CRAVE - BAD BOY ROMANCE (15 page)

“Don't touch me,” I whispered.

“Have it your way,” he said. “That
doesn't mean I'm going anywhere. I'm going to tear this place part, which is
what I should've done the last time I had a chance to do it.”

“Why didn't you, then?”

Thrace snarled. “Because that fucker
came back.”

Cade. He was talking about Cade. “Yeah?
So what?” I asked, trying to draw out as many details as I could. If Thrace was
talking, there was still a chance. I did my best not to glance in the direction
of the kitchen, where the gun lay on the table out in the open. If I could get
to it first, I could turn this around.

At least for now.

“So what?” Thrace was obviously
agitated, and for a moment I thought he'd reach across and hit me. The very
mention of Cade's name seemed to infuriate him. I filed that away hopeful I'd
be able to use it later. “What do you mean ‘so what’? Your boyfriend has gone
Boy Scout the last year or so. There's no telling what he would've done if he
found me standing over your Grandmother's body. I knew she’d make arrangements
for the deeds to go to someone else, so when she wouldn't give them up all I
had to do was be patient.”

“You better go then,” I said. “Because
Cade's not out of the picture.”

“Don't get your hopes up, sweetie.
The cops won't be able to hold him for long, not on something as flimsy as
fingerprints on a crowbar, but you can be damn sure they know better than to
let him go without calling me first. No, for the moment he's locked up tight.”

I believed him. Just judging by how
angry he got when he thought of Cade interrupting him last time, I knew he
would've taken precautions this time around. We'd played right into his hands,
and he wasn't going to squander the opportunity again.

I sought that central place that
would let me get through this and said, “All right, then. If you're so sure the
deeds are here, you may as well have a look.”

Thrace flashed me a toothy smile. “Don't
mind if I do.” With that, he moved past me and said “You stay right there now,”
 
over his shoulder at me.

Here was the gamble. If he turned
left and went to the kitchen, indeed if he so much as glanced in that direction
he’d seethe gun and the game would be up. But if he went right… Well, if he
went right he'd head toward the bedroom and find nothing, and I'd get the
opportunity I needed to run for the gun and turn the tables on Thrace once and
for all.

Left
, my inner voice practically
screamed.
He's going to go left
. I
could see it before it happened, in that strange vision like quality that had
touched me a time or two since I’d been here in Louisiana. He was going to go
left and my plan would be destroyed before it had even gotten off the ground.

“I haven't found anything,” I
whispered, letting my voice tell the lie badly. “Please just leave me alone.”
Once I knew I had his attention I wiped absently, almost subconsciously, at the
dirt stains on the thighs of my jeans.

It worked. Thrace thought he saw
through me, and when his gaze flicked to my eyes I let them dart for a moment
to the hallway that led to the bedroom before giving him my best crestfallen
expression.

He bought it, hook, line and sinker.
After all, who finds something buried in the dirt and then re-berries it hours
later? Nobody, normally.

Nobody except me.

“So that's how it is, you stupid
bitch?” he asked. “You think it's that easy to outsmart me, do you?” He turned
and strode down the hallway toward the bedroom.

The moment he was out of sight I was
on my feet. It didn't matter if he heard me, not now. Speed, that was the
important thing. I needed to be able to beat him to the gun, and to do that I
was going to need to use every ounce of strength and agility and adrenaline-soaked
ability that I had.

He was fast too. Incredibly fast. I
heard him pounding behind me in his heavy boots. Thrace was closing in on me already
and I was hardly halfway there. As I entered the kitchen I felt his hand loop
around my waist. I purposely crashed into the doorframe to loosen his grip, and
was rewarded with freedom as I heard him smash into the wall behind me.

I dove for the gun as he grabbed my
ankle. The table went over, and so did I. I heard the gun clattered to the
ground, saw it skitter across the old linoleum like a cockroach caught in the
open when the lights snap on. It made it all the way to the pantry before
banging up against the wall, and I lashed out with my heel and grimaced when I
felt Thrace’s nose crunch beneath it.

It was a race. The winner got the
gun, and the loser lost everything.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

The
palm of my hand landed on the gun just as Thrace grabbed my wrist. I screamed,
kicking back at him again but he was already on top of me. He was strong,
incredibly strong and he climbed up my body to snatch the gun out of my hand. I
fought for dear life because that's exactly what this was. Life or death.

I tried to get my finger on the
trigger. Even though the gun was facing away from both of us, I thought maybe
if I could at least squeeze off a shot or two someone would finally call the
police. Looking the other way while outsiders were intimidated was one thing,
but flat out letting a murder happened under their nose must surely be
something else entirely. Right?

Except wasn’t that exactly what had
happened to my Grandmother?

Regardless, it didn't look like I was
going to get the chance to find out. Thrace twisted the gun out of my hand and
pressed his powerful forearm into the back of my neck as he got to his feet,
grinding my face against the ground painfully in what felt like one animal forcing
another to submit. “Stand up,” he barked.

I did as I was told. I didn't have
much choice, and compliance felt like the only way to drag this out. I didn't
want to give him the deeds, but I'd rather that than lose my life.

I turned to face him, trying to read
his expression. Was this more bluff than real? If they wanted me dead, they
could have made it happen any of a hundred times. Even if Cade had been looking
out for me, I'd had my guard down for most of my stay. They could have run me
off the road or riddled my car with bullets on the way into town if they felt
like it. They didn't have to resort to shouting threats across a crowded
funeral party if their goal was another corpse.

No, they were being careful for a reason.
They’d either known or guessed that the deeds would pass to me, but they had no
idea who would get them when
I
went
into the ground. Neither did I, for that matter.

