by A. J. Downey
“She okay?” I asked standing.
“Looks like she’s been cryin’, keeps glaring guys off. Doubt she’s sober enough to effectively fend one off should they make any kind of real play but she’s holding her own. Want I should bring her in?”
“No, don’t try. Just sit on her and watch her back, I’ll be there in a minute.” I looked up, Reaver slid Hayden off his lap, stood and stretched.
“Aye, Captain.” Lightning hung up and so did I.
“I think you should sit this one out, let me go down there, bet you I’d have a better chance of it than you would,” he said.
“Oh yeah, how’s that?”
“I’m not you, and I’m not Hayden. Hell, I’m not even Kraken. Neutral party… Come on. Let me give it a try.”
I wasn’t biting, but what he said next had me leaning back in my seat, he had me hook line and sinker with it. He said, “Come on man, you gave my woman back to me, delivered her safe and sound and took care of her… Let me return the favor; even though this won’t even come close to what you did for us.”
I rubbed my hand over my mouth and beard thoughtful, and finally nodded, “Alright man. Try not to take too long.”
“You get some dinner going on the grill of yours, I’ll bring her back here. The four of us will have a nice dinner and act like civilian grownups for a minute,” he grinned at me and winked and I huffed a laugh.
“I’ll help you cook,” Hayden murmured.
“Okay, Li’l Bit can stay here, I’ll run to the store and she and I will grill up some food. Surf or turf?” I asked.
“Surf,” he and Li’l Bit said in unison and laughed.
“We get plenty of turf at home,” he said and leapt down onto the dock. His running shoes making a soft thud.
“Yeah, kind of figured,” I said.
“I’ll bring her back, give me an hour. Maybe two if she’s stubborn.”
“She’s definitely that,” I agreed.
“If she doesn’t try to kill me, I am so telling on you,” Li’l Bit giggled.
“You don’t need to give me an excuse to spank that ass, Doll. If you wanna insist you know I’ll take you up on it though.” Reaver pointed both index fingers at her about chest height as he walked backwards down the dock. He winked at her and dropped both thumbs down. She laughed high and bright and blew him a kiss which he caught and tucked inside his cut before turning and strolling away, up towards the boulevard.
“He won’t let you down, you know. He’ll talk her into coming around.”
“It hurt her, Li’l Bit. It hurt her a lot.”
“I know, Sweetie, I really am sorry, but if she didn’t love you it wouldn’t bother her and if she loves you she’ll come back here and work it out. She’ll listen to reason.”
“I hope you’re right.”
She rolled her eyes and scraped her short bangs off to the side, “Of course I’m right. I’m always right about these things.”
“Now who is gonna tattle on who?” I asked. She blushed and bit her lower lip, and I could tell the prospect excited her. Yep. She and Reave were doing just fine. A weight, a worry I hadn’t known I was carrying lifted at that. She was okay. Reave was okay.
Good. I was glad for that. I really was. Now I just needed Hope to be alright and if that went down like it was supposed to, well then I would be right as rain. I really was in love with the bitch. Hopelessly in love with Hope. I smiled, it had a nice ring to it.
Chapter 35
Hope
I wanted a cigarette. I hadn’t smoked in years but I wanted a fucking cigarette so bad right now. I lifted my glass and took a drink, sniffed and set it back down. I was pretty much done drowning my sorrows but didn’t have any place to go just yet so I figured I would knock back a few more and maybe if I got lucky something would present itself. I wasn’t exactly a stranger to picking up men in bars… except I didn’t want that anymore. I wasn’t up for a one night stand. I’d had a taste of something better, and I just wanted him now… except now I wasn’t sure he would want me.
“Have another?” I asked dully.
A blur of light denim, black leather and beneath that, white cotton dropped onto the barstool beside me. I looked over at ol’ blue eyes from Cutter’s boat that morning.
“Think you’ve had enough,” the bartender said looking me over.
“I’m inclined to agree but go ahead and give her one more, I got this,” Ol’ Blue Eyes winked at me and I huffed a half assed snarky laugh.
