Unbound (Crimson Romance)
Unbound
Nikkie Locke
Avon, Massachusetts
This edition published by
Crimson Romance
an imprint of F+W Media, Inc.
10151 Carver Road, Suite 200
Blue Ash, Ohio 45242
Copyright © 2012 by Amber Lockhart
ISBN 10: 1-4405-5150-2
ISBN 13: 978-1-4405-5150-5
eISBN 10: 1-4405-5130-8
eISBN 13: 978-1-4405-5130-7
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
Cover art ©123rf.com, ©istockphoto.com/©essenin quijada
This one is for you, girls. You know who you are.
Life wouldn’t be the same without you.
Who else would make boob jokes at my graduation party? Who else would cry when I sold my first book? Who else would call and offer to let me watch their baby during edit week?
I love you girls. Period.
Also, this book is for Chip. Just because.
Contents
Prologue
Thirteen Years Earlier
Peppermints. She always smelled like peppermints. Her skin, her clothes, even her breath smelled like peppermints. He could smell it when she kissed him. Even when he had something on his face and she licked her thumb to rub it off — spit baths, she called them — he could smell the peppermint.
She always carried them in her pockets. Peppermints rolled around in the cup holders of her beat-up station wagon. When he behaved, she shared them with him. Sometimes, even when he didn’t, she let him have them.
He could see her from where he lay on the kitchen floor. Despite the warmth outside, the coolness of the tile gave him chills. Lying on her back, she stared blankly at him. She didn’t answer when he called.
He pushed himself onto his hands and knees. The hard floor hurt his knees, but he couldn’t stand, and he knew he had to move. If he could just reach her, she would be okay.
His hands slipped in the pool around her as he crawled through it. He knew what coated his hands, but refused to think about it. His face ached, throbbing in time with his heartbeat. When he first woke, pain radiated throughout his small body. Throwing up then didn’t ease the sickness he felt in the pit of his stomach as he slowly made his way to her.
He sat up beside her, his leg against her side. The blood on the floor felt cold as it soaked through his jeans and dampened his skin. Working up his courage, he touched her face. The blood on his hands smeared wherever he touched. Her skin felt as soft as always, but it wasn’t warm. He knew then. He knew she was dead.
He opened his mouth to scream. No sound came out. He thought about running for help, but why? No one could bring her back, and he couldn’t leave her alone. Instead, he sat next to her waiting for someone to find them. His tears were hot against his cheeks. He didn’t bother to wipe them away.
She told him stories. She loved stories. Good versus evil with heroes and monsters. The hero always won. He kept people safe, and they loved him for it. He wanted to be a hero.
Real life wasn’t like the stories though. Monsters existed outside her stories. He knew it better than anyone. Sometimes, in real life, the monsters won.
Chapter One
I am way too young to feel this damn old.
The thought came to Payten as she stood up from picking straw wrappers off the floor of her parents’ diner. She threw the paper into the trashcan and rubbed at her back. The late-night dancing at the local bar the night before with her friend Kalvin combined with a long day at the diner added up to an aching back and tired feet. All she wanted was a long, hot bath in the peace and quiet of her home.
I wouldn’t say no to a foot rub from a gorgeous man, as well. Hell, I wouldn’t say no to a foot rub from a total creeper at this point.
She glanced around the front of the diner. The long room was painted a pale blue that hadn’t changed since her childhood. A large, round table with ten chairs took up most of one side of the room. A small table with a four-pot coffee maker was pushed against the wall closest to the front door. Coffee cups hung on the wall above it. Down that same wall, on the other half of the room, four booths with benches covered in faded navy upholstery waited for patrons to fill the diner. Across from the booths, a long counter with bar stools covered in the same upholstery separated the dining room from the kitchen.
The dining room was finally clean after what seemed like hours. She checked her watch. It read twenty minutes after ten o’clock. She tapped at the watch’s face, but it seemed to be working fine. She had only been cleaning for a little more than an hour.
They always leave such a mess.
On Sunday nights, she always opened the diner back up from seven to nine for the town’s youth. She remembered what it was like being a teenager in a small town where the lights went out at six. As a result, she served burgers, shakes, and sweets to the town’s teenagers for an extra couple hours. The jukebox was always too loud, but she loved it. She did not love cleaning up the mess or the pounding headache that usually resulted from said jukebox.
A quiet rap on the locked front door pulled her out of her moping. Her best friend waved from the other side of the glass. Hopping up, she moved quickly to unlock the door.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, tugging her friend into the warmth of the diner and relocking the door behind her.
“What? A girl can’t come visit?”
Payten rolled her eyes, even as she hugged Britt. “You were here for lunch.”
