“I owe him my life,” Dallas answered, his blue eyes closing for a long beat as the words left his lips. “And that debt isn’t something you can settle for me.”
She opened her mouth to argue but closed it again quickly. Her brother’s military experience was legend but rarely spoken about. Emmitt’s deployments had been wracked with danger and, though she frequently wanted to wring her brother’s neck, she had no doubt many lives had been saved because of his service. “You served with Emmitt?”
“No, I’m not military. I’m a . . . no . . . I was a police officer.” The discomfort on his face was hard to watch, a world she’d just jabbed at without realizing it.
“A little young to be retired,” she said, watching to see if his expression would change.
“It’s time for us to go,” Dallas stressed, finally waving her by, as though the coast was clear.
“Fine,” she grumbled. “But when we get out of here I will call Emmitt, and he will tell you to leave me alone. He’ll order it. He can’t control my life.”
“And I’ll respect that,” Dallas agreed as they made their way back to the raised platform that would take them past the club dance floor and out the door.
“I checked the back exits, and I don’t think they’re suitable. We’d have to circle back around through an alley and that’s not ideal.”
“The door I came in is fine. Rylie won’t do anything.” Harlan truly believed that. Her ex-husband was a lot of things, but violent wasn’t one of them. Now she was worried about where he might end up. If he’d drunk himself sick, how would he get home? Wherever home was now.
Logically, leaving the marriage had been her only option. There was an obligation to her children that couldn’t be overlooked. But when she saw the brittle and crushed pieces of the man she once loved, guilt filled every inch of her body. These were his choices, his failures; she couldn’t save him. She was not enough.
“You’re right; he won’t do anything,” Dallas declared. It was far more about what he would allow, and not what Rylie would try.
“You picked up another guy in the bathroom?” Rylie cackled, spilling half the contents of his drink on the floor as he charged toward her. “My lawyer is going to love these stories. I’m going to have my girls back by the end of the week. You’re screwing some kid who’s barely legal then you’re on to the next guy. Some stranger.”
“You aren’t ever going to have your girls in your life until you stop drinking,” Harlan reminded him, saddened by the reality of how far Rylie had fallen. How much he’d lost. But also angered by the fact that he’d let it happen to him, and to all of them.
“Slut,” he bit out, a rage building in his eyes. “One of these nights you’re not going to make it home. I won’t need the courts then. The girls will be mine.”
“Let’s go,” Dallas said, putting his body between Rylie and Harlan as he guided her toward the door.
“One of these nights you’re going to end up face down in a ditch, lying in mud like the pig that you are.”
Her face burst open with hot embers of fury. People were staring now, listening over the music. Laughing. Judging. She had a diatribe of rebuttals, a thousand insults that would make him shrink down or maybe make him strike back, and she wanted to use them all.
Dallas placed a firm hand on her shoulder and gave her a look that could not be argued with. Just a subtle raise of his brow, a glare that said stay put.
He backtracked toward Rylie, and she was certain Dallas intended to crush him. Not metaphorically either. There was no doubt that he could reduce him down the way you might smash a soda can flat under your boot.
She knew every expression on Rylie’s face, the road map of his emotions. The way any wife does of her husband. Fear pulsed through him.
Rather than cocking his fist back or reaching out for Rylie’s neck, Dallas just leaned in. It was only a moment or two, a few whispered words, but whatever he’d said had Rylie frozen. The best he could muster was a simple almost imperceptible nod of understanding.
“Let’s go,” Dallas repeated, now at Harlan’s side again.
“What did you say to him?” she asked, her cheeks still hot and flushed.
“It doesn’t matter. It’s handled. Let’s just get to the car. This is a shitty area, and I’d prefer the rest of the night be uneventful.”
“My car is that way,” she corrected as they stepped outside. She pointed to the parking lot they were moving away from.
“I know,” he replied, keeping his eyes roving over every inch of the scene in front of them. “I’ll have it picked up tomorrow. We’re taking my car.”
“I’m not an object,” she said, stopping in her tracks. “I’m not something Mathew can broker into safety, and Emmitt can’t control the danger out of my life. You can’t just make me do whatever you want.”
“You’re right,” Dallas agreed, looking slightly somber now. “You’re not an object. You’re not property. You’re their sister. You’re their only sister.” He stood there looking at her expectantly as though again, he’d won.
“So what? That means they get to run my life? Both of them have made questionable choices over the years, and no one has stepped in and demanded anything of them. Why should I be any different?”
“Because you are,” he answered quietly.
“I consider myself a feminist, and I don’t appreciate the assumption that being a woman makes me less than—” Before she could go on, he jumped in with a passion in his voice.
“I consider myself a feminist too,” Dallas assured her. “These aren’t mutually exclusive ideas. You’re someone’s mom, Harlan,” he said. The sound of her name on his lips made her pulse with excitement. “For two people on this planet, you are their whole world. Their everything. That’s what makes you different.”
“But still—” she tried, but his voice grew louder.
