CHAPTER 12
CHARGE
I stand in that fuckin’ window, staring at the door to Kayla’s place, wonderin’ how Nickel and Creech and all my other hot-headed brothers handle the fuckin’ rage. I know I’m made different than them. The hippie bitch who birthed me gifted me a good dose of mellow in my DNA, and Boots laughs at the good and the bad alike.
What the fuck am I goin’ to do with this killin’ urge when there’s no motherfucker to put down? Maybe if Kayla’s shitty excuses for parents did what they were supposed to do at the time, there’d be a name. Leads. But six, seven years on?
Who remembers who all was at a kegger when they was fifteen?
One thing for sure: that fucker who let his little girl out of his sight to walk into trouble and then didn’t have her back after? No kind of father at all.
Not all my brothers are stand-up. Bullet, for one, has a bad record when it comes to child support. Dude cannot grasp that givin’ his old lady a sack of cash when he wins at the races and then going into arrears when shit gets lean is not acceptable support in the eyes of the state. But there’s not a one of them that wouldn’t paint the walls with blood if a fucker touched his kid.
My body ain’t used to this shit. Muscles bunched to cramping, gut sour, fuckin’ fists locked so hard my knuckles look like they gonna bust from the skin. A ride would chill me out, but I ain’t movin’ from this house. She may not be in my bed, but that girl across the parking pad is mine. Her boy, too.
I don’t know when it happened.
And it’s strange. I was addicted to Harper. Wild for her classy pussy. Ate shit from my brothers for years for puttin’ up with her drama. But I never felt this click. One minute I’m checkin’ out a sweet peach of an ass, then click, next minute my soul is fuckin’ sick cause I can’t go back in time and kill a man. Men.
Fuck.
I need to do something.
That girl and her boy need to be under my roof.
Fuck. I need a god damn roof. And I don’t know what I’m thinkin’, but an hour later I’ve got a measuring tape and a hammer, up in the attic, with floorboards pried up, examinin’ the joists. Checkin’ to see if they’d hold a second floor.
“Fuckin’ squirrel! Get out of my damn attic!” Pops yells at one point, and I hear a thump, likely from a thrown boot.
“Go back to sleep!” I holler back.
He’s been after me—since Harper and I split—to move back in. I didn’t want to do that, didn’t want to go backwards in my life.
Now, though, one thing I know with some clarity. Bein’ with Harper wasn’t movin’ forwards. Bein’ with her demanded nothin’ from me. I just had to go along with the good times.
Kayla, though…my girl is work. But she’s worth the work.
After exhausting myself with sketchin’ out plans for an addition—those joists are solid, but not close enough to support another floor—I get a few hours of sleep before it’s time to drive Kayla to work.
She’s hidin’ when I go up to get her. Her hair’s down in her face. Fussin’ over Jimmy while he finishes his cereal. All bashful.
I slap her ass so she knows where we stand.
She shrieks and makes a little angry face at me. Her eyes ain’t worried no more, though.
I could slap her ass all day if it makes her feel better.
Oh, sweet Lord, now that image is in my head. Kayla bent over my knee, round ass bright red, squirmin’ and whimperin’, beggin’ me to stop and make her feel all better.
I gotta pull it together. Remember where I am. And what my girl’s been through. I don’t need to be thinkin’ shit like that. Besides, I’m spendin’ the day with the little guy. I need to focus on that.
“Ready, bud?”
Jimmy nods, grabs his toy tool belt from where he must have set it out on the bed.
“Mama says we’re going to fix her car.”
“We gonna try. You got your belt?”
Jimmy nods, buckles it around his waist, and says, “I ain’t bringing my tools cause they ain’t real.”
“They’re not real,” Kayla corrects, grabbin’ her shit from the kitchen counter and stuffin’ her purse.
“I know, Mama. That’s what I said.”
Jimmy races out the door ahead of us, and I take advantage, pullin’ Kayla close, arm tight around the small of her back so I’m restin’ my forearm on that juicy ass. I take a sip from her pretty lips, taste the gloss, groan.
