Safe at Last (Slow Burn #3) Read Online Free

because she deserved that. For that matter all the women he’d been with deserved better than he’d given them, but at least he hadn’t lied or misled them in any manner and both parties had gone in knowing the score. He wasn’t that much of a bastard.
    But Tonya? Despite her spiel about not wanting marriage and commitment—and he believed her because she was inherently honest and refreshingly straightforward—she was the bring-home-to-meet-the-family type woman.
    “I’ve had exactly one and one-fourth beers. I’m good. Want to test my blood alcohol?” he teased.
    She rolled her eyes. “Okay. You get a pass. I just don’t want you in my ER when I’m off duty. So be careful.”
    “I will. And Tonya, thanks. I mean that.”
    “Anything for a friend.”
    “I’m going to take off and get some rest. Been a shitty day. Ready for it to be over and start over again tomorrow. And hope to hell it’s not a repeat of today.”
    She saluted him with her beer bottle as he gave her another hug and then headed for the door.
    The cooler air was welcome after the suffocating interior of the bar, and it also served as a wake-up call from the maudlin direction his thoughts had taken over the last hour.
    He slid behind the wheel of his truck and paused before cranking the engine. He hadn’t lied. Today had been epic on the shit scale. Rivaled by very few other events in his life. And maybe that’s why it had hit him so hard.
    Losing Gracie. Not knowing how or why. That was the most difficult thing to swallow. And he still hadn’t gotten over it.
    His old man had been furious with him because Zack had seriously considered not even entering the draft his senior year of college after a stellar four years as starting quarterback for the University of Tennessee. But his head and heart hadn’t been in it. How could it be? If the one person he wanted most to share his dream with was gone—disappeared without a goddamn trace, leaving him to think the absolute worst—then what was the point?
    His father had railed at him that he was throwing his life away over white trailer park trash who wasn’t worth his time. He’d never liked Gracie. Disliked was too mild a term. He despised her. The one and only time he’d brought Gracie to his home to meet his father, the bastard had humiliated her by calling her white trash and making it all too evident that she had no place in Zack’s life, his priorities and that she wasn’t good enough and would never amount to anything.
    He’d never taken her back there. And it had forever caused a rift between him and his father. One that hadn’t been repaired to this day.
    After her disappearance, he’d gone to his father. Asked for his help. It was his father’s goddamn job as chief of police to protect the citizens of his town. His father had laughed. The asshole had actually laughed and celebrated the fact that she was out of the picture. He hadn’t lifted a goddamn finger to investigate her disappearance.
    And then when Zack had hesitated to enter the draft because he feared above all else that she would return and he wouldn’t be there, that it would appear he’d simply given up on her, abandoned her, his father had lost his shit.
    Only his friends talking him down and assuring him that if Gracie did return they’d sit on her and let him know gave him the impetus to pursue his dream of playing in the pros, something he’d never imagined doing without Gracie at his side.
    They were going to be married. Have a big family. He’d play in the pros ten years, bank enough money so his family would be financially secure and then retire so he could devote all his time to his wife and children.
    The first two seasons, he’d led a previously struggling, bottom-rung team to the playoffs. He’d been heralded as saving the franchise and putting it back on the map. Making it relevant. And then a bad hit sustained while he was making the game-winning touchdown pass had resulted in a torn rotator