Lucy’s closeness had stirred old memories I’d nearly forgotten existed. I remembered the way she used to press her lips to mine when her father wasn’t looking, the way her hands felt sliding along the muscled ridges of my stomach and up over my chest. I remembered how she’d tasted so damn sweet, like honey dripping onto my tongue, the night before I’d left, and that alone was more than enough to arouse my long-harbored affections and bring them to a raging boil.

It was hard to properly entertain those feelings, though, when you were trying to prevent yourself from being concussed. Damn, Lucy had one hell of a slap in her. I’d been hit far harder and by far more adept fighters than Lucy was, but the idea that this little thing could stagger me, a grown-ass man, had me in a state of shock. And admittedly, I was a little impressed. Even after all she’d been through, she still had a fire in her. She was still so scrappy. Despite the fear of God she was putting into me, I’d missed her.

“Do you realize what you did to me? Do you have even the faintest idea?” she asked, face scarlet, cheeks streaked with tears that I imagined she had been holding back for a long time now. Part of me wanted to tell her that yes, of course I understood, that I knew exactly what she’d been through. But that would have been a lie, and one I don’t think she would have forgiven me for, regardless of my good intentions. “You lied to me, Leo!”

“I never meant to!” I said, trying to keep my voice as low as I could muster. The last thing either of us needed was an audience—some neighbor peeking up over their hedges to see what all the commotion was next door.

“But you did! Whether you meant to or not doesn’t mean shit!” She shook her head, tucking a few loose strands of her hair behind her reddening ears. “I woke up and you were gone! After all you said to me, after all we did…” She trailed off, as if those memories still had the power to stop her in her tracks. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing—her expression was distant and unreadable.

I hoped she was hesitating because there was some part of her deep inside that believed we were meant to be together—a part of Lucy that could forgive me for what I’d done and maybe force me to forgive myself. But then she waved her hand, a gesture of dismissal, and my heart sank. Clearly, there was something darker in her heart right now.

“You disappeared without a trace,” she continued, voice low and shaky, “and like an idiot, I waited for you! I even went to that… that pig sty you and the Hell Dogs were staying at—”

“Hounds,” I said softly. She blinked at me, and I elaborated, “The name of the club is the Hounds of Hell.” The look on Lucy’s face made me immediately regret the interruption. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone scowl that fiercely before, or since.

“Fine. The Hounds of Hell,” she said through her teeth. “I went to that seedy motel you were all staying at, and do you know what I found?”

I did. I knew. But I wasn’t stupid enough to answer.

“Nothing!” Lucy threw her hands into the air. “Just empty rooms. And not a single one of you had left a way to get in touch! It was like you just… disappeared. Like you were never even here at all!”

I could imagine it so vividly—Lucy getting the key from the clerk at the front desk of that shithole the boys and I had stayed in during my last visit to Pleasant Lakes. Lucy walking down the outdoor hall toward the room, having already been told we’d all skipped town, but unwilling to believe it until she saw it for herself. She’d been so young then, so naïve. No way she could fathom she’d been left behind. No way she could bring herself to believe I’d abandon her, betray her, like that. She was still living in the world of heroes and fairy tales. A land of happy endings…

The look on her face as she opened the door and looked inside. That dawning realization that everything bad anyone had ever said about me must’ve been true. The grief settling in over her angelic features as she remembered what she’d given up for me, given to me, a gift she could never take back. There were no receipts. There never were, when you gave your heart and body to someone. That’s what made love so damn terrifying.

“I thought that maybe something had happened,” she went on, eyes glassy. I was glad she broke the silence first. I didn’t think I could manage to form words around this lump in my throat. “But I was sure that whatever it was, you’d find a way back to me. At least, that’s what I told myself for a while… but then I started to think that maybe the reason you hadn’t come back was because something bad had happened. Something you couldn’t get away from.”

She held herself now, fingers clutching at her own upper arms. God, I wanted to be the one to do that for her, to pull her close and let her feel safe for a little while—but could I be that for her anymore? Or was the damage permanent, irrevocable?

