“I never get to eat dessert when it’s served,” Maggie said. “I’m cutting pieces for everyone and making the coffee, and then the plates are coming back and they have to go in the dishwasher.” Behind them, the machine droned and sloshed softly, proving her point. “And I never get to have any.” She forked up a big bite and stared at it, grinning to herself. “Somehow I convinced myself it’s worth the calories to come get some later.”
“It’s worth it,” Ava assured her, licking the edge of her fork. It was New York style, with raspberry compote spooned over the top. Homemade, because Maggie didn’t do store-bought anything.
“Your cookies are good,” Maggie said, “I already had one of those.”
Ava waved her fork. “I’m a long way from this, though.”
“You’re just getting started with your cooking. It takes a while, baby.” Her voice was like a gentle caress, like a hand pulling through the tangles of her hair.
Beyond the window, by the glow of the security light, the snow still fell, a total whiteout as it streamed from the heavens.
Maggie asked, “So what’s Mercy think of his first family Christmas?”
“Not much, I don’t think. None of that bothered him, Mom. I mean, it wasn’t fun, but he’s not one to get all excited about that kind of family drama.”
“Hmm, guess not.”
They were quiet a moment, forks clinking against their plates, as they reflected on the insignificance of Denise Lowe’s disapproval. They’d all lived through far worse.
When a shape appeared in the threshold, and held statue-still for a long moment, neither of them registered Denise for who she was. For a second, the robe-clad figure seemed a specter, and Ava was coiled in automatic reaction, before her grandmother took another step into the kitchen and the candlelight caught her beneath the chin and eyes and revealed her for who she was.
Maggie’s quick intake of breath said that she’d been startled too.
“I…” Denise hesitated, her features stiff. “I thought I might get a glass of water. I didn’t know anyone else was up.”
“Just the ghosts of Christmas Present and Future,” Maggie said, starting to rise.
Denise waved her back down, and walked to the sink. “I can get it.”
Maggie sighed as she lowered into her chair. “Of course,” she whispered. Then: “There’s cheesecake, if you want. We’re having some.”
It was shadowy along the counter, and Denise’s back was ramrod straight as she opened the cabinet, pulled down a glass. Ava couldn’t see what she did, only hear it, and she bit back a smile when she heard the soft sound of the cork pulling out of the wine.
Maggie lifted her brows and Ava shrugged.
When Denise came to the table, it was with a slice of cake and a half-glass of Chardonnay. There was a stiffness to her movements that wasn’t just the result of beauty queen posture lessons; her face was tight, her lips trembling, her gaze on the candles, rather than on them as she sat opposite Ava. She was nervous, like a girl on her first day at a new school, who isn’t comfortable having lunch with strangers.
Or, more accurately, Ava thought, uncomfortable sitting with those she’d been cruel to.
Even with her makeup washed off and her hair tied back, she managed to look regal. She was where Maggie got her own queenly bearing, though Ava didn’t tell that disturbing bit of news to her mom. Denise said, “The cake is very good, Maggie. Your grandmother’s recipe?”
Maggie and Ava traded disbelieving looks. It was unnatural and unsure, but it was still a compliment. It was a reaching out. People couldn’t sit around candles, Ava didn’t guess, and retain their shields for very long. It brought out their basic sides.
“Yes,” Maggie said. “I added the raspberries.”
Denise nodded. “Mother was always a wonderful cook. Much better than I’ve ever been.”
“You do better with savory dishes, Mom. MiMi was always the best with desserts.”
Denise looked startled, eyes going to her daughter. “Do you think so?” True curiosity, caught off guard by the praise.
“I do.”
It wasn’t a smile, but it was a pleasant expression that touched Denise’s face.
“Ava’s really coming along,” Maggie said. “With her cooking, I mean. She’s always been leaps and bounds ahead of the rest of us academically” – she rolled her eyes and Ava blushed – “so she’s determined to cook us all under the table now, too. She made the cookies for today.”
