Unforgiven--Includes a bonus novella Page 2

  I watched her heart break right in front of my eyes. I could see that she believed I’d let Aaron down. And I didn’t disagree with her. All I could do was walk away, because I knew that if I touched her she really would try to hit me.

  After the funeral I silently promised I would stay out of her life and move on with my own, but it was hard. I still cared about her more than I should. So I kept our contact to a minimum when I was back in town. It was easier for both of us, and eventually things between us got less hostile and awkward. We matured and learned a little more about ourselves, and a whole lot about bipolar disorder and depression. We grieved separately, but the pain over losing Aaron tied us together indefinitely. I buried myself in work and became even more of a chronic bachelor, and Kody, she committed to being an even bigger pain in the ass than she already was. I resigned myself to the fact that we would never be friends, but we would always be almost family.

  It was my unfortunate luck that fate was determined to have love, death, and Kody Lawton pulling my strings for an eternity. I’d never wanted to tell her she’d lost someone else. Never planned on being the guy who continually trampled her heart. But here I was, so many years later, getting ready to explain to all the Lawton kids their father had been murdered. And it was my job to find his killer.

  Chapter 1

  Kody

  I skipped over the first stage of grief after hearing about my father’s murder and went right to stage two…anger. I had little use for denial, bargaining, depression, or acceptance. The last time I’d lost someone I loved, I’d suffered through all the stages and still ended up feeling lost and alone. This time I knew anger served me well. Anger kept me going. Anger was a comfortable, familiar feeling when it came to my father. It was an emotion I had no problem embracing when word of his murder made its way around the small town where our family had lived for generations.

  Loveless was a tight-knit community, one with a lot of secrets and a history of looking the other way when bad things happened. However, those bad things were forever discussed in hushed voices after church and in low tones in passing. The fact that Conrad Lawton, my father and the town’s sheriff for many, many years, had been found murdered just outside of Austin was bound to be the only topic of conversation for months to come. The thought made my skin crawl and fueled the silent fury I’d been clinging to since I’d gotten the news my father was no longer around to be a major thorn in my side.

  But my anger was complicated. I didn’t want false sympathy from the folks who whispered when my back was turned that the old man had deserved it. I didn’t want to hear the gossip about how Conrad Lawton’s notorious misdeeds had finally caught up to him. I didn’t want to see the curious looks weighing and judging how I and my two older brothers were dealing with the loss of the man who had demeaned and emotionally terrorized us throughout our childhoods. If I showed any sort of regret, the busybodies and rumor mill would start churning out theories that tales of our tortured youth had been exaggerated. Yet if I wasn’t sad enough that Conrad had met a violent, brutal end, I would never hear the end of that.

  People in Loveless already questioned my motives, sanity, and capability. If they decided I wasn’t responding appropriately to the news that my father had been murdered, I would become more of an outcast than I already was. And my bar, which was barely staying afloat as it was, would undoubtedly go under.

  So anger it was. We were old friends anyway.

  I lived it. I breathed it. I spread it around to the point that my brothers and everyone else who loved me were walking on eggshells, not knowing when or where I was going to explode next. I was unpredictable and volatile. Which wasn’t exactly new, but I’d gotten better at controlling myself as I’d gotten older. But after I got the news about my father, all my old, uncontrollable impulses seemed to roar back to life, and I was back to being a prickly, easily provoked mess. It didn’t help matters that the person who came bearing the bad news was the last person on the planet I wanted to hear such devastating words from.

  It felt like every single time my disorderly world was finally righting itself, Hill Gamble and his stupidly handsome face would show up and send everything spiraling chaotically out of control once again. I’d started to associate Hill with everything bad that had ever happened in my life, so naturally, where my unchecked anger was concerned, Hill always seemed to end up being the main target. Since he’d delivered the news of my father’s death, I had a hard time recalling a single second when I wasn’t absolutely furious at the gorgeous Texas Ranger. It should’ve been exhausting, but the warmth from the rage Hill sent swirling through my blood was the only heat I felt anymore.

  I grew up in a house mostly devoid of love and affection. Sure, my mother doted on me and my brothers, but she did it knowing she would have to bear the brunt of my father’s temper anytime he thought she was being too soft on us. There was no love between them, only fear and impossible expectations. My older brothers, Crew and Case, loved me unconditionally, but sometimes that love leaned into their being overprotective and overbearing. Especially after our mother died. I’d had to push them back in order to breathe, in order to live any kind of life of my own. Their love was tinted with several shades of pain and remorse and always came with the dark shadows of our shared history. It was ultimately a cold, and slightly savage, upbringing.

  When I was a teenager, I thought I’d finally found the kind of love that would chase away the chill that always lingered inside my heart. When Hill and Aaron Gamble came crashing into my life, they brought the sun and the promise of better days ahead with them. Hill reminded me of my oldest brother, Case. He was serious, steady, focused on the future and a life outside of Loveless, Texas. He was reserved and thoughtful, always watching and evaluating the world around him. He was also too beautiful for words. I literally had a hard time forming words around him. Luckily, Aaron Gamble was far easier to approach. He was quiet, moody, and sweet enough to give a girl cavities. He was the first boy who made me smile. He was the first boy brave enough to be my friend. Neither my brothers’ warnings nor my father’s ugly reputation was enough to scare Aaron off when I started to cling to him. He was my first best friend, and later on my first love. I wanted to believe the warmth he brought into my life, and into my heart, would last forever, but things were never that simple. It wasn’t until I promised to marry Aaron Gamble that I realized exactly how cold I could be on the inside.

