SCORCHED: A Firefighter Stepbrother Romance Thriller by Evelyn Graves Read Free Book Online Page B

the
attention of the others around me. Deep down I knew where this was going, but I
didn’t want to believe it. I wanted what Garfield was about to say to not be
true with every fiber of my being.

 
    “All
right,” Garfield said. “I’m just gonna come out with it,
then.” He looked at me very seriously. “You’re sister’s a stripper, Gunner.”

 
    “Fuck
you.”

 
    “I mean
it,” he said, pushing himself up out of his chair. I felt like everything was
closing in on me. My chest felt tight and my heart was racing in my ears. “I’m
not saying this to be some kind of a jerk, man. I’m just telling you what I
saw.”

 
    “You
don’t know it was her. It could have been any fuckin ’
girl. Just ‘cause she looks like someone who shook their tits in your face
doesn’t mean . . . ”

 
    “Is her
name Tanya?” Garfield asked, looking me dead in the eyes.

 
    I swung
my arm out wide and clocked him in his right eye, knocking him right back into
his crappy lawn chair. One moment he was looking into my face and then the next
he was on his ass, clutching his eye. It only took the other guys a few seconds
to get between us, pushing me as far back away from Garfield as I’d let them. I
fought against the tide of human bodies, yelling over the deafening tattoo of
my pulse in my ears.

 
    “Don’t
you ever fuckin ’
say that shit about my sister! You fucking hear me, Garfield ?! ”

 
    I tried
to push against the wall of my fellow firemen. I wanted to hurt him so bad, to
make everything he said not be true. But inside I knew that he might be right.
She’d been so adamant about me not driving her to work. Was she really hiding
something like this from me? My blood felt like it was boiling in my veins as I
finally turned away from the human barricade.

 
    “Maybe
you need to go home,” Stoggins said softly. He put
his hand on my shoulder and I jerked away and headed toward my car. I was going
to get to the bottom of this if it was the last thing I did.

 
    I
pulled into my driveway only minutes later, breaking more than a few traffic
laws along the way. I didn’t care. I needed to know. Could my sister have been
reduced to shaking her ass on stage like some slut?

 
    I
opened the door, calling out her name. “Tanya?” I took a deep breath and walked
down the hallway, pushing open her door without so much as a knock.

 
    “Tanya,”
I began, but the room was empty, and the bed not so much as touched since I
made it.

 
    I let
out a snarl, driving the heels of my palms against my forehead in a feeble
effort to calm my anger. The hell was she doing taking off like that? I told
her to rest!

 
    I
marched back out toward the kitchen in the hopes of grabbing myself a beer to
calm my nerves. I’d never been a big fan of booze, but beer had a way of taking
the edge off. It was just as I was reaching toward the handle of the refrigerator
that I finally saw the note.

 
 
 
    Gunner,

 
 
 
    I just couldn’t sit around all day and do
nothing. I went to work and I’ll be back late. I’ll catch a ride home with one
of the other girls. Don’t wait up.

 
 
 
    Tanya

 
 
 
    “Goddammit!”
I growled, crumpling up the note as I pressed my back against the fridge. I
shut my eyes tight, struggling to think. This rage was like a fog that just
wouldn’t lift, no matter how hard I tried. All I could think about was finding
Tanya and bringing her home.

 
    I
pulled my phone out of my pocket and started a search for strip clubs down
town. I knew that one of them had to be the one Tanya worked at, and I’d check
them all if I had to. I had all night.

 

Chapter 6

 
    Tanya

 
 
 
    Maybe I
couldn’t work a pole so good with my crispy right hand, but that didn’t mean I
couldn’t dance.

 
    I used
the pole as a prop, sliding my back down it as the bass throbbed in my chest.
When I got low to the ground I opened my legs, showing off the goods