Lawton Read online

  Lawton

  A New Adult Romance

  By Sabrina Stark

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  Copyright © 2016 Sabrina Stark

  Smashwords Edition

  Chapter 1

  It was her. My breath caught. She looked exactly like I remembered.

  Wholesome. That was the word. Or at least, that was the word normal people might use for a twenty-something girl with sun-kissed hair and wide, innocent eyes. For a girl wearing classic clothes and only the hint of makeup. For a girl who looked way too nice for the likes of me.

  Standing outside my new place, I watched, too messed up for words, as the girl of my dreams walked past, oblivious to the fact that she'd just rocked me to the bone.

  I waited for her to speak. To say something. Anything. For years, her voice had haunted my thoughts. And that face, it was the thing that kept me awake too many nights, except for the nights she rocked me to sleep, in my thoughts, if not in my bed.

  The messed up thing was, I didn't even know her name.

  But in my book, she had saved my life.

  Leaning against the massive iron gate to my new estate, I had to laugh, watching her walk by without even a glance. The laugh was low – too low to hear, but loud enough to make me want to kick my own ass.

  This was no time to be stupid. I looked down at my feet, bare, and stifled a curse. If I'd been smart, I'd have worn shoes, or hey, how about a shirt, when I walked outside to reprogram the gate.

  In this neighborhood, I knew exactly how I looked. I stuck out like a wolf in a field of sheep. I had too many tattoos, and not enough class. My cars were loud, and so were my friends. I had more money than Midas, but no college degree.

  And now, I had a three-acre estate in Rochester Hills, just a half-hour away from the hellhole I'd grown up in.

  I watched as the girl – the one with the playful smile and hypnotic eyes – kept on walking without a backward glance. In front of her, a small brown terrier bounded forward, like he'd drag her to China if she gave him half the chance.

  I heard her laugh, and the sound carried across the cool fall air. I sucked in a breath and tried like hell not to chase her down. I had no shirt, no shoes, and no intention of screwing this up.

  I'd had my share of girls – more than my share, I guess – but I'd never had a girl like her, warm and smart, and funny as hell. I felt myself frown. And rich. From birth, obviously.

  Standing by the gate, I took a good look around. In this neighborhood, that was all you got – surgeons and CEOs, kids who went to private schools, and old-money assholes who thought they were better than guys like me.

  Were they? Maybe. Maybe not.

  But that girl? She was better than me. And the way it looked, she damn well knew it.

  But somehow, I was gonna make her forget.

  Chapter 2

  "That girl?" Bishop said. "She's trouble."

  We were sitting in my study. I glanced out the front window just in time to see her, the girl with the terrier, walking along the sidewalk just outside my gate. She moved forward, looking perfect as ever, with her designer clothes and designer dog.

  I turned back to Bishop, my half-brother and full-time cynic. "Who's trouble?" I asked.

  "Cut the crap," he said. "You know damn well who."

  Outside, the girl kept going. Her gaze remained straight ahead while the dog dragged her along like a sugar-junkie on uppers. A smile played across her lips, and I felt myself swallow. She was so fucking beautiful I wanted to die.

  She wasn't trouble. She was Heaven on Earth.

  "And why is it," Bishop continued, "that every time she walks by, you stop whatever you're doing to stare at her?"

  No way I'd be telling him this story. So I only shrugged. "Hey, she's worth staring at."

  One time, maybe a couple years ago, I made the mistake of mentioning her, Hospital Girl, as I called her back then. All I got was a load of grief.

  I didn't want grief. I wanted her.

  In my study, Bishop turned in his chair to give the girl a good, long look. He watched until she was nearly out of sight. Slowly, he turned back. "Maybe."

  "There's no maybe," I said. "Just look at her."

  He didn't move. "Too late. She's gone."

  "Good," I told him.

  His eyebrows lifted. "Good?"

  "Yeah," I said, "because you don't deserve to look at a girl like that."

  "Is that so?" He gave something like a laugh. "What's so special about her?"

