He disconnected.
Shoved the phone in his back pocket.
And looked to Hop.
“Let’s roll.”
Rebel
“So tell me about his member. He has a beautiful member, am I right? All the rest of him carries through to his crotch?” Essence asked.
It was after I sent Meryl what she needed.
After naptime.
After a late lunch delivered by Jag (one of the brothers, a recruit who’d helped hijack me, and yes, you guessed it, he was gorgeous—young, but hot).
We were hanging out in Essence’s kitchen, drinking fresh-brewed tea we’d poured over ice and shooting the shit, both of us standing, leaning full body on our forearms into the massive butcher block she used as an island.
My kitchen was a riot of color everywhere, à la Essence.
Essence’s kitchen was enormous, but nearly all white.
That was except for the butcherblock, the sky-blue paint on the walls behind her glass-fronted cabinets, little button knobs on her cabinets and drawers that were all different colors and styles, and a cornucopia of bright, mismatched, square tiles that covered the floor in front of the work area, the rest of it was wood.
“One could say God likes him,” I answered on a smile.
“Far out!” Essence shouted.
One of her cats, a poofy ginger one with a smushed face called Groucho, even though she was a girl (Essence was into gender-neutral naming) jumped up, sat, swished her tail on the block and stared at me.
We both ignored her. Cats anywhere—island, counters, enjoying the show when you went to the bathroom—was the way it was anywhere near Essence.
“He’s great, Essence,” I told her.
“I was getting that impression.”
“I really like him.”
“Not much not to like,” she said, lifting her glass to take a sip.
I shook my head. “He’s more than handsome, honey.”
“I hope so. Though he’s really, really handsome, and I wouldn’t normally say this, but he’s so handsome, back when I was in my prime and I could land a cutie like that boy, it’d probably take me a whole year to get over him if he was a jackass.”
I grinned.
“Well, he’s not a jackass . . . at all,” I said as my phone binged with a text.
I looked down.
It was from Rush.
I opened it.
Not gonna make lunch. Pick you up. 5:30.
I wasn’t surprised he wasn’t going to make lunch, considering it was coming on two thirty.
Still, it was sweet he touched base.
And it was cool having my first-ever text from him.
Cool. Hope you’re having a good day. See you later, honey. I texted back.
“Him?” Essence asked.
I lifted my head to look at her. “Yeah.”
“I knew because your aura turned all red and green and lots of pink.”
I totally had to download an aura chart.
“With some white,” she said softly in a way I knew that was more significant than the others.
“What’s white?”
“Balance.”
For some reason, that took the breath out of me.
“I like this for you, my Rebel,” she told me.
“I like it too,” I whispered.
“And you know, if he grows up to look like his father, you got years of goodness ahead of you.”
I grinned again. “I know. I mean, seriously. Talk about a DILF.”
She grinned back but noted, “Not to be a wet blanket, but this means, Rush becomes your old man, all the girls’ll think he’s a DILF.”
I did not care even a little bit.
If Rush became my old man, he’d be mine.
We both turned from staring giddily in each other’s eyes when Roscoe strolled in.
He was followed by a cat.
He stopped.
The cat stopped.
“Fuck, you’re drinkin’ tea,” he muttered. “Got any beer?” he asked Essence.
“You need to be on your game, keeping us safe,” I reminded him. “Not downing beers.”
“Babe, I drink beer with breakfast,” he retorted.
“You lie,” I said.
“I’d suggest you spend the night with me and find out, but Rush’d have my balls, so you just gotta trust me.” Back to Essence. “Beer?”
“I think Boz left some brewskis in the fridge,” Essence told him.
He went to the fridge.
The cat went with him.
He got his beer and left.
The cat went with him, as well as Groucho jumping off the butcher block to follow.
“I think you’ve been dethroned,” Essence remarked, staring at the doorway Roscoe disappeared through. “There’s a new cat king.”
This kind of bummed me out.
I loved her cats.
My phone binged again.
I looked down at it.
Amy.
I opened the text.
Sorry, doll, we can’t make it Sunday. Raincheck?
Oh boy.
“What?” Essence asked.
“Amy,” I told her, picking up my phone to text back.
“And this is why your aura went gray,” Essence mumbled.
Everything cool? I texted to Amy.
“We were having brunch on Sunday. She’s cancelled,” I told Essence.
“From your aura, and the expression on your face, I’m guessing this is not a good thing,” Essence noted.
My phone binged again.
Fine. All fine. I’ll call soon and we’ll chat. Love you!
“She’s so lying,” I murmured and texted, Okay. I’m here if you need me. Love you back!
“Lying about what?” Essence asked.
Off the hook for brunch. Not sure that’s a good thing, I texted Rush and looked to Essence. “Paul’s kind of been hitting the bottle a lot since we lost Diane.”
“Ah,” she mumbled.
“I’m worried,” I told her.
“You would not be you if you weren’t.”
