by Anne Malcom
It was kind of a sticking point in my family. Polly had too many boyfriends traipsing over her heart, and Mom’s vintage Moroccan rugs and I didn’t have enough. Or any. That they knew of. And if they did know of the one and only, Polly would not clap. Her gentle heart might just shatter. And my dad, no matter how much of a hero he was, couldn’t save me from the past or ghosts, and I wouldn’t let him live with that.
“No,” I lied. I hated lying to my sister. I did lie to her, when I had to. To protect her. Like how I lied and said to my sobbing teenage sister that Laurie, the woman she’d thought of as another sister, didn’t suffer before she died. Or that she was in a better place. Or that Peter was our real dad.
But I didn’t lie about this kind of stuff.
Then again, I’d never had a man like Keltan get under my skin with just one kiss.
There were firsts for everything.
I jostled on the sofa. “I was just thinking about the future.”
Polly screwed her nose up. “Why?”
I sighed. “Because I hear that’s what responsible adults do.” I glanced to the online shopping package discarded next to my matte black coffee table. “Instead of maxing out their credit card on shoes that could have been half a month’s rent.”
Polly’s eyes went in that direction.
She glanced back at me. “Since when did shoes that could have fed a small African village—” She gave me a nonjudgmental look even though I knew her stance against consumer items such as this. “—not bring you happiness?”
Since Keltan.
I stood, padding over to the package and lifting the black suede Jimmy Choo’s, turning them in the light. “They do. But I want to have somewhere to wear them that isn’t the club or Laura Maye’s bar. And a use for them that isn’t to take a photo of me wearing some fabulous outfit looking like I’m not going to one of those places and posting it on my blog, giving an illusion of a life that I’m not really living.” I sighed, placing them down carefully.
“Wow. That’s deep,” Polly observed.
I sighed again. “Yeah.” I glanced up to see my sister’s face contorted in worry. I quickly straightened my shoulders. “Hey, don’t worry about me. I’m not eating carbs this week. You know that makes me melancholy,” I tried to reassure her.
Her frown only deepened. “You know you’re beautiful already and shouldn’t be doing things like that to perpetuate a stereotype of how women should look,” she grumbled.
I grinned. “I’m not doing it do perpetuate a stereotype. I’m doing it to ensure I can fit the sample sizes. They’re the only ones I can afford.” I winked.
She rolled her eyes, lifting herself off my black suede sofa and throwing down my white fur throw. “Whatever. I’ve got a poetry slam to go to, wanna come?” she asked, grabbing her fringed bag from the ottoman.
I raised my brow at her. “In what universe?”
She rolled her eyes again.
I folded my arms. “Actually, in what universe would you be going?”
My sister always had a passing fancy. Knitting. Jewelry making. Pottery. Mountain biking.
They usually had one thing in common.
“This wouldn’t have to do with a guy, would it?” I asked, smirking.
She scowled at me. “Of course not. Poetry is good for the mind. The soul,” she snapped.
I continued to look at her.
She blew her choppy bangs from her face. “Okay, it’s because of a guy,” she relented. “But Skyler is really the one. He’s soulful and kind and sensitive and—don’t say it!” she commanded, pointing at me as I opened my mouth to tell her that she’d had about fifty “the ones” in her short life. “This one is really special.”
I nodded, going to kiss her head. “Of course, he is, Lol. I’ll burn his car to the ground otherwise.”
She stepped back, hitching her bag on her shoulder. “You couldn’t do that, he doesn’t have a car. Doesn’t believe in polluting the environment with more fossil fuels. He rides a bike.”
I choked back my smile. “Of course, he does,” I said with a straight face. “Bikes can still burn too. With enough gasoline.”
She rolled her eyes once more before turning on her fringed ankle boot. “Goodbye, loving and arsonist sister,” she called on her way out.
“Say hello to Skyler for me. Peace to Mother Earth.” I held up two fingers to her.
She gave me her middle finger as response.
I shook my head as the door slammed closed.
