But they didn’t tremble when Hopper held them.
That was something. More than something.
I stepped away from the mirror and took a piss. As I did, I glanced around the tiny bathroom with no real mirror, no counter space, and a poor excuse for a shower.
I needed more than this.
I needed to let myself out of this cage.
Maybe an apartment at headquarters was a good start.
Resolve solidified inside me. As I washed my hands, anticipation curled my toes. Or maybe it was the cold-ass floor against my bare feet.
Nah. It was anticipation.
I was going to sign with NASCAR.
For so many years now, I literally thought life would amount to nothing and that was exactly what I deserved.
Gradually, over the past several months, changes started to bloom inside me. Small at first. I found a friend in Drew. Then in Trent. I saw two men in love make it work, and there was no abuse, no fear… just love.
Lorhaven fell in love—something I thought was impossible. Joey accepted me without pause, and I gained a sister. Lorhaven started driving for the NRR and encouraged me to try out for Gamble.
All this time, I’d been building a life. A life just waiting for me to take a chance and join it. Without realizing it, I was healing. I would never be the way I was back when I was Dylan.
I didn’t want to be him.
But I didn’t want to be who I was now either.
I wanted to be a hybrid. Me now… just happy.
I didn’t think I’d ever be whole, but a little less broken might be nice.
I shut off the water and dried my hands. The sound of muffled voices came through the bathroom door. My nose wrinkled, and I tilted my head to the side to listen.
Was Hopp talking to himself out there?
All of a sudden, a yell cut through the garage, followed by a grunt and then the definite sound of a struggle.
Panic sliced through me. It was sharp and reminiscent of the past. Something new rose to match it, though.
Resolve to protect something I loved.
I ripped open the bathroom door and charged out into the fight.
Someone was messing with Hopper, and that someone was going to pay.
His nerves calmed mine.
The tremble in his hands made mine more steady.
Arrow brought out something in me I thought was long gone. Well, okay, he brought out more than one thing, but the most surprising was compassion.
I cared about him despite trying not to.
I told myself I came here this morning to talk contracts, to get a signature. Gamble was waiting to hear the word. He called and reminded me at the ass crack of dawn.
As I swung through a drive-thru for coffee and copious amounts of food, it became harder to lie to myself.
I wasn’t just coming over here for business.
It was pleasure, too.
When I walked in the garage and saw him sprawled out in the too-small bed, yet again without a shirt, his sleeve of ink on full display, the lie I still clung to laughed right in my face.
I’d come here to see him. If the contract was already signed, I’d have found another excuse.
I hated whatever made him think he wasn’t good enough. I hated the fact he lived in this dump. I hated the scars I felt on his wrist.
So careful… I had to be so careful with him.
Sitting next to Arrow, going in for a kiss, was sort of like walking across a floor covered with shattered glass. The shards would absolutely pierce me; they would even draw blood.
I kept walking anyway.
I knew what it felt like to be cut deep, and I knew without a doubt, every time he stepped close to me, he walked over the same broken glass.
God, the way he responded when I kissed him. Timid but eager. Entranced but guarded. He felt so much, more than quite possibly anyone I’d ever known. The way he’d looked at me when I held his hands. Awe. He’d been in awe of me for doing barely anything at all.
It inspired me. It challenged me to give him so much more.
He’d become overwhelmed quickly, though, an expression I knew well because I’d worn it so many times myself. I watched his bare back retreat, and the second he disappeared behind the bathroom door, I shot up from the bed and paced away.
The guilt was instantaneous. It was never far, but sometimes, especially when Arrow was close enough to touch, it didn’t swallow me whole.
He wasn’t beside me right now, and though I still wanted him, the guilt was taking over.
I felt as though I’d betrayed Matt today. No. Not just today. Every day since I got here. I made a promise to him and a vow to myself.
Infinity.
My heart. My loyalty and the memories of us were forever. Why should I get to move on when he was frozen in time?
By a death that had been meant for me.
Holy shit, if I’d only been on the Ducati that day. If only I hadn’t hit my head.
I wouldn’t be here right now. Maybe I’d be in Matt’s place, or maybe I’d have kept control and walked away. Maybe I’d be an international Motocross star. Maybe Matt would be, too. Maybe we’d still be together. Maybe we’d be happy.
Maybe.
What a cruel fucking word. It was torment wondering what would have been.
I asked myself why every single day.
I never had an answer, and I likely never would.
Perhaps between yesterday with the snowmobiles and then this morning with the intimacy (Because that’s what it was. It hadn’t been just a kiss this morning; it had been so much more.), it was too much, not just for me, but also for him. I should have left and come back in a couple days when the world tilted back again, tilted back to the way it was supposed to be.
Lonely and cold.
I could make an excuse to Gamble, spin it in a way that didn’t make it look like Arrow was stalling. I didn’t want to hurt his career because there were things between us neither of us knew what to do with.
The sound of a door opening and closing brought me around. When Arrow didn’t fill my line of sight, I frowned at the bathroom door.