She sighs, soft, like she don’t mean to. From that open face of hers, I can tell her brain’s been twistin’ shit. She ain’t totally at ease, like she was when she was tuckin’ into that steak last night. But that’s part of the work, isn’t it? My girl don’t understand what it is to belong to a man.
She will.
Once she moves in with me, she ain’t workin’ no more. Or if she does, it’ll be at one of the club’s businesses where I know she’s taken care of.
It ’bout kills me—after last night—to drive her to General Goods, let her walk past those gates in that ass-ugly, red-collared shirt. But I do. After I drag her into me for a kiss that leaves her shaky and flushed the same color as her shirt.
I can’t rush in, make demands, swing my cock around like some brothers do. Not with Kayla. She’s young and sweet and the world ain’t treated her right.
I got to do this right.
And I have no fuckin’ clue how.
“How you doin’ bud?” I glance at Jimmy in the rearview. Like his mama, he don’t say much. Not unless he’s into something like fishin’. He don’t talk to hear himself. It’s nice.
“Good.”
Little dude’s added a matchbox car and a small rubber duckie to the soldiers he’s got battling in the back seat. No idea where they came from, but the duckie ain’t long for the world. He’s surrounded, and the soldiers are now mobile.
When we roll up to the garage, Jimmy tucks the soldiers into the pocket of his tool belt.
Scrap is here, and so’s Gus and some of the older guys. They’re workin’ on a rebuild. Or rather bossin’ around some prospects, supervisin’ and drinkin’ beers. It is a Saturday.
“Charge, what up?” My brothers greet me, not hidin’ their curiosity at my little helper. I ain’t never had no kid in tow before. “Who’s the little dude?”
“This is my man Jimmy. We gonna work on the Corolla. Parts in?”
Scrap nods and leaves off his work to show me where my shit got stored.
Jimmy is all big eyes, checkin’ out the lifts and the workbenches. He sticks close to my heels, and it feels strange. Strange but right.
“Shit’s still boxed,” Scrap points out.
“Ayup.” I know what he’s hintin’ at.
“Easy enough to return. Southwestern is down with us. They’ll take it back, no questions.”
I shake my head and lift the box onto my shoulder, headin’ for the bay with Kayla’s car.
Scrap follows. Don’t know when he got so interested in other people’s business. Actually been keepin’ most to himself since his release.
He helps me get the hood up, and I pick Jimmy up and set him on the bumper so he can see better.
“You put that new engine in there, you puttin’ lipstick on a pig.” Scrap eyes me like I’m dumb or gone crazy.
Jimmy giggles. I guess at the idea of lipstick on a pig.
“Little man, this your mama’s car?” Scrap asks.
Jimmy nods.
“She love it, I guess?”
Jimmy shakes his head. “I don’t think so. She kicks it sometimes. And she calls it the Crapolla.”
Scrap gives me the eye. “What you doin’, brother? Throwin’ good money after bad on this.”
“My money,” I point out. Shouldn’t have to.
“So put it toward somethin’ new. You could almost buy a better used straight out for what you’re payin’ for parts for this piece of sh—, er, crap.”
“Cain’t just buy a female a car.”
�
��So lease.” Scrap shrugs and stalks away, back to his own bay, leaving Jimmy and I staring at a rusted-out hulk with a busted, black-coated engine.
The asshole has a point. I ain’t in this for kicks. And my old lady ain’t gonna be drivin’ a Crapolla.
“Change of plans, little dude. We goin’ shoppin’.”
He looks a little crestfallen. “I hate shopping.”
“For a car.”
He perks up a little at that.
And he’s a good partner, Jimmy is. We start at the Ford dealer up near Ebensburg, and each time we look under a hood, he stands next to me, arms crossed like mine, stone-faced. Freaks the sales guys out. They try and tousle his hair, offer him a lollipop, but he ain’t havin’ it. Kid’s got a world class poker face.
What was his dad like? A fuckin’ rapist, for one.
Second thought, I don’t like that fuckin’ question. Jimmy don’t have a dad yet, but he will, and ain’t nobody’ll need to be askin’ any questions about anythin’ after that.
The rage washes through me again, not so bad as last night, but enough that the sales guy backs up a step or two from me.
I make an effort to pull myself out of it.
