by Jamie Begley
She straightened her shoulders before she walked out into the lights shining down on the stage.
Her image joined Kaden’s on the huge screens, so that the audience could get a closer view of what was happening on the stage. Sawyer had helped her pick out the midnight blue jumpsuit that left her shoulders bare. The material concealed her breasts before flaring out in loose, flowing pants. She had also been talked into getting her hair cut into a bob. Everything about her had gone through a transformation on the outside, while inside she was still the three-year-old little girl who just wanted everyone to hear her sing.
Raising her hand in the air, she waved at the audience as she walked to stand behind the microphone next to Kaden’s.
As she took her place, Kaden began to sing as Ginny stared out at the crowd watching her. She wasn’t having to stand on the sidelines and watch someone else do what she wanted. For the first time, she was right where she wanted to be.
Chapter Forty-Two
Ginny 23 / Gavin 36
“Are you going to hide in the kitchen during the whole reception?”
Ginny picked up a hand towel to dry her hands as Trudy came into the kitchen, glaring at her with her hands on her hips. “I was just finishing plating the rest of the appetizers.” Laying the towel down, Ginny fiddled with the tray, waiting for her sister to leave. When she didn’t, Ginny tried to hurry her along.
“You should go before someone comes in.”
“I don’t care.” Trudy moved away from the door to come from around the counter to take her shoulders, forcing her to face her. “What’s wrong?”
“No matter what happens now, it’s never going to be just me and you again, is it?”
Trudy’s face softened. “No. I love you, but I love Dalton, too.”
“I know.” Ginny wiped her tears away. “I know I’m being silly. Ignore me.” Reaching up, she pulled her sister’s hands down to take them in hers. “You look beautiful.”
Trudy’s face broke in a breathtaking smile. “You tell me that every time you see me.”
“Because it’s true. Dalton is a very lucky man.”
“I don’t think he would agree with you. I think he believes I’m trying to kill him with sex.” Trudy giggled.
“Are you?” She giggled back.
“No, I just like making him think so.” Laughing, Trudy reached out to hold her close. Growing serious, she pressed against her. “I wanted this house because it’s big enough for all of us. We’re still going to be a family; it just won’t be a family of two.”
Ginny started to nod but stopped. “You’re going to ruin your makeup.”
Trudy instantly pulled away to fluff her hair and smooth her dress, making sure she was still picture-perfect. “I’m not the only one who looks beautiful today.”
While Ginny knew that Trudy was exaggerating, she was pleased with the way she looked. She was just in a plain, navy sheath dress with a small jacket. She had managed to maneuver herself into several of the pictures of Trudy and she planned to get a few copies for herself.
“Where’s Dalton?”
“Around,” Trudy said absently.
“What are you up to?” Ginny asked her sister, not liking the look in her eye.
“He’s upstairs with Shade, getting our suitcases. Lily wanted the chance to sneak out to get his Valentine’s Day present ready.”
“How’s he getting home? He and Lily came together.”
“I’m sure he’ll figure it out,” Trudy said carelessly.
Both women turned nervously, then relaxed when Killyama came into the kitchen. “The band is looking for Ginny. They’re getting ready to start the music.”
“I’ll take these platters then—”
“Bitch, go. I’ll put them on the table.” Killyama took them from her.
“Thanks.” Ginny started laughing when Trudy started to follow her, only to have Killyama thrust one of the trays in her hand.
Seeing Trudy alone for those few minutes helped ease the sadness that had hung in the air all day. Weddings always made her sad. It was hard for her to celebrate them when she knew she would never have one.
Skirting around the crowd, Ginny managed to work her way out to the backyard. It was beautifully decorated. Small tables were set up around the pool with red tablecloths and vases filled with white roses on top. It was cool today, so she was comfortable with the small jacket she wore.
The members of the band gave her nods that they were ready. As she moved to stand behind the microphone, the familiar music began to play from the speakers.
“I’m searching for you …,” she sang out, scanning over the crowd, watching the back door for Trudy and Dalton to come out. She might not be able to give them a toast like a family member could, but she could sing for them. She had written one for them, and when they were both outside, the band would play it next.
“Calling for you …”
The song she had written for Trudy and Dalton was a celebration of their love. The song she was singing now, she had written about her own heartache for a soul mate, who she knew was no longer there, that for whatever reason, life had snatched him away from her, had never given them the opportunity to touch. She had written the song, hoping that she was wrong and that he really was out there, thinking the same thing, waiting for her, waiting for her song to lead the way to her.
“Hoping for you, praying for you …”
Her eyes moved over the familiar faces in the crowd, drawing them in with her heartache to lighten the sorrow that was growing like an ink stain on her heart.
Her eyes went to the door to see a man walk out; his eyes met hers.
He wasn’t dressed like the other men at the wedding, wearing black jeans and a black T-shirt. Even under the dark color, his massive shoulders and chest strained the material, showing the immense size and strength contained within his body. She didn’t notice the numerous tattoos that covered his hands, arms, neck, and traveled up the side of his face to where he had shaved his head to show the tattoos there. Her eyes were lost in his … clinging to his, as he moved around the pool.
