All Chained Up (19 page)

Knox nodded, not knowing what to say. Or think. He settled for, “Okay, Uncle Mac.”

His uncle released his arm with a satisfied nod as if the matter were resolved. Knox went to his room. It was exactly the same as when he graduated from high school. Same trophies and plaid quilt comforter. Even his old baseball mitt sat on the dresser. When he entered this room, he felt like he was stuck in a time warp. A teenager again and not a man that had lived through all he had.

Suddenly, the air felt too tight in his lungs. He had to get out of here. Turning, he headed back down the hall.

“Hey, I'll be back later, Uncle Mac. Don't wait up.”

Uncle Mac waved from his chair, his eyes gleaming with satisfaction. He probably thought his talk did some good and Knox was going out to live it up.

Knox didn't know where he was going. He only knew that he couldn't sit in that room tonight, reflecting on his lost boyhood. Before everything went to hell. Especially with his uncle's words echoing all around him:
Find someone to spend your life with . . .

He made it sound so simple. Like he could go pick out a woman, decide to be happy, and all would be well. Nothing was that simple.

He drove down the county road until he hit the highway. Then he passed Roscoe's and kept going, heading into Sweet Hill. He drove almost blindly, some other force, a deep-­buried instinct, guiding him. The way Briar had looked before she turned and left him in the back of Roscoe's. That nagged at him, tangling with all the other bullshit weighing on him. He was a Grade A asshole who treated nice girls like shit. And his uncle thought he deserved happiness.

His uncle didn't get it. Knox had tossed out any chance for a life like that when he was twenty. Sometimes you fucked up so badly, you didn't get a chance for normal. You definitely didn't get a chance for happiness. His uncle didn't realize that.

But he did.

 

TWENTY-ONE

W
ITH HER FACE
scrubbed free of makeup and her hair pulled back into its usual ponytail, Briar felt more like her old self. She certainly didn't feel like the strange creature that got down on her knees in the back of Roscoe's. Where anyone could see her. Where someone
had
seen her. That wasn't her. She didn't do those things. Really.

With a miserable groan, she fell sideways face-­first into one of the couch pillows.

She didn't know what she had been thinking. That this fling could keep going? That it could be something real? That it could last? She had been listening to Shelley too much when she should have asked herself what Laurel would do.

She reached for the pack of M&Ms on the table and tore into it. Pouring several into her hand, she tossed them into her mouth. Once she let him know she wasn't pregnant, he had cut ties. She wouldn't embarrass herself and chase after him anymore.

When the ­couple on her television screen started kissing, she punched the remote control with more force than necessary and raced through channels, images blurring until she stopped on a rerun of
The Walking Dead.

Perfect. Nothing sappy. Just what she needed. A little pulse-­pounding action and horror.

Her phone buzzed on the coffee table and she hesitated before answering it. It was probably Shelley sending a well-­meaning text, calling Knox a jerk and telling her she could do better. Like she had the entire drive home. Only it didn't make her feel
better
. It made her feel worse.

Her phone gave a reminder ding and she sighed, snatching it off the table. The last thing she wanted was Shelley knocking on her door. A very real possibility if she ignored her text.

When she spotted Knox's name at the top of the text she choked on an M&M. Lurching up from the couch, she held the phone in both hands as though it might suddenly fly away.

A single word stared at her from her phone.
Sorry
.

Why was he sorry? She waited, staring at her phone and wondering if he would elaborate. Her fingers flew over the keys, not bothering to wait to see.
Why??

She waited as he typed back. When his words burst to life on the screen of her phone, she sucked in a breath.
Open the door.

She bounded off the couch and stared at the door as if it were an animal that might spring to life and bite her.

Knox was on the other side of that door. Why?
What did he want?
After tonight, she was certain he wouldn't be dropping by anymore.

She quickly typed back.
Don't think that's a good idea.

Instantly, he replied.
Please.

Her chest clenched. It was tempting, but a recipe for disaster. Her fingers flew over the keys.
We have nothing left to say.

“Briar, open the door.” His commanding voice carried through the door. “Please,” he added.

Her phone slipped through her fingers and thudded to the floor. The “Please” was her undoing.

She moved toward the door, unbolting the top lock.

Her chin shot up. This wouldn't be another booty call. She wouldn't be used . . . or use him. Not anymore.