My sister and I were polar opposites in every way. And not just the way she rebelled against black like I did pastels. She fell in love all the time, letting everyone in.
Me? I avoided it like I did pastels and let no one in.
Well, apart from the guy under my skin.
Silence which descended on my black-and-white living room itched my skin. It was far too accommodating for thoughts that needed to be unthought.
I jumped when “Sexy Bitch” punctured the air. Then I glanced to my black quilted Chanel, realizing where the sound was coming from and who was calling.
Only one person would program that to be their own personal ringtone. Especially when I just changed it from “Remember the Name.”
“Hey, slut,” Rosie greeted when I answered. “I feel like partying tonight. Or causing some form of trouble. In?”
I gazed around my quiet living room, the stillness and silence more than a little stifling.
“So in,” I said without hesitation. Maybe I should have started being responsible.
Maybe I would.
Tomorrow.
Horns sounded through the phone, which I had no doubt had to do with Rosie’s driving. “See you in five. Wear your new shoes.”
The car stopped, and I frowned.
“Is this my house?” Rosie asked, leaning over me to peer at the small cottage.
I peered with her. “No. I’m reasonably sure it’s mine.”
The door opened, and because I had been peering at the window, and Rosie had been leaning over me, I almost toppled out, not expecting it. My seat belt caught me, and I hung there for a moment, suspended in the air.
“Fuck,” Dwayne muttered, amusement dancing in his tone.
It was the first word he’d spoken since he’d picked us up from a club in Hope. Lucky had come too, with Wire driving the truck. All three of them were not exactly impressed to be traveling to a club the next town over, where they had rumblings of trouble with a rival club, to pick us and Rosie’s car up at 2:00 a.m.
He and Lucky had played rock, paper, scissors. Which Lucky had been more than happy to win.
Hence Dwayne playing taxi driver.
A job he did not like, which was precisely why Rosie and I were in the back seat and had flat-out refused to sit in the front when he’d requested it. Or demanded with a healthy spattering of curse words.
But two drunk, stubborn females could always beat one muscled, tattooed biker.
Any day.
He was currently giving us the silent treatment.
Well, he had been, until this mishap.
He gently pushed me back and bent his considerable form into the car so he could lean over me to unbuckle my seat belt.
As if I couldn’t do it myself.
“You smell nice,” I observed as he leaned back.
He did. A mixture of crisp soap and leather. And man.
I hadn’t smelled that in a while.
In two months, to be exact.
Two months ago, when I’d tasted only the lips of a man for a handful of seconds that were enough to imprint his scent in my memory.
Dwayne’s scent was different. Nice.
Though it wasn’t the same, and my body didn’t respond with the same fire as he who shall not be named. I wasn’t dead. Dwayne was hot. And smelled good. Plus, I was drunk.
I noticed.
“Get out of the car this year, Lucy,” he commanded.
I grinned at Rosie, clutching my purse and kissing h
er cheek. “See you never,” I said.
“Love you always,” she replied, as we had been saying since we’d known each other. In other words, forever.
Dwayne righted me as I stumbled slightly getting up.
His grip on my arm was firm and not entirely unpleasant. He rested his other hand on the open door, eyes illuminated by the lights of the car as he spoke to Rosie. “Stay put. And try not to get yourself into trouble while I walk Lucy inside.”
She gave Dwayne wide eyes that worked on all of our teachers in high school, and sometimes Cade. “It’s an empty car on a quiet street on a Wednesday night. What possible trouble could I get into?”
Dwayne gave her a look. He knew too well just how much she could get into, considering there was a “Rosie Protocol” for the Sons of Templar and he’d been a patched member for almost a decade.
She crossed her arms, leaning back. “Fine, I’ll try. I can’t make any promises if I get bored.”
I grinned as Dwayne closed the door and moved his hand on my waist to direct me up the cobbled walkway to my house.
“She’ll get bored in eight-point-five seconds,” I informed him happily.
He didn’t reply.
