Finding Fate

by Charisse Spiers

  I hesitate for a second, unsure if I want to discuss it so openly, but really, he’s not a secret with any of them. “My son’s name and birthdate incorporated in some type of design. I don’t know what that design is yet. I know you can’t give me an exact price until I figure it out, but an estimate would work.”

  He’s no longer smiling. “I’m not going to charge you, Gabby. Just bring me something to eat when you come, and we’ll call it even.”

  “That’s not necessary. I want to pay you for the work just like a normal customer.”

  “If I don’t charge Konnor, I’m not charging you, and dipshit over there likes using me as an ink pen that never runs dry. That’s the way it works. I’d tattoo Maddox more, but he’s slower to add than the ink junkie you call your friend.”

  “Hey,” Konnor says, splashing water his way. “Your ‘tattoo twin’ is grateful for every piece. I pay you with shit that matters, like favors. Don’t be a dick. If you don’t want to be in high demand, maybe you shouldn’t do awesome tattoos.”

  Riggan rolls his eyes, but a grin follows behind. “I’ll do it after Veteran’s Day. We’re swamped right now. I’ll look at my schedule tomorrow and let you know a day and time. Figure out what all you want beforehand.”

  “Okay, thank you.” Excitement bubbles in my belly as everyone settles into comfortable conversation, enjoying the cool breeze kissing our skin that came to visit tonight. I never would have foreseen this becoming my life when I met Konnor. What started as a mutual agreement turned to friendship, which led me right back to the one I’ve been yearning for. I’m making new friends, I’m starting a new life, and I’m marrying the love of my life. For the first time since I was fourteen, I’m starting to feel at peace, and I must say, it feels damn good.

  Maddox places his lips to my ear. “I want to get the matching tattoo, even if we have to get them at separate times. I know I haven’t really said much on the subject, but you’ll never know how much it means to me that you gave him part of my name. You’ll never be able to top that in my eyes.”

  I turn my head farther to look at him. “It was simple for me. You’re worth having a part of.” . . . And then I stamp his open, shocked mouth with a kiss.

  Twenty-Six

  Maddox

  I glance over at Gabby in the passenger side of my truck, chewing on a piece of gum and trying to stay focused on the road but finding it difficult, a smile already spreading as a feeling of déjà vu washes over my mind. She’s sitting on the edge of the black leather seat holding onto the ‘oh shit’ handle to the right of the dash in one hand, moving her upper body to the beat of the music as she raps along with All The Girls Wanna Ride by Jawga Boys like I’m not even here.

  The funniest part is she knows almost every word. For someone that came from wealth and class it doesn’t take long to pull her redneck out like she was born one of us. That one is a country girl through and through, which is likely the exact thing he didn’t want her to be. Too bad, asshole. Shouldn’t have moved her to a place like south Mississippi. She likes mud riding and slinging dirt more than me.

  I thought I was going to nut on myself the night I saw her wearing some of my old camo the week of homecoming when she told her dad she was staying with her friend to study for a test so I could sneak her to Egg Wars with me, which is nothing more than an egg fight at night between juniors and seniors every year at a battlefield—usually a field or woodsy area—that remains secret until it’s time. We take it very seriously; have shirts made and all for the freshman and sophomores to pick a side. Then we go to war. Fights break out. Partying and drinking are going on at the end. Parents think it’s nothing more than a rite of passage. It was the perfect opportunity to take her with me for a little fun with people my age. With a ball cap pulled down low and it already dark from the night, no one asked questions. Every guy usually has a girl with him, and a lot of them are from the surrounding schools. She loved it. Good fucking memories.

  The second we got in my truck to go to the store she confiscated my phone and started reminiscing our past with all the songs I used to play when she was riding shotgun in my truck. Some I haven’t listened to in years, mostly because there is so much music to discover now it’s hard to remember everything. The only thing that’s changed is our age and my truck. I no longer have my dad’s hand-me-down F-150. I guess we’re a Ford family. Too bad we can’t take the backroads back home to relive it. I miss those days a lot. You have no problems at seventeen outside of the high school walls. Life was simple when we were together. Even though lying and hiding are wrong, we were happy to just be left alone. She was always game for anything as long as it was me and her.

