“For what it’s worth, I would have much rather put the cuffs on the old guy. I see it every day. I understand you were just trying to do right by your mom. Too many kids find themselves in that situation, a lot of them are much younger than you.”

I just sighed and thanked him for his time.

Rowdy clapped me on the back of the neck and practically dragged me out of the station. I was surprised to see that he was alone, but as we walked to his black SUV he told me, “The cop mentioned you left the Challenger in the Heights with the keys still in it. Nash convinced Rule to go with him to pick it up and drop it off at the house. Didn’t know what the old bastard might do to it.”

That hadn’t even occurred to me, so I muttered a thank-you and looked at him out of the corner of my eye. “Thanks for coming to get me, dude.”

He brushed it off. “Whatever.”

“Seriously. I’ll pay you back.”

“Okay, I’m about to punch you on the other side of your face. Knock it off and just tell me what happened.”

I jammed my fists into my eye sockets and tried to block it out but all I could see was my mom crying and her black eye. It made me want to beat on the old man all over again.

“It was a total shit show that involved my dad throwing me on the ground, my mom with a black eye, and some pretty serious assault charges leveled at me.” I flexed my hands and winced as the scrapes across my raw knuckles pulled and tugged. “I would have killed him. Seriously, Rowdy. I was so goddamn close.”

He was quiet for a long minute and I thought maybe I had crossed a line in our friendship, but when he spoke, his voice was steady and there was no censure in it.

“He would have deserved it. No man should ever hit a woman.”

I groaned and wanted to pull my hair out. “Now all I can think about is how long it was going on and why she never said anything. She got into the fucking ambulance with him and went to the hospital. She was bleeding and had a black eye and she went with that bastard to the hospital where she works. She didn’t say a word when they put cuffs on me and shoved me in the back of the cruiser, not even ‘thank you.’ I’m over it, dude. Just over it.”

“You need to get a lawyer.”

“Yeah, I guess I probably should.”

“Talk to your mom. Get her to tell them that he hit her first.”

I shook my head. “That won’t happen. I mean, I guess I should have seen this coming. It’s been getting worse and worse. I refused to set him up with Dario and the boys in Artifice. He wanted to go on tour with them as a roadie. Can you believe that shit? I told him no and he beat the crap out of her and then tried to whip my ass. He’s insane.”

“What are you going to do?”

That was the question. What was I going to do? Since I didn’t have an answer, I just kept my mouth shut. I was glad to see the Challenger parked in the driveway. I was also glad to see that Cora’s Mini was gone and so was Ayden’s Jeep. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to say to either of them, and now that I had the time to wash the stench of jail off and try to put my head back on right, I was gladly going to use it. I turned to Rowdy and gave him a lopsided grin that had no humor in it.

“Let the guys know I’m cool. Especially Nash. This isn’t the first rodeo with my old man. I doubt it’ll be the last.”

“We got your back, Jet. Don’t sweat it.”

I nodded my thanks and jumped out of the SUV. It was closing in on midnight and I felt wrung out and dirty. All I wanted to do was strip down both physically and mentally. I felt like I should have seen this coming from a mile away, and it bothered me that I was still disappointed that it was happening to me. Before I could change my mind, before I could let guilt and anything else get in the way, I sent Dario a text to tell him that the boys and I were in for the tour. I would deal with what that meant for where I stood with Ayden later. Right now, I needed something tangible to focus on and put my energy into, and getting together an amazing set to take overseas was just the ticket. I turned the phone off before I could see what he sent me back, and wandered into the bathroom.

I dropped everything in a messy, bloodstained pile on the floor and turned the water on as hot as it would go. When the steam filled the room, I climbed in and let the scalding burn slide over my head and down over my shoulders. I wanted to wash the entire day away, but that was far-fetched because I still had a dad in the hospital and a looming court date, and no matter how hot the water was, neither of those things was simply going to wash away. I flexed my hands under the water and watched dispassionately as the dried blood swirled with the water down the drain. The slice on my face started to sting and I was going to scrub it, when the glass door to the shower opened and I felt soft hands slide around my waist and rest on my stomach. A feather-light kiss landed on the back of my neck and I felt her lay her cheek on the center of my spine.

She was all soft hands, soft skin, soft breasts, and the sweetest-sounding voice I had ever heard. All the razor-sharp edges and stabbing pain of the day bled away, piece by piece, and started to swirl down the drain with everything else. Some of the awful tension that was coiled inside me started to unwind and I put one of my battered hands over the top of her much smaller ones.

“Bad day?”

Her twang was a little more pronounced than it typically was and I wanted to believe it was because she was worried about me, and that she really did care about me in the same way I was rapidly starting to care for her. I felt her move closer to me, so that her entire front was pressed along my back. I could feel other parts of my body start to tense now, but in an entirely better way. All it took was a touch from this girl and nothing else seemed to matter.

