Undeserving (Undeniable #5)(56)

"Maybe sad wasn't the right word. Maybe lonely."

"Lonely? Why do you say that?"

Preacher actually couldn't care less about the South Jersey chatterbox who'd trapped his brother in a shitty marriage. But because he liked hearing Debbie talk and wanted to keep her talking, he kept the dialogue rolling. Debbie was the polar opposite of Sylvia, and while he didn't like overly chatty women, he did appreciate some conversation.

Gazing off into the park, Debbie shrugged. "I don't know. I just got that impression. I think she and your brother are equally unhappy and neither of them knows what to do about it."

Preacher lit up a cigarette. "You know a lot about unhappy marriages?"

Her eyes found his, flashing fire, fire that was in direct contrast to the vulnerable expression she was suddenly wearing. "A little bit," she said softly.

Preacher stared at her, wondering what she meant. And as his eyes roamed her face, he found himself noticing things he hadn't before. The high cut of her cheekbones, the dashes of gold shining in her big brown eyes. And her nose wasn't just small; it was straight and pretty much perfect. And her lips …  shit, he just really fucking liked her lips.

He'd been wrong yesterday when he'd thought her no great beauty. She was beautiful-really beautiful.

And young. Too young for him.

"Preacher?"

"Hmm?"

"Why'd you run away from home?" The vulnerability in her expression had doubled, and Preacher got the impression that his response was important to her.

He took several pulls on his cigarette before answering. "It's gonna sound stupid," he said, and shook his head. "But I couldn't breathe. I couldn't think." Dropping his cigarette, he crushed it beneath the toe of his boot. "I felt like the goddamn walls were closin' in on me."

Debbie placed her hand on his forearm. "That doesn't sound stupid," she said, breathless. "I couldn't breathe either."

Their eyes collided, and what Preacher saw in her face gutted him. He'd already guessed there was pain in her past, but he hadn't speculated the extent of it. Looking at her now, he knew someone had hurt this girl badly. And he didn't know what to feel first-pity or rage.

"Wheels," he started to say and then stopped. He didn't have a clue what to say; he just felt like he needed to say something, anything at all, to try and close that raw, gaping wound he saw in her expression.

A sudden crash caused Debbie to jump, and Preacher spun in a circle, seeking the source of the noise. There was a splintering crack, and Preacher watched as the entire face of a trailer bowed outward and then shuddered, rippling. Then a muffled shout, and the unmistakable thump of a fist hitting something solid-wood or bone-and then the trailer door flew open, the wall of metal quaking around it, and a body came flying through the opening. A man wearing a blood-soaked T-shirt and boxer shorts hit the ground on his back with an audible thump.



       
         
       
        

A young woman appeared in the doorway, blonde and beautiful, with legs for days and big, bouncy tits, the kind a man could bury his face in and fall asleep happy. Wearing only a bra and a pair of underwear half torn off her, she fled down the steps and dropped to her knees beside the man. "Oh my God!" she cried, horror-stricken. "Are you okay?"

"Get the fuck off me, Christine," the man hissed, shoving her away.

"It wasn't my fault!" Wrapping her arms around her middle, she rocked backward. Tears streamed down her cheeks, black rivulets of smeared eye makeup. "I was sleepin'! He attacked me!"

"You motherfuckin' stupid fuck."

Preacher jerked. He knew that voice-that unmistakable Midwestern snarl.

Robert "Reaper" West, president of the Hell's Horsemen Motorcycle Club, stepped out of the shadows of the trailer and into the growing daylight. With arms the size of tree trunks folded across an impressively built chest, and wearing a scowl forged in the bowels of hell, one couldn't help but get the impression that "Reaper" wasn't just a nickname.

Preacher instinctively grabbed Debbie's arm and shoved her behind him. Doing a mental sweep of himself, he quickly pinpointed the blade in his boot.

Hailing from Miles City, Montana, the Hell's Horsemen Motorcycle Club had been making quite a name for itself lately. It wasn't a new club by any means, but it was less well-known than the Silver Demons. And their president was suddenly, desperately trying to change all that. Within the last five years, the Hell's Horsemen had gone from making friends and forging alliances to acting like petty thieves and street thugs.