  Bishop wasn't the sentimental type. I knew that. He knew that. So I grasped at something easy, something even he might understand. "She has nice hair."

  "Nice hair?"

  "Yeah." Again, I glanced out the window. She was long gone. But in my mind, I could still see her. "It's like sun-kissed, you know?"

  "Sun-kissed?" His voice was flat. "Like an orange?"

  I pulled my gaze from the window and stared at him for a long moment. With most people, they'd look away. Not Bishop. His gaze held, and the silence stretched out. Brother or not, he could still be a royal pain in my ass.

  "Oh, fuck off," I finally said.

  As usual, he ignored the insult. "Why is it," he asked, "that she never looks at you?"

  I knew why. For one thing, I wasn't her type. "Why should she?"

  "Everyone else does." Bishop leaned back in his seat. "Why should she be different?"

  Because she was different.

  "You're Lawton Fuckin' Rastor," Bishop continued. "Everyone looks."

  He was right, but I'd never admit it. After five years of fame, I was tired of being gawked at, and even more tired of people knocking on my door. It was half the reason I'd moved out here to the suburbs, this one in particular.

  This place? It was a world away from my usual crowd. The way I saw it, that was a good thing.

  Yeah, I didn't fit in, but that was the whole point. I almost smiled. Maybe I'd pretend to be civilized. Just one of the neighbors. A regular Joe. Who knows, it might be nice.

  Bishop's voice broke into my thoughts. "You know, I've seen you when she goes by."

  "So?"

  "So whatever you're doing – inside, outside, whatever – you stop and watch." His eyebrows furrowed. "But she never watches you back."

  I gave him a look. "So?"

  "So there's something off about it."

  I should be used to this. The guy was suspicious of everyone and everything. For the past week, he'd been staying at my house, planning one of our secret side ventures. If this kept up, it would be a week too long.

  "Maybe she's too nice to stare," I told him. It wasn't like I'd known a lot of nice girls, but it made sense. Right?

  "I didn't say 'stare.' I said 'look.'"

  "Either way," I said, "it's not a bad thing to be polite."

  I'd been raised by my grandmother, so I knew a thing or two about politeness. I didn't curse in front of girls or forget to say thanks when someone did me a favor, which, come to think of it, wasn't all too often. "Besides," I added, "it's not like she knows me."

  Not that she knew of, anyway.

  Bishop glanced down at my arms, covered in tattoos. "Maybe."

  Then there was the thing he didn't say. Money or not, I was infamous, and not only for fighting. Thanks to that godawful sex tape and a reality show disaster, none of my parts were exactly private, and neither was my past. Some might call me a household name. Sometimes, that wasn't a plus.

  Cash and fame, they couldn’t buy respectability. And they sure as hell couldn't buy a girl like that, not that I wanted to win her that way. I'd learned some things along the way. Groupies were over-rated, and so were friends of the paid variety.
>
  That girl, she was something different. I knew her, even if she didn't know me.

  But she would.

  The next time she walked by, it was time to ditch the pretense and just go after her. I'd walk up to her and say, "Hey, remember me, the bleeding idiot you found on the sidewalk?"

  She had to remember. I mean, it's not every day you find someone that messed up. And if she didn't remember? Well, I sure as hell did.

  And it all started in the back of some white SUV.

  Chapter 3

  It was five years earlier. The music was pulsing, and the vehicle was moving. I was lying on the floor of the back seat, trying to decide if I should ride it out, or make a break for it.

  "He don't look so good," Trick said from the other side of the seat.

  As usual, Sammy was driving. "He's not supposed to look good," he said. "It's called a beat-down, not a barbecue."

  That's where Sammy was wrong. My arms still burned from their cigarettes. So technically, there had been some barbecuing. It was almost funny in a screwed up kind of way.

  "Yeah, I know," Trick said, "but we weren't supposed to kill him."

  From the front seat, Sammy said something that I couldn’t make out, probably because he'd just turned up the music. Again.

  Soon, I felt a finger at my throat. Checking for a pulse? Hell if I knew.

  "If he dies," Trick said, "the boss'll be pissed."

