by Parker, Ali
“This sucks,” I muttered, collapsing against the back of the sofa and rubbing my temples. “I thought he was…” I shook my head and didn’t finish my thought. It didn’t matter. “Never mind.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I won’t see him again.”
“You’re sure it’s that easy?”
I nodded. “It has to be.”
My uncle pushed himself to his feet and came to stand beside my sofa, where he put his hand on my shoulder and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry, Genie.”
I closed my hand over his. “Thanks.”
It was worth something.
“Hungry?”
“In other words, do I feel like eating my feelings away? Yes, please.”
My uncle chuckled and patted my shoulder. “That’s my girl.”
I stayed on the sofa for a little while longer while my uncle started tinkering in the kitchen. I wasn’t sure what he was cooking. Whatever it was would be delicious. Not that it mattered. My appetite was gone.
I’d be more than happy to finish the champagne on my own and wallow in self-pity instead of enjoying one of his meals.
How could I have been so stupid?
Yet again, I’d fallen for the whole “Knight in Shining Armor” shtick. Like fucking clockwork. And here I was, alone, regretting the last few weeks of my life and how much I’d shared with Liam.
I’d let him in. Fearlessly. I’d shared my passions with him and my hopes and dreams. And my body.
He’d been lying to me since the very start.
Security detail my ass.
Of course, he was a good fighter. He was a criminal.
My stomach rolled over.
Chapter 19
Liam
My brothers had warned me this would happen.
And like the stupid shit I was, I ignored them. I stuck my head in the sand like a damn ostrich and pretended not to hear their worries. Because it was all worth it to have Genevieve on my arm just one more night. One more morning. One more anything.
Now she was gone.
I could only imagine what kinds of things her uncle was saying to her. And truth be told, I couldn’t blame him.
He’d been scarred by what our MC went through all those years ago with Isaac Reed. I hadn’t been there when Hyde died or when Ryder lost Jason, but I saw the aftermath. I knew what grief looked like, and I knew how long the hurt stuck around for.
Hell, Rhys was a testament to that. Even though he was on the mend and had his woman in his life, there were still bad days. Ryder was the same. We all were. I’d lost people too. Max was my brother, just as he was Rhys’s.
But I had the real facts. In this life, there was a price to pay. Hyde paid the ultimate price. And we settled the score for him with a bullet in the alley beside Kadia.
Tom had it all backward, but I couldn’t expect him to see it any other way.
The trouble was, now Genevieve was going to see it his way. She was going to see me through his hate-tinted lenses, and things would never go back to how they were. She probably wanted nothing to do with me now that she knew the truth. I was a liar and a manipulator, and from the outside looking in, I was just as bad as Tom’s idea of me.
I ran my fingers through my hair as I stared at my reflection in the mirror above my bathroom sink.
“You fucked it up,” I growled.
I needed space to clear my head. Otherwise, I was just going to sit around, hating myself and what I’d done.
I splashed cold water on my face, patted my skin dry with my hand towel, and marched out of the bathroom to put my leather jacket on. Once I was suited up, I went into my garage, opened the door, and got on my bike.
A ride was just what the doctor ordered.
The weather was chilly, but that wasn’t going to stop me. The alternative was sitting around at home, kicking myself for ruining the best thing that ever happened to me.
I needed to ride. I needed the air pushing against my chest, rushing over my shoulders. I needed the hum of the engine between my knees and the rumble of the throttle at my fingertips. I needed speed.
I pulled out of the garage and peeled off down my street, earning the middle finger from an older man walking his dog on the sidewalk. I ignored him. He could hate me, too, for all I cared.
My Harley was loyal. She roared with power when I opened her up and ate away the pavement as she picked up speed. I swerved gently across the dotted line on the empty street I rode down, pretending the broken pieces of paint were cones, ducking and weaving and dancing through them until I grew bored and picked up speed again.
I didn’t know how long I rode for. I didn’t have a destination in mind when I left the house, but I ended up in Owen’s driveway, nonetheless. He was in his garage with the door open, checking the oil in his truck.
When I turned my bike off, he straightened up and wiped his hands on his jeans. He nodded hello at me and dropped the hood of his truck. “No. You can’t borrow it again.”
“Not here for the truck,” I said.
Owen had broken a sweat. He wiped his upper lip with his wrist. “Then what do you want?”
“Advice.”
Owen studied me. “So, shit finally hit the fan?”
I nodded.
Owen sighed and leaned up against his truck to cross his arms over his chest. “What happened?”
I rubbed the back of my neck before setting my helmet down on his workbench on the right wall of the garage. “She took me to her uncle’s house for dinner last night.”
Owen nodded, encouraging me to continue. When I didn’t, he arched an eyebrow. “And?”
“And… her Uncle was an old friend of Hyde’s.”
“Oh. Shit.”
“Shit is right.”
“Did he recognize you?”
“Immediately.”
“How?”
“No idea, but he did.”
