Mia sat at the tall table and scanned the crowd filling the pub for Carl. He hadn’t sent a picture but gave her a description of what he would wear so she could find him. She gripped the beer bottle in her shaking hands, hoping the booze would calm her, but she felt even more sick to her stomach.

She had done it. She was finally getting away from Keith. The Seahawk cap on her head helped hide her face, just in case the bastard had managed to follow her, but his car hadn’t been anywhere near the library when Gina had picked her up. The small duffel sat at her feet, ready to go. All she needed was for Carl to appear out of the crowd so she could get out of sight and safe. She would then figure out her next move. The door opened and two men stepped in, but neither of them matched Carl’s blue hoodie or black ball cap. Mia deflated on her chair and worried for a horrible second that maybe she was at the wrong pub, or that he wouldn’t come at all.

The two men who walked in were tall and handsome, to say the least. The one on the right walked to the bar while the other scoped out the place, his sandy brown hair catching the light. He didn’t smile and didn’t even look happy to be there. Mia tried to look away, but when his face drifted over her table, his sharp blue gaze stilled her heart and she gasped. Those eyes sent her to the beach, watching waves roll in, their shifting blues and greens against the sand. They threatened to drag her below the surf with no hope of ever rising again. Eyes with the same hardness as the man she was desperately trying to run away from. Quickly, she ducked down though she saw the way his lips thinned in her direction before he walked through the crowd and out of sight.

Mia checked her cell for the tenth time. Ten o’clock, and Carl still wasn’t here. If he didn’t show up, she wasn’t sure what to do. She should’ve withdrawn all her money instead of just half, but wasting any of it on a motel room would shrink her budget for a car and gas. Her fallback plan was to call Gina and stay with her, but Keith would know and she didn’t want to put her only friend in the world in harm’s way.

“Mia?”

She nearly fell of her chair as a hand clamped down on her upper arm before quickly releasing her. “Shit! I’m sorry, you scared me.” The man standing beside her held up his hands, an innocent smile on his face. He wore the blue hoodie Carl described. “Carl?”

“Yeah, sorry. I wasn’t thinking,” he said and pointed to the empty chair.

“Go ahead, but I don’t want to stay long.”

“Worried he followed you?” Carl asked, and his narrowed eyes did a quick once over of her chest. Mia zipped up her ragged jacket and crossed her arms.

“No, I think I got away without him following. Thank you, by the way, for doing this. I’ll pay you what we agreed upon for food and then I’ll be out of here the second I get my license on Monday.”

His innocent grin faded as his hand snaked across the table, touching hers. “What’s the rush, sweetheart? Why don’t you take some time to relax, catch your breath?”

“No, really, I just want to get out of here,” she insisted as her stomach roiled.

“I think you should stay longer, and don’t worry about the money. We can come to some other agreement. You look like you could use a good lay.”

Mia’s mouth fell open, and she yanked her hands off the table. “You sick bastard! Is that all you’re after?” Tears burned in her eyes as she hopped off her chair and grabbed the duffel from the floor. “I’ll risk the bus. Thanks for your help.”

She walked past him on her way towards the door, but he caught her elbow in a vice-like grip. “Let me go,” she hissed. “I’ll scream.”

“Go for it. Keith warned me you might still have some fight left in you and told me exactly how to handle it.”

Horror filled her at the mention of Keith. It couldn’t be possible, but the dark glint in the man’s eyes told her all she needed to know. “You’re a friend of Keith’s!”

“You really think he hasn’t had someone watching you, honey, even online at the library. I’m his go to man for computers, and he knows all about you and your plan to escape.”

Mia flinched, thinking of how careful she’d been and how it was never enough. She couldn’t get away this easily. “I don’t have any family left for him to threaten me with,” she whispered, struggling to keep her panic in check, but her shaky voice gave her away.

“No? Not even that lovely woman you work with? What is her name… Gina? Yeah, she and I had a great conversation the other day when I went through your browser history.” At her shocked expression, he shrugged. “Lied, said I was an IT guy from the city. Dumb bitch believed me.”

Mia shoved him hard in the chest, trying to break free. “You leave her alone! And get your hands off me! Just let me go.”

“No, I think I’ll return you to your man.” Carl grunted when she hit him in the stomach. “Damn it, woman. If I have to knock you out, I’ll do it.” He grabbed her other arm, but Mia’s fight instinct kicked in and she screamed. She stomped hard on his instep and brought her knee up into his groin. She would rather have done it to Keith, but his friend would suffice for the moment.

He winced and staggered, his grip loosening, and Mia made a break for it.

“Get back here, bitch!” He lunged forward and grabbed her duffle.

