Text copyright ©2017 Lani Lynn Vale

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents

either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely
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 Other titles by Lani Lynn Vale:
The Freebirds
Boomtown
Highway Don’t Care
Another One Bites the Dust
Last Day of My Life
Texas Tornado
I Don’t Dance
The Heroes of The Dixie Wardens MC
Lights To My Siren
Halligan To My Axe
Kevlar To My Vest
Keys To My Cuffs
Life To My Flight
Charge To My Line
Counter To My Intelligence
Right To My Wrong
Code 11- KPD SWAT
Center Mass
Double Tap
Bang Switch
Execution Style
Charlie Foxtrot
Kill Shot
Coup De Grace
The Uncertain Saints
Whiskey Neat
Jack & Coke
Vodka On The Rocks
Bad Apple
Dirty Mother
Rusty Nail
 The Kilgore Fire Series
Shock Advised
Flash Point
Oxygen Deprived
Controlled Burn
Put Out
I Like Big Dragons Series
I Like Big Dragons and I Cannot Lie
Dragons Need Love, Too
Oh, My Dragon
The Dixie Warden Rejects
Beard Mode
Fear the Beard
Son of a Beard
I’m Only Here for the Beard
The Beard Made Me Do It
Beard Up (7-27-17)
For the Love of Beard (8-31-17)
 Dedication
To my man. Your beard really is an inspiration. <3
 Acknowledgements
Golden Czermak aka Furiousfotog—I love everything about this cover
and photo.
Jacob Wilson—I loved every single photo you’ve taken, but this one has
to be my favorite.
Danielle—As I’m sure you know already, I really wouldn’t know what
to do without you. Thank you for making my babies shine.
Asli—You’re the first to get my babies, and it make my heart happy to
know that you love them as much as I do.
Kellie Montgomery—thank you for editing my babies.
 He’s only a friend.
Those words had haunted him from the moment Jessie James had heard
them muttered from the girl who held his heart, and whom he thought had
his back.
Fourteen years later, he still feels those words like a brand on his soul.
Lucky for him he has a son to focus on, a full-time job that demands his
attention the rest of the day, and not a single moment to spare for a woman
who won’t stand up for him when he needs her the most.
He’s only a friend.
The words had slipped out of Ellen’s mouth, and before she could recall
them, or better yet, explain them, Jessie is gone from her life for good,
taking her heart with him.
She tries to move on, to climb her way out of the pit of despair, but not
one single person – regardless of how badly she wants to make it work –
can fill the void that was left in his wake.
Time heals all wounds.
Or at least that is how the saying goes.
It’s a crock of crap, though.
Fourteen years pass when Jessie and Ellen see each other again without
the influence of the town and bad memories surrounding them, and it’s as if
not a single day has passed.
Ellen knows the instant that her eyes see her old love that she’s still just
as in love with him today as she was all those years ago.
The problem is that Jessie wants nothing to do with her. Or at least
that’s what he keeps telling himself.
 Prologue
Love is finding someone to get fat with.
-Fact of life
Jessie
Age seventeen
“Oh, my God, Mom!” Ellen cried out in frustration. “There’s nothing
wrong going on here! He’s only a friend.”
Ellen had lied.
My heart skipped a beat as, yet again, the damn girl didn’t claim to have
anything going on with me. Ellen wouldn’t acknowledge that we had any
type of a relationship.
Am I fucking stupid or something? How was this ever going to work
when she wouldn’t even acknowledge that we were more than just friends?
Her mother looked at her like she knew she was lying, but we all knew
that she couldn’t prove it.
We hadn’t gone too far, and I was sitting here, on the couch, just like
she’d asked me to do.
Don’t touch. Don’t do anything untoward. I’ll be watching.
Sure, I’d had my hands down Ellen’s pants before Marian had walked in
here, but she didn’t need to know that.
“I think it’s time for you to go home, Jessie.”
Ellen’s mother’s anger was palpable, and I knew before she said
anything that Ellen would never hear the end of it.
You’re going to get a bad reputation. Why would you want to date a boy
like that?
Jessie James? Really? You know he’s trouble.
 One day you’re going to wind up hurt and pregnant, and you’ll have no
one to blame but yourself.
“All right, ma’am.” I stood up. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Ellie.”
Ellen stood up, and she waved goodbye. Both of us knew better than to
touch in front of her mom or dad. If we did, they started to turn red in the
face.
It wasn’t like I was an axe murderer or anything, but they didn’t seem to
care.
I was lucky they even let me in their house.
I waved goodbye to Ellen and walked down the hallway to the front
door, wondering how long it would be before the next bus arrived at the bus
stop.
I’d just gotten to the front door when I heard Ellen’s mom start talking.
“Seriously, there’s no way in hell that kid is only eighteen,” Marian
whispered—just not soft enough for me not to hear. “He has a damn beard,
Ellen. You can’t do this anymore. Your father was going to talk to you later,
but I can’t wait until then. This either ends or we won’t pay for your
frivolities anymore. That means no cell phone. No car. No college. No
nothing. You’ll have to get a job.”
