Speechless (Pier 70 #3) Read Online Free Page A

had apparently blocked out, according to the stories he’d been told. What the fuck a three-year-old was supposed to do when his mother was dead on her bed, he had yet to figure out. From the details that had been shared with him, it had taken two days before her boss at the grocery store she had worked for finally showed up to check on her. Teague had been living off crackers and water from the sink in the bathroom, or so they’d said.
    From that point forward, he’d been a ward of the state. The longest he’d stayed with one family was two years, right after he had been taken into the system. Of course, he didn’t remember that. Being in foster care, Teague had been passed around from one family to the next, no one capable of taking care of a wild, out-of-control kid like him. He’d hated school and had started rebelling at an early age, which pretty much made him unlovable. To put it simply, he’d been unwanted.
    Sure, he’d probably made it more difficult by acting out, but he didn’t feel bad about that. He’d been dealt a shitty hand; why should he have to make nice with everyone else? Fuck them.
    He was sure there was some psychiatrist somewhere who would say that he used sex to feel close to people, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. He didn’t want to feel close to people. He wanted to get his dick sucked and his ass fucked. It wasn’t sexy, it wasn’t intimate. It was a means to an end. There was no psychological bullshit attached to his motives. If anything, Teague didn’t want love at all. He’d survived all these years without it; he damn sure didn’t need it now.
    However, he had established a great friendship with the three guys who owned Pier 70. If it weren’t for them, he didn’t know where he’d be today. Cam Strickland had given Teague a job when he was sixteen years old, letting him help out in the repair shop, and over time, he’d proven himself. So much so that four years ago, Cam had offered him a stake in the business. Him. A broke-ass twenty-one-year-old with a high school diploma and a beat-up old truck that got him from point A to point B, was now part owner of one of the most successful marinas in the area. He hadn’t had a dime to contribute, but Cam said that wasn’t the reason they wanted to bring him on board. It’d been the nicest thing anyone had ever done for him. Ever.
    Which was the very reason that Pier 70 was the only thing that mattered to him. He would do anything for the three people who had taken a chance on him, and the business they all held near and dear. No matter what happened, Teague would never let them down. That was his only motive in life.
    A knock sounded on the door, and he took another long swig on the bottle in his hand before pushing to his feet.
    It was time to get this party started, and time to stop thinking about all the bullshit.

    HUDSON HIT THE button on the remote to change the channel. He continued to click past all the nonsense, finally settling on baseball. He turned it up another notch, trying to drown out the noise coming from across the hall.
    For the past hour, Hudson had attempted to ignore the ruckus coming from Teague’s apartment. Between the music and the loud laughter, he’d been hell-bent on sitting on his couch and not going to put a stop to it. Despite what Teague thought about him, Hudson wasn’t an old man. He didn’t get his rocks off by being grumpy or interfering in other people’s lives.
    What Teague did wasn’t his damn business, and he had somehow managed to talk himself out of interfering tonight although it had been touch and go there for a little while. If it hadn’t been for the hour he’d spent at the gym, followed by a cold shower and the pizza he’d devoured when he got home, he could’ve still been holding on to that irritation. Some people turned to drugs or alcohol to relieve stress; Hudson turned to weights. He didn’t drink. Maybe the occasional beer with his brother, but never