Out of the Darkness: a Hope Valley novel

by Prince, Jessica

  I looked around the group, my eyebrows raised in confusion. “Who’s Xander?”

  “Not as far as I know,” Linc answered.

  I got the distinct impression I was missing something as I asked again, “Who’s Xander.”

  Before anyone could say a word, Bryce spoke again. “Speak of the devil . . . Xander, my man, come meet our new assistant, the lovely Sage.”

  “You gotta be joking,” a familiar, deep, throaty voice said from behind me, the tone twisted with displeasure.

  I turned and looked up, up, up. My blood simmered with anger as electricity zinged through me, making my panties dampen. Suddenly, I was turned on and pissed all at the same time as my eyes landed on the man who’d nearly ruined my morning and narrowed into viscous slits as I growled, “You.” The air in the reception area became wired as I entered into a stare-off with the bearded bastard.

  “Uh . . . I take it these two have already met,” Eden announced cautiously.

  “If by ‘met’ you mean had an unpleasant encounter wherein this jackass proved he’s got all the manners of a person raised by wolves, then, yeah, we’ve already met.”

  Eden let out a loud snort at my little rant and slapped her hands over her mouth as if trying to hide her laughter.

  “Wait.” Roxanne butted in, looking at me with big eyes. “This is the guy who cut in line and made fun of your shoes?”

  “Yep,” I announced, popping the P loudly.

  “Sounds about right,” Bryce muttered under his breath at the same time Linc looked to the ceiling with a heavy sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose.

  “Oh, I didn’t even notice,” Eden spoke up. “Those shoes are really cute.”

  I looked back at her with a grin. “Thanks, babe.”

  The dude I now knew to be the infamous Xander pointed one of his huge hotdog fingers in my direction while turning to Linc and declaring, “She is not working here.”

  “Yes, I am,” I bit out. “That’s not your call.”

  “No, you’re not,” he growled. The menace in his voice might have scared me had I not been so damn mad at his barbaric display.

  “Eat me, Paul Bunyan. I so am.”

  “Paul Bunyan,” Bryce hooted hysterically. “That’s priceless. How have none of us thought of that?”

  His black eyes flashed with warning that would have made anyone else cower in fear. “Real classy.”

  I let out a harrumph and crossed my arms over my chest. “Says the scone-stealing, line-cutting reject from Sons of Anarchy.”

  “Oh, this is so much fun. I can’t wait to tell the girls,” Eden chirped, her tone holding way too much excitement.

  Neither of us blinked as we silently tried to melt the skin off of each other’s faces for several tense seconds. Finally, unable to keep my mouth shut—a problem I’d struggled with my whole life—I leaned in and whispered loud enough for everyone to hear, “I. Don’t. Like. You,” enunciating every word just to make sure I got my point across.

  “Believe me, Shortcake. The feeling’s more than mutual,” he said with a grunt. “Don’t get too comfortable. You won’t be here long.”

  “You think you can force me into quitting?”

  His smirk was cocky and self-assured. “Oh, honey, I know I can.”

  I felt my lips pull up in an evil grin. This guy didn’t know it yet, but I never backed down from a challenge.

  He’d just poked the bear. “Game on, Big Foot. Game. On.”

  Chapter Four

  Xander

  Sage fucking Winthrop

  Alpha Omega’s new assistant.

  Christ, this was my goddamn nightmare.

  The first time I saw her, she’d been checking me out through the coffee shop window. I wasn’t unaccustomed to that kind of attention, but years of practice had made me capable of tuning it out. The relief I’d been searching for with Mallory the night before might not have lasted as long as I needed, but the itch had at least temporarily been scratched, so I was good for the time being.

  Or at least that was what I thought, until I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned to see the indignant little minx up close and personal.

  At first I’d been annoyed as hell by the run-in. Unless I was looking for a woman, I detested crowded places, and Muffin Top was packed with the early morning crowd. But my goddamn coffeemaker decided to give up the ghost, and I couldn’t function without caffeine so there was no other choice.

