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  Typical Mikey, handing out penance, knowing full well that there was no way for a man like Pedro to come up with three-quarters of a million dollars.

  “How’s Grace gonna get him the money?” Donnie had asked.

  Pedro had looked at him in disbelief, as if shocked that Donnie was so far gone from his years in Mikey’s shit that he couldn’t figure it out for himself.

  And then he had, and his blood had grown cold. “Sex?”

  Pedro had nodded. “Far as I know, Grace’s still a virgin, Don. I don’t know if she’s saving herself for marriage to Prince Charming, or if she just drank too much of the good-girl Kool-Aid that my dad passed out, but I’ve never seen her with a guy. She’s never even dated. And if Mikey has his way, her first time is gonna be sold to the highest bidder and broadcast online.”

  Over Donnie’s dead body.

  The ringing in his headset finally stopped and a slurred voice answered. “H’lo?”

  “Joe.”

  Just one word, just the man’s name, but it was enough to get his older brother from happy drunk to allll worked up.

  “I can’t talk to you! What the fuck are you doing calling me, Donnie? You’re dead to us, remember. Jesus, I have kids.”

  Funny how Donnie had been very much alive last year, when Joe’s son Declan had been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer and needed a bone marrow donor, wasn’t it?

  “I’m coming to the house,” he said simply.

  “No, Don! Fuck. Just… No. Meet me somewhere else,” his brother begged. “A bar… or…”

  “Better open the door,” Donnie said. “The longer I stand outside banging, the more the neighbors are gonna get an eyeful. And we wouldn’t want them to get the wrong impression, would we, Joey?”

  “You’re killin’ me, man,” Joe whined.

  Donnie snorted and disengaged the call. Killing his brother was just the beginning. If those assholes harmed Grace, no one would be safe.

  When he arrived at his brother’s house a few minutes later, he pulled his bike around to the back, near the rickety old garage, and left his helmet on the seat. He climbed the rear steps two at a time, and the back door opened before he could knock.

  “Get in here!” Joe told him, pulling Donnie into the kitchen and making sure none of the neighbors had seen. “Christ, you have no idea, Don…”

  His brother was tall and whip-thin, with thinning, sandy hair that had once been bright red. There had been a time, when Don was a kid, that he’d thought Joe was the bravest of the brave, always looking out for Donnie, protecting him from the worst of his father’s booze-soaked beatings.

  Now, Joe’s hands shook with fear.

  “Let’s get this over with,” Donnie said without preamble. “Mikey took Grace Diaz to pay Pedro’s debt.”

  Joe didn’t look surprised, but somehow he seemed to grow even more nervous.

  “What do you know about that, Joe?” Donnie asked.

  Joe licked his lips, but instead of answering, he turned pleading eyes to Don. “Why’d you have to get involved now, Donnie? You haven’t been back to this neighborhood in years. Why now, huh? Why not just… stay gone?”

  A fair question. He hadn’t seen Grace Diaz in nearly twelve years; not since he’d been nineteen and she’d been a wide-eyed thirteen-year-old. For all he knew, he’d passed her a hundred times at the grocery store or riding the subway, and hadn’t even known. Would he even recognize her as a woman?

  It didn’t matter, though. Grace was the best part of him—his conscience, his beating heart. The only part of his childhood that he could remember without feeling disgust or shame. Just subconsciously knowing that she was okay, that she still existed in the world, had meant that he could keep existing too.

  But Joe didn’t need to know any of that shit.

  “You owe me, Joe.”

  He hadn’t wanted to say those words. You didn’t hold a kid’s life over his father’s head. That wasn’t a debt you ever called in…

  But for Grace, he was calling it.

  Joe shook his head and drew a shaky breath. “I need a drink. Have a seat. We’ve got… shit to discuss.” Joe gestured his hand at the Formica table in the corner, then sat down and poured himself three fingers of Irish.

  Jameson’s. Just like their dad had drunk.

