by Jayne Blue
“You don’t understand,” he said, picking at his nail. “You’ve had it easy, Nicole. You’ve had everything handed to you. You’re perfect. Remember?”
“Oh shut up. Don’t start with me. You don’t understand. I’ve worked hard for everything, Doug. Everything. You think it was easy keeping the business afloat after Daddy did what he did? I gave up my life to come back here and salvage what I could. And I did it. No one helped me.”
“I helped you. Jesus. You talk like Dad’s shit didn’t land on me just as hard. It was harder even because I’m named after him. You could have gotten away clean. I couldn’t. You didn’t have to come back here.”
I literally bit my tongue. He didn’t want to hear what I had to say. There was nothing clean about what I did. He was right though, I’d had my future laid out for me. I was two weeks away from college graduation when my father got arrested. I was ready to go and get an MBA. But I came back home. Doug was only a senior in high school and I came home for him. And I saved the business for him too. At least, that’s how it started. Now though, it was mine. And instead of Daddy’s bad choices threatening to take it all away, now they were Doug’s.
“Doug, I’m asking you to get help. No. I’m begging you. Get clean. Stay clean. If you do that, then I swear to God I’ll do whatever I can to get you out of the mess you’re in. The doctors are going to come in here in a bit and they’re going to talk to you about options. You need rehab. Far away from here. You know it and so do I. Won’t you please go? For me, if not for yourself. Please.”
Tears sprang into his eyes and for once I think they were genuine. And that was the crux of my brother. He could volley from sweet to awful in the literal blink of an eye. And no matter what else he was, he’d always be that lost little boy who couldn’t understand why his mother left him the way she did. And no matter what else I was, I could never replace her.
“I’m sorry,” he sobbed and I could see the physical pain of the effort etched in his face. I went to him, gingerly wrapping my arms around him. There was nowhere on him to kiss that wasn’t bruised or bandaged.
“Please,” I said, letting my own tears fall. “Please get help this time. I want you back. I need you. I’m so tired of doing all of this by myself. We’re all we’ve got. Don’t you get that? They’re never coming back. Not Mom. Not Dad. It’s just us. And I’m trying so hard to keep it together. But I need you. Please.”
Doug nodded and cried into my shoulder.
“Mel’s here,” I whispered into the top of his head. Doug let out a painful sob at the news.
“Are you serious?”
I smoothed back a lock of his hair still caked with blood. “I’m serious. She rode with me. She’s out in the waiting room and scared to death. She still cares about you too. I can’t speak for her. You’ve put her through almost as much as you’ve put me through. But maybe there’s still a chance.”
“God. I love her, Nic.”
“I know. So why don’t you do everything you can to fight for her?”
“She doesn’t want me anymore.”
“You’re right. She doesn’t want you sick anymore. But Doug, she never left. You get that, right? She sure as hell didn’t have to stay at Ridley’s, but she has. You think that’s just because she likes serving ice cream to pimply teenagers? You can ask her yourself, but I think she’s waiting to see how you’ll turn out.”
He sniffled. “I want to see her. Can you go get her?”
I kissed the top of his head and slid off the bed. “Yes. But be nice. She’s a wreck and worried about you. Let her be mad at you for a little while if that’s what she needs. And then be a man. Tell her you’re going to rehab and you’re going to get better. And Jesus, don’t scare her. Don’t make her any promises. Just tell her you’re going to try.”
Doug slowly nodded and gave me as much of a smile as he could through his swollen lips. God, he looked pitiful and small in that bed and it was everything in me not to hug him tight. But I couldn’t protect him. I knew that now. He was never going to get better unless he wanted to. I just prayed that this was finally his rock bottom. Because I couldn’t imagine anything worse.
Chapter Fifteen
Brax
I came back to the ice cream shop with her that night. Nicole was so spent I practically had to carry her in the back door. She’d been tough all day for her brother but it had taken its toll. She propped herself up against the back wall while I insisted on checking the place out. When I’d convinced myself the coast was clear, I went back for her.
