Payton (Dreamcatchers Romantic Suspense Series Book 3) Read online

  “Yeah, you’ve got that kick in the groin thing down, don’t you?”

  “You’re damn right I do.” She let out a roar and slammed her foot up into the air. Aaron stepped backward and grinned at her.

  “Good going. We’ll make a master out of you yet.” He turned back to the group. “That’s all, guys.” He clapped his hands. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  The class had left Payton burning with energy, and she wasn’t ready to leave yet. She walked back to the free-weight station and started practicing the move Rico had shown her earlier, but Aaron was right behind her. “You did that already. You have to work on your whole body or else you’re just wasting your time.”

  Payton dropped her weight on the ground and sighed in frustration. There was too much to learn, so little time to do it in.

  “Here, try using the leg press here. You liked the kick in class, and so now let’s add a little bit of force behind it. Sit down.” He pointed at a chair with a back at the end connected to a weight set. Payton sat and put her legs on the block. “All you do is just press in, hold it as long as you can, and let go. Now, press in.”

  The block wouldn’t move. Damn it. She’d felt so strong in class. “I can’t do it.”

  Aaron went around to the back of the machine, and she looked to see what he was doing. “Try this. If it hurts, it’s the right one.” He pulled a pin out from in between the weights and shoved it in near the top of the pile.

  “Oh, God.” Her legs felt like they were being torn apart, but she was able to move the stack of weights.

  “Good. Keep at it. If you can do that for ten reps, then you’re really here to work.”

  “Oh, I’m here to work.” Payton met his eyes.

  That block was the strange man and the woman. If she didn’t make it move, then there was no way she would ever succeed. She thrust her feet forward and the bar rose.

  “One, two, three,” Aaron said slowly, as she took the tension off and began again. The tingling in her calves turned into fire, but Payton wasn’t giving up. Not with crazed psychopaths still out there. If that block didn’t move, then she could die.

  She pushed her legs forward again, and then again, until Aaron practically forced her out the door and told her to go carb up. After hours of working out, Payton’s stomach was starting to protest and so she walked into the juice bar next door. The strange woman from earlier that morning was standing at the bar helping a hipster with three-inch holes in his ears.

  When she was done, the girl turned to greet Payton on the other side of the bar, smiling happily at her. Whatever had upset the girl that morning must have figured itself out. “Oh, hello again. Did you try out a class?”

  “Yeah.” Payton felt herself warming to the other woman. There was no point in trying to avoid her if she was going to be here every day. Besides, she didn’t look like much of a threat.

  The blonde woman didn’t either. Don’t forget that.

  She slapped the thought away. The other woman’s attitude was somewhat infectious, and Payton was still pumped from that morning’s workout.

  “How was it?”

  “You know, it was probably one of the hardest but most amazing things I’ve ever done.”

  “Nice.” The woman smiled at Payton, and her whole face almost seemed to light up. Yep, she was definitely in a better mood than she had been in that morning.

  “What’s good for somebody doing strength training?”

  “You definitely came to the right place. If you’re after something portable, we sell muscle bars. The guys next door love it, and I’ve also got an organic protein smoothie.”

  “Is it any good?” Payton wanted something substantial.

  “Blueberry and chocolate.” The girl sounded a little excited.

  “I’ll take it.”

  “Great.” She went to go make the drink. “I’m Lainey, by the way.”

  “Payton.”

  Lainey handed her the bar. “On the house. It’s great to meet you.”

  6

  The week passed quickly. After another weird chat with Lainey over lunch, Payton ran to the beach to work on her cardio. Class that morning had worked her hard, but the only way she was going to survive was not to waste one moment. It could be next year or it could be the next day—the only thing Payton knew for sure was that someone would eventually come for her again. She was going to be ready.

  Her feet sank into the soft sand. With another two hours before her first real shift at the bar, she had enough time to run the line of the coast twice more before heading back to clean up. She set her sights on the line of trees at the horizon. The vision of her kidnappers behind her had turned into the ultimate competitor in her head, driving her toward an imaginary finish line.

