Greetings from Sugartown

by Carmen Jenner

  “Just now, when you came, you whispered something.”

  “I did?” Fuck. That shit was more mind-blowing than even I had planned. If I could high-five myself right now, I abso-fucking-lutely would.

  “You just said ‘marry me’.”

  Oh, fuck.

  “Can you maybe untie me? I think the restraints are stopping the blood flow to my head,” Ana says, her voice taking on the panicked tone she uses when she has fifty pies to bake for a pie drive, and only a day left to do it in. Like an arsehole, I let the most important words I’ll ever say slip out of my mouth in the heat of the moment, and now I have no way to take it back. I can’t let fucking her in the arse be our proposal story.

  I am so fucking screwed.

  THE PANICKED look on Elijah’s face when he slips the blindfold from my eyes is all the assurance I need to know he didn’t mean what he just blurted out. I mean, no man in their right mind would ask a woman to marry them after he’d just had his penis stuck in his intended wife’s arse. Oh my God. Do married couples even have anal sex? Did I just seal my fate as a lonely old crazy cat lady? I should never have let him stick it in my arse. Now he’s forever going to think of me as that girlfriend he had that one time who let him tie her up and take him down double penetration lane.

  “Are you okay?” he asks as he lets out a shaky breath. He avoids my gaze as he unties my hands. I wince at the sudden rush of blood as it flows back to my extremities.

  “Uh-huh.” I nod, and ease back onto the bed. I wish I had the top sheet to cover me. I stare at the ribbons he made of my Egyptian cotton sheets, and my temper flares. God damn it. I loved those sheets, and now I’m about to lose the love of my life and my favourite sheet set, all in one night.

  “I’m just gonna go clean up,” Elijah says, as he scuttles sideways towards the door, with the remainder of my sheet wrapped around his waist. It’s as if he’s afraid to take his eyes from me in case I take him down, a lioness claiming a gazelle. He lets the door slam behind him, and I hear him slump against the other side.

  Oh God. I let him fuck me in the arse, and he’s freaked out by how much I liked it. And that proposal? What the hell was that? I didn’t think he was serious. I mean, who proposes in the middle of kinky anal sex? Elijah was in a complete panic when he left the room. He’s probably out there thinking up ways to end it.

  I lie here freezing, anxiously waiting for him to return, and then it dawns on me: I shouldn’t be feeling this way. This is his fault. He’s the kinky one here. I just go along with what feels good, but if we want to get technical, he’s the one who should be embarrassed. Not me. I should be fuming. He took my arse without even having a conversation about it, and he ruined my sheets. My very expensive, very soft, very, very expensive sheets.

  Elijah is the reason I can never have nice things.

  After several long minutes of lying in a wet patch—and my own mortification—the bedroom door opens, and Elijah comes in. He’s still avoiding my gaze as he drops the towel from around his waist and throws on a pair of loose, worn house pants. I get up and strip the under sheet from the bed, wrapping it around me in an attempt to make my mad dash to the shower a little less humiliating.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Shower.”

  “Ana,” he says, and then pauses when he sees my eyes darting back and forth between him and the door. “About what I said—”

  “It’s fine, I didn’t think you meant it anyway.”

  “Wait, what the hell is that supposed to mean?” he asks, and he looks pissed. His dark gaze bores into mine. That little muscle in his jaw that pops out when he’s furious starts ticking.

  “Marriage?” I supply in an are-you-fucking-crazy tone of voice. “It’s not like you’re ready for that.”

  “Excuse me?”

  I snap my gaze up from the floor to stare at him. Why is he so pissed off about this? This is Elijah we’re talking about. I know he loves me, just as much as I love him, but sometimes I feel like the part of him that likes to pull away for self-preservation is going to come rearing its way to the top, and ruin all we’ve worked so hard to accomplish. Sometimes it’s hard not to see us having an expiration date. Clearly, though, from the way he’s acting, this is not something he thinks about.

  “You don’t think we’re ready for that?”

  “I …” I pause, trying to understand why he’s so mad. “Do you?”