“Did you?” Denise’s gaze came to Ava. “They were very good.”
There was something penetrating about her grandmother’s eyes that made her want to squirm. Denise was looking at her, through her, like she was trying to detect some visible hint of the madness that had driven her to marry a biker and set herself on this path she’d chosen.
She stared at Ava a long moment, and in a quiet voice, said, “How far along are you?”
Ava almost dropped her fork. Her throat went dry immediately and she swallowed. “About fourteen weeks.”
There was no explosion, only a small, sad smile. Denise’s eyelids seemed heavy in the candlelight, her face tired and old. “Hmm. That’s why the sudden wedding, then.”
Maggie gathered a breath and Ava touched her mom’s foot with her own under the table. Let me handle this, please. I have to.
Ava said, “No. The wedding was sudden because we couldn’t wait any longer.” And we were running from a man hell-bent on killing Mercy, but who wants to hear that story? “I wasn’t pregnant then.”
“I see.”
But she didn’t. She never had and probably never would.
“His name is Felix,” Ava said. “He’s from New Orleans, originally. He loves Tolstoy and he likes when I read Shakespeare to him, and he cooks a mean stir fry.”
Maggie was watching her with open approval, Denise with something like shock.
“He’ll be thirty-six in a couple months, which means, yes, he’s a good bit older than me. And yes, he’s been around since I was little. But he’s my best friend, Grammie, and my husband, and I love him so much…and I won’t defend him to anyone, not even my grandmother. He’s here. I’m hoping you can get used to that.”
Denise sat back in her chair, eyes too large. Finally, she blinked. “Well, aren’t you growing up to be just like your mother?” It was said without malice. A simple statement of fact, and she picked up her fork again. “What did you do to these raspberries to turn them into syrup?”
Fifteen minutes later, after the candles had been blown out – Maggie hugged her close, stroked her hair; “My precious girl, you give ‘em hell” – Ava tiptoed back to her room.
Mercy was sitting up against the headboard, reading. He’d dug a paperback collection of Tennyson poems from her old stash and he put it on the nightstand when she entered and closed the door behind her.
His brows lifted. “Better?”
“Much.” Despite the running heat, the house was cold with the snow packed all around it, and she was shivering between taking off her robe and climbing back under the covers. “How can you stand to be shirtless?”
“I’m just hot, baby. C’mere, you wanna feel?”
She rolled her eyes, but burrowed through the covers to get to him. His skin was warm, the bone and muscle beneath a solid comfort. She snuggled against him, into the hollow he made for her beneath one lifted arm.
“You know what would make Christmas even better?” he asked, and there was a mischievous note in his voice that she knew too well.
“What?”
“If we did it in your dad’s house.”
She sighed. “That’s romance for you – ‘did it.’ I’m afraid doing it to stick it to my dad isn’t exactly a turn-on.”
“Fillette.” He twisted his upper body toward her, so he could put both arms around her, press her back against the pillows and blot out the lamplight with his shoulder. “I only ever want to love you because it’s you, and it’s me, and I can’t help myself
.” He whispered against her neck in French and she felt herself melting.
His hand found her stomach and covered the growing swell of the baby. “How?” he asked, in a faraway, wondrous voice. “Just my little baby, and now you’re all grown up and having one.”
And he showered her with more French, and she was lost to him, as the snow rained silently against the window.
Sixteen
The city of Knoxville ground to a halt, shut down beneath a blanket of snow. Black ice glazed the streets. The South did not bustle and plow and struggle against the snow; it slept beneath it, the silence broken only by the chatter of hungry birds and the exuberant shouts of children using trash can lids as makeshift sleds.
They were snowed in, and Holly wasn’t sure she’d ever experienced this kind of happiness. There was nothing to do but watch movies, and Michael didn’t seem to care that she leaned against him, or slipped her arms around his waist. They talked in unhurried bursts of words, lapsing back into comfortable silence afterward. He wasn’t chatty, but he didn’t mind the way that she sometimes was. She could sense him listening, even if he didn’t respond.