  Once the danger subsided, if it ever did, Payton didn’t know what she’d do. Already the energy—the power—she’d felt from just a week of classes was becoming addictive. The need to stand up and fight was the only thing that she cared about, but she knew something else had changed. She wasn’t just getting fitter, or finally standing up for herself. Her entire life was changing.

  She was no longer afraid of her own shadow, and she wasn’t going to let anyone else push her around. Sure, she was still scared as shit of her kidnappers, but she was using that fear to drive herself forward instead of hiding. Payton saw her past and her entire life more clearly. She had a future that she wanted for the first time, and she’d be dammed before she let anyone else try to take it from her.

  What mattered right now was the finish line in front of her, both the one that met her on the beach every morning and the proverbial one inside her mind. The one she was working toward every day, where she’d finally be strong enough.

  After running back to her room for a quick shower, she turned onto the street and walked to work. The bar wasn’t as empty as it had been the day she’d been hired. There were more than a dozen people spread across the room, some crying into their glasses and others dancing around like children. Hillbilly music was blasting on the radio, and the crowd looked like a bunch of washed-out, middle-aged alcoholics who spent most of their time drowning in liquor and cocaine, wondering why their lives were so terrible.

  Payton had already figured out work there wasn’t going to be easy, not like the diner back in Chicago. Liquor changed people, made them aggressive, and by the looks of the patrons today, this shift was going to be full of trouble.

  Rita walked out from behind the bar as soon as Payton walked in. She grabbed Payton by the hand and pulled her into the back room. “What is wrong with you?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “You can’t wear that!”

  “Jeans and a white t-shirt? It’s universal.”

  “The bartenders in here dress nice.” She sighed and walked through another door leading farther back, where she started looking through a pile of clothes. “This is a classy place.”

  “No, it isn’t.”

  Rita sighed. “Fine, show some skin and you’ll get better tips. Work for you?” She threw a red top and a short black skirt at her. “Wear that. You can change in here.”

  Payton held the skirt up to her body. She’d be lucky if the length of it even skimmed her ass. “I’m not that desperate for money just yet.”

  Rita shrugged. “Pick yourself something out there, but a skirt is mandatory.”

  Payton sighed, and after digging through the pile, emerged from the back room ten minutes later in a tight black dress with a lace neckline. It dipped down at the front enough to keep Rita happy, without showing enough skin that she’d be pushing back barflies all night.

  “How do I look?” She walked behind the bar.

  “Nice.” Rita nodded her head. “Tomorrow, come in early and pick something else out.” She smiled at Payton. “You look like you could do with a hand up.” Rita waved her hand dismissively. “Besides, that stuff won’t ever fit me again, anyway.”

  Payton smiled. She wasn’t sure whether to take Rit
a’s offer as a gesture of friendship or as her boss just watching her bottom line. She shrugged. Either way, she’d take the free clothes. Most of the stuff she’d managed to take with her when she ran from Chicago wasn’t suited to San Diego’s weather. “Alright.”

  “Miss!” Payton turned around to see an old man with leathery skin calling out to her. “Can I have a Jack and Coke?”

  “Three-fifty,” Rita yelled out.

  He handed Payton the money, and watched closely as she poured the drink and handed it back to him, no doubt watching to make sure how much liquor went in with the Coke. “Thanks.” He sat down at the bar right in front of her.

  “I’m taking a smoke break!” Rita called out, pushing through the back doors before Payton could say another word.

  “She doesn’t really smoke,” the man sitting at the bar said.

  “Then why’d she go out there?”

  “To see how you do.”

  “How nice of her. I don’t even know how much the drinks are yet.”

  He pointed at the register where they were taped on the side. “You’ll get it.”

