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  Sebring

  Kristen Ashley

  Discover other titles by Kristen Ashley:

  Rock Chick Series:

  Rock Chick

  Rock Chick Rescue

  Rock Chick Redemption

  Rock Chick Renegade

  Rock Chick Revenge

  Rock Chick Reckoning

  Rock Chick Regret

  Rock Chick Revolution

  The ‘Burg Series:

  For You

  At Peace

  Golden Trail

  Games of the Heart

  The Promise

  Hold On

  The Chaos Series:

  Own the Wind

  Fire Inside

  Ride Steady

  Walk Through Fire

  The Colorado Mountain Series:

  The Gamble

  Sweet Dreams

  Lady Luck

  Breathe

  Jagged

  Kaleidoscope

  Dream Man Series:

  Mystery Man

  Wild Man

  Law Man

  Motorcycle Man

  The Fantasyland Series:

  Wildest Dreams

  The Golden Dynasty

  Fantastical

  Broken Dove

  The Magdalene Series:

  The Will

  Soaring

  The Three Series:

  Until the Sun Falls from the Sky

  With Everything I Am

  Wild and Free

  The Unfinished Hero Series:

  Knight

  Creed

  Raid

  Deacon

  Sebring

  Other Titles by Kristen Ashley:

  Fairytale Come Alive

  Heaven and Hell

  Lacybourne Manor

  Lucky Stars

  Mathilda, SuperWitch

  Penmort Castle

  Play It Safe

  Sommersgate House

  Three Wishes

  www.kristenashley.net

  *****

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright ©2016 by Kristen Ashley

  First ebook edition: January 11, 2016

  First print edition: January 11, 2016

  WARNING

  This book is an ADULT EROTIC romance featuring an anti-hero. This novel contains explicit scenes of pain play, domination (control) and bondage. The hero in this novel lives a life by his own code with no apologies. In an effort not to spoil it for you, I will not explain further about the hero, but he is most definitely not your (or my, in my other books) “normal” hero. If you do not enjoy the above, I would suggest that this novel is not for you.

  Author’s Note

  With Sebring, I complete my Unfinished Heroes Series.

  Though, as you’ll find, nothing is ever complete in the worlds that live in my head. I can’t say good-bye, so I don’t ask my readers to.

  What I will ask of you is to find the song “Stay Alive” by José Gonzalez. If you’re not already familiar with this extraordinary song, I make the request that you wait until you’ve hit Chapter Twenty-Five before you cue it up in order to experience its beauty along with the scene I wish for it to accompany.

  I often offer soundtracks to play with my books because, as I type them to give to you, they play like movies in my head. And everyone knows, the soundtrack is essential to the experience.

  But “Stay Alive,” along with every song I’ve ever heard by the masterful Gonzalez, is essential to life.

  I took chances with this series, starting with Knight and onward through the tortuous beauty that followed with Creed, Raid and Deacon. As ever and always, I thank my readers, my fabulous Rock Chicks, those who had a direct cheerleading hand in the birth of this series (and you know who you are) to those who championed it simply by buying the books.

  I love it that you love my worlds.

  As much as I may try to explain how much, no words can express it.

  I’m blessed by legions of champions.

  How do you express gratitude for that?

  The only way I know how is to give you the best story I can.

  To that end, I hope with all my heart you fall in love with Sebring.

  You’re here forever and you’re by my side.

  Prologue

  For Her

  Nick

  “Nick.”

  He was sweating. His wrists torn raw. His muscles strained well beyond pain. The gag in his mouth filthy, and not just with his blood and saliva.

  His eyes were locked to hers.

  “Nick.”

  As the asshole made his approach, his gun aimed to her head, he didn’t speak. Didn’t touch her. Didn’t take off her gag and let her say a thing.

  She was speaking, though.

  To Nick.

  Her eyes were filled.

  With love, as usual.

  And fear.

  “Nick!”

  He jolted awake.

  Instantly gripping the wrist at his shoulder, his body knifed up and twisted off the couch. Yanking the wrist up a man’s back, Nick forced him forward with the intent of shoving him against the wall.

  “Nick,” the voice was soft now. “Brother.”

  That voice hit him, the fact the man wasn’t struggling hit him, he let him go and stepped back.

  His brother, Knight, turned to face him.

  Bending slightly, Knight switched on a light by the couch. Through the now-illuminated room, he caught Nick’s eyes.

  “You’re not sleeping well,” Knight told him quietly. “Heard you all the way down the hall.”

  This wasn’t good. He was sleeping on his brother’s and his woman, Anya’s couch. They had two little girls. Little girls needed their sleep. What they never needed was their uncle losing it down the hall and waking them.

  Nick tore his hand through his hair and turned his head away, muttering, “Sorry.”

