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  I nodded. Realistically, it wasn’t something I could honestly promise. Caraway wasn’t on my list and so long as Santos got what was coming to him, I didn’t really care about the rest. Still, if I could avoid screwing the only guy who had been interested in helping me out, it would be all the better. I didn’t want Calvin to lose everything, but I also knew that there was some part of me that wouldn’t care if he did so long as Santos paid for his crimes.

  And I wasn’t talking about the construction shit. The crimes he committed against me were at the forefront of my mind and they were, in the very end, all I truly cared about.

  Still, if I could keep Calvin from losing his job, I would.

  Chapter Ten

  Zelda

  I kept glancing in the rearview mirror, half expecting a maniacally crazed Santos to be driving drunk and careless along the road behind me, his face flushed with rage and alcohol as he swerved across the entire road, gunning for me. Determined and blood thirsty.

  But the road remained empty behind me as I drove farther away from Santos and closer to where I knew Nester was staying.

  He’d lost his place when he went to prison. We hadn’t lived together, despite being together for as long as we had. I’d insisted that I needed the personal space, a place to go to where I could immerse myself in the tough studying that came with being a student in nursing school. But in retrospect, I had to admit that it was foolish. Nester was over all of the time anyway and we spent the night at each other’s places more nights than we spent alone. The only practical thing about it was that if Nester got into trouble with the law, they at least wouldn’t come sniffing at my door. Maybe to ask questions, but not in the hopes of truly finding anything.

  I almost laughed at the memories. How I’d stubbornly clung to my little house, even though I was madly, hopelessly in love with Nester. How I’d spent more time studying at the library in the end anyway and was only at the house when Nester was there to keep me company.

  And the most ironic part of all: how I was going to lose that house in such a short amount of time when Santos and I married.

  I shuddered at the thought. Marriage. We’d be married soon, and while I’d always known deep down inside that Santos was a ticking time bomb, I had seen firsthand tonight what it would be like to live with him.

  A nightmare. An ongoing, never ending, rage fueled nightmare. One that would leave me bruised and broken and flinching at my own shadow. It wasn’t something I had ever wanted—Santos wasn’t ever what I’d wanted—but I didn’t know how to get out of it now.

  Nester was staying at a house that belonged to one of the guys who was part of the Berserkers. One of his more loyal friends. Jackson was a decent guy, always the sort of person who was really good to me, but never in a way that made me feel uncomfortable, like he was hitting on me. Part of that was that Jackson was a family man. Maybe he didn’t walk the straight and narrow path—that seemed pretty hard to do given that he was a part of a motorcycle club—but he was good to his little girl and had made a huge effort to be the kind of husband you wanted to come home to.

  Not that it had worked out in the end. His wife had left him and I didn’t know what was going on with their kid. I had to assume there was some sort of arrangement, but if there was a custody battle, I was sorry to say I had a feeling Jackson would lose.

  I felt bad going to Jackson’s house knowing that Santos could follow me and Jackson’s little girl could be there, but I truly didn’t have anywhere else to go. No family. No real friends. Santos had made sure of that. And if I went home, surely Santos would go there first to find me.

  No, I couldn’t risk it.

  It was what kept me driving. I promised myself that I would leave if Jackson’s daughter was there. And I convinced myself that Santos wasn’t following anyway.

  I pulled up along the road beside Jackson’s house. There were still a few lights on, for which I was grateful. It meant someone at least was still up. A trickle of fear ran through me. What if Nester told me to get lost? That I’d made my choice and deserved what I got? I forced those thoughts aside. I couldn’t think like that. I had to believe that, however mad Nester might be with me, he wouldn’t throw me back to the wolves after something like this.

  Getting out of the car, I headed up the sidewalk, wrapping my arms around my middle defensively. My face hurt, the quickly forming bruises throbbing on my cheeks and the taste of copper lingering from my split lip. I felt paranoid, glancing behind me to make sure that Santos wasn’t creeping up just a few steps after me.

  But no one was there.

  I got to the door and knocked. When no one came immediately, I knocked again, harder. I was about to knock a third time, when the door swung in to reveal Nester dressed in a pair of loose gray sweats and a form fitting t-shirt that covered some of his snaking, rolling tattoos.

  For a moment, I just stared at him, relief flooding me. He was here and everything would be okay. I opened my mouth to try and explain myself—why I was here, what had happened with Santos—but nothing came out. I couldn’t tell him the awful things he’d said to me or how he’d hit me.

  But it turned out I didn’t have to.

  Nester stepped closer, reaching for me, and within moments I was wrapped up in his strong arms. He was warm, burning almost, and it seeped into me, soothing my aching, trembling muscles.

  “I’ll fucking kill him,” Nester whispered into my hair, his voice low and dark, quiet because it was so filled with the promise of violence that it couldn’t get any louder. “No one fucking touches you. Not ever.”

