loosened his grip, gaze dipping to his drying cum on her tits to her
face. There it was again, his feral look that told her he’d rip another
man to pieces without hesitation if that man so much as looked at her
wrong. Tonight proved that theory.
She should be afraid of being with a man like him. Violence
came to Jax easily, but one huge factor differentiated him from all the
other assholes she met in her life. Unlike dirt bags like Dwayne, he’d
hurt himself and others first before putting his hands on her.
Jax was wrong about her deserving better too, because no one
else would look at another man’s cast-off. Dwayne broke her, but be-
fore that, she’d never seen herself as strong either. Lia had been weak
to Dwayne’s charms, foolishly believed he loved her enough to steer
her away from her town. She’d been naïve but with Jax, she began to
find her own inner strength.
She could never return to her old, foolish innocent self, but she
couldn’t wait to see how this new her would turn out.
Chapter Eight
“After this shipment, I want to head back to my hometown.
See my mother.”
Lia’s request caught Jax off-guard. No, it hadn’t sounded like
a request, but a demand. Lia had transformed from a scared victim
into a woman with steely determination in her gaze. Jax said nothing
for a few moments. Anger and possessiveness warred inside of him.
She was his to keep. Jax didn’t plan on letting her go, but he
couldn’t be the one to clip her wings either. Refusing her this little
thing would make him no better than Dwayne. It finally happened.
Maybe Lia woke up today, realizing this hadn’t been the kind of life
she wanted and Jax hadn’t been the man she envisioned spending her
future with.
It gutted him, but he didn’t tell her that. Nancy abandoned
him, kept their son from him. Would Lia leave him, too? Fuck. Jax
thought they crossed some kind of boundary a few nights ago, cleared
things up for the two of them. Did she know there wouldn’t be any
other woman for him but her?
“Jax,” she said, hesitation in her voice.
“I’m not fucking deaf.”
“It’s not what you think,” she quickly said.
“Tell me, sweetheart. Explain what’s going on in my mind,”
he said in a low voice, aware the last thing he wanted was to pick a
fight with her.
Jax silently swore. Beginning the day fighting hadn’t been on
his damn agenda. Jax began to hate the uneasy silence that permeated
the truck after an argument. Lia would sit so still, one could mistake
her for a statue, her gaze pinned to the window, her look blank and
faraway. Jax didn’t want to make her sad again.
Maybe she was really off better off without him. Jax had
known from the start, hadn’t he? An angel like her was too good for a
bastard like him.
“I’m not leaving you. All I want is to talk to my mother. I’d
like to think she’s worried about me after I left with Dwayne. Besides,
there’s nothing for me back in my hometown.”
“There’s nothing for you here either.” I’ll only drag you down
to the darkness with me.
“Don’t say that.” The fierceness of her voice surprised him.
She unbuckled her seat belt, stood behind his seat, and hugged him
from the back. The scent of her, the soap she used that morning and
the little cologne of his she started to wear, enveloped him. Jax
couldn’t remember the last time anyone ever gave him a hug. The
simple gesture calmed him, relaxed all the tense muscles in his body.
She continued, “We got something here, don’t we? Have you gotten
sick of me?”
“Never.” The word felt like a fierce whisper on his lips. “If I
had my way, I won’t let you go. You’re mine forever.”
“I want that too. Going to see my mom is just a pit stop.”
Jax didn’t know whether to believe her or not. Nancy prom-
ised him once that he could see Matt whenever he wanted to, but Lia
was the exact opposite of that bitch. Lia didn’t have a single deceitful
bone in her body, and Nancy, well. She seemed intent on hurting him
Still, Lia seeing the town she grew up in might trigger senti-
mental memories. True, she told him she wanted to travel, to explore
places beyond her little town, but did that hold true even now? Lia left
home only to discover that world contained monsters in human skin
like Dwayne, and to some extent, him. She never once seemed con-
sidered him in the same league as Dwayne, but they both contained
the capacity to do harm.
“Penny for your thoughts?” she asked, leaning down to kiss
the right side of his unshaven jaw.
Jax told her.
She gripped his shoulders tighter, but he hardly felt the pres-
sure. It told her what he said pissed her off, but he couldn’t under-
stand why.
“You also have the capacity to do good,” she told him in that
same steely voice. “Remember the other day when you stopped for an
elderly couple who had a busted tire? Not many people would stop to
help.”
Sometimes it still amazed him that she tried so hard to see him
in a positive light. Then again, Jax couldn’t deny that despite the short time they spent together, Lia changed him too. Being around her felt
like being close to a beacon of light. When they stopped by a diner for
lunch or a convenience store for a supply run, being next to her didn’t
make him feel like an outsider around normal people.