“Do you know what it’s like,” she whispered, looking away from me, “wasting years thinking that someone that you love is dead and that you’ll never see them again? But even worse, simply not knowing whether they’re dead or not? I had dreams, sometimes, of you riding back into town on your bike, the sun in your hair as you told me to get on… and then other times, I’d dream that you were a corpse, lying in a ditch. And to tell you the truth, Leo, I got to a point where I could no longer tell which one of those dreams was the real nightmare.” She squeezed her tiny frame as if to steel herself against a storm. “Hope can be so cruel.”

I closed my eyes a moment, struck by a sudden sensation of falling. No, not just falling—plummeting, careening straight into the depths of hell. There was a black void waiting for me there, an obscene event horizon I would never escape from if I let myself think one more moment about Lucy’s pain. Pain that I had caused her. Wounds I had inflicted. I had promised her, that night I held her so very close to me—as close as two people could possibly be—that I would never hurt her. And then I’d asked her to trust me, and I’d made myself seem deserving of that trust. How many lies had I inadvertently told her? How deep did the rabbit hole of her suffering go?

Yet I’d come here for forgiveness. I’d come here seeking absolution. From Lucy. From the girl I’d already taken so much from.

You’re a damn fool, Leo Richards, I thought, opening my eyes again to watch Lucy pace in front of me. You really thought you were just gonna sweep her off her feet, put her on the back of your hog, and ride off into the sunset? Apparently, Lucy wasn’t the only one of us who put stock in fairy tales.

I had been so selfish, then as well as now. I needed to stop thinking of myself as the hero of Lucy’s story. She’d already filled that role all on her own. She was the one who had struggled to survive, the one who had overcome excruciating odds. Me? I was the dashing rogue just trying to steal another treasure for himself. At least Delfino was unequivocally the villain.

“I tried so goddamn hard to forget you, Leo,” Lucy whispered around a sob. Her shoulders shook with the effort she exerted to contain her anguish, and I hated that she felt like she couldn’t let it all out in front of me. I hated these barriers, this space, between us. “I prayed every night, hoping that I could just wish you out of my head forever, but the more I tried to stop thinking about you, the more you showed up in my dreams. And the more I dreamed, the more I felt responsible—because you were alive there, Leo.” Her voice cracked; her wide, innocent eyes were wild and pleading. “You were back. In my dreams, I brought you back. And then when I woke up… when I opened my eyes… I killed you. Every single time the alarm clock rang, you left me all over again.

“And then there was him.” She took to the window, turning her back on me, staring out at the driveway where Delfino’s car would eventually return. “Before you came into my life was one thing. But after you left… after that, I knew what freedom was. And it broke me, Leo.” Her chest caved suddenly, as though she’d begun to crumple in on herself. The rage that had burned so brightly only a moment before had dwindled, as though someone had blown out the candle flame of her indignation, leaving only a smoldering wick as a testament to it ever having been there at all. “You—not Delfino—broke me.”

Words failed me. Lucy turned slightly, and I found myself staring into the face of the woman I loved with all my heart, who I’d run from the men I’d called my brothers in order to be with. I’d executed one hell of a betrayal on her behalf. Made decisions, big decisions, that would have consequences the breadth of which were still unknown to me.

Yet in that moment, I wasn’t sure how I could fix any of this. I felt my heart thudding hard against my ribs, my brain calling for me to do something to help make things right again.

I could only think of a single thing to do, and it probably wasn’t even the smartest idea, but I needed to do something. Words were never my strong suit, but I knew that when those failed me there was always an alternative: action.

I stepped forward and pulled Lucy into a tight embrace, enveloping her against me. I slid one hand into her hair while the other grasped at her waist, my face turned down, breath against her ear. God, she smelled so good. Like everything good about summer. She smelled like no school and ice cream trucks circling the neighborhood in the summer heat, raking in the cash from the parents of kids who couldn’t imagine spending one goddamn moment indoors. Like a cool breeze that hit right before dusk, the first sign that dinner would be ready soon and Mom would be calling you in to sit down and fill up after a long day at play. Uncapped fire hydrants and cicadas rattling in the pre-dark, purple-streaked sunsets and saccharine sweat; Lucy smelled like the rose-tinted glow of childhood. She smelled like the kind of home I’d always wanted… but never known.