I froze with my hand on the knob.
Ellen’s dream was always to go to school. Her hope was to go into the
medical field and become a doctor, like her brother was in the process of
doing.
“Mom, that’s not fair!” Ellen said. “You know how much college means
to me. You know!”
I knew, too. I knew.
“Then I won’t go to college,” Ellen snapped. “If that’s the way you want
to treat me, then I’ll leave and never come back. This has nothing to do with
him, and everything to do with the fact that you can’t stand to see me
making a decision that you haven’t confirmed as good, first.”
 And that was why I couldn’t do this to her anymore. If I had to let her
go to let her fly, then I’d do it.
I dropped my chin to my chest.
I couldn’t do that to her. I couldn’t ruin another life. Not when I was
well on the way to ruining mine and my son’s.
“He has a kid out of wedlock, didn’t graduate high school and is
working a minimum wage job. There’s literally nothing you can tell me
here that will make this all right. He’ll hold you down. You will end up
taking care of his kid, you’ll drop out of college, and he’ll get you hooked
on drugs.”
“I already told you he’s a friend. Not to mention he’s a welder’s
assistant. I never knew you to be a snob.”
My belly sank.
I didn’t deal drugs, even though most of the town thought I did.
It was hard to deny it when your parents did. Hence the reason I was
now on my own, with no diploma and working a minimum wage job, when
I could be attending college on a football scholarship.
When you had a kid to take care of, and nobody to watch him while you
were at school or while you were at work, you had to make certain
sacrifices. Unfortunately, school was one of them.
It’d been two years since Linc had come into my life, and not a single
day went by that I regretted anything I’d done or given up for him.
I thought I was doing all right. Thought that maybe, after time, Ellen’s
family would see me as the man I was, not the man they thought I was.
But I was wrong.
With one final look in the direction of where Ellen had last been
standing, I walked down the steps and didn’t look back.
If I hurried, I wouldn’t have to pay the babysitter I’d managed to get for
the evening; that extra ten dollars that would’ve killed me to lose.
 I walked away, rubbing my chest as if it would somehow help the
gaping hole that had suddenly formed where my heart was.
 Chapter 1
Don’t piss in your boot because you think it’s funny.
-Things I never thought I would have to tell my kid not to do.
Jessie
“Why the hell are you out here and not in your fucking room doing
that?” I asked my sixteen-year-old son, Linc.
Linc looked up from his homework and shrugged.
The problem with Linc doing his homework out here meant that he had
the TV blaring, his phone on some stupid YouTube video, and his pencil
tapping a million miles an hour while he hummed to some random song that
only he could hear.
He was also nearly naked. Had been for the majority of his life.
He ignored me as if I hadn’t said a word.
“Seriously,” I said to him. “What makes you think it’s okay to sit here in
your underwear with the fuckin’ front window wide ass open? The people
in this neighborhood are not down with that, and I’d rather they not egg our
shit to communicate that to us. Not to mention you don’t pay the fuckin’
electric bill, and it’s cold as fuck out.”
Linc snorted.
“They’d have to be able to walk close to our cars and, since most of
them are old geezers, I don’t see that happening,” he countered. “What’s
gotten up your ass?”
I grunted, walking to the kitchen to grab a beer. It’d been a long fucking
day, and I had to go back to work and do it all over again tomorrow.
I was a welder for a pipeline. My job was exhaustingly hard work that I
fucking loved. I made a whack and paid my bills, but I had to work long
hours to do it. Nearly eighty hours a week.
“Someone called for you today. A woman.”
 “What was her name?” I asked, scanning the contents of the refrigerator
for something to eat. “Did you eat all the leftover pizza?”
Linc and I had pizza a lot. Anything that was fast, usually something
that came out of a box, was one of our go-to menu items seeing as neither
one of us really knew how to cook. Lunchables, macaroni and sometimes
Hamburger Helper when we were feeling adventurous.
“Ellen?” Linc guessed. “I wrote it down on the pad next to the phone.”
The name ‘Ellen’ wasn’t common, but it was still unlikely that a girl
from my past—almost fourteen years ago to be exact—to come back and
haunt me some two-thousand odd miles away from where I knew she had
moved to all those years ago.
“What did she want?” I asked. “And you never answered me on the
pizza.”
“That was gone around three in the morning,” Linc chuckled
unrepentantly. “And I wrote it all down on the note.”
I closed the fridge and moved across the small space to the counter next
to the landline that I wasn’t sure why we still had, and I stared at the pad of
paper with two words on it.
Club party.
“Can I go?”
I looked up to find Linc, the boy who was the spitting image of me,
standing at my side.
Already standing at six foot one, he was likely to continue to grow
according to his pediatrician who said he’d probably reach my height, if not
pass it. He had jet-black hair with a slight wave to it, also exactly like mine.
Hell, he even had a beard, just like me. Though, his was trimmed and
neatly kept because the school he was attending informed him if it wasn’t
done just so, he’d have to shave it or leave the school.