  Then she shocked the shit out of me by ripping me a new one right there in the middle of a crowded sidewalk. Women either wanted me or were scared of me. Sure, the shortcake standing in front of me had initially shown interest while gawking through the glass, but after our argument in the coffee shop, that had changed. She went at me with a fearlessness I hadn’t experienced in years.

  That, matched with the hot mini-biker-bitch getup she was sporting was enough to make me hard as a teenage boy getting his first erection. I hadn’t had such an intense reaction to a woman in longer than I could remember. And that lack of control scared the hell out of me, causing me to lash out.

  I’d forced myself to dismiss her like she was nothing, climbing on my bike and heading to the office where I could lose myself in my work, burying myself in wire taps and email hacks so I wouldn’t have to think of a certain stunning brunette with an amazing rack. When I’d gotten up later to take a leak and turned the corner into reception, I nearly swallowed my tongue at the sight of her.

  Having to work in such close proximity to her every day was like a special form of torture. For a week, my dick hadn’t been able to control itself. That fucking itch was back with a vengeance. Every time I saw her, heard her sweet, musical voice, or got close enough to smell the soft floral scent she wore I got hard enough to pound nails.

  And it made me even more agitated than normal, to the point I didn’t know how to act and found myself avoiding her as much as humanly possible, going so far as to make Bryce or one of the other guys give her my files to close out and invoice. I’d made the mistake of stepping into her office once and the pleasant smell of lilies nearly made me come out of my skin.

  There was no end to the shit the guys were giving me about my evasion of the new girl, especially considering what she looked like.

  It was Friday morning, meaning I only had to deal with being in the vicinity of Sage for a few more hours before I got two days of blessed relief. I was standing in the breakroom, pouring myself my third cup of coffee, when Bryce walked in.

  “Good lord, Xander. How long you been here? It’s barely seven.”

  “A while,” I answered flatly. It wasn’t uncommon for me to be one of the first in most mornings. Thanks to nightmares of my past plaguing me, finding sleep had been a problem for years, and keeping it was even harder. For the past week it had been damn near impossible due to a certain new hire invading my thoughts. So this morning I’d finally climbed out of bed long before the sun came up, gone for a run, got my workout in, and made it to the office by five thirty.

  “Damn, man. You get any sleep at all last night? You look like hell.”

  “Fuck off,” I muttered, bringing the coffee mug to my lips and sucking back a huge gulp, ignoring the way the scalding liquid burned on the way down.

  He moved to the coffee machine and shoved me out of the way to make his own. “You know, you’ve been an even bigger dick than usual lately, and that’s really sayin’ something, considering you’re you.”

  “I already said fuck off, didn’t I? Or was I just imagining that?”

  Unfazed by my attitude, the asshole chuckled behind his coffee cup. “You’re a delight, brother. Anyone ever tell you that?”

  I didn’t bother acknowledging him. I’d already said what I had to say. Seeing he wasn’t going to get another response out of me, he started out of the breakroom, clapping me on my shoulder on his way out.

  At his departure, I breathed a sigh of relief, thinking I’d get a couple minutes of peace before shit started back up. But, as
usual, fortune didn’t feel like shining in my favor.

  I heard her soft hum before I saw her, and just as it had for the past week, my body acted of its own accord.

  Lust slammed into me with the force of a high-speed train the instant Sage rounded the corner into the breakroom. She stuttered to a stop the moment she saw me, making the paper coffee cup and bright pink box she was balancing in her hands wobble precariously.

  Without giving it a thought, I jumped in her direction, snatching up the cup before it fell to the ground and reaching beneath the box with my other hand to help keep it steady.

  Then I realized my mistake. The second my fingers brushed against hers under that ugly pink box, my whole body lit up like a Roman candle. But when I saw her deep brown eyes flare at the small touch, I knew I was completely and utterly screwed. That light brush had the exact same effect on her as it did me.

  “Uh . . . th-thank you.” She looked at the cup I’d rescued before turning back to me with a small grin. “Losing that coffee would’ve been a disaster.”