  “I asked you first,” he demands. At first I think he’s just being facetious, but when I finally meet his gaze, there’s nothing in his expression that could be considered playful. Furious, but certainly not playful.

  “Honestly? I don’t know. Sometimes I wonder if it’s all going to come crashing down around us, you know?”

  “Why?”

  “Why not? Look at our relationship up until this point: secrets, lies, jail time, MCs hell-bent on killing us both, not to mention outside factors, like my dad, Scott … Nicole.”

  “What the hell does she have to do with us?”

  “What doesn’t she have to do with us?” I demand. “You screwed her, Elijah.”

  “Yeah, years ago. Have I fucked anyone but you since? No!”

  My voice rises in pitch to match his own. “The second she came back to town you starting acting shady.”

  Elijah runs his palms over his face, as if he’s had enough. “That’s what tonight was about, wasn’t it? That’s why I come home to find you and Kick passed out drunk? That’s what it comes down to, huh? That you still don’t fucking trust me, after everything.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Isn’t it? Why were you so worried about me working late, Ana? You think I want that filthy fucking whore?”

  “Well it certainly didn’t stop you too long ago.”

  “You know what? You’re right. We obviously aren’t ready for marriage. We can’t have a single fucking conversation without wanting to tear one another apart.”

  “Didn’t I tell you that’s how it would be?” My voice cracks over the question. I swallow past the lump in my throat. “Didn’t I say that from the very beginning, that we’d tear one another apart? And look at us. Three years on, and we’re still fighting.”

  “Because you still don’t trust me.” He stalks over towards the tallboy and yanks open a drawer. Feeling around the underside of the dresser, he locates an object, wrenches it free and throws a sticky-tape covered ring box on the bed. “I bought it two weeks ago. You remember that night that Jack finally went home after two days of playing Xbox on our couch, and you were making pies in the kitchen? I had to have you right there on the bench, and afterward, when we were lying on the floor, sticky with chocolate sauce, I wrapped you in my arms and said I never wanted to move again. I just wanted life to go on around us, without us, so we could always stay right there in that moment. You told me I’d get tired of screwing you because you’d eventually get old and wrinkly, and be covered in stretchmarks from having my fat babies ravage your body.

  “I wanted that, the moment those words left your mouth. I wanted all that. I wanted you barefoot and pregnant in our kitchen; I wanted to wake up to your face every morning. I wanted forever with the woman I love. I wanted it so much that the very next day I drove halfway to Brisbane to buy you that ring, and I’ve spent every second since trying to figure out a proposal worthy of you.” He points to the offending box on the bed. “I still want that. But obviously we’re not where I thought we were.”

  Tears sting my eyes, and I close my lids as they trail down my cheeks. “I had no idea. I’m sorry.”

  “You know, I think that’s what hurts the most. Hearing you say that we’re—” He shakes his head, “—that I’m not ready for that. You couldn’t be more wrong. Obviously, though, I’m the fucking chump here, because I never would have thought we wouldn’t be on the same page about this.” He exhales loudly and stalks over to the chest of drawers. He yanks off his pants and throws them to the floor before pulling on a pair of faded jea
ns, a T-shirt and his leather jacket.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Out.”

  “Out where? It’s after three,” I demand. I stalk over to him, still wrapped in my sheet, and trying desperately not to trip as I race him to the door. “Elijah, we should talk about this.”

  “I’m all talked out, baby girl,” he says, and slides his thumb over the tears coursing down my cheeks. “We’re obviously on different pages here. It’s okay—”

  “We’re not. I just need some time to adjust. I just need to be sure this isn’t all going to blow up in our faces.”

  “See, that’s the thing. If we were on the same page you wouldn’t need time to think, and you certainly wouldn’t be second guessing whether it was all going to fall apart.” He reaches for the door handle, and I place my hand over his.

  “Stay.”

  He shakes his head. “I can’t.”

  “Why?” I ask, furious.

  “Because you just ripped my heart right out of my chest, Ana. I need a couple seconds to deal with it.”

  “I didn’t say no,” I offer unhelpfully.