  I grab her hand and pull it across the middle console, kissing the back. “I’ve missed my closet redneck.”

  She’s trying not to smile, making it even more obvious. “Just because I like your redneck rap, or hick-hop, or whatever the hell it’s called, doesn’t mean I’m classy by day and a country bumpkin at night.”

  I laugh, realizing how damn accurate that is, constantly looking between her and the road, the bitterness over everything else fading a little more with each day we’re together. “That’s exactly what it means. The real version always comes out when no one is around. Don’t deny your true character, baby. It’s hot. I’ll keep your secrets from Daddy. Do you know how many times we’ve been spotlighting for deer and you were the one holding the gun? Rich, city boys wouldn’t know what to do with you, girl.”

  Laughter is dancing in her dark eyes. “Bet they wouldn’t let me drive through mud tearing shit up like you.”

  “Drive through mud in what? A bitch car like your dad drives? Hell naw. Then they’d have to call people like me to come get their ass unstuck. Country boys only drive trucks with mud tires.”

  She smirks, pulling her hand out of mine to turn toward me in her seat. “You tried this one out yet? This truck is fine as fuck.”

  I adjust in my seat and switch hands on the wheel as I prepare to turn into the grocery store parking lot. “No.”

  I pull into an open spot, the sudden playfulness gone with the question. She narrows her eyes at me, confirming she is aware of the mood change. I can see it from the corner of my eye. She knows it used to be one of my favorite things to do. Me and her went all the time after a heavy rain. We got creative in how she could get out of the house to be with me. Looking back now, I don’t know how we weren’t obvious. My truck would come back covered in it. It pissed Dad off, always griping I’d tear it up. I didn’t work to buy tires with big mud grips for nothing. “Why not? You took me all the time. You didn’t take any of your slutty sluts mud riding? You were always the hottest when you were dirty. The tailgate and the bed of that truck saw a lot of action.”

  Images are flickering in my mind. Please don’t let me get hard right now. I’ll beg. I’m not giving her that glory. They won’t stop, just angering me more. The memories of us are always so vivid in my head, like a movie, including sex. My mind is full of our porn.

  I jerk my head toward her. God, she knows how to piss me off. She can go from the most loving person you’ve ever met to the biggest bitch in two point five seconds. It’s a skill. “Don’t fucking do that, Gabrielle. I told you what those girls were to me. No one got me the way you did. I didn’t take girls to our places. I didn’t date them. I didn’t fuck them without condoms. I didn’t put my mouth between their legs or let them suck me. You were with guys in ways too, goddammit. Drop it. This truck is still basically new—new truck smell and all still lingers,” I say, dodging.

  The bitch smiles. I’ve never wanted to strangle and make out with someone at the same time so bad. She knows if I use her full name I’m pissed. Instead of backing off I think it fuels her. I hate for people to yell at me. It sets me off like a bomb. She’s always liked that I’m hot-headed, and only God knows why. “One thing I can always count on with you is your guilt. You’ll never be able to cheat on me and live with yourself, but it’s easy for you
to drop it. I’m the one that has to think about it when I don’t want to. I saw some of the skanks you brought home. I’ve proven my loyalty to you and your dick. No dildo is the real thing. How do I know you aren’t going to miss having two-for-one nights?”

  “Are you fucking serious? That cunt of yours is like crack. I almost went to jail for it. Since you, all a girl makes me feel is dirty. Cheat on you. Shut that shit up. You have enough personalities and shades of crazy to keep me busy.” I rub my hands up and down my face. “You’re going to drive me to drinking. I don’t know how I’ve lived this long without you.”

  As soon as I shift it into park she reaches over and kills the engine, snatching the keys out of the ignition. “Back to the subject. When have you ever cared about property over pastimes?”