  Their boss wasn't the only one. I'd be kind of pissed, too.

  Through a cloud of fog, I heard their voices calling back and forth over some forgettable song with too much bass. It was turned up so loud, the doors vibrated with every beat.

  Sammy's sound system sucked, and so did his driving. I felt the SUV pop a curb as he rounded the next corner. My body shifted, and I sucked in a breath.

  I didn't know how bad they'd beaten me, but I knew it had to be bad. I took punches for a living, so I considered myself an expert when it came to dishing it out and yeah, occasionally receiving.

  Normally, I dished out a lot more than I ever took. Not tonight. And not in the usual way.

  One stupid punch.

  In this case, I didn't mean the hundreds I'd taken. I meant the one I'd delivered. That one stupid punch had knocked the guy out cold. Bad for him. Worse for me. Because that particular fight, I wasn't supposed to win.

  I knew the score. Someone had to pay, and that someone was me. With Sammy and Trick, I hadn't bothered to fight back. What was the use? I'd just get it worse in the end. Better to man up and get the damn thing over with. That had been my logic, right up to the moment I coughed up a kidney, along with a lung or two.

  Or at least, it sure felt that way.

  Now, I was in Sammy's SUV, flopped on the floor, while he drove like an idiot through downtown Detroit. Hell, he was an idiot, and Trick wasn't much smarter. They were hired tough guys with two basic skills – following orders and hurting people. Tonight, they'd done some of both.

  You could call it a twofer.

  From up front, Sammy called back, "Get ready. We're almost there."

  Knowing these guys, they were taking me one of two places – to the hospital or to the river. Since I was still alive, my best guess was the hospital, assuming I didn't die first along the way. On the upside, I was still conscious. That was a good sign.

  Think positive.

  "Hey," Trick said, kicking at my bare shoulder. "You dead down there?"

  "Not me," I mumbled. "Song sucks though."

  I wasn't lying. I wasn't dead, and the song did suck. It was some techno piece of crap that sounded like a million others just like it. But Sammy wasn't exactly the creative type.

  I heard tires squeal as Sammy rounded the next corner.

  "Remember," Sammy called over the music. "You talk, and your little sister gets it. Granny too."

  As if I didn't know.

  A second later, the vehicle squealed to a stop, sending me rolling across the wide floor of his oversized back seat. Reaching above me, Trick pushed open the door and shoved me out. I hit the pavement hard and kept on rolling.

  When I came to a stop, I was face down on the sidewalk, lying in a pool of blood that happened to be my own.

  Through a muddled haze, I heard the SUV squeal off, leaving me to fend for myself or die on the concrete. I sure as hell didn't plan on dying, so I needed to get my ass in gear, like yesterday.

  There was only one hitch. I couldn’t make myself move. I closed my eyes. Just for a minute, or at least that was the plan.

  And then, from a few feet away, I heard a female voice. "Oh my God."

  I heard footsteps on the pavement and felt a soft touch on my bare shoulder. "Are you okay?"

  I liked that question. It was a good sign. If she was asking, maybe I wasn't hurt so bad as I thought. I tried to answer, but my lips didn't move.

  Her voice rang out over the cold pavement. "Somebody help!" Her hand moved to my wrist before she started calling out again. She sounded worried and maybe a little scared.

  I didn't want her to be scared. Somehow, I made myself mumble, "No. I'm good."

  I heard a gasp, followed by that same voice, sweet as honey, but obviously shaken, "Uh," she stammered. "I, uh, I don't think you're exactly alright."

  I was sinking fast. I tried to answer, but it was taking a long time.

  That same sweet voice drifted through the mist. "Wait here. I'll get help."

  "No," I murmured. "Wait."

  She hesitated. "What?"

  I couldn’t let her leave. She might not come back. Whoever she was, I had to see her face. It took everything I had, but somehow, I managed to lift my head and turn it in her direction. Through the haze and the blood, I tried to focus.

  All I saw was a foggy blur. I needed more time. "Don't go."

