Forbidden Harmony (Harmony Falls #3) - Elizabeth Kelly Page 0,6

it in her head. Her head throbbed with fresh pain and she rubbed at her temples. Screw that. She was tired of being a proper lady. She was having sex with Brad tonight and that was that.

But first… she really needed to do something about her headache. She’d never relax and enjoy herself if her head was aching like a rotting tooth.

She squinted around the pub. Grace had gone to the bar and it looked like she was talking to the woman who ran the animal rescue. Rain or Raylene, maybe…

She touched Brad’s arm. He might be into her but even his lust took a backseat when it was the bottom of the eighth and the score was tied. He, along with every other guy at the table, had been glued to the big screen television mounted on the wall for the last half hour.

“Brad, I have a terrible headache. There’s some Advil in the glovebox of my car. Will you walk me out to get it?”

“Uh, the game is almost over. Can you give me half an hour?” Brad said without taking his eyes off the screen. “Oh, come the fuck on! You call that a fucking strike? What kind of ump is this guy?”

“A shit one,” Jesse said, one of the other firefighters sitting at the table with them.

“It’s late and it’s dark out. It’ll only take us a few minutes to walk to the car and back. I’m not comfortable walking in the parking lot by myself,” Addison said.

“Nothing’s going to happen,” Brad said. “This is Harmony Falls. Nothing bad ever happens here.”

She waited another few seconds before standing and heading toward the door. Brad was right. She didn’t need an escort. She was just being a silly little girl.

She made her way to the front door of the pub as there was another round of cheers from the people watching the game. She pushed the door open, stepped into the warm night air, and breathed deeply.

She rubbed at her temples as she leaned against the brick exterior for a moment. God, what was wrong with her? Why did she have such a need to be protected? Being a helpless female was so outdated and she should be ashamed that she even wanted Brad to act like her hero. She needed to be her own hero. Needed to take care of herself for a change.

She’d been so used to having Harrison at her side that some days it seemed overwhelming to be on her own.

Still rubbing at her temples, she walked across the dark parking lot to her car. She opened the car and rummaged through the glovebox, breathing a sigh of relief when she found the Advil. Clutching it, she slid out of the car and locked it before walking toward the pub. She would feel better and more like herself when this horrible headache was –

“Well, hi there, pretty lady.”

She turned and stared at the four men who were trailing behind her. She had no idea where they’d come from and her headache surged into almost unbearable pain as a rush of adrenaline went through her.

“Whatcha’ doin’ out here all by yourself?” The biggest of the men drawled.

Fear spiking in her veins, she backed away as the men wandered a little closer. “Just grabbing something from my car.”

Her mouth was cotton-dry, and her legs were shaking as her body went into flight or fight mode. Predictably it chose flight but before she could even turn and take off, the leader shook his head.

“You thinking about running, little lady? Guarantee you, we’re faster than you.”

More adrenaline surged through her as she slipped out of her heels. No one else was around and the noise in the pub was too loud for anyone to hear her scream. Grace didn’t know where she’d gone, and Brad was completely absorbed in the baseball game and wouldn’t notice if she was gone too long. Her only chance was to run.

The men watched her in amusement as she took a few deep breaths and calculated in her head the distance to the pub. She ran track in high school. She could beat them. She just had to keep a level head and not look back.

“Looks like we got ourselves a runner, boys,” the leader said with a cold grin. “Truth be told – we like it when you run. We like the -”

She turned and fled. She could hear the men chasing after her and she’d taken maybe a dozen steps