Holly cooked, and she wore his clothes, and they ate in front of the fire while they watched all the Lethal Weapons.
He opened up the gun safe and took out his impressive collection of handguns and rifles, showing her how they worked, letting her heft their weight in her hands, talking of the shooting lessons they would have.
And they were in his bed, and he was gentle and rough, and patient and raw, and Holly didn’t want this time together to come to a close. There were words building in her, pressing behind her lips as she watched him sleep beside her, and felt the strong thumping of his heart beneath her hand. She wanted to express to him how much it meant to her that he’d brought her into his home, and into his bed, and that he’d showed her what it was supposed to feel when a man was inside a woman. She wanted to describe the prettiness of his eyes to him; wanted to tease him for the way scowls or frowns were his favorite facial expressions. But mostly she wanted to thank him until she was out of breath, for the nights he’d given her.
She didn’t say any of it though, only closed her eyes and slept beside him.
And the time did come to a close, because it had to. Two days after Christmas, they woke to a morning of forty degrees, and the snow was melting in thick globs from the trees, collecting in puddles on the asphalt. It was time for Knoxville to wake again, and time for them to go back to work.
“I’ll drive you home,” Michael said, collecting her keys off the kitchen counter.
She studied the casual, assertive set of his shoulders as she flipped her hair over her jacket collar. “How will you get back?”
“I’ll walk. It’s not far.”
She didn’t protest. It was in her nature to tell him not to bother, that she could make it home alone. But she knew now that he would ignore her; better to have his company without arguing and making him extra surly.
The streets were clear, but the sidewalks were not, and people bundled in coats were slip-sliding in snowy patches and clutching at brick building facades to keep their footing.
“What will you do today?” Holly asked, enjoying the sun coming through the windows and the quiet warmth of his company.
He shrugged as he drove. “Go into Dartmoor I guess. See if there’s any work for me.”
“Okay, two questions.” She put her back against the door so she could face him fully. “What is Dartmoor?”
“You came to town looking for a Dog and you don’t know what Dartmoor is?”
“Well I’ve heard of it. It’s you guy’s headquarters, right?”
He nodded. “It’s where our clubhouse is. And it’s the corporate entity that owns all the club businesses.”
“Corporate entity,” she said, smiling. “I’m impressed.”
He snorted. “Second question.”
“Well, now it’s three. But okay, number two: what sort of work do you mean? Like…murder and stuff?”
He gave her a dry, sideways glance. “You’re all about the murder.”
“Well I don’t know what being a sergeant at arms means.”
“I’m a mechanic,” he said. “I work on cars. The sergeant title is just my role in the club.”
“So you guys all have day jobs.”
“How else do you think I pay for all those Salisbury steak dinners?”
She felt her cheeks color, a bit embarrassed at her own assumptions. “I didn’t know,” she defended, “so that’s why I asked.”
“Question three?” he prodded.
“Why is Dartmoor called Dartmoor?”
He studied the road a moment, as they pulled to a slow stop at an intersection built up in the corners with snow. “There’s legends all over the UK of black dogs,” he said, not looking at her, his voice taking on a reflective quality. “Hell hounds. Crossroads demons. Dartmoor, in England, is where the stories of ghost hounds are the strongest. The Lean Dog is a specific legend,” he continued. “The vengeful ghost of a chimney sweep, hanged in Hertfordshire. The club’s founding fathers were English – based outta London. They named us for that legend. The Lean Dogs.”
Holly envisioned the mist-shrouded green landscapes of Sherlock Holmes movies; felt the tradition of lasting English lore. “Wow,” she murmured.
Michael glanced over at her. “You don’t have to make fun of it.”
“I’m not. I think it’s–”
“Beautiful?” he mocked.
“I happen to like beautiful,” she said. “Now who’s making fun?”
He shook his head and accelerated as the light changed. “It’s an old club,” he said quietly, almost to himself. “Way older than me. I owe it my respect.”
