The guilt that rolled around him after that was powerful enough to constrict his airways. He didn’t just have himself to think about anymore. He didn’t have even just his company and siblings to think about anymore. He had a son, and even though he knew that Grace and Ryder would be taken care of financially if he went away, it was more than that. He wouldn’t be there to take care of them personally and that mattered to him. It mattered to Grace, too.
“Thank you,” she whispered to him as she kissed his face and hugged him.
“For what?” He hadn’t done anything but walk away.
“For putting him first.”
That’s what fatherhood was, wasn’t it? Putting your kids first.
Ryder sat the kitchen table looking uneasy. Grace was next to him, kissing his face and mothering him. “Are you sure you don’t want to go with your friend? I’ll drop you off.”
“I want to stay here,” Ryder said looking up at him.
“I’m not going to do anything. I promise you that, boy. I was angry, but I’m okay now.”
Ryder shook his head. “I want to stay here.”
To watch him. He didn’t trust him fully yet, and Duke understood that. “Fine. We’ll go out and do stuff.”
“What kind of stuff?” Grace asked, looking up at him.
“We’ll get ice cream and shit. You know, stuff other families do around here.”
“Don’t curse in the house,” Grace automatically chided, but there was amusement in her eyes as she walked over to him. “Family stuff, huh?” She looked over to Ryder. “Come on, sweetheart. Let’s do some family stuff with your father.”
They ended up on Main Street where there was an old movie theater that mostly played second-run movies. But there were a few classics and they both decided that Ryder needed to see E.T. And despite it being the middle of summer they were the only people in that showing. In fact the entire building seemed to be empty save for the staff.
“There’s still not much to do here,” Grace whispered to him. “People mostly travel to the casino complex to have fun. They have a lot of stuff to do there, and some nice shops. It’s too expensive for most of us to really have fun there. But it’s nice to window-shop and people-watch.”
Duke looked around the theater, which was large and still held most of the character it had when it was built in the 1950s. He had memories of his mother bringing him here. Sometimes Colt came along, but it was mostly just him and her. She loved movies and Hollywood and all things old-fashioned. He had forgotten that about her. But being back here brought it back to him, and for the first time in a very long time he felt close to his mother.
“Nobody has thought of opening a first-run theater here?” he asked Grace as he tried to push away the emotions that suddenly choked him. “Where do you go to see new movies?”
“The casino has one of those huge screens that shows three-D movies. People go there if they want to see something really badly, or else they wait for it to come out on DVD. If people here don’t work for the factory or the casino, they work in small businesses. It would take someone with a lot of money to fix this place up enough to get people to come back and enjoy it here. You’re not going to find that in Destiny, where most people are just trying to get through the end of the month.”
“Where do people go out on dates here?”
“Same places as always. To dinner. The two bars. The bowling alley. They still hold dances at the VFW every last Friday of the month. Most of the people here are married. That’s the problem with Destiny. There’s nothing here to hold most young people here. They go away to college and never look back. It makes me sad.”
“You would have stayed here if you’d had the choice all those years ago.”
“You were cocky enough to think that I just wanted to stay here because of you all those years ago, but I love it here and I would have stayed here with you,” she said softly. “But if you had wanted to go, I would have gone with you, too.”
He turned to look at her just as Ryder made an annoyed grunt. “I’m trying to watch this. Can you stop talking please?”
Duke closed his mouth that he hadn’t realized was open. He was glad his son had saved him from responding to that, because he wasn’t sure what he was going to say.
*
They left the movie theater and walked up the street toward the diner for an early dinner. Even though she had a hard time paying attention to the screen, Grace enjoyed going to the movies with Duke and Ryder. It was an odd experience for her, not just to be out with her son and his father—an experience she’d thought she would never have—but to be sitting next to Duke in a public space, having his arm brush hers, having his warm breath touch her skin as he spoke into her ear. She had never been out on a proper date with him. Never gone to the movies with him or eaten in a restaurant. It was so unlike the experience other girls her age had. She had met him in class when she was sixteen and from that day she knew that she didn’t want anyone but him, but Duke wouldn’t even look at her until she turned eighteen. He said he didn’t want her father coming after him because he was a couple of years older than her. And even when she was eighteen and her father could do nothing to him, he still wanted to keep them a secret.
I’m no good for you. It will be bad if people find out about us.
At the time Grace thought it was romantic, thought it was the price she had to pay for falling in love with a bad boy. But being with him now without the sneaking around, without fear of getting caught, was like a little charge to her system.
She was never ashamed of being with him. She wondered if he’d ever thought she was.
They walked into the diner and dozens of eyes turned to them. She immediately felt Duke stiffen, as if he were putting on armor, but most of the stares were just curious and Grace realized that people were not used to seeing them together. Most of the town found out they had been together after the fight, but they had never witnessed them together, especially with their son.
“Hey, Duke,” Boris the owner called from behind the counter. “Sit wherever you want. And holy hell that boy looks like you. Bunch of dumb-asses we were not figuring it out sooner.”
