Bull in a Tea Shop (Bodyguard Shifters Book 5) by Zoe Chant

Author:Zoe Chant [Chant, Zoe]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-03-26T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve: Verity

The neighbors and firefighters trickled gradually out of her yard, but Verity was much too wired to go back to bed. Thanks to an internet search, she now had the numbers of half a dozen lawyers—with no idea how she might be able to pay for their services, but she'd find some way. But there was nothing she could do until their offices began to open.

And all the while, Maddox was in the sheriff's clutches; she could only imagine the terrible things that could be happening to him right now.

Cleaning often made her feel better, and there was certainly a lot of cleaning to be done. It was better than sitting around worrying until morning. She'd started examining the fire damage on the porch with her hands, determining what would need to be replaced, when tires crunched at the curb.

Verity turned. She'd finally managed to stop obsessively checking the time, but she didn't think it was morning yet. "Hello?"

"Verity?" Maddox's voice said, and she let out a tiny cry and threw herself into his arms.

He hugged her back fiercely. He smelled like dirt and blood and the outdoors, but he was here, he was okay, he wasn't locked in a jail cell or lying in a shallow grave in the desert.

The vehicle that had dropped him off pulled away. "Who was that?" Verity asked.

"Sheriff Hawkins. We've got an understanding."

"Hawkins? What do you mean?"

"I mean he's going to leave us alone," Maddox said. "At least I'm reasonably confident he will. If he doesn't, I'll deal with him."

"But how? Did you—pay him off?"

Maddox laughed quietly, a rumble that she felt more than heard; she still had her arms locked tight around him. "No, we just discussed things, and he decided leaving me alone was less trouble than being my enemy. It's Ducker who's the real problem, not him."

Verity's hands had found the ragged mess of his shirt, the stickiness of blood at his wrists, and her blood began to boil. "Did the sheriff do this?"

"I mostly did it to myself, getting out of the handcuffs. It's not as bad as it probably feels to you," he added quickly, with the same odd undertone that he often got when he talked about any of his injuries. She knew a lot of men had trouble admitting physical weakness, but Maddox must have a world-class case of it to get so weird about it. "It's almost healed already," he added.

And there he went again. "If it just happened an hour or two ago, it can't possibly be."

"I told you, I'm a fast healer."

"You sure are." She shook her head in disbelief.

"Verity ..." Maddox began, and then he stopped, like he'd changed his mind about what he wanted to say. "I think I'm going to need a new shirt. I kinda destroyed the one you gave me."

"Come on. There's plenty more where that came from. And we can get your wrists cleaned up."

They went around the side of the house with their arms still around each other.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.