Page 23 of Heavy

Two men, both dressed in dark blue polos with cargo pants, tower over me. The one I ran into is gathering himself and taking a step to me, his black boots crunching against the grass.

“You alright?” the dark-skinned man says, while the white guy narrows his eyes on me. “How’d you get here?”

“This is private property,” the other says.

I look down at their belts strapped to them, and see a flashlight and radio strapped to it. My guess, they are the security guards that are stationed at the entry point.

Why are they out here…

I’ve never seen them, but I don’t ever see anyone sitting in the station, the gate just opens when I approach.

“I-I’m sorry… I’m a resident.”

“Why are you running? Are you alright?” the gentle security guard asks.

“I doubt she lives here,” the other scoffs, taking an aggressive step and reaching down to grab me.

“Don’t touch me!” I scream and scoot back before finding my footing and standing. “I do, I live at the Sanderson cabin. I’m out just… going for a run.” Jesus, I need to be a better storyteller. All I can think about is saying I’m running away from my roommate, but that might raise too many eyebrows. I don’t want to get Ronan in trouble; he hasn’t done anything wrong. He was just concerned.

But would I even call that concern? Was he, or was he just being nosey?

“Come on, Mike. If she’s telling the truth, we can’t do anything here.”

I want to make a smart-ass remark that they can’t lay a hand on me without plausible evidence of trespassing.

“Where’s your ID?” Mike asks, and I feel like I’ve done something personal to provoke his shitty attitude. He slowly sizes me up, wetting his lips before smirking. “Just came out for a run half-naked. Do you even have panties on?”

“Mike!” his partner snaps. “Please excuse him, Miss.” I don’t respond and cross my arms under my chest while taking a step back. He continues, “Do you have your ID? We need to confirm you live here.”

I shake my head. “No…”

“Then you will need to come with us until we can verify you live here. Trespassing is—”

I cut Mike off. “We can go back to the cabin. I can grab my wallet.”

He takes two quick strides to me and grabs my wrist, dragging me right behind him as he says, “Josh, she’s trespassing. The rich don’t run around like this in the fucking forest.”

“Let go, I swear I’m not—”

“Take your hand off her.” My heart pounds against my chest at the sound of his voice, the thrum of my pulse ringing in my ears.

Both Josh and Mike turn their attention to the source of the voice, and when I do, I see Ronan striding toward us. He doesn’t even look out of breath, but damn he looks furious.

I can’t help but wonder if he regrets hesitating to let me go, because by the time Ronan reaches us, his fist connects hard with Mike's jaw. The impact makes me jump back, and I instinctively cup my hands over my chest, trying to make myself smaller.

“What the fu—”

“She told you to let her go and you idiotically didn’t listen.” He shakes out his hand and raises his fist to swing again when Josh pulls something out of his back pocket. It isn’t a gun, but it looks similar enough to one that I gasp; a taser.

“We had reasonable suspicion and were using appropriate force! You just assaulted an officer!” Josh continues to argue because I’m fairly sure Mike’s jaw is broken.

“I don’t see a badge.” Ronan looks them both up and down quickly. “Under the self-defense law I believed you were taking away this woman—you know what.” He cuts off his statement and takes an angry step toward them, one fist slapping into his open palm. Just as he cracks his knuckles, he seethes, “Go ahead and tase me, I’d love to fuck you up for free.”

I swear to god, my pussy just wept.

Mike is finally finding the ability to stand straight, his hand gripping his entire jaw.

“Please don’t…” I say through a whimper. Even if I believed Ronan could take them both, I don’t want to see him get hurt. “I swear we both reside here. My mother, Jasmine Sanderson, now Byrne, is the current owner.”