As underhanded as they were, even the
Gravedigger Union knew that you couldn't simply show up with the deed to a
place and legally own it. There had to be a paper trail. You had to pay
mortgage transfer fees and the various other taxes and tariffs which made
everyone hate the government so much. If I were dead, their ownership of the
clubhouse would be farther from them, not nearer.

And so I resolved to act. “I found a
wooden box last night, I told him. Inside was a big ring of keys, and some of
them looked to be as old as the turn of last century. There were a bunch of
deeds, too. I flicked through them but I didn't know what to do. So I put them
back.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” he
grinned wickedly. “Where are they now?”

“Where I found them.”

He tossed me a look of warning. It
was clear he wasn't in the mood to be pushed any farther than I’d already
pushed him. “And where is that?”

I pointed toward the backyard. “In Cade's
place. He wasn't here last night, so he couldn't stop me looking. I figured my Grandma
had kept him around because he scared you guys off, which meant the smartest
place to put something she wanted kept away from you would be with him.”

Thrace didn't like the way I talked
about him being afraid of Cade, but he didn't deny it either. “Let's go then.”
He dragged me to my feet by my hair and spun me around before pushing me in the
direction of the back door.

I reached out and gently opened it.
Thrace was gloating already, and when I darted away from him I had just enough of
a head start to leap over the rotten backstairs and evade his grasp.

“God dammit,” I heard him mutter as
his fingers grabbed for my hair again and came away with only a few stray
strands. “You just don't learn, do you?”

No, it appears I didn't. Nor did I risk
looking back over my shoulder, but I heard a crunch of wood and a sick crack of
bone as his headlong pursuit was brought to a sudden end by the trap I'd
accidentally set for him earlier and purposefully led him into now.

I could tell by his screams of rage
that I hadn't succeeded in knocking him out, and I didn't hear the clatter of
metal and concrete which probably meant he still had the gun. But I'd hurt him,
even if it was only temporary. I was going to take my lead and make good use of
it.

I sprinted through the backyard,
taking a left Cade's house and bursting onto the street like a woman possessed.
I didn't know where to go. My car was in the driveway, but my keys were back
inside on the nightstand where I’d left them.

I took a right once I hit the
sidewalk instead, and yanked at the garage door attached to Cade's place.
Thankfully, whether it was small town values or simply the knowledge that no
one would dare steal from him, the door wasn't locked. It swung up towards the
ceiling freely, and as I stepped inside the motion sensor made the florescent
lights stuttered into life. His bike was here, and his keys were in the same
place they always were on the workbench.

I'd watched him start it. I'd been
mesmerized by his hands as they went through the gears, nimble and solid as any
machine. I thought I could duplicate his actions and ride like hell.

“Well, Rachel,” I whispered to myself
under my breath, “Only one way to find out.”

And I did.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

I guess
you could say it was like riding a bike. A huge, ungainly, powerful bike that
threatened to tip over and crush me beneath it if I dared to slow down even for
a moment, but a bike nonetheless.

Once I got the hang of the throttle
and the gears enough to think that I might be able to make it to my destination
without crashing into a flaming heap, I had to decide where I was going. I
didn't know many places in town, and I
certainly
didn't understand the politics of who owned what and where their allegiances
lay.

If I weren't careful, I'd run the
risk of hopping off the bike and landing in even more trouble, if that was even
possible. As it was, I didn't think Thrace would be very far behind. I had to
watch out for him and both of his cronies, all the while navigating strange
streets and unfamiliar networks.

There was one place though… Cade had
mentioned it yesterday, when he was worried that he'd be picked up by the cops as
we left Jessica’s dress shop. A bar. Somewhere where he felt I'd be safe until
he could come and collect me. It wasn't much, but it was just about the only
thing I had to go on and I was desperate enough to try it.

What had it been called, again? Finn’s?
Flick’s?

Finnegan’s. That was it. Because the
town was small and it was all I knew in the area I was already headed for it.
It wasn't hard to find the street the dress shop was on either, and Cade had
said that the bar was at the end of it.

I turned heads as I rumbled down the
main street. Even if the locals didn't recognize Cade's Harley, I was sure they
didn't often see a woman like me riding a bike like this solo.
Oh well
, I thought to myself.
It can't be helped
. There was no doubt
that word of this would get back to Thrace and maybe even the cops, but what
was I supposed to do about that?

Nothing, that's what.

I stopped the motorcycle around
behind the bar since I didn't want it to be visible from the street, not if I
could help it. The engine dipped to a low growl and I turned the key to cut it
off. After wrestling with the kickstand for a couple of seconds my heel finally
caught it just right and it snapped into place before I carefully leaned the
bike to the left and climbing off the back of the Harley.

I know it was a little thing, but I
was pretty pleased with myself that I hadn't scratched his bike. I guess you
have to take small victories when you have them, no matter the circumstances.

Another thought struck me, this one
much more worrying. What if the bar was closed? What then?

It won't be
, I told myself.
It won't be because it can't be, because if it is then I'm screwed
.

Well, I guess I couldn't argue with
that sort of logic. Not that arguing would do me any good anyway. I hurried to
the door and gave it a solid push, breathing an audible sigh of relief when it
swung open.

I'd expected darkness and dinginess
inside, but that's not what greeted me. Instead the decor reminded me of
nothing so much as the wooden box Grandma had left the deeds in. Everywhere I
looked I saw polished walnut or cherry wood, worn smooth by a thousand thousand
hands over who knew how many years.

I was immediately comforted by how
empty it was. There was a bartender, though he didn't even look up when I hurried
inside. Other than him, there was only one other person in Finnegan’s.

Cade.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN