Blood & Rust (Lock & Key Book 4)

by Cat Porter

  “Well, that’s just what this lady wanted to hear.” I laughed as he moved us to the Luke Bryan song.

  Travis could dance. His one hand pressed into my lower back, bringing our hips closer together.

  “Good to see you smiling again and cutting loose, Tania. It suits you. You doing better since—”

  “I’m great. I came out tonight to have fun with everybody.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “You having fun now?”

  “Oh, I most certainly am.”

  He let out a rich laugh.

  Travis and I danced to three more songs, chatting easily over the loud music. We sat back down at the table, and he pulled my chair close to his, throwing his arm around it, as I sat back. His fingers brushed over my shoulder as I wiped my damp hair off my hot face.

  A fresh pitcher of margaritas along with new beers were now on our table. We drank and talked and laughed, sharing stories with Grace and Lock, and Jill and Boner. Travis had a wry sense of humor. Grace grinned at me from behind her beer bottle.

  Yep, it’s all good, girlfriend!

  Except for that flaming red-hot laser—or rather, icy-blue laser—blasting its special brand of heat through the back of my head.

  Yes, Butler, here I am, having fun. Fun, fun, fun. How about you?

  Travis’s phone rang, and his eyes squinted at the screen. “I’ve got to take this. Sorry.”

  I waved at him. “Of course.”

  Grace and Jill chatted while Boner and Lock were wrapped up in an earnest conversation. The damned pitcher was empty again, as were the chips and salsa baskets. I grabbed a basket and the empty pitcher, pushed back from the table, and strode to the bar. I angled through a sudden gap in a group of four girls and caught the bartender’s eye.

  I slid the empty basket and pitcher toward him. “Could I get refills for our table?”

  “Sure thing! Sorry about that.”

  “It’s all right. Things are busy.”

  “Tania,” Butler said, his voice low.

  I cast him a glance. “Hey.”

  “Having a good time?”

  “Doesn’t it look like it?”

  “Oh, it does. How’s Travis?”

  My face tilted up at him, and I gave him a smile worthy of a teeth whitening commercial. “Travis is great. He’s a good dancer. A very good dancer. Great rhythm. Knows how to move those hips of his.”

  The edges of his lips twitched. “That’s a good talent to have.”

  “Isn’t it? Why don’t you come sit with us? I’m sure we could find you someone to dance with.”

  “There you go, hon,” said the bartender, sliding a plastic basket stuffed with tortilla chips and a small ceramic bowl of salsa. His eyes darted to Butler for a second and back to me. “I’ll send two margarita pitchers over in a sec—on the house.”

  “Oh, great. Thanks.”

  “Let me take that for you,” Butler said, moving closer to me.

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  “I want to.”

  “Really?”

  His radiant eyes melded with mine. “Yeah, really.” That come-hither tone of his reverberated in my lady parts.

  “You’ve been avoiding me.”

  “You got that wrong, Scarlett.”

  My heart sparked, tossed up, and landed somewhere between provoked and aroused. I leaned in closer to him, and that fresh citrusy cologne of his mixed with acrid tobacco hit me.

  “Prove it, Rhett,” shot out of my mouth.

  His pale eyes glinted at me in the soft glow from the brass lamps hanging over the bar. “Tania—”

  “Butler? Butler?” A young woman swung from behind him, her arms slinking around his middle. “Hey, you!”

  Ah, yes, of course.

  Butler was once a club president. He must have left a trail of groupies along with his notorious party-animal reputation behind him when he blew out of town. Butler’s return and his recent breakup with his old lady must have made the rounds.

  “It is you, isn’t it?” the woman yelped, squeezing into his side.

  How the hell did Grace ever deal with this shit when she was married to Dig?

  From what little I remembered, she’d never shown many signs of irritation even though I was sure her guts were churning deep down inside. I used to get annoyed for her whenever I’d join them for a night out, and she’d shoot me warning glares for me to keep my cool. Even tonight, I’d noticed the occasional young thing gazing at Lock like she was one-clicking him onto her Amazon Wish List. These men left trails of roadkill everywhere they went.