Mia screamed and fell forward, right into the arms and very solid body of a man who immediately picked her up and set her behind him. Too shaken to care who he was, she cowered behind him as Carl charged forward.

“Move aside,” Carl snapped. “She’s with me.”

“I don’t think she wants to be,” the brute of a man hiding Mia said and crossed his arms.

“She and her boyfriend got in a fight and she ran off, all right? I came to talk some sense into her. He’s worried sick about her.” Carl lowered his tone and tried to sound innocent, but the man’s shoulders stiffened; he wasn’t buying it.

“I think if he cared so much, he would be here and not you,” her rescuer stated. “You might need to give her some more time to cool off.”

Mia peeked out from behind the man’s arm and swallowed hard when Carl glared at her, holding himself gingerly from her previous assault. “Sure, buddy, that’s fine. Just so you know, Mia, he wants to talk to you soon, so don’t make him wait too long.” Carl tapped his head in a salute and sidled around the man and Mia. Her rescuer reached an arm back and around her, keeping her safe until Carl was completely out the door and gone. Only then did he turn slowly to face her, and Mia realized it was the man from before with the sharp blue eyes. They narrowed at her, and he reached out a hand to steady her as her knees wobbled.

“You okay?” he asked, voice rough.

Mia couldn’t look away, no matter how hard she tried, and nodded as she readjusted her baseball cap. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m good. Uh… thanks for that. He got a little… a little out of hand and I think I’m just going to step outside. Get some air, you know?’

He pursed his lips, and when he tilted his head to the right, she spotted the edges of a black tattoo curling up his neck. “I’m not sure you should be alone right now.”

“No? Probably not, but I have no one to call, so that’s where I’ll be—alone, forever,” she rambled as the weight of what this meant fell on her shoulders as if the pub itself had collapsed on top of her. “I think… I think I need to sit down.” Tears blurred her vision and the man before her bristled.

“Don’t do that… don’t start crying,” he muttered. “I don’t deal with tears.”

Mia swiped at her eyes automatically but stopped and glared up at him. Not sure where the nerve came from, she poked him hard in the chest, hurting her finger more than him but she didn’t care. “Look, buddy, I didn’t ask you to step in and save me, but you did, so thanks. But there’s no rule that says you have to stick around, all right?” She tugged her duffel up onto her shoulder and straightened her cap. “I’m going outside to cry, so if you don’t want to deal with that, then do me a favor and don’t follow me.”

Light-headed, her heart pounding and legs still shaky, Mia pushed through the crowd and hit the front door hard. Air. She needed fresh air and a chance to make a plan. She couldn’t go home and she couldn’t go to Gina’s. She was at a dead end. A taxi would be a start, and a motel for the night.

“Huh,” she muttered as her duffel fell to the sidewalk. “That’s not good.” Everything spun around her and went dark as she took a nose dive towards the pavement.

* * *

Max heard the arguing from across the pub, but by the time he stood up to see if Jeremy was in the middle of it, the woman was trying to get away and the man wouldn’t let her go. Grumbling about dumbasses ruining his chance for finding a potential fake wife, he walked over to tell the guy to leave the woman alone. The second he saw the fear in her eyes, he knew this was not just a simple misunderstanding.

He stood in the pub, watching her stumble for the door, and took a deep breath.

“Don’t do it, man,” he whispered to himself. “Don’t fucking do it.”

He was not about to get involved with some woman who probably had more issues than he did, but her legs shook as she walked to the door and the idea of leaving her alone in that condition ate at him until he was moving for the door to go after her. He prayed she wasn’t going to cry all over him. He hated crying, hated sad people, hated dealing with drama, but as he hesitated before going out the door, he replayed their short exchange. She had looked at him, stared actually, but her gaze never drifted to the scar. Not once.

The chill evening air hit Max in the face as he scanned the sidewalk, shoving his hair out of his face, and spotted her baseball cap near the curb. He opened his mouth to call out to her when her duffle hit the ground and her knees buckled.

“Shit,” he snapped and lunged forward, catching her as she fell to the ground, cradling her in his lap. “You are going to be trouble.”

She was out, lying limply in his arms, her hair splayed out over his bare skin as he held her.

“Hey, man, I wondered where you went,” Jeremy called out and his eyes widened as they fell on Max and the woman. “Uh… what the hell did I miss? I just went to take a piss and I find you out here with a woman in your lap. Are you desperate enough to start knocking them over the head?”

Max hefted the woman up higher in his lap. “Long story, man. Just grab her duffle and bring the car around, would you?”

“You’re taking her home? Is she drunk?” Jeremy asked as Max tossed him the keys.