  I huff. She never forgets anything. “Since I grew up and had to be a man, Gabby. Grown-ass men don’t go destroy shit they work hard to pay for. It’s irresponsible.”

  “That sounds like some dumb shit your dad would say.” Her look turns hard like she thought of something. She can see straight through me. Always has. “Maddox Leroy Burns! Lie to me one more time.”

  My chest is starting to heat. If it wasn’t my damn grandfather’s name I’d hate my middle name, but he is a good, respectable man, which makes it hard. I reach for my keys and she holds them back like the bitch that she is when she wants to be. My shoulders drop. “I knew your dad was never going to take me seriously for you by acting like an immature teenage boy or he would have let us stay together. I work hard, even on days I feel like crap. I save and don’t overspend, and I rarely do stupid shit. I hold back my temper when sometimes I’d love nothing more than to beat someone’s ass. I try to be a good guy. I keep myself clean cut, wear nice clothes, and keep my tattoos hidden. I watch my mouth when I’m not around my friends. Before I moved here, I was in church every damn Sunday, even if I had been drinking the night before.”

  I’m starting to yell unconsciously from my emotions being heightened, so I lean back against the seat to calm down and drop my head back. “I lived in my parents’ house for low rent because I was saving to buy a house. It was their idea since they have the camp too. They put my rent money toward the utilities that I used, only making me pay it to get used to paying a monthly note since I didn’t have a truck note at the time it started. I sat down with Riggan’s mom at the bank when I moved back from my brother’s. I was going to buy a house before a truck. She told me I needed to save at least ten percent of the list price that’s in my budget, preferably twenty. Where we’re from a two-hundred-thousand-dollar house on private land is a lot of house. That’s a minimum of twenty grand I gotta come up with for the bank to loan the rest. Had we gone on that band’s tour at the time that Abby died, I’d already have it. I put money in multiple accounts every month. I’ve been trying to be a decent human being to get you back since the day I left. And to further drive my point home, my parents aren’t stupid. Just because I don’t admit it doesn’t mean they don’t know what I’m doing, so the next time you think anyone on this damn planet could possibly hate you, you can remember that this entire time we’ve been apart, they’ve helped me plan for a future with you in ways even if they didn’t believe it’d happen. I was praying for a miracle and living like it’d come true.”

  She wipes her cheek. “So, what? You didn’t come back for me because you wanted to buy me a fairytale first? That’s bullshit. We could live in a trailer for all I fucking care, Maddox. That stuff isn’t important to me. What we’re doing right now—the fighting and the loving—is what I want.”

  “Hell no, we aren’t living in a trailer.” The words feel like fire on my tongue. “I didn’t lose you and my son and all that time to put you in a doublewide. I’m going to prove to him that I deserve you as much as any other prick he has picked out if I have to work myself to death to do it. I’ll never like him and he’ll never like me unless God steps in, but I will earn his respect. You’re the only girl I’ve ever loved, Gabby. I can’t stop. It was never about the sex for me. I didn’t wake up one day and say, ‘I think I’ll fuck a thirteen-year-old today’. He made us dirty. He made us wrong. He made me feel like a sexual predator. He made me out to be a criminal when all I wanted to do was love you.”

  I press my fingers against my closed eyes with the moisture buildup, stopping it before it can fall. “Shit,” she whispers, and then the truck door opens and slams. I scrub my fingers down to make sure my eyes are dry before blinking to clear my vision as she rounds the front of the truck, coming toward me. I can’t see much of her head because of the lift on my truck. It has the Rocky Ridge package on it. I bought it brand-new and loaded out in the spring last year, making it a year and a half old. It’s not cheap, but it’s what I wanted, and my old truck wasn’t dependable anymore.

  My door flies open and she jerks on my arm until I get out, not missing a beat before wrapping her arms around my neck and pulling her legs up and around my waist, forcing me to hold her. Her lips are locked with mine before I can ask what she’s doing. She draws a groan out of me and I’m hard before I can even think about it. I turn, sitting her on my seat sideways, and let my emotions go. My hands rake through her hair. We kiss, we devour each other, and we feel every inch of skin we can without removing clothes.