  To the right, there was a line of customers waiting for drinks, and every single one of them wanted them right now. By the time Rita came back in, Payton felt like an octopus.

  “You were out there for nearly half an hour.”

  “Everyone’s got drinks. That’s all I care about.”

  “I’m not used to serving twenty people at once yet. Please don’t do that again.”

  Rita scoffed. “Who’s the boss here?”

  “You needed a bartender. And I’m a quick learner.”

  “Yeah”—Rita nodded her head—“that you are.”

  The bar stayed busy and Payton’s shift flew by. By the time the moon was high in the sky, there were still a few stragglers hanging on for last call when a man in a jeans jacket and tight pants walked in. He must’ve been in his fifties, and judging by his staggering walk, he’d already been drinking somewhere else that night. When he sat down, he pointed to Payton. “Another?” he asked Rita.

  “Whaddaya mean ‘another’?”

  “This is your fourth new cutie in two months.”

  “So?”

  “So I like this one best of all. Can I get a beer and a shot of Smirnoff?” He downed his shot almost as soon as Rita put them down. “Hey there, Sweetie.”

  Payton had in her hand the knife she was using to cut up limes and she lifted that hand in greeting, maybe accidentally on purpose. He waggled his eyebrows and motioned for her to come over, but she ignored him and went back to cutting her limes.

  “I said, hey, Sweetie.”

  “What?”

  “I just wanted to get a proper look at you is all.” He winked and sat back with his arms behind his head. “You’re something. You think you could get me another shot?” He pointed at the liquor case behind her. She had to bend over in front of him to get it, and when she did, he smacked her in the ass.

  Payton froze at the slap and memories flooded her mind. Faces flew through her thoughts: the giant who’d abducted her, the blonde woman, then another guy punching the giant, bringing him to his knees. That man had been with the blonde. Fuck! Moving here, to the sun, was supposed to get rid of all this!

  Payton felt a hand touch her shoulder, pulling her around, and the stream of faces in her mind was replaced with just one. Aaron. She saw him demonstrating a strike, just as clearly as if he were standing in front of her.

  “Hands off, asshole!” Payton’s arm flew up as she dodged sideways, stepping out of reach of the drunk’s hand, before placing her hand over his chin and pushing him hard. Because he was already wobbly on his feet before he’d arrived, it wasn’t much of a challenge to send him crashing to the ground.

  Payton started to pull herself back to standing again when the sound of a shotgun cocking above her head made her freeze again.

  “Here.” Rita picked up the lime knife and handed it to her. “Take this, just don’t get caught.”

  Payton turned back toward the man, and a grin slid across her face. She lifted the knife up in her hand, grinning at the man lying on the floor.

  “Shit. Forget it, Love. You crazies aren’t worth it.” He stood up, wobbled once more and raised both middle fingers as he walked backward out the door, eyes hovering between Payton’s breasts and the knife.

  “The fuck was that?” Payton turned around and set the knife on the bar.

  “I’m sorry, Hon. He’s a regular, that one, but he’s never been violent with the girls before. I don’t let anyone push my girls around. You got that?”

  “Oh, yeah. I think the shotgun made your point loud and clear.”

  “Good. Now help me close this bitch before he comes back.”

  Rita cleaned the bar and washed endless glasses while Payton swept the floor, picked up the chairs, and scrubbed some unidentifiable substance—oh, she so did not want to know what—off a wall in the corner. By the time they were done, Payton was regretting her extra run that morning. She was exhausted to the point she could barely walk or think and she was dreading the walk home, but there was no way around it. She’d be lucky if a taxi would come into this neighborhood so late at night, even if she were up for spending more of her savings.

  She left out front and started walking up to the street when gravel crunched beneath someone else’s footsteps behind her. Too close behind her. Payton didn’t have time to run before the man got in front of her, darting side to side, to keep her from running.

  She looked up and met the eyes of the drunk she’d tossed out of the bar less than an hour before.

