Forbidden Crush Page 3

  “Hawk’s a man who corrupts everything around him. A bad man.” The judge shook his head. “I’m ordering you to fulfill 120 hours of community service here in Eastland. Your license is hereby suspended as well, pending completion of the community service. If you would like to appeal the decision, you may file the paperwork with the courthouse in Macon county.” He nodded with finality. “Pretend you heard me bang a gavel.”

  “My license?” I sputtered. “I didn’t even… No! You can’t do this!”

  He whirled. Fire was in his eyes, now. “I cannot do what, exactly?”

  His words dripped with unspoken threat. Just like the sheriff last night. Daring me to say anything more.

  “Nevermind, your honor,” I said in a weak voice.

  “You are lucky I am so lenient,” he declared, as if the river reeds were a courtroom audience demanding a performance. “If I asked the sheriff if he smelled alcohol on your breath last night, I’m sure he would say yes. I’m letting you off mighty easy, on account of I’m in such a good mood. Tell me you understand what I’m saying to you, sweetie.”

  “Yes, your honor.”

  He nodded, then added a new lure to the end of his hook. “Beautiful morning to be under God’s blue sky, isn’t it? You have a nice day, now.”

  I trembled with anger as I walked back to the sheriff’s cruiser.

  6

  Charlotte

  The sheriff didn’t say anything on the way back to the station. He could probably tell based on the look on my face. Or because my fate was predetermined the moment I was pulled over last night.

  My anger faded away and was replaced by self-pity. I was stuck in this podunk little town with a power-tripping sheriff and an arrogant judge. 120 hours of community service in a town almost three hours from home. My license had been suspended in the meantime.

  And for what? Driving down the wrong road on a rainy night? Pulled over for no flipping reason?

  I’d never considered myself to be an unlucky woman. Heck, I didn’t even think I believed in luck. But based on how the past few weeks had gone, I was ready to start plucking four-leaf clovers and rubbing a lucky rabbit’s foot.

  There was a rumble of a motorcycle. It came around the bend in the opposite direction, passing us on the right. Without a helmet, I was able to recognize Hawk instantly. He wore wide aviator sunglasses and his sandy hair flowed in the wind. The sheriff shook his head as Hawk passed, the rumbling sound of his Harley disappearing behind us.

  That’s when I remembered that the judge had reacted when he saw Hawk’s jacket. He seemed to be going easy on me until then. As if I somehow had a connection to the tattooed biker in the cell next door.

  My anger returned, this time at Hawk. It was his fault. I didn’t ask for his help. I should have left his stupid jacket on the floor of my cell.

  The police station was empty when we arrived. “Let me go get the clerk,” the sheriff said, going around the desk and sitting down. He removed his hat and smoothed back his hair, then grinned like he’d made a joke. “Oh, right. I’m the clerk too.”

  We spent the next few hours going through all the charging paperwork listing my offenses. Then a form stating that I understood my Georgia driver’s license was suspended pending the completion of the community service, which was required to be performed in Eastland. $210 in Eastland court fees, which I really wanted to protest since my court appearance had taken place at the banks of a river while the judge fished. Then there was the paperwork for the community service itself. The woman I would report to, the duties I would be expected to perform. A waiver stating that I had no health problems preventing me from picking up trash or repairing fences.

  Although I signed everything then, I was holding out hope that I could appeal it later. That I wouldn’t need to do 120 hours here in this crappy little town.

  Once the forms were signed, the sheriff spent over an hour sending them one at a time through the fax machine which was so old the white plastic was now yellow. I sat in the corner and thought about how long 120 hours was. Three weeks. 15 days. Over 7,000 minutes.

  “All set!” the sheriff announced happily. He was in a much better mood this morning. “You’ll report for your community service at the community center over on main street. Be there right at 8:00 tomorrow. If you’re late, they’ll deduct an hour from your timesheet.”