  He felt something and twisted his neck, looking to the doorway where Anya was standing, wearing a long, gray cashmere robe, her beautiful face troubled but her eyes were warm on him.

  Knight saw her too.

  “Go back to bed, baby,” he called gently.

  She didn’t look from Nick. “You need anything, Nick?”

  “I’m good, Anya,” he lied. “Sorry I woke you.”

  “It’s okay,” she whispered, her face no less troubled, her eyes still warm but also concerned and moving to her man.

  “I got him,” Knight told her.

  She studied his brother, nodded, threw a small smile Nick’s way and disappeared out of the doorframe.

  Nick walked to the big windows that were two sides of the corner room of Knight’s and Anya’s high-rise condo. Windows that now showed the lights of a nighttime Denver.

  He glanced at his brother before looking at the city. “You can go to bed too, Knight. I’m okay. It’ll be good. And tomorrow, I’ll find somewhere else to crash.”

  “I think right now you need to be with family.”

  At Knight’s words, Nick’s mouth got tight.

  He didn’t deserve that. He knew it.

  But Knight was giving it to him. So was Anya. Both of them having reason to spit right in his face.

  He felt Knight draw nearer and stop.
>
  “We haven’t been close,” Knight told him something he knew. “But what you were doin’. Why you were doin’ it. What you lost—”

  Oh no.

  As much as he owed his brother in a lot of ways, they were not going there.

  Nick cut his gaze to Knight and bit out the question, “Can we not do this now?”

  Knight looked into Nick’s eyes a beat before he answered, “Yeah. We can not do this now.” He moved closer and dropped his voice low. “But, Nick, we gotta do it. You gotta talk that shit outta you, brother. What they did to your wo—”

  “Can we…not…talk about this now?” Nick repeated through clenched teeth.

  Knight nodded. “It’s too soon.”

  It fucking was.

  They blew a hole in her head right in front of him two fucking days ago.

  So yeah.

  It was way too fucking soon.

  “You’re here,” Knight decreed like his big brother was prone to decreeing, this happening Nick’s whole life. “You’re here with your family until you can sleep easy. I’ll give you time. We’ll talk it through later.” He held Nick’s eyes as he lifted a hand and curled it around the side of Nick’s neck, squeezing firmly. “But just gonna say, fuckin’ proud of you. I’m sorry for you. I hurt for you. But I’m fuckin’ proud of you.”

  Nick didn’t want that to feel good.

  He’d spent his whole life wanting that from his brother. His father. Fuck, even his mother, who loved him like crazy, had spoiled him, but he knew she didn’t think he’d amount to much. Not like her glory boy. Not like she knew her Knight would do.

  And she was right, everything Knight touched turned to gold.

  Nick had also spent a lot of time and energy trying to beat the need out of himself to make his family proud.

  Then he’d spent a lot of time doing whatever he wanted to do to feel good despite knowing they wouldn’t, chase whatever highs life offered to drown out that need, convince himself he didn’t give a fuck what they thought.

  And when his brother took what Nick wanted, namely Anya, Nick had pulled some lame-ass bullshit in order to try to tear them apart. Bullshit that, if it was Knight who did it to him, he wouldn’t give a fuck two days ago the woman Knight loved had a hole blown into her head. He would not be standing in his sweet crib telling Knight he was proud of him.

  But the fact remained it felt good, his brother giving him that. It felt good because it was from Knight.

  And it felt good because he knew Knight was right to be proud.

  Last, it felt good because he knew she died proud of her man.

  Even with all that, he just muttered, “Thanks.”

  Knight took his hand away. “Watch a movie. Read a book. Try to get some rest.”

  He wouldn’t be doing any of that. He still nodded.

  Knight studied him a second then nodded too and walked out of the room, saying before closing the door behind him, “See you in the morning.”

  Nick turned his attention back to the lights of Denver.

  Within moments, the city went out of focus and all Nick could see was his reflection in the glass. He could also feel the sweat trickling down his spine, pooling around his balls, the agony radiating through his muscles as he struggled against the restraints.

  He lifted his hands and looked down, seeing at his wrists the scabs, deep scratches and pus-colored broken skin of cuts so deep they had not yet begun to heal.

  He’d used those hands. For once in his life, he’d used those hands and his head and his gut and his strength and his courage and everything he had in him to do right.

  Not for himself.

  Not for his dad.

  Not for his mom.

  Not for Knight.

  For her.

  The mission had only marginally succeeded.

  But she was gone.

  * * * * *

  Three Weeks Later

  “I’m out.”

  Nick said this firmly, looking right into FBI Special Agent Eric Turner’s eyes.

  “I get that,” Turner replied quietly.

  Nick didn’t want to give him what he had to give to him next. He didn’t used to be that guy. He didn’t used to be the guy who found it in him to do the right thing.

  But the man he was now, the man she taught him to be, he gave it to him.

