FURIOUS

by Honey Palomino

“Shhh! He seems nice, actually.”

  “Nice?” she asked. “A guy that looks like that? Sexy, sure. Fucking white-hot, absolutely. But nice? I doubt that.”

  “You never know,” I shrugged.

  “You’re right,” she said. “I bet he’s amazing in bed. Look how big his hands are! You know what they say about guys with big hands…”

  “Yeah, they wear big gloves,” I replied, rolling my eyes and shaking my head. “Stop gawking, Tara. They’re going to be here for a while, they said.”

  “Oh, that’s fantastic! Give him your number!”

  “What? No!”

  “Yes! C’mon, Jackie,” she whined. “I need to live vicariously through you.” Tara had been married to Jimmy Daniels since right after high school and I’d heard all about how the spark had faded from their marriage recently. If Tara wasn’t such a loyal wife, I had no doubt she’d be giving Fury her own number. “Please? Besides, you could use a good roll in the hay. You’ve been insufferably tense lately.”

  “I’m not tense!” I protested.

  “Yes, you are! Ever since your Ma died and left you in charge of this place, you’ve been ready to break like a tightly wound guitar string. You could use a little…distraction. Or, a big one,” she winked, shaking her head. “Whew! Those hands…”

  I took a deep breath and shook my head.

  “No.” I said, leaving her in the kitchen as I walked back out to their table. They’d left the cash for the check on the table, and I grabbed it with a smile, once again seeking the safety of Grace’s kind, totally not-dangerous gaze.

  “Keep the change,” she said.

  “Thank you, kindly,” I said, putting the money in my apron pocket.

  “Jackie, what’s your favorite watering hole? Where do people hang out the most?” Grace asked.

  “Well, there’s only two in town. Jack’s Green Room is on the corner, that’s where most of the older crowd go.”

  “What do you mean by older?”

  “I mean the one’s who have been going to the same bar at the same time everyday to play shuffleboard with their same friends for the last forty years. Those older people.”

  Fury broke out laughing and I glanced down at him, delighting in the cluster of smile lines that formed at the corner of his eyes.

  “There’s another tavern, the Green Frog, on the other end of town. A bit of a younger crowd there, and a great jukebox. You don’t feel like you stepped into a time machine so much. Patty, the bartender, makes a great margarita. If you’re into that.”

  “Thank you,” Grace said. “Anything else fun to do around here?”

  I looked down at Fury, instinctively wondering just how much fun he would be. I imagined he’d far surpass the carousel on the riverfront, which was technically one of the only things I could suggest for them.

  “There’s a carousel down the street at the riverfront. Lots of birds to watch on the river, a few trails that lead off into the woods. There’s a movie theater, a steak house, and this diner you’re currently sitting in. A few shops. That’s about it. You can probably cover all of that in about three hours tops.”

  “Got it,” Grace said. “I guess we’ll see you again soon?”

  “I’m here every day,” I shrugged.

  “Great,” Fury said, his voice a low growl that seemed to come out of nowhere, surprising even him. He grunted and cleared his throat quickly.

  I smiled and nodded politely.

  “Well, have a great day,” I said, walking away quickly before they could see the blush rising in my cheeks. Tara was waiting for me behind the counter with a look of irritation on her face.

  “You didn’t give him your number!”

  “No, I didn’t,” I said, swallowing hard and pushing past her.

  “You’re hopeless,” she said, shaking her head.

  “Maybe,” I murmured, as I filled my coffee pot up, knowing full well I’d not seen the last of Fury. My heart pounded in my chest like a drum, the aching anticipation of future sightings settling into my stomach like a heavy rock.

  CHAPTER 11

  FURY

  Ma taught me not to stare at strangers.

  Asher taught me not to stare at women.