  He handed me the bag with my purse and cell phone. I glanced at it: the screen was a flurry of missed texts and voicemails. My parents, I thought with alarm. I hadn’t arrived home last night. They must have thought I was dead.

  “Where are my car keys?” I asked. “And for that matter, where’s my car?”

  “We had it towed to the town’s motel. Tow truck driver has the keys. I’ll drive you there.”

  I blinked. “Why the motel?”

  The sheriff chuckled as if it were a silly question. “Well, you can’t exactly drive out of town with your license suspended, now can you?”

  I let him drive me over to the motel. I texted momma and dad on the way: everything’s fine, I’ll call and explain soon. But I’m safe.

  The Hollow Hare Motel looked abandoned. It was long and narrow, running parallel to the road. There was only one floor. The parking lot was spiderwebbed with cracks that had weeds poking through. In another few years the cement might not even be visible.

  Next to the sign on the road was a weird piece of metal art. Just like the one I’d seen my first night driving into town, it was like a skeleton made of metal. In the daylight I saw more details: it had three long fingers on each hand, like claws, one of which gestured at the road. A wide-brimmed hat covered its empty face. The metal of its chest, where the sternum might have been, had rivets up the front like rusty buttons. It was beautiful in a haunting sort of way, and it filled my chest with despair.

  My car waited in one of the parking spots. Next to it was a tow truck without any business marking on the side. “Have a pleasant stay,” the sheriff said in a bored tone.

  I bit back an angry response and got out of the car.

  “Ma’am?” said the man who climbed down out of the tow truck. “You Miss Owens?”

  “Unfortunately.”

  It took him a beat to realize that was a yes. “You owe me for the tow.”

  “Give me a minute, alright?” I said, and went into the lobby.

  A teenage boy sat behind the front desk with his feet up, playing on his cell phone. He looked annoyed to see a customer come in.

  “Huh?” he said as a greeting.

  “How much for a room?” I asked. I wasn’t sure if I was going to spend the night, but I did know that I wanted a shower and a place to change into fresh clothes.

  “$20 for a night, or $100 for the full week.”

  “Just the one night.”

  His mouth hung open. “Naw, you see, it’s cheaper to take the week. You end up saving…” He trailed off as the gears in his head tried to do the mental math.

  “I won’t be here a week,” I said. God willing.

  “Whatever,” he said, as if I was the idiot for passing up the deal.

  I held out my credit card. He stared at it. “Do you not take credit?” I asked.

  “Well, sure, we do,” he admitted. “But it’s an awful lot of work. I gotta fish out the scanner from the back room with the spiders. Then I gotta hook up the connection, which is real slow. You’d be makin’ my life easier if you had cash.”

  I found a $20 in my wallet and handed it over. He accepted it without charging me tax or even printing a receipt. He handed me a key attached to a plastic lanyard. “Room one.”

  I took the keys and frowned. “Am I the only one staying here?”

  He was already looking down at his phone again. “We don’t get a lot of business.”

  “Right,” I said, and went back outside.

  The tow truck guy was waiting to accost me. “Miss Owens, I can’t give you the keys to your car ‘til you pay the balance.”

  He seeme
d like a nice enough guy, so I held back from chewing him out. “My license is suspended, so I don’t really need my keys, now do I?”

  I smiled to let him know it was a joke. He took off his baseball cap and rubbed his bald head nervously.

  “How much do I owe you?” I asked.

  “$150.”

  “What!” I exclaimed. “I could stay here for almost two weeks for that.”

  His already dour face grew gloomier. “Well, it’s a $50 flat fee for a tow, plus $100 for each additional day kept at the yard. You didn’t take possession yesterday, so…”

  “That’s because I was in jail last night.”

  “That’s none of my business, miss,” he said.

  I sighed. “Do you take credit cards?’

  “No, miss.”

  I fished out my checkbook and paid him without a single smart-mouthed comment about how this was beginning to feel like extortion. With all the business expenses we’d had for our food truck in Savannah, I wasn’t exactly flush with cash. But I was also exhausted, and just wanted to get somewhere private.