When Jax first got out of prison, the world felt like one
fucked-up mess he couldn’t quite identify with. He hated crowds,
despised talking with other people because most of the time he
couldn’t identify with them. Time had passed and the world had
moved on while he rotted behind bars. Hell, he never even got the
chance to witness important moments in his son’s life, not that Nancy
would let him.
“We’ll make that stop after this shipment,” he told her.
Jax hadn’t been fully convinced that her hometown would just
be a temporary stop. It could be a final one for her, but he wouldn’t
deny her that choice. That fucker Dwayne stole her ability to make
her own choices. He’d never do that to her. Which reminded him,
maybe during their drive to her old home, he’d find out where that
bastard lived and pay him a personal visit.
“Thank you,” she murmured. “Why don’t you take a break?”
She ran her gentle fingers through his hair. Fuck, but he’d
miss her touch, miss using his hands and mouth all over her soft,
tempting curves. Jax still didn’t get it, why a woman like her would
choose to remain with a damaged bastard like him. Time in prison
didn’t rid him of his temper, didn’t make a better man out of him. He
drove big trucks for a living, avoiding the rest of the world until she
came into his life.
If the time came to let her go, Jax wondered if he had the
courage to do the right thing.
***
*
Lia stood just in front of the trailer park entrance, fists
clenched by her sides. She took deep breaths. The wind lifted strands
of her hair as she chewed on her bottom lip. Lia could do this easy
thing. Jax called her a survivor, considered her act of running from
Dwayne bravery, not cowardice. She went after Jax in a rowdy road-
side bar to find her man, too.
Why did confronting her mother seem so difficult?
No. She didn’t come here to start a fight only to talk. Mary
Reed wasn’t a bad mother. Like most single mothers living in the
park, she worked to the bone, too busy keep herself and a daughter
afloat to care about Lia.
Jax had insisted on coming with her but she told him she
needed alone time with her mom. Lia’s phone beeped and she took it
out, smiling at Jax’s text message.
Jax: Message me when you’re done. I’ll be around the ar-
ea.
Lia didn’t think her little town had any interesting sight-seeing
attractions, but she knew he’d be worried about her. Jax couldn’t say
it out loud, but she knew he thought she’d still change her mind about
being with him. As if that would happen.
Jax’s job was an important component of his life, a necessity,
because her man didn’t see himself finding a new occupation. Lia had
done her research on long-haul truck drivers during times when they
got Wi-Fi from a diner. She read about a couple taking turns driving a
truck. Maybe they could do that. She could get a license, get paid for
work, and at the same time, share Jax’s world and remain by his side.
Her smile dropped when she heard a whistle. Tucking her
phone away, she started walking to her mom’s trailer.
“Hey baby, you lost?” a voice called.
“Aw, Travis. It’s just Lia,” another guy said.
She turned her head to see Bert and Travis, brothers she went
to high school with. Lia would have ducked her head and moved on
another time, but not now. Even growing up, she’d been the oddity
who preferred books to parties, having learned the guys who ogled
her at parties only wanted to get into her panties.
“Thought you left town with that sweet-tongued pretty boy
Dwayne,” Bert told her.
“I left him. He turned out to be an asshole. Do you know if my
mom’s home?” She didn’t want to linger around town longer than
necessary.
Walking around the place would only make her remember her
foolish and naïve self. When Dwayne started dating her, she thought
she’d been better than everyone else there. Lured by Dwayne’s prom-
ises of an escape, she never even once wondered if Dwayne had other
intentions in mind.
“Well, good for you,” Bert said. “Never liked that bastard. As
for Mary? She came in a couple of hours ago from her shift at the din-
er with Mom.”
“Tell your mom I said hi,” she said, then headed to Mary’s
trailer.
“Hey, Lia. I happen to be looking for a girl to settle down
with. You single?” Travis joked.
She turned and flashed him a warm smile. “I’m taken. Good
luck with that though.”
Lia soon found herself in front of the trailer she grew up in.
Taking a deep breath, she rang the doorbell. A cranky voice grumbled
from within.
“Who the hell is it? I don’t want to buy anything,” came her
mother’s groggy voice.
“Momma? It’s Lia.”
The door swung open to reveal her mother peering down at
her with a frown on her lips. Mary looked older than what Lia imag-
ined, with more grays in her hair than brown. For a couple of seconds,
they stared at each other, not speaking.
“You’re back,” Mary finally said. Lia couldn’t read the ex-
pression on her face.