  Loving him forced my icy heart to thaw. Losing him froze it right back up and shattered the brittle block of ice into a million pieces. I was certain I was never going to be warm again. I got used to living with a frigid void inside my chest. I tolerated the constant chill embedding itself deep into my bones.

  From the start I never knew what to do with the heat Hill brought with him when he crept into my thoughts. I would never be as angry at anyone as I was at my father, but Hill owned the second spot on my shit list. I refused to think about why he was the only person who always managed to make me forget I was frozen solid on the inside. It bugged me to no end that Hill didn’t even have to try to make me feel like my insides were kindling for an impending inferno. He just did.

  I hated that he was the one who was going to be investigating my father’s death, not because he wasn’t good at his job, but because it meant he was going to be hanging around Loveless and my family far more than I was comfortable with. It grated on my last nerve that with little effort, Hill still managed to make my whole world spin off its axis. I didn’t want him to have that kind of power in my life. I didn’t want anyone to have that effect on me.

  But Hill always had. And still did…

  When he calmly and coolly informed me that my dad was dead, I hit him.

  Was it fair? No.

  Did he deserve it? Absolutely not.

  But once again, I couldn’t control my anger around him. It was the second time Hill was the one explaining to me that a man who had fundamentally changed me had been taken away. Since there was no
way to take out my frustration on my father, Hill was the target. Just like he’d been when Aaron died.

  He absorbed my misguided anger, my misplaced blame, in the exact same way he had when Aaron passed away. The man was a sponge. Taking all my insults and hastily hurled venom without saying a word, never letting a drop of my ugly, unjust emotions spill out and infect the other people in our lives. He suffered in silence, but I could see the way my words affected him in those sharp silver eyes of his.

  “Whose job is it to cut the bartender off when they’ve had too much to drink?” The question laden with sarcasm came from across the bar.

  There was only one person not related to me who was daring enough to talk to me that way. I had a zero-bullshit policy in my bar. I didn’t take lip or attitude from anyone. My regulars knew not to mess with me, but this particular regular was braver than most and one of the few actual friends I had. My brothers hated that I was close with Shot Caldwell. Mostly because he was the president of the local outlaw motorcycle club, but also because I could confide in Shot in a way I couldn’t with them.

  This bar was my safe haven. It was also the only place I was comfortable enough to let my guard down. I’d spent the last few days in a fog, trying to figure out how I really felt about Conrad Lawton being gone and what his death meant to me, all while drinking myself into a stupor. Both my brothers had been by to check up on me, but I wasn’t in the mood to be coddled or critiqued. I chased both Crew and Case away with my bad temper and continued with my bender, trying to drink myself numb.

  It wasn’t a surprise the gruff, good-looking biker had made it a point to come check on me. Not that I was in any mood to entertain his concern.

  “No one is cutting me off. Not if they want to keep their job.” All of my staff had been giving me a wide berth the last couple of days. I couldn’t blame them. I’d snapped at each and every single one of them for no reason. I was going to have to apologize once I came back to my senses.

  Unfazed by my snarky warning, he reached a tattooed hand across the bar and snagged the rocks glass with a double shot of Crown Royal from my hand. I made a clumsy grab for my stolen drink but ended up watching as the dark-haired man tossed it back and finished it in one swallow. He wiped his mouth with the back of the same tattooed hand and lifted a dark eyebrow in my direction.

  If I were sober, I would’ve cut him down to size with a witty retort or ordered him out of my bar. Since I’d been three sheets to the wind for a solid two days and was hovering on the precipice of a sharp emotional drop-off, it was all I could do not to burst into tears or climb across the bar and strangle him.

  Letting my wild temper loose on Shot wasn’t a good idea. He was a good friend and had been, at one point, something more, but he wasn’t Hill Gamble. He wouldn’t just accept my anger. Shot’s temper ran almost as hot as mine. He was one of the few people in my life I had a healthy dose of respect for. I went out of my way to avoid pushing his buttons most days.

  I rubbed my tired, dry eyes with the heels of my palms and sucked in a painful breath.

  “I’m not in the mood to play with you, Shot.” My voice was raspy and the words burned on their way out. Maybe I’d had enough to drink. It wasn’t like the booze was helping me forget the look on Hill’s face when he told me my father was dead, or the sharp pain in my chest at the thought of my father no longer being around. It didn’t matter how much I’d disliked him.

  “You in the mood to tell me what’s going on with your old man’s case? Or how about you tell me what you need, Trouble. You know I’ve got your back, no matter what.” He tapped his fingers on the bar and pushed the empty glass in my direction. I poured him another shot on autopilot and nearly lost my balance when I pushed it back in his direction.

  I sighed and rubbed at the painful throb in the center of my chest.