“A man just looked you in the eye and told you one of these nights you won’t make it home. You’ve been used as a bargaining chip by the mob to hurt your father. That might be over, or it might not be. Is it fair that you need some stranger following you around in order to protect you? No. Is it damn lucky you have people who love you enough to insist you have it anyway? Yeah, it is. Everything about what I’m doing is a nuisance until I’m the guy taking the bullet for you. Then suddenly having me around doesn’t sound so bad.”
“You aren’t going to take a bullet for me,” she scoffed, starting to walk again, realizing there would be no level of debate that would get her out of this situation, at least for tonight.
“I might not have to,” he agreed with a shrug. “But I would. That’s how this works.”
“I don’t want anyone taking a bullet for me,” she insisted. “You don’t even know me. You don’t get to decide your life is worth less than mine.”
“It’s not something that needs to be decided. Trust me. You’re a mother. You’re a daughter. You matter to people.”
“And you don’t?” she asked, watching the profile of his face fall slightly at the question.
“I don’t. Now get in the car and take up your fight with your brothers. I’m driving you home.”
“I’m not going home,” she argued, stopping again just short of the car and making his face grow tight with more frustration.
“Why not?”
“Because I have an overnight babysitter, and I just had the most embarrassing night of my life on display for a club full of people. I’m going to get so drunk I forget my own name. You want to be on the payroll? Then buckle up, because tonight I do need protection.”
“From who?”
“From myself.”
Chapter 3
Harlan Kalling was the exact level of pain in the ass that Dallas had been warned about. All her previous tricks to rid her security details had been laid out for him. He was ready for her attempt at bribery. Ready for her to run. What he wasn’t prepared for was the pained look in her big brown eyes. They were the color of r
ich deep soil you’d find only in the farthest untouched corners of a jungle.
Dallas had been a bully, an officer, a leader, a judge, jury, and executioner in his lifetime, but sitting next to Harlan as they sped away from the bar, he felt like his most challenging job lay ahead of him.
“So you have to take me wherever I want?” Harlan asked, her words layered with diabolical intent.
“No,” he replied, checking the rearview mirror to ensure no one had followed them out of the parking lot.
“I told you I’m not going home yet,” she argued, and from the corner of his eye he could see the pout forming on her lips. This woman was defeated. She was exhausted. All feelings he could relate to, even if they didn’t show on his face.
When his phone rang he considered ignoring it. There was something engaging about the fight Harlan was waging against him, against the world. He hated to interrupt it. But this wasn’t his work phone, it was his personal cell. Very few people had the number and none of them called unless it was something pressing.
“Hello,” he said, shifting the car quickly and picking up speed as they hit the highway. He tucked the phone between his shoulder and his ear as the familiar voice on the other end of the line launched into a long speech.
“You knew this day was coming, Dallas. I’ve kept you as informed as I possibly could over the last year. So when I tell you this news I hope that you’ve prepared yourself appropriately for the emotional blowback you might feel.”
“Melissa,” he growled, unable to hold back the rage that was boiling in his gut. “He’s not getting the new trial?”
“We’re not positive yet, but it doesn’t look promising,” she whispered apologetically, and the quiet tone reminded him she was not the enemy.
“I can’t talk right now,” Dallas said through his ground together teeth. “I’ve got to go.”
“Whatever you’re planning, whatever you’re thinking, just let it go. Please. I can only do my job if you stay out of this.”
Dallas didn’t reply. Disconnecting the line, he threw his phone into the center console hard enough to send Harlan jumping.
“I need to drop you off,” he said, leaving no room for debate.
“What’s the matter?” Harlan asked, every ounce of the combativeness in her voice gone now. “Who was that?”
“I’m dropping you off,” he repeated.
“You’re clearly very upset. Maybe you shouldn’t be alone.”
“I need to go kill a man right now,” Dallas said, knowing his words were concerning, considering how level and unemotional his tone was. If he’d have been yelling maybe she’d think he was just blowing off some steam. “I’d prefer it if you were not an accessory to murder.”
“Stop,” she said, a nervous laugh. “I’m sure whatever it is will turn out fine. Plus, just announcing that you were going to kill someone already makes me at least a witness, and possible partially culpable if I don’t step in. Now I’m ethically, maybe even legally, obligated to not leave you alone.”
Dallas realized suddenly how fast he was driving and reduced his speed, moving over to the right-hand lane and getting ready to take the next exit. It didn’t lead anywhere in particular. He had no destination in mind, but he wanted the option to pull over if he needed to, if his hands began to shake, if the sweat started to gather on his forehead.
“Who’s not getting the new trial?” she asked, her words so cautious he felt bad for probably scaring her. Though Harlan didn’t seem to frighten easily.
“A friend,” Dallas replied, pulling in to the parking lot of a burger joint and slamming the car into park.
“New evidence, inadequate representation, jury tampering?” Harlan shifted in her seat so she could see him better, but the extra attention made him more rigid in his responses.
“How do you know so much about it?”
“I was going to be a lawyer when I grew up,” she said, that breathy sigh of defeat back in her voice. “The problem is I grew up too fast and missed my chance. But I’ve always loved the law. The control of it. The black and white of it all. There is right. There is wrong.”