  “Well, hello.” His eyes were wide and now glazed over, his pupils a tiny dot in the center of his eyes. Great, now the dickhead was high, too.

  “Fuck off.” She hoped her loud tone would scare him off. That he wouldn’t notice the tiny shake in her voice.

  “Oh, don’t worry. It’s only gonna take a second, Sweetie, and it won’t hurt that much, I promise.” The man pushed her up against a wall with one hand, his bulk holding her in place while the other started unzipping his pants. Memories swarmed through her head. Oh, God. The man was chasing her again, just like on the beach that morning, but this time he’d caught her and he wasn’t going to stop.

  “Please!”

  “It’s okay, Honey, I’m nearly ready.”

  “No!” Terror overtook her and Payton’s body shook. Something inside of her rattled loose, a force so strong she felt her consciousness almost draw in on itself. The world ebbed and flowed as her terror took a backseat to whatever was building inside her at that moment. Whatever that thing was, it was erupting, reaching for the man’s mind, a black mass of energy and consciousness that was thrust into her awareness. It had to be wiped clean, he had to forget her, just as she’d wished the night she’d escaped her kidnappers. She had to get away and make the man forget she was ever there.

  The man leaned in to her so closely Payton could smell the stale beer on his breath, and his erection pressed into her stomach. Terror took her again and, this time, something flashed through her veins. A force she couldn’t see flew from her mind and the man fell to the ground in front of her. He lay stunned, with his pants still half unzipped. Images swirled through her mind that she didn’t recognize. Sick visions of herself, of someone moving inside her as they used her for their own pleasure.

  What the ever-loving fuck?

  She pushed deeper into the mental image and the man lying on the ground in front of her twitched. God, it was his thoughts she was seeing, his fantasies, her own face reflected back at her, contorted with fear as he thrust inside of her against the bar wall.

  Her fear morphed to rage and Payton felt the force inside her push out again. The man writhed on the ground and groaned deeply.

  Good.

  He was a predator, someone who stalked women and forced his control on them to get off. She pushed again and his limbs contracted toward his body, pain flashing across his face. A grim smile cre
pt across her lips.

  She hoped she was killing him.

  Somewhere behind her a car backfired, startling her out of the man’s mind. Payton staggered backward, nearly collapsing on the ground herself.

  What. The. Fuck. Was. That?

  Maybe it was all a delusion. Had she drunk anything that night? Maybe her kidnapping had made her finally go insane? Hell, maybe she’d never escaped that dark room and she was still lying there, drugged and hallucinating the entire week.

  No.

  The blonde woman. She might have been full of shit, but she’d said something. Something important. Payton locked onto it in her mind as she sank to her knees on the ground, totally spent. The woman had found Payton because she’d had a vision. She hadn’t believed a word coming out of the woman’s mouth at the time. But now?

  Adrenaline and pure power had pulsed through her moments before. She hadn’t made that up.

  This shit was real.

  Payton didn’t sleep that night. Sitting there slumped on the ground, she’d tried to reach inside the man’s mind again. Maybe there were other things inside his head, other women he’d hurt, that she could see if she looked hard enough. She’d pushed hard against the barrier containing herself until she’d felt the power build again, and her consciousness slipped her own mind. She’d fallen into his mind again, easier this time now it was familiar, but all she saw was emptiness, the blank expanse of unconsciousness. Shit, had she killed him?

  No, he may be out cold, but he wasn’t dead. Base memories filtered past her, glimpses of herself and others. She saw herself standing over the man, brandishing the knife in the bar. Fuck. That wasn’t good. He had to forget.

  The energy inside her head had surged again and Payton pushed it into the man’s psyche, obliterating every thought she could find of herself, everything that had happened that night. She could have been standing there for hours—time passed in the literal blink of an eye—and the man started to stir. Pulling back so quickly she jolted herself, Payton had fled to the beach, where she’d paced the waterline for hours, until the dawn had broken into her thoughts.