  Donnie took a seat at the table and glanced around the kitchen. The only time he’d been here, a year ago, Joe’s wife Karen had had a pot roast in the oven, and the whole place had smelled homey and inviting. Their three kids had been running around, bouncing off the walls, even Declan. But tonight, the house was… quiet. Stale.

  No car in the driveway. No kids making noise.

  Suspicion clenched in Donnie’s gut and he got up to open the refrigerator. Joe sighed, but didn’t move to stop him.

  Empty, except for a pitcher of water and a bunch of condiments in the door. It looked like Karen and the kids had taken off… or Joe had sent them away.

  Fuck.

  “Where is she, Joe?” he demanded.

  “I… I’m not saying shit,” Joe replied. But his eyes darted left, to the small bedroom off the kitchen.

  Christ Jesus, she was here.

  Donnie strode across the room, his eyes on his brother, but Joe didn’t move except to pour the whiskey down his throat and pour himself another.

  “I didn’t wanna be mixed up in this shit, Don. You know how Mikey is,” Joe whined.

  Yeah, Donnie knew. That’s why he’d walked away years ago rather than spend his life as Mikey’s lackey. Joe had chosen differently.

  Donnie turned the knob, but the door was locked. He ran his hand above the door jamb, rolling his eyes at his brother’s stupidity when he found the fucking skeleton key on the first try. To Joe’s credit, he clearly hadn’t been trying very hard. It was almost like he’d wanted someone to find Grace.

  He pushed the door open, and entered the cool, dark room.

  The room was empty except for a twin bed in the corner, where a woman lay curled on her side away from him, covered by a thin blanket. He crept toward the bed slowly, his mind rapidly cycling through the best ways of transporting her. Was she drugged? How could he wake her?

  Long, long, strands of familiar dark hair covered her face and he reached out a hand to push them aside, but he actually found himself hesitating. God, what did she look like now?

  The hesitation was nearly his downfall.

  The woman on the bed, who had been breathing so deeply just a moment ago, leapt into action, grabbing his wrist and yanking him down, then delivering a powerful knee to his gut, before lunging upright and delivering a sharp blow to the back of his head that made him see stars.

  Only instinct had him reaching out, ducking her flailing fists, to grab her around the waist and pull her back on the bed.

  “Let go of me, asshole!” the woman screamed as she thrashed and flailed. “Or I swear to God, I will extract your motherfucking dick through your motherfucking nose!”

  What?

  Without wasting another moment, Donnie lifted one knee and straddled her on the bed, sitting across her thighs to neutralize her legs. He grabbed her hands in each of his and bore down, until her arms were braced above her head, and still she would not yield.

  “Let. Me. Go!” She reared up, trying to knock her head into his.

  Christ, she was amazing. Every twist of her head against the pillow had him smelling cinnamon, and every flex of her muscles reminded him that she was here. She was okay.

  A weight on his chest he hadn’t realized he was carrying seemed to loosen.

  “Grace,” he said. “Grace, baby, it’s me.”

  Her thrashing stopped, and only the sound of harsh breathing—hers and his—filled the room.

  “D-donnie?” Her voice was small, tentative.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  He cautiously released one of her hands and brushed the hair back from her face.

  His breath stuttered.

  The only light in th
e room came from the streetlight shining in the window, but as her gorgeous eyes came into view, he wondered how he could ever have doubted that he’d recognize her. He’d know those eyes anywhere. But the rest of her…

  The last time he’d seen Grace, she’d been on the edge of womanhood. She’d lost the sweet, rounded look she’d had as a little girl, but she’d still been stick-skinny, all knobby knees and braces. But now…

  He swallowed hard.

  She was all curves, from the pleasantly rounded hips and thighs between his knees, to the sweet, full curve of her breasts as her chest heaved under his. And damn if, all spread out on top of her like this, his dick hadn’t taken notice. Time seemed suspended as he returned his gaze to her face, to those full lips that parted and begged to be kissed, to be bitten hard. He could imagine himself wrapping that hair around his wrist, and holding her down as he fucked her until she screamed…

  She was staring up at him the way she always had, with full-on trust, like he’d hung the moon… and suddenly he felt like the sickest prick on the planet.