“You should be proud of your daddy, boy,” an older man said from the counter. “He made good and gives back. Helped my boy out of a jam. A good man.” He took a sip of his coffee. “A good man.”
Duke just grunted. Placing his hand on the small of Grace’s back, he led her to a booth in the back of the diner where there were less people. “How did you help that man?” Grace asked him when they were seated.
“Gave his son a job at one of my shops.”
“Why?”
“He got into some trouble. I sent him to the Tulsa shop. My friend Tiny runs it.”
“You know Tiny from prison?” Ryder asked.
Duke hesitated for a moment before he nodded. “Tiny is a good man who got caught up with the wrong crowd and got put away for it. He’s a hard-ass but a good leader, and I knew he could keep Mr. Mulhern’s son in check and teach him well. Jake is doing all right now.”
“So Mr. Mulhern just asked you to help his son and you did?” Grace asked, curious about this side of Duke. He was more nurturing under that gruff exterior than he would ever admit. Always championing the underdog, always sticking up for the kids in school who couldn’t defend themselves.
He thought people had hated him, but the truth was he was more of a mystery than anything. A quiet badass who didn’t take shit from anybody and was probably a better person than most, despite his tough upbringing.
“He wrote to me. I help when I can.” He looked at Ryder. “I want you to do that. Help out when you can. Even when it’s a pain in the ass.”
“But don’t be soft and don’t get walked all over,” Ryder said.
Duke nodded. “Which one of your uncles told you that?”
“Colt. He told me about the man who lived in the basement before you did. He said that he wants me to meet him when we go to Las Vegas.�
�
“What else did your uncle say?” Grace asked, realizing for the first time that most of Ryder’s family would be in Vegas; he didn’t have just a father now but also uncles who would shape his life.
“That I could get a job in King’s Customs when I graduated from college and that he was glad I was alive because he needed somebody else who was smart he could talk to.”
“Colt would say that.” Duke frowned.
“He said you had a different kind of smart than he did. That you can look at anything that needs fixing and see how it should be and not what it was. He said he knew numbers but you had vision.”
“What did he say about Levi?”
“That he was pretty and that’s all he needed to get by in the world.”
Duke let out a bark of laughter that surprised Grace but made Ryder smile. She was going to have to let Duke win the bet. In the back of her mind she’d always known that. Ryder had gone his entire life without a male role model and now he had three with the King brothers. They could teach him so much more about the world than she ever could here in Destiny.
“Can I take your order?” A waitress came over and studied them just a little longer than she would most customers. Grace knew the town of Destiny was probably wondering what the hell was going on with them living in that house together.
They were once again going to be the talk of the town after they were spotted out today. Grace didn’t care, because there was nothing scandalous about them being together as a family.
Then again, maybe that was the most shocking thing of it all. Nobody thought the daughter of the judge turned teenage mother could ever make it work with the son of the town drunk turned millionaire. She still didn’t know if they could make it work, but she was going to try like hell and hope they did.
“Can I have a double bacon cheeseburger and a milk shake?” Grace asked as she watched her boys’ heads swivel toward her, their eyes wide with shock. “Oh, and an order of cheese fries.”
“Grace.” Duke took her hand, actually looking concerned. “They’ve got salads here.”
“I know.” She smiled at him and looked back up to the waitress. “Can I have some grilled onions on that and a side of barbecue sauce? I’m hungry today.”
*
Duke went up the basement stairs, prepared to go to Grace that night. They had spent most of the day together and he thought that it would be enough time with her, but he found himself wanting more. Just as his foot hit the fifth step, his door opened and there she stood in a white nightgown that was almost sheer. He could see the outline of her body through it and her hardened nipples pressing against the delicate fabric. He wasn’t going upstairs to be with her because he had sex on the mind. He was going upstairs simply to be with her, but as soon as he saw her, the urge to be with her nearly took over all of his senses.
“Oh!” She was surprised to see him on the stairs. “Did you need something? Can I get it for you?”
He remembered clearly that she said that she had wanted to take care of him. It had made him uncomfortable because he’d always had to do for himself. No one had ever taken care of him or even offered to. Except his mother. But when she had died he learned early on never to count on others to do what he could do for himself. Yet there was Grace, offering and looking so damn enticing while she did it.
“I can get it.”
“But I’d be happy to get it for you. You’ve got to let me do something. You do all the cooking and the picking up and dropping off. You don’t like it when I go to work. Let me get you a damn glass of water!”
He walked up the stairs and stopped on her step, where he lifted her into his arms. She let out a tiny yelp. “There. I have what I came up to get.”
“You’re crazy for attempting to carry me down the stairs. I’m not the dainty flower I used to be.”
“Who said I wanted a dainty flower?” He made his way down the steps and didn’t stop until they were at the bed. The covers were already turned down and he placed her on the sheets, climbing in next to her and pulling the blankets up around them.