We had to fight for the beard, so, if he wanted to keep it, he’d damn
well follow their rules or I’d make him shave it off myself.
 His body mass was the only thing still lagging behind mine. He was
much skinnier, but he was definitely on the verge of getting some bulk, just
like I’d been at sixteen. He was still in that in-between stage, no longer a
boy but not yet a man. You could see the promise of what he would become
some day, but he just wasn’t quite there yet.
Me, I was six foot four, two-hundred-fifty pounds of solid muscle,
including a six-pack that was honed the hard way—through long days of
manual labor on the pipeline. I had a beard that was on the verge of being
too bushy, but I’d lost the desire to impress anyone a long fucking time ago.
I was me, and I wasn’t going to change, even though there were some
who wished I would.
“I’ll have to ask if it’s kid friendly,” I laughed when my son gave me a
face that clearly conveyed what he thought about me lumping him in the
kid-friendly category. “And you didn’t mention the time, or why she called
to tell me something I already knew.”
“She was supposedly reminding everyone about it since someone
complained a few weeks ago that they weren’t reminded. Oh, and I’m not a
kid.”
My kid wasn’t a kid. He couldn’t be when he was raised by me.
I’d done my best, but I’d been more like a brother than a parent. We
were sixteen years apart in age, and there wasn’t a day that went by where I
did the whole parenting thing correctly.
He had to grow up faster than most. By the age of ten, I was leaving
him at home for extended periods of time because I’d been switched to a
different shift that meant I didn’t get home from work until a little after nine
o’clock.
By the age of twelve, he was spending almost the entire night alone,
every other day, because my shifts were switched again.
By fifteen, we didn’t even pass each other for the entire day at times.
Now, at sixteen, I had a better paying position. One where I worked
days, though they were long and just as tiring—if not more so—as my
previous job. I was a supervisor (or manager, whatever) and being the boss
was the pits. I had a low tolerance for dealing with people’s bullshit, and
there was a lot of that in this job.
The only saving grace was being able to pay all my bills, and slowly
drive down the debt I’d accrued over the years. Not to mention I was able to
afford a house payment for the first time ever.
“You took me to the last one.”
I grinned. “That’s right. I did.”
“I can’t believe you’re prospecting. I’m so fuckin’ excited.”
I just shook my head.
My kid rolled his eyes at me and went back to the couch. He came back
to me with a paper in his hand. “Read this and make sure it looks good.”
I grabbed the paper and read it, my heart tightening slightly when I read
the words on the paper.
“You think I’m a superhero?” I asked quietly, my eyes flicking up to my
son’s, where he was leaning against the wall.
Linc looked at me, really looked at me, and nodded.
“Yeah, Dad. I think you’re a fucking superhero,” he grated out.
“Otherwise, I wouldn’t be here right now, now would I? My paper was on
someone who inspires me to be a better person. That’s you, bitch.”
I grabbed my man-child in a headlock and brought him in close to me,
then pressed a kiss to the top of his head before taking him down to the
ground and tickling him like I used to do when he was six.
“Get out of here, kid. Let me read. You get your shit picked up outside,
or it’ll get stolen.”
My kid left, thankfully putting on his pants before he walked outside to
pick up his football gear, leaving me to read a paper that was enough to
bring a grown man to tears.
***
 I pulled my tired body out of bed, walked stiffly to the bathroom, and
clambered into the shower.
Yesterday had been long and tiring, but I loved being a Dixie Wardens’
prospect.
Being called out at three in the morning because another member’s wife
was in trouble made me feel like I was actually wanted. Needed. Like I had
something to offer the men of the Dixie Wardens.
Sadly, my job didn’t allow me to do that all the time. I couldn’t just take
off whenever I felt like it as some of the other brothers could. I had to work
from six in the morning until five or six at night, Monday through Friday. If
I didn’t, I didn’t have the cash for the house payment or have enough
money to buy food after all of my credit card bills were paid, or the loan
payments that I’d taken out when I couldn’t afford to put food on my son’s
plate, or buy him school clothes for the year.
Not and keep Linc in school. A school where he was finally excelling.
Groaning with the need to fall back in bed, I finished my shower, then
went to work. Only to do it all over again the next night.
 Chapter 2
When a woman starts laughing during an argument, you
should probably shield yourself, because she’s just flipped
her psycho switch.
-Words of wisdom
Jessie
“Kick some ass, boy,” I said to my son. “Call me with the score once
you’re done.”
And he would. He never missed a chance to tell me since he started
playing over ten years ago.
“Will do, Pop. Love you.”
It’d been two weeks since the night I’d read Linc’s paper, and today was
the first game between his football team and their biggest rivals in the
district.
“Love you too, kid,” I rumbled. “Watch the feet.”
Linc laughed as he hung up. I was grinning, too, at the inside joke.
When I started him in our city’s pee-wee league, I had to have a long
discussion with a then six-year-old Linc about kicking people when they
were down.
And it’d been something I’d said to him each and every time he started
a game. A superstition of sorts. One that he thought was paramount to
whether he threw a good game or not.
“Yo.” I looked over to the man that was leaning up against the railing
beside me, and nodded.
