Her Mountain Saviors (Why Just One? #1)

Chapter 1

ROXIE

In the two years I’ve been slinging drinks at one of Manhattan’s top clubs, I’ve learned that bad men don’t always look it. Some wear thousand-dollar suits and smile like saints, while committing some of the worst sins imaginable.

But college doesn’t pay for itself, and the tips make the forced smiles worth it.

Vincent Caruso is at one of my tables again tonight, all pearly white teeth and smooth, sophisticated menace.

Silver-white streaks shoot through his black hair and deep lines are etched into formerly handsome features.

His tailored cream-colored suit alone probably costs as much as my rent for an entire year.

Rumor has it he is the kind of guy who can order a hit and a martini in the same breath. He leans across the table, speaking intently to some other older guy opposite him.

Music from the main dance floor filters up to the balcony where they are seated, with strobe lights flashing overhead and washing their features in pulses of red, purple, and green.

I’m supposed to be listening as I approach, but it’s hard not to when the music isn’t deafening up here and someone drops the words “take out Reed” between a toast and a refill.

I freeze mid-step, the champagne bottle suddenly like a flashing beacon of oh-fuck between my fingers. My hand is still steady, but my brain isn’t.

My thoughts start racing, my fingers going numb when it dawns on me what I’ve walked into. Bob Reed is the district attorney. The guy has been on every news channel this week talking about cleaning up the Caruso syndicate.

I don’t breathe or blink. I just try to fade into the velvet wallpaper and pretend I hadn’t heard a damn thing, but then the ice bucket gets in my way.

There’s a neat little clink when I smack the bottle into it as I back away, then comes the long, dramatic crash of my paycheck and my hopes of getting away unnoticed hitting the floor.

Melted ice sloshes out, the silver bucket lying in the middle of the darkening carpet like a victim at a crime scene. Glass shatters, flying in every direction when the replacement bottle bursts on impact.

Caruso’s head turns at the commotion, the boss’s dark eyes immediately finding mine. I swallow hard, my mouth suddenly drier than the Sahara.

Shit.

I don’t see him give any signal, but the bodyguards flanking the table move fast, like shadows bound in muscle as they start toward me.

In the space between one heartbeat and the next, I’m already running, ducking behind the VIP curtain and abandoning my tray while my heart does its best impression of a pounding drumline.

I know the layout of this club as well as my own apartment. I tear down the hall, race past the kitchen, and burst through the door that sticks unless you hit it with your hip.

The shouts I leave in my wake grow louder as I sprint past the back bar and into the service corridor. Someone yells my name, but I recognize the voice and it doesn’t belong to anyone dangerous.

Trinity, my coworker, is probably wondering why I’m racing through the club like I have hellhounds on my tail.

I tuck my chin and keep running. Tomorrow, I will explain. Maybe. Right now, all I need is to get out of here. Out of sight, out of mind. Isn’t that how it works?

There’s no way they’ll remember the waitress’s face, I tell myself. No way they care enough to come after me if I can just get out.

Finally, I burst out into the alley, the city noise swallowing me whole. The cool night air hits like a slap after the heat in the club, the scent of diesel, rain, and freedom in every ragged breath I drag in.

My pulse is still hammering when I hit the street. My whole body shakes, but I keep running.

I’ll have to get a new job just to be on the safe side. Maybe even a new name. But I’m alive.

Unless they come after me.

Don’t be dramatic. They’re not going to come—

A gunshot cracks through the night, and my heart drops straight past my stomach all the way to Middle earth. Concrete crumbles. Glass rains down from somewhere.

My brain doesn’t even fully register the sounds for what they are until instinct does. Holy fuck. They’re chasing me.

One of my heels disappears when I bolt around the corner, sacrificed to the gods of bad timing and uneven pavement. I kick the other away instead of hobbling. Survival will be enough. I don’t need to accessorize on the other side.

“Stop!” one of them shouts, the word freezing my spine worse than the wind.

God, he’s closer than I thought. Too close.

Bullets hiss past, a hot swipe of air and panic. A car alarm starts screaming somewhere as I duck into an alley that smells like piss, fried oil, and regret, my heart still trying to break out of my ribs.