Lucy pulled in a sharp breath and made to press into my chest, to hide in me, take shelter—and that was exactly the kind of comfort I wanted to give her. But there was something I needed to tell her first. Something I knew was going to be woefully inadequate in the face of her pain, but I couldn’t let one more thing remain unsaid between us. I couldn’t separate us with one more stretch of silence.

They were three words that didn’t come easily to me. Never had—my father wasn’t big on apologies. He called them excuses and used them as a reason to go at my bare back with a belt. I still bore those scars, inside and out. Scars I’d only ever let Lucy see, on both counts. The way she’d touched them that night, first with her fingers, then with her lips, then with something much deeper and spiritual than all that… something that seemed to rend those old wounds open as much as it seemed to heal them… oh, God, she’d done something to me. Put herself in my bones and blood. Insinuated herself into the very foundations of my being in a way that was completely and utterly irreversible.

In a way that made her worthy of hearing those three words that fell from my lips not like a confession, but like a prayer.

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered, cradling the back of her skull as I drew back to look down at her. “I know it’s not okay, baby. I know it’s not enough. But I am so fucking sorry, Lulu. For everything. For riding into and out of your life on a whim. For leaving you when it mattered most, and coming back way too late. For thinking I was gonna just scoop you up into my arms and take you away from all this, when it’s become the only constant you’ve got.” She whimpered, and I moved my hands to her cheeks instead, my coarse palms abrading the wetness from her silken skin. “I’ve never… not once… asked you what you wanted. Not then, and not now. So tell me, Lulu: what do you want, baby?” I cracked the faintest smile, remembering the silly moniker I’d given her when we’d first met years before. “What’s my best girl looking for?”

The way she looked at me in reply was heartbreaking. Like no one had thought to ask her that question in so long she had no idea how to answer. My jaw clenched so hard I felt the muscle in my cheek spasm. I had the feeling that if things went south and I actually ended up killing Delfino, one look at Lucy’s ashen face would ensure no jury in the world would convict me.

“I want…” she began, the words clunky and alien on her tongue. She blinked, and a few more errant tears escaped her. “I want…”

We stood there in silence for what felt like a long damn time as her eyes searched mine for some kind of answer that, in the end, only she could provide. Her lips were parted and the little scrunch of her nose told me that she was thinking about it—hard, from the looks of things. What had happened in my absence that simply asking her what she wanted made her react this way? Whatever it was, I was going to find out and make Delfino pay. And then I was going to work on undoing all the damage he—and I—had done.

“I want for it to not be too late,” she said at last, and suddenly I understood why it had taken her so long to answer. The weight of those words took my breath away; she seemed to find it with a quivering gasp. “I want… I want you to have made it back here in time to… to save me…”

“Shit, Lulu,” I choked. And then I gave her what she wanted. And what I wanted, too.

I leaned down and captured her open mouth with mine, crushing her to me as if the very force of our contact could make this dream a reality—could pull the memory of our love out of the past and manifest it here, now. Her fingers found my nape as easily as they ever had, nails prickling my skin, and the way she drew herself against me—so eager, so desperate and frenetic—was enough to arouse more than just my recollections of the first time we’d done this dance.

Lucy didn’t pull away when I hardened against her, nor when I reached down to caress her curves. They melted like butter beneath my palms, and as I clutched at the curve of her spine, she cleaved to my shoulders and moaned. Her breath was coming hot and fast through her nose—mine was, too—and the panting gasps she stole between kisses made me move, pushing her back toward the wall.