  Once I had my keys, I grabbed one of my suitcases from the car and then went inside my motel room.

  Two double-beds took up half the room, with a dresser across from them. A boxy old television sat on the dresser. On the far end of the room was a bathroom, and a kitchenette with a microwave, mini fridge, and a hotplate.

  “At least it’s clean on the inside,” I muttered to myself. It even smelled clean. Thank God for small miracles.

  I locked the deadbolt, then took a shower. The bathroom was clean and there was plenty of hot water, which improved my mood from god-awful to merely terrible. Once I had the smell of the jail off my skin, and once I had fresh clothes on, I felt like a new woman.

  Without listening to any of the voicemails, I called Momma.

  She was relieved to hear my voice until I told her what had happened. She listened quietly as I explained everything that had happened last night and today.

  “Eastland?” she said. I heard her speaking to my dad, then her voice returned to the phone. “Your father’s going to call in some favors. We’ll get this all sorted out soon.”

  “I promise,” I heard dad say. “I’ve got a lot of old buddies working down between Macon and Savannah.”

  “Do you want me to come pick you up?” Momma asked.

  I sighed. “As much as I want to say yes, is there any point? I have 120 hours of community service, and my license was revoked. I’m scheduled to begin my hours tomorrow morning. So unless you want to pick me up, and then drive me three hours back in the morning…”

  “I’d do it if you want me to,” Momma said. “There’s nothing like staying in your own bed to soothe the soul.”

  I smiled to myself. “Thanks, Momma, but I’ll be alright tonight.”

  “Hopefully just tonight,” she said, anger trickling into her tone. “Handle your community service tomorrow as if nothing’s wrong. By tomorrow night your father should have fixed this. Love you, sweet pea.”

  “Love you, Momma.”

  As soon as I hung up, I quickly plugged my phone charger into the wall before my phone could die. Then I closed my eyes with my head on my pillow. Having a dad who was the sheriff of a small town had been a pain growing up, because it meant I couldn’t get away with anything in town without word getting to him. If he got me out of this mess it would make up for all the missed curfews in the world.

  I rolled my head over to look at my suitcase. I’d been in such a hurry leaving the apartment I shared with Scott that I’d thrown everything into suitcases without bothering to fold them. Since I didn’t have anything to do, I retrieved the other two suitcases from the car and arranged all my clothes on the second bed. I sorted them by type, then folded everything nice and neat back into the suitcases. An orderly closet made for an orderly life, Momma always said.

  Here in the run-down motel in a run-down town, the simple chore was calming.

  By the time I was done, I was starving. The last thing I’d eaten was the bread at the beginning of last night’s dinner. The stress of everything had tightened my stomach into such a small ball that I hadn’t noticed until now.

  I went back to the motel lobby. “How far is it into town?”

  The kid behind the desk looked up from his phone. “Uh. I dunno. A while thataways?” He pointed in a vague direction that wasn’t helpful.

  “Are there taxis in this town?”

  He laughed as if that were a joke.

  I was too hungry to walk to the diner, especially after just showering. “Is this food fresh?” I asked, pointing to the cooler of purchasable food.

  “I dunno. Check the labels.”

  I picked out a microwavable burrito, some canned fruit, a diet coke, and a big bag of chips from the rack underneath. I stared at the cooler a few seconds longer and then grabbed a six-pack of beer too.

  “Having a party?” the kid asked with a snicker. “Or a pity party?”

  I smiled sweetly at him. “What’s your name?”

  “Billy.”

  “Well, Billy,” I said as I handed him my Visa. “Go fetch the machine from the closet, because I’m paying with credit.”

  I savored his groan as he obeyed.

  I carried my bounty of junk food in my arms outside. A deep rumbling vibrated through the ground, announcing the arrival of a gang of motorcycles before I saw them. They came around the bend in the road, riding two-by-two. They looked like the same guys I’d seen at the police station last night, though there were closer to 20 of them than just six. Their leather jackets had a snake coiled around a skull on the back, with the word COPPERHEAD in bronze letters above. I looked for Hawk, but didn’t see him in the group.

