I don’t think I’ll be here long enough to need one, but I don’t say that, I just nod and put the jacket on. “Thanks.”
Ace gets on his bike, and I do the same, wrapping my arms around him, but not too tightly, even though that’s my first inclination. His engine is loud, but the sound fills me with excitement. I don’t know how I’m going to go back to my old life now that I’ve had a taste of this. I want to go on long rides every day, and yeah, I’d love Gage to teach me so one day I can feel this freedom whenever I want to.
Maybe I’m not cut out for all of it, but this . . . this I understand.
I watch my ponytail blowing in the wind in my shadow as we ride toward the city center, all the passing shops, traffic, and scenery consuming my attention. I ignore Ace’s warmth pressing against me and the feeling it gives me.
I need to see him as a friend, and a friend only.
It even sounds stupid in my own head.
We come to a stop, and I hop off the bike before he does, removing my helmet and fixing my hair, pulling it out of its bind and letting it cascade down my back. Glancing around the parking lot, I look toward the shopping mall and back to Ace, who is removing his own helmet and placing it on the bike. I stare at the back of his leather cut while he does so, wondering if he’s going to take it off to walk into the mall.
“All right, let’s go get your phone fixed,” he says, walking past me, his bare arm brushing the leather of his jacket.
I guess that’s a no.
I rush to catch up, then walk next to him. “Is this where you go to shop?”
He barks out a laugh and shakes his head. “This is more . . . your scene.”
“And what scene is that?” I ask him, removing his jacket and holding it in my hands. He takes it from me, carrying the heavy leather himself.
“I don’t know—girly, expensive shit,” he says, shrugging his broad shoulders. “This is the biggest mall we have. If you can’t find something here, you won’t be able to find it anywhere.”
I look straight ahead and purse my lips. I might be girly, but I’m not wealthy enough to buy expensive shit. I’m about to go to college, and both my parents are teachers. I’ve never gone without, and we have a nice home and everything, but we’re far from rich. He leads me to an electronics store and asks them how much they charge to fix a phone screen. I hand my phone over so they can have a look, and they give us a quote of two hundred dollars.
“How long will it be?” Ace asks the older gentleman.
“I can have it done in about an hour,” he replies, and Ace nods.
“All right, thanks.”
With his hand on the small of my back, we walk away from the store.
“So we have an hour to kill,” I say, checking out all the different food options as we head toward the food court.
“Looks like it. Do you want to eat now or later?” he asks, turning to me. “Prez said to buy you whatever you wanted. Anything in mind?”
I point to the doughnut stand. “We can start with a few of those.”
And then work our way around the food court.
We don’t even have a food court where I live; this might be normal for him, but I’m not used to it.
He laughs under his breath. “Fuck, you’re cute.”
I duck my head as I feel myself blushing a little, not wanting him to see it.
I’d rather be beautiful, gorgeous, or sexy . . . but I guess I’ll take cute.
I decide to call him out on what I saw last night, to just be open and honest with him. If anything, his answer will help me forget about this attraction I have to him, and maybe we could even become friends.
“So you know how you said I could drop by your room if I needed anything last night?” I start, after ordering four doughnuts for the both of us.
“Yeah?” he replies, studying me. “You never came; you were alright though, weren’t you?”
“I was fine. I pretty much went straight to bed,” I say, wondering if I should bring this up or just let it be. It doesn’t really change anything after all. “I did venture into the kitchen to grab some water.”
He studies me for a moment, giving nothing away.
I continue, unable to stop the verbal diarrhea. “I might have seen a woman go into your room. Do you . . . have a woman or something?”
Maybe just like Gage, Ace cheats on his woman too. After what I’ve seen thus far, I guess it wouldn’t be unusual around here.
“No, I don’t,” he replies, but doesn’t elaborate.
So he’s not officially taken, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t fucking someone last night.
I don’t want to ask myself why I don’t like the idea of that. I have no reason to be invested in any kind of way in who he’s fucking.
“So what if I had dropped by?” I ask, because apparently I have no shame. I regret asking him this the second the words fly out of my mouth, but it’s too late to take them back now. I need to change the subject. He’s single and can sleep with whomever he wants. I shouldn’t have brought this up, because it’s none of my business.
He studies me for a moment, giving nothing away. “You didn’t though.”
“No,” I whisper. “I guess I didn’t.”
“Is this why you’ve been brooding all morning?” he asks, amusement in his tone.
“No,” I deny. “I’ve been brooding all morning because I only stayed at the clubhouse so I could spend some time with Gage, who has gone MIA.”
“You’ll see him when we get back, don’t worry,” he assures me. “There was something he had to do today that he couldn’t cancel. I think he would have if he could.”
Suddenly I feel a little bratty about the whole thing. I surprised him. It’s not like his world should stop just because I showed up. I murmur, “I guess I can wait.”
“Good,” he replies.
He pays for the doughnuts and then we move along.
5
How the fuck do you eat so much and not put on weight?” he asks me, his gaze roaming over my body.
“I’m not skinny,” I point out, licking the ketchup off my lips. “And I stay pretty active. I don’t have my driver’s license yet, so I walk everywhere.”
