My lips were curling before I realized it, and that surprised me. I’d met her, what? Fifteen hours ago? And already I knew Stevie was the most interesting person I’d met. She was strong, and brave, and rolled with anything life threw at her.
That’s your cock talking.
Well, yeah.
This morning, stepping out of the bathroom to see her staring at me like that? Her hair all rumpled, and that little indented stripe on her cheek from the pillow? Blinking up at me like I was some kinda… Well, there’d been hunger in her eyes, not pity, when she’d seen my leg.
And then this morning, I’dknownshe was there in the kitchen—hells, I could scent her mood from across the room, so of course I knew she’d been looking at me. But she’d asked me if she could ask me about my leg, and that had been a strange sort of experience.
It was like she’d known exactly what to say.
She was insightful, yeah, but also…understanding, maybe?
You sure you’re not just making up excuses to like her?
Maybe I was.
Why the fuck had Trevor Hendricks chosenherto pay his debt?
And should I be grateful?
“Is that the beach over there?” Stevie’s question, and the way she was stretching against her seatbelt to see, drew me back to the present.
“Yeah. This park runs along the boardwalk, which is behind those shops. That’s the library over there. Town Hall is the big one.” I flicked my fingers as I pointed. “I haven’t visited the beach, but I hear it’s nice?—”
She’d swung around to stare at me, and her incredulity made me snap my mouth shut.
“You’ve lived here for six months and haven’t been to the beach?”
I shrugged. “I grew up mining in Alaska, then moved to the Rockies as the foreman for Vengeance—no, it’s called Radiance, Incorporated now. Not exactly a beach guy.”
She shook her head, her smirk wry as she slumped back against her seat. “You’re missing out. The winter is the most interesting time to go to the beach—the storms kick up all sorts of neat stuff.”
“Ah.” I tried to remember what she’d said about herpast.Hadshe said anything about her past? “Where are you from?”
Stevie turned to look out the window. Because she was curious about the nature preserve? Or because she didn’t want to meet my eyes? “All over the Gulf Coast. Texas, the Florida panhandle. We moved around a lot.”
I remembered Hendricks’ threat. “New Orleans?” I asked quietly.
“Yeah. I’m…” She took a deep breath. “My flight is back there on Sunday. Gotta report back.”
And tell that bastard she’d failed?
WhowasHendricks to her? Her male? Her pimp? Or was she nothing to him, just someone he could threaten into doing what he wanted? The way she stumbled over his name whenever she spoke about him hadn’t escaped my notice.
The leather of the steering wheel made a creaking noise as my fingers tightened on it, and inside, myKteerraged at a male taking advantage like that. She was a human, for fuck’s sake, not an object. Stevie deserved to be protected, cherished?—
Are you volunteering?
It bothered me that I couldn’t immediately deny it.
The SUV slowed as I reached the building site. “Here we are,” I muttered, more to distract myself than anything else.
“A…community center? That’s where your meeting is?”
Surprised, I froze with my hand on the gearshift as I glanced at her. “You can tell it’s going to be a community center?”
Stevie flicked her fingers like it was no big deal as she reached for her seatbelt with the other hand. “It’s either that or a church, yeah? And you didn’t strike me as the type to call a meeting at a church. What is it?”