She set a hand on his stomach and her head on his chest. “We had a good day with you, Duke.”
“You’re not upset about what went down with Patrick?”
“No. I would have been upset if you hurt him.”
“I knew he lived in town. I knew he worked for the factory, but none of it clicked in my head until I saw him standing there in front of me again. Thirteen damn years and a prison sentence didn’t change how I felt. I still wanted to kill him. I could still see him slapping you. I could still see his handprint on your face.”
“What would killing him have solved?”
“Nothing. Might have made me feel better, though.”
Grace laughed, and the sound soothed him. “I have thanked God for Ryder a million times but today I was extra grateful for him.”
“This shit is hard … being a parent. I’ve only known him for a little while, but I can’t see myself going back to life without him. I never thought that I would care about somebody else’s feelings so much that it would alter everything I do.”
“That’s not true.” She absently stroked his stomach. “At first I thought you bought the factory just for spite, but I know you better than that. You don’t do things just for spite and you don’t spend money for no reason. What’s your plan?”
She got him. He forgot sometimes that she knew him so well. “It’s Levi’s plan. I can’t take credit for it. The factory was going to close. Most of the manufacturing jobs have gone overseas, and they lost their biggest contract. None of the workers know, but in a few months the owners were planning to shut the doors for good.”
“So you’re going to keep it open at a loss?”
“On any given day I could take Colt in a fight, but if I threw away money he’d rip my throat out. We’re going to open an indoor racetrack. Levi did a little research and learned that the area can support a business like that. He was thinking we should expand it and open more family-friendly entertainment. Maybe an arcade and some batting cages. An ice-skating rink. We could make it a whole entertainment complex and draw some tourism away from Vegas. With the mine and the casino in this area and its location near the Oregon border, we’re primed to do good business.”
She climbed on top of him and cupped his face in her hands. “For some reason, I keep picturing Levi as a cute kid, but he’s a man now, isn’t he?”
“I have a hard time remembering that, but he’s a smart man, too.”
“Why did you go back into the movie theater?”
“I bought it.”
She laughed, and it vibrated throughout her body and into his own. “What’s your vision for it? I know you have one. I could see it in the way you looked at the place.”
“Take out the seating and put in tables, a full-service kitchen, a bar, and wait staff. The people from Destiny shouldn’t be going out of town to have fun. People should be coming here. And if we get the theater open we can save all of the factory jobs and add about a dozen more.”
“If you would have asked me ten years ago if I’d end up in bed with a man who could buy movie theaters and factories on a whim and save the jobs of half the town, I would have called you a liar.”
“Nobody thought I would be in this place right now.”
She leaned down and softly kissed his mouth. “What do you think would have happened if that night never happened? If you’d known I was pregnant?”
“I would have married you. I would have tried my hardest to give you a comfortable life.”
“What about King’s Customs? Would you have opened it here? Or would we have gone to Vegas?”
“Why are we doing this?” He felt frustrated, not wanting to think about what-ifs or could-have-beens in that moment. He couldn’t change what happened. He couldn’t have taken it back.
“I just want to know if you would have gone after your dreams with a baby and wife in tow?”
“I don’t wa
nt to talk about this, Grace.”
“You wouldn’t have done it, would you?”
“Probably not, but it doesn’t matter because it won’t change the fact that I didn’t know Ryder. It won’t change the fact that I spent years in prison and pissed at you. It won’t change a single damn thing either of us has done for the past thirteen years. We are where we are and that’s it.”
She looked pained and climbed off him, turning away and sitting on the edge of the bed. He knew she was just a moment from fleeing, from putting the same space between them that was there during the day.
“I’m not sure how much longer I can do this,” she said quietly.
“Do what?”
“Live like this with you.”
Their month together was almost over, just a few days left. He had only planned for a month. He’d told his shop manager he would be back in a month, and yet the things he was doing here in Destiny didn’t seem like temporary things. He was having the house fixed up. He was starting new businesses.
He was putting down roots, it seemed, but that was the last thing he wanted. To end up back here in the place that he hated for so long. Only he didn’t hate it so much and he was starting to remember that every day hadn’t been bad. That there had been good times here, people he’d been friendly with, places that felt good to be back in. And then there was Grace, whom he wanted to be happy despite everything that had gone on between them.
He didn’t know what to say to her. He didn’t want to be mad at her anymore and he sure as hell didn’t want to lose her.
He could enforce his will and make her move, but he knew she would end up resenting him.
Or he could let her win the bet. He could go home and go back to his shop and burying himself in his work and see Ryder on weekends and holidays even though being away from his son was the last thing he wanted. But he would miss her, too. He would miss waking up and knowing that he was going to see her. He would miss hearing her laugh and seeing her smile. He would miss the way she stood up to him like few people were brave enough to do. He would miss her. Miss her more than he had these past thirteen years because he had fallen in love with her again, even harder this time.
Betting the Bad Boy Page 16