“Can you hear me?” she sang out to the crowd while silently begging him … only him.
Her voice broke, afraid he didn’t know the song was meant for him. “Oh ….”
Ginny closed her eyes, terrified he couldn’t see she was meant for him.
A brush of wind had her opening her eyes again as he moved around a woman to face her across the expanse of the pool.
“Why can’t you hear me?”
Taking the microphone off the stand, she took a small step forward. Looking down to make sure she didn’t fall into the pool, their reflections swirled from the increased wind picking up speed, merging their reflections so they were dancing … touching … kissing ….
Reaper pulled his phone out from his jeans pocket after he felt the ding of the vibration.
Need a ride.
He quickly typed his answer.
Ask someone else.
He went back to looking over Ink’s past records that Jonas had managed to score for him. His brief text hadn’t worked when the next ding came in, breaking his concentration.
Come and get me from the reception.
I can see where you are. Give me five, Reaper sarcastically texted back before getting up from his desk, taking his cell phone.
Why in the fuck did Shade need a ride? He had taken his own vehicle with Lily. Not only that, but most of the club was at T.A. and Dalton’s wedding.
Taking the spare keys off the wall for Train’s truck, he went out the door and headed into town.
Fuck. The brother couldn’t have waited outside for him?
Reaper found a parking space, getting a dirty look from T.A.’s nosy-ass neighbors who were sitting outside in lawn chairs. He glowered back until the fuckers decided it was more advantageous to get their asses in gear to go back inside.
He saw Shade talking to Dalton on the stairs when he came in the door, forced to
wait at the bottom of steps. He hadn’t bothered to close the door, expecting to go right back outside.
“I’ll be right back,” Shade said as they reached the bottom of the stairs.
“I don’t have all day,” he ground out.
Waiting for his return, all he wanted was to get the fuck out of there. The last place he wanted to be at was a fucking wedding. It was as if God were rubbing His heel in the crushed dreams that he had planned for him and Taylor. That most of The Last Riders were there to celebrate just added salt to the wound.
He didn’t begrudge T.A. and Dalton their day; he just didn’t want his nose rubbed into what would never be for him.
Fed up with Shade, Reaper couldn’t take it any longer and was about to go back outside when the wind swept the door closed. He was reaching for the doorknob when a voice came over a loudspeaker from outside.
“I’m searching for you…”
Every fucking hair stood on end on his body. It was the same experience he felt on a beach so many years ago, filling him with despair.
“Calling for you …”
The tenderness in her voice had his feet blindly walking to the backyard door.
“Hoping for you, praying for you …”
It was as if she held a power over him, putting him in a trance, as he moved through the crowd, all by hearing her sing.
“Can you hear me?”
The pounding of his heart clung to her every word, like an instrument being played in the background.
Right before he moved the last person out of the way, the pure rawness in her voice struck him with a powerful force as he heard her voice slightly break, as if it was her heart breaking instead.
“Oh …” the woman cried before she broke off, opening her eyes. “Why can’t you hear me?”
Their eyes locked immediately, and his heart seized into a fist when he was finally able to see the woman clearly without everyone blocking her face from him. At last, the only thing that separated them was the ten-foot-wide dazzling pool between them.
His amber gaze traveled down to the glistening water to see what she was staring at, seeing their reflections in the pool. There might have been a ten-foot difference between them, but the water showed a different story. She took a step forward and their reflections finally met as the water glowed around them.
While their mirror images met for the first time, his heart beat again to a rhythm that only they could understand … that only they could witness their reflections converging into one … that only she and wind could hear his whispered answer.
“I can hear you.”
Chapter Forty-Three
When the music changed to another song, Ginny knew that Trudy and Dalton had come outside. Switching to the song she wrote for them, she never took her eyes off the man across the pool. She memorized his face, as if it were a song that she would have to sing in front of thousands, afraid that if he left before she finished, she would never see him again.
Her tight grip on the microphone eased when she realized Shade was standing next to him. She would be able to find him … be able touch to him.
When the song ended, she started to go around the pool, when a movement brought her into Trudy’s waiting arms as she thanked her for singing and attending the wedding.
“You’re welcome,” she was finally able to get the strangled words outs.
When Dalton would have thanked her, she hooked Trudy’s arm through hers. “Willa needed you to check on something in the kitchen.”
“Uh … I just talked to … Willa.”
Desperately tugging her sister through the crowd that had swelled to watch her sing, Ginny kept trying to get her around the pool to the back door.
Tilting her head sideways, she whispered to Trudy. “Who’s that man with Shade?”
Ginny didn’t slow, rudely passing Fat Louise and Sex Piston as they tried to talk to Trudy.
“Who? I don’t see Shade?” Trudy craned her neck, trying to look over the crowd.
“Bitch, you owe me a new pair of white heels!” Sex Piston snapped, catching up with them to give Trudy a piece of her mind.
“I’ll pay for them,” Ginny said, trying to shut Sex Piston up from distracting Trudy.