“Oh, yeah.” Bridgett shrugged. “Dad and Aaron are making poor Michael watch
Rambo
. I bailed on him.”
“‘Poor Michael?’ I’ll bet he’s loving it.”
Bridgett snorted. “Yeah, he is. I thought I’d come walk you home. Figured you’d be about done.”
“Almost,” Payten replied. “Coop,” she called into the kitchen. “You done?”
Plate and rag in hand, he stepped into view. “No, ma’am.”
She rolled her eyes. She and Cooper had worked together in the diner since she was sixteen. He was two years older than her.
“Don’t call me ma’am. You’re older than I am.”
“I know,” he told her with a wink. “How’s Bridgett?”
Bridgett grinned. “Doing good. How’s that wife of yours?”
“According to what she told me an hour ago, she feels like a bloated elephant waiting to give birth to a whale.” He winced. “I get to rub her feet when I get home.”
“So, you wouldn’t mind finishing up here while I steal Payten?” Bridgett asked.
“Not in the least.”
“Shame on you,” Payten said as they followed him back into the kitchen.
Still rubbing at the bone-dry plate in his hand, he replied, “Oh, yeah. I’m a terrible husband.”
Payten knew he was lying through his teeth. Cooper adored his delicate, sweet wife.
Near the back door, she grabbed her coat off a hook. Her apron took its place. She tossed Bridgett her purse. Since it was Bridgett’s fault the damn thing was so huge — getting her addicted to humongous purses after giving her one for her birthday — she could carry the darn thing.
“I’ll owe you both one,” she told him, shrugging into her coat.
“Add it to that Christmas bonus.” He laughed.
“Later, Coop,” Bridgett said, following Payten out the door.
The cold hit her full force, pushing heavily against her chest. Then again, she wasn’t exactly dressed for it. The warm fleece coat zipped up the front, covering her black McFly shirt. Bridgett had gotten it for her at a Dublin concert.
Her jeans were probably not the warmest choice she could have made when getting dressed that morning. They were rubbing a little thin in places, but the dark denim jeans were her favorite pair. She compensated for the lack of warmth by wearing knee-high athletic socks. A pair of black Nikes completed the look she liked to think of as “Diner Chic.” It was much better than what their friend Andie had dubbed it. Hers had been more along the lines of “Not Even Trying.”
Underneath the outfit, she wore a red silk bra and matching panties.
Not that it matters
, she thought with a sigh.
No one will be seeing them anytime soon.
“It’s so freaking cold,” she muttered. “Not the night for a walk.”
Bridgett shrugged. “Just thought it might be nice.”
Payten couldn’t count the number of times Bridgett had shown up at the diner to walk her home. When she turned sixteen, her parents had started letting her close the diner during the week. Bridgett arrived nightly to walk her home. They talked about everything under the sun and more. Bridgett was her friend and constant companion. Bridgett living in Ireland the past four years hadn’t changed that. Cold or no cold, she was so in for this walk.
“Let’s go,” she replied.
From experience, she knew it would take Bridgett a bit to start talking. The walk to her house was only four short blocks from the diner, but seeing her breath cloud as it left her mouth made it impossible to forget the cold. Without a conversation to distract her, she decided to focus on other things.
She planned her to-do list in her head. She’d already written it down, but a mental review couldn’t hurt.
Wrap presents, make dessert for Christmas dinner at Grandma’s, do the laundry, check e-mail, call Betsy about last minute vendor at the New Year’s celebration.
She briefly considered calling Betsy the next day. She remembered Betsy’s one
A.M.
phone call from several days before and changed her mind. Betsy was her manic volunteer on the planning committee. If Betsy could call at one in the morning, Payten could call her at eleven. It sounded fair to her. Then again, Betsy was her only volunteer on the planning committee.
“So,” Bridgett drawled.
Here we go,
she thought. “So what?”
“Seeing anybody?”
She winced.
Not this again.
“Nope.”
She could see Bridgett glance over at her from the corner of her eye. Her friend’s disgusted frown was comical enough to almost make the worn-out conversation worth repeating.
“My mom says that the Wilson kid is single,” Bridgett offered.
She snorted. “Bennie is fourteen years old, Britt. He should be dating your sister, not me.”
“Not Bennie, doofus. The other one.”
Payten frowned. “Wait. You mean Shelia? Britt, you don’t seriously think — ”
She stared at Bridgett astonished for a minute. The fact that Britt couldn’t meet her gaze and couldn’t suppress her grin gave her away.
“Britt!” Her friend burst into laughter, and Payten laughed along. “You really had me going there for a second. Jeez.”