CHAPTER 1
“Fucking whore,” a disheveled man who smells like urine mumbles.
Did he really just say that?
Taking a deep breath, I remind myself to give the man the benefit of the doubt.
Think of his upbringing … not everyone’s as lucky as you all are …
not everyone gets to know their lord and savior …
it’s your job to spread the message, to spread the good news …
it’s your duty to help those who are less fortunate …
The pastor’s words ring in my ears as I tentatively take another step towards the disgruntled man.
“Excuse me, sir, but would you be interested in—”
“I SAID FUCKING WHORE!” he screams, spitting at me. He suddenly jumps up, and he’s wielding a knife.
Holy fuck.
The pastor never prepared us for this. Never told us what to do if a homeless person attacked us.
I look around and realize I’m alone. Where did everyone go?
I hear faint yelling in the distance. I grit my teeth. What happened to putting others first? To self-sacrifice? At the first sign of danger, they opted to save their own asses instead. Fucking hypocrites.
The man takes a step towards me, and as he opens his mouth, I notice he’s missing about half his teeth.
“DEVIL WOMAN!” he screams. “DEVIL WOMAN!”
I step back, and my left heel bumps into something. Suddenly, I’m falling.
My right palm smacks into asphalt hard, and gravel digs through my cotton dress and impales my skin. I look up, and the man is standing directly above me, wielding his rusty knife.
I close my eyes. If I die, at least I’ll go out as a good person, I think to myself. I picture the obituary in my mind’s eye: Belle Lawson, twenty-two-year-old college senior: died while doing God’s work.
Panic washes over me. All the things I’ve wanted to do but never got around to doing flash through my mind like one of those old-school movies. Seeing the Eiffel Tower. Skydiving. Having sex in a church … wait, where did that last one come from?
Bile rises in the back of my throat. I brace myself to open my eyes. If I’m going to die, I’m not going out as a coward.
I hear a loud THUD, and the sound of scuffling. And then a low, frightening voice. That’s not the guy with the knife, I think to myself.
My eyes pop open, and instead of seeing the knife-wielding maniac, I see the palest blue eyes I’ve ever seen. My breath catches as I take in the man’s impossibly long lashes, tanned skin, and chiseled jawline.
Pawn shop.
That’s the first thought that pops into my mind.
This man is exactly like a hidden treasure you find at a pawn shop. A few years ago, I found the most beautiful engagement ring I’d ever seen for $100 at a pawn shop down the street.
I was shopping with my friends that day, and they all thought I was crazy. They all thought it was just a piece of junk, but I knew better.
They told me that pawn shops made money by appraising jewelry accurately and that I was a fool. But I knew better.
And I was right.
I took it to a jeweler later that week and sold it for $10,000.
The man with the icy blue eyes extends his hand, and I latch on to it. He pulls me up with so much force that I stumble into him. My chest brushes against his dirty t-shirt, and electricity sparks across my skin.
Embarrassed, I quickly step away and cross my arms. The second he’s not touching me, I feel a vague sense of uneasiness. It’s like the feeling you get when you take off a ring you always wear, and suddenly you feel naked without it.
My skin flushes. What the hell is wrong with me right now? Am I having PTSD or something from almost dying?
Speaking of which… I peek around the man and see the homeless man lying on the ground a few feet away from us, groaning.
“Wh-what did you do to him?” I ask the stranger who just saved me.
He cocks his head to the right, and a flirty smile plays on his lips. He looks pleasantly surprised.
“Is he okay?” I ask again.
“Who gives a fuck if he’s okay? He just came at you with a fucking knife,” the man says.
“I do,” I say quietly. “I give a f—” I stop myself, remembering the vow I made last week in confession to stop swearing. “Care,” I say finally. “I care if he’s okay.”
The man crosses his arms, and for the first time, I get a really good look at him. He’s tall—probably 6’4” or so—and covered in tattoos.
The tattoos peek out beneath the neckline of his white shirt and wrap around his muscular arms like sleeves. Speaking of muscular, he’s lean, but he also looks rough.
An image of an inmate doing push-ups in a concrete cell jumps into my mind, and I swallow, my heartbeat quickening.
I wonder if he’s been to prison.
The thought appears out of nowhere, and I bat it away like an annoying gnat.
I turn my attention back to the stranger. Now, he’s the one eyeing me. His eyes scan my body brazenly. My stomach tightens, and my cheeks flush. I’m not used to this kind of attention. Sure, the church boys check the church women out, but they aren’t so fucking obvious about it.
“That’s rude, you know,” I say.
He catches my eye, and his gaze burns me. I feel exposed, like I’m under a microscope, and I don’t know why.
The corner of his right lip slowly twitches upwards, and he chuckles. His voice is somehow smooth and hoarse at the same time, and surprisingly sexy.
“What is?” he asks, taking a step towards me.
