"Fuck, Mina, sorry," he said, shaking his head as I flinched back. I knew he would never purposely hit me, but if he was dealing with some kind of post-traumatic thing, he could do things without really realizing he was doing them, without knowing it was me he was hurting.
"It's okay," I said, moving closer, putting my hand on his stomach. "Are you alright?"
He looked over my shoulder, past me, thinking it over for a genuine moment. Then he exhaled hard as his arm slid around my shoulders and his head ducked to look at me. "Not right now, no," he admitted, surprising us both, I think.
I moved even closer, resting my head under his chin and putting my arms around him, letting him squeeze me tight without any objection even though it was borderline painful. "Tell me about him," I prompted.
"Jazz," he supplied, resting the side of his face to the top of my head. "He joined around the time Repo did. He was a fucking slob and he was constantly purposely trying to make the clubwhores jealous of each other by being nice to one one day then another the next day. Just a shit-starter really. But he was loyal. He never bitched about walking the grounds or being left behind when the others went on a drop and he had to stay and watch the clubhouse. Found him in that bathroom," he went on, voice going low so that I had to strain to hear. His hands had started rubbing up and down my back absentmindedly, like I was an anchor for him and he needed to keep touching me to remind himself he was here, in the present, and not back in that God-awful night.
"He must have been getting ready to shower. The place was steamed and the water was running still when I came in. He was facing it too, shot in the back of the head three times. There were pieces of brain matter fucking everywhere," he added and I could feel him swallow hard at that.
I wanted to tell him it was okay. I wanted to offer hollow comforts. But Renny wasn't the type of man to accept them. He knew it wasn't alright, that he wasn't alright about it and that he likely wouldn't be for a good, long time. People didn't just get over things like that. It was a mark on the soul. It was a source of nightmares for years to come, no matter how hardened a criminal you were.
So I gave him what I felt. "I'm sorry, Renny," I offered, tilting my head up slightly, planting a kiss under his jaw. His arms squeezed me even tighter for a second. "Why are you in here?" I added a minute of silence later.
From what I understood, since the cleaning had been conducted, a large part of that done by Renny himself, the poor soul, the doors had been closed and the rooms had become somewhat of a memorial to the fallen brothers.
He took a long minute to answer and when he did, his tone was resigned. "Got three potential new members. Eventually, they are going to need rooms."
"But they're usually probates for..."
"A year, give or take," he answered for me. "But there's a lot to fucking do. Figured I would start packing up, get the clothes and shit to Goodwill at least."
Really, it made more sense to get the rooms taken care of. If, for no other reason, to have more places for the kids to hang out. But, on top of that, keeping the rooms like shrines kept things in suspension. If they wanted closure, they needed to get things taken care of.
But it was unfair for Renny to take that all on by himself.
"Want some help?" I asked, pulling back slightly to look up at him, wanting to gauge his non-verbal reaction.
He looked down, his light eyes seeming suddenly soft. "Yeah, sweetheart. I'd like that."
So then we boxed up clothes for Goodwill. And, on a roll, emptied the garbage and the drawers, tossing anything that wasn't of some personal significance, and putting the things that were into a separate box that we eventually kept filling up as we went to the next room where the bed was missing both the boxspring and mattress because the brother who occupied it had been killed in his sleep on them. Then, finally, we finished a third room before calling it quits, deciding three rooms for three new members was plenty. Eventually, they would move in and put their own marks on the rooms, taking away some of the bad memories with their personal stamps.
We stopped there for the night.
We had dinner.
We went to bed.
We woke up.
And everything changed.
Because Renny was in a mood.
Meaning- one his his moods.
I walked out of the bathroom, post-shower, and he was in the room, sitting off the side of the bed, all shut down.
The thing was, nothing and happened. There seemed to be no trigger. We had woken up, he had gotten his "breakfast", we had hard sex, we both came, then I went to clean up.
That was it.
And all during the physical activities, he was fully engaged and open.
"Everything alright?" I asked, stopping short as I reached into the closet to pull out my duffle bag and place it on my side of the bed, digging out the galaxy-print leggings, a tank, and the red wine-colored shrug along with some underthings.
"Fine," he said in that creepy dead tone of his. He was watching me as I piled my clothes, his face guarded, eyes cold.
I had a strong urge to take my clothes and go into the bathroom. But, at the same time, I knew he was watching me. And he wasn't watching me in the way I often found him doing over the past few months and, especially, since we hooked up. That was the kind of watching where he was trying to catch my smile or trying to imagine me naked. This was a completely different kind of watching. This was invasive and clinical and it seemed to leave my body cold and my skin slimy.
But it felt like a test.
It felt like he wanted me to take my clothes and walk away, like in doing so, I was somehow proving some silent point of his.
So I reached for the tuck in my towel and I pulled it, grabbing the towel and tossing it on the edge of the bed as I reached for my panties. He watched every single move I made, hardly blinking, and I tried my best to not be bothered by it.
