Chapter 2
Wyatt
Blackberries and wild honey.
The skittish new waitress’s scent clings to me as the bell over the diner door chimes when it closes behind me.
On my way to my truck, I can’t help but think about Maisie. Keeping my distance over the last month has required a level of control I didn’t know I possessed.
One sniff of her lush scent as she tops up my coffee, and I’m fighting an almost uncontrollable urge to drag her into my arms and kiss her soft lips as sweetly as I want to bend her over the nearest hard surface and fuck her. But maintaining distance and my urges has been necessary.
Extremely necessary.
My first glimpse of the petite waitress with shoulder-length strawberry blonde hair and ice-blue eyes had been like a fucking dream. I’d stepped through the front doors of Nico’s Diner, and it had been akin to a truck slamming into me.
I’d stared for too fucking long. She noticed. How could she not notice when I was clogging up the front door? Those gorgeous ice-blue eyes had widened, and wariness had given way to fear.
I thought my size had intimidated her until Knox nudged my shoulder and gave me a pointed look. My eyes had tracked his gaze downward to dark, almost-black marks on her forearms shaped like bruises.
I’d mistaken the shadows under her eyes for a lack of sleep. They were too dark, too large to be anything but two healing black eyes. Someone hadn’t just dragged her around by her arms. They’d put their hands on her, and more than once. A man, from the size of those finger-shaped bruises.
She’d taken her time coming to our table, eyes wary and her body half-turned, poised to run.
I’d kept my expression blank, fighting to control my rage that anyone could hurt her.
And her voice—soft, unsure—had made me want her as badly as I’d ached to snap the neck of the man who’d put his hands on her.
My cell phone vibrates in my back pocket, returning me to the present. I’m no longer in the past where a timid, shy omega had been so nervous around me that she’d nearly poured hot coffee into my lap. As long as she stayed beside me, I wouldn't have cared what she spilled on me.
I fish my cell phone out and hit answer when I see who's calling. Needing a free hand, I set the pie box on my truck so I can open the door.
“Did she get to work all right?” Elias asks.
“She did.”
If Maisie had glanced behind her on her ten-minute walk from her apartment to the diner to start her shift, she might have seen me.
Then again, she might not have. It’s not the first time I’ve watched over her, and it won’t be the last. Maisie Lucas came to Rios with a black eye and bruises on her arms. No one is putting their hands on her. Not if I have anything to do with it.
“And no sign of the POS who hurt her?”
“Nope.” None of us knows who it is since she’s been so cagey about her past.
Between things she’s revealed over the last month, we know her name, that she was on the road for a while before she came to Rios, that she’s 26, and that she has an older sister she misses and bakes pies like a dream.
And that someone hurt her.
Badly.
So badly that she shuts down the conversation if it even starts to lead to her past. Husband, boyfriend, or whoever it is, makes no difference to me. Between the four of us, the guy doesn’t stand a chance if he sets one foot in Rios.
I met Elias, Knox, and Hunter on a job we all worked on in Texas nearly ten years ago. We fell into the construction business, wanting a job that paid well and didn’t tie us down in one place for too long. Now that we’re all in our early thirties, the itch to keep moving is decreasing.
We go where the work is. With projects lasting several months to a couple of years, we usually find a place to rent together for however long the job lasts. This Iowa job is no different, except that it's ending, and we haven’t started talking about what comes next.
“I'd better go grab breakfast,” Elias says. “Hunter is yelling.”
I can’t hear Hunter’s yell. Elias must still be up in his room, calling to check in before he makes his way downstairs.
“I’ll see you at the site.” I hang up, grab the pie box from the top of my truck, and climb into my seat.
Our rented house is thirty minutes out of town, so I have plenty of time to make a quick stop before I head into work. I’ll be too early, but that’s okay. It won’t be the first time I’m at the site kicking my heels after watching over Maisie.
I place the pie on the passenger seat, making sure it won’t slide to the floor before I slam my door shut and start the engine. Through the window of Nico’s Diner, Maisie stands at the counter with Nico.
If I didn’t have a full day of work ahead of me, I’d sit right here, demolish this third slice of blueberry pie and continue to watch sweet Maisie through the diner’s front window.
Alphas are possessive. We see what we want, and we go hard after it. That’s not an option with Maisie. She’s so wary that any step I’ve taken toward her, she’s taken one away. I need more answers about what chased her to Rios, and only one person can give them to me.
The sheriff's department is located halfway down Lincoln Road, Rios’s main street, which is lined with most of the town’s stores and restaurants.
It’s quiet now, but it never stays that way for long.
This is the heart of the town, and with all eight units in the condo we’re building already sold, Rios looks to be a fast-growing, popular area.
