Nobody's Hero Read Free Page B

the club’s theme rooms, causing her to plunge
into deep subspace, Marc had rescued her. But he was needed as a
Dungeon Monitor Supervisor in the busy club that night to keep an
eye on other scenes. He’d carried Angie upstairs and Adam had asked
Karla to watch over her until she recovered enough for Karla to
take her home to Aspen Corners, about three hours away.
    When she’d dropped Angie off at home the next
morning, battered and disheartened, Karla hadn’t ever expected to
see her anywhere near the club again. But she and Marc had somehow
reconnected in her hometown a month later following a
search-and-rescue mission Marc and Luke were on, and they’d wound
up bringing her back to the club. Somehow Angie didn’t know Marc
had been the one to rescue her. Karla and others at the club had
been brought into perpetuating the lie for reasons Karla still
didn’t understand. But Marc and Angelina seemed to be willing to
work things out and had been together almost ever since.
    Every year since her college roommate and
best friend, Cassie López, had moved to Colorado, she and Karla had
spent a week together in the fall, including an annual overnight
camping trip on one of Colorado’s Fourteeners. This year they’d
chosen Mount Evans near Denver and Karla and Angie had picked up
Cassie at her remote mountain cabin home during the first week of
October. When they got to their camping spot, all hell broke loose
when Angie’s abusive ex-boyfriend, who had been stalking her,
kidnapped her.
    Karla had called Adam to report Angie missing
and he’d notified Marc, Luke, and Damián. By the time they’d all
arrived, Angie had outsmarted her stalker and escaped unharmed.
Minutes later, though, Karla had been threatened by a cougar,
leading Adam to try to entice the cat away from Karla, only to be
attacked himself.
    Angie had become a good friend in a short
time. The loneliness Karla had experienced since arriving at the
club in July disappeared when Angie came for a visit last week.
Since the cougar attack, however, Angie had been staying at Marc’s
house—well, when they weren’t at Adam’s, but both had spent a lot
of time here, too, after Adam had come home.
    Angie told her she hoped to move out of Aspen
Corners for good once she found a job as a chef here in town. Karla
understood her need for financial independence. Adam provided for
so many of Karla’s personal needs—room, board, clothing. She felt
guilty about that and, while she’d never admit this to her
independent mother or friends, she also liked being taken care of.
If that was the only role Adam wanted to play in her life, then
she’d take it.
    “Kitty, let me sit with him tonight so you
can get some sleep. I feel like a fifth wheel around here
anyway.”
    Karla glanced over her shoulder at Cassie,
whose Peruvian heritage, with her lustrous long dark hair and a
beautiful olive complexion that Karla would give almost anything to
have, gave her an exotic persona, accentuated by the scent of
freesia that surrounded her. Her best friend wrapped her in a big
hug, probably hating to have been caught up in all this drama.
    Karla had rarely left Adam’s side since he
was in the hospital. Now that he’d come home, Cassie stayed on to
support her friend. She helped with meals, laundry, and watching
over Adam while Karla showered or a napped.
    “Just having you here has helped me so much,
Cassie.”
    The kitchen door opened and in walked Luke
Denton, Marc’s search-and-rescue partner and the newest Dom at the
club. Adam and his friends pretty much had run of the building,
which included the club and Adam’s private living quarters.
    “Something smelled good all the way out on
the porch.” He walked over to Angie, placed a hand on her back, and
started to kiss her on the cheek, then halted and turned to Marc.
“Permission to kiss the cook.”
    “Granted—but only on the cheek.” The two Doms
exchanged an amicable look, but Karla had to wonder if there