“Leo,” she whispered, into my mouth. “You bastard.” I stopped, looking down at her, and she shook her head at me helplessly. “God, I missed you…”

A little smile touched my lips, swollen and wet from where they’d just merged with hers. “I missed you too, Lulu.” I touched her face again, the sweet, angelic sweep of her jaw. “I missed you so much…”

Lucy rested her head against my chest, heaving a sigh as she snaked her arms around me and held me tight. I closed my eyes, setting my chin on the top of her head and letting her squeeze me, even if it meant promptly experiencing a twinge in my damaged ribs. Fuck the pain—I needed to feel her body against my own.

“We have to get out of here,” she whispered against my scrubs, breathing deep of the scent she’d been deprived of all these years. “There’s so much going on in this town that you don’t understand.”

I frowned, tilting her head up with a finger beneath her chin to look into her eyes. I could see fear there—there was so much of it—but under all of that there was a glimmer of hope.

“Tell me,” I whispered, running my fingers through her hair. “Tell me what’s happened since I’ve been gone.”

She let out a breath and nodded, smiling—truly, genuinely—for the first time since I’d been back. Shit, maybe for the first time since I’d left. I had no real way of knowing. But now wasn’t the time to dwell on my mistakes. I needed to be thinking about the future. Our future. I needed to have my head in the game. I couldn’t afford to fuck this up.

“Father—Delfino—he isn’t my actual father,” she began, wincing as my frown pulled the remainder of the truth from her. “We’re only distantly related.”

You could’ve knocked me over with a feather. Why would Lucy have lied about something like that? Or at the very least—why would she have let me believe he was? And if they weren’t family, then why was she tolerating his bullshit? Dread coiled tight and cold in my stomach. Something was all wrong here.

“What do you mean?” I asked her, trying and failing to get my bearings with the situation. “I don’t get it, Lu. If he’s not your dad… then who is he? And why are you living in his house?”

“He calls himself my guardian,” she answered, her smile vanishing, only to be replaced by a grimace. “That title—‘Father’—is what he makes everyone call him. Has them all fooled that he’s the town minister, except he isn’t. Sure, he plays at it, but the reality is that none of the people in his ‘flock’ are there for the Good Book.”

“Then what are they there for?” I asked, my eyebrows raised.

Lucy hesitated. “The mob.” Her gaze slid away from mine and she shifted from one foot to another, as if uncomfortable with the subject matter. And why shouldn’t she be? This was huge. Criminally huge. “This place is a safe haven for them. Their men on the run. Operations they don’t want to draw any attention to. Money laundering. Drugs. The town cemetery? I’m pretty sure it’s not just townsfolk buried out there.” She smiled wanly. “Of course… who would know, right? We’re not even on the map…”

“Jesus,” I muttered, carding my fingers through my hair. This was, to say the least, surreal. And it made sense, the way Jackal had high-tailed it out of here. The way he’d cowed, in the end, to Delfino. For him to have been entrusted with a project like this, he had to be pretty high up on the food chain. Someone important. Someone lethal.

That much didn’t surprise me. He was one cunning fuck. Behind his eyes you could tell that there was a plan being incubated, nurtured, prepared for being enacted to put that bastard one more step ahead of everyone else in the room.

I stepped away from Lucy, giving myself space to breathe and think, neither of which were easy tasks while I was pressed so close to her. Her fingers trailed down my arm in a display of reluctance to let me go. I smiled inwardly at that. It felt good to know she wanted me around, especially in the midst of all this dark, disturbing shit.

“That still doesn’t explain you, though,” I said. “Why the hell are you living with this guy, Lucy? Does he have something on you?” I couldn’t imagine that he did. Lucy was as innocent as they came. But then what possible reason could she have for being here? For playing the role of his dutiful prisoner?

Lucy chewed a bit of dry skin on her lower lip, slowly peeling it back to reveal the red, raw flesh beneath it. I had to reach over and touch her face to get her to stop. She had that thousand-yard stare going on again and I was worried she wouldn’t come back from it this time unless I pulled her out of that pit before she hit rock bottom.

