Sinful Southern Hero: 2 (17 page)

The barest inch out of her reach, she used the tip of her
middle finger to nudge the box farther over the edge until its weight shifted
and the box tilted down, ready to plunge to the floor and scatter its secrets
over her feet. Before that could happen, she snatched the box out of the air,
fumbled for a heartbeat, then clutched the box to her chest, careful to keep
the lid on tight. Whatever was inside this box, Lucy didn’t want to see it, not
inside this house, not inside this bedroom.

She took enough time to shut the closet door, hoping her
trespassing would go unnoticed until it was too late. She didn’t stop at the
front door and glance behind her, didn’t offer a last look at the home she’d
once thought she would spend the rest of her life in. There was nothing left in
this place Lucy felt the least bit nostalgic about. Nothing that wasn’t tainted
by violence and fear and evil. After locking the front door, she jogged to her
car, set the box on the passenger seat, started her car and backed out of the
drive, squealing the tires in her haste to leave this place behind.

Lucy’s pulse pounded and sweat beaded on her upper lip. At
the stop sign at the end of the street, she placed a hand on the top of the box
that held evidence of her greatest shame, evidence which could, in the right
hands, expose the dark truth of her life, upset the Good ’Ol Boy network at the
police station in her old suburb of Cincinnati and get Ross Vance out of her
life for good.

She made it outside of town before she had to pull her car
to the side of the road. Adrenaline and emotional overload forced her out of
the car, into the ditch and onto her knees where she emptied the contents of
her stomach until all that was left was dry heaves and determination.

Once Lucy was back inside the car, she felt cleansed and new
in the way one felt only after a good hard cry or a poison-expelling vomit
session. After turning her cell phone back on, she ignored all the notices of
messages and missed calls, too exhausted to deal with Dalton and her most
likely unrequited feelings for the big jerk. Instead, she thumbed through her
contacts until she found Abigail’s number and placed the call.

“Lucy? Oh, thank God! Are you okay? Did you make it? Did you
find the pictures? When are you coming back?”

Abigail’s urgent voice and endless questions forced a burst
of laughter out of Lucy. In the background, Lucy heard Jed’s rumbling voice say
“babe” in the tone he used only when speaking to Abbey.

“What?” Abigail snapped, the sound muffled as if she’d
placed a hand over the receiver.

“Abbey, I’m fine,” Lucy said into the phone, hoping to get
the feisty woman’s attention. “I’ve got the box but I haven’t opened it. I
just…can’t. Not alone.”

“Lucy,” Abigail said, her tone heavy with sympathy.

“Text me directions to your house and I’ll come straight
there. It’ll be late, but I’ll come straight there.” She paused. “That is, if
you’re still okay with me staying there. I don’t have to. I can find somewhere
else. I should find somewhere else. I don’t want to drag you in—”

Abigail interrupted her babbling. “You’re staying with us,
damn it, and don’t even think about staying anywhere else. I’ll text you
directions. Drive safe.”

“Okay.” Lucy whispered her reply, then ended the call and
maneuvered her car back onto the road.

The long gravel driveway leading to Jed and Abigail’s house
was shrouded in the kind of darkness only seen after the hour of midnight but
long before the sun begins to rise. Lucy had never been afraid of the dark,
knowing there were more worrisome things to dedicate fear to than the natural
order of night and day. Tonight, she was also too tired after the twelve-hour
round trip drive and the stress of her day to feel emotional about the fact she
was pulling her car up to Jed’s instead of Dalton’s.

Her eyes drooped closed and she jerked her chin up, blinking
hard in an attempt to stay conscious long enough to park. Wrecking her car a
hundred feet from her destination, after everything else that had happened
today, would put a nice brown bow on the shitastic mess which was her life at
the moment.

Once she’d parked and turned the engine off, she twisted in
her seat to retrieve the box. She paused, eyebrows drawn together in thought,
and studied the item in her passenger seat. Such an innocuous bit of cardboard
yet it potentially held her darkest secrets and biggest chance at ultimate
freedom. It was larger than an average shoe box and she had a fleeting thought
that it must have once held a pair of cowboy boots, and she’d never once seen
Ross wear a pair of boots. The box no longer held any identifying signs of what
its original purpose might have been. It’d long since been painted over in a
matte black. Lucy shivered, imagining Ross hunched over the wooden workbench in
his garage, painting this bit of cardboard in preparation for its newly
designated job of holding Lucy’s shame and heartache.

Shaking her head, she grabbed the box, climbed out of the
car and headed up the steps to Jed and Abigail’s porch. Standing on the porch,
light reflected off of something next to the substantial barn situated a short
walk from the house. Squinting into the dark, she recognized Dez’s motorcycle
parked in the shadow of the barn.