“Okay, when I said ‘kind of,’ I meant he’s maybe borderline alcoholic, with about a week until that’s minus the ‘borderline,’” I admitted.
“Ah, hell,” Essence mumbled.
“I was going to have a chat with him at brunch.”
Essence’s face wiped clean.
“I promised Amy,” I defended myself. “She says he won’t listen to her.”
My phone binged.
Text from Rush.
They cancelled?
Yeah, I texted back.
“Rebel, child,” Essence called.
I looked to her.
“If the borderline gets ixnayed, Amy needs to step up.”
“She says she can’t get through.”
“Well then,” Essence replied, “she has to try harder.”
It appeared Essence was in Rush’s camp when it came to this.
I should not be surprised. She had the wisdom and experience of age.
He had what I was sensing was an old soul.
My phone binged.
Rush.
Not your gig. Let it go, he said.
See?
We’ll talk later, I replied.
I turned my attention back to Essence. “Wanna help me pick out a ‘meet the sister’ outfit for tonight?”
She allowed my subject change, God bless her.
“So you’ve met the dad. And the stepmom. And now you’re meeting the sister?”
I nodded.
“Well, dear, his unusual name doesn’t need explaining.”
I grinned at her again.
My phone sounded.
And when we talk later, I’ll tell you it’s not your gig. Let it go. So, babe, let it go.
Hmm . . .
It was a text, and Rush and I had precisely eight bubbles on our text string, so I couldn’t really know.
Still, that tone didn
’t seem like him.
Essence yelling, “Roscoe!” made me look again at her.
She looked at me.
“I like having an escort everywhere, even to your cottage. It makes me feel regal. I wish we had some crowns.”
I didn’t think Roscoe would dig on escorting two chicks wearing crowns.
He came in, neck of the beer bottle in the fingers of one hand, Groucho upside down purring loudly cradled in both arms.
Okay.
He was a cat king.
Maybe he wouldn’t mind crowns.
“We need to go to Rebel’s to pick out an outfit,” Essence announced.
Roscoe scowled.
Nope on the crowns.
Essence snatched up her glass. “Let’s go!”
She bounced toward Roscoe not missing a step even when it looked like he wouldn’t get out of her way.
At the last minute, he got out of her way.
I grabbed my glass and followed.
I also decided not to text Rush back. I would be talking to him in person in a couple of hours. I’d suss out his mood then.
Now, I’d spend my afternoon being girlie with Essence, Roscoe and the cats.
And maybe get online and order crowns.
We ended up deciding I’d wear my maxi dress with the V-neck, long sleeves and deep side slit that was robin egg blue with a hot pink, pale pink and green pattern on it that was busy but cool. Cowboy boots. Some necklaces.
The dress was pushing it, since we were coming out of summer, but I figured the cowboy boots and long sleeves evened it out.
And we both did a mani and pedi. Me, ballet pink all around. Essence, red and yellow for fingers, purple and blue for toes.
Needless to say, when Rush showed at my place to pick me up (I added text nine to tell him we were there, I didn’t explain it was because I had the footbath and all the nail polish at my pad), Roscoe practically tossed Essence in a fireman’s hold to get the hell out of there.
This made me giggle as I followed them to the door, shouting after them, “Tomorrow! Facials!”
“Groovy!” Essence shouted back, being guided almost forcefully down my walk.
Roscoe just made a noise.
But it as an unhappy one.
I turned my smile on Rush.
“Hey,” I said.
No “hey” back. No kiss. No touch. No once over of my kickass dress. Not even a glance at my hair, and I’d gone big for him.
He just said, “Ready to go?”
Okay.
Well, suffice it to say, I read that text right. He was ticked I was worried about Amy and Paul.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Great,” he replied shortly. “Ready to go?”
I studied him.
He had not shaved that morning, or the one before. And since I’d seen him every day that week, I felt I could safely say he hadn’t shaved since I first saw him. His stubble was heavy and full, but hot.
I could still see his jaw was tight, as was the skin around his eyes.
“Are you angry with me?” I asked carefully.
“No,” he answered shortly. “Now, babe, you ready to go?”
“Are you sure?” I pushed.
“Jesus, Rebel!” he suddenly exploded, and I froze. “I answered that. Now are you fucking ready to go?”
Okay, so him losing it like that I did not like.
And okay, our first date lasted thirty-eight hours and included a dead body, lots of sex, meeting both his parents, and knowing what he wanted to name his son.
But I did not know him.
And first, I was not going to his sister’s house with him being in a shitty mood.
Second, unless he was an exceptionally good actor, this was not him.
So I slowly closed the door.
“Goddammit,” he clipped.
“Talk to me,” I ordered.
“It’s rush hour, Rebel. We gotta go or we’ll be late.”
“I’m not leaving this house with you in this mood,” I informed him. “Now tell me. Are you pissed about Paul and Amy? Because I didn’t push them about brunch. I didn’t ask Amy how things were. I didn’t put myself out there for them. I waited so I could talk to you about it. So there’s nothing to be pissed about.”