I was bothered.
But I didn't want him to know it.
I was hoping that maybe it was just some little bullshit thing that got him in a pissy mood and that if I didn't focus on it too much, it might go away on its own.
I should have known better.
Problems didn't just go away.
Anytime I saw Renny for the rest of the day, he was always further away from me than usual, not smiling, and barely interacting with anyone.
"Come on," he demanded sometime around midday right after I finished straightening up the mess the guys had all left around, trying to remind myself not to be pissed about it seeing as it was a clubhouse and was never known for being immaculate before.
"Come where?" I asked, turning to find him waving keys at me. "We can't leave. You're in charge here," I reminded him.
"Lo said she would hold down the fort."
"Why?" I asked, knowing very little was more important to a Henchmen than loyalty. And he was supposed to be protecting the women and kids.
"Because I have a surprise for you."
I should have been thrilled.
When men spontaneously had a surprise for you, you were supposed to be excited and happy and just about bursting.
But instead, my stomach twisted almost painfully and my heart seemed to freeze in my chest.
"What kind of surprise?" I asked cautiously.
"Get your purse and let's head out," he said instead of answering, making me all the more sure that something was up.
But I went to grab my wallet, slipped into the flats Ash had packed, and followed him into the garage where we loaded into the SUV and headed out onto the main drag.
He pulled to a park just barely two minutes down the road in front of a storefront with a sign that was unfamiliar to me, but the name on it was familiar.
She's Bean Around.
It was the coffeehouse Cyrus worked at.
"Renny, you really shouldn't be..." I started, but he jumped out and walked toward the sidewalk, "in public until we are sure the threat was gone fully," I added to myself as I reached for the do
or handle and let myself out. "What is this? A date?" I asked as he moved silently toward the door and held it open for me.
But he didn't answer, just let me inside and followed behind.
The inside toed the line between intimate and packed with about ten small tables of two lining there walls and a couch seating section in the center around a coffee table. There was a counter along the fourth wall with a giant blackboard with multi-colored chalk outlining the menu.
Two women were behind the counter- a stunning redhead and an equally stunning black woman, both in black pants and a black tee with the store's name across the front.
The music was loud and almost overwhelming, but according to the sign near the register: "Our music keeps us from slapping rude customers. No, we will not turn it down or change the station. K, thanks."
I turned back to Renny only to find him several feet away, standing near a table where two people were crammed in the space where only one was supposed to be sitting, watching me.
And those people?
Yeah, they would be my parents.
Parents I hadn't seen in eight years, mind you. Parents I had purposely walked away from. Parents who were to blame for every bit of coolness I wore like a shield.
And there they were sitting with Renny bouncing on his heels behind them, excited to see his little experiment play out.
The mother fucker.
My hands curled into tight fists, my fingernails biting into my palms painfully. I took a breath and forced my feet to move forward, giving them the best imitation of a smile I could muster.
"Mom, Dad, what are you doing in the United States?"
Last I heard, they had been settled in England. I would say happily, but I wasn't entirely convinced either of them had a capacity for happiness. What my father had was his obsession with work. What my mother had was her obsession with my father. Obsession was not a happy thing to base your life around.
"We were on business in New York and we got a call from your young man," my mother started, lifting her chin a little, clearly objecting not only to my choice of a 'young man' but also my outfit, my hometown, and likely the coffee shop we were sitting in.
I didn't look a lot like my mother. She was full Japanese where I was only half. My skin was darker, my hair lighter, my eyes that of my father, and my body more curvy than hers. But my face had the same roundness she had.
And I didn't inherit any of her strong opinions on cuisine, clothing, music, or theater. It was a fact that always annoyed her. Why, she would bemoan, would I want to play with silly little fake animals instead of sit and watch Les Mis in French?
My father was always a bit more laid-back, more workaday, less pretentious. He never cared enough to notice that I even had a Gameboy, let alone lectured me about how much I played it.
"Renny," I said, forcing a smile but it was all ice, "why didn't you tell me you called my parents?"
"It was a surprise, Mina," he offered, watching me closely. And I just knew he was reading way too much into my stiffness, into the fact that I hadn't sat down.
So I sat down. "How have you been?"
"Perhaps you would know that if you called, Minny," my mother chastened.
"I have called." I called every single mother's and father's day just so they couldn't say I never called.
"Twice a year," she scoffed, shaking her head. "After all we have done for you. The best schools, the right contacts..."
The best schools across eight different countries over the course of my childhood. And the only contacts I had were the pampered, snooty offspring of the women she befriended in the 'right' circles in each of those countries.
"I'm sorry, Mother," I offered, swallowing past the bitter taste of that apology because I didn't mean it in the least. "I have been traveling a lot for work," I said, looking to my father who would not only understand, but approve, of that. "I will make more of an effort." Say, on Christmas or New Years when I knew they wouldn't be around to pick up the phone anyway.
"How has work been?" my father broke in, interested.