She felt a rush of warmth in her chest at the thought Dez
might have stayed here waiting for her even though it was past midnight and he
surely had to work in the morning. She liked Dez. He was proving to be a good
friend and a trustworthy man. If only he made her heart speed and her breath
catch like Dalton.

Putting the thought away for later, she raised her fist and
knocked on the screen door. Before she had time to lower her fist, the inner
door was thrown open to reveal Abigail dressed in capri-length lounge pants and
a sporty racerback tank top. The sight made Lucy smile. She should have known
Abbey wasn’t the negligee and silk robe type.

Abbey pushed the screen open and pulled Lucy inside with a
firm hand on Lucy’s elbow. Lucy was yanked into a bear hug, the box trapped
against her chest.

“Thank Christ,” Abbey whispered.

“Um, yeah. It’s good to see you too.” Lucy cleared her
throat, uncomfortable with such affection.

Abbey backed away far enough to see Lucy’s face, her eyes
searching Lucy’s. “Are you back?” Abbey asked.

What a strange question.
Lucy tilted her head to the
side but didn’t reply, wondering if perhaps Abbey was as delirious with the
need for sleep as she was. “I’m standing here so I guess the answer is yes.”

Abigail’s eyes narrowed. “What do you think of Dalton?”

Caught off guard by the random question, Lucy snorted an
unladylike laugh. “Right now I think he’s a lying dickbag. Why do you ask?”

A smile grew on Abbey’s lips until she shone with a full
grin. “Yeah, you’re back. You had us all scared this morning with your
blank-eyed, detached routine. This is good. Now I won’t have to slap you around
until you snap out of it.”

Abbey led her down a hallway and into an open, spacey
country kitchen. Dez stood near the sink, reclined with his ass pressed to the
counter and his arms crossed over his chest. He might have been posed like a
scary biker but there was mischief in his eyes and a small smile on his lips
that drew attention away from the scar on his face and to his straight, white
teeth. “Well, shit. I stayed up late on the promise of a cat fight.” He focused
his gaze on Abigail. “You sure you don’t want to slap her around, just a little?
We got the bikinis and baby pool full of Jello all ready to go.” He aimed a
wink in Lucy’s direction. “Seems like shame to waste it.”

“Asshole,” Abbey grumbled but smiled to soften the curse.

Jed reached out from his seat at the table to snag Abigail
and pull her onto his lap. She landed with a “hmmph” and crossed her arms over
her chest.

“Well, let’s see it, honey,” Jed said, motioning to the box
Lucy held. “Best to get it over with sooner rather than later.”

Lucy’s hands began to tingle and her feet felt glued to the
floor. He wanted her to reveal the contents of her nightmare, right here, now,
under the bright light of the kitchen ceiling fan while they all looked on? She
began to tremble and her eyes burned with tears.

She didn’t want to look at the pictures alone but she didn’t
know if she could handle these nice, normal people seeing the depths of her
depravity. God only knew what exactly they’d find inside the box. Beyond the
obvious, she’d rather not have her new friends presented with a money shot of
her crotch. It was entirely possible a picture like that could await her
displeasure beneath the square black lid.

Lucy jumped when Dez’s hand landed on the small of her back,
not having seen him move across the room to her. She forced a swallow and
closed her eyes.

“Lucy?”

She shook her head, not able to speak.

“Lucy, look at me,” Dez demanded.

She dared a peek at him out of the corner of her eye, barely
turning her head toward him.

“Whatever we find in that box, whatever we see, no matter
how awful it might be, it won’t change how we feel about you. We’ll still be
your friends, still help you through this, no matter what. Let us help you.”

Dez gave her a gentle push and steered her to the table
before swiftly divesting her of the box that’d been locked against her chest by
both of her arms. After sitting the box in the center of the table, Dez turned
to her. “We’ll see what we’re working with, then decide what to do with it. I
have a connection in law enforcement
a bit
higher up than Ross Vance’s
tiny, bumfucked precinct. If there is anything in here that can be used to nail
your ex’s balls to the wall, I’ll call my contact first thing in the morning.

Lucy nodded but still stammered, “Maybe we should wait.
Until tomorrow. Or later. Just wait to open it until we have a plan.”

Three sympathetic faces stared back at her but no one agreed
with her plan.

“Do you want me to open it?” Abigail asked in a soft tone.

“No. No, I should do it. Don’t you think? I’ll just…” Lucy
sucked a deep breath in through her nose and blew it out slowly between pursed
lips. At the end of the exhalation, she leaned over the table and flipped the
lid off of the box in one quick motion.

Jed, Abigail and Dez spat curses as soon as the contents
were exposed.

“Fuck!”

“Oh, God.”

“I’m gonna kill that motherfucker.”

Lucy stared down into the box, feeling curiously lighter, as
though a weight had been lifted from her soul. She hadn’t imagined her abuse.
It was real. All of it. And she finally had the proof.