“That’s why you took the bus here?” he asks, eyebrows rising. “Why don’t you have your license?”
“I live in a small town.” I shrug, not wanting to tell him the truth. “It only takes ten minutes to get anywhere, so I haven’t really needed it.”
“You’ll need it if you decide to move out here,” he points out. “And you’re talking about getting your motorcycle license when you don’t even have one to drive a car?”
“Something like that,” I reply, grinning. “A girl’s got to have goals.”
“You didn’t say anything about my comment about moving to the city,” he says, leaning back on the mall bench and watching me from beneath his lashes. “Would you ever?”
I chew and swallow my fry before replying. “I start college next month, so I don’t think I could move even if I wanted to. I could come back on holidays, and some weekends, I’m sure.”
Ace stays silent for a few moments, dissatisfaction coming off him in waves. What, did he think I was going to move here? I’m not going to change my plans, just because the MC has suddenly come into my life. “What are you studying in college?”
“Nursing,” I tell him. It was an easy decision for me. I’ve always wanted a job where I can help people. I want to be useful, contribute to society somehow. I think I’ll be a good nurse, and I actually am very excited to start college and this new chapter of my life, even though I’m a bit older than most freshmen. After I was in a car accident, I took a few years off, worked and saved, and even went to Europe for six months to get away. Whenever anyone asks me about it, I tell them I went traveling, but nothing about the accident. So, yes, I’ll be a freshman in college at twenty-one.
I wait for Ace to make some stupid comment about my plans or something about the nurse’s
uniform, something I’ve heard plenty of times from the boys back home, but he surprises me with his reply.
“I could see you as a nurse,” he says, a glint of approval shining in his eyes. “I think you’d be a good one. You seem to have determination, that’s for sure.”
Maybe I am only used to boys, and he’s not a boy.
He’s a man.
“You’ve known me for about five minutes,” I point out.
“I saw you walk into a biker clubhouse on a party night, storm in and demand to speak to our prez. You ignored all the much older and more experienced women who were staring at you, and went face-to-face with a few of our men without backing down once. You’re brave.”
“Brave or stupid?” I reply, arching my brow.
His lip twitches. “Maybe a bit of both.”
“And I had no idea any of the women were staring at me,” I tell him truthfully.
I was too busy looking at him.
“They were. Everyone was.”
I playfully nudge him with my shoulder. Maybe I do have determination. I wanted to meet Gage, and I didn’t care what I had to do to make that happen, I was going to do it. Even walk into a biker clubhouse.
“I think he wants you to pimp out your bedroom and make it yours so you’ll stay,” he admits softly. “Or feel like you have a second home.”
“If he wants me to stay he should be sitting next to me right now instead of you,” I reply.
“He only just found out he has a kid,” Ace returns, lifting his arm to rest along the back of the bench, behind my neck. “You might want to cut him some slack.”
I open my mouth and close it.
“He should be making an effort though,” I reply. “I mean, he could have come and seen me before he left and told me himself he had to be somewhere. That would have been better than nothing.”
“People handle things in different ways, Erin,” he continues, stealing one of my fries and popping it into his mouth.
“Well, I thought you were being wise right up until you ate my food,” I tell him in a dry tone, moving the cardboard closer to my chest. “That’s not a very smart move.”
His eyes dance with humor. “I am wise. It comes with age and experience.”
“How long am I going to get the age digs for?” I ask, rolling my eyes.
“Until you hit your late twenties.”
“That’s ages away,” I reply, part joking, part being serious. “And I’ll have you know that I’m very mature for my age. I’m twenty-one, not seventeen.”
“How did you find out about Gage being your dad?” he asks, a curious glint in his eyes.
“I found my original birth certificate,” I admit. “And I confronted my mom about it. She told me about Gage and how he’s a biker and in the Cursed Ravens MC. She never mentioned he was the president; I’m not sure if she knows that.”
“And then what? You decided on a whim to come here and find him? Did she even know that you left?”
“Yeah, I told her I was going to find him, and no, she didn’t like it. After many fights and telling her I was going to just show up at random biker bars asking for him, she agreed to give me the address of the clubhouse, or at least where it was when she knew him. That’s all I had to go by, really. A name and an address.”
I did as much online research as I could about motorcycle clubs, because I didn’t want to go in blind. I don’t think I was ready for the reality of it though.
“You’re kind of crazy, you know that? Anything could have happened,” he says, shaking his head.
“I know,” I admit, shrugging. “Probably wasn’t the smartest thing I’ve ever done, but I just had to know. I had to see him with my own eyes. I can’t even explain how it feels finding out something like this. It’s like my entire life was a lie, and I wanted to correct that.”
“What were you expecting?” he asks.
“I don’t know,” I say, looking at the people walking past us. “I didn’t know what to expect, I was just hoping that he would be happy to find out about me. If he wasn’t, that probably would have been a hard blow.”
“It was a surprise, that’s for sure,” he replies, and I can feel him watching me. “Do you still live at home with your mom?” he asks me next, and I turn to see judgment written all over his face.
“Yes,” I reply, my voice much smaller now.