“Yo,” I said right back. “Whatcha doin’ out here all by yourself?”
I knew why I was out here. It was too loud in there, and it literally took
everything I had not to go into hyperventilation mode when it came to
stuffed spaces.
 “My head’s killing me.”
I eyed the cigar that Big Papa had lit before retuning my eyes to him.
“Maybe you should stop smoking,” I offered up my two cents.
Big Papa, the president of the Dixie Wardens MC, only grunted.
My eyes strayed to the door where a woman was laughing and cursing
at the same time. A man had his hands on her hips, holding her up by the
strength in his arms alone.
And I was lost.
I’d know that ass anywhere.
That long hair had a first-place spot in my thoughts, and I often
wandered there when I least expected it, even fourteen years later.
That laugh, though. That laugh was the place of my dreams.
When I was feeling down or out of sorts, I’d close my eyes and let my
mind drift to those long-ago days where it was only me and her.
And now, I was at a club party. A club that I wanted to be a member of
about as bad as I wanted to draw my next breath.
I needed a place to heal. I needed the support. And this place was it.
It had to be it.
Because, if I didn’t have this place, if I didn’t gain their trust, when I
was gone, my son would be left all alone.
I wasn't stupid. The job I did wasn’t a young man’s job. Soon—in a few
years—I’d be too old to work. By that time I’d probably be dead from a
heart attack as I tried to pay off all my bills.
I’d watched these men from afar. Noticed how they interacted with
everyone and everything for six months before I’d decided that it was time
to stop being a loner and find a home—a family—for my kid. I knew they
were all a loyal bunch of bikers, though rough around the edges, who were
family oriented and watched out for their own.
 And now that I had a better paying job that allowed me the time and
ability to actually put forth the effort to become one of them, I wouldn’t be
fucking it up now.
Even if the woman that still held my heart had her arm around some
other man.
A man who was a fully patched member of The Dixie Wardens MC—
the very same MC I was trying to become a member of; that is, if I didn’t
want to kill myself by the time the process was over.
“What are you looking at?”
That was Fender, another prospect.
When did he get here?
“Nothing,” I rumbled. “What’s that?”
The distraction worked, and a smile grew on Fender’s face as he got a
load of what was coming at us.
“Hey, baby. You want to come for a ride on the Fender train?”
I rolled my eyes to the dark, night sky and wondered if that pick-up line
actually worked. Surely not.
I was proved wrong moments later when Fender walked away, his hand
on the small of the woman’s back. He didn’t bother flashing his smug grin
in my direction before he took off. He didn’t have to. He knew I was
watching with surprise in my eyes.
“Hey, baby.”
I looked up, grimaced, and then walked away without bothering to reply
to the woman.
I didn’t have time for this shit.
My son was about thirty minutes from his first game, and I was stuck
here, dealing with bullshit, while my son got ready for one of the biggest
days of his short life.
 “We don’t want to keep you from your family event, you know,” Big
Papa said quietly. “If you had a prior engagement, you only needed to say
something. This party was for y’all, anyway.”
I didn’t bother to reply.
“Who’s he playing?”
My shoulders loosened. “Wildcats.”
Big Papa grunted. “Kid of yours is pretty good, isn’t he?”
Best in the state, for sure. He was exactly like me in so many ways that
it physically hurt sometimes.
“Yeah. Better than good,” I commented. “They really won’t mind if I
leave?”
“No,” Big Papa confirmed. “We only needed an excuse to drink. It
being six months since you arrived was the only thing we came up with to
have a party.”
Something inside of my chest loosened.
The idea of getting out of here right now, going somewhere that would
calm me down, was definitely on the highest position of my list of
priorities.
Normally, this place made me feel comfortable, but when people I
didn’t know, and couldn’t vouch for, started to enter, I started to lose my
ability to think rationally.
But I couldn’t lie to myself completely. I likely would’ve been a lot
more comfortable staying here had I not just had a blast from my past
knock me upside my head with a goddamn two-by-four.
Though, the woman always did have the power to bring me to my
knees.
“I’m going to head out, then,” I said to Big Papa. “What time is the ride
out on Saturday?”
Big Papa pulled out his phone, checked something on the calendar, and
then showed me. “Says eight o’clock in the morning. You should probably
get there about eight thirty.”
I laughed, “That sounds about right.”
I’d be there at eight, though, if not before.
I hated being late. If you were late, then you were pretty much signing
the death warrant on the rest of your day. You’d never be on time for
anything else again, because lateness had a cumulative effect.
“Have a good night, JJ.”
The tension from my shoulders lessened the further away from the back
deck I got, but I did stop right at the edge of the property line to take one
more longing glance back and wished I hadn’t.
Because she was there, laughing, not realizing that she was ripping my
heart out while she did it.
I should’ve known, really.
***
I was standing at the railing, the railing that had a sign on it that said ‘no
standing’, and waited for the kick off to the third quarter.
The Wildcats were winning by three points, but the Wolves had the ball,
and a damn fine quarterback who didn’t believe in losing.