  She squeezed my hand. "Don't worry," she said. "I'll be right back. With help. I promise."

  I looked toward the voice and tried again. Focus. Finally, the haze cleared, and I saw that face. It was the perfect match for that perfect voice. Her eyes were wide, and her lips were parted. She looked scared to death, but sweeter than anything I'd ever seen.

  For the first time in my life, I was suddenly scared. She was an angel, and if she left me now, I knew I'd die. And if I was going to die, I refused to go without knowing her name. "No," I murmured. "Stay. Please."

  After the briefest hesitation, she asked, "What happened?"

  If she only knew.

  When I didn't respond, she tried again. "Were you shot or something?"

  It hurt like hell, but I had to laugh. "That bad, huh?"

  A racking pain shook my insides. Suddenly, I was choking. I coughed and sputtered and then coughed some more. When it was all over, I tasted fresh blood, and not just a little.

  This wasn't good.

  She was yelling again, louder now. "Someone's hurt over here!" Her voice broke. "Please? We need help!"

  The panic sounded wrong on her lips. If only I could move, I'd wipe her fears away. Through the blood and the pain, I made myself croak out, "Stop."

  She leaned close. "Stop what?"

  I tried to smile, but I don’t think I did. Somehow, I managed to murmur, "Stop yelling."

  Her hand, still on mine, grew suddenly stiff. She paused. "Then I'll be right back." She made a move to pull away.

  No.

  She couldn’t go. Not until I warned her. If something happened – if I didn't make it or if she took off and ran – there was something she needed to know. I summoned up all my strength and made a grab for her wrist. When my fingers closed around it, I held on tight. "Don't tell," I said.

  She hesitated. "Don't tell what?"

  "Anything. Whatever you saw, it didn't happen."

  When she said nothing, I tried again. "Stairs. Fell down 'em. No big deal." Something sliced across my insides, and I tried not to lose it. When it sliced again, I rolled onto my side and clutched my stomach. Still, I managed to grit out, "Be fine in a minute."

  But I
wasn't fine. When the next spasm hit, everything grew dark.

  Chapter 4

  She loved dogs and hated seafood. She had a kid brother she called brilliant and a Polish grandma who was, in her words, a "total potty-mouth." She loved comedies and hated to cry.

  And, apparently, she lied like a rug.

  Through the foggy haze, I heard her tell somebody, "I'm his sister."

  Thank God she wasn't, and not only because my sister's life hadn't exactly been easy. The way I felt about this girl, well, there was nothing sisterly about it.

  For hours, she stayed beside me. She held my hand. She whispered soothing words and funny stories while I drifted in and out, a lot like all those doctors and nurses doing who-knows-what.

  She gave them a name – not hers, and not mine. Apparently, I was now John Livingston of Maple Drive instead of Lawton Rastor, fuck-up extraordinaire. If only that were true. I might stand a chance with a girl like this.

  I couldn't move, and I couldn’t talk. It had to be the drugs. Because if it was something else, I was in deeper than I knew. What would I do if I couldn’t fight? What would happen to my sister? My grandma? My sanity?

  My one miracle was this girl, with her soft hands and sappy stories. As time wore on, she felt like my sole grip on reality – a better reality, without the ugliness and without the pain. When I fell into darkness, her sweet voice drifted over me again and again, like a warm blanket that kept the winter at bay.

  And then, who knows when, the voice at my side changed – from feminine to masculine, no longer warm and definitely not funny. "Who's the girl?" he asked.

  Shit. It was Sammy. What the hell was he doing here?

  "Grab his legs," Sammy said. "Hurry. Before she comes back."

  After that, everything faded to nothing. I woke in some cheap hotel room with Sammy and Trick, along with some toothless guy who might pass for a doctor if you weren't too particular about credentials and degrees.

  The girl was nobody, or at least, that's what I told them – not for my sake, for hers. I had to keep her safe. Safe from them. Safe from me.

  I wanted to find her, and I wanted to forget. A girl like that? What would she ever want with a guy like me? I was poor, beat-up, and headed for a crash.