“I’m not pissed about that,” he said tightly.
“Then what are you pissed about?”
“Right now, you not getting your ass out that door,” he bit.
“Rush—”
“God fucking dammit, if you don’t wanna go, I’ll take you to the big house and I’ll go.”
“I want to go. No. Honestly, I’m worried about meeting your sister. But I still want to go.”
“Then let’s go.”
“Not before you tell me what’s bothering you.”
“Nothing’s bothering me.”
“Rush, you can’t imagine for a second I don’t know something’s bothering you.”
“Jesus fucking Christ, nothing is bothering me!” he thundered.
I stood solid, staring up at him.
Belatedly, his plans for the day hit me.
“Your mom,” I whispered.
“Fuckin’ fuck me,” he growled, glowered at me, dropped his head, swiped his hand over the back of his neck, lifted his head, and his hair fell into his eye.
Impatiently, he tucked it behind his ear.
A hank of it fell back into his eye.
I’d never seen him do that. It was somehow cute. And sexy, even done while he was in this foul mood.
“Let me guess, you had to kidnap her,” I said.
“No, babe. But I did talk to her and after all this time apart she shared her love, Rebel. Covered me in it. It’s a wonder I don’t got rainbows shooting out of me, I’m so full of my mother’s love.”
I didn’t like what his words said, or the sarcasm he used to say them, but . . .
This was good.
Not good.
Absolutely not good.
But still in a way, good.
He wasn’t perfect.
He wasn’t going to be that side of our relationship that was about understanding and support and acceptance and tolerance and wisdom. It wasn’t going to be one-sided and eventually get to the point where I wondered why he bothered, then worried he was bothered, then did shit that fucked us up and made him bothered enough to get shot of me.
He needed me too.
And it already had been established I was a girl who needed to be needed.
I had a feeling my aura was white AF when I moved into him and put a hand to his abs.
“Tell me,” I whispered.
He gave me a look, which I’d have to check and make certain didn’t scorch off my eyebrows, before he spoke.
“She refused Chaos protection. Said she hoped we all got our throats slit, that being the end of our Club.”
I stepped back in horror, my hand dropping.
“Yeah, got that blood in me, sweetheart. Isn’t that awesome?” he asked, again with the sarcasm.
But I could oh so totally forgive the sarcasm.
“Rush—”
“We had a brother, long time ago, I was a little kid. He was like an uncle to me. Straight up, somethin’ ever happened to my dad, he’d come in, take on Tab and me, raise us like his own. Good man. The best. Club was fucked up with shit they should not be doin’, Dad was getting them clean. There was someone in the Club who wasn’t down with that. So Black got his throat slit to stop it from happening.”
“Oh my God,” I breathed.
“So yeah,” he ground out. “That cut close to the bone. She knew Black. She knew precisely what she was saying. And she still said that to me. And that wasn’t all she said.”
“What else did she say?” I whispered.
“She called me my father’s dog and told me I was there to get my treat. And she blamed Dad for everything that’s happening. Everything that’s ever happened. Including Black. And she threw in Natalie. Reb. All of it.�
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“She loves him,” I told Rush. “She misses him.”
“Who? Dad?” he asked, looking at me like I was crazy.
“Trust me, honey, a woman doesn’t hold on to that kind of anger unless it’s rooted in love.”
“That’s whacked.”
“Who wanted the divorce?”
He shut up.
Tack had.
I moved to him again, putting my hands on either side of his waist.
“I want to say that you should shake this off. But it’s your mom. Even being distant from her, you can’t shake this off. I don’t know how to help you feel less anger than you’re feeling now. But I’m not sure I want to. That anger is justified. What she said is hideous, and it’s hideous even without a man you loved having died that way. The rest was salt in a wound. But your anger will burn out eventually, and that’s when I’ll feel sorry for her.”
Again, looking at me like I was crazy. “You’ll feel sorry for her?”
“Yeah. Because when you stop feeling this deep about shit she said to hurt you, she’ll have lost the power to hurt you, which means she’ll have lost your love. And when she does that, I’ll definitely feel sorry for her.”
Rush stared down on me.
Then I let out an, “Oof!” when he yanked me roughly in his arms and held on way too tightly.
I slid my arms around him and did my best to breathe before he came into himself and loosened his hold, but he didn’t let me go.
“Was a dick,” he muttered in my ear.
“It happens.”
“It’s not cool.”
“Maybe not, but in this instance, it was understandable.”
He lifted his head and I pulled mine back so I could find those crystal-blue eyes.
They were troubled.
“Honey,” I whispered.
“I got a bad temper.”
I didn’t miss that.
“This may make me sound like a freak, but I’m kinda glad. You were wearing me out by being perfect.”
His brows went up and his chin jerked back before his face relaxed and his lips twitched.
“Now I know,” I told him.
“Know what?”
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