I had no doubt in my mind that this was about to get very interesting.
And I was proved right five minutes later when something caught my
eye.
Turning, I froze at the sight behind me.
 Chapter 3
Is ‘ugh’ an emotion? Because I feel it all the time.
-Ellen’s secret thoughts
Ellen
“Why are we at a football game again?” I asked impassively. “And a
private school’s game at that.”
Sean said a few words to me, but I couldn’t hear him over the
excitement of the crowd.
I turned to survey the field, eyes widening slightly when I saw a kid
who had to be twenty-one, at least, standing on the sidelines, talking to a
coach, while squirting water in his mouth as he nodded.
It took impressive skill, that was for sure.
The boy—his features reminded me of someone else. Someone that
looked so similar to the boy that it took my breath away.
Longing for something I lost from long ago rolled through me, and I
shut it down so viciously that my head spun.
No, I couldn’t be thinking of him. Not when I was seeing Sean.
Sean walked to the edge of the fence, and my eyes went to the sign that
was next to a tall man with wavy jet-black hair. The sign read ‘No standing’
and I nearly laughed. The man had a ball cap in his hands as he was waving
it around in excitement over something that was going on on the field.
Since he was turned to watch the play down field, I could only make out
his back and a very partial view of his face, but it was enough to make my
body hum.
His other hand was fisted so tight that it was almost as if the man was
tensing and dodging right along with the plays. His shoulders moved. His
feet shuffled. And I was reminded of a man from my former life.
A boy who I’d loved with all my heart who couldn’t sit still for long.
 I shut those thoughts down, too.
Why was I thinking about him all of a sudden? I hadn’t thought about
him in months. Though, every year around his birthday, I’d think about
him. Think about where he was now, and how he was doing.
Shit!
“You okay?”
I looked over at Tally, my brother’s wife, and nodded.
“Yeah,” I cleared my throat. “Just a lot on my mind.”
She watched me closely for a few seconds before turning back to the
game, her eyes on the field.
“Are you as lost as me?” I asked her.
She tossed me a laughing grin. “Yeah, but it looks fun. The air is filled
with excitement. And the sound of the band brings back memories of those
Friday pep rallies.”
I nodded my head in understanding. The band had already started
playing a song that even my band had played when I was in school.
I’d gone to football games, of course, but never to watch the actual
game. I was less of a social butterfly, and more of a follower, only there
because that was the place to be in the South on a Friday night.
Then I’d met Jessie, and my entire social calendar had taken a turn for
the better…until he left.
I squeezed my hands into tight fists, not stopping even when the bite of
my fingernails dug into my bare palms.
This wasn’t good.
It had to be because his birthday was only a few short weeks away that I
was thinking about him. His birthday was the same day as mine, and I could
never think about my special day without thinking about his.
“Oh, shit.”
My eyes snapped up and zeroed in on what was happening on the field.
 Someone was down.
I couldn’t see who it was, due to the crowd that was now surrounding
the downed figure, but from the crowd’s reaction, it was someone
important.
The man who was standing beside Sean suddenly tensed. Within a
heartbeat he was standing directly on the railing of the bleachers. His large,
scarred hand that had a single tattoo of an E on the backside was resting
against the large silver pole that held up the massive stadium lights.
He was staring at the crowd, his body stiff but ready to move if there
was a need, and it hit me like a twelve-ton truck.
I knew that man.
Knew that strong jaw.
Knew that wavy black hair.
The elbow with the scar.
The way he held himself, even fourteen years later, was the same as he
had when he was a teenager.
My belly clenched, and I found it hard to breathe.
His beard was different, fuller maybe. He had lines at the sides of his
eyes that told about a hard fourteen years.
The tell-tale sign that this was the man who had held my heart, for what
felt like a lifetime, was the white shock of hair at the bottom of his chin.
The curly locks were distinctive, and had made me want to laugh when the
man had been eighteen.
Now, at thirty-two, it looked like he owned it.
Then he’d been self-conscious; now…well, now, it didn’t look like the
man had a self-conscious bone in his body.
The crowd on the field parted, and the kid I’d seen talking to the coach
earlier, emerged.
 He looked into the stands, worry in his eyes, and found the man
standing on the rails.
He pointed, the man from my past pointed back, and everyone let out
the breath they’d been holding.
I, on the other hand, was in danger of passing out.
I was lightheaded, sick to my stomach, and angry all at the same time.
How dare he?
How dare he show up now when I was just finally starting to get my act
together! Finally moving out from under my mother and father’s thumbs.
Shit!
“I’ll be right back,” I said to Tally. “I need to use the restroom.”
With that, I stood up, inched through the crowd of parents who were
still strung too tight from the call that was just made, and made my way
down the bleachers.
I had to walk directly past Jessie to do it, too.
I’d almost gotten to him when he finally decided to climb back down
off of the railing, inadvertently knocking into me when his ass hit my
shoulder in his haste to move.
“Sorry,” he muttered, not bothering to look up at me.
I gasped, and his eyes finally came to me.