Going around Crazy Bitch and Calder, she pulled Trudy closer to her so she would have a better viewpoint.
“Can you see him now?” Ginny kept trying to move her sister before Trudy could even answer, not caring that Trudy’s friends were looking at her as if she had lost her mind.
“Do you …?” Ginny started to say when Trudy’s mouth dropped open and her eyes went from where Shade and the man were going out the door, to her hopeful expression. She knew Trudy knew who he was.
Her sister brought her hands to her hips. “Oh … hell … no.” Trudy started shaking her head, some of her curls falling down that Sex Piston had styled.
“Who is he?”
“No.” Trudy shook her head again. “Not in a million fucking years.”
“Sex Piston, did you see?”
Sex Piston turned pale, then looked down and decided to stare at her nails. “I couldn’t see him.”
“Crazy Bitch?”
Crazy Bitch looked at Sex Piston, then Trudy. “I didn’t see a fucking thing.”
“What’s going on?” Fat Louise asked.
“Nothing,” Trudy snapped.
“Did you see who Shade was talking to?” Ginny begged her.
“Excuse me. I need to go to the potty. Bye.”
Looking around at who else she could ask, her eyes met Killyama’s, and Ginny knew from the look in her eyes that she knew who the man was.
“If you don’t tell me who he is, I’ll just call and ask Shade,” she warned.
“It was Reaper, Viper’s brother.”
“Good morning,” Ginny greeted Willa as she walked into the church’s kitchen.
“Good morning. I thought you would still be asleep.” Opening the oven door, Willa slid a baking sheet in.
“It’s too beautiful a day to sleep in. Would you mind if I go out for a while?”
“Why would I mind? You don’t work for me anymore.” Willa smiled, beginning to roll out some pastry dough.
“I know, but I had planned to spend the day with you. But I ….”
“Ginny, you don’t have to explain. Go have a good time.”
“Thanks.” Ginny ran a hand through her hair, tucking it behind her ear. “Do I look okay?”
The rolling pin stopped. “I’ve known you since you were eighteen years old. You’ve never once asked me how you look.”
Nervously, she pulled down the tan-colored top to make sure her pouch didn’t show. “It never mattered before.”
“And now it does?” she asked softly.
“Yes.”
“Can I ask why?” Willa’s eyes twinkled at her.
“You can, but I’d rather you didn’t.”
“Then I won’t. You can tell me when you’re ready. You look very pretty,” Willa complimented her.
Giving Willa a big hug, Ginny then gave her a kiss on her cheek. “Thanks, Willa.”
“Anytime.”
Leaving her friend to make pie crust, Ginny left the church. Usually, she stayed at the hotel when she was in town, but with so many of Dalton’s friends coming into town, Lucky offered to let her stay at the church, in the part where he and Willa used to live before they moved in with The Last Riders and built their own home on the connecting property.
Getting in her car, she buckled her seatbelt, then turned the music on. Rolling down the window, she cranked the radio even louder.
She pulled out of the parking lot and saw Knox about to get in his squad car, giving her a frown at the loud music. She didn’t bother turning it down. Knox might be the sheriff, but she’d heard his music cranked as high as hers when he drove around on that badass bike of his.
Going around a curve, she passed Rosie’s bar and started to sing and bop her head along to another song that came on. She
pressed down on her horn when she saw Rider, Train, and Shade coming out of the bar, giving them a jaunty wave.
Cracking up at their expressions, she started singing a song that she began writing last night.
Reaper was squatting beside his motorcycle, replacing the belt, when he heard a car pull into the parking lot. He didn’t even bother to see who it was, aggravated the belt needed to be changed when all he wanted to do was get the fuck out of town.
“Hi!”
Raising his head, he saw the woman who The Last Riders were protecting, determined to find her stalker, and the reason he was getting the fuck out of dodge, looking down at him with a million-watt smile.
That he didn’t respond to her didn’t dim her smile as she walked around his motorcycle to stare down at his bike as if she knew what was wrong with it.
“Need any help?”
“No,” he snapped.
Squatting down next to him, she rested her wrists on her thighs. “I can hand you a wrench if you need it,” she offered, picking up a pressure gauge.
When he didn’t make a move to take it from her, she laid it down and picked up the motorcycle chain. “I can hand you this when you’re ready for it.”
“I just took it off,” he said coldly.
“Oh ….” Still smiling, she laid it back down, then wiped her hands on her clean, white pant leg. Then she stuck her hand out. “I’m Ginny.”
He didn’t take her hand, but he did turn his face toward hers.
“Reaper.”
Ginny’s face went soft.
He froze when she lifted the hand that he hadn’t shaken to touch his face, sliding her soft fingertips down his cheek, skimming the skin above his beard, then curving downward to stop before she reached the fullness of his beard.
“You look more like a Gavin to me,” she whispered, her eyes memorizing his. “I’ve been searching for you for such a long time,” she said achingly.
Reaper felt his mouth drop open at her words.
Removing her hand from his face, she turned her fingers to show him the oil stains on her fingertips.