Heavy, quick footfalls rushed in behind me, and I swung around just as Lorhaven barreled around the heater toward the back of the garage. “Who the fuck’s car is—” He stopped when he saw me. His eyes narrowed into slits. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
It was the world’s worst secret that Arrow’s brother hated me. Honestly, I didn’t really blame him. The woman he loved got hurt, and it was my fault.
I couldn’t be mad at him for hating me, not when I hated myself.
I’d never harbored any ill will toward Lorhaven, not even when he hurled harsh words at me on behalf of Joey. Sure, he was rough around the edges (read that as: he was an asshole), but life likely made him that way, just as life made me the way I was.
However…
Looking at him now, standing in the middle of an airplane hangar where he allowed his brother to live?
Fury ignited. I no longer saw just an asshole life made. I saw a man who had the ability to protect Arrow and did a piss poor job.
“What the fuck business is it of yours?” I snapped back.
Lorhaven’s narrowed eyes widened. “Excuse me?”
“I didn’t stutter.”
He took a step toward me. “If it concerns my brother, then it’s my fucking business.”
“You mean the brother you let live in this fucking hellhole?” I growled, all the muscles in my back tensing.
Lorhaven’s face darkened. His eyes swung around, pausing on the bed, which clearly had just been vacated. I shifted a little so he could take in the two coffees and the breakfast right beside the mattress.
He made a strangled sound. “You better not have touched him.”
I smirked.
He rushed me, but I was ready. Hell, I was primed for a fight. All the pent-up aggression inside me roared to get out, and seeing him here, in the middle of this space, well…
He lit the fuse.
I ducked under his fist when he threw it out, hooking my arms around his middle, and ran until we collided with a stack of tires near the wall. The top one fell off, and both of us tumbled but didn’t fall.
Lorhaven shoved me backward, and before I could right myself, he caught me with a right hook. My head snapped back, pain exploded, but I ignored it and delivered a punch of my own to his middle.
The sound of breath whooshing out of him was pretty satisfactory, so I buried my fist again.
I swung a third time, but he blocked the hit and came in with a low punch of his own, right into my side.
Blows started flying rapidly then. Some connected; some didn’t. We went at each other like two caged tigers who’d been starved and the winner got a steak.
As we fought, we knocked into a table. Tools scattered all over the floor, and someone behind me shouted my name.
“Hopper!” Arrow roared, but beneath the anger, I heard his panic. I felt his anxiety.
I stopped battling Lorhaven instantly, swinging around to assure him everything was fine. Lorhaven didn’t stop, though. He swept out his leg and knocked my feet out from under me. I fell back, hitting the concrete with a considerable, “Oomph.”
Adrenaline pumped through my limbs; retaliation sang in my veins. Lorhaven lunged toward me like he thought he had the upper hand now that I was down.
Stupid fucker. I knew how to fight better than most when I was down.
In a blur of movement, Arrow appeared. He literally jumped in front of me and shoved his brother with both hands. “Back off!” he growled in a tone I’d never heard from him before.
I forgot about Lorhaven, the fight, and everything in between. All I saw was Arrow, all six feet one inch of him planted in front of me in a fighter’s stance. All the muscles in his back were bunched, his hands were fisted, and the muscles beneath the sleeve of tattoos down his arm rippled.
He was fucking sexy.
He was about to throw down with his own brother to protect me.
He was still wearing pants covered with emojis.
And that right there explained Arrow to a T. Innocent enough to sleep in emoji pants, but beneath it all was a man made of steel who, when push came to shove, would come out swinging.
“Arrow…” Lorhaven gasped, partially out of breath from our rumble but also from shock. Clearly, he’d never been challenged by his brother before.
“Don’t fucking touch him again, Jace!” Arrow warned.
I definitely didn’t need him to protect me. But the fact that he intended to?
Realization hit me like a gallon of frigid water.
That question I thought I’d never have an answer to? Why?
I had one.
It was him.
It was Arrow.
There was a look on my brother’s face I hadn’t seen before.
Well, not directed at me anyway.
The second I heard the struggle, I barged out of the bathroom, and by then it had turn into a full-blown fight.
Tools scattered, fists were flying, and the sound of flesh against flesh turned my stomach. It reminded me of the past, of something I didn’t even witness, but it didn’t matter because that unwitnessed event reminded me of greater shit that went down that night.
Shit I was all too present for.
I loved Lorhaven. I really did. More than anyone else on this planet. But the second I saw his fist connect with Hopper’s face, something inside me screamed.
I raced across the room, forgoing the sick feeling and pushing past the memories. Hopper hit the floor, and I panicked. Lorhaven was a beast. I knew exactly what he was capable of.
I lunged between them, planting myself right in front of Hopp. “Back off!” I intoned. No way was this fight going to happen. No way would I stand by and watch.
Lorhaven’s eyes flicked to me with surprise, but then he looked over my shoulder at the man behind me.
“Don’t fucking touch him again, Jace!” I yelled, bringing his focus back to me.
That’s when the shock took over his face. The genuine confusion that I would challenge him. I never had before. I let him fight my battles.
Not today.
Not ever again.
My battles were now my own.