Keep going. Don’t think. Don’t stop.

The alley splits and the corridor to the right is dark, but the one to the left, even darker. I pick darker. My lungs burn and so do my muscles, but I don’t slow until I see an open door, light spilling out along with the sound of laughter and the clatter of woks.

Taking a hard corner, I crash straight into the chaos of a kitchen in the middle of a Friday-night rush. Steam hisses from burners, the scent of garlic hitting my nostrils on my next deep gulp of air. People are shouting at each other in a language I don’t speak. Mandarin, if I had to guess.

A cleaver hits a board with the same rhythm as my pulse. The cook turns as I race past him, his eyes wide. “Hey! You can’t—!”

“Sorry, I’m so sorry!” I gasp, and back up, scanning for an exit, only to realize I’m facing a brick wall.

Someone else yells, “Out! Get out!”

Yeah, no kidding.

Thankfully, the cook points me in the right direction, his hand jabbing angrily toward a set of swinging doors still in motion as servers hurry in and out. A waitress appears in front of me when I take off toward the doors, a tiny woman holding a tray like a shield.

She looks me up and down once, and she must see the missing shoes and the absolute terror in my eyes, because she doesn’t ask questions. Instead, she jerks her head toward a different swinging door.

“Hide. Now.”

I don’t hesitate, sidestepping toward the door and smacking my palms into it. A second later, I’m in a storage room. The smell of soy sauce and ginger is heavy in the air, but it sure as shit beats gunpowder.

Still desperate, with hysteria setting in and no clue what else to do, I crouch behind a stack of rice bags, every breath a fight to stay quiet.

This isn’t exactly a masterful hiding spot.

I wouldn’t have been crowned hide-and-seek champion even against three-year-olds, but it’s the best I could do.

A few moments later, I hear the cooks shouting again, their voices louder this time, angrier. They hadn’t welcomed the first interruption. I doubted they are any happier with two.

While I have no way of knowing for sure, I strongly suspect those men had followed me in here. Caruso’s men.

The thought is so ridiculous that a hysterical bark of laughter almost bursts out, but I bite it back and pressed my palm to my chest, trying to muffle even the sound of my heartbeat.

When I’d gotten dressed for my shift tonight, I had not expected it to end with me running barefoot through Chinatown, hiding from mobsters behind a mountain of jasmine rice.

Voices echo from the kitchen, heavy tones that belong to the kind of men who don’t say please. “Is she here?”

The kitchen noise dips like someone hit mute on the whole place. I hear the back door thud shut, and silence fall, the heavy, terrified kind that prickles under my skin.

I freeze, feeling like even the bags of rice are suddenly holding their breath.

“Where is she?” a man barks, his voice carrying the rough edge of too many cigarettes and too much power.

No one answers.

“Blonde girl. Short dress. Have you seen her?”

A cook mutters something sharp in Mandarin. I don’t understand it, but the tone says piss off. Relief trickles through me, but it comes with a sharp stab of fear for the poor cook. He might not have given me up yet, but I just hope they don’t hurt him for his insolence.

“Hey!” the guy barks again. “Do you think I’m playing with you?”

Another crash rings out, maybe a stool falling over or something slamming against the wall. My throat tightens, my nails digging into my palms to keep myself from making a sound.

“If she’s here and you’re lying to me…” The man lets the threat hang midair, thick and heavy.

Only silence follows. Then, mercifully, I hear footsteps retreating. The back door slams again, and a few seconds later, engines roar to life outside.

For a full twenty seconds after the engines rev, I stay still, my lungs burning, my mind shrieking, and my heart in complete overdrive. The door finally creaks open, and the waitress from before appears in the doorway.

She carries the same tray, that same unquestioning calm about her, but her eyes know too much. “They’re gone.”

I exhale for the first time in what feel like years. My whole body trembles, adrenaline turning my muscles to static. “Thank you.”

For a brief moment, her gaze runs over me again, just watching me shake as I straighten up and push to my feet. “Those men are bad. You know this?”

I nod, unable to form any words.

“You got lucky,” she adds, her voice soft but final. “Luck doesn’t last with men like that. You’re a dead woman walking.”