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Somerset was beautiful, inspiring and filled with dark, poisonous little creatures just waiting to strike. She had sensed that during the first few months settling in. She knew it the moment she had met these two, and now she felt its swift, sharp retribution.
The pictures were in her purse, but she knew that meant so very little. Simply that she had her own copy. Damn them.
“Staying here will serve no purpose,” Dayle Mackay snorted. “You’re not wanted, you little bitch, any more than your ignorant father was wanted or any of the Walker clan. The lot of you are nothing but white trash whores and drug guzzling bastards.”
Oh, one day, he’d pay for that one. They would both pay for that one.
“Oh well, far be it from me to prove you wrong,” she replied mockingly. “Do whatever the hell you want with the pictures. But”—she paused as she picked up the oversized bag at her side—“be watching for me. When you least expect it.” She looked between the two. “When you very least expect it, I’ll be there. And it won’t be trumped-up photos that are used to break either one of you. It will be the truth.”
She left the school, and she left her dreams behind her. She refused to call her parents. This was her life, and the thought of dragging them into the mess she had allowed to develop made her cringe.
It was her fault. She should have done as her father warned her and let his friends who managed the bar he still owned in town know who she was when she went there, rather than hiding from them. It wouldn’t have happened then, because they would have watched out for her.
The problem was, she hadn’t wanted anyone to watch out for her. She had been too confident that she could watch out for herself. She was an adult. She was able to defend herself. In the arrogance of youth she had convinced herself that nothing and no one could touch her.
She had entered that bar as confident and arrogant as any young woman that had just turned twenty-one, watched the excitement and fun with a sense of anticipation and she had let herself be betrayed and nearly used. She had made that mistake. It was no one’s fault but her own. She would live with it.
She wasn’t about to leave Pulaski County though. As she drove home, she stared out at the mountains, watched the sun blaze full and bright as it began its descent in the evening sky, and she knew she couldn’t leave.
She had been raised in the city, but these mountains, they were a part of her. From the moment she had entered them, she had known she had come home, and she’d known she never wanted to be anywhere else.
But now, she knew an adjustment would have to be made.
Her eyes narrowed, her jaw clenched. Damn Nadine Grace and Dayle Mackay. She wasn’t going to be run out of town. She wouldn’t be defeated like that. They had won this round, and those pictures would probably be on the Internet within hours. But that didn’t mean they had beaten her.
Her hands clenched on the steering wheel as she drew in a hard, deep breath. Her father had always called her his little Rogue. He would smile fondly when she dressed in her ‘good girl’ clothes as he called them, and his eyes would always twinkle as though he knew something she didn’t.
“You’re as wild as the wind,” he would tell her, and she had always denied it.
But now, she could feel that part of herself burning beneath the surface of the ‘good girl’. The dreams of teaching had always held her back. A teacher had to be circumspect. She had to be careful. But Caitlyn Rogue Walker was no longer a teacher. She no longer had to worry about being circumspect. She didn’t have to worry about protecting a job she didn’t have.
She flipped on the car’s turn signal and took the road that headed to the little bar outside of town. It had begun there, and if her father knew what had happened, he would burn it to the ground. Unfortunately, she had loved being in that damned bar.
She had sat in the corner, watched, devoured the atmosphere and longed to be something more than a “good girl” while she had been there.
There was an apartment overhead. The manager, Jonesy, was a good friend of her father’s, as were the bouncers that worked there. She only had to walk in, announce who she was and take over ownership.
Had her father somehow sensed her dreams would go awry here more than he had told her? Because he had offered her the bar. Told her that when she got tired of playing the political games that filled the educational system that she could always run the bar. And his eyes had been filled with knowledge, as though he had known the wildness inside his daughter would eventually be drawn free.
Her reputation had been destroyed because of whatever had happened there the one night she hadn’t been cautious enough. Now, it was time to remake that reputation.
Rogue was young, but she was pragmatic. She was bitter now, and she knew that bitterness would fester until Nadine Grace and Dayle Mackay had paid for what they had done. But she wasn’t going to let it destroy her. She wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of destroying her.
She smiled in anticipation, in anger. Nadine Grace and Dayle Mackay had no idea what they had done. They had destroyed Caitlyn Walker, but nothing and no one coul
d destroy the Rogue she intended to become.
ONE WEEK LATER
Sheriff Ezekiel Mayes eased from his current lover’s bed and moved through the bedroom to the shower. The widow he was currently seeing slept on, oblivious to his defection as he showered and dressed.
It would be the last night he spent with her, he knew. Zeke insisted on privacy in his relationships. He didn’t publicly date. He didn’t claim any woman. There was no room in his life, his heart or his secrets for such a woman. And she was steadily pushing for more. He knew if he didn’t break it off now then it would only become a mess he didn’t want to face.
He didn’t want ties. He didn’t want the mess that came from claiming any woman as his own. He didn’t want the danger he knew a woman of his could face. He was walking a thin line and he knew it. He wouldn’t make his balance more precarious by taking a lover that could become a weakness. Calvin Walker’s daughter was definitely a weakness, simply because of her affiliation with the Walkers and others’ hatred for them. The job he had set for himself demanded a fragile balance at the moment. Maintaining that balance would be impossible if he gave in to the needs clawing at his gut right now for one innocent little school teacher.
As he moved from the bathroom Mina rolled over and blinked back at him sleepily. Slumberous dark eyes flickered over him as a pout pursed her full, sensual lips.
“It’s not even dawn yet,” she muttered, obviously less than pleased to find him leaving.