“Think your mama needs a backup camera?”
Jimmy and I are checkin’ out an SUV. Pig Iron’s old lady drives this model. So does Grinder’s. The bitches like the clearance since they always ridin’ over curbs and shit.
“What’s that?”
“See this screen here? Shows what’s behind the car. So she can see when she’s backing up.”
“Mama don’t need that. She’s got eyes there.”
“What? Where?” the sales guy asks.
“In the back of her head. That’s what she says. ‘I have eyes in the back of my head.’ So I don’t think she needs a camera to see back there.”
I don’t laugh out loud, but it’s close.
In the end, I pick a vehicle with the backup camera, curve control, highest safety rating, heated steering wheel, all of it. I put ten thousand down, makin’ a mental note to return the parts and move some funds around.
Then I have a prospect meet me, swap the car seat into the SUV, and send him back to Pops’ with my truck. And then, finally, I can get my girl. I pick up three sodas on the way. Jimmy’s stoked. Apparently he don’t get soda much. Must be a luxury my girl can’t afford.
Those times are over now.
Not that she knows it.
She’s surprised when I pull up. I walk around to open her door, and a foot away, that vanilla scent hits me, turns me rock hard. I tug her close to hide it, but I want her to feel it, too. Know what this is. I kiss her, no tongue; the kid’s awake in the back.
She looks all flustered and confused and in her eyes I can see the heat for me. She don’t know what it is, what to do with it. I understand better now why that may be. But that don’t stop me from restin’ my hands on that lush ass, down low where her boy can’t see if he were lookin’—which he ain’t cause that duckie is makin’ a comeback; somethin’ has made that kid hyper. I cup that ass, massage, stoke that heat until I get a sweet whimper.
“Brought you somethin’.” I gesture to her new ride.
“What’s this?” She likes it. Her eyes sweep from hood to trunk with appreciation. But she’s unsure.
I’ve thought this out. A little bullshit for the sake of takin’ it slow. “Loaner. The Corolla’s gonna take a little longer than I thought.”
“Oh. I guess…that’s okay.”
“You guess?” I nibble the puffy bottom lip she’s been workin’ with her teeth. She giggles, and I figure I’m the hottest fuckin’ thing in western PA.
“Thank you,” she says, soft. And then she glances in the car window. “Did you bring me a soda?” She smiles. The prettiest smile, no fakeness to it, all gentle and toothy and delighted. I mean, fuck, I bought her a car.
But it took a pop to earn that smile.
CHAPTER 13
KAYLA
Sue’s already made herself comfortable on my bed. She’s dip-dyed her long black hair white, and she looks more than ever like a pin-up girl painted on the side of an old airplane. She’s playing with Jimmy, mostly letting him build a tall tower with blocks and then ramming into it with a matchbox car until the blocks scatter everywhere. Build, ram, repeat.
I’m fidgeting, packing and unpacking the same blue cardigan in my overnight bag. When Charge gets home from work, he’s taking me away for the weekend. On his bike.
Except for Charge taking me on short rides along the river while Jimmy hangs out with Pops and Shirlene, I’ve never ridden on his bike before. And that’s not all I’ve never done before. Or rather… I push the ugly thoughts away.
Charge and I have talked about it. He understands. I don’t have to worry. If I’m in the mood, we’ll do it. If I don’t, we don’t.
“Leave it, nervous Nelly,” Sue orders, tugging the cardigan out of my hands.
I do and sink into a chair, but she’s right. I’m a ball of nerves. Charge has been taking me on dates—he calls them dates and makes me call them that when I slip and say we’re hanging out—for over a month now. He’s taken Jimmy and me bowling, fishing on a boat up on Lake Patonquin, and to a cookout at this guy Dizzy’s house.
Dizzy’s one of his brothers from the MC. That was an experience. He’s married to a crazy biker chick close to my age named Fay-Lee. Well, I think they’re married. Fay-Lee wears a vest with a top rocker that reads property of , and Dizzy calls her his old lady. She also wears something that looks like a dog collar.
