Redemption Read Online Free PDF Page B

started bouncing on his feet. I hadn’t boxed since Christmas, but it was second nature for me to defend myself. He sidestepped and gave me the weakest shove I’d ever seen.
    I swung outwards and knocked him in the jaw. “Hey!” he shouted.
    I shrugged. “Fight then. I’ve been doing this way longer than you have, kid.”
    That made him mad. He corrected his stance and threw punches wildly at me until he was so tired he couldn’t breathe. “You need a break.”
    “No, I don’t.”
    “I think you do.”
    “I don’t,” he snapped and tried an uppercut but missed. Aggravated sounds vibrated from his chest, and I almost felt sorry for the kid. Almost.
    When he fell to the floor, I offered him my hand, he didn’t take it. I left him sulking on the floor while I washed my face off in the guest bathroom.
    The guy still sat in the middle of the floor when I walked back through. Sore loser.
    A woman came in almost an hour later. She searched the room and looked down the hallway, completely ignoring me. “Can I help you?”
    She jerked upward and gave me an obvious onceover. “ Sorry —who are you?”
    Eyeing her too tight clothes, I lifted a brow. “I work here. I’m Wes’ daughter.”
    This seemed to change things. “Oh, I’m Nick’s mother, just here to pick him up. Where is your dad?”
    None of your business . “Nick and I just got finished sparring, he should be about ready.”
    She gave me the weakest smile I’ve ever seen and sashayed through the double doors.
    Two minutes later she came storming through the door with Nick trailing behind her. Neither one of them looked my way. Suite yourself.
    ***
    I tapped my fingers along the desk. I knew I needed to take a look at Dad’s books, but I had too much on my mind. Was the mystery guy okay? Had they found out what happened? His name?
    The minutes slowly ticked by, and my nerves grew wilder. My phone buzzed in my jeans, but I knew it was Heath, because it’d been him all morning long. I had no intentions of talking to him, and he would do good to get the hint sooner rather than later.
    Then I reached into my other pocket and remembered his phone. I pulled it out and pressed the center button. The background was blue and there were no apps or anything. I felt like a nosey girlfriend, but I wanted to know who this guy was.
    Glancing around, I’m not sure why, I scrolled through his texts but there weren’t any, and no calls either. Damn, had he erased everything?
    I clicked on the camera icon and one lonely picture pulled up. A blonde girl stared back at me with big blue eyes. She looked happy and content. Something tinged in my chest. Why only have one picture? Is this his wife or girlfriend? Is she looking for him? ”
    “Ma’am.”
    I dropped the phone in my lap and quickly shoved it into my jeans. “Yes?”
    “When is Mr. Wes getting back? The boys are killing each other out there.”
    I tried not to show my annoyance. “I don’t know. Tell ‘em if they don’t stop I’ll kick all their asses out.”
    The boy grinned and ran off toward the double doors. “She said she gonna kick y’all’s asses!”
    Three hours ticked by before Dad finally showed up. I could tell he’d taken another shower, probably due to the amount of blood that mystery guy had shared on their long walk back to the house. Had they carried him? He looked so broad and big, he’d be difficult to carry.
    I darted upward. “What happened? Is he okay?”
    Dad’s gaze flickered to the double doors and then back to me. “Everything is okay for right now. It doesn’t look like he has any broken bones, but he’s lost a lot of blood, and he’s weak. But it’s nothing that Cooper can’t fix over time.”
    “So you’re not takin’ him to the hospital, right?”
    Dad rounded the corner and dropped a white paper sack soaked in grease in front of me. “Let’s go back to my office and eat. I’ll tell you everything. Let me talk to my boys first.”
    Dammit. I’d waited