.”
“Asshole face?” He laughed with disbelief. “Wow, Bowie.”
“Well, you’re acting like an asshole face.”
“That’s not a thing.”
“But it suits you just so damn good.”
He rubbed his chin. “So you sneak around my place—”
“Not sneaking!”
“And then after I save you from drowning, you accuse me of kidnapping and I’m the asshole face?”
“You’re so dramatic. I am checking that you haven’t changed your mind on fighting Walker.”
“I don’t go back on my word.”
She rolled her eyes. “Let’s cut the crap, Patino. Enough of the silent jabs at me. I left.”
“You left?” he roared. “You had the cops arrest me!”
“What do you want from me now? An apology? An explanation? What did you expect from me? I was a flaky reality star.”
“I know the difference between the foolish girl on camera and the girl I fell in love with.”
Her heart plummeted. “Just face it, I wasn’t the person you thought I was.”
“Your words.” He stepped toward her. “But you know what really pisses me off?”
The way his eyes narrowed on her told her she didn’t, but there would be no backing away from him. “What? Enlighten me.”
“You coming back into my life after walking away. I’ve moved on and yet you have the nerve to show up at my dad’s gym.”
“Clearly, you’ve moved on.” Her toned dripped with sarcasm. “You have a couple of German Shepherds out there beyond the sun room and when were you going to start my garden? After the gazebo?”
“Know this, woman—” She hated when he said that one word, so demeaning. “—I never planned to fight for your brother. It’s a damn shame what happened to him and had he been any other person I would feel pity for him. But I don’t. So I’m not doing this for him. I’m not even doing this for you. You and I aren’t even acquaintances, which means you sneaking around—”
“Oh god, get over yourself. I wasn’t sneaking!”
He took another step not even breaking a breath to listen to her. “Showing up at my house is done. I will fight Walker, for myself. I will train and get bruises and scars and blood...” He paused, clenched his jaw until a vein pulsed.
So serious. So dark. So much not the man she’d never stopped loving.
When he finally spoke his cold-hearted words stripped away any remaining tiny bit of hope that even the remnants of a friendship remained between them.
He shoved the ice back at her. “Don’t come to lick my wounds. Mine are deeper than flesh and beyond repair.”
Ouch.
“Give me the date and time we’re leaving for Oakston. Hire your trainers, rent a gym—I don’t care—but this is a business transaction. I don’t mix business with pleasure. Not anymore.”
Business. Good. That’s all she’d wanted.
“We leave tomorrow. Eight o’clock sharp. I’ll meet you at your dad’s gym.”
Chapter Eight
THE NEXT MORNING, Stone parked his truck out in front of his dad’s gym. He left the truck idling to keep the air conditioner cooling the cab.
At the back of the truck, he unhitched the tailgate, letting it fall open. He loaded his hands with bags of groceries he’d picked up from Carlex’s Grocery Store and enough bottles to last his dad during his absence. Maneuvering with his full hands, he managed to get the tailgate up and slam it shut with his shoulder.
He’d given himself a fifteen minute space before Bowie agreed to meet him. He still wasn’t convinced meeting up with her was the wisest choice. He could have easily driven up to Oakston alone, but as much as he didn’t want to be anywhere near her, at the same time, he couldn’t avoid her. Whether he liked it or not, she was his ticket to a fair—as fair as an underground match could be—fight with Walker.
Two weeks. Two weeks together and they’d part once again. Only this time he knew he’d be the one doing the walking and nothing on this bloody earth would change his mind.
Inside the gym, Stone nodded to a couple of local regulars. One nodded back as he picked up his pace on the treadmill and the other guy raised a brow while doing dumbbell incline curls. He caught sight of one of his dad’s employees, a short older man who should’ve been retired years ago, but couldn’t seem to leave. “Hey, Thomas, where’s my old man?”
He shrugged. “Haven’t seen him yet today.”
“Who opened?”
He held out his arms, s
tretching his blue shirt and allowing hair to poke through the slits between the buttons. “You’re looking at him.”
Stone shook his head. This guy and his dad were quite the odd fellows. “Tell Dad his groceries are in the fridge and I’ll put his alcohol in the bar fridge in his office.” Moving quickly, he tied the bags, cleared room on a shelf in the lunchroom, and stacked them in the fridge. He stuck the bottles of alcohol in the mini fridge in his dad’s office and locked the door behind him.
Thomas stood where Stone had left him, using a piece of exercise equipment as a leaning post. “I’m going to be gone a week. If he needs anything, phone Dax at the shop.”
“You got it, boy.” Thomas nodded, but was more interested in the sparring match that had developed in the ring.
Stone stepped back outside to see his father lifting a duffle bag into the back of his truck. In two large steps, he met his old man and caught the bag as he was about to chuck it in his truck. “Dad, what is this? What are you doing?”
“Don’t squish mine. There are breakables in there.” His father dropped another bag at Stone’s feet, hard enough to break what he assumed were bottles of alcohol.
“What are you doing?” Stone repeated.
“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m coming with you.” Slate shook his head and started walking around the truck to the passenger’s side. “Sometimes I think I raised an idiot. What am I doing? For crying out loud, it isn’t rocket science.”
A stretch limo slowed down beside them before pulling into two empty spaces in front of his truck.
His father whistled. “Fancy. I guess Oscar cashed in some big bucks with his underground shit. I mean, they call it illegal fighting for a reason...” He walked to the passenger’s side of the truck, muttering about his dislike of underground fighting. Stone wondered if he’d forgotten where Stone planned on fighting, or had he simply dismissed it? Slate opened the passenger’s door and climbed into the truck, slamming it shut after him.
Stone glanced between the door, the bag in his hand, the bag at his feet, and the limousine.