“Right.”
I didn’t want to end the call, but I didn’t want to talk about my past either. My life was what it was. It wasn’t going to change, especially my past. “Thanks, Reed.”
“For what?”
“Being there.”
13
REED
I was glad Harper was so far away. If she saw me now, she’d be afraid. I’d been so angry when she told me what had happened to her, I heel palmed the cinderblock wall. The throbbing pain dulled my need to beat the shit out of her brother, and I shook my wrist to work it out. I knew better than to injure myself, but fuck, this woman pulled out every one of my protective instincts. I’d been born to fight. Hell, I’d survived by fighting, and I wouldn’t hesitate to defend someone I cared about.
Did I care
about Harper? Fuck, yes.
Why? I had no idea. I just knew the second I saw her she was different.
More.
When I’d seen her text, I’d just finished my workout and was heading upstairs to shower. Sweat dripped down my face, made my t-shirt cling. I was ripe and ready for a protein shake and my usual lunch of salmon and brown rice.
I’d walked out of the gym and into the emergency stairs leading to our apartments, sat down on the hard steps as we talked, but when she’d shared about what her brother had done, given her to his friend, I couldn’t hold back. I’d had to hit something. I wanted to hit the fucker Brad. Good thing he was dead. No, I wanted to hit her brother more. An older brother was supposed to watch out for a sister, not give her to a friend. Fuck!
I’d had to keep my cool, to hide the rage that seeped from me like the sweat from my morning training session. Harper had done nothing wrong, and she didn’t need to feel bad about what had happened to her. She’d been practically a child. Thirteen! What the hell did she know about sex at thirteen? From the sound of it, she played it off as something that wasn’t rape. It hadn’t sounded like the guy forced her, but what kind of consent could she give? She might not have said no, but I doubted she’d been into it, that she’d said yes. She’d been thirteen.
Jesus.
Maybe that was how she coped although knowing she’d been ready to fuck Larry in this damn stairwell meant she wasn’t completely straightened out. She’d left the country. Fled to London. Maybe what we’d done in my apartment had set her off, but I was sure it wasn’t the only reason she’d run. Something else was going on. She’d texted me though—and not because she was bored. Although if I had to sit through a meeting about a seven-hundred-year-old cathedral, I’d lose my mind. No, she didn’t know anything about me except that I was safe. That I’d listen, hold her, protect her.
Since she’d just let slip that her brother gave her to his friend, it was a sign that she trusted me, at least a little but, in a way she’d never expected. Our friendship, whatever the fuck it was, was unexpected. The princess and the guy on the wrong side of the tracks. Somehow, I could give her things no one else could. I wasn’t exactly sure what that was since I had no idea what the fuck I was doing. When it came to women, I didn’t do relationships. I didn’t do anything deep because I didn’t want anyone to see past the fighter veneer because no one would like what they found.
I just knew I had to be there for her. The rest, I’d figure out.
I went back into the gym, tracked down Gray, who was with a client by the punching bags warming up. The guy, Wiley, was debating going pro. He was good, and if anyone was going to get him there, it was Gray. Wiley was kicking the crap out of the bag, one after the other, the dense sound of it louder than the music through the overhead speakers.
“Good, now roll your hip over. Yes, like that. Again.”
Gray kept his eyes on his client but gave a little chin lift, a sign I could interrupt.
I stepped close, murmured, “Who’s the cop who comes to the BJJ class?”
Gray arched one dark brow, crossed his arms over his chest. He wore a gym T-shirt and his black grappling shorts. His feet were bare since he was on the mats. “Jasper?”
I nodded. “That’s him. I need him to find out about someone.”
“Go grab a drink, grab your gloves, and I’ll meet you in the ring,” Gray said to Wiley.
Wiley said hi to me on the way to the bench where he grabbed his towel, mopped the sweat from his face as he grabbed his water bottle.
Gray and I stood alone in the far side of the gym. “Someone?”
“Harper’s brother. Said his name was Cam, and he’s in prison.”
“From your tone, it sounds bad.”
I met his steel colored eyes. “Real bad.”