The instant they connected, I knew he knew it was me. I also knew that
he wasn’t happy to see me, seeing as his eyes went from apologetic to blank
in a matter of moments.
He didn’t say a word as he turned around and walked down the
bleachers in front of me.
I, on the other hand, had no other choice but to follow him or look
stupid because I was the one who got up to walk this way anyway.
I watched his back as he threaded his way through the crowd, all the
while my heart was hammering and tears clogged my throat.
 The memories started to assault me before I could halt them.
The way he kissed me on the corner of my mouth, his tongue sweeping
along my lower lip before he’d back away quickly.
His arms wrapping around my shoulders, pulling me close and holding
me tight as I cried about something only a teenage girl would cry about.
My first time meeting Jessie’s son, Linc. The way Linc had wrapped his
arms around my neck, just like his daddy did, and held me tight.
Linc’s second birthday party, with Jessie’s arm tight around my lower
back, holding me to him as we watched his son play his little heart out with
his friends.
The first time I had sex with him.
The after party of my prom, where we snuck out together to spend some
time with each other without my parents insinuating themselves between us.
Yes, I had a lot of great memories.
Then…nothing. One day, he just up and left, and I hadn’t been able to
find him again.
I’d spent the next week searching for him. Going to all of his old
haunts. I’d even gone as far as to run by his parents’ house, but I’d
chickened out about halfway up the driveway and turned around.
By the time I made it to the bathroom, I was lost. So completely and
utterly lost that I wanted nothing more than to go home, wrap myself up in
a blanket cocoon, not unrolling myself until all of this hurt disappeared or I
became stronger.
Both of which were not going to happen.
Firstly, I had to work to support myself. Not to mention that my brother
would come searching for me in a few days, and I’d have to explain to him
exactly why it was that I was depressed in the first place.
And if my brother knew that Jessie James, my high school love, was in
the same motorcycle club as him, I wouldn’t like what would happen
afterward.
 I’d heard, as we made our way to the football game, that they were
going to watch the son of a prospect play. A prospect being a guy who was
not yet a member of the club but wanted to be and was working to do just
that. Kind of like a biker apprenticeship of sorts.
If Tommy knew that Jessie was trying to ‘patch in,’ as he called it, then
shit would go down, and I’d feel terrible all over again.
I was so lost in my thoughts as I went to the bathroom and then washed
my hands, that I didn’t even notice that I was done and heading out the door
again—the wrong way—until I was locked out and had nowhere to go but
through the darkness toward the lights that I could see along the back of the
bathrooms.
“What are you doing here?”
The harshness of the voice in the shadows had me halting, and I turned
to look at the darkness, knowing that Jessie was the owner of that dark,
husky voice.
“I’m here because my boyfriend and my brother are here,” I managed to
squeak out. “I didn’t know you were here, too, or I wouldn’t have come.”
Silence.
“Good to know.”
Jessie emerged from the shadows, and I had to fight the urge to throw
myself into his arms.
“Keep it that way.”
Then he was gone, and I was left wondering what in the hell had
happened to the sweet man who had been there for me when I needed him
the most.
***
“It’s nice,” I lied.
It was nice, but it wasn’t my cup of tea. I liked city living. I liked being
only a few short minutes away from the shopping mall or the grocery store.
 What I didn’t like were the thirty minutes it took to get out here and the
way Sean was watching me with intense eyes.
“You think you could live out here?”
I paused. “Ummm,” I hesitated. “Yeah, I guess. I mean I suppose, if I
had no other choice. Why?”
He looked at me like I’d just broken his heart.
“No reason.” He cleared his throat and turned away. “You ready?”
I nodded thankfully as I climbed on the back of the bike after him.
The entire way to my house, I questioned what I was about to do.
But I knew that I had to do it. I knew that I couldn’t let this go on
anymore without saying what was on my mind.
The moment we parked outside of the house where I was staying, I
dismounted, my heart in my throat.
“What’s wrong?”
Sean’s worried words brought my eyes up to his, and I knew he read
what I was about to say before I said it.
“Ellen…”
I held up my hand. “I can’t do this. You’re a great guy. You’re sweet,
nice and funny. You’re going to make some woman a great husband one
day, but that woman will not be me. I can’t do this anymore.”
Sean’s hand came up to cup my face, but I stepped away.
“No.”
He looked at me as if I’d burned him.
My eyes closed.
“It’s not you, it’s me,” I whispered.
He laughed darkly. “Words that no man ever wants to hear, but oddly
enough, I’ve heard that before.”
 My eyelids slid open, and I stared at the man who was obviously upset
in front of me.
“I’m sorry.”
The words were barely a whisper.
But I knew. The moment that I saw him, Jessie, I knew that I couldn’t
do this with Sean anymore. It only took one single eye lock between Jessie
and I to realize that what Sean and I had wasn’t enough.
It’d been years since I’d last seen Jessie, and I knew, almost
immediately, that what Sean and I had wasn’t working. This relationship
wasn’t what I wanted or hoped it would be, and it wasn’t what I needed.