  The smell of lilies invaded my senses, and I struggled with how to act. I let out a grunt, and before I could control the words, they came pouring past my lips, “Maybe learn to be more careful next time.”

  That heat I’d seen flare in her eyes only moments ago turned to ice as her smile dropped into a vicious glare. “Man, you really can’t help but be an asshole, can you? It’s like second nature.”

  “What can I say? You just make it easy,” I replied with a shrug, setting her coffee down on the counter and moving several feet back. I felt like shit being so damn rude when she’d done nothing to deserve it. But I couldn’t trust myself around her, and the only way I knew to keep that distance between us was to make her hate me.

  “So is this your new tactic? You spent the past few days giving me the silent treatment, and when you realized that wasn’t gonna get me to quit, you decided to step it up? Well, I’ve got news for you, Goliath, you can be as big a dick as you want. I’m not quitting, so I suggest you suck it the fuck up.”

  With that, she stomped over to the fridge and yanked the door open, shoving the pink box in unceremoniously before slamming it closed. Then she stormed out of the breakroom, snatching her coffee on the way, leaving me with an uncomfortable stiffness behind my fly.

  * * *

  Sage

  To say I held a strong dislike for Xander Caine would have been like saying the Sahara was a little dry and kind of hot—a serious freaking understatement.

  I loathed him to the point that I’d started having dreams at night where I’d smothered him to death, only to wake up and discover it wasn’t real.

  Sad clown.

  He had a gift for pissing me off so badly that I drank my way through half a six-pack and screamed into my pillow before bed each night. The worst part was, even though I hated him with the fiery passion of a thousand suns, I couldn’t make my body get on board. My skin tingled, my breathing escalated, and my nipples turned into homing beacons, pointing straight in his direction whenever he was around.

  I’d been at Alpha Omega for a week, and I pretty much loved everything about my job. The work was easy, and hearing about some of the more interesting cases the guys had worked on kept me seriously entertained. Linc was the laid back, hands-off kind of boss who left me to do my work without micromanaging the hell out of everything. I’d met the rest of the guys, and aside from the testosterone overload and the fact it sometimes felt like dealing with them was the same as trying to herd a bunch of toddlers who’d just sniffed glue, they were all a delight to work with . . . with the exception of one six foot six, two-hundred-plus pound dickwad masquerading as a human being.

  “Knock, knock.” I looked up from my computer screen to see Eden standing in the doorway of my office.

  “Hey,” I greeted with a big smile as I waved her in. “Pleasant surprise, sister. What brings you by?”

  She took a seat in the chair on the other side of my small desk. “I just dropped off lunch from the diner for Linc and thought I’d swing by with that face mask sample I told you about.”

  She placed a tiny jar on my desk, and I quickly reached over to grab it, unscrewing the lid and taking a sniff. “Oh wow, this smells fantastic.”

  Eden beamed brightly at my praise. “Thanks. Let me know if you like it, and I’ll bring you some more.”

  “You’re the sweetest. And I’m sure I’ll love it.”

  “So how’s your first week been so far?”

  “It’s been great,” I answered enthusiastically, until I remembered a certain someone. “Well . . . mostly.”

  Her features twisted in a sympathetic wince. “Xander?”

  “Yes, Xander,” I answered, saying the asshole’s name with a sneer. “What’s that guy’s deal anyway? Is there a reason for his perpetual bad mood, or is he just a miserable bastard?”

  Her shoulders rose in a shrug. “I’m not really sure. I don’t know the guy all that well. Not many people do. I mean, my friend Gypsy got to know him a little better than the rest of us during her drama, but she’s still pretty in the dark about the guy.”

  My head tilted to the side in curiosity. “Her drama?”

  “Oh, yeah, it’s become kind of a thing with our little group. Bad guys, kidnappings, being held hostage . . . stuff like that. Each time, the cops and Linc’s guys are a part of the rescue mission or are put on bodyguard duty for whichever of us is currently in the crosshairs of some lunatic. Gypsy’s thing involved a hardcore bad guy meth dealer. Xander played a bigger part in her thing than he did in the rest of ours, so she knows him the best.”