  The anger building inside of him was palpable. Even if I couldn’t hear it threaded through his deep voice, I could feel it in his body as it held me tightly. He was tense, a tightly coiled spring ready to release into action, to propel the rest of him into a deadly fight. And the best part of it was that I didn’t feel any of that anger, not a drop of it, directed at me. All I felt was security and protectiveness and the sense that finally I was safe.

  For a glorious moment, I reveled in it. Nester would protect me, and in this moment, I felt that he still loved me, too. Something I was craving desperately.

  I wanted to let Nester do whatever he needed to do while basking in his protective embrace, but I couldn’t. I knew I couldn’t. If Nester went after Santos, it all would go horribly wrong. What if Santos called the police and got Nester thrown back in prison? Or worse still, what if Nester got himself killed? Santos wouldn’t fight fair; I knew that much at least. He’d use every dirty trick he could—including letting his boys help him out—to make sure that Nester didn’t win.

  And I couldn’t lose him. Not again.

  The tears came suddenly, though maybe not unexpectedly. I felt them burn my eyes and I nearly choked on them as I buried my face deeper into Nester’s chest. I hugged him tightly, clinging almost desperately to his hard frame, because I needed him and I was so scared I’d lose him forever.

  A sob wracked my body and Nester pulled me even closer, his arms clutching at my back to hold me to him.

  “Shh, you’re okay now,” he whispered to me, the anger in his voice still there, but pushed to the side so that he could be soothing for me. “I won’t let that bastard hurt you. I won’t.”

  I shook my head, still sobbing but trying to talk through the tears. “Don’t, please, you can’t… he’ll…he’ll…”

  I couldn’t get out the words, couldn’t even say that Santos would kill Nester and then I’d lose him forever. But Nester seemed to understand. Or maybe he didn’t. Maybe he just knew that I was too upset for him to leave me alone, for him to go there tonight and try to kill the man who had done this to me.

  With a sigh, he whispered, “C’mon, Zel. Let’s get you inside, baby.”

  I let him pull me in and close the door behind us. I couldn’t tell if Jackson or his little girl were home, but I hadn’t seen his bike parked outside that I could remember, so maybe not. Nester escorted me to the couch, then sat me down into it
s warm, giving cushions. There were pillows and a blanket strewn across it, letting me know that Nester had been sleeping here.

  I shivered a little at the thought.

  “Do you need some ice? Something to drink? Damnit, Zel, I’ll fucking kill him for touching you.”

  His eyes flashed with the promise of violence, fierce and protective and heartbreakingly sweet all at once. He knelt down in front of me, sitting back on his haunches so that we were eye level. Carefully, he reached for me. The rough tips of his fingers were soft as they caressed their way across my cheek, trailing just barely over the bruises there.

  Instantly, I was sure that I looked terrible. That I was the most hideous thing in the damn room and I felt awful for it, because I wanted him to think I was beautiful. I always wanted him to think that.

  “No, Nester, I…” I only need you, I wanted to say, but just couldn’t. It was enough that he was here; I couldn’t start a fight and risk that. So I fell silent and tried to tell him with my eyes that he meant everything to me.

  His eyebrows pulled down, his eyes trailing over every inch of my face as though to memorize it. Maybe they were scanning for more signs of damage or checking the extent of that damage. Or maybe it was just that they were looking at me.

  He leaned closer to me as his fingertips turned into a palm, cupping my cheek gently and letting his thumb run soft circles over my skin. His gaze flickered to my lips before jerking back up to my eyes. He seemed on the verge of something. Of saying something or thinking something or realizing something about this moment, but I didn’t have any idea what it was or could be. All I knew was that I wanted him forever closer.

  “Nester,” I breathed, my voice a little hoarse still from crying, but not enough that it could hide the desperation that lingered in that one, single word. The need.

  “I know,” he whispered, and in that glorious moment, we were in sync. We just knew what was going on in the other’s head.

  So when he closed the space between us and let his lips ever so gently brush against mine, I wasn’t surprised. My eyes fluttered closed at the contact, and I longed for a deeper kiss. But he barely let our lips touch before he pulled away.

  I snapped my eyes open to look at him and saw him frowning at my lips. “Does it hurt?” he asked, and I remembered that my lip was split open, just a little bit.

  I shook my head. “No,” I told him, my voice breathy and needy. “No, it doesn’t. Not…not when you touch me.”

  That was all the invitation he needed. He crashed his lips against mine again. It did actually sting a little bit, but not enough to make me want to stop. Instead, I wanted more of him. My hands went to his t-shirt, fisting into the material so that I could pull him closer. He obliged, moving to me, while his own hands simultaneously pulled me to the edge of the couch until our bodies touched.

  He was on his knees now in front of me so that he could lift up into the kiss and more effectively press our bodies together. I opened my knees so that his body settled between them. My chest pressed against his as he tried to pull us even closer, his hands on my hips and my lower back, holding me tightly against him as though afraid I might leave him. That I might disappear.

  I’m not going anywhere, I wanted to tell him. I’ll never go anywhere without you ever again.