“Maybe he’s seen you around town with some of the original crew?”
That was the only conclusion I’d come to as well. Seeing as how I’d never met Hyde, it wasn’t like he knew me through him. It was all by association.
“Yeah, well, regardless, he knew who I was as soon as he saw me. And he sort of freaked out. Told me to get the fuck out.”
“What did you do?” Owen asked slowly.
I shrugged. “I left.”
“Simple as that?”
“Simple as that.” I nodded.
“And the girl?”
“She stayed behind. I didn’t ask her to come with me or anything. I knew I wasn’t wanted there, and staying to try to defend myself would have only made things worse. It’s his house. And I’m not that guy.”
“No, you’re not,” Owen agreed. He pushed himself off the truck and went to the mini fridge on the back wall. He tugged the door open, and the air sealing strip let out a little grunt as it came open. He reached in, grabbed two cans of Bud, and tossed me one. I cracked it and drank thankfully. Owen did the same. “Have you talked to her since?”
“No. I wasn’t sure I should.”
“Fair enough.”
I frowned. Not the answer I wanted. “Do you think I should?”
“Should what?” Owen asked.
“Call her or something? I don’t know. Try to explain myself.”
“How can you explain it? You lied. End of story. Now she knows who you are, and she probably thinks you’re just as untrustworthy as her uncle does.”
“Thanks for the support,” I grumbled before tipping my head back to drink.
“Did you come here for a pep talk or real talk?”
He knew the answer. I didn’t like bullshit. Neither did Owen. And he’d always been good in the sense that he told me how it was, when it was. If I didn’t listen, that was my call. But in the end, he had never led me astray.
I had to remember that and start taking his word for things more often. For starters, it would have spared me this shi
t with Genevieve.
“So what do I do, then?” I asked. Now was my chance to take his advice.
“You let it go.”
I blinked. That was easier said than done. “Just like that? I walk away from it and let her think we’re all shit? That we’re all bad guys? Shouldn’t I try to prove we’re not what her uncle thinks we are?”
“You want honesty?”
Fuck. Not really. But it was better than a sugar-coated answer, so I nodded.
Owen tipped his head like he was acknowledging that I made the right choice. “In my experience, you can’t make people think we’re anything other than what they believe we are. People are going to think what they’re going to think. It’s our job not to let that affect our day to day. Sure, we might do things… unconventionally. And yeah, when it comes down to it, shit can get a bit messy. But at the end of the day, I have to believe this family of ours is good.”
“We are good,” I said, hating how desperate I sounded.
Owen shrugged.
I stared at him. “You think we aren’t?”
“I think we’ve done things. Seen things. Things we could have handled better. Things that cost people their lives.”
“People like Hyde and Jason.”
Owen nodded and drank more of his beer.
“We didn’t do that. The Lost Breeds didn’t do that. Isaac Reed did. He fucked them just like he fucked us back in Chicago. And if Rhys hadn’t put him down when he did—”
“I know. I know. He would have killed more people. I’m not saying that would be different. I’m saying there’s a line. We are not the law, Liam.”
Owen never called me by my name. It caught me a little off guard.
He scratched his jaw. “We like to think we are, but we’re not. The deeper we get into shit like what happened with Reed, the drunker we become on our own egos. It’s a slippery slope. And you, my friend, are too good to fall down it. That’s why this shit with Genevieve had me all bent out of shape. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like you becoming one of us.”
“But I am one of you.”
He nodded slowly. “But you can be better.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to. This MC is going to get fresh blood. And one of these days, it’s going to look entirely different than it does now. And it will need good men calling the shots. Men like you. Men with the least amount of blood on their hands as possible.”
I shook my head. “You’re too hard on them. On yourself.”
Owen licked his lips. “Maybe.”
“You are. We’re good. All of us. You had it right before. We do things unconventionally. But our intentions are good every time, and that’s what matters. I don’t regret what happened to Reed. Not for one second. And if I had to go back and be the one to fire the gun, I would. In a heartbeat.”
“Killing a man is not that easy.”
“No. I wouldn’t expect it to be. But making the choice to stand between him and another victim? That’s easy.”
Owen gave me a lopsided smile. “Yeah. Well. You’re one of the good ones. I’m sorry this all blew up in your face. I know you cared about the girl.”
Cared about her was an understatement. I wasn’t willing to say it out loud, or even confirm it in my thoughts, but there was something very real between me and Genevieve London.
And I wasn’t the guy to sit back and let it all fall apart. Not without putting up a bit of a fight.
Because that was what a Lost Breed really was. A fighter.
“I have to go,” I said.
“Go where?”
“There’s something I have to do.”
“Don’t get into trouble.”
I grinned as I put my half-full beer can down on his workbench and grabbed my helmet. “No promises.”
Chapter 20
Genevieve
Marley and I had been getting our mani pedis done at the same place since we were sixteen years old. It took a lot of convincing to get Uncle Tom on board. He thought it was a reckless way to spend money and tried to convince the two of us that natural nails were prettier and there were better things to spend our money on.
