“Honey. Uh, Evanee.” Her name felt weird in his mouth. “It’s me, Lathan. We need to talk.”
From the moment she’d left him and walked into her room, something had felt wrong, but he’d ignored the feeling. Or tried to. Now he was acting all OCD over her. Obsessed about her safety. Compelled to make sure she was all right. Disordered enough to do it at midnight.
He banged a little harder on the door, feeling the hollow echo underneath his gloved knuckles. “I know it’s late. I just need a minute. Then I’ll leave.”
He waited. She might be sleeping. She might be telling him through the door to come back tomorrow, and he couldn’t hear her. He leaned in, sticking his damaged ears to the crack, trying to make them listen.
Her sweet honey scent floated to him. God, he loved her smell. He inhaled deeply and found garlic and motor oil and gasoline mixed with her.
Garlic? Motor oil? Gasoline?
Junior’s name slammed into his mind harder than a baseball bat upside the head. Adrenaline, or maybe it was fury, gripped every muscle to the point of pain. Only one thing was going to take care of that particular pain. Killing Junior.
Lathan went through the door. He didn’t remember how he got through it; he just went from outside to inside.
It took him less than a picosecond to catalog the scene. What he saw nearly slayed him.
Junior lay over Honey, holding her arms above her head, even though she wasn’t fighting, wasn’t moving. His hand over her mouth. His mouth over her nose. Her nose? What the fuck was he doing to her? Junior raised his head and looked directly at Lathan.
A smile stretched across Junior’s lips. The smile of someone who savored his dominance. The smile of someone who got jacked off by it.
“You don’t touch her.” The words ripped from his throat like a snarling cornered coon.
He was on top of Junior before his brain even sent the message to his body, grabbing him by his shirt, dragging him off her, away from her. Junior tried to hit him, but the blows were less than effectual. Lathan tossed him onto the floor in a dark corner of the room. He kicked into the dark, packing all the force of his fury into the movement. He connected. One. Two. Three. Four. That should keep Junior down for a while.
He turned to Evanee.
She lay in the patch of orangish light spilling in from outside. Her chest bellowed up and down in giant movements. He knelt next to her.
“What did he do to you?”
Her eyes were wild, and fear rolled off her.
“I’m here now. He won’t hurt you anymore.” To keep that promise, he needed to get her out of there. No telling when Junior might get a second wind.
He scooped her up in his arms. She felt so good he buried his face in her hair, inhaling deeply as he stood. She turned into his neck and fisted his shirt in her hand. He ran from the room, heading for the restaurant across the parking lot.
He wanted to punch himself in the head for not listening to the warning in his gut. He’d known. He’d fucking known something bad was going to happen. And what did he do? Spent hours driving around until he stopped—a-fucking-gain—at the carving. The giant, snarling bear sculpted from one big-assed hunk of wood that stood atop a hill outside town. He’d wasted an hour staring at that carving and asking himself why he felt compelled to visit the thing so damned often. Just like every other time, he got no answers.
He shouldn’t have squandered his time on such a useless activity. He should’ve been watching out for her. Protecting her. He’d fucking known Junior would make a play for her. He just hadn’t thought it would be so soon.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I should’ve been here sooner. It’s my fault. My fucking fault.” The words leaped from his mouth before he could contain them.
At least she was alive. Everything else they could deal with. They. Because he was going to act like a tattoo and permanently attach to her. There wouldn’t be a next time when it came to Junior. Or if there was, there wouldn’t be a Junior after next time.
“Call 911,” he yelled the moment he pushed through the door of Sweet Buns and Eats. A trucker three booths in had just stood. Lathan shoved the table full of dishes back with his leg and sat in the empty booth with Evanee.
“Honey?” He tilted her face up to him.
She was purple. Fucking purple. Gasping for air like it was in low supply.
“Shh… Honey. Breathe. Just breathe.”
Her eyes were ravaged, consumed by an agony that went deeper than any physical pain ever could. Her mouth was a horrifying smear of crimson that wasn’t lip gloss.
Fury burned through him. He shook from the power of it.
Cold steel pressed against his temple. A gun. Shit. Fucking damn.
Lathan cut his gaze to the side, expecting to see Junior, but a Mr. Clean impersonator held the shotgun to his head. Mr. Clean backed off a few inches and Lathan faced him.
“…her down real easy and I’ll… arrested without putting any holes in…head.”
Lathan didn’t catch all the words, but he got the gist. He didn’t blink away from the threat. “I’m not letting her go.”
Burning cinnamon flowed off the guy.
Honey straightened, her backbone going rigid one vertebra at a time. She spoke, but Lathan didn’t attempt to hear the words. He was locked on Mr. Clean and the gun aimed at him, which was too close to being aimed at her.
Anger snarled Mr. Clean’s lips and clenched his jaw, but his eyes were full of soft tenderness for Honey. The guy had a fucking thing for her.
Lathan pulled her in closer, and she responded by looping her arm around his neck.
Mr. Clean lowered the shotgun barrel to the floor. Only then did Lathan’s attention go to her words.
“…killed her.”
Killed her? Did he hear that right?
“Stay in here.” Mr. Clean pointed at the floor and ran out the door toward the motel.
A waitress—dressed in shorts so skimpy they might’ve actually been underwear—approached the table. “Evan…okay? Is there anything I can do?”
Evan. The waitress called her Evan. Was that a nickname? Lathan craned his neck in an unnatural position to see Honey’s response.