Before she could reconsider, she yanked the door open. Knox stood there in the same black T-­shirt and jeans from earlier, still looking bigger than life and sexy as hell in the frame of her doorway. A plastic grocery bag dangled from his hand.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded, refusing to let the sight of him wreak havoc on her senses and undermine her determination to resist him.

He surveyed her, looking her up and down, making her acutely conscious that she was braless under her T-­shirt. Her face burned and she blinked, hoping she didn't bear the evidence of the chocolate she had been inhaling like oxygen.

“I came to say I was sorry for the way I was with you earlier and . . . to see if you're okay.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “You wanted me to leave. I left.” Only after she had flung herself at him. Heat crept up her face and her composure threatened to crumble. “No big deal,” she added with a shrug.

“Yeah. Well. I could have been less . . . harsh.”

A short laugh escaped her. “Do you know how to be any other way?”

“I can be . . . not harsh,” he responded without the faintest smile.

“
Not
harsh? You can't even bring yourself to say
nice
.”

He nodded slowly, scrubbing a hand over his dark cropped hair. Her belly contracted as she watched him. She knew the shape of his skull. The velvet texture of his hair against her palm and fingers.

“Well, I'm not nice. I know that, but I'm trying to make this right with us.”

“You can't, Knox. It's done. We're done.” She moved to shut the door in his face but he stopped her, wedging his boot in the way and preventing her.

With a growl, she yanked the door back open. “What are you doing here?”

He lifted his hand and dangled the bag between them. “Dammit, Briar. I brought you this.”

She stared at the bag, able to make out the Ben and Jerry's logo through the thin plastic.

She shook her head, at a loss. “You brought me ice cream?”

He lifted one shoulder. “Yeah. I'm sorry I was a dick. I didn't mean to hurt you tonight. I wasn't trying to do that.”

She opened her mouth, ready to ask him what it was he had been trying to do. Or maybe, more importantly, what he was trying to do
now
. But then something made her snap her mouth shut.

He held the bag up higher between them. “This ice cream is melting.”

She hesitated only a moment before stepping aside. “It'd be a shame to let it melt. We should eat it. I guess.”

He stepped inside, and she shut the door after him.

“I guess so,” he agreed, his expression unreadable.

An eruption of screams exploded on her wide screen. She glanced over her shoulder to catch Rick busting zombie ass.

Facing Knox again, she caught him looking in that direction.

“You like scary movies?” he asked.

“The Walking Dead,”
she replied unthinkingly, glancing at that bag in his hand, feeling some of her anger slip away as she struggled to wrap her head around the fact that he had brought her ice cream. All her girl parts heated and quivered as she remembered what he did with ice cream last time.

“Never heard of it.”

She blinked, shaking off her erotic memories. “You've never heard of
The
Walking Dead
? Where've you been? Under a rock?”

“Just prison.”

“Oh.” Her face burned. “There are TVs in prison,” she reminded him.

“I never spent much time in the rec room watching TV.”

No, from the looks of him he had spent all his time working out, honing his body into a weapon that could protect him while he was in there.
And me
. The reminder of what he had done for her, how he had saved her, was never far, but right now it went a long way in softening her toward him.

He moved ahead of her, sinking down on her couch. He seemed to dominate everything, making the space of her living room somehow tighter, but not in a bad way. It just seemed cozier. It felt more like a home with him in it. Dangerous thinking.

She fetched two spoons from the kitchen and returned, sinking down on the couch beside him, careful to leave space between them. “Well, c'mon. It's a marathon. We're halfway through season two but I'll catch you up.”

She pulled the carton out of the bag, pausing when she looked at it. Her face warmed. “Cherry Garcia,” she murmured, easing off the lid. “My favorite.”

“Yeah. I remember.” His voice had gone all gravelly. Her gaze cut to him. His bright blue eyes went dark as they stared at her face, then lowered, dropping to her chest. Her breasts grew aching, straining against her T-­shirt, nipples hardening as she remembered his fingers rubbing cold ice cream on her, followed by the hot swipe of his tongue. The nip of his teeth. The squeeze of his fingers.
Oh. God.

She dug her spoon into the semisoft ice cream and shoved it into her mouth, hoping that would cool off the sudden heat of arousal swamping her.

She handed him a spoon and he dug in, taking a big bite. She pointed her spoon at the TV. “That's Rick and that's Shane. They used to be best friends . . . but at this point Shane has gone kind of bonkers.”

They watched the drama unfolding on the screen for several more moments. She inserted explanations when necessary. Even though she'd seen it before, she gasped when Rick stabbed Shane.