  He wasn’t my father, but he might as well have been. Father to my two best friends, Malice and Mayhem — oh, wait a minute, they’re using their given names now. I’ll get used to it eventually, but it still hasn’t stuck. They’re calling themselves Nate and Eli now — but anyway, their old man, Asher, was more of a father to me than my own old man. I hooked up with Nate and Eli the last day of the sixth grade at Chapman Hill elementary school. We were all awkward as fuck back then. All lanky limbs and pimples and big balls of confusion.

  It’s painful to think about it now. I guess that’s why I latched onto their family so tightly, though, because for the first time in my short life, I felt like I needed one. At least an older guy to bounce stuff off of, you know?

  Puberty and shit…

  A kid has questions, you know?

  I sure didn’t find any answers at home. Dad was absent entirely, and Ma might as well have not even been there, she was so checked out after he left. I mean, she tried, don’t get me wrong. But she failed, big time.

  Asher was unlike anyone I’d ever known. He was a man’s man. He respected everyone, even his brother Rebel, who he later ended up shooting because Asher walked in on him attacking his girlfriend.

  That was his first stroke of bad luck.

  The bullet ricocheting into his girlfriend’s skull was the second.

  Now, he was gone, serving life in prison for one mistake made during a rage of passion that had not only changed Asher’s life, it’d changed the life of everyone who served in the club. By that time, I was deep in it. Eli and Nate had grown up in it, they’d never known anything but the close-knit family of the Loyal Gentlemen, however unusual and untraditional it might have been to grow up in a biker family.

  But it was unlike anything I’d ever known.

  I didn’t care. I loved them, in fact, in all their gritty glory. The day I was patched in was the happiest of my life. I’d finally found a family and I knew nothing could ever take that away.

  Boy, was I wrong.

  Now, it was all gone. All of it. Everything I’d used to identify myself in the past had been ripped away from me as soon as that bullet left the barrel of Asher’s gun.

  It seemed like so long ago…

  Which is maybe why the good manners I’d been taught by Asher seemed to have faded to a distant spot in the back of my mind, because here I was, in a rundown greasy spoon in some tiny ass town and my eyes were so firmly glued to the vixen waiting on us, that I felt like I was in a trance.

  I wasn’t Fury anymore.

  I wasn’t here to help out the people who’d so graciously given us a chance at redemption. The Gods have given us an opportunity to rebuild everything we’ve lost. Grace and Ryder sat across from me, but I barely saw them right then.

  Instead, I couldn’t tear my gaze away from the way this beautiful woman’s shiny black hair brushed back and forth against her back, couldn’t stop looking at the way it cascaded down to her sweetly swaying ass. I couldn’t stop running my eyes all the way down her endless legs and then snap back up to literally the most beautiful face I’d ever seen.

  I mean, listen — she was prettier than the Mona Lisa, prettier than Elizabeth Taylor in A Date With Judy, prettier than Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, even prettier than my very first girlfriend, Wednesday Reynolds in the ninth grade, and Wednesday was — until today — the first place winner of the 'Prettiest Girl I’d Ever Seen’ trophy that lives in my head.

  I wasn’t completely lost. I mean, I tried to snap out of it a few times, turn my attention away from the waitress, but then she’d just sashay up to the table, all lavender perfume and velvety skin, with a voice that was sweeter than honey — and it was like getting run over by a train each time.

  That’s what she wa
s like — a beautiful train wreck that I couldn’t look away from. Perhaps that’s not the most attractive metaphor, I know. And I wasn’t sure if I was a passenger on the train or standing on the tracks about to get blown to smithereens, but either way, there was no way in hell I could look away because she was just so there.

  You know?

  It was as if she was followed around by a spotlight, a dancer in her own one-woman ballet. Gracefully, she wove through the tables, a serene smile on her bewitching face, animated and lively, radiating pure sunlight onto each customer.

  It was downright mesmerizing.

  And that fact that I’d been struck so strongly by her rattled me, fascinated me.

  This shit never happened.

  I’m a grown-ass man, not some hormone-ridden preteen.

  I’m a gentleman.

  I’m also a fucking professional, I forced myself to remember.