“It wasn’t one of the better ones, for sure.”

She moved one of her hands up so that it was resting on my heart, which I was pretty sure she could feel pounding at her touch. The other she moved lower and it was almost enough to make me forget about what a crap day it really had been. I wanted to turn around, wanted to put my arms around her, but letting her hold on to me, letting her put me back together was what I needed right now. So I just kept my eyes closed and stretched my hands out to brace myself against the wall. I couldn’t see my mom’s battered face anymore or feel my dad’s face break under my hands. All that mattered was Ayden, and that she could make it right, make me right.

Her fingers trailed a tingling pattern along my cock. I felt each brush, each twist of her hand on my chest. My heart pounded a rhythm that I was sure she could feel, and each time she squeezed me or slicked her hand over the ring through the tip, it thundered and I could feel her smile against the back of my neck. She moved her hand that was on my chest, so that she could run her fingers around the hoop through my nipple, and for a second I thought my knees were going to give out. She normally didn’t pay any attention to the hardware I had in places she only got to see when we got naked together. The fact that she was paying extra attention to it right now, that she was just taking care of me so well, I think it was what pushed me over the edge.

She kissed me behind my ear and ran her tongue over the spike that decorated the top. Her clever hands did something with the ring at the tip of my dick that made me breathe out her name, and I knew there was no way I was going to hold out for much longer. I bit my bottom lip and thrust a rhythm into her slick hand. Her palm was soft and pliable, like she knew just what I needed in order to get all the poison out. When she clamped her strong teeth onto the cord of my neck that was straining in effort to prolong the pleasure and to wring out every single second of mindless oblivion she offered, I was done for. She laughed in a soft caress against my shoulder and I felt her rest her cheek on my damp skin. She wrung me out dry, while I panted and she patted the flexed muscles on my flat stomach.

“All better?”

I shook the water out of my face and reached out to turn off the tap. I turned around to look at her. I saw her pretty eyes get big when they landed on the gash in my cheek and I held up my hands backward so she could see the damage to them as well.

“Not even close.”

She reached out to touch my face, but I jerked away before she could make contact. I didn’t want her to have anything to do with all that ugliness, even if it was just a gesture of comfort and care. I pulled her to my chest so we were pressed together, all wet skin and slick bodies, and wished I could have this moment last forever. She put her arms around me and I almost choked on a sigh of relief. There was a part of me that didn’t know where this girl’s head was and I really thought seeing the wrecked shape I was in might be enough to make her say, “It was fun, Jet, but I don’t have time for this.” Instead, she put her hands on my ass and rubbed her soft cheek against the one of mine that was still intact.

“I was supposed to close, but I was worried about you so I harassed Shaw into staying for me. Everyone was freaking out.”

I sighed into her hair and pushed open the shower door. I wrapped a towel around her first, which was a shame because there were very few things in life I liked more than a naked Ayden, then hooked one around my own waist. I wasn’t sure if she wanted to go to my room or hers, so I followed her out of the bathroom, which had the added bonus of me getting to watch those long, bare legs the entire way. She picked my room, which wasn’t a surprise. She liked when I played the guitar and worked on songs, and I think she knew that after the way today had gone, I was no doubt going to need to get something out and on paper before the night was over. I don’t know how she got it the way she did, but regardless of where we went with our relationship—or nonrelationship—Ayden Cross was the one person who simply understood me. That alone was enough to make me care for her like I had never cared for anyone else. It would be so easy to fall in love with her, secrets and all.

She let the towel drop and crawled up on the dark red comforter. Those legs, that dark cap of hair and those eyes that just burned with furtive stories and every kind of enticement held me entranced, and all I wanted to do was stare at her. She watched me steadily for a long minute. I didn’t know what to say to her, so I looked at my torn-up hands again and frowned as I flexed them open and closed.

“You didn’t have to leave work early. I would have made it until you got home.”

One of her sable-colored brows went up and the side of her mouth kicked up in a sexy grin. She leaned back on her elbows, which made her breasts do things that any red-blooded male on the planet would give his left nut to see.

“Stop it, Jet. I was worried about you. I debated all afternoon about coming down to the station, but figured if you wanted me there you would have called me. I knew the boys would take care of you in their own way, but I needed to get to you in order to take care of you in mine. I’m going to ask you what happened and we’re going to talk about it for real, because I see your hands, Jet I’ve had them all over me and I know that whatever got you to this point is bad. I don’t see any reason for us to have that conversation before we work out some of that nasty stuff floating around in those eyes, though, so get that fine ass in gear and get over here.”