“Come on,” I said, taking her hand. “Take me upstairs.”
“Mmm.” God, when this woman moaned it sent shock waves through me. She rested her head against my chest as we walked up the stairs together. She had a steel door at the top separating the apartment from the restaurant downstairs.
“Good move,” I said, liking the solid weight of the thing. “And good door.”
“Doug installed it for me. I’ve always hated it because it’s so heavy and ugly.”
I smiled down at her. It was kind of a chick thing to say and for half a second I got a glimpse of maybe what the real Doug Ridley was like underneath his addiction. If anyone tried to bust into the shop at night, they’d have a hell of a time getting through this door. He’d put two heavy deadbolts on it. Just like I would have if I’d been the one here when she moved in.
Nicole fumbled for her keys and handed them to me. I’d insisted on going in first there too though I doubted anything could have busted through that door. Still, who the fuck knew if her brother gave someone else the keys.
“I want you to change the locks on at least this door like yesterday,” I told her as I popped open and had a look inside.
I liked the layout of the place. The building that housed Ridley’s had been a warehouse long ago. Nicole owned half of it, the dry cleaners and barber shop owned the other half. She hadn’t covered the brick walls or the huge pipes throughout.
“It’s a little sparse,” she said, through a yawn. “We used to use it for storage. After my dad, uh . . . left, I wanted to save all the money I could and the bank took the house I grew up in. So I kinda turned this place into mine. I wanted to put up walls and drywall, but Doug talked me out of it.”
Well, shit, I thought. The kid knew what he was doing.
“No. I like it like this. All open the way it is.” I looked at the place with a carpenter’s eye. She had custom shelving on the back wall near her bed. A half wall separated her living space from the kitchen. The whole thing was inlaid with stain-glassed windows. I ran my hands along them. Shit, they were old with copper frames and intricate designs.
“That was also Doug,” she said. “You remember Saint Augustine’s down on Jackson Street? When they tore it down he went down there and salvaged a bunch of stuff.”
I nodded, impressed as hell. “It’s perfect.” And it was. Shit.
“Are you hungry?”
She padded over to the kitchen area and opened the fridge. She took out two bottles of beer and tossed one to me. “I’m not much of a cook. How do you feel about spaghetti?”
“Beer’s fine. I’m good. But I’ll make you something if you want.”
She smiled and shook her head. “God, I’m just tired. Exhausted. And you must think I’m a crazy person dragging you into all my drama like this. It occurred to me today that where you’re concerned that’s all I’ve ever done.”
She collapsed on a futon near the center of the room. I sat beside her and pulled her feet into my lap. She groaned again when I rubbed her insteps and it made my cock swell. I knew she was cooked, but I wasn’t sure I could leave here tonight without easing my growing need.
“I don’t exactly mind,” I said. “I’m just sorry you’ve got that kind of drama. I know what it’s like, you know?”
Her eyes snapped open and she took a swig of beer. “Really?”
I nodded. “Not me personally, but my mom was a junkie. Pills mostly. Sweet one minute, l
ife of the party. Then she’d turn on a dime and get the fuck out of the way. She was an artist back in her day. She painted murals and landscapes. There are even a few of her pieces still hanging on a wall somewhere at the Lincolnshire Art Museum. But she couldn’t keep it up. Everything started going to hell. My dad took off when I was maybe five. Couldn’t put up with her shit anymore. It’s funny how much you can love and hate a person all at once.”
Nicole ran a hand over her face. “That’s exactly it, isn’t it? I know you must hate Doug. And why wouldn’t you? God, he’s such an asshole. He wasn’t always. Underneath all of that he’s sweet and funny and vulnerable. He was so smart. Artistic. He could fix anything with his hands. What he did with this place was just the tip of the iceberg of the kind of things he could do. I tried to get him to go to college to study architecture or interior design. He even took a few classes, but then everything just turned to shit. He calls it his reverse Midas touch.”