  “You need to get gone. I’m sure one of my brothers will be in to try and bully me into going to one of their houses so they can hover over me until the funeral. I don’t have it in me to play referee between you and them right now. You know if I need anything I’ll let you know.” And I would. Shot was often the person I turned to when I was at my wits’ end. He never judged me. His unwavering acceptance was something I had fallen back on time and time again. It was also the reason I refused to cut him out of my life, even though my brothers and even my worthless father had pushed for me to do just that.

  “You want me to look into who might be behind his death?” His midnight-colored eyebrows lifted again. “You know I can go places and ask questions your brother and the boys in blue can’t.”

  My father had been the sheriff in Loveless for a very long time. The job had passed into Case’s hands after my oldest brother did his best to bring our father down. Dad had been a dirty cop. Corrupt as hell. The man had left a list of enemies a mile long, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Shot was among them. It was no secret the biker and my father never saw eye to eye on what was best for the town, or for me. If I hadn’t known down to my soul that Shot would never do anything to intentionally hurt me, I might have wondered exactly what he was up to the night my father was killed. Fortunately, I knew his fondness for me ran much deeper than most people, including my family, believed.

  “Stay away from it, Shot.” With the Rangers on the case, nothing good could come of it. Especially considering Shot wasn’t involved in exactly legal activities. “Case won’t be involved in the investigation. He can’t be. They called in the Texas Rangers to investigate since Dad was a cop.” And because there were more than a handful of people who’d wanted him dead. I came by my knack for making enemies naturally, it seemed.

  I poured Shot another drink and got myself a glass of water. I was dizzy and starting to feel a little queasy now that I wasn’t pickling my insides with liquor.

  Shot blew out a low whistle and gave his head a little shake. He was a good-looking guy in a dark and dangerous way. I was drawn to his rebellious attitude and his complete disregard for what anyone else happened to think about him. He reminded me of the man Aaron might have grown into if he’d given himself the chance. There were moments when I wished I’d tried harder to make things between me and Shot into something more than they were, but even his good looks and our easy compatibility weren’t enough to melt all the frost gathered inside my soft, secret places. Shot never warmed me up from the inside out, even though he tried his best. I always wondered how badly I’d hurt him when I let our brief romance fizzle out. It made me feel uneasy when I thought about it…but that might have been the booze.

  “The Rangers, huh?” He finished the drink with a grimace and knocked the wooden bar top with his knuckles. “They bring in the guy who’s friends with your brother?”

  I gulped down another glass of water and wavered on my feet a little. “How did you know that?”

  Shot flashed a grin. “Makes sense. He’s familiar with your old man’s history and knows both the family and this town.”

  I nodded, my head flopping around sloppily. “He’s assisting. He can’t be lead on the case since he knew Dad personally.” I swallowed again and rubbed my forehead. “Case trusts Hill. He believes he’ll find whoever killed our dad.”

  Shot leaned on the bar and stared at me intently. “What do you believe, Kody? Do you think he’ll find whoever took out your old man? Do you think the justice system is going to work in your favor if he does? Conrad had some of the dirtiest hands I’ve ever seen. You sure whoever killed your dad is going to get what’s coming to them, or will everyone view them as having done Loveless a favor by taking out the trash?”

  My breath locked in my lungs. I knew Shot was just being brutally honest, but hearing him voice some of my biggest fears when I was in no place to hear them made my knees turn to water and sent my head throbbing painfully.

  I reached out to brace myself on the bar. I heard one of the bartenders ask if I was all right and heard Shot call my name. My vision blurred out for a second, but not before I caught sight of a very tall
man wearing a gray Stetson coming through the front door of my bar. Considering this was Texas, a man in a cowboy hat was nothing to write home about. But when that man practically glowed in a golden light of perfection and wore a shiny badge that was impossible to miss, people stopped and took notice. I couldn’t miss him, because suddenly, in all the places where I had been ice-cold, a fire burned.

  Scowling, I let go of the bar and tried to wave both my employee and Shot off when they made sounds of concern. It was a mistake. Too little sleep, too much to drink, too much stress and sadness all combined with gravity sent me toppling to the ground. My knees hit the hardwood behind the bar with a jolt and I heard loud exclamations burst out from somewhere above my head.

  I put both my hands on my chest and tried to hold my pounding heart in place. I wasn’t used to the normally frozen thing getting such a hefty workout. I closed my eyes and ordered myself to get it together. I tried to remember I was angry…and that was it. Anger was all I was going to allow myself to feel.

  Suddenly a pair of boots hit the floor in front of me. Not the heavy black motorcycle boots I knew Shot wore, but an expensive pair of gray ostrich boots that matched the Stetson on Hill’s head when he walked through the door.

  When I pried my eyes open they met a soft, dove-gray gaze filled with simmering concern and something else. Something I’d always been terrified to acknowledge.

  A warm hand landed on my shoulder and I felt the brush of his thumb along the side of my neck.

  “Are you okay, Kody?” The question was quiet and asked in a familiar drawl.

  That damn heat he brought with him crept across my skin, and before I could stop myself I burst into tears, crying for the first time since I’d learned my father was dead.

  Chapter 2