Her Reluctant Husband by Erica Marselas (summer beach reads txt) 📗

silly girl.” Alex gives me a shy smile. “We have some just outside.”

“What about you? I can find the key…you can.”

“June,” he snaps, breaking me out of my daze. “Don’t worry about me. Him first. You need to hogtie him like a pig just in case he wakes. I have no idea if that key is even on him.” Right. He’s right.

I run out the door, and I’m halfway down the porch stairs when tires skid on the gravel road in front of me. The blue and white vehicle turns off, and a burly man in beige with a peaked cap exits the car. He rounds the front and comes barreling towards me. My first instinct is to scream, and I do. I back up and shake my head. I have no trust in the cops. They side with him.

“June?” The sheriff looks over my shoulder, with his hand on his service pistol. “I’m here for you. Are you okay?”

Here for me?

“I—" My eyes flit behind him to see two more officers with their flashing lights on coming up the driveway. “Inside,” I find my words.

The sheriff darts around me, and I go following behind him, knowing I’ll need to explain. He releases his pistol, still holstered, and looks at me when he sees Deacon on the floor. “Shit, what happened to him?”

“June,” Alex echoes proudly from the corner, “kneed him in the jewels.”

The sheriff winces as he bends down to put the cuffs on Deacon. “Well, by the looks of him, good thing the ambulance is on the way.”

“Let him suffer,” Alex grumbles, “and Hilbert, can I get out of these?” He wiggles the cuffs.

Once Alex is free, he scoops me into his arms and kisses my face all over. “Fuck, I love you.”

“I love you, too.” He cups my face and kisses me hard. I’m left breathless, forgetting everything around me. It takes the loud commotion of things slamming around and people talking around us for me to tap out. “Alex,” I moan and push back on his shoulders.

Alex pulls back and rests his head on my forehead. “I’m not letting you go, again. You hear me?”

“I hear you,” I whisper.

Hilbert clears his throat beside us and looks us both over. “Are you two, okay? June?” Hilbert’s brown eyes reflect a deep concern as he examines me. “EMS is here. I’ll tell them to check you both out first.” Hilbert smirks as he glances over at Deacon who is starting to twitch.

“I’m good, but I have to ask, how did you know to come?”

“Whitney Fieldman called me. She mentioned Deacon was coming over here and was worried. Thought we should get over right away and check it out. The second I heard that name, I grabbed my team and we came.”

“Whitney. Whitney Fieldman called you?” I ask, both shocked and confused.

“Yeah. Real concerned.”

“Really? Whitney?” I glance up at Alex and he looks as perplexed as I feel.

“And about that one.” Hilbert points to Deacon, where the EMS have just dropped their stuff around him. “Don’t worry about him. I’m going to see he is put away for a long time. There’s no way I’m going to let him get away after what I saw him do to you in that motel.”

“That was you. You were that deputy.” I don’t remember his face, I was too messed up, but I remember his kindness.

“It was. I’m sorry I didn’t do more for you then, kiddo.”

“It’s okay. You tried.” One of the few.

“I already have a list of charges piling in my head. From breaking his restraining order, breaking and entering, to intent to harm, and attempted murder.”

“Can you get him on all those?”

“I sure think I can. June, walking away that day after seeing you in the motel is my biggest regret. I thought I could trust my superior, but I found out the hard way I couldn’t. That’s why I’m going to see he pays. Once this town learns how vile the boy really is, and what he did today, and with the accident, they won’t rest until he’s put away either.”

“Thank you.”

“Why don’t you two step outside while we handle this in here.”

Alex wraps his arm around my shoulder and leads me outside into the fresh air. “Well, this night is nothing like I had planned.”

“I’m sure it’s not.

“What are the chances I can make you stay just a little bit longer?”

“I actually didn’t plan on leaving.” Things aren’t so scary anymore and this is my home. I’m not letting it be taken away from me now. Not after everything.

“Good, because I have something for you still.”

“Really?”

“Once everyone leaves.”

“Is that Whitney?” I peer down the road and behind the cop cars is a blonde, leaning against a Honda biting her nails.

“It is.”

Whitney sees us and her shoulders deflate in relief. We walk down the stairs to go to her and as we approach, she pushes off her car to jogs over to us. “Thank god, you’re okay.”

“We are. Your cousin not so much.” Alex snorts.

“Is he?”

“No, but if I heard the EMS guy right before we walked out, he might wish he was. He thinks something might have ruptured.” Alex chuckles.

“Thanks for calling. If things didn’t go right, we really would have needed the help.”

If I landed that kick wrong or he full on attacked, who knows what trouble I would have been in. Whitney really would have saved the day, and that’s a mind-blowing thought.

“I had to. He hasn’t called me in five years, and now he was telling me he would be stopping by my place. That he was going to need a place to stay and my car after he handled some unfinished business with his favorite couple. I