“No, she was being harassed by some fucker in there and I broke it up, but… something else is going on with her,” he said and smoothed her hair back from her face gently, wishing she would open her damn eyes and look at him. “I came out here to check on her and she passed out.”

“Should we call someone?”

Max shook his head, remembering what she’d said about not having anyone. “She can crash in the guest room. Do you mind staying over tonight, too?”

Jeremy clapped his hands and jumped up and down. “Oh, a slumber party! I didn’t pack the right shoes.”

“And you wonder why you don’t have a boyfriend yet,” Max muttered. “Car, please?”

“Right, on it,” he said and ran down the sidewalk.

Max considered hoisting the woman up and trying to wake her, but she was so peaceful with her head resting on his thigh. It was new to him, having a woman this close to his groin and not stirring anything in him. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. She was definitely filling him with a warmth that spread through his limbs. A few people passing asked if she was all right, and he told them politely she’d passed out and he was taking his friend home for the night.

“Bad breakup,” he whispered, and they all nodded in understanding, which only disgusted him more. This was why Jeremy was his only real friend. Everyone else was too fake, too easy to let things go, but at least he had one friend. The woman had said she had no one, and he wondered if that meant family or friends, or both. “Don’t worry, my grey-eyed beauty. You’ll be fine with us for a night,” he whispered to her.

His dark red challenger pulled up next to the curb, and Jeremy hopped out.

“Get her duffel in the trunk,” Max ordered.

Jeremy picked it up quickly and stowed it before coming back to help Max lift the woman into his arms. Jeremy tapped her cheeks gently while Max held her, but all she did was mumble under her breath and curl against Max’s chest. He froze, his hands holding her protectively, and stared quizzically down at her.

“Well, you did come here tonight to find a wife,” Jeremy reminded him quietly.

“I can’t marry someone who’s unconscious. I think that’s illegal.”

“Eh, depends on what state you’re in,” Jeremy teased. He opened the back door and Max gave himself a good shake, working at ignoring the sliver of want stabbing him in the gut. He lay the woman down, slid out of his jacket, and tucked it under her head as a pillow.

Jeremy slid into the passenger side as Max climbed in behind the wheel and took off for home.

“She is quite attractive,” Jeremy commented as the leather squeaked when he turned around and glanced over his shoulder. “Tiny spit of a thing, too.”

“Yeah, you should’ve seen her, though. She hit the man a few good times, and kneed him in his package too, I think,” Max smirked. “The girl’s got some fight in her.”

“You seem impressed by that fact.”

Max didn’t have to pull his eyes from the road to know Jeremy was staring intently at him. His hands shifted on the steering wheel as the three of them drove deeper into the city towards Max’s penthouse. “I am,” he uttered on a breath. “And I want to know what kind of man thinks he can send his friend to drag her back to him after a fight.”

Jeremy sighed. “You think she’s running from something?”

“Someone is more like it,” he said and checked her in the rearview mirror. “Fear—it was all over her face, man. But I don’t want to jump to conclusions. It could be nothing, maybe just a really bad spat.”

“So his friend threatens to drag her back to him, kicking and screaming? That reeks of abuse.”

“We won’t know anything until she wakes up. We’ll set her up in the guest room for the night, and in the morning, I’ll see if I can coax some answers out of her.”

Jeremy burst out laughing, slapping his thigh as Max reached over and whacked his arm. “I’m sorry, but you are not the smoothest man in the shed, buddy boy. Trust me. You might scare the poor thing half to death.”

Max gritted his teeth but didn’t argue. He was brash on his good days and vulgar on his bad. Most people were scared of him before he even opened his mouth, and usually, by then, they were running in the other direction—unless they were women after the sex and money. He was damn good in the sack, one of his better qualities, but afterwards, he wanted to be alone again. He turned into the parking garage below his building and glided into his spot with ease.

“Fine, you’re right,” he agreed, but when Jeremy opened the door, he gripped his friend’s arm. “She didn’t look at the scar. Didn’t say anything about it.”

“That’s good, right?” Jeremy glanced back at her and frowned. “Or maybe she’s half blind.”

“Fucking jackass, man,” Max snapped as his friend chortled. “Just grab her bag and get the elevator.”

Jeremy did as he was told, and Max maneuvered the woman carefully out of the back seat and scooped her into his arms. She fidgeted, her face scrunching, looking ready to fight, but her eyes never opened and she sagged in his arms. Max let out a shaky breath, kicked his car door closed, and carried the woman towards the waiting elevator.