  And this was a job, not an opportunity to find out what that little diamond looked like after a long night in my bed. When she finally brought the check to the table, I was disappointed yet grateful, because I knew that getting out of there was going to be the only thing to keep me from making a complete fool of myself.

  I was pretty damned sure we’d given these small town folks enough of a show already, considering the constant questioning glances we’d endured throughout our meal.

  If I laid a passionate, sudden kiss on the waitress they’d probably have one big, collective, small-town heart attack.

  CHAPTER 12

  MOLLY

  Ms. Canterbury’s face was made up entirely of wrinkles.

  Wrinkles going sideways from the corner of her eyes all the way to the hairline of her lavender hair. Wrinkles angling away from her tight smile and heading down towards the square line of her jaw. She even had wrinkles on her neck, peeking out of the pink silk bow she’d tied around it to hide them.

  Everyone at the Greenville School knew Ms. Canterbury was not a happy woman. She’d lived a lonely life, with no husband or kids of her own. The school, and the students in it, were her entire life. Because of that, you’d think she’d have cared a little more about what happened to the kids, but she didn’t.

  Or, if she did, she didn’t show it.

  She cared about other things, though. She cared about appearances. She cared about test scores and college scholarships. She cared about donations, which mainly came from my family. And, I’d come to learn, she cared very deeply what Daddy thought of her and her performance as the principal of the school.

  Which is why, as she peered at me over the purple reading glasses that were perched on the end of her tiny nose, feigning concern and interest, I knew it was all an act.

  “How are you feeling, dear?” she asked.

  “Fine,” I replied.

  “And your arm?”

  “It’s broken.”

  “I see that, darling. Is it healing up nicely?”

  “It’s been two days,” I said, rolling my eyes.

  “Right,” she nodded. “Well, I’m sure it’ll be better in no time at all.”

  I sat looking at her blankly, knowing I was being a little rude, but I didn’t really care. I’d given up long ago on anyone doing anything to help me, let alone acknowledge there was even a problem at all, so it was increasingly difficult to play along.

  “So, you fell down the stairs your father said?”

  “Is that what Daddy told you.”

  “Yes, dear.”

  “Then why are you asking me?”

  She paused and nodded, her lips pursed tightly, causing the wrinkles to deepen into little crevices that her purple lipstick crawled into.

  “Molly, you know your father is a very good man.”

  “Is he?” I asked, lifting my chin boldly.

  “He’s been very generous to us here at the Greenville School. If it wasn’t for his regular donations — well, Greenville wouldn’t even have a school. You kids would have to be bussed out somewhere, long bus rides every day…”

  Her voice trailed off as I broke her gaze, staring down at the amber colored carpet of her office. I yawned.

  “Well,” she continued. “I just wanted to check in on you.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “There was someone here asking about you. A woman.”

  I didn’t look up or acknowledge her, but I knew she was talking about the woman Benji called. We’d talked on the phone last night and he told me he thought the woman had arrived, that he was sure he’d seen her at the diner that morning.

  I was angry at Benji a little bit. He shouldn’t have gotten involved, because I knew nothing would happen, not even a stranger running around and asking questions would change a thing.

  Daddy’s connected. He’s got everyone in his pocket, he likes to remind anyone of that very fact, at a moment’s notice. When Mom threatens to call the cops, he reminds her that his good friend Ross is the sheriff. When a business owner threatens to sue him, he reminds them that the judge is also one of his best friends, Connor. And if Connor rubs him the wrong way, he reminds him how close he is with the Governor. It’s an endless cycle.

  I knew what this meeting was about. The only thing that could come from some strange woman poking around this town asking about me is that I would likely be the one to take the heat for it.

  I dreaded going home already, the last thing I needed was another reason to avoid my own father.

  But here we were.

  “Did you hear me, Molly?”

  “What?”

  “A woman. She was here. Asking about you and your father.”

  I shrugged.