  But I refused to break the kiss just to waste words. This moment I had been dreaming of forever. I wanted him, touched myself as I thought of him, and it had been too long since anyone had made my body respond like this physically.

  He clutched at me, and I thought, I hoped, that he would rip off my clothes and take me right then and there. Instead, I was surprised by the sudden lifting of my body. He held me tightly in his arms and had stood with me, holding me against him and carrying me without so much of a care.

  I groaned into his mouth as my body shuddered at his strength. His bulging muscles made me shiver with want and his tongue, diving and delving in my mouth, made me wish that I could taste more of him. All of him.

  I wrapped my legs automatically around his middle, wishing we didn’t have so many layers between us, wishing that I could just slide myself a little farther down until I was impaled on his thick length.

  He walked with me wrapped around him through the living room. My eyes were clenched shut tightly as I lost myself in his lips, so I had no idea where we were moving, but after a few steps I felt my back slam hard against a wall. I cried out into his mouth and he growled into mine, the reverberation slipping into my chest and tripping down low into my belly.

  Wetness swelled between my legs and I thought if I didn’t take my pants off soon I would soak right through my panties and my jeans both.

  His hands clutched at my hips, then moved lower to that spot where my thighs turned into the lower curve of my ass. There he squeezed, simultaneously pulling me closer to him and opening my legs wider to fit between them.

  I arched my back against the wall, pushing my crotch into him, sliding against him. I felt the tip of his hardness which tented his slacks, and he groaned. I wanted to grind myself against him, but couldn’t quite slide down low enough to rub along his shaft.

  “Please,” I heard myself beg in a breathless voice, and he groaned in response.

  He pushed me harder into the wall so that his hands could move from my rear to the waistband of my jeans, which were squashed between us. I arched my back again, pushing my pelvis out and he put his left knee beneath me to hold me up so that his hand could work between us. It was difficult and took some maneuvering on both of our parts but he managed to pop the button of my jeans and jerk down my fly.

  “Why couldn’t you wear a damn dress?” he growled at me, the heat in his voice sending tendrils of pleasure running down my spine and across my skin.

  I licked my lips, but didn’t answer him. I was on fire. Because I want you to take off my clothes, I thought, though that wasn’t true in the sense that that was why I had worn the jeans. But I wasn’t going to explain to him the real reason that I’d dressed the way I was.

  There were much better things to focus on now.

  He pulled me away from the wall, our chests slamming together, my hands tangling into his hair as his clutched at my ass again. We were moving, up the stairs this time, though we didn’t make it to the landing before he was pressing me into the wall again, his hand diving beneath my shirt to reach for my chest. He found my bra and tugged at it, pulling one of my breasts free.

  “I’ve always had a thing for your tits,” he said, grinning cheekily at me as he squeezed it before rolling his palm to find the nipple. It hardened and he pinched it between his forefinger and thumb.

  I gasped. “Thank god,” I muttered, and he laughed.

  Our lips crashed once again and instantly our mouths were open so that our tongues could do battle. His hand left my breast to go behind my back, still beneath my shirt. We pulled away from the wall again as his hand searched for the clasp of my bra. He tongued me still, carrying me up the stairs, trying to get my damn bra undone.

  Multitasker. I love it. I felt giddy at our closeness, at the touch that I’d been craving from him for five years.

  We reached the second floor at the same time that he managed to undo my bra. We stumbled into a room, most likely Jackson’s, with a large bed with plain dark blue bedding and only one pillow. I was still kissing him like my life depended on it when we got to the edge of the bed, but a moment later, he pulled away from me.

  I might have whined at him for breaking our kiss, but then he threw me down onto the bed so that I fell onto my back, my legs spreading automatically, my breasts bouncing in the bra that was trying its hardest to slide off of my body.

  “Please,” was all I managed to get out, and it was all he needed.

  Nester jerked his shirt off, revealing an expanse of rock hard chest. There were scars across his abdomen that hadn’t been there before, and I saw the snake tattoo in full now as it wrapped around his large bicep. His large fingers went to the waistband of h
is sweats which were tented with thick desire and it snapped me away from his delicious, strong body to remember that I was essentially fully clothed still.

  Quickly, my fingers went to my shirt, undoing the buttons and cursing the fact that it wasn’t a tee in the first place. Nester growled in appreciation as he jerked down his sweats. I licked my lips at the sight of his massive erection, his cock standing at attention, the bulbous head slick with his own lubricant.

  Deciding I was taking too long—which I happened to agree with—Nester reached for me, going for my pants as I worked to get my shirt undone. He grabbed my jeans by the belt loops and jerked, my ass coming up off the mattress as he yanked them down my hips. He got them about halfway down before he reached for my panties, too, pulling them halfway down my thighs so that my moist nether region was exposed to his lustful gaze.

  “Fuck,” he muttered, one hand sliding up my thigh so that he could let his thumb slip along my wet lips.