  There was something about the bikes that was unnerving. I shuddered. The sooner I was out of this little town, the better.

  Back in my room, I microwaved the burrito and then bit into it despite its hot contents. It tasted better than any frozen burrito I’d had in my life. There was no greater spice than hunger. I sat up in bed and scrolled through the map on my phone while eating. Eastland was indeed a one-road town, just off the interstate and surrounded by little square plots of farmland. The aerial view in Google Maps looked like a chess board whose squares were floating away in every direction.

  I zoomed back in on the Eastland main street. The community center where I had to be in the morning was only about half a mile from my motel. Close enough to walk, at least. The diner was even closer. I could’ve gone there for dinner.

  “Don’t worry,” I told my burrito. “You’re doing the trick tonight all by yourself.”

  I washed it down with my diet coke while deleting Momma’s frantic emails. She’d left 14 of them, and over 60 text messages! I swiped them away without listening. I felt guilty enough that she and dad had been worried sick for most of a day before I had a chance to call them.

  I was almost through all the voicemails when I saw one from a different contact.

  Scott.

  My thumb hit the play button before I could stop myself. As I held the phone up to my ear, I prayed there was an excuse for the text I’d seen on his phone. That this was all some funny misunderstanding we’d be laughing about years from now.

  “Hey,” came Scott’s monotone voice. “It’s, uh, me.” He cleared his throat. “Listen. Charlotte. I didn’t want you to find out that way. I should’ve told you about Tammy. We’ve been seeing each other for—”

  I tossed my phone over to the other bed as if it were a poisonous snake. I didn’t have it in me to listen to this right now. The simple confirmation that there was another woman was enough to crush me. It felt like my rib cage was being squeezed.

  Leaning back against the headboard, I sucked in a breath and let it exhale through my clenched teeth. I wasn’t going to cry. I was too exhausted to cry. I’d already cried before I’d gotten confirmation.

  Somehow, it felt like I’d known for a while already. Like deep down there was
part of my brain that realized our relationship was falling apart, but I refused to acknowledge it. I’d been avoiding the truth all this time, hoping we could hold it all together.

  Nope, I thought sadly. It’s all over now.

  “You’re not going to do,” I told my diet coke, swapping it out for a beer from the fridge instead. The cap twisted off with a hiss, and I flicked it into the trash can. I drank from the bottle until the tightness in my rib cage loosened just a bit. Enough that I felt like I could breathe.

  “To Scott,” I said, toasting the air. “The cause of all my new problems.”

  If only I had known my problems were just beginning.

  7

  Charlotte

  A knock came on my door.

  I blinked awake, my eyes scanning the dark motel room. Had I imagined it? The only sound was the hum of the mini fridge over in the kitchenette. There was nothing that—

  Knock knock knock.

  Three hard knocks, unmistakable in their urgency. Like police announcing that they were about to kick the door in.

  “Coming,” I called, rushing out of bed to the door.

  Before I could reach for the handle, the door swung open. Hawk stood in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest. The moonlight reflected off his colorful tattoos, and his eyes glistened with a smile that didn’t touch his lips.

  “Hey,” he said in that rumbling voice, full of mischief.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m here for my jacket.”

  “Oh. Right.” I numbly went back into the room. It was folded neatly on the table, though I didn’t remember putting it there. I carried it back to the doorway. “Here.”

  A grin came to his beautiful face. “That’s not all I came for, Charlotte.”

  The door closed behind him as he stepped into the room.

  Our lips connected with magnetic attraction. His beard tickled my chin as we kissed, and his hand slid around the side of my neck to hold me against him even though nothing could make me stop kissing him in that moment. Fireworks exploded in between my legs as he drove me toward the bed. I fell to the sheets, which were wonderfully soft against my back as he stepped up between my legs.