I blinked up at my house in the moonlight, the porch light not yet on. The grass was green and healthy, and even though you couldn’t see them, white flowers framed my walk. Not planted by me, of course; my mom was the flower child of the family. And Polly, on occasion, when she was dating a landscaper.
The house was small, made from pure white weatherboard and blue shutters, removed from town so I had the beach backing off into the distance. Not that I ever went; the view was nice, but my pale skin went from pearl to lobster if I exposed it to the sun for too long.
It was small but full of chic furniture that had taken me years to accumulate.
Why had I even been thinking of leaving?”
“You think there’s a point in your lives when you and Rosie might ever grow up?” Dwayne asked mildly.
I pretended to think on it as he unlatched my gate. “Maybe, when we’re eighty. No, wait, we’ve already planned on being the first people to invent a resting home that gives you wine through IVs.”
His grasp moved from merely supporting me to something more. Something maybe even nice enough to forget my stance on bikers and remember the glances and “almost” with Dwayne over the years.
“Don’t,” he murmured, pulling me slightly closer to his muscled body as we walked. I leaned into him, because the world was tilting and because he was hot and I was a woman. “Grow up,” he clarified. “You’re perfect the way you are. Never borin’, that’s for sure.”
I tipped my head back to look at him, a feat in itself while walking on cobblestones in heels as the world tilted. “Only time I’ll be boring is when I’m dead.”
His jaw hardened. “Well, let’s make sure that never happens. Nor will you talk about that shit while—”
He abruptly stopped speaking and yanked me behind him. I tottered slightly and clutched the back of his cut for balance as he pulled his gun from it.
“Stay the fuck where you are, asshole,” he hissed.
I blinked away the stars from the movement, trying to register what exactly was going on.
A figure emerged from a sitting position on my porch, illuminated by the sensor lights as he moved.
I couldn’t properly see on account of the fact that Dwayne was a better door than a window.
“Easy, mate,” a familiar deep voice said. “I just managed to leave a desert full of bullets and not have one hit me. I’d rather not have that just so I could die by one on a porch in a little town in the New World.”
My breath caught.
Dwayne paused, his arm still raised as I shifted just enough to see Keltan illuminated in the dim light. The edges of his body were fuzzy but there was no mistaking the muscled form, the shadows of his tattoos dancing in the light.
I stepped around Dwayne, as Keltan’s eyes were no longer on the large biker with the gun pointed at him.
They were on me.
“Lucy. Stay the fuck behind me,” Dwayne bit out.
I glanced to Dwayne, his eyes darting between the two of us. I raised my arm to lightly touch his bicep, noting in a detached way how warm and hard the muscle was.
“It’s okay, Dwayne. We can put down the gun now. Unless you want to face Gwen’s wrath.” I nodded to Keltan, who was still staring at me—or more aptly, my hand on Dwayne’s bicep. “That’s Keltan, Gwen’s friend. Did you not notice the accent? Heck, I’ve had five cocktails, and I noticed it before you. Shouldn’t you strong biker types be a little more aware? You must shoot the wrong people all the time,” I mused. “The hospital bills must be enormous. Or at least the body count.”
The heat from Keltan’s stare was ready to set me aflame as it focused on my hand on Dwayne’s arm, which finally lowered.
I quickly brought my hand back to my side, and Keltan’s eyes lost the glint that had been there moments before.
Dwayne folded his arms, looking between us, then focusing on Keltan. “Instinct, when I see someone lurkin’ in the shadows of one of our women’s houses,” he addressed him with a hard jaw, as close to an apology as Keltan would ever get.
Is it just me or is the testosterone level getting uncomfortably high right now?
“Easy mistake, mate. I’d likely be doin’ the same if I was in your position. Precious one, Snow is. Though I am educated on the fact that she likes to protect her own honor,” he replied, voice light but with an edge as his eyes lingered on me.