I wasn’t saying that Jessie was what I needed, but I couldn’t be with a
man who I didn’t feel strongly about.
“Is there someone else?” he asked.
So, he had noticed my glances, even though I’d tried to hide them.
I opened my mouth to reply, but he held up his hand. He deserved to
hear the truth, and he deserved to know exactly why I was ending things
between us.
“Don’t answer that.”
I snapped my mouth shut and nodded once.
Sean lifted his arm and ran his hand through his hair.
“I’ll see you around some time.”
He shot me a pained look.
“Yeah,” he grunted. “We’ll see about that.”
With that he was gone, accelerating his motorcycle out of my
neighborhood as fast as he could safely get out of there.
And I was left wondering why I just broke it off with a good guy who
clearly cared about me.
 But just thinking of Jessie made me realize that it would’ve never
worked.
A man like Sean wouldn’t appreciate being compared to a man from my
past, especially when he had absolutely no chance of ever living up to my
teenage memories.
I pulled out my keys and walked into my house, grateful that I lived
alone, because as soon as the door closed behind me, I burst into tears.
 Chapter 4
Never underestimate a woman’s ability to make everything
your fault.
-An actual conversation between men
Ellen
One month later
I got my first look at Jessie’s son, and I realized that he looked just like
his father did at that age, despite the color difference of his eyes.
“Nice to meet you, ma’am,” Linc said as he held his hand out to me.
I took it, refraining from saying that I’d already met him, and smiled at
the boy-man.
He was already good-looking, and given time, he’d be breaking hearts
left and right once he filled into that tall frame of his.
“Nice to meet you, too, Linc,” I said genuinely.
“How’d you know my name?”
My smile faltered.
“I heard it from some of the other members,” I lied.
His eyes scrutinized me for a few long seconds before he nodded once,
turned toward the table that was groaning with the amount of food put on it,
and gestured to the plate. “Hungry?”
Hopefully he didn’t catch on that I knew him way before he was able to
remember that he did.
He eyed all of the food on the table and reached forward to grab some
fruit.
I nearly laughed.
His dad would’ve done the same thing years ago. Given the choice
between sweets, chips or fruit, he chose the fruit each and every time.
 I turned away and surveyed the room as I waited for Linc to finish with
his plate.
The moment he moved, I picked up my own plate, and my hands
collided with another person reaching for a plate at the same time.
“Sorry,” I murmured.
Jessie didn’t even acknowledge me.
No eye flicker, no breathing heavier. No nothing.
He just looked at me so impassively that it made me wonder what I’d
done to piss him off so badly. Why he’d left me without a word. Why he’d
ripped my heart out, stomped on it, and probably laughed as he did it.
My hand burned where our skin had collided, and I idly wondered what
in the hell I’d done to deserve this.
Everyone was mad at me. Sean couldn’t even stand to look at me.
Tommy was pissed off that I’d hurt his fellow club member. Then there was
Jessie. A man who I’d done nothing to, looking at me like I’d skinned his
cat right in front of him.
I didn’t even know how to skin a cat!
I got my plate, hands shaking like an alcoholic’s looking for his next
bottle, and took a seat at the far side of the patio.
There, I watched the crowd as they all had a good time.
Jessie was talking with his son and Big Papa, the president of this band
of misfits, about some football game that had happened last week.
This Friday was, apparently, a huge game for them, and Linc, of course,
was the star quarterback.
My stomach hurt.
Looking down at my plate, I realized that I’d eaten it all. I hadn’t even
left a single crumb behind.
I threw the plate to the side, sickened with myself, yet again, for eating
when I was so clearly in need of a goddamn run.
 I should really, really stop stress-eating, but I couldn’t help it. My life,
or what had become my life, wasn’t at all what I wanted.
I hated my job. Hated my house. Hated where I was living. And the
worst part was seeing all these happy people around me while I was stuck
in limbo.
I took one final look at Jessie, then I got up and walked out, choosing to
go home to my crappy little house instead of staying here torturing myself.
***
Jessie
“Who’s the woman?”
I looked over at my son, just now realizing that I was staring after
Ellen’s retreating form with worry etched all over my face.
As hard as I tried, I couldn’t wipe it off.
“Her name’s Ellen,” I murmured, glancing up at Sean as he watched me
speculatively.
Shit.
“How do you know her?” my son asked at the worst possible time.
Kids did that, though. Asked questions.
There was one time when I took my then seven-year-old son out to get a
Christmas tree, and he saw an old man with half an arm walking up to us.
The man’s wife and grandchildren followed him, the two grandkids
dragging the Christmas tree as they moved to the path where the tractor
would pick them up.
Upon seeing the old man and his half an arm, my son, embarrassing the
shit out of me, walked up to the man, pointed at his mangled stump and
said, “That’s a pretty nasty looking arm.”
My hand had moved to cover my face as I’d tried to think of an apology
that would make the guy realize that my kid was just being a kid and that he
wasn’t normally that rude. At least not intentionally.
 But the old man had waved off my apology before it could even leave
my lips.
“Kids are kids,” the old man had said. “They don’t know better yet. I’d
rather him ask than to be scared of it.”