“The way you’re looking at me,” I hiss.
“Let me get this straight, angel,” he says. “Instead of worrying about the guy who almost stabbed you, you’re offended by me checking you out? Did I get that right?”
I narrow my eyes at him, heat building in my core.
Fuck. How is he able to twist things to make me sound so unreasonable? I mean, I’m not that unreasonable, right?
The smirk on his face sparks something in me.
“That guy,” I say, staring the stranger right in his arrogant blue eyes, “is probably mentally ill or on something. He might be hallucinating or psychotic. It’s not his fault that he’s acting like that. Whereas you—”
I pause and further narrow my eyes, daring this man to break eye contact, but he doesn’t. He somehow stands up even straighter and starts checking me out even more brazenly, which I didn’t even know was possible. It’s almost as if he’s goading me.
I see red, but at the same time, feel something stir deep in my core. I feel a slickness between my thighs, and I desperately try to push all deviant thoughts about this man out of my head.
“Go on, little girl. What were you going to say about me?”
My blood runs hotter, and my pulse quickens. How dare he call me little girl … and how dare I like it. Fuck.
“You,” I say, taking a step towards him. He’s so close now that I can smell him—gasoline and dirt—and feel his body heat. “You,” I repeat, stabbing his chest with my index finger, “are just an asshole. By choice.”
He grabs my finger, holding it against his chest. Surprised, I try to pull my hand back, but he doesn't let me.
I try to swallow and notice that my mouth feels dry. I suddenly feel hyper-aware of every part of my body, like the sweat pooling at the back of my knees.
“Let go,” I demand, trying to yank my hand back.
He smiles but doesn’t budge. “I don’t think so,” he says.
“You don’t think so? What the hell does that mean?” I ask.
Oops. I clap my free hand over my mouth.
“Sorry,” I squeak automatically.
He tilts his head. “For what?”
“Um, swearing,” I mumble, looking at the ground.
Fuck, why did I just apologize? This guy clearly doesn’t have an issue with swearing.
He starts laughing, and it startles me. It’s more of a bellow than a laugh, actually—deep and rough. I feel it reverberate through my body, and I get the sudden urge to press myself against his rib cage to feel the vibrations up close.
After a few tortuously long seconds, he stops laughing.
“Catholic or Protestant?” he asks.
“What?”
“Are you Catholic or Protestant?” he asks, seemingly amused.
“Who says I’m either?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.
“Well, one, your prudish attitude. And two, the fact that you apologized for saying the word hell. And three, the way you’re looking at me right now.”
The butterflies in my stomach intensify, and I look down at my feet. I steel myself and look up at the man.
“Yeah?” I ask. “And how’s that?”
He smirks. “Like a good little Christian girl who’s never been properly fucked in her life.”
I inhale sharply.
“I’m right, aren’t I?” he asks.
“Belle! You okay?”
The man releases his grip on me, and I whip my head around and see Tyler, the second-in-command in our young-adult group. He scowls at the hot man questioning me, and the man smiles back tauntingly. I stifle a laugh.
“She is, actually,” the annoyingly hot stranger says. “No thanks to you and your little posse of cowards.”
The hot stranger wraps one of his arms around me from behind, and I’m suddenly very aware of how fast my heart’s beating.
Breathe, Belle, breathe, I tell myself.
“Get your hands off her, jackass,” Tyler says, his face turning red.
“She doesn’t mind, do you, angel?”
My voice catches in the back of my throat. It takes every ounce of my self-control to tear myself out of the man’s arms. But Tyler’s watching. And besides, this guy is no good for me. He’s not good. Period. Tyler’s doing me a favor, really.
I step away and let Tyler slip his gangly arm across my shoulders. I resist the urge to shove it off.
Tyler shoots the stranger a dirty look and then spins so that we're facing away from him. Behind us, someone shouts that the police are on the way, and another person kicks the knife out of the attacker’s reach.
My scraped palm stings, but I can move it.
Tyler begins walking briskly, dragging me along with him.
The second Tyler and I start walking, though, an image of the stranger's arm wrapped around me pops back into my head.
I flash back to a few minutes ago and remember how it felt to be protected like that. Wrapped securely in his strong arms. My chest flushes, and I wish more than anything I could go back to that moment.
With every step Tyler and I take away from the stranger, the urge to turn around for one last look at him gets stronger. Finally, I can’t take it anymore.
I quickly peek behind me, and my insides get warm and melty. Although he must be 50 feet away, I can feel his stare like the heat from a fire. I can feel his eyes raking across my body like coals.
Face burning, I turn around. I’m scared. A man's never made me feel like this before. Never. It feels like this hot stranger already has some sort of power over me, and I don’t like it.
“You okay?” Tyler asks, his eyebrows furrowed.
I nod and paste a smile on my face. “Yep. Anyway, what did I miss?”