* * * * *

Dalton, hands gripped on either side, hefted the heavy steel
post-hole digger as high as his strength would allow before using gravity and
what felt like every muscle in his body to slam the digger into the ground. He
didn’t really need a fence strong enough it could double as a horse corral
surrounding his garden. Hell, he didn’t even need or want a garden all that
much, but repetitive action combined with brutal physical labor was the only
thing that had gotten him through the last week. This and the regular updates
on Lucy provided by Dez.

He lifted the post-hole digger, knuckles white on the
handles, and held it high until his shoulders started to shake before slamming
it into the ground again.

Dez. The prick. Dalton’s foreman sure hadn’t put up much of
a fight when Dalton had tasked him with the job of sticking close to Lucy while
he was still in the doghouse. Lucy hadn’t allowed him to explain about Rachel.
The stubborn woman wouldn’t even let Dalton get close enough to speak to her
about anything. Though Jed swore he and Abigail had explained the situation,
which admittedly still made Dalton look like a dick because he
had
fucked up just a bit, Lucy still wasn’t taking his calls. Despite Jed and
Abigail seeming to be on Dalton’s side, they did damn fine impressions of a
guard dog and a mama bear whenever he tried to slip into Lucy’s office to kiss
some sense into her. Apparently she’d given a “do not disturb” order which his
friends were inclined to enforce no matter what.

He slammed the digger again then paused to wipe sweat from
his brow with his forearm. Flexing his fingers, he cursed at the ache caused by
his fierce grip and lack of work gloves. Pulling a pair of leather gloves from
his back pocket, the pair he’d intended to put on before he started digging
holes, he cursed himself. Shit. He needed to get his head on straight before he
fucked something up and got himself or one of his crew hurt when he went into
work the next morning.

No one would tell him what was inside the box Lucy had
retrieved from her ex’s house. All they’d say was that it was bad, but Lucy was
handling it better than expected. Dalton knew Dez had turned some of the
evidence over to the state investigator he knew from his time in the military
and all signs suggested Ross was lying low. Not being on the front line in
Lucy’s protection, having to trust the word and actions of others with her
safety, was a kick to the nuts of Dalton’s pride. Everything in him rebelled at
taking the backseat.

He was used to being in charge, damn it.
Slam!
Another strike of the post-hole digger resonated through his bones. And if he
had to be subjected to one more too-amused smirk from Dez he was going to break
his best friend’s face.
Slam!
He’d already come close to ripping Dez’s
tongue right out of his stupid face when the guy had the nerve to ask Dalton
if, since Dalton wasn’t getting anywhere with Lucy, he’d mind if Dez gave it a
try himself.
Slam!
Hell yes he fucking minded! Only knowing all his
friends had done to keep Lucy safe kept Dalton from tearing into the guy right
then and there.

Leaving the post-hole digger perched upright in the hole
that was probably too deep for a fence post, Dalton spun on a heel and strode
toward his house. Fuck this. He was going to straighten this shit out with
Lucy,
today
. Right now. Whatever problems they had, they’d work out
together. No more of this hide-and-seek avoidance bullshit.

He slammed through the back door, yanking the sweat-soaked
shirt over his head as he stomped through the kitchen.

And no more sleepovers at Jed and Abigail’s. If it wasn’t
safe or she didn’t feel comfortable staying in her apartment, Lucy would have
her sweet ass in his bed, her crazy mess of red hair splayed on his pillows,
her intoxicating scent on
his
sheets. Even if he had to sleep on the
couch, it would still be better just knowing she was within his reach where he
could protect her and love her like she needed.

He stopped at the bottom of the stairs leading to the second
floor, a hand on the heel of one dust-covered work boot while the other boot
sat sprawled on the floor where he’d tossed it. He squeezed his eyes shut,
finally processing the emotions that had been eating him up and swelling inside
his chest since he first laid eyes on the curvy, sweet-smiling redhead.

Dalton had never imagined falling in love. If he had, he
sure as hell wouldn’t have imagined it hurting so bad, pissing him off so much
or filling him with the contentment and excitement and joy he felt whenever
Lucy was in the room.

“I love her.” Dalton said it out loud to test the words on
his tongue. “I love her,” he said again, this time with more conviction. For
the first time in a week his thoughts stopped skipping and grinding and driving
him mad. It felt as though his gears and sprockets had finally caught and begun
spinning in sync.

He pulled off the remaining boot and climbed the stairs,
determination pushing him forward. He would shower, throw on some clean
clothes, then he’d get his woman. He smiled at his reflection in the mirror
over the bathroom sink as he moved past it to the shower. His grin was feral, a
baring of teeth with no room for the softening effect of dimples. As much as
his friends meant to him, he’d mow the motherfuckers down if they stood between
him and Lucy today.