  “You didn’t say yes, either,” he whispers and leaves the room, closing the door quietly behind him. I slide down the wall, sitting heavily on the carpet, tangled in my flimsy sheet and all the words I left unsaid.

  I’M UNDER the hood of a beautiful navy-blue 1967 SHELBY GT350. The car belongs to an old friend of Bob’s, but the owner doesn’t do this baby justice on account of never taking her out of the garage, other than to get a service every few years. He probably kicks over the engine every couple of weeks, but a car like this needs to feel the blacktop beneath her wheels to really clean the cobwebs from her system. A car like this needs to be worshipped. If I owned this car, I’d drive it every weekend, and then I’d drive Ana’s pussy into the plush leather backseat. Yeah, okay, so I probably wouldn’t fit in the backseat, but a man can dream.

  “Hey, I’m heading over to the diner for lunch. You want something?” Kick asks. I slide out from under the hood.

  “Yeah, can you get me a meat pie, vanilla milkshake, and a slice of Old Melty Eyes? Wallet’s on the back bench.”

  “Your girlfriend makes you pay for lunch?” He picks up my wallet and fishes out a twenty.

  “She might today,” I deadpan, thinking of the way we left things last night. We still haven’t talked about it. I drove around the deserted streets of Sugartown for an hour before realising there was nowhere else to run. I finally went home, made up the couch, and tossed and turned for two hours. The van pulling out of the drive woke me at seven. Ana hadn’t said goodbye.

  Call me a chump, but I’m not going anywhere. Not even if she begs me to. I love her. I already know I can’t live without her, so even though it rips my heart open to know she’s not ready to be mine forever, I’ll wait.

  “If Ana’s on a break, the other girls will make you pay.” I say.

  “I don’t know, man. I think Kristine has a crush on me.”

  “You mean she didn’t shank your sorry arse after you fucked her on my couch and blew her off in the morning?” I ask, shaking my head. “I hope you got a small fortune tucked away in that wallet of yours, because that girl is high maintenance. She took Ana and Holly shopping one day, and Jack and I have been in hiding from the credit card companies ever since.”

  “Don’t need money when you’re blessed with a cock as big as mine.”

  “Keep dreamin’, wanker. I’ve seen that ‘big cock’ of yours, remember? You’re no Jonah Falcon.”

  “Let’s see what pretty Ana has to say about it.” He throws over his shoulder as he heads for the door. “I’ll be sure to give her a kiss for you.”

  “You do and you’re a dead man.”

  “What’s the matter, Moose? Afraid she’ll like it too much?”

  “You really aren’t fond of your balls are ya, mate?”

  “Relax, Ana’s sweet, and her rack …” Kick raises his brows and smiles like a motherfucker who needs his face beaten in. “… but I’m not interested.”

  “Make sure it stays the hell that way, or your nose won’t be the only thing I’m breaking.”

  “I could take you.”

  “In your dreams, mate.” I throw the spanner down beside me. “You know what? I’m kinda in the mood for a side of hot arse with my pie. I’m coming with you.” I get off the trolley and head to our tiny basin in the back to scrub up. I gotta go talk to her. I gotta set this shit to rights, let her scream, and yell, and throw things at me if she has to. All I know is every second without her fucking sucks, and if she doesn’t wanna get married, fine, I can live with that, as long as it’s what she wants. As long as she never walks away.

  “Who’s gonna watch the shop?”

  “You are. After you collect lunch, you’re coming right back over here to keep an eye on things while I take my sexy-as-fuck girlfriend out the back and show her the true meaning of God.”

  “Smooth, Moose.” Kick shakes his head and laughs. “Real smooth.”

  We head on out through the garage door. Our bikes are sitting curb side, and Kick runs his hand over the seat of my baby when we pass. “I can’t believe you still have this piece of shit, man. You not making enough to buy a new one?”

  “Hey, hey, hey. No one talks about my baby that way.” I stroke her seat lovingly. “Shh, don’t worry, kitten, Daddy knows how to keep you purring.”

  “Jesus. When did you become such a paedophile?”