Beyond the surprise, I saw a pinch of hurt. As if he felt betrayed. I didn’t want that. It was the last fucking thing I wanted.
Well, second to last, because the very last thing I wanted was Hopper getting pounded by my unrelenting brother.
“What the fuck is he doing here?” Lor asked, his breath heavy. As he stared at me, he swiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
I caught his stare wandering accusingly toward the man I was guarding. I stepped over a little farther, just to send the message I wasn’t fucking around.
I’d never win in a fight against my brother. No way in hell. In fact, if it came down to it, I probably wouldn’t fight him. But he wouldn’t fight me either.
I trusted him, more than anyone else, and he trusted me.
But I’d deck him if I had to.
He raised an eyebrow, regarding me with some derision. “Are you protecting him?”
“Yes,” I replied, unflinching.
“I don’t need protection.” Hopper inserted.
I didn’t turn to look at him. Lor acted like he wasn’t there.
Lorhaven looked over at my bed, then back at me. He literally appeared as if he swallowed an entire lemon.
“I thought you weren’t coming home for a few more days?” I asked, trying to distract him.
“Yeah, well, when some asshole comes sniffing around, trying to take advantage of my brother, I cut my business short.”
“So you can boss him around, but not make sure he has fucking heat in the winter?” Hopper spat.
“He has heat,” Lorhaven growled.
Hopper made a disgusted sound. “Yeah, from a box that plugs into the wall!”
“You accusing me of something?” Lor challenged, taking a threatening step forward.
Behind me, Hopper’s body heat connected with mine. “I don’t have to accuse. The evidence is right in front of your face.” His chest bumped into my shoulder when he spoke.
I turned sideways so my back wasn’t to either man. I pressed my palm to the center of Hopper’s chest and was momentarily distracted by the feel of his heart thumping beneath my skin.
I glanced down to where I touched him. I wished he wasn’t wearing a shirt.
I wished I could see him, just once, without it.
“Arrow,” Lorhaven growled, like me standing there touching Hopper was going to send him through the roof.
I tore my eyes from his chest and up to his face. “Calm down,” I murmured. “I live here because I want to. Jace doesn’t like it either.”
Hopper turned his head and glanced away from me. He wasn’t buying what I was selling.
There was blood smeared on the side of his lip. It streaked into his stubble from where he obviously tried to brush it away.
I made a sound, grabbed his chin, and squeezed. “You’re bleeding,” I spat. Then I whipped around to Jace. “He’s fucking bleeding!”
“It’s barely a scratch.” Jace scoffed.
I loathed the sight of blood on his face. It physically hurt. The sight of blood at all wasn’t something I enjoyed. Ever since that night… and then the one later…
Blood stood for too much in my mind, and none of it was good.
“He split your lip,” I told Hopper, fully turning to face him again. I reached for the hem of my shirt to dab away the red, but I wasn’t wearing one.
He grunted. “It’s fine. I got in a few punches of my own.”
I didn’t say anything. Instead, I used my thumb to swipe at the blood. My finger came away red, and for a moment I stared at the smear, dumbstruck. Transported back in time. To another place.
Hopper’s hand wrapped around my wrist. “Arrow.”
“Don’t fucking to
uch him!” Lorhaven roared and jumped forward, wrapping his arm around my waist and towing me back.
Hopper’s hand fell away.
It snapped me out of it.
I jerked away from my brother and spun, advancing on him. “What the fuck is your problem, Jace?”
“He’s taking advantage of you.”
“You know why I’m here,” Hopper said without heat. “I know Gamble called you.”
“So you came to check up on me?” I asked, angry. “You came to make sure I wasn’t making the wrong decision with my life?”
Lorhaven drew back like I’d decked him. “I came because I thought you needed me.”
That took the anger right out of me. What the fuck was I doing yelling at my brother? The only person who’d been there for me through everything.
Caught in the middle. That was me right now.
I didn’t much care for it.
“I do,” I told Jace. Then with a sigh, I turned toward Hopper.
“I’ll, ah, go. Give you guys some room.”
“I don’t want you to go,” I said instantly.
Behind me, I heard Lorhaven’s indrawn breath.
Hopper’s light eyes widened.
“Maybe just give us a few?” I asked, hoping he would understand. I didn’t want him to feel like I was choosing.
But I also wanted to smooth things out with my brother without the pair of them snarling at each other over every other word.
Hopper’s eyes bounced between mine. Then he relented. “Sure.” He produced the keys to his Audi from his pocket. “I’ll go sit in my car. Handle a few calls I need to make.”
I followed him to the door and then out. Instantly, my nipples hardened against the frigid air.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Hopper bitched. “It’s below freezing out here.”
“You’re not leaving, are you?” I asked, feeling stupid and vulnerable.
“Leave you here with that asshole? No way.”
“He’s not that bad.” I scoffed. I reached up to wipe at the blood still on his lip.
Our eyes connected. “You’re close to him,” he stated.
I nodded, rubbing my thumb over the prickly yet soft stubble lining his jaw.
“You got between us, though, went up against him.” He shifted a little closer, his body blocking the coldest of the wind.
#Blur (The GearShark Series Book 4) Page 19