  Control yourself. This is Grace.

  “Get her out of here,” Joe said from the doorway, resignation in his voice. “I told you I’d help you, but we need to figure out a plan.”

  Donnie nodded without turning his head, and heard Joe shuffle away.

  “If I let you go, are you gonna extract my motherfucking dick through my motherfucking nose?” he asked, unable to look away from her face.

  She giggled, and then her eyes filled with tears. For all her tough talk, she’d been scared to death, and he knew it.

  “I’ll try to restrain myself,” she whispered.

  He smiled. Then he let go of her hands and eased back. But before he could stand, she stopped him with a hand on his cheek.

  “I knew when you found out you’d come, Donnie. I knew you’d keep me safe.”

  He closed his eyes against the warmth that seared his chest, a sensation he hadn’t felt in years. That, coupled with the arousal that hadn’t completely abated, had him biting back a moan.

  He’d keep her safe from Mikey, but who was gonna keep this woman safe from him?

  Chapter 2

  Grace clung to the heat of Donnie’s back, her legs straddling his bike as it rumbled beneath them. This couldn’t be happening. She’d wake up and realize this had all been a dream, something that had started like her worst nightmare come true and ended with her here, on his bike, rescued by none other than the one man she’d been in love with since she was in grade school. God, how she’d wanted to be here, just like this, her arms around his broad, muscled chest, her body pressed up against his, feeling the power of his bike beneath her.

  It was a sticky, hot summer day in July, the cicadas’ buzzing warning that the temperature would be rising. “The sizzle bugs say it’ll be hot today,” her mother would say. “Make sure you keep safe, chica.” Her father and mother had to work, and her brother was with his posse of friends, supposedly going to the fireworks on the beach come nightfall, but more likely planning to sneak in beer and weed and lift some skirts.

  Grace, who had just turned thirteen years old, was sitting on the balcony of the third-floor apartment where her family lived. She hated the third floor when it was grocery shopping day, as it meant lugging the bags up three flights of stairs, but on days like today, when everyone was gone and she was alone, she liked it. Sitting on a worn, rusty folding chair high enough she could see over the railing, she was drawing. Humming, she was drawing on a scrap of paper she’d saved from art class at school, and a stub of a pencil she had left from a birthday present Donnie had given her the month before. Below, in the yard, rose tall stalks of summer wildflowers. But from here, her vision was obscured. She needed to get down to see them.

  As she stood, she heard the riproar of a motorcycle entering the yard, and her heart did a somersault. There was only one boy who had a motorcycle on their street, and when he parked it, he’d be just on the other side of the gate in her backyard.

  Kneeling behind the rail, she looked down. Would he be alone?

  He was.

  Her heart soared. This is when her fantasy would play out. He’d park his bike, and hop the fence, climbing the fire escape and somehow managing to swing up and come to her. But no, that wouldn’t happen. She’d have to go to him.

  She walked quickly through the tiny apartment, ignoring her piles of schoolbooks and the mountain of laundry her mother had asked her to fold. When she got to the first floor exit that led to the small, paved backyard, she looked to make sure he was still there. She could see his large frame through the wrought iron fence just on the other side of the yard, smoothing a rag over the gleaming handlebars. He’d saved every penny for six years to buy his first bike, and he took meticulous care of it. She didn’t even want to know what kinds of jobs he’d done to earn the money, but she’d been as happy as he’d been the day he’d driven it home.

  “Hey, Donnie!” she said, waving her hand to get his attention.

  He turned to her, but his eyes were guarded. He looked over her shoulder and up, to the balcony of the apartment where her family lived. Her momentary glee halted as she realized who he was looking for. He wanted to be sure her father wouldn’t come out and berate her for talking to “the lowlife Nolan boys.” Her father hated the whole family. He reluctantly allowed Pedro to hang with Donnie, but wouldn’t allow Grace.

  But her father was at work, and what he didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.