  Now, this girl exhibited not a care in the world that she was interrupting Butler while he spoke with another woman. Nope, nope, nope. Here was proof that the women around here still had their antennae up, excited by Butler’s return, and there were plenty of others hoping for Grace’s fall and probably Jill’s and Mary Lynn’s, too. Law of nature, Darwin’s survival of the fittest.

  The girl giggled as she hugged Butler, her layered coppery blonde hair sweeping from her face.

  A piece of my heart deflated. Butler got attention from carefree, sexy young things like this one wherever he went. So, how could he be attracted to me? I had just been there in moments of loneliness, anxiety, when he needed a friend. I was the wild card, the dark horse, the one he could have a serious conversation with when he needed to.

  She squealed, “I thought that was you! It’s been such a long time. So good to see you!” She waved down the long bar at a group of young women who were staring at us from behind their oversized margarita glasses.

  “Lori! Shanda! Amy! Look who’s here!” She clapped her hands together. “Things have not been the same without you, Butler. Oh my gosh, are you back for good now?” Her hands slid up his torso.

  “Yeah,” Butler muttered, removing her hands from his chest.

  Her smile was as blinding as her enthusiasm. “That is so awesome!”

  #TotallyFuckingAwesome.

  She was his type, wasn’t she? The leggy young blonde, sporting her false eyelashes, sparkly makeup, and super tight clothes for a night out. The party girl, free and wild as fuck. The biker-adoring chick. Only, she didn’t look like some biker skank. She looked like a girl my mother would have wanted my brother to date in high school. Effervescent, wholesome, sweet.

  The girl stood on her toes and whispered in his ear.

  No, Butler and I were two ships that had passed in the night. Well, twice. The universe had given us those opportunities, and we’d fucked them up, or the timing had been off, or whatever the hell.

  I picked up the full chip basket off the bar.

  Butler clamped a hand over my wrist. “Tania, wait.”

  I cast him a downward glance as I peeled my arm away from him, and I moved back from the bar.

  Butler jerked his head, scowling at the blonde. “Forget it, Kandace. I’m not into that shit anymore.”

  “Aw, c’mon!” Kandace wailed behind me. “We used to have so much fun! You used to love to lick the…”

  I quickened my stride, so I could get out of earshot of that surely colorful reminiscence. That was certainly black disappointment in little Miss Kandace’s voice. She wanted her party-animal biker god back. I glanced over my shoulder. Kandace and the three other girls nattered away at Butler’s side, but his pale blue eyes, now stern and stony, were on me. Focused, in control.

  Butler the Hedonist was no longer in the building. There was no hint of that untamed, hungry decadence of yore. Only this restrained, quiet self-possession that telegraphed that he had nothing to prove. Wasps buzzed around him, but he didn’t flinch or move a muscle. He was impervious.

  Butler the Zen Master.

  Shit.

  I was in deep trouble.

  I slammed into a rock wall.

  “There you are.” Travis took the basket from me, dropping it on the center of the table, as he pulled me into his side with his other hand.

  Two waitress appeared, one brandishing two fresh pitcher
s of margaritas, the other, bottles of beer. Travis filled my glass right away and grabbed a new bottle of beer for himself.

  I stood up and raised my glass. “Hey, guys!” Everyone at the table looked up at me. “I’d like to take a moment and say thank you for all your support these past months with my store. I couldn’t have done it without you. Thank you for helping me make my dream come true.”

  Lock held up his beer, a huge grin splitting his face. “Continued success, Tania.”

  “You rock, honey!” Mary Lynn shouted.

  “Here’s to you, babe,” said Dready.

  Everyone raised their drinks and cheered.

  My chest swelled. Enjoy this. This is the best.

  Yes, my new start was a success, my dream a reality. I took a deep swallow of the icy drink, its coolness washing down my hot throat, the intense zip of the alcohol warming my insides.

  Travis slung an arm around my waist and pulled me onto his lap.

  “Whoa!” I laughed, planting my glass safely on the table.

