Brandon started laughing. Full out belly laughing. “Oh my shit I have to call Ralph right fucking now,” Brandon said reaching into his pocket for his phone.
“Why?”
“Because, your boyfriend thinks I’m straight. Who better to appreciate the humor in that than MY boyfriend?” Brandon said. He smiled as his thumb clicked across the screen.
He had a point. The situation would probably be funny to me.
Someday.
Brandon was just about to hold the phone up to his ear when the crowd erupted in cheers once again. I looked to where Thia and Bear were in the front and he was planting a big kiss on her mouth.
“Preppy, you’re fucking next!” someone shouted, and I realized it was Billy. His mason jar now only half of what it had been ten minutes before. “Don’t drink the water over here or you’ll be getting hitched!”
At the sound of his name my stomach flipped. Brandon had finished dialing and was holding the phone to his ear. I heard Ralph on the other end saying “Hello? Baby is that you?” Brandon opened his mouth and was about to speak but stopped when someone on the other side of the crowd chimed in.
“Actually, I got married before these two beautiful big fucks,” the voice slurred.
Preppy.
The crowd was quiet. A few people in the front shuffled around and parted and that’s when I saw him again. This time he was standing on the edge of the fire pit where Bear was standing only seconds before. “In fact, my wife’s here tonight.” He looked around and spotted me with Brandon. Our eyes locked and he pinned me in place with his gaze. He lifted the bottle in his hand in my direction. He swayed slightly. “This is for you, Doc. Isn’t my wife beautiful folks?” I felt a hundred set of eyes shift toward me. “Don’t worry about the bleeding guy. That’s just my wife’s fiance who I punched in the fucking face.” He threw the bottle into the fire which cracked against the brick. Flames shot higher into the sky as he jumped down and disappeared from view. Several people called out his name after him.
Brandon might have been the one Preppy hit, but it felt as if it were me he punched square in the gut.
13
PREPPY
Life was fucking loud.
And Doc was fucking engaged.
She kissed me.
Noise was everywhere and anywhere.
Whispers, laughter, chattering, music, tires on the gravel, birds in the trees. Even the low buzzing of King’s tattoo gun in the next room had a jack-hammer-esque quality to it that made my pulse pound in my head.
With each passing moment the noise grew louder and louder until I was face first on the mattress covering my head with a pillow and screaming into the sheets over the ear torture of everyday life.
I’d come to the apartment so that Doe, I mean RAY, and King’s kid could have her room back but also because I thought it would be quieter.
I was wrong.
The last straw was a motherfucking cricket sitting just outside the open window. I jumped to my feet and darted from drawer to cabinet, discarding contents to the floor. I was so focused on my search I didn’t hear Bear come in until he spoke up from the doorway. “Something I can help you look for?”
“My gun. Do you know where it is?” I asked without looking back at him. “Did you keep it or throw it away like the rest of my shit.”
“Fuck you. We kept your shit for a long time and you know we don’t throw away guns.” Bear tilted his head. “You got someone to kill?”
“Fuck yeah I do,” I corrected.
“You gonna tell me who?”
“Why is it all so fucking loud!” I shouted, opening the last cabinet in the kitchenette, pushing aside the pots and pans with no luck. I slammed the door and headed to the bedroom to start on my search there.
“Uhhhhh I don’t hear anything,” Bear said, following me into the bedroom and then the bathroom and back out again.
“Fuck it,” I finally said, giving up my search. I turned to Bear and held out my hand. “Let me use yours.”
“First tell me who it is you thinking of killin’,” Bear insisted, placing a protective hand inside his cut over his gun.
“You really don’t hear that?”
Bear looked around and even briefly closed his eyes before opening them again. “I don’t have a fucking clue what you’re talking about.”
“Close your eyes again. Fucking LISTEN,” I snapped, growing frustrated. My mind racing.
The second Bear closed his eyes and removed his hand off his gun I reached inside his cut and before he could stop me I shot through the open window, blasting the little green bug into smithereens and in the process exploding the piece of faux marble covering the window sill and shattering the glass of the window when it fell from its locked position.
“Much better,” I said, tossing the gun back at Bear before he had a chance to grab it back from me.
“You don’t grab another man’s gun, asshole,” Bear growled, anger lacing his every word as I climbed back into bed. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
“Getting rid of some of the goddamned noise around here. That’s what I was fucking doing.”
“Preppy, you’ve lost your goddamned mind is what you’ve done,” Bear barked over me. The door to the apartment slammed open and King burst into the room, a frantic look on his face.
“What the fuck was that?”
“Preppy sentenced a cricket outside the window to death by firing squad of one,” Bear remarked.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” King shouted, pulling me up and holding me in front of him, his face only inches from mine. An angry vein thrummed in his forehead as it had always done when he was pissed. I missed that vein.
“What the fuck is your problem?” I asked.
“Are you fucking kidding me right now? My problem is that we have kids and women who fucking live here and you’re firing a gun outside the window like it’s the wild west. Fuck, Prep. I know shit’s different around here now, but that shit you just pulled wouldn’t fucking fly before you went away either.”