  “Wait, wait. Just . . .” I waved my hands to get her to stop before pressing my fingers against my temples. “Give me a second to try and process everything you just said.”

  “It sounds worse than it is,” she said with a sheepish smile on her face. “If it makes you feel better, we all made it out just fine, and all the girls ended up with their dream guy. So each story had a happy ending.”

  “So . . . you’ve all been kidnapped?”

  “Nona wasn’t,” she answered quickly, then amended, “Well . . . her kids were, but only for a little while,” like that made it any better. “And they’re totally okay.” Eden began chewing on her bottom lip nervously. “Oh god. You’re freaked, aren’t you? Please don’t quit and run for the hills. Lincoln would kill me. They’ve been trying to get a good assistant for months now, and he says you’re doing an awesome job.”

  I let out a soft chuckle and shook my head. “I’m not gonna go running for the hills,” I said in assurance. “I mean, it’s a little crazy all that stuff happened in a small, quiet place like this, but I don’t scare easily.”

  After all, with the life I’d lived, there wasn’t much that fazed me anymore. My own father was currently doing a stint in the state penitentiary down in Tennessee for attempted murder, and my ex had desensitized me to a lot of the nasty shit people were capable of. But I wasn’t going to mention any of that.

  “Oh, thank god,” she said with a sigh, her shoulders slumping in relief.

  “Besides, working here, I seriously doubt there’ll be any chance for potential kidnappers or drug kingpins to get at me.”

  Her giggle sounded like windchimes, making her even more adorable than she already was. “True enough.”

  We chatted for a few more minutes before she took off, and I got back to work, feeling a thousand times better than I had after my latest encounter with the Bearded Bastard.

  Chapter Five

  Sage

  The administrative part of what kept Alpha Omega Investigations running had been so backlogged and in such disarray when I started that it was shocking they were still in business.

  In the days I’d been there, I’d managed to get payment on several old cases that had been closed months before my arrival as well as update the filing system and move everything online for better efficiency.

  I was in the middle of updating the group c
alendar for the entire team when a knock sounded on my open door. “Hey gorgeous. You’re lookin’ as beautiful as always,” Bryce called out, pulling me from my task. Over the week, I’d gotten to know all the guys I worked with relatively well, but out of all of them, I’d grown closest to Bryce. Easy-going and openly friendly, he was my second favorite person after Roxanne at Alpha Omega. In his way, he’d taken me under his wing and showed me the ropes, and by “his way,” I meant he was a shameless flirt. It was all perfectly harmless and innocent, but where Xander couldn’t open his mouth without being a prick, Bryce couldn’t speak to the opposite sex without flirting.

  “Your charm is wasted on me, pretty boy,” I teased in return, enjoying the easy rapport he and I had formed.

  He placed a hand over his heart and shot me a wounded look. “That kills, babe. It really does.”

  I rolled my eyes at his dramatics and leaned back in my chair. “You stop by for a reason, or do you just like to distract me from my work?”

  “As much fun as distracting a beauty like you is, I’m here to let you know the staff meeting’s about to start.”

  “Thanks, Bry. I’ll be right there.”

  Moving out of my office, I headed into the breakroom where I’d stashed the awesome birthday cake I picked up that morning from the cutesy little baker in town.

  I might have worked at a place surrounded by men who took alpha to an extreme, but I was still a girl, and as one of the only two women on staff, I took it upon myself to find out everyone’s birthday and made the decision that staff meetings would also be celebrations for whoever’s birthday fell during that week, and today we’d be celebrating West with a pretty cake.

  Grabbing a stack of paper plates and some plastic utensils, I made my way to the conference room where almost everyone had gathered and presented the box with a flourish. “Ta-da!”

  My enthusiastic call was met with nine looks of confusion and one of excitement. Of course, the excitement came from Roxanne, who I’d already told what the box contained.