Chapter Five
Trent
I inhaled deeply before I opened my eyes, the scent of tantalizing barbecued meat wrapping around me and teasing my senses. The smell made my stomach twist painfully with hunger. Wherever that smell was coming from, I wanted to be there.
Opening my eyes, I froze. The ceiling above me wasn’t mine. Mine had a water stain shaped vaguely like Florida. This one was wood. Actual wood beams crossing dark planks, with a ceiling fan turning lazy circles in the middle.
This wasn’t my bedroom. The room was small but neat. A dresser against one wall, dark wood matching the beams. A leather jacket slung over the back of a chair.
A nightstand with a phone charger snaking down to the floor, and—oh, perfect—a folded knife sitting next to a paperback like it was a coaster.
The walls were a deep slate gray, broken up by a framed black-and-white photo of a stretch of highway disappearing into mountains.
No clutter. No dust. Whoever lived here either didn’t live here much or was the kind of person who folded their socks.
I was willing to bet it was the second one.
The bed beneath me was firmer than mine, the sheets softer, the pillow under my head smelling like laundry detergent and something else. Something smoky. Something male.
“Oh god.” I dragged a hand down my face and immediately regretted it when my fingers brushed the bruise. “Oh god, oh god, oh god.” I’d fainted, in front of an entire row of outlaw bikers who probably ate nails for breakfast.
“Okay,” I whispered. “Step one. Don’t die. Step two. Find food. Step three. Figure out the rest.”
Step one was already complete. Generous of the universe.
I sat up slowly, the room swimming for a second before it settled.
My jaw still ached, but the pain had dulled into something I could ignore if I focused.
Someone had loosened my belt. I checked under the blanket fast, the panic spiking, but my jeans were still on.
Just unbuttoned at the top, like whoever had laid me down had wanted me comfortable but had stopped well short of anything that would make me want to crawl under the bed and die.
Considerate. The word didn’t fit anything I knew about Preacher Deluca, and yet here it was, stamped all over the careful arrangement of my shoes and the glass of water within arm’s reach.
The barbecue smell hit me again. My mouth flooded with saliva so fast it was embarrassing.
I swung my legs over the edge. The hardwood was cool under my feet. My socks had been left on, which was somehow the detail that almost broke me. I sat there for a second, head down, hands braced on my knees, breathing through my nose until the prickling behind my eyes subsided.
“Not crying in a biker’s bed.” I muttered it like a vow. “That’s a line, Trent. We have so few left. Hold this one.”
I thought of Preacher’s hand on my back. His voice, low enough that it had felt like he was pouring it into my ear instead of speaking it. Something about a brother and a sister and a front door. Maybe candy?
Giving up, I stood. The world tilted, my head sloshing like a snow globe, then it righted itself.
The mirror over the dresser caught me on my way past, and I stopped to take inventory.
Hair stuck up on one side like I’d been electrocuted.
Bruise looking exactly as charming as expected.
Diner T-shirt rumpled to hell. I licked my palm and tried to flatten my hair. It bounced right back up. Effort made.
I started to splash water on my face from the glass before I remembered that wasn’t what it was for. I drank it instead, the whole thing, in three long swallows. It was cold enough to make my teeth ache.
Turning, I saw the window was cracked open a few inches, and that was where the smell of food was coming from, riding in on a breeze along with something else.
Voices. Laughter. The low growl of an engine being revved, then revved again, like somebody was tuning it.
And under all of it, threading through everything, music.
Something with a guitar that sounded like a serenade.
Weird.
Padding across the room, I pressed my ear against the door like that was going to tell me anything useful. I heard a man laugh, deep and rolling. Somebody yelled something about propane. Somebody else yelled back about getting it yourself.
Real intimidating crew, arguing about a grill.
The barbecue smell grew stronger when I cracked the door an inch. Just an inch. Enough to peek.
The hallway outside was long and ended in what looked like a common room.
From my limited view I could see the corner of a pool table, the glow of a beer sign on a wall, and a sliver of glass door beyond that opened onto a back patio.
That was where the smoke was coming from.
I could see a haze drifting past the door, lit gold by the same late sun that had been pouring through the bedroom window.
The music kicked into a chorus, and a voice I recognized as Crowbar’s sang along, badly.
Man went from intimidating biker to off-key menace.
It was so normal it scrambled my brain. I’d been bracing for a horror movie, and instead, I was looking at what amounted to a backyard cookout with extra leather.