“My parents died when I was twelve,” she said at length, her shoulders hitching with a sigh. “Car wreck. Just outside of town. I survived, but it took months and months for me to recover… and that was just physically. I had to learn to walk again, Leo. It was that bad. And I had nothing and no one. I was a stranger. An outsider. If Delfino hadn’t taken a shining to me…” She shrugged. “I don’t know how to explain it. To this day, I’m not sure why he chose me as his… pet project. But he did, and if he hadn’t, I’m not sure what would have happened to me. In some perverse way, I feel like I should be… grateful.”

“No one’s tried to find you?” I asked her, disbelief knotting my brow. “You don’t have any other family?”

“I do,” Lucy said softly. “Have other family, I mean. But I don’t know where they are. All I know is that nobody but Delfino showed up.” She looked away then. “That’s when all this started. He came to Pleasant Lakes because of me. Sometimes, I feel like I’m the reason everything here is so messed up.”

“That’s not true,” I insisted. “Lucy—whatever else, I need you to know that you’re not responsible for Delfino, or what he’s done to this town.”

She nodded faintly in reply. “Sure.” I didn’t believe her. Not for a second. “But the fact remains I have nothing and no one. No way to get out of here.” Her gaze flicked up to meet mine through her thick, dark lashes. “Except for you.”

“Baby, I’m in no shape to ride,” I said, regretting that I had to dash her hopes once more. “Not with my ribs the way they are.” The disappointment that flashed in her eyes was too much to bear, and I put my hands on her shoulders to bring her closer to me. “Hey, Lu. Hey. None of that now. I’m not saying we’re not leaving. Because we are. And that was always the plan. It just… it can’t be right this second. I gotta get better first. And I gotta figure out what the hell happened to my ride.”

Being without my bike was like being without my right arm. I felt helpless, trapped. I was sure Lucy felt the same way, given her situation, but fuck. I wasn’t used to cages. Could never abide chains. There was a constant itch inside me that could only be scratched by getting on the Fat Boy and riding the hell out of here. Seeing as how that wasn’t in the cards right now, though, I was going to have to learn to live with it. For now.

“Delfino said he was taking care of it,” Lucy told me, eyes cast to the floor in thought. “Which means it’s probably with the mechanic. Or otherwise, he scrapped it.”

I grunted. Entertaining that idea was like being physically struck in the gut. “Let’s hope that last one’s not the case, otherwise I’m gonna have to kill a man.” Not that he wouldn’t have deserved it either way, but scrapping my Harley? That was a mortal sin. “That bike’s our ticket out of here, Lu. Soon as it, and me, are back up and running, we’ll blow this town. I promise you. We’re saying ‘fuck off’ to Pleasant Lakes together this time around.”

Lucy’s smile was heartbreaking. She slipped her arms around me again, this time much more carefully, and hid her face in my chest. “And this time, I’m gonna hold you to that,” she murmured. “But what are we going to do until then?”

Tenderly, possessively, I stroked her hair. “We’re gonna beat Delfino at his own game,” I told her. I could feel my expression darkening, and I was glad Lucy couldn’t see it. She didn’t need to see me bare my teeth right now. She needed the warm comfort of my arms. She needed Teddy Bear Leo. Not Murder Leo.

But that didn’t change the fact that I was going to do whatever it took to con the conman, to settle the score between him and Lucy and even me.

I looked down into Lucy’s eyes, the tips of my fingers caressing the tender flesh of her cheeks, down slowly over to her rose colored lips. It’d taken me until that moment to truly quantify just how deeply I had missed the feeling of her skin beneath my fingers. But there was something I missed even more than that.

I leaned in, tilting her chin up with two of my fingers as I slowly caressed her lips with mine, my eyes closing as a fire flared between us—a fire that hadn’t blazed in years, one that had lain dormant since I had left Pleasant Lakes. A wave of warmth—longing—lapped over me like the swelling of the wide as I began to wrap my arms around Lulu’s waist, pulling her tenderly against me, careful to mind my aching ribs.

“I’m not leaving here without you, Lulu,” I whispered as our lips parted. “I promise.”

I hoped she believed me.