They’ve got kids, though, two boys a little older than Jimmy. Dizzy’s from a first marriage. Fay-Lee’s the stepmom. The kids were as crazy as Fay-Lee, cussin’ bold as day, roughhousing, no shirts, no shoes, and elbows and knees all scraped to hell. Jimmy loved every minute playing with them. And they took off with him like he was a long lost brother. I teared up a little at that. No one noticed except Charge. And then Charge looked mad as hell until I smiled at him.
Charge gets worried when I frown. He always wants to know what’s wrong so he can fix it. I usually make up something around the house, a loose floorboard or a window that sticks in the frame. He feels better once he makes it right.
I don’t tell him it’s usually black thoughts. Wondering that gets me nowhere. Regrets.
I have a lot, and they’re stubborn suckers.
Now, though, I have something good besides Jimmy. I’ve got a boyfriend. And to my complete surprise, he’s sweet as hell.
After each date, Charge walks Jimmy and me up the steps to our place, kisses me gently―sometimes on my forehead, sometimes my cheek, sometimes the quickest brush across my lips—and then he reminds me about the deadbolt and goes back to Pops’.
He’s been staying at Pops’ most nights. When he isn’t there, I know he’s at his work site. He gets home early in the morning, mud-caked and exhausted, with worry wrinkling his eyes. They have a problem with trespassers, and I can tell it frustrates him. He shakes it off real easy though once his boots are off. I don’t think the man has an uptight bone in his body.
Me, though. I’m wound tight.
Every week, every respectful kiss, the anticipation grows. We’re going to have to do it at some point. And I want to.
I’m scared, but I’m ready. I think.
“You have Charge’s cell phone number, right?” I check with Sue. Again.
“Yes. And yours. Charge texted me where you’ll be staying and the phone number there.”
“Where are we staying?”
I’ve tried to worm the information out of Sue a few times already, but she’s keeping mum. She came with us fishing on Lake Patonquin, and even though she wouldn’t cast a line and played RPGs on her phone the whole time, she had fun. She says Charge is the first guy in a man bun she thought she couldn’t take in a fight.
“And you know all of Jimmy’s emergency numbers are on the fridge. Pediatrician. Dentist. Poison Control.”
“You
r mom thinks we’re gonna be having way more fun than we actually are,” Sue tells Jimmy and winks.
That’s when I hear the engine to Charge’s bike and my nerves go truly bonkers. I flush hot, sweat breaks out behind my knees, and I grab the cardigan and shove it back in my bag like it’s a life preserver.
Sue sits up, one smooth movement—damn her rock-solid abs—and she grins, her eyes full of love.
“You’re gonna have fun, Kayla-cakes. Breathe.”
I can’t. My throat is parched.
I’m going off on a weekend away with a biker who’s probably been with hundreds of women, and I have no idea what I’m doing, and what if I freak out in the middle of it, and am I really going to leave Jimmy to have sex with some guy? What if he falls and breaks an arm? Doesn’t that make me the worst mother on the planet?
Sue narrows her eyes and reads my mind.
“Jimmy and I are going to spend the next two days eating junk food, going to the arcade, eating more junk food, going to see a superhero double feature, getting ice cream, and then we’re going to go to Municipal Park and run around with no shoes on.”
Jimmy brightens up. He loves his Aunt Sue. He knows she’s serious. She’s a big-time spoiler. And kind of a nut.
“And you know what else? If you don’t go on this well-deserved little getaway with Hottie McManBun, Jimmy and I won’t get to spend all this quality time together.”
I nod. I appreciate her trying to talk me down.
“No, Kayla. I’m serious. Jimmy’s my godson. Loving on him is a gift. Don’t crap on my gift with your garbage-culture induced mom-guilt.”
My eyes mist. “Don’t let him run around in Municipal Park with no shoes. There’s goose poop all over the place.”
“Okay,” Sue says, pulling me to her by the back of my head to plant a loud, wet kiss on my forehead. “Now kiss Jimmy and go ride off into the sunset with McManBun.”
“Could you make him sound less hot?”
“Kayla, nothing on the planet could make that man less hot. Enjoy. For all of womankind, honey. Go.”
✽✽✽
“That’s a champagne glass bathtub.”
Charge: A Steel Bones Motorcycle Club Romance Page 12