  “You all alone today, Gracie?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Mama and Papa are at work,” she said, “and Pedro is doing God-knows-what. I’m supposed to stay mostly in, but it’s hot, and I wanted to get a better view of the flowers I was sketching.”

  She suddenly remembered the paper in her hand, her flimsy excuse for running downstairs to see him, as she hid it behind her back. He stood, all six foot two inches of muscles and testosterone, the tattoos her father despised creeping along his neck and arms. Her hands trembled holding the paper as he approached the fence. He was everything a teenaged girl could dream of, and everything a teenaged girl’s father hated. His faded jeans clung to his hips, a thin black t-shirt stretched taut against his chest, as he leaned against the fence and crossed his arms. His dirty-blond hair was so long it nearly hit his stubbled chin, shading his warm but intimidating chocolate-brown eyes. He made her feel things no other boy ever had, and as he leaned over the thin fence that separated them, her stomach clenched while her heart soared. She was reminded of the time she’d gone on a field trip to Niagara Falls and walked close to the edge. Fear mingled with awe, and she was dumbstruck.

  He reached one large hand over the fence, his fingers clean but stained from the dirty work he did—both maintaining his bike, and whatever he did for his cousin. She didn’t know exactly what his family was into or what Donnie’s role was, but she knew that where he went, a wide berth followed, and she knew it was for good reason.

  “Lemme see,” he said, his deep voice making her shiver despite the sweltering heat.

  She shook her head, holding it behind her back. She could not do this. Her family cared little for her drawings, and the kids at school mocked her. They weren’t good. She knew that, had been told so plenty of times, but she loved them.

  “I’m not done,” she stalled. As his eyes narrowed and his heavy blond brows drew together, she suddenly realized how very scary he could be.

  “Grace,” he said, warning, his growly voice and stern look making her hands shake, but still, she shook her head. His eyes softened, and his voice lowered. “Hey, it’s me. You can trust me, honey.”

  Honey. Oh, God. A lump rose in her throat. She wanted to run and hide. She wanted to climb over the fence and kiss him.

  “It’s not good, Donnie,” she whispered.

  He smiled then, a rarity in those days, his beautiful brown eyes welcoming and kind. “Gracie,” he said. “I’ve seen more of your drawings than anyone, and I can promise you this. If y
ou did it, it’s fucking good.”

  She knew then that she loved him.

  “I’ll make you a deal,” she said, on a whim of temporary bravado. “You let me sit on your bike, and you can see it.” The moment the words left her mouth, she wanted to take them back, as his eyes darkened and his jaw clenched.

  “Your father would kill me, and then lock you in your house until you’re thirty, and you know it,” he growled.

  The reminder of her father’s overprotectiveness needled her temper. “Oh yeah?” she spat. “Maybe I’ll wait until you’re gone and sneak over and go on it myself!” she said, sounding like a bratty child even to her own ears.

  His eyes narrowed even further as his voice hardened. “I catch you on my bike without my permission, I’ll bend you over my knee and spank your ass, and I don’t mean maybe.” Though she’d heard similar threats from her older brother a million times, somehow hearing it come from Donnie’s lips felt… different. His sternness made her repentant. She’d crossed a line. Though her heart was hammering and her palms were sweaty, she felt chastened. She cast her eyes down.

  “I’m sorry, Donnie,” she said. As a peace offering, she drew the paper from behind her back and handed it to him. “Here. I still have a ways to go…” she halted, but his broad hand had already gently taken the sketch from her.

  “Jesus, Gracie,” he said, his voice low and reverent now as he took in her drawing. The wildflowers bordered the edge of a creek. He could feel the movement of the water in the strokes of lines on paper, hear the caws of the crows she’d drawn tucked into the branches of pine needles. “Not finished?” he asked. “How could you make something like this even better?”

  “You’re just saying that to be nice,” she stammered, unable to fathom that anyone could react with such emotion to something she’d created.

  He frowned, lifting his eyes to hers, as he shook his head. “Don’t be ridiculous,” he said. “I never say shit I don’t mean, and you know that.”