  “You were right. I shouldn’t have gotten involved with her.”

  “Shit happens, Nick,” Turner responded. “It was really her as an agent who shouldn’t have blurred those lines but that can happen to anyone. I had a job once. A job that involved a girl and it happened to me. I fell for her. It wasn’t right but I couldn’t stop it. I lost her too.” His gaze grew intense as he hid a flinch. Knowing he’d said the wrong thing, he finished quickly, “Not like you lost Hettie. But I fell hard for her and she’s still not mine.”

  Nick didn’t want to sit around listening to Turner telling tales he hoped would help Nick feel better. Turner knew no words would make that happen.

  There was only one thing that would make Nick feel better.

  Turner knew that too.

  Which was why he asked, “You gonna stay in town?”

  Fuck yes, he was gonna stay in town.

  “Yeah,” Nick answered.

  At that, Turner did what a lot of people were doing these days.

  He studied Nick closely before he said, “Doesn’t feel like it, but with time, it’ll hurt less. It just will, Nick. Give it time and then get on with your life.”

  Turner had no fucking clue what he was talking about. He didn’t know what girl Turner fell for but if she wasn’t dead, never to see her again, never to smell her hair, taste her pussy, listen to her laugh, eat the fried eggs she always broke the yolk when she flipped them over, knowing she wouldn’t give that to him or to anyone…

  If he didn’t survive that then he had not one fucking clue what he was talking about.

  Nick did not share this.

  He just repeated, “Yeah.” Then, to turn the subject, he said, “Talked to Knight, Raid, Sylvie, Marcus, all of ’em. Had to, Eric. Their women and families were targeted. They had to know what we were doin’, why we were doin’ it and how they were gonna use anyone that was close to me or Knight in order to use him to get to me to stop us from doin’ what we were doin’. My brother and his crew also dragged my ass out of that hellhole so they had to know why I was there in the first place.”

  “Not thinkin’ any of those folks will talk,” Turner muttered in reply.

  He was absolutely right.

  Nick nodded.

  His gaze still intense, Turner stated, “We were planning an extraction, Nick.”

  Nick nodded again, this time sharply.

  He didn’t want to go there.

  “I know you were,” he said in an effort to stop Turner from talking about it.

  He did know that. Turner wouldn’t leave Nick hanging. He definitely wouldn’t leave Hettie that way.

  “Your brother and his crew, they don’t have to worry about the rules like my crew does,” Turner explained. “They could go in hot. They could take those risks, no plan, flyin’ by the seat of their pants.”

  “I know,” Nick replied.

  “We were comin’ for you,” Turner went on. “You and Hettie.”

  Nick didn’t repeat himself.

  They were. It was still too late. When Knight and his crew tore in there to save his ass, they were too late too.

  Too fucking late.

  “Coupla weeks, we’ll go for a beer,” Turner suggested.

  It was Nick’s turn to study him.

  “You do that a lot with your ex-CI’s?”

  Turner suddenly looked pissed. “Jesus, Sebring, the shit we been through the last coupla years, you seriously think you’re still just a confidential informant to me?”

  Now that…

  That felt good.

  Nick had not had a habit of surrounding himself with good people.

  And Turner
was definitely a good man.

  “Fucked thing to say,” Nick muttered.

  Turner’s face again changed. He might not have any clue how bad it was but he still got where Nick’s head was at.

  “Coupla weeks, buddy,” he said quietly.

  Nick nodded.

  Unexpectedly, Turner was whispering, “Be smart, Nick.”

  Yeah. He knew.

  But Special Agent Eric Turner had taught him a lot.

  So he also knew Nick had some of the skills he needed to get the job done.

  And she’d taught him patience.

  He’d acquire the skills he didn’t have. If it took him a decade, he’d do it.

  Then he’d get the job done.

  * * * * *

  Five Months Later

  Nick stood by the river, its banks covered in tiny but bright bursts of wildflowers, the spring thaw of the mountains having subsided, the rush of water still heavy but also soothing.

  He felt him coming before he came to a stop at Nick’s side.

  “Me and Cassie are glad you showed,” Deacon Gates said to him.

  “You put a pink bow on your dog,” Nick replied.

  “I didn’t,” Deacon returned.

  “Your woman put a pink bow on your dog,” Nick said then turned to look at the man at his side. “And that dog is a German shepherd. It’s a wonder every shepherd breeder in North America isn’t rushin’ this location to put a gun to your head to demand payback for that dog’s dignity.”

  Deacon grinned at him, shrugging one shoulder. “It’s a wedding.”

  It was.

  That day, in a gazebo by a river in the middle of fucking nowhere in the Colorado Mountains, the man known throughout the dark, harsh, fetid, hostile underbelly of this great United States as Ghost got married to one of the most beautiful women Nick had ever laid eyes on.