“Ohhh you couldn’t handle me. Trust me, Baby Cakes,” I said.
“You got someone who can though, don’t you?” he asked and smoothed his hair down in front, so it formed a point between his eyes. It was a style that worked for him. Easy to manage but made him look real nonconformist and badass… of course the raggedy assed leather vest… excuse me, cut, he had on went a long way to perpetuate that image.
“Seems that guy can handle a lot of women, doesn’t it?” I asked him and nodded to the bartender who set a fresh Cosmo in front of me. I took a sip. Ol’ Blue Eyes smiled a crooked panty dropping grin at me which did absolutely nothing for my lady bits whatsoever.
“Reaver,” he said ignoring my barb completely and he stuck out his hand before following up with, “Reaver Michaels.”
“What is it with you guys and the juvenile,” I frowned my brain catching up, “Wait, I thought bikers didn’t do last names.”
He was shaking my casted hand and I didn’t remember giving it to him. He let me have it back, again with that grin, his sky blue eyes sparkling.
“It’s my name. Well the Reaver part wasn’t always, neither was the Michaels part. I took my road name and my wife’s last name when we got married. You met her this morning.”
I narrowed my eyes, it was taking way too much fucking brainpower for me to work that one out. I was fucking lit and I knew it. The nice part about being this lit is the rest of it was dulled, the ache was still there but it was less sharp, less raw.
“How about this, Princess? I’m going to tell you a story. You just sit back and enjoy your drink and have a listen.” He looked me over and that’s when I saw it. Sliding behind his eyes. He really needed me to listen, I just didn’t know if I had it in me to carry any more people today. I sighed. Why the fuck not? I was pretty good at being some kind of big damned hero lately.
“Shoot,” I told him and waved him on. If he was talking, then I didn’t have to, which was probably a good thing.
“So I’m at this wedding, the girl getting married? My wife. Except she was marrying this total douchebag and I was gonna let her.”
“You’re joking right?”
“Don’t interrupt.”
I put up my hands and leaned back, I wasn’t sure I was drunk enough for this, but he was continuing on, “I lucked out, and I know it’s a shitty thing to say, but I did. The douchebag dumped her at the alter.”
“Shit, that sucks…”
“Don’t interrupt,” he said.
“Sorry, except, you know, I’m not.” I giggled. For some reason I thought that was hysterical. He grinned too, and shook his head and kept talking anyways.
“So I put her on the back of my bike and took her to her honeymoon destination, figured she needed the dust to settle and the vacation was already paid for, so what the fuck? Why not right?”
He paused so I figured it was okay to speak, “Lemme guess, destination here?”
“Destination here,” he said with a smile. Let me tell you something, for a guy I didn’t know, Reaver told me a lot of shit. Enlightening shit…
“You did what?” I asked abruptly, I wanted to make sure I’d heard him right.
“We shared her. Take it you’re not a fan?” he said.
Reaver let me stew for a minute, mulling things over. I’d never done two guys at once. Not that the notion didn’t appeal to me, it was one seriously hot fantasy. More like the guys I had been with, I’d never been with long enough to find out if sharing was an option.
Or if it had been, I’d never found another guy at the same time I was with one, that would share to make the fantasy a reality.
“Okay, so you guys shared her, you went home and did what? Got hitched?”
He nodded then said, “This is where shit gets real,” and he didn’t sound one bit happy about it. Something told me I wasn’t going to like this and today had really been a shitty day, aw, what the hell? I waved him on. Maybe listening to this would make my damage seem like less.
The shit got real. Reaver spilled it, about being shot, about faking his death to get the women of his club to agree to stay out of harm’s way, and how Cutter played Captain-save-a-ho, taking them all in. Including Reaver’s wife… who thought she was a widow.
“What the fuck?” It was a rhetorical question but he shrugged laconically and sighed.