They rode up in silence to the lobby, passing the man at the desk giving them a curious stare, but Jeremy, as always, pulled through. He waved to the man and hurried over, grinning and laughing as he talked to him about what had happened. By the time they reached the other elevator, the man was back to his football game playing on the small TV at his station. They reached the top floor, and Jeremy hurried ahead to unlock the door to the penthouse so Max could step inside and head straight for the guest room. Jeremy usually slept in there when he stayed over, but tonight he would bunk on the couch. Max laid her gently on the bed, expecting her to wake up, but she rolled onto her side, curled up in a ball, and when her breathing steadied, he backed out of the room. The door clicked closed and he leaned a hand against it, glaring at the floorboards.

What was he thinking? He was not the hero type and certainly not a knight in shining armor. He didn’t save people. He pissed them off and scared them away, but there he was with a woman in his penthouse who would probably wake up screaming, thinking she’d been kidnapped.

“Come on,” Jeremy said after he’d set the woman’s duffel on the floor in the living room. “I want to see if there’s anything in here that might tell us who she is, and then I’m getting you a drink.”

Max turned with a grunt, not sure if he should go through the duffel, but knowing her name would be nice. He sank onto the overstuffed couch that matched nothing else in his penthouse and unzipped the bag while Jeremy fumbled around in the kitchen. He hummed as he always did—some song from the latest casino shows, no doubt. He loved those damn things and always dragged Max with him. He said he should be there since he was the owner. He kept telling his friend to try out for one and be done with it, but every time, Jeremy would laugh and tell Max he would be lost without his assistant and best friend around to keep his head on straight.

“And remember,” he would always add, “I’m the only one who actually likes you.”

Max dug carefully through the bag, but it contained clothes, a few toiletries, and no wallet he could find. She probably still had it on her, and he couldn’t dig through her pockets while she slept. Waking up to that would be worse than simply waking up in a strange place.

“Drink,” Jeremy said and a highball glass appeared in his face.

“Whiskey?” he asked.

“Who do you think I am? It’s bourbon,” Jeremy corrected and sat beside him. “Anything useful?”

“Nope, not that I can see. Just the basics.” He set his drink down after taking a long sip and glanced towards the hallway. “Think we should call the cops?”

“No, not yet. Give her ‘til morning, and we’ll talk to her then.”

“And if she is running from someone? What am I supposed to do? I can’t be her savior. You know I don’t do well with people in general. I’m not… I’m not a nice guy,” he admitted roughly.

“Eh, we’ll figure it out then.” He leaned back and flipped on the TV. “But you know, if you aren’t a nice guy, then why did you save her from that asshole and pick her up off the street?”

Max scrunched his face. Why had he done that? There was no explanation, but come morning, he would have to figure out what the hell to do with the woman he’d rescued.

* * *

Keith chucked the kitchen chair across the room, which smashed into the wall. Carl took a few steps back from his friend. “So she’s gone?”

“I told you, that guy chased me off. No offense, but I ain’t going to jail for you.”

“You didn’t think to follow her? Stick around a bit longer?” Keith raged.

“No. That man could’ve eaten me alive. He was bigger than you.”

Keith stalked around the kitchen, passed by the counter, and took a swig from the whiskey bottle. “It’s fine, we’ll find her. She’s not going to run away from me that easily. Do you at least remember this man’s face?”

“Yeah, I do, but I don’t know how that’s going to help. Seattle’s a big city, you know.”

“Most people frequent the same places.” He opened his wallet and pulled out a few hundreds. “Every few nights, I want you back at that pub. See if you can find this guy again. I’m going to talk to a few of my other friends and let them know the situation.”’

Carl hesitated as he took the money. “Keith, maybe you should just let her go. I don’t think she loves you anymore.”

Keith grabbed him by his shirtfront and yanked him close. “She loves me. She will always love me. I’m going to marry Mia Destros, no matter what happens. She is mine and no one is going to keep her from me.” He shoved his friend back and yelled at him to get out of his house. He had plans to create, phone calls to make, and a woman to find. She thought she could run from him and he would just let her go? She had another thing coming, that was for sure.

The only person who might know where Mia was headed was Gina. First thing in the morning, he’d head over to the library and see if he could pry some answers from the old bat.

He’d get Mia back in his arms if it was the last thing he did. Angry and stressed about how this night had turned out, he pounded upstairs to the bedroom and opened the closet. He dragged down the box he’d originally bought for Mia, but he needed release and needed it now. Drawing out his cell, he dialed Alice and waited impatiently for her to answer.

“Don’t say another word. Get your ass over here, and the second you step inside, I expect you to be naked,” he growled and hung up. She would come. She couldn’t resist him. If only she could be Mia. He warred between her being so pure and staying that way as long as possible and breaking her in, shaping her the way he wanted. Once he found her and brought her home, they would have a nice long talk about what he expected to change, and she would see reason.

She would have no other choice.