“Well, that was coming,” Knox declared.

She snorted. “Oh, like you absolutely knew that was going to happen.”

“He wanted Rick's wife for himself.”

“So?”

“Rick was gonna kill him,” he answered, as if it were the most simple explanation in the world.

“How do you know that? You've just started watching—­”

“It's a zombie world, right? Normal rules of society don't exactly apply.”

She looked at Knox, studying the hard set to his features and realizing that he had lived in a place where the normal rules of society didn't apply. When he'd come to her rescue in the HSU, he had been primitive. An animal uncaged.

He had lived in a place void of civilization. Maybe, in his mind, he still lived there. That's what set him apart. He had an edge to him even out here. He always would.

They were still staring at each other when he calmly added, “A man has to defend what's his.”

Had he seen her as his then? Even in that prison? It was crazy. He certainly didn't view her like that now. He might be here, but it was just because he felt sorry for the way things went down between them at Roscoe's and wanted to make amends.

She looked back at the TV, just in time to watch as a full-­scale zombie herd started attacking everyone.

“Wow,” he announced at the end of the episode. “That was pretty intense.”

“Good, right? Want to watch the next one?”

He nodded, and she settled back down on the couch, not minding anymore that their shoulders touched. It actually felt . . . companionable. For a fleeting moment she wondered if this could be the start of a friendship between them. Was that even possible? Could they be friends after everything?

She focused on the TV screen. Of course, it didn't escape her notice that they were starting the season where the group took refuge from the zombies in a prison. Apparently Knox noticed that plot point, too.

“You'd never see me back in a prison,” he said after a while.

“But it's fortified. It has walls and fences. Makes sense that they can keep the zombies out of there,” she argued. “Otherwise they're risking themselves out in the woods—­”

“I wouldn't care.” He shrugged and she let the matter drop. Obviously he would feel that way, but then she couldn't help the next question from slipping out of her mouth.

“Do you regret it?” She felt his stare on the side of her face, and forged on, fixing her gaze on the screen as she asked what had always been in the back of her mind, lurking, a shadow that wouldn't fade. “What you did . . . do you regret it?'

“Do you know what I did?'

She shook her head.

“I served out my sentence,” he responded, his tone revealing nothing.

“That's not an answer.”

“I'll never do it again, if that's what you're asking me. I won't go back there.”

Not exactly an admission of regret, and she wanted to know. As frightened as she was to hear it, she wanted to know what he had done. She wanted to know his crime. She
needed
to know. As though it would complete her picture of what manner of man he truly was. As though hearing him admit it all would once and for all relegate him to a category marked DO NOT TOUCH.

“What did you do?” she whispered.

He said nothing for a while. The air crackled between them. The sounds of the television echoed within the space of her condo. She stared at the TV screen as though she wasn't breathlessly waiting for his answer.

The silence ate at her, gnawing at her composure until she had to turn and face him.

His gaze was locked on her, his blue eyes bright and intense, his body wound tighter than a spring beside her. “You want to know what I did to get locked up?'

She nodded, unblinking.

“You don't think I'm innocent? You don't think it was a mistake?” He smirked, that corner of his mouth kicking up.

She lifted one shoulder in a half shrug. “Was it?”

His lips curled now into a full-­fledged smile that set loose dark and wicked things inside her. “No.” He inched closer, his big shoulders angling so he faced her more fully on the couch. His fingers brushed her cheek, making her skin pucker to gooseflesh. “You know what I am.”

“What's that?”

“I'm guilty.”

“Guilty of what?”

“Murder.”

She gulped, fighting against the sudden lump in her throat. “Who?”

His gaze flicked over her face, assessing before he answered. “One night my cousin went on a date. She was seventeen. Shy. She hadn't been on many dates. Never had a boyfriend before. This boy took Katie to a party where he raped her.” Briar inhaled sharply but said nothing, afraid that a word from her would put an end to the recounting. “Everyone at the party . . . his friends . . . they all backed him up and said she wanted it. That she had been all over him. It was her word against theirs. My brother and I paid the boy a visit to get him to admit what he had done to her. We wanted the truth out of him. We wanted him to stop lying.” He nodded, his gaze faraway, as if he was there now. “We went there to get him to admit what happened. We wanted justice for Katie. Yeah, we wanted to hurt him. I don't deny it, but we didn't set out to do that. When he started mouthing off and calling her dirty words and saying things about her—­” He stopped hard, his throat working as he swallowed.