A figure crossed my line of sight, broad shoulders and a black bandana, and my whole body went still in the way prey animals did right before they were eaten.
Preacher was talking to somebody, head tilted, one hand resting on the back of his neck while he listened.
Even from behind, in profile, with distance between us, the man’s appearance was unfair to the rest of us.
He’d replaced his shirt, now wearing a black tee, ink crawling down one of his forearms.
His other hand had a bottle dangling from two fingers.
My gaze slid over his features. His face was relaxed, in contrast to the intense expression he wore in my presence. He looked like…a normal guy, not someone who’d held a gun to Tap’s forehead with a savage curl on his lips.
I stood there at the crack of the door, watching him, and somewhere in the back of my brain, a small voice was politely suggesting I close the door, climb back into the bed that smelled like him, and pretend I was still unconscious.
As if he’d felt the weight of my gaze, he turned.
Just enough that he could look over his shoulder, straight into the inch of door I’d cracked open.
Straight at me.
Caught.
My stomach dropped through the floor, through the foundation, and probably halfway to China.
He smiled.
Not the almost-smile from the diner. An actual slow, real smile that softened every hard line in his face and did something obscene to the corners of his eyes. It was a smile that said there you are, and I knew the second you woke up, and a third thing I couldn’t translate.
My knees considered buckling for the second time today.
I shut the door.
Then I leaned my forehead against it and tried to breathe through the fact that a man I’d known for less than twenty-six hours had just smiled at me like I was something he was glad to see, and I had reacted by hiding behind a piece of wood like I was twelve years old.
“Cool,” I whispered to myself. “Cool, cool, cool. Real smooth. Award-winning behavior, Trent.”
I had a choice. Stay in this room and starve and pretend I hadn’t just been caught peeking like a kid at a slumber party or open the door, walk out there, and face the man whose bed I’d been laid out in.
Neither option was good. But only one would settle my hunger pain.
I straightened up, ran a hand through my unruly hair, then smoothed it down my rumpled shirt.
“You can do this,” I told the door. “He’s already seen you face-plant onto concrete. The bar is so low it’s on the floor.”
The door, predictably, didn’t answer.
I stood there with my hand on the doorknob, socks on the hardwood, stomach growling, smelling his pillow on my collar from where my cheek had been pressed against it, and I had exactly one coherent thought.
I was in so much trouble.
And not the kind I’d walked into yesterday.
Taking a deep breath, I opened the door and stepped out into the hallway before I could chicken out again.
Preacher was standing in the common room, staring at my door. His door.
“Sleeping Beauty.” His voice carried easy down the hall, low enough but still heard over the music. “Was about to come check on you.”
“I, uh…” I gestured vaguely behind me at the room I’d just come out of. “I think I drooled on your pillow.”
What in the hell was wrong with me?
His shoulders shook, smile widening into something that flashed a hint of teeth.
“That right?” He started toward me, unhurried, beer bottle still dangling. The hallway suddenly seemed a lot shorter than it had a second ago. “Guess I’ll have to burn it.”
“Or wash it. Like a normal person.”
“Or that.” He stopped close enough that I had to tip my chin up to keep eye contact, and the bruise on my jaw twinged at the movement.
He noticed. The smile dimmed by a notch, and his free hand came up, two knuckles brushing the underside of my chin, so lightly I almost didn’t feel it. “Color’s better.”
The touch lasted maybe two seconds. Long enough that I forgot how to breathe. Short enough that by the time my brain caught up, his hand was already dropping back to his side like he hadn’t just rewired my entire nervous system with two knuckles.
“You should sit.” His eyes did that slow sweep again, making my skin feel three sizes too small. “You’re still pale.”
“I’m always pale. It’s a lifestyle.”
That earned me another flash of teeth. He stepped back, jerked his chin toward the open glass door, and the smell of barbecue rolled in fresh, hot, and aggressive enough that my stomach answered for me with a sound I would’ve paid money to take back.
Preacher’s mouth twitched as he patted my hair like he was testing buoyancy. “Yeah. Outside. Now.”
“I’m not a dog you can command.” But I didn’t move, enjoying the feel of his fingers gliding through my electrified hair.
“Didn’t say you were.” Dropping his hand, Preacher moved to the door and waited. “Asked you nicely.”
“That wasn’t an actual question.”
“It was as close as you’re getting.”