  A chair squawked along the wood-planked floor. Across the table, Butler settled in next to Lock, his steady gaze on me. I slid an arm around Travis’s massive shoulders.

  Travis was younger than me by several years, but he didn’t seem to mind. One of his large hands roamed up and down my back. Nope, I didn’t mind either. This was fun and—ah, yes—uncomplicated, my alcohol-infused inner ninja whispered in my ear.

  Grace grinned at me, and I grinned right back. Suddenly, her smile froze, her eyes widening at something over my shoulder. Both Lock and Butler’s expressions hardened, their suddenly steely eyes aiming in the same direction.

  “Tania? What the hell’s going on?”

  My giddy euphoria evaporated at the sound of that voice. I shifted in Travis’s lap, my gaze finding the man standing behind us.

  I stiffened in Travis’s hold. “Kyle?”

  “WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?” I asked, lifting up from Travis’s lap.

  Kyle glared at me.

  Was he angry or simply confused?

  “I wanted to surprise you. I talked to your mom. She said I’d find you here with your girlfriends.” He let out a dry laugh. “Guess you still don’t tell your mother everything, huh?”

  Travis rose from his chair and stood at my side, a hand at my waist. “Who’s this guy, Tania?”

  “This is my ex-husband.”

  “I’m still your husband,” Kyle said, his eyes narrowing.

  The lines of Travis’s body hardened. “Sounds to me like you’ve got that wrong, bud.” His harsh once-in-the-military-always-in-the-military gaze swept over Kyle in his All Stars, cargo pants, designer polo shirt with his brown hair pulled back into a ponytail.

  Kyle held his ground, his brows knitting under Travis’s inspection. “I need to talk to my wife.”

  “Why did you come all the way out here?” I asked. “Why didn’t you call me?”

  “I’m interrupting, huh? Are we really going to do this in front of…your friends?” Kyle’s lips twisted as he took in Alicia, Ronny, Kicker, Mary Lynn, Jill, Grace, Lock, a stern Dready, an annoyed Boner, a very amused Butler, and lastly, the steel mountain that was Travis once again.

  Travis folded his arms across his massive chest. “You’re interrupting. You should’ve made an appointment with the lady. Until then—”

  Kyle scowled. “Who the hell are you? This is between me and my wife. Not anybody else.”

  “You need to watch the way you talk—” Travis said, slanting his head.

  Lock’s voice rose from behind us. “Trav!”

  Butler leaned back in his seat, studying us, his lips curved in a slight grin. I clenched my teeth at the sight. We were entertaining him.

  I planted a hand on Travis’s thick arm. “Travis, I’ve got this. Thank you. Kyle, don’t say another word and follow me.”

  Kyle’s face darkened. “Tania—”

  “Kyle, please!” I pulled him by the arm toward the end of the bar. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was in Denver for a seminar this week. I took a quick flight into Rapid City and rented a car to come out here and see you.”

  My mouth fell open. That was a lot of effort and planning. “Did something happen?”

  “No.” He leaned against the bar, rubbing a hand across his jaw. “Everything’s great.”

  “Is Celia okay?”

  “Celia’s fine.”

  “Oh. All right. You’ve lost me.”

  “Tania! I came all this way to see you, and you’re puzzled as to why?”

  I shifted my weight under his sour scrutiny. It hung over me like a familiar bad smell.

  “Those people over there are your friends?” he asked.

  “Yes, those people are my friends.”

  “They look like a bunch of wayward thugs and their molls.”

  “They are not thugs. They are my friends. Most of them own their own businesses and run charities for their community. Please don’t start with your white-trash, blue-collar bullshit.”

  “I’m just making an observation.”

  “Well, it’s an insulting narrow-minded observation,” I shot back.

  If the Jacks were wearing their club colors tonight, Kyle would’ve had a field day, going on about biker gangs. But Dead Ringer’s was a colors-free zone to keep the peace among the many different bike clubs who partied here.

  What a shame it isn’t Bike Night.

  Kyle’s glare softened. “I didn’t come all the way out here to fight. I wanted to say I’m sorry about how we left things the last time we saw each other at home. We shouldn’t let go of our marriage over a few piled up misunderstandings. We owe it to ourselves to keep trying. We really should. Come home with me.”