“Listen, Sister. Six months was a long time for him to keep my secret and to take care of my Doll while she was falling the fuck apart. He told me he’d fallen in love with her, that he did love her, and when he gave her back to me, he told me I was a lucky bastard, which don’t I fucking know it? Feelings like that don’t evaporate overnight. Hell it’s only been three months since I showed up down here very much alive, if not well.” He lifted his shirt under his cut and exposed some pretty serious scars on his side. An entrance wound, with several surgical scars radiating out from it.
A pair of dog tags was also revealed but he wasn’t military, never had been and never would be. I pointed at them, “And who do those belong to?” I asked.
“My best friend Trig, he and Sunshine wanted to come down too but their shop is too busy.”
“Why? Why did you come down here? Why did he want you to come down here?” Something felt like it was missing.
“Cutter called, said he was in love with this woman, that his crew just went all rescue black ops mission to New Orleans with her to save her sister. Said the sister was in bad shape… heroin, and he needed Doc’s help with getting her straight physically, so one of his guys could help her detox. Trig and I know something about that, detoxing I mean. Trig man, he couldn’t come down, but like I said, I owe Cutter for what he did. Keeping my woman safe for me, giving her back to me… I would do just about anything to repay that debt so here I am.”
“Here you are…” I twisted my lips back and forth and stared at the melting ice in my glass, which had emptied its self. The world swam around its edges from my drunk and I didn’t feel one damn bit better. I just felt tired, angry, hurt, and… alone. I licked my lips and bowed my head and sighed. I was so fucking tired of being alone and for a brief, shining moment, Cutter had shown me I didn’t need to be… Then she’d crashed into him and the illusion that I might finally have something did some crashing of its own. Crashing and burning. I wasn’t blind. She was pretty… there was history…
“Hey, look at me.”
I did it without thinking, concerned blue eyes roved my face and I blinked.
“Let me take you back to the boat. You and Cutter can talk, sitting here drinking yourself stupid isn’t helping, I can see it isn’t,” he leaned back on his stool and looked me over.
“Can I get another?” I asked the bartender, who gave me a kind if slightly nervous smile.
“Sorry, Sweetheart. You’re cut off. I think you should do what your friend suggests and get on back to Cutter, I’ve known that guy a long time. He’s stand up and I bet you he’s worried about you.”
“He’s got this whole damn town in his pocket doesn’t he?” I asked the bartender point blank.
He gave me a smile and didn’t even try to deny it, “There’s a reason for that, Honey. He’s done right by this town in a lot of things, in a lot of ways.”
I huffed out a sigh, “Saint Cutter,” I muttered.
“Come on, I’ll walk with you. Don’t even have to talk, but I bet some clean air will do you some good,” Reaver looked me over and frowned a bit, “And food. Food too. It’s waiting back at the boat.”
“He’s there with her, huh?” I asked.
“Come on, here we go,” he paid for my drinks, took my uninjured hand, and helped me to my feet. I swayed, dizzy for a moment and his arm went around my back until I was steady.
“You good?” he asked softly.
I snorted and laughed, and the laughter built until I had tears rolling down my cheeks. I was fucking losing my shit, and all Ol’ Blue Eyes did was stand there, a serene little smile on his lips as he watched me fall apart, waiting for the laughter to subside so we could get under way.
“Oh that was good, I needed that…” Except I didn’t. My words were a lie, this wasn’t a much needed laugh when the going got rough this was me barely holding on by my fingertips. I pretended everything was okay. That I was good. Nothing was bothering me! I was a happy drunk… when really all I wanted to do was slide down some wall somewhere into a corner and cry.
I wanted to scream my injustice into the night and I didn’t want to quit screaming until somebody heard me and I really, really wanted that somebody to be Cutter. I knew just how pathetic and weak that sounded and I would pull myself up by the boot straps in a minute. No one would know. No one would ever know these things and that is what made me stop in my tracks along the boulevard and take in several deep breaths. I stared out over the water. The sun was down, but the sky still had that fiery light in it, the orange globe having just dropped below the horizon.
“What’s up chick?” Reaver asked and I shook my head.
“Dizzy,” I lied.