I nodded. “I’m sorry for that. And I’d like to tell you everything is going to be okay. But you more than anyone know I’d be lying.”
She smiled and shifted her weight; bringing herself up on her knees she took my face in her hands and kissed me. She smelled like cinnamon and sunlight as her hair fell around my shoulders.
“Don’t,” she whispered. “Don’t tell me that. Never lie to me, Brax.”
Never lie to her. I tilted her head toward mine and kissed her sweet lips. “I can’t promise I can tell you everything all the time, Nic.”
She nodded. “I know what you mean and I get that. I’m not asking for all of your secrets. But if you tell me something, promise me it will always be the truth.”
My heart clenched at the set of her eyes. I knew what she was asking me. She wanted to trust me and she’d been burned enough in her life to understand the risk of that. And I wanted to be worthy of it. I swallowed hard and looked away first, hating myself for it just a little bit. But when I looked back, she was still waiting for me to answer. She hadn’t flinched.
“I promise I won’t lie to you.”
I leaned down to kiss her and I swear it started out just with that. But when her lips warmed beneath mine, a fuse lit inside me. I slid one hand beneath her skirt and fumbled with the snaps down the front of her dress. She groaned in half-hearted protest. “I won’t be able to walk tomorrow.”
“Walking’s overrated,” I said as I kissed along her throat and lifted her, carrying her toward the bed. “Besides, I’ll take it easy on you this time, promise.”
“Hmm, two promises in one day,” she said, dubious, but she was already working on my belt loop. She shed her dress and unhooked her bra, letting me at those luscious pink nipples.
“We ought to invent a new flavor for these,” I said as I licked at the tiny buds and made them rise to peaks for me. “Strawberry kiss.”
“Mmm. We could do that. Maybe some night you could help me with a taste test.”
“Now that is something we are definitely going to do.”
I kept my promise. I was quick but gentle with her as I slid into her heated wetness. Fuck. This felt like home. I wished I could stay inside of her forever. I stretched her wide and felt her juices flow around me with every inch she took. I loved the way she arched her back for me; I put my hands under her supple ass, angling her just right. She opened her eyes and smiled as I felt the first quickening of her walls. God. She fit me tight like a glove and all it took was one look from me and she was primed and ready. Like she was made for me. Or maybe I was made for her.
She curved herself around me, giving into her powerful orgasm as I held her tight and waited. For in a minute, I wouldn’t be able to hold back. I needed the release as much as she did.
When she clawed my back and cried out my name, the dam inside of me burst as well. I spilled my seed into her, claiming her all over again. For so many years I’d wondered if having her like this would feel as good as I remembered. It didn’t. It was so much better. Because now, we knew who we were. We had the battle scars to prove it. And yet somehow, we’d found each other again.
When we were both spent, she curled against me, resting her head against my arm. I smoothed her hair away from her face and kissed the space behind her earlobe. Inhaling her scent, I gave her a little nip that made her squeal and buck against me. Shit. I wondered if I’d make it through the night without needing her again. Nicole molded herself against me, that round little ass of hers fitting tight against my thighs.
“Thank you,” she whispered, drunk with impending sleep. “For being there with me today. You didn’t have to.”
I nodded and kissed her again. I wouldn’t tell her what I wanted to say—not yet. The truth was, I did need to be there. Because she was mine now. What hurt her, hurt me. It might have happened fast and I didn’t want to spook her. But there it was. If she’d have me, I wasn’t going to let her go. And I wasn’t going to let anything dark come into her world again if I could help it.
Chapter Sixteen
“You look ridiculous.” I held my hand against my mouth and tried not to laugh but failed.
Kellan raised a middle finger and threw a paperweight from Colt’s desk across the table. The whole crew erupted in laughter when Kellan missed. Kellan and Colt had just got back from the Florida panhandle after meeting with our Emerald Coast charter. They’d brought two new prospects with them, but this was a members-only meeting. Kellan’s face was beet red from sunburn except for two perfect white circles around his eyes in the shape of his sunglasses. He looked like a damn raccoon.