Try convincing a sixteen-year-old girl with a bank account the size of an Academy Award Winner not to spend a hundred dollars on her toes and fingernails.
Not gonna happen.
Marley and I had found our perfect salon all those years ago. They were a full-treatment location with plush white massage chairs, a breezy atmosphere, and extremely talented and accommodating employees. Upon arrival, you received a hot towel for your hands and a glass of champagne to sip while you pored over their generous selection of colors and designs.
That was what Marley and I were presently doing while we waited for our pedicure appointments to start.
I flipped through my plastic ring of samples, not really paying much mind to the colors.
“You’ve looked at those three times over,” Marley said, plucking the ring from my hands and switching it out with the one she’d been looking through. “Look alive, Genie.”
I sighed. “Sorry, it’s been a long couple of days.”
“You still haven’t called him?”
“Liam?”
Marley gave me a bored look. “Yes. Obviously Liam. Who else would I be talking about?”
I ignored her attitude. “No, I haven’t called him.”
“Are you going to?”
It wasn’t as easy as that. There was more mixed up in this than just how I felt about him. Even though I’d called it quits in front of Uncle Tom the other night, I wasn’t so sure I’d made the right call. I flip flopped back and forth between what was the right choice almost every hour: to be with him or not be with him.
“I don’t think I will,” I said finally.
Marley shook her head. “That’s too bad.”
“Yeah,” I said lamely.
The nail colors in my hands weren’t making me feel better. I thought if I came here, sat down, and picked a bright, cheerful color, it might put a bit of pep in my step. If anything, I felt worse. So I settled on a black polish that shimmered with green and blue flakes of glitter and set it aside to give to the esthetician when she took us to our seats.
“I thought he might have reached out to you between now and ‘the event’,” Marley said. She’d been referring to Uncle Tom’s blow up as “the event” all week. It was a fitting name. He never lost his cool, so seeing him crack when he saw Liam was a sight to behold. It was a little scary, too.
“I think he’s embarrassed,” I said.
“Why?”
“Because he got caught.”
Marley shrugged. “I suppose. Do you think he was planning on telling you? I mean, you never know. Maybe he was waiting for the right moment?”
I grumbled. “Waiting for the right moment? This isn’t middle school, Marley. There are no right moments. He should have come clean as soon as there was something between us.”
“I agree. I’m just saying. People make choices, and we don’t have all the facts.”
“I have enough of them.” I sighed, leaning back to rest my head against the back of the chair as I gazed around the salon. Our pedicure chairs were being prepped. The basins at the foot of the chairs were filling with hot water that smelled like lemons and lavender while our two estheticians wiped the chairs down and released the sheer white curtains on one side of each chair to give us privacy from the other customers.
“He didn’t strike me as the bad sort,” Marley said.
“No. Me neither. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t.”
“True. But it doesn’t mean he is, either.”
“Bad?”
Marley nodded. “Yeah.”
“You are the people you spend the most time with, right? So how can he be anything but bad? Uncle Tom told me about this Lost Breed group of his. How dangerous they are. The things they’ve done or let happen. And I don’t know about you, but I think it’s pretty savage.”
>
Marley rubbed her lips together and was about to respond when our estheticians called for us to come take a seat. I brought my champagne and nail color to my tech, Raven, who gave me a big hug. “It’s so nice to see you, Miss London. You look beautiful as always.”
“Thank you, Raven. You too.”
I wasn’t lying. Raven was a drop-dead gorgeous young woman. She was the daughter of the salon owners, and after trying to make it in business, she switched careers to work for the family company. She made more money now with her talent and extreme eye for detail than she did before, and she enjoyed every second of it. She had a massive client base and no longer took on any more customers. She was booked straight through every day all week and liked to stay busy.
She told me I was her favorite client. I wondered if she said that to everyone. It didn’t matter. She made me feel like I was genuinely her favorite every time I came in, and that was good customer service.
Marley and I settled into our chairs as our techs bustled around us, prepping our stations and getting our colors. They topped off our champagne before they began, and then Marley and I were free to go back to our conversation.
“What was I saying before?” Marley asked as her tech removed her old color from her toes.
“I said the Lost Breeds were savage.”
“Right. From the outside.”
I arched an eyebrow. “What does that mean?”
Marley shrugged as she toyed with the remote that powered her massage chair so she could get the roller balls into the middle of her back. “I don’t know. Just that he hasn’t had a chance to explain things from his side of the tracks.”
“This isn’t Lady and the Tramp.”
Marley snickered. “No. Well. Actually, if you think about it, it sort of is.”
I blinked slowly at her. “What?”
She giggled. “Oh come on, Genie. Lighten up. I’m trying to make a shitty situation less shitty. He’s Tramp. You’re Lady. Rich, sophisticated, beautiful. He’s a little rough around the edges. But he’s still good.”