“That’s bullshit,” he said, angry that he’d cursed in front of a client. “Sorry, I just mean it’s not true. There are loopholes and laws to protect the criminals. You leave your fate to twelve strangers and hope they can tell the difference between liars and good men. They can’t.”
“The laws are to protect all of us,” she challenged. “If you were innocent and charged with a crime, those laws could free you.”
“They aren’t freeing him,” Dallas said, slamming his fist against the steering wheel. “He deserves a new trial. The investigation was botched; his lawyer was a disaster.”
“Who is he?”
“I’m not getting in to it right now. Especially with you. You’re a client, not my therapist.”
“You have a therapist?” she asked, her lips lifting into a tiny smile.
“Hypothetical therapist. If I had one, you would not be it. You wouldn’t be my lawyer either.”
“Who is he?” she asked again, and he could feel her eyes on him as he stared out at the flashing burger sign in front of him.
“Tim Andrews,” Dallas said, a vice tightening around his stomach as he said his good friend’s name.
“And what exactly did he do?” Harlan sounded tentative, as if the tightness in his jaw or the bear-trap grip he had on the steering wheel let her know she better tread lightly.
“He didn’t do anything. He’s innocent.”
“Right,” she said gently. “So what was he convicted of?”
“Maybe you would have made a good lawyer.” He looked down at his phone and thought the next call he got from Melissa might bring even worse news. “He was convicted of murder. But it wasn’t him. Tim wouldn’t hurt a fly. That’s not who he is. The problem was he figured if he was innocent he wouldn’t go to jail. He took a court appointed lawyer and assumed because truth was on his side he’d be fine.”
“Oh,” she said, drawing in a rigid breath, clearly not prepared for his blunt truth. But who was? He certainly hadn’t been prepared the night he got the call that Tim had been arrested for murder.
Dallas had been running. Not literally, but he knew what his life had turned into. As a cop the caseload was big, and he never took a break. It was all about filling the day so you didn’t have to feel the pain with each new case. It hadn’t worked. There was no real escaping when you’re running from your own mind.
“I’m sorry,” Harlan whispered. “We don’t have to talk about it.”
“I’ll drop you off at your house. There’s ample security there.”
“You shouldn’t be alone,” she said, urgency in her voice. “I’m not sure who you were planning on killing or how it would help the situation, but it’s not worth it. Plus I’m starving. Maybe we can get a burger.” Gesturing over at the burger joint, she smiled.
“I could eat,” he shrugged, the gears in his brain sparking and burning from the thoughts spinning through them. Maybe a greasy burger would help. Not to mention if he dropped Harlan off right now, driving away alone, there wouldn’t be anything stopping him from doing something incredibly stupid.
Chapter 4
“This is not a burger,” Harlan commented, staring down at half a cow sitting on a giant bun resting on a mountain of fries. “This could feed a small country.”
“You told me to order for you,” Dallas said, cracking a smile for the first time since his phone had rung with the bad news.
“And you assumed this caloric monstrosity would be what I normally eat?”
“No,” he admitted coyly. “I just wanted to see your face when it hit the table. Totally worth it.”
“Glad you’re in a better mood,” she said, making her first attempt at getting her hands around the burger. “Should I cut this in half? That knife won’t work. Do you have a Samari sword?”
“Not on me,” Dallas said, mockingly patting his front poc
ket. “Come on, just pick it up and eat it.”
“Switch with me,” she pouted looking at his average size burger and moderate amount of French fries. “I’m not going to eat this. I’ll just sit here and complain.”
“Fine,” he said swapping the plates. “I’m not afraid of it. Plus I’m sure you’re used to getting your way. I’d hate to interfere with that.”
“Ha.” She laughed loud enough for a few other people in the place to turn toward them. “I’m used to getting my way? That’s ridiculous.”
“Come on,” he scoffed. “I know how wealthy the Kalling family is. Your one brother is in Texas making a fortune on oil. Emmitt might not be flashy with his money, but I know he’s got plenty.”
“Money doesn’t make your life perfect,” Harlan argued, feeling annoyed that she had to defend how shitty things could be even when you were rich. “You were watching tonight, right? You saw my blind date turned out to be a kid who grew up down the street from us. Or I should say he’s still growing up. That was mortifying. Made worse only by the fact that my ex-husband witnessed it all.”
“He’s a real gem, huh?”
“I’m supposed to realize by now he won’t turn back into the man he once was, and we can’t just pick up where we left off. I like to give people the benefit of the doubt. But Rylie might be too far gone to let back in my life; he might not ever be the father I dreamed he would be to our girls. Money can’t fix that.”
“He’s been following you for a while,” Dallas explained, taking the steak knife and trying to slice the burger in half. “You don’t make it very hard. You should vary your schedule, do some unpredictable things that keep him guessing.”
“Tonight was spontaneous,” she argued, thinking about how far off the rails it had all gone. If she’d been given a hundred guesses of where she’d be right now, who she’d be with, she never would have said she’d be with a hot stranger at a burger joint in the middle of nowhere. A man who wasn’t her blind date in the first place.
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