Colt stood behind him and put a hand hard on his shoulder, making Kellan wince. Apparently the sunburn wasn’t just on his face.
“Mallory told him,” Colt said. Mallory was Kellan’s brand-new wife. “We all did.”
Colt looked pretty dark himself and he started out that way. He had dark hair and lashes that framed his eyes like guyliner. It made him look like a damn pirate. As he took his seat at the head of the table, I slid the gavel over to him, happy not to feel the weight of it anymore. President was never one of my ambitions. I knew where my talents best served the club. If the Great Wolf patch intimidated outsiders, I was a huge part of the reason why.
“It was her damn fault,” Kellan grumbled. “The girls wanted to spend all their time on the beach. I wasn’t about to let them go out there without protection.”
I shook my head. “So you thought your smoldering menace would be enough to fight off UV rays too?”
Colt and Kellan had used the trip as a sort of honeymoon neither of them ever got the chance to take. I was glad for both of them. Marriage suited them well. In Colt’s case, he could add fatherhood to the mix too. And that was one of the biggest new changes to our membership. For years none of us had wanted to risk the shit we did blowing back on people we loved. It had been easier to stay unattached. Now though, all that was changing.
My back stiffened. It was changing. But not so far for me. I’d given everything I had to this club and would until the day I died. It hadn’t been easy though. Of the guys at this table, only Colt and Kellan really knew what it was like to live with real blood on your hands. Colt had been part of the crew in Green Bluff, California. The first club to go legit. The first battlefront was often the heaviest hit. Though he’d never told us the details, I knew that war had cost him like ours had cost me.
And in Kellan’s case, he’d seen real war. Two tours in Afghanistan had cost him half his leg and part of his soul. I remembered that dead look he had in his eyes. I’d been the one waiting for him at the airport when he came home the last time thinking his life was over. For both of them and for me, it had been the club that had pulled us through. We’d give our life for it and for each other. Now Kellan and Colt had been the first of us to try for something more. They had wives. Babies. They’d opened my eyes to the possibility of something normal. God. Was I really ready to settle down the way they had? Could I be that lucky too?
“What’s up?” Kellan said, kicki
ng me under the table. Part of my thoughts must have been written on my expression. Those thoughts, like they had for the past few weeks, mostly centered on Nicole. She said she could stand my secrets but not my lies. Was she strong enough to handle being with a member of the Great Wolves M.C. long term?
I waved a hand. I needed to bring her problem to the table, but not until after we’d finished the rest of our business. Kellan narrowed his eyes at me. He knew me well enough to know something was up, but Colt called the meeting to order.
Things were good. Better than they had been in a while. We’d dealt with a threat from a rival club, the Devils Hawks, before Colt and Kellan rode out to Florida. The gym and the club were in the black. A few of our other charters had branched out into private security and Colt liked what he saw. Someday soon, it might be something we could think about for Lincolnshire.
“I like it,” Tate said. “Especially if we’ve got some good new prospects coming on.”
“Agreed,” Colt said. “Brax, what do you think? You’re kinda quiet down there. If we do expand in the next year or two, you’d be the one I’d rely on most to spearhead it.”
That threw me. “Me?”
“Of course, dickhead.” Kellan kicked me under the table again. “Who’d you think? There’s a real need for private security in this town and further out into Toledo. Maybe even over the border into Michigan. The local police departments don’t want to pay their guys overtime anymore for what we can do. The mayor’s looking to expand the area by the docks even more, turn the old hockey stadium into a major venue. Things like that need security. Tight shit. We could set it up the way we want it. The right way. Sly and Dex out in Cali said they’re even thinking about starting up a security firm closer to L.A. guarding VIPs and stuff.”
I was floored. I’d never thought for a minute they’d want me to branch off into my own business.