“I moved out from my parents’ house when I was fourteen,” he tells me, not sounding smug, just stating a fact.
“Well, that’s just ridiculous,” I say, brow furrowing.
And really sad, but I don’t say that, because I doubt he wants my sympathy.
“Fourteen is way too young to be on your own. I hadn’t even had my first kiss at fourteen,” I tell him, frowning. “Where did you go?”
“I rented out a room in a share house,” he explains, acting like it’s no big deal. “I was a troubled kid, kept getting into shit, and my mother had had enough of it.”
“My mom loves having me at home still,” I tell him, comparing our different lives. “And I’m really close with my sister, Eden. She wanted to come with me on this little adventure, but I told her I had to do it alone.”
Plus my mom probably would have been even more furious if I’d brought Eden with me. Not exactly a place you want to take your baby sister who just turned eighteen.
I twist my body toward him. “Do you have any siblings?”
He shakes his head. “Nope. Only child.”
“I read an article the other day that said only children are most likely to cheat on their partners,” I say.
“I read that article too,” he replies, crossing his arms over his chest. “Didn’t it say that firstborns are the second most likely?”
“It might have.” I grin. “But you took the number one spot.”
“I’ve never cheated on a woman in my life,” he proclaims, gray eyes unwavering.
“Never?” I ask, feeling somewhat surprised.
I’ve only experienced their lifestyle for one night. But even in that short time I’ve seen things that give me a hint at what their lives are like. At what Ace is like.
“You have to be taken to cheat,” he replies, lip twitching. “And I’m always single.”
Ahhhh, a loophole.
“How long ago was your last relationship?” I ask, being nosy. I want to know everything I can about this man, in the short amount of time I get to be around him. I want to know what makes him tick, and whether he’s a good man on the inside, not just the outside.
Because he is really pretty on the outside.
“Did you just call me pretty?” he asks, sounding extremely offended.
Shit, did I say that out loud?
His eyes narrow to slits as he waits for my reply.
“No, of course not. I said, ‘Whoever you had a relationship with must have been really pretty,’ ” I lie, not batting an eyelid.
His lips tighten like he doesn’t believe me, but he lets it slide. “About four years ago. I ended it. She was raging jealous and ended up moving overseas afterward.”
“Raging jealous?” I ask, eyes widening.
“Yeah, she didn’t think I could be trusted alone, even for a second, so she practically moved into the clubhouse, and we just weren’t meant to be together. We were fighting all the time, and we were both unhappy,” he explains, shrugging. “I chose wrong. And I guess that’s probably why I’ve been single since then; I don’t want to get into something like that again.”
“Not all relationships will be like that,” I say gently.
“How about you? Boyfriends?”
I don’t miss the way he emphasizes the word boy.
“Nope, no boyfriends,” I reply, throwing my trash in the bin next to me.
“Liar,” he mutters under his breath, but I catch it.
“What?” I snap, my temper flaring. “Why am I a liar?”
“Who is Clint, then?” he asks me, and my jaw drops.
Wait, what? How
does he know that name?
Clint was my high school boyfriend, my only boyfriend. We dated for about three years, and we’re still friends now, although that’s all we’ve been ever since high school. How could he know that though?
“And how do you know about Clint?” I ask, keeping my tone even. Inside, I’m fuming. Ace shouldn’t know any information that I haven’t given him.
He stands up and offers me his hand. “Your phone should be ready now, let’s go and grab it.”
“Why don’t you answer my question first?” I reply, taking his hand and allowing him to pull me up, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let him try to change the subject.
“I don’t have to answer to a little girl,” is his curt reply.
“Little girl? Don’t you have anything else to use against me other than my age? Because I’m really not that much younger than you,” I say to him, unflinching.
“You can be whatever I say you are,” he replies, a muscle ticking in his jaw.
I’m obviously pushing him now, but he started this, I don’t care how angry he gets.
“You can’t say something like that and then not explain,” I growl, following him as he heads to the phone repair shop, ignoring me. “That’s not fair, Ace.”
He walks up to the counter and asks if my phone is ready.
“Yes it is,” the man says, handing him the phone. “Good as new.”
Ace hands over Gage’s card, and the man swipes it and asks Ace to put in a pin. He gives me my phone and exits the store, again, with me trying to keep up with him. I glance down at my brand-new screen when it hits me.
My phone.
My phone doesn’t have a password, and although the screen was cracked, the phone itself still worked.
“You went through my phone?” I accuse, realization hitting me. “How could you do that? It’s a breach of fucking privacy! What is wrong with you? You call me a little girl, but that is some immature shit right there.”
He stops in his tracks, expression giving nothing away. All he says is, “It wasn’t me who went through your phone, princess,” and then continues on his merry way.
It wasn’t him?
Gage went through my fucking phone and must have seen a message from Clint, or read our message history. We still message each other now and again; he was once a big part of my life, and will probably always remain so, in a purely platonic way. It’s true that he claims to still want me back, but I don’t see him like that. Besides, I could never trust him again. He cheated on me after the accident, and I don’t think I could ever forgive him for that.
Ace of Hearts Page 4