Page 63 of Redemption

He’d dropped her hand when they rounded the corner. The rules didn’t allow them to be boyfriend and girlfriend. Maybe some other kid had guessed, but mostly, the grownups assumed they were just close. Or they didn’t care.

Bright lights in the entryway got under his skin too. He shouldn’t be jealous of anyone getting a home, and he wouldn’t be. They ignored the adults standing to the side, heading toward the stairs—

“Here she is,” Ms. Briddle, the head of services, said, and Ryder’s blood ran cold.

Zoe stood on the first stair and glanced into the parlor room, maybe searching for whomever they’d missed, but Ryder’s eyes were glued to her.

“Come over, Zoe. There’s someone we’d like you to meet.”

His eyes dropped to her white knuckles gripping the stair rail. She didn’t move, frozen in place.

Ms. Briddle, that matronly old hag, turned toward an older couple who looked more like grandparents than parents, and said, “She’s not shy. Zoe?”

“Yes?” Her voice shook.

“Come down and meet Mr. and Mrs. Wards.”

“Why?”

The adults chuckled as if they thought her terror was cute. Ryder put his hand on the railing, bracing himself, fencing her from them.

“Why?” he growled.

“Because it’s time for her to meet her adoptive parents.” Ms. Briddle’s forehead pinched.

A tidal wave of nausea hit him, and Zoe swayed. “But I’ve never met you before.”

“That’s fine,” the old lady who wanted to adopt her said. “We just need someone around the house.”

“What, like a worker?” Anger boiled in Ryder. “You don’t getworkershere. You get afamily.” Something he always wanted and never had. Something hewas going to havewith Zoe, as soon as they escaped this place.

“Zoe, come over here,” Ms. Briddle demanded firmly, fake smile in place and an ass-kicking bent to her words.

“I don’t want to.”

Displeasure marred Ms. Briddle’s oval face. “It’s for your own good. Come here.”

Ryder stepped closer to her, putting his other hand around her waist. “She doesn’t go anywhere I don’t go.”

“I don’t wantbothof them,” the old lady said.

“That wasn’t part of the agreement at all,” the man agreed.

“Zoe.”

They had to run away. Could they make it out the door? That old guy was older than dirt, but he was big and looked meaner than hell, the type to chase Zoe if he wanted to bring her home. They couldn’t get out the upstairs windows, so they had to turn around and go back out the front.

“Son, why don’t you run along?” The man came closer.

“Why don’t you bugger off?” Ryder snapped back.

“Manners!” Ms. Briddle snatched her hands to her chest as if it was the first time she’d heard that from him.

Ryder squeezed Zoe aside, one step below her, and his mouth was near her ear. He whispered, “Run.”

He dropped his hand from her waist, and she spun to his side. Ryder was a protective barrier between hell and his future. The old man lunged at Zoe, and he jumped on him, wrapping an arm around his meaty throat and knocking his face with a fist, over and over and over.

They spun, and Ryder’s back smacked against the wall with the old man’s full force. The air left his lungs. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t gasp. Couldn’t punch. And found himself on the floor, pushing up as his breath came back.

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