  I was so done with shoulds. They’d exhausted me. Kyle had been trying to delay the divorce with little legal tactics here and there all these months.

  “Kyle, both of us have been drifting in this marriage for a long time now. We owe it to ourselves to put an end to it and get on with our lives. Have you ever looked at it that way? It’s never too late. Plus, I have my own business in Meager now. You know that.”

  He glanced back at my table. “You’re fucking that big one, aren’t you?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “That’s it, isn’t it? I mean, you’re mad at me for what I did, and now you’re acting like some teenager, getting drunk, hanging with the town bad boys, having your good time.”

  “Fuck you!”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Look, Mr. Officially Separated—even if I were sleeping with someone now—and I’m not—A, that’s my business, and, B, why the hell not? I could use it.”

  “Here we go.”

  “It’s true! I really can’t believe you’re here, you know that? And I really don’t think it has anything to do with me or with us. I think it’s your ego that can’t accept the idea that you failed at something, at marriage yet again, at being the perfect husband. News flash, Kyle, none of us is perfect, and we all fail at one thing or another at some point in our lives, often more than once. You don’t have to hang on to us just because your parents got divorced, and then your first marriage ended the same way. Maybe you feel like you’re a part of some sort of failed chain of destiny. We tried, and it didn’t work between us. We grew apart over the years, into different people. And you know what? That’s okay.”

  Kyle’s face hardened, his gaze darting back at my table once again.

  I touched his arm, and his attention returned to me. “I don’t want to fix it, really. I’m sorry, but I don’t. Let it go. You can do that, you know. It’s all right. Let it go, and get on with your life in Chicago. I appreciate that you came all the way out here. I do. You surprised me.”

  “See? I can still surprise you, Tania. So, why don’t—”

  “Please, Kyle. I can’t. I don’t want to. Essentially, this is about me. Me.” I took in a quick breath. “And I have feelings for someone else now.”

  He
visibly flinched, his eyes creasing. “So, you lied to me before—about not fucking someone?”

  I winced. Kyle didn’t usually use the F word unless he was really angry and extremely bitter.

  “No, I didn’t lie. It’s not Travis, the big guy. It’s someone else. The point is, these feelings are there, and they’re real. I just haven’t acted on them yet. I can’t ignore them though. I won’t.”

  Just. Just. Just.

  “It’s one of them, right? Who is it? Which one?”

  “Kyle, you should go.”

  His eyes searched mine, and the silence strained between us in the midst of a bouncy Miranda Lambert song.

  “This is really what you want?” he asked, his face grim.

  “Yes.”

  This was it—that feeling of letting go of a piece of yourself. Something twisted my insides and whooshed through me like a hot wind.

  “The divorce will be final next week,” he said, his voice tight.

  “I know.”

  He cleared his throat and glanced at the floor, his hands smoothing down his shirt. “I’m going to go then. My flight back to Denver is first thing in the morning. I’m staying at a hotel in Rapid City, at the—”

  “Kyle.”

  He only nodded, looking away, his lips pressed into a firm line.

  “Good-bye,” I murmured.

  “Good-bye, Tania.” He planted a kiss on my forehead, a hand touching my upper arm.

  The faint fragrance of his favorite fabric softener and the scent of his expensive Italian cologne rose between us, and my heart squeezed. Kyle was no longer my wretched present. Now, he was my resolved past.

  Two young cowboys jostled past me and joined Butler’s Kandace and her friends at the bar.

  I turned toward our table. Lock and Grace danced a few feet away. Boner had Jill in his lap, his arms around her, as she sipped on a margarita. Both of them along with Alicia and Ronny laughed at something Mary Lynn, was telling them. Travis stood stiffly, his eyes following Kyle out the main door of the saloon.

  Butler stared at me from his seat at the table, the lines of his face relaxed, the edges of his lips turned up.

  I sucked in a breath.

  I want you, goddamn it. The rest is nothing. Nothing but smoke and lights.