“I’m so fucking sorry that I don’t live up to your new family-man standards,” I said, grabbing his wrist and tossing it away from where he had gathered a handful of my shirt in his hand. I grabbed a duffel bag from under the bed and tossed a few pairs of shorts and shirts into it.
“You need help?” King asked, his anger turning into frustration. “Do we need to send you somewhere? Just tell me what you fucking need, Preppy!”
“I need the noise to stop. I need the light to stop burning my fucking eyes. I need my fucking cock to work instead of lying limp between my fucking legs.” I zipped the bag and tossed it over my shoulder. I looked back at King who was standing there with that look on his face that I was tired of seeing. “I need my friends to stop looking at me like I’m some dog who got hit by a fucking car.”
“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” Bear asked as I made my way to the door.
“Somewhere much fucking quieter.”
King’s arm shot out, blocking me from the door.
“Just let him go,” Bear said pulling on King’s arm. He reluctantly let it fall with a growl and I left, slamming the door and leaving my two best friends behind me.
Nobody followed me.
Which was good.
Because I had no fucking idea where I was going.
14
KING
“Hey, you busy?” Pup asked, peeking her blonde head around the door.
“Just finishing up,” I said, snapping off my black gloves and tossing them into the trash bin. I rolled my stool to the center of the room and she didn’t need another invitation, she stepped into the room and between my legs so I could wrap my arms around her, but it wasn’t close enough.
Never was.
I grabbed her hips and pulled her close until her body was firmly against mine and my face against her chest.
“What’s going on?” I mumbled from between her tits. My last cli
ent just left and I was beat. It was the last session of six for one of the biggest and most intricate back pieces I’d ever done.
“Oh wow. It’s beautiful,” Pup exclaimed and when I looked up she had my phone in one hand and the other was covering her mouth as she looked down at the screen at the picture I’d just taken before I’d wrapped up his back and sent him on his way. “It’s your best one yet.”
“You say that about all of them,” I said, again pressing my face between her braless tits and wanting very badly to sleep there for the rest of the fucking night.
Pup laughed and stepped back but I wouldn’t let her get far so I grabbed her hand and pulled her back into me. “I need to talk to you about something serious,” she said.
“You pregnant again?” I asked, unable to hide the hope in my voice. Some may view my need to knock my woman up constantly as pathetic, but I saw her being pregnant with my baby as more than just carrying a kid. Her being pregnant with my baby was like the possession of her. A body and soul kind of thing. It made me rock fucking hard every time I thought of her belly growing and her tits swelling again.
“No!” she said, slapping me playfully on the shoulder. “We said we would take a break. We have three and I need a minute to just…to just breathe!”
“How long do you need to breathe, baby?” I murmured, lightly running my teeth over sensitive spot of skin under her tit over her shirt. “A week?” I dug my fingers into her hips and moved my head lower to kiss the small strip of skin between her tank top and her shorts. “Two weeks?” I asked, licking a circle around her belly button. I looked up just as her pale cheeks turned bright pink. “Three? Because you know, baby, I’ll give you whatever you want.” I rubbed my thumbs over the tops of her thighs from the outside in, dipping them into the frayed opening of her shorts. Goosebumps rose on her warm flesh.
“Time,” she said sternly. Well, as sternly as she could with my thumbs circling so close to her pussy. “I just want a little time.”
“I’ll give you two months,” I bargained without waiting for her to reply. Instead, I watched as her eyes turned dark as I ran my nose over stomach and breathed in her arousal. There was no better scent on earth than my woman when she was turned on.
MY woman.
Something I could say a million fucking times and it never got old.
MINE.
“We…we can talk about that stuff. Baby stuff. La…later,” she stammered. “Right now I need to talk to you. It’s about Prep.”
“What about Prep?” I asked, realizing that Pup was serious about whatever it was she had to talk to me about I needed some space so I could actually hear her so I took my tools over to the sink where I started taking apart my equipment for cleaning and sanitizing.
Pup sighed and plopped down onto the black leather couch beside me, pulling her legs up onto the cushions and resting her chin on her knees. “He feels off to me. It all feels off. His outburst at the bonfire. His storming off. I can’t stop wanting to help him.”
King shrugged. “Everyone deals with shit their own way and he hasn’t been around in a while. Let him ease back into things in his own way. He’s gonna freak out now and again. He’s been through some shit.”
Pup sighed, her eyes looked tired. “I don’t know how to say this to you so I’m just going to say it.” She took a deep breath and looked at the floor when she said, “I think all this is more than just a freak out. There is more to all this. The girl. Dre, and who she is to him.”
I shook my head. “He’s confused. He already explained it.”
“Don’t you see? He doesn’t want us to worry about him. He says he’s fine when clearly he’s not fine. If this girl meant something to him then he’s keeping that to himself except for the occasional outburst because he doesn’t want us trying to fix things for him.”
I wiped off the last part of my tattoo gun, setting the tools in the sterilizer and hitting the button. Neon blue lights lit up the mini fridge looking contraption. A low hum vibrated from the machine. “Don’t you think he deserves the benefit of the doubt? After all he’s been through?” I turned around and leaned against the arm of the couch, towering over my girl.