Dwayne folded his arms. “Yeah, she’s more than capable of doing so. But I’ve been looking out for her since she was in college, so I’m thinkin’ I know what she likes to do,” he replied, challenge in his gaze. Then he looked between the two of us. “If you’re Gwen’s friend, then can I ask what you’re doin’ on Lucy’s doorstep in the middle of the night?” he asked, voice hard.
I stared at him harder. I would rather like to know that too. Well, sober Lucy did. Drunk Lucy didn’t give two shits. Drunk Lucy was horny.
Keltan’s answer was lost with the loud and unrelenting horn.
Both male heads turned to the curb. I continued to watch the way Keltan’s neck moved under the dim light.
The horn stopped. “Come the fuck on, Bridget!’ Rosie yelled from the car. “I’m getting bored, and that doesn’t mean good things for you,” she called.
I shook my head.
Dwayne gritted his teeth.
Keltan grinned. “Think you might have your hands full with that one, mate. I can take it from here.” His eyes went to me, stepping forward slightly, his intention clear.
Dwayne stayed put, turning so he obscured my view of Keltan’s chest straining against his black tee.
“You okay with this, babe?” he asked, voice low. And not happy.
In fact, as a woman well versed in man grunts, I knew the jealousy in his tone. Which was unfounded since our years of “almosts” didn’t add up to anything but “almost.” And in the realm of sex and romance, “almost” was the same as nothing.
I nodded once, knowing my drunken self might “yippee” with glee if I spoke.
And then my sober self would’ve had to throat-punch my drunk self.
And then either or both of these men would likely commit the girl punching herself in the throat.
Throat preservation was the main reason for silence. And the fact that these men so did not need to hear the gleeful Lucy. Not in any way, shape or form.
He glowered. “Gonna need verbal confirmation.”
I rolled my eyes, swallowing the glee and finding the ice. “It’s fine. Keltan was actually right. I can take care of myself. Rosie, on the other hand, can’t.” My eyes flickered to the car at the curb pointedly. “And you’ll have Cade to answer to if you instill another code red like the time Rosie managed to find Lucky’s fireworks stash.”
He paused for another second, just long enough for the horn t
o sound once more. Then he leaned in and kissed my cheek. The male fury at that gesture was palpable from the doorstep. Dwayne hovered close to my face. “Call me, and I’ll be here in five,” he offered. “Any time. Any hour. No such thing as too late or too early with you, babe.”
The air was thick, Keltan’s stare along with Dwayne’s somewhat stifling.
“Think there is such a thing as too late,” Keltan cut in, voice still friendly but with an edge. One that could’ve cut steel.
I actually wanted to look down to my new shoes to make sure there was no pee on them from this epic pissing contest.
Dwayne’s body tensed for a split second, and I worried about the gun he’d only just sheathed. But the bloodshed was avoided as he relaxed.
He gave Keltan a stiff nod and me a lingering and pointed look before sauntering down the walk.
I hadn’t been able to take my eyes off Keltan with Dwayne as a buffer, but now I was very fascinated with the journey of the back of his cut, watching the reaper on his back melt into the darkness.
I then heard him ordering Rosie to put the cigarette lighter down, followed by a mutter of curses before doors shut and the car left the curb.
Then silence.
And I was forced to turn to look at Keltan.
My eyes drank him in in the gentle moonlight. The muscled form very annoyingly shielded by clothing, his body still exuding that presence that seemed to steal the air from my lungs. Though this was stupid to think, even drunk, my heart stuttered once, twice, three times when my eyes locked on his.
“You’re back,” I observed.
His eyes glowed. “I’m back.”
“From war,” I clarified, my voice blank and shaking with that slight slur that gave away drunk teenagers to knowing parents everywhere.
He nodded, his eyes dancing with a little amusement, a lot of desire and a sprinkling of that residual anger.
“Early,” I continued, remembering the fact that he was meant to have at least another month.
I had been counting. A month to try and extract myself from the web I’d found myself in. A month to get tangled even deeper.
“Yep. Surprise,” he all but whispered.