  My lips run down her smooth neck that’s back to her natural olive skin tone, no longer an orangish shade from whatever the hell she kept putting on it as I slip my hand beneath her bra. Her heavy, warm breath coats my lips when she speaks. “You can’t change the parts of you that I fell in love with. You’re not going to cheat me. You want all of me? I get all of you.”

  I kiss her again, because it never seems to be enough, always feeling like I need to kiss her one more time in case it’s the last time. It’s a tormenting feeling to live with. I hate it, but when something is stolen from you how do you feel any other way? I want the piece of paper that says she’s mine and not his. “I promised myself if I got you back I would do anything it takes not to lose you again. I need you more than I need anything else. I’ve been operating on an ‘all work, little play’ mentality for years now. Ever since you told me of that conversation with your dad about him wanting to arrange your marriage, I wake up sweating at least once a night dreaming about it. I’m worried you’ll give in to him at some point to make him happy. You can’t marry someone else, Gab. You’re supposed to marry me.”

  She combs her nail tips through the top of my hair, pressing her closed mouth against my lips over and over again. Then she smiles against me. “I guess it’s a good thing you got to me before he did then. You showed me love at an impressionable age. I believe in falling in love first and then getting married because you can’t live without them, not getting married because two people work socially and hope you fall in love to make your life a little happier. And the first time my husband lays in bed with another woman I’m going to kill one or both of them. It’s probably better for his life status if he actually loves me so he’ll stay faithful.”

  I laugh. “You know I’d never cheat on you.”

  She looks at me, her dark eyes so telling, taunting, and then she pulls me closer. “That’s because you’re just as fucking crazy and jealous as me. It tends to make us explosive. You’d kill my ass if I did it too.”

  We smile at the same time. “No, I’d kill him and punish you. Killing you would be too permanent and that would hurt me as much as you being with someone else.”

  She runs her fingertip between the waistband of my jeans and my pelvis, giving me chills. “I’m glad we’re on the same page. The only person that’s getting me forever is the one that deserves me. Stop trying to prove something you proved years ago. You took that spot when you were seventeen. I’m all booked up.”

  I grip her jaw in my hand, rubbing my lips up and down hers, my heart pounding away at my chest. I don’t even understand the magnitude of my love for her. It’s too big. There’s always just been something about her that keeps me coming bac
k for more. “Yeah you are. Love of my life, wife, mother of my kid—all of those badges you wear belong to me. Mine belong to you too.”

  She tugs on my bottom lip. “You shouldn’t sweat my dad so hard. If you’d really stop and think, I’m just like him in ways, and so are you. You’ll never let me go. I’ll never let you go. He refuses to let me go. I’ve been running from him since graduation. I scare him. He knows I don’t need his money to survive. He wouldn’t be trying so hard if it wasn’t driven by fear. I’m the one thing that’s always been his that he can’t completely control. Now I’m not a kid anymore. His threats don’t hold the same merit they did when I was a minor, and he knows it. He lost his wife to another man and never remarried. What’s the one thing that stands between him and me?”

  I gaze into her shining coffee-colored eyes so dark you can barely see where the pupil ends and the iris begins, thinking. “I threaten him?”

  “The fact that you’ve never picked up on it makes me question how much you actually pay attention. Since my mom left it’s just been the two of us. Then I turn thirteen—literally the beginning of my teens—and meet a boy that alters my entire world. By fourteen his innocent little girl is in love with a high school senior and not so innocent anymore. I was supposed to be a virgin when I married, and certainly not doing it that young. He got mad about it. He reacted. He was left with a pregnant fourteen-year-old. The men my family would deem appropriate to have my hand wouldn’t want a child they didn’t create to come with the package. Most high school couples don’t make it. In his mind, adoption was the best option. We aren’t most couples. After you left, aside from him taking our son, things were relatively calm until . . .”