“Yeah, I do. But…”
“What about after all WE’VE been through? I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to go digging into shit that don’t need digging into just because a part of his story seems off to you. It’s all fucking off. WAY fucking off. He’ll deal with his own shit when he’s ready. When he comes back he’ll work it out and if he needs us he’ll ask. Cut him some fucking slack, babe.”
“I know, but he won’t even talk about what happened to him,” Ray said, looking down at her hands.
I tipped her chin up and I met her worried blue gaze. “He needs time. You feel me, Pup?”
“I feel you,” she breathed, giving me that look that made my balls tighten every fucking time.
“Good,” I said, leaning in to press my lips to hers and pushing down on her shoulders so that her back was against the cushions. I pushed her legs apart and quickly settled myself between them.
My favorite fucking place in the world.
“Now let’s quit all the serious talk while I seriously fuck you until you’re the one begging ME for another baby.” I reached behind her and grabbed her ass, lifting her off the couch enough for my cock to press against the shorts covering her sweet pussy.
“I’ll quit. I promise,” she assured me, breathing heavy. “No more digging.”
“Good girl,” I said, palming her tits through her tank top, feeling her nipples harden underneath my touch had me impossibly hard and I was well on my way to fixing the situation she’d started the second she came into my shop wearing that little scrap of material she calls shorts and that impossibly tight top that did all sorts of everything for her already amazing body.
“I’ll quit,” she said again and I sensed we weren’t done talking about it when she pushed against my chest until I had no choice but to set a knee on the floor so I could lift up off of her. “As soon as you take a look at this,” she pulled a folded piece of paper from between her tits and I could give two shits if it was the Declaration of Independence or directions to the Holy Grail, all I could focus on was my need to tongue between her tits while I fingered her pussy from behind. “I dug this up a while ago. But I promise no more digging. Please,” she begged, snapping my focus back up to her eyes.
It wasn’t the kind of begging I was hoping for.
I rubbed my hand over my face and snatched the paper from her hands. She sat up next to me and watched as I unfolded it. It was a copy of some sort of paperwork. “What exactly the fuck is this?” I asked, looking down at some sort of photocopy of an official document. I mentally braced myself at what was to come because anything having to do with the law usually didn’t end well.
At least, not for me it didn’t.
Pup jabbed her finger at the paper. “Just keep going. Please,” she insisted, her hands curled up around my bicep, her head against my shoulder as her lips silently moved as she read along with me. The smell of whatever girly shampoo she used wafted into my nostrils and did nothing to help reduce the massive hard-on still pressing painfully against my jeans.
Focus.
I sighed, started at the beginning and then paused after reading the very first sentence. No fucking way. Not believing what I was reading I glanced from Pup back to the page and started all over again. Pup was no longer looking at the document, but at me as I read it again, this time out loud. “State of Florida, Division of Vital Statistics, Certificate of Marriage. Issued to Samuel Clearwater and Andrea Anne Capulet, issued this day, June the…” I paused and read the rest quickly, mumbling my way through the rest of the numerical facts with my hand over my mouth until I reached the bottom where both the official seal of Florida and the county’s stamp were right there on the bottom. “What did that girl say her name was?” I asked.
“Dre. Short for…”
“Andrea,”
I finished for her.
Pup nodded. “I showed this to Dre. She was surprised as hell. She said she was trying to help Preppy get Max by forging some documents to make Preppy seem more like an upstanding citizen but Preppy actually filed this with the clerk’s office after she’d already left to go back home.”
“Holy fuck. I thought he was just losing his shit at the bonfire,” I said, hating the way the words sounded coming from my own mouth and feeling bitter and hurt that my best friend, a man I saw as my brother could lie to me. “For YEARS he’s been lying to me. It’s all true.”
“Does it bother you that he’s married?”
“No, I don’t fucking care. I mean, I don’t know WHY but him getting married would never fucking bother me. What I fucking care about is that I was lied to by one of the only people on the planet I never thought I had to worry about lying to me!” I said, my voice rising along with my temper.
“You should talk to him. We can’t just sit back and wait for him to come to us.”
“That’s what I’m going to do,” I said, stomping out the door with Pup close on my heels.
“What are you doing?” she asked, struggling to keep pace beside me as I stormed over to the main house.
“Going to get some answers,” I replied. “But first I have to find him.”
“Wait!” Pup shouted, grabbing me by one of the belts on my arm. I stopped and turned around to face her. “We don’t even know where to look!”
Instantly my temper cooled at the reminder that we’d gone without him for so long. We fucking BURIED him for fucks sake and now we knew he was alive but didn’t know where he was.
“We’ll find him,” Ray said. “And then you will talk to him. Calmly. And you’ll be understanding. I promise if that fucks things up more then we can talk about speeding up getting me pregnant again.” She pressed her soft lips to my neck and the combination of her smell and nearness sent a shot of sensation directly to my already impossibly hard cock.
Preppy, The Life & Death of Samuel Clearwater: A King Series Trilogy Page 32