Roni Loren - Caught Up In You

Police sirens wailed in the background, echoing against the buildings.

Wyatt eased the pressure and smiled. “I’ll be sure to do that. In a minute.”

The guy closed his eyes, sagging in Wyatt’s grip.

An hour and an ice pack later, Wyatt sat on the back steps outside the restaurant, watching as the last cop car pulled away. He’d asked them to make sure to not release details of the event. The last thing he needed was the press picking this up. His father would love that. Kelsey, who’d been standing at the end of the alley, turned around. She had her arms wrapped around herself and carried a hollow look in her eyes.

When she got close, he lowered the ice pack and saw the tears that shimmered in her eyes. “I am so sorry, Mr. Austin. Is it bad?”

He set the ice pack aside, pushed himself to stand, and dusted off his slacks. “Please, I think we’ve moved on to the stage where you can call me Wyatt. And I’m fine. I’m more worried about you. Did he hurt you?”

She shook her head and a thousand responses seemed to touch her lips in rapid time, her mouth twitching. But after a few too many failed attempts at speaking, she simply flung herself at him, stunning him with a hug. His arms went out to his sides as if they’d forgotten the proper response to being embraced, and he looked down his body at the woman he’d so often imagined touching.

“Thank you,” she whispered into his shirt.

God, she was warm. And her scent … Who’d have ever thought bacon and maple syrup could smell so goddamned perfect on a woman? The thought that anyone would want to harm her had his rage firing up anew.

Unable to hold back any longer, he gave into the urge and wrapped his arms around her, holding her against him as she let the adrenaline and the emotions drain out of her.

The back door of the restaurant cracked open, and the kid from the kitchen peeked out, concern weighing heavy on his boyish features. He’d come outside a few times to check on Kelsey, and Wyatt had instantly liked him. “You okay, baby girl?”

Kelsey stepped out of Wyatt’s embrace with an apologetic smile and swiped at her face. “I’m fine, Nathan. Thanks for checking on me. And for calling the cops.”

“I’ve only got an hour left on my shift. Want me to give you a ride home after?” Nathan asked, looking between her and Wyatt.

“I—”

“I’ve got her,” Wyatt said, cutting her off.

Kelsey’s head whipped around. “Mr. Au— Wyatt, you don’t have to do that.”

“You worked all night and you’ve had a hell of a morning. You don’t need to be waiting around here. I want you in bed.”

Nathan’s eyebrows disappeared beneath his shaggy bangs.

“Resting,” Wyatt clarified.

Kelsey actually gave him a half smile on that one, some of the color coming back into her cheeks. “Yes, sir.”

He should’ve told her to drop the sir. But for reasons he’d rather not examine at the moment, he wasn’t in a hurry to stop hearing that little gem roll off her lips.

He pressed his hand to the small of her back to lead her back up the stairs, reciting in his head: Too young. Too sweet. Too messy.

TWO

Kelsey stared out the side window of Wyatt’s BMW, trying to get her skin to stop crawling and her heart to stop its attempt to bust out of her chest. When Howie Miller had stepped into the restaurant, it was like being yanked back eighteen months—her life rewinding and then hitting the play button at the shittiest part.

Well, almost the shittiest part.

She’d been so careful. Had picked up and moved her whole life to a completely new area. She’d even registered her apartment and all her utilities under another name. And the cops had said they would never reveal that she’d been the informant. But the look in Howie’s eyes when he’d pushed her against the wall had said he knew exactly whose information had put his brother in jail. If Wyatt hadn’t followed her out there and distracted him … She didn’t even want to think about it. In that world, being a snitch was a capital offense. And Howie had looked more than ready to mete out her punishment.

Wyatt, who’d been quiet for the last few miles, glanced over at her. The lingering anger over what Howie had done hovered there in the tense lines of his face and his grip on the wheel. He looked as if he wanted to beat up the guy all over again. “What did that punk want with you? I’m guessing it wasn’t a random attack.”

“No, it wasn’t,” she said, turning back toward the window, wishing she didn’t have to have this conversation with Wyatt. Wyatt, who only knew her as the chatty waitress and his brother’s friend. Nothing else. None of the ugly stuff. She’d hoped it could remain that way.

“Was he an ex or something?”

She grimaced, the idea making her stomach turn. “God, no.”

Wyatt blew out a breath like that was the best news he’d heard all day. “Then what?”

She glanced down at her hands, fiddling with the silver bracelet she’d treated herself to when she’d celebrated her first year sober. That day had felt like such a fresh start, like a new life was there for the taking. But apparently the dregs of her past were determined to stir up and muddy everything again. “I helped put his brother in jail a while back. He wasn’t supposed to know it was me, but I guess he figured it out and was coming to pay me back.”

“Christ,” he said under his breath as he took the turn toward her apartment complex. “Thank God he’s going to be behind bars now, too.”

“Yeah, we’ll see how long that lasts,” she said dryly.

Wyatt flexed his fingers against the steering wheel again, those big, beautiful hands of his knotted with tension. “You need to file a restraining order on him when you get home. Just to be safe.”

She had to fight back the scoff that wanted to jump out of her throat. Restraining orders were worth about as much as the ink used to sign them. In her experience, they usually just served to instigate the person further—like waving a flag at a crazed bull. “Sure. Will do. My building’s the one there on the right.”

“You’re humoring me,” he said, displeasure coloring his tone as he swung the car into a parking space.

“I’m sorry,” she said, letting her head fall back against the seat, exhaustion setting in now that the adrenaline had left her system. How long had it been since she’d slept? She couldn’t quite remember. “I’m not trying to be flip. I just—everything was going so well and now I have this to deal with. I want to throttle that asshole.” She opened her eyes, staring forward. “Is it supposed to be this hard to live a drama-free life?”

She caught his smirk in her peripheral vision. “Some people would call drama-free boring.”

She turned her head toward him. “Boring sounds amazing .”

He smiled fully now. His jaw was still a little swollen from the punch, but that didn’t reduce the impact of the expression. God, he was gorgeous when he let that grin slip through, lighting up all those dark features and revealing the dimples hidden beneath. He smiled so infrequently that it felt like a gift each time it happened, like she’d won some secret contest.

She stayed where she was, enjoying the close-up view of him too much to look away. But in the small space of the car, the ocean blue of his eyes darkened behind his glasses the longer she sat there, his humor morphing into something decidedly more intense. Heat seeped through her in a slow roll, the playful fantasizing about her fictional boyfriend becoming more of a desperate itch for the real thing.

Wyatt reached out, his large palm cradling the side of her face. “You’re too young and too sweet to have so much history in those eyes.”