  “I ain’t trading in. That piece of shit there has been in my family for years. It’s the only thing I have left of my grandpa. And now … I guess my dad, too.”

  “I’m sorry man,” Kick says as he leans back on the seat of his bike. “He fought like a fucking mountain lion before they finished him off. He deserved better.”

  “No, he didn’t. The families he tore apart deserved better. Mum and Lil deserved better. Hell, even I deserved better.” I let out a shaky breath, and lower my voice. “I’m not sorry he’s dead, Kick. Been a long time coming, and he deserved everything he got.”

  “Come on, man, you don’t feel nothing knowing he’s worm food?”

  “Oh, I feel plenty, all right. I just have nothing left to give him.”

  Across the street, Antonio’s door swings open and Nicole exits the pizzeria, hand in hand with Scott fucking Turner. I shake my head, preparing to turn away and forget all about them—fucking deserve each other if you ask me—when it dawns on me that he’s dining right next door to Belle’s Pies, and he’s breaking the restraining order again. I stalk toward the happy couple, hell-bent on pounding his face into last week, but then Kick is all up in my face, pushing me back.

  “Get out of the fucking way.”

  “Hey, think about this, man,” Kick reasons, pushing at my chest in an effort to get me to back up. He’s not exactly gentle, and it doesn’t fucking tickle, I can tell you that much. “You don’t need to wind up in jail while that cock-fuck is here on the outside, where he can get at your girl.”

  “Can’t get to my girl if he’s in the fucking ground, now, can he?”

  “Ethan, stop,” he commands. The use of my real name jolts me right out of my rage.

  “Stop fucking calling me that.”

  “You go over there acting like a bull in a china shop, you’ll bring the cops down on our arses quicker than you can blink. If you want to teach him a lesson, do it someplace not so public.”

  “Yeah, well, short of breaking into his parents’ house again and punching his lights out in the middle of the night, he’s always in public.”

  “He walks home from the pub most nights,” he offers, then adds, “Alone.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “That night Ana lost it at the bar, I was there. I didn’t know what had happened; I didn’t even know if you two were still together. He could have been her overprotective boyfriend who just liked to watch her pee in public toilets for all I knew. But the fear in her eyes told me different.�
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  “You saw him approach her, and you didn’t step in?”

  “Of course I didn’t step in, you dumb fuck. I just told you I didn’t have any idea who the hell he was, and I needed to stay on the down low until I figured out what I was going to do. I’d seen the two of you argue in the street before, but that could have meant anything. When I saw you come in, looking like someone had stole your fucking firstborn, and there was gonna be hell to pay, I knew the two of you were still on. And I knew this dickwad had to have done something pretty bad to make you lose your shit that way.” He scrubs at his beard, raking unkempt nails along the sparse, dark brown hair. The sound grates on my nerves. Everything grates on my nerves. “The only time I’ve ever seen you show that much damn emotion was that night we ambushed you, and Maggot attacked her. So I followed him home. I did the same the following night, and the one after.”

  “So all I have to do is sit around Dave’s all night, waiting for him to leave?”

  Kick shrugs. “Sounds like fun to me.”

  “I wouldn’t ask you to do this for me.”

  “I know, brother, I’m offering.” He pauses, as if he’s unsure about going further. “If he did what I think he did, I wanna string him up by the balls and make him watch as we peel the skin from his limp dick. I’ve grown kinda fond of my future sister-in-law.”

  “It’s what you’re thinking, and so much worse,” I say, straight-faced.

  “Then I can’t wait to play big bad biker again. We’ll have that little bitch screaming for his mamma within seconds.”

  I can’t help but smile. I know it’s not the right thing to do. I know Ana would be horrified with me even entertaining the idea, but I can’t give this fucker any more leeway, because the one time I turn my back is the one time he’ll drive the knife into it.

  There’s no room for Scott Turner in this town anymore. And I’m sure I’m not the only one who believes it.

  “You’re going out?” Ana asks, taking in my jacket and the keychain dangling from my hands. She was out making deliveries today when Kick and I finally made it across the road to Belle’s, and I haven’t had a moment alone with her since.