We were the last construction workers to arrive in Rios, opting to rent a farmhouse thirty minutes outside town.
With our days starting around eight, we all thought the drive would eventually piss us off enough that we’d move into town.
But in the seven months we’ve called Rios home, it’s actually started to feel like home. More than anywhere else has before.
After pulling up and parking in front of the sheriff’s department, I cut the engine and grab my keys and the pie box. Getting out, I slam the door shut and head for the entrance, spying Audrey, Sheriff Watson’s wife of thirty years, sitting at the front desk.
“Hi, Audrey,” I greet her as I push open the door and step into the sheriff’s department.
She takes one look at the box in my hand and subtly shakes her head. “Good luck.”
As greetings go, that doesn’t bode well.
The sheriff's department is a large room with three desks in the center. A closed door leads to the back of the building, where the holding cells and interview rooms are.
I walk past two neat but empty desks on my way to the only other person in the office, a dark-haired man in his late fifties wearing a khaki uniform and sitting at his desk.
As I lift the pie box, I waft its sweet and fruity aroma toward the sheriff. “I brought you a slice of pie. Blueberry. Best pie in the world.”
I’m not even saying that to butter him up. I wouldn’t be handing over this slice of ambrosia if it weren’t to protect a certain waitress.
“I can’t tell you anything.” Sheriff Watson doesn’t so much as glance at the delicious-smelling box.
“I’m just here because I’m worried, Sheriff,” I say, lowering the box since waving it at him isn’t getting me anywhere.
“You know I can’t dig into her past.” He turns a page and scrawls his signature at the bottom. “Which is exactly what I told you the last time you were in here.”
I set the pie on his desk and take the only chair on the other side of a desk damn near cascading with papers. If anyone walked into the police station, they’d know at a glance which desk belonged to the sheriff. “I’m not asking you to dig into Maisie’s past. Just into the person who hurt her.”
He gives me a long look that conveys I’m not convincing him of anything. “It’s the same thing.”
I should have listened to Audrey’s warning. This man is not budging.
“You had to have seen the bruises, and she’s skittish as hell. Someone put their hands on her. Could you just…” My voice trails off at his weary sigh.
He sets his papers down and turns in his seat to give me his full attention.
“I can’t do anything without her say-so.
Even if I hunted down where she came from and who hurt her, I can’t file a restraining order or investigate any abuse she suffered without a statement from her.
” His expression softens. “I know you’re coming at this from a good place, and you’re looking out for her, but this is personal to her.
If she’s in trouble, she needs to ask for help.
I let her know that I’m here, but I can’t force her to accept my help, and neither can you.
” His eyes dip to the box I placed on his desk. “Pie or no pie.”
We’ve rehashed the same argument five times now.
A month ago, when I first saw Maisie in the diner, she was skittish and wary.
I thought if she couldn’t talk to me about whoever hurt her, she could talk to the sheriff, a good man with a loving wife who works the front desk, and a married daughter with a family of her own.
My first visit to the sheriff was later that same day, after work.
He told me the same thing he just told me now: a request for help has to come from Maisie.
If Maisie doesn’t even want to accept help from the sheriff, I can’t help but wonder why. Is she still that terrified of the person who hurt her? Was he a cop, and she doesn’t trust cops?
“You’ve done all you can, Wyatt,” the sheriff says. “I have my eyes open. You know that.”
“I do.”
With a sigh, I get to my feet to leave.
“Your pie,” he calls after me.
“It’s yours.” I can’t help but smile at his suspicious look. “It’s no bribe. I had two slices this morning, and I don’t need another before work.” As much as my belly would thank me for it.
“Then I’ll enjoy it with my morning coffee,” he says with a grateful nod.
On my way out of the building, Audrey motions me over.
She says quietly, “Keep doing what you’re doing.”
“Coming here?” I frown.
She shakes her head. “Being there for Maisie.”
I glance over at the sheriff, decimating the pie in record time. It’s damn good pie. I don’t blame the guy.
Lowering my voice, I lean closer to the counter. “But she might need more help than I can give her.”
She pats the back of my hand. “You’re a good man, Wyatt,” she adds. “I’ve seen the way you all keep an eye on her. Give her time to get used to the idea that you won’t hurt her, and she will open up about her past. Scars need time to heal. If she didn’t feel safe here, she’d have left already.”
“I know that.” I rub a hand over my jaw. It’s why I’m so desperate to help her in case someone scares her away before I can get through to her. “Thanks, Audrey.”
None of us can make her talk or open up, but we can be there when she needs us.
“She’ll be okay here,” Audrey assures me with a confidence I wish I could absorb. “Rios has always come together for one of its own, and that includes Maisie as well.”