  “I just think you need to appreciate everything your father does, Molly. Calling someone and telling lies about him is a very disrespectful thing to do.”

  “I didn’t call anyone.”

  “Okay. I believe you. Do you have any idea why this woman would be asking about you?”

  “No,” I lied, cursing Benji in my head and then immediately feeling guilty for it. Benji was the only person in my life, outside of maybe Maria, that cared about me. I couldn’t afford to be angry with him. He was only trying to help, even if it was going to make things worse.

  “Alright then,” she said, sighing. “You can go back to class now.”

  I jumped up quickly, eager to leave her office.

  “Molly,” she said, stopping me as I put my hand on the doorknob.

  “Yes?” I asked, turning.

  “I’m here for you, if you ever need me.”

  It took all my strength not to laugh at her. I’d told her the very first time Daddy hit me, when I was in the first grade, and she’d insisted it was a harmless spanking and I received the same lecture she’d just given me about how wonderful my father was. She might be here in this office physically, but there was no way she was ever going to be ‘here for me’.

  “Thank you, Ms. Canterbury,” I said, flashing her a sweetly fake smile.

  I just wanted out of there and I’d have done anything to get away.

  “Have a good day, dear,” she said. “And please, give your family my love, will you?”

  CHAPTER 13

  BODHI GREEN

  “Pearl!” I shouted for my assistant.

  Will sat in front of me, his head in his hands, tension rolling off his body as we waited for Pearl to come in with the documents we’d been waiting for.

  “Pearl, goddammit!” I shouted again, finally hearing the scurrying of footsteps coming around the corner. She appeared in my doorway, a perfectly manicured thirty-year old woman with blonde hair and red lipstick, her tailored blue suit perfectly hugging her curvaceous frame. She waved a piece of paper in front of her as she rushed over, placing it on my desk.

  “Sorry, Mr. Green, the printer jammed.”

  “Get out,” I barked, devouring the words on the paper she’d laid in front of me. Will looked up at me expectantly as I scanned the printed email from my attorney in New York.

  “It doesn’t look go
od,” I muttered. “They want more time to investigate the deal.”

  “Dammit!” Will shouted, shaking his head. “If we don’t get a signature on that contract soon, we won’t have time to get all the permits in place to open the hotel on time.”

  “I know,” I said. “Look, Andrew will work on them. He’ll wear them down soon enough.”

  “We don’t have much time.”

  “Yeah, you just said that and I said I knew that. How many fucking times do you have to repeat yourself, Will, why the hell do you do that?”

  He shook his head, silently glaring at me.

  “If you’d kept everything on the up-and-up, we wouldn’t be facing these challenges now, Bodhi.”

  His words cut through me, igniting my anger in a flash. Anger is an emotion I’m quite familiar with. In fact, it’s what I seem to feel the most in life. But I’m not one of those assholes that blows up every second.

  At my angriest, I’m also at my quietest.

  Will knows this. Will knows me quite well.

  So, when I just stared over the desk at him wordlessly, I was satisfied when he began squirming in his seat before he began the backpedaling that I knew was coming.

  Will was easy to read and easy to manipulate, as I’d found most people to be. You just had to know what you were doing.

  “Sorry, Bodhi, this whole thing is so damned frustrating. We’ve worked a long time on this and it just seems to be dragging on.”

  “Well, it’s not my fault,” I insisted, even though it probably was, but that was another thing I’d learned — never admit when you made a mistake. If you admitted to one mistake, you had to admit to a second and a third and then your whole life was just one big mistake.

  My life was executed with utter confidence, even if it was fake.

  “Yeah,” Will agreed. He was so damned gullible. “I know.”

  “Shit happens. We just have to roll with the punches, Will. You should know that by now.”

  “Yeah,” he agreed again, letting his head fall into his hands again.

  “So, it’s fucking stressful, all the waiting. So what? Without a few unexpected obstacles, this wouldn’t be any fun, right? C’mon, Will, you know your boring ass secretly likes to live on the edge.”