“Yeah, right. Look, you don’t have to tell me and you don’t know me and can tell me to fuck right off if you want, but I really want to ask you a favor.”
We resumed our sedate pace back towards the marina and I held my breath for a moment, “Yeah, what’s that?” I finally asked after a long exhale.
“You’re drowning on the inside and for whatever reason, I think you were letting Cutter in and I really, really don’t want to see that dude shut down or shut out because of me or my Doll. It’d crush her and she doesn’t need or deserve any more hurt. She didn’t know about you when we got here. She feels bad, I hate seeing her hurt.”
I stopped him, “Were you going to actually get around to asking me something anytime soon?” I asked wearily and yeah I know I sounded like a bitch.
“Don’t shut him down or shut him out just yet, please?” he asked and I looked up at him. His face was somber and I thought about it…
“Ever hear the whole ‘it’s not you it’s me’ line?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he smirked wryly.
“Yeah. That.” I trudged along wordlessly beside him for a minute or so before he broke the silence.
“I come from a screwed up background. So do a lot of the dudes that land in this life, typically they’re looking for a place to belong when no one else will accept them…” he cleared his throat, “Cutter, his crew… I don’t know what you did, but they accept you. Cutter put out the call that you were missing and I was there, not a one of his guys argued. Every one of them dropped what they were doing to go out and go look. From the sounds of it a couple of them got in Cutters ass about it too. Wanted to know what he’d done to fuck up.”
“Nothing,” I said, and it was true, “He didn’t do anything.”
No it was all me. Screwed up, isolated, stubborn and set in my ways looking for the slightest flaw. It’s what I did. Look hard enough, look long enough you find a loose thread. Pull it and the whole pretty lie unravels. Except when you’re me, you do more than just look. When I can’t find a loose thread, I end up making one.
“He’s not going to give up on you that easy you know,” Reaver said and again with that grin. I sniffed and looked at him.
“Eventually, I’ll make him,” I said and shrugged a little hopelessly, “It’s what I’ve always done. It’s what I do.” It was how I saved myself from letting them break my heart. I did the breaking first.
Reaver turned and stood in front of me, blocking my path. He loo
ked down at me and gripping my shoulders lightly gave me a little shake, “So if you know that, why don’t you knock it off? You’re the only one who can.”
I blinked up at him stupidly. I mean he was right… but, I gave a little shrug and he let his hands drop. We were at the marina and I looked out over the boats gently bobbing and swaying in their berths.
“I don’t mean to be a pain the ass, I just don’t know any other way to be,” which was both honest and true. The first of many waves of humiliation washed over me.
“Hmm, why is that?” he asked.
“You tell me, Dr. Phil,” I uttered and yeah my resting bitch face was back but I think that had more to do with the fact I was sobering up and was feeling pretty fucking embarrassed about my craptastic behavior of today than it had to do with anything else. So of course what do you do when you’re embarrassed by your shitty behavior but are a prideful bitch like me? Why make it worse of course.
Goddamn it I was a mess.
I struck out across the parking lot towards Cutter’s berth, Reaver shadowing me silently, hands buried in the pockets of his jeans. I didn’t want to do this in front of them. Either of them, meaning Reaver and his wife. There was nothing for it though. Not like they were going away. I steeled myself and stepped onto the wharf following it down to Cutter’s dock. He was at the small grill on the stern of his boat. She was setting places at his small deck table.
I climbed aboard and stopped, uncomfortable with only myself to blame. He set aside his spatula and she stopped, plate between her hands and peered at me from behind him. I suddenly felt just so damned tired. Like all I wanted to do was crawl into a bed somewhere and sleep for a thousand years.
Cutter closed the distance between us and cradled my face between his hands and the gesture was so sweet, coupled with the concern and yes, maybe even fear radiating out of his warm brown eyes, I felt so incredibly guilty…
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled and the smile he graced me with was so perfect, sad but perfect. He pulled me into the circle of his arms and the cracks in my veneer finally became too much. I closed my eyes, took shelter in his arms and let myself cry.