And killing men who did business with the club wasn’t doing so. The sudden resurgence of the outside world – the real world, beyond their bubble of snowbound sex and movie-watching – was an unpleasant shock.
Holly frowned. “I don’t want you to get in trouble with your brothers – that’s the word for them, right? Your brothers? I don’t want you to get in hot water with them because of me.”
“Might as well get in hot water for something.” The words were flippant, but the lines bracketing his mouth were grave.
“I’m serious, Michael,” she said. “What you’ve already done for me is so much. If you can’t–”
“I said I’d do it, didn’t I? Don’t you worry about it.”
Holly held back the tender smile that threatened. He wasn’t gracious in his sweetness; at his most earnest, he was either locked in the throes of passion, or grumbling like an old grouch.
“Yes, you did,” she said. “And you have no idea how grateful I am.”
“Don’t be grateful. Just be alive.”
She left him alone the rest of the short drive, resisting comment as he walked her up both flights of steps to her loft and ensured the door locks were still in place.
He caught her around the waist before she slipped inside, kissed her hard, and pressed a slip of paper into her hand. “You call me if you get scared,” he said, like it was a dire warning.
The paper was his phone number, written out in his bold, strong hand.
Holly went to the window and watched him walk off down the street, his shoulders set in a way that would repel rather than attract attention.
“Michael, Michael,” she murmured to herself, and typed his number into her phone.
In wake of the snow shutdown, Dartmoor was teeming with business. The bad press from back in the fall had, as Ghost had predicted, blown over. Quality had always been heavily emphasized at all the Dartmoor shops, and the reputation of good work had finally overridden the reputation of violence. People had short memories, and busy lives. Dublin’s crew ran a tight ship at the auto garage, and it was raucous with air wrenches and shouted instructions as Michael approached the open roll top doors.
One of the prospects, Harry, was trying to roll two tires into the
first bay, and he paused and ducked his head in reference as Michael passed.
Stupid kid, he thought, but approved of the respect. This new crop of prospects, if nothing else, were reverent in their address of all the patched members. Good little squires tending to the knights’ every need.
Dublin was under the hood of a Chevy, an old Nova that immediately brought to mind Holly’s Chevelle. The thing had a bad Maaco paint job, one which Michael intended to correct in the near future. No sense letting a classic like that roll around in shitty paint.
He pushed thoughts of her aside and said, “I’m here.”
Dublin paused, greasy hands wrapped around a bad battery, and gave Michael a look of mild frustration. “Good for you.”
Michael frowned. He wasn’t sure he could claim any of his club brothers felt like actual brothers. “You got anything for me to do?”
“Nah. Actually, Ghost’s looking for you. He’s been by twice to see if you’re in yet.”
Michael took a step back. “He’s at the clubhouse?”
“Yeah.”
He shoved his hands in his cut pockets and walked that direction. Probably later he’d regret that his bike wasn’t close at hand, but he anticipated walking back, taking on an oil change or something. He at least wanted to check the work order board and see if there was a good time in the coming weeks to work Holly’s car into the rotation. It really did need that new paint job.
As so often happened after an aggressive snow, the morning was mild, the sky blue and brushed with wisps of high clouds. Everything was wet and gleaming as the snow continued to melt with ever-increasing speed. The water was evaporating, making the lot humid, shot through at moments by a cold breeze coming off the river with that usual taint of muck.
He was almost at the clubhouse, was walking past the small central office building where Maggie Teague ran this entire battleship, when he spotted Ava Teague climbing out of her truck. Ava Lécuyer, he had to remind himself. Here to visit with her mother, most like.
He paused.
He’d approached her before, and almost put a question to her the day she’d brought brownies to the boys after church. It had been on the tip of his tongue to ask her, but he’d been less certain then, still struggling with his own understanding of what was happening in his personal life. And Mercy had been there, glaring at him. So he’d backed off.
Price of Angels (Dartmoor Book 2) Page 25