Lia knew it wasn’t fair, but during her most miserable times
with Dwayne, she hated her mother because it had been easy blaming
the woman whose last words to her had been “good riddance.” She
understood now that there was no predicting what Dwayne told her. A
wiser woman would have seen past Dwayne’s charms and smiles, but
she’d never been wise.
“Yes,” she answered, relieved when her mom opened the door
wide.
“Come in, then. Are you staying long?”
Lia heard the testiness in Mary’s voice, but didn’t blame her.
For all of Mary’s faults, Lia knew her mom wouldn’t turn her away if
she didn’t have a place to stay. Lia went inside and shut the door be-
hind her.
Past the kitchen and small dining area, she glimpsed the space
where her old room used to be. Mary had converted it into a mini-
exercise room. Mary followed her gaze.
“If you’re planning on sticking around, we can move the shit I
put in there out. I don’t have time to use those exercise things any-
way,” her mother said in the same no-nonsense voice.
For the longest time, Lia didn’t understand the woman who
raised her well. Her mother always seemed busy, had no time for her
growing up. She hated parent-teacher conferences because Mary nev-
er showed up. Lia missed school trips because her mom forgot to sign
the permission slips.
Mary had never done those things on purpose. Right here, her
mother’s true colors showed. In her own way, her mom cared about
her, cared enough to offer her old room back. She walked up to her
mom and did what she’d never done in her entire life. Lia hugged her.
Her mom froze up, probably unsure of what just happened.
“I’m not staying long,” she finally said. “I just wanted to see
you and tell you what’s been happening in my life.”
Chapter Nine
Jax looked at the crumpled piece of paper in his hand, scrib-
bled hastily with an address, then at the single-floor modest home in
front of him. Sure, it was no palace, but it was too good of a nest for
an asshole who got his kicks from beating helpless women.
A haggard-looking woman carrying a baby in one arm scur-
ried out of the front door. She winced as a male voice yelled, “Re-
member to bring me a six pack, bitch.”
She shut the door, juggling the now crying baby in her arm.
This scene looked no different from the foster homes he grew up in,
but watching the woman leaving in a hurry sickened him. Jax spotted
the black eye she hid badly with a concealer.
It struck him this woman could have been Lia. No, his Lia
wouldn’t let herself be chained down by a bastard long enough for
Dwayne to get her pregnant. Jax wondered if Dwayne’s wife knew
about her husband’s activities outside their home.
Maybe she did and didn’t care. Perhaps she was glad Dwayne
had another victim to entertain himself with instead of her. He
wouldn’t be surprised if Dwayne’s wife had developed some kind of
submissive personality and bent easily to Dwayne’s will.
Seeing him, she hesitated. “Can I help you?”
“Nope, just lost, but my GPS is working again.” He held out
his phone and flashed her a toothy smile which
only made her hasten
her footsteps. None of his business, but now, he knew he couldn’t let
Dwayne off with a simple warning. Jax was no one’s hero, but he
couldn’t let a slippery fucker like that free.
It took Lia and him a week to return to her hometown. Jax had
been guilty of taking more stops than necessary, but she hadn’t com-
plained. He didn’t tell her that while she slept in the back, he’d busied himself making phone calls.
Jax might not have been the most social guy during his time in
prison, but he’d made connections along the way. Another ex-con he
knew now worked as a private investigator, and he gave Ben all the
information he knew about Dwayne. Whether Lia knew it or not, he’d
started fishing her for information, casually asking names about the
bars Dwayne used to drag her to. Lia was smart, probably knew he
was up to no good, but wisely didn’t ask questions.
Ben visited all the bars she’d named, talked to the regulars,
and it wasn’t hard getting more information about Dwayne, who
seemed to frequent the same bars with different women. Lia hadn’t
been the bastard’s first victim and wouldn’t be his last.
Jax pulled the hood of his hoodie up and walked up to the
house. He put on his gloves and tried the door. Dwayne’s lady had
forgotten to lock it. Good. He slipped in, moving quietly for a man his
size and locked it behind him.
“What now, bitch?” a drunk voice yelled.
Jax tracked the bastard to the living room. All the curtains had
been shut. Bottles lay scattered on the floor, the coffee table, every-
where. The asshole probably shut himself in the dark because he was
recovering from a hangover or something. Perfect.
“Who the fuck are you?” Dwayne slurred, getting up to his
feet. Too slow. Jax let Dwayne stumble to the living room table where
he spotted a revolver. What kind of father and husband left that lying
around the house?
He didn’t remember moving. Dwayne cried out as he shoved
the fucker to the nearest wall, hand on his throat. He squeezed hard.
Dwayne choked as he landed a punch to Dwayne’s gut. The bastard
gurgled. Rage rode him as he recalled all the cuts and bruises Lia