He looked older than I remembered. Eight years would do that to a person, but it was almost startling to see. His hair that had always been a rich medium brown was graying. His eyes that were so much like my own had crows feet around them.
"Work has been good. Constant. I have been all over the place the past year."
"But your headquarters is here, correct?" he asked. "Hailstorm Industries."
I almost corrected him before, at the last second, I remembered that was exactly what I had told him many years before when Lo took me in. The 'industries' I thought made it sound more legitimate. I knew he would never look them up. He wouldn't care enough.
"So how long have you and your young man been dating?" my mother broke in, always trying to steer conversation away from work, the only thing my father and I were comfortable discussing.
"Oh, ah..." I started.
"A few months," Renny supplied, moving over toward me, borrowing a chair from the table behind us, and sitting down, his knees touching me.
And, for the first time ever, I wanted to pull away from his touch. Not because I was fighting an attraction like I had been at the beginning, but because I genuinely did not want him touching me right then.
Or ever fucking again.
"Is it serious?" she asked, one brow raising.
It was seriously over at least.
"It has been steady," I improvised.
"You are getting too old to not be serious, Minny," she chastened.
I hated being called Minny. She hated the name Mina because it was my paternal grandmother's name and my mother blamed her for making my father emotionally distant. The joke was on her, though, seeing as my Granny Mina was the only bit of warmth I had ever known my entire childhood.
"She is focusing on her career now, dear," my father cut in. "She has plenty of time to have children if she chooses."
That was less for my benefit and more his way of landing a blow to her. He had never wanted children, had never wanted me. Sure, he had done the right thing and provided for me and occasionally interacted with me, but it was painfully clear that I was a mistake. Or, more accurately, a manipulation.
"Of course she will be having a child," my mother scoffed, doing a completely ridiculous hair toss as she waved down the waitress as she passed to get the bill. "You want children don't you... Reggy?"
"Renny," I corrected, knee-jerk, defensive.
It was right then that Renny's hand landed on my knee, squeezing, reassuring. I knew that if I looked, I would find the coldness gone. I would find my old Renny back. Because he got the answers he wanted. He got to push my button and watch me squirm.
But I didn't want my Renny back.
It was too late.
And he fucked up way too much.
The hand on my knee didn't feel comforting; it felt like a shackle that I desperately needed to pry off before I got stuck forever.
"Let me," I offered, reaching for the bill.
"Don't be silly, Minny," my mother scoffed, passing the bill to my father.
"Yes," Renny broke in then.
"Yes?" my mother prompted.
"Yes, I want to have children. Blank slates," he added and I was a mix of pleased that he remembered I had made that comment and disgusted that he would bring it up in front of my parents, people who had a squishy little blank slate once upon a time and turned it into me.
"That is quite the... clinical way of looking at it," my mother said, reaching to put her purse in front of her on the table. A lifetime of prompts told me that she was signaling the meeting was over.
They drove over an hour to spend less than five minutes with me. Eight years and I got five minutes.
It shouldn't have hurt, not after so many years, not after me knowing to expect nothing else. But it hurt.
And it hurt double right then because their coldness wasn't the only thing I had to deal with.
I had to deal with R
enny too.
Just the thought of it made bile rise up my throat.
"Well, you'll excuse us, darling," my mother said, standing, straightening her dress, "but your father has a meeting back in New York in three and a half hours. Had we known you were nearby ahead of time, perhaps we could have given you more time."
It took about every drop of willpower to not blurt out- why start now?
So I stood and I accepted the cold kiss to the cheek from my mother and the cup to the shoulder from my father, wished them a good trip back, and watched them leave.
"Sit, sweetheart," Renny's voice said, his hand touching my thigh, making me realize I had been watching the closed door for a long minute after they walked out it.
I looked down at him, at his perfect, beautiful face and his amazing, impossibly light blue eyes, his charmingly copper-red hair, and the pain to my stomach almost doubled me over.
"Don't call me sweetheart," I demanded, pulling away from him and tearing through the store and onto the street, making my way on foot back toward the compound where I knew I could find a car and a way back to Hailstorm. Renny caught up to me just a couple storefronts after.
"Mina, let me..."
"You probably shouldn't be on the street right now," I cut him off. "Some people might be upset if someone put a bullet in your heart. Not me, of course," I added, viciously, too hurt, too offended, too shocked to be anything other than cruel, "but some people."
"Mina, I thought..."
"You thought what?" I snapped as we came up toward the gates of the compound. I turned to face him, finding his face remorseful. But it was too late for that. There were some screw ups that couldn't be wiped away by sad eyes. "You thought that I would somehow allow you to press my buttons and watch me squirm while you jotted down notes about me?" I almost shrieked. "For someone who loathes his parents so much, you sure fit into their shoes perfectly!"
That was a bit of a low blow and I could see the impact it made when he winced.
"You won't talk to me," he said oddly, a long second later.
Renny (The Henchmen MC #6) Page 17