Right now, though, my kid was sixteen-years-old and could clearly read
the tension in the air surrounding us.
Did that stop my kid from continuing to put his foot further into it? Hell
no.
“It was obvious to me that she knew you and that you know her,” he
continued. “She watched you the entire night, and when she was looking
away, you took your turn. It was kind of nauseating, really.”
I glared at my son.
“How about you go home and get your homework done for tomorrow
so you don’t fail your test,” I snapped.
Linc held up his hands. “I would, but I’m pretty sure my car’s blocked
in.”
I handed him the keys to my motorcycle. “Go.”
He took them, not turning back, knowing that I’d just handed him my
trust.
He had a motorcycle, of course. One that he and I had been fixing up
since last year, when I’d bought it for him for Christmas. Technically, he
wasn't allowed to drive it yet. He had to be 18 to legally ride the
motorcycle, but none of the cops in this town would pull my kid over unless
he was being a dumbass.
Then he deserved to be pulled over.
“So…” Sean said. “I kind of knew you had a thing for her, but I didn’t
know you knew her.”
I was saved from answering by the ring of my phone, and I’d never
been happier to be called in to work than I was at that moment.
“Yeah, I’ll be there in ten,” I grunted.
 I waved apologetically at Sean, finishing the rest of my Dr. Pepper as I
headed out.
Only to realize that I’d given my kid the keys to my bike not five
minutes before.
“Shit,” I sighed, looking at Linc’s car, where it was being blocked by a
red Nissan Maxima.
A red Maxima that had a distinctive form in the front seat.
One that was huddled into herself as she cried.
My heart stuttered, and my feet started moving before I could tell them
not to.
I knocked on the window, and the moment she heard it, she startled as
she looked up at me.
The tears in her eyes, being confirmed now that I could see her face,
were enough to make me check my bad mood.
However, the moment she saw me, she started her car and reversed out
of the parking spot as fast as she could.
With one final look at me out of her tear-filled eyes, she accelerated
down the street, freeing up Linc’s car.
I gritted my teeth at the urge to follow her, instead driving to work and
submersing myself in my job.
The moment I was finished, four hours later, I realized that I’d only held
off the inevitable.
I was going to have to talk to her. I was going to have to discuss with
her what had happened—not necessarily to smooth things over between us
or to start our relationship back up where we’d left off, but to give her the
closure she so obviously needed.
 Chapter 5
Yoga…because boys like bendy.
-Fact of life
Ellen
Two months later
I smiled at Sean and his new woman, so freakin’ happy for him I could
cry.
I thought that I’d broken something in him, but he’d gone and proved to
me, and everyone else, that he could find someone who made him happy.
Though they were still in the early stages, I had no doubt in my mind
that this relationship would be getting serious quickly.
It hurt a little bit that she looked at me like I was a rude cow who’d hurt
Sean just to see him bleed.
I hadn’t.
But I wasn’t fooling myself, and I wouldn’t have fooled him. If he
really looked closely at our relationship, he would’ve seen that I wasn’t
giving it my all.
Though, now I could tell that he knew I had the hots for a man who
didn’t have the hots for me.
I raised only my eyelashes to watch Jessie from my perch across the
room.
It physically hurt to have him within reaching distance.
I looked away, studying the baseboards and wondering how long it
would be acceptable to stay at a club event when my brother wasn’t even
there.
He’d called me, about twenty minutes ago, to inform me that he was
called into work, but I should go to the party anyway.
 According to him, I was being antisocial and everyone missed me.
I highly doubted that.
If they’d missed me, they could’ve come to visit me. They didn’t.
I was alone.
I might go somewhere else. Visit some faraway place where I didn’t
have to constantly see the man who still held my heart—after all of these
years—at every turn.
“Dad!”
I turned my head to see Linc jogging toward where his father sat
huddled around the group of men.
“Yeah?” He partially turned, and that was when I saw his face clearly
for the first time that night.
He’d toned his beard down. Went to the barber shop or something,
because those lines were way too clean and straight to say ‘I did this
myself.’
“I got a call from the Sooners! They want me to play for them next
year.”
Excitement started to bubble in my veins as I thought about Linc
playing for one of the most prestigious football colleges in the entire United
States.
My excitement dimmed when I caught Jessie looking at me. His face
was blank, no longer the animated mask of excitement that’d been painted
all over it just a few seconds prior.
He took one look at my face, curled his lip, and then turned so he could
no longer look at me, but still hold a conversation with the men around him,
as well as his son.
I felt utterly dejected.
I smoothed my skirt with shaking hands, bit my lip and finally decided
that this was a mistake.
 Only, my brother showed up just as I was about to take off, halting me
before I could leave.
“Hey, where are you going?” He caught me by the arm.
I plastered on my fake grin that usually worked on him, and he smiled
pleasantly before tossing one thick arm around my neck and pulling me into
him.
He smelled sweaty, and I curled my nose up at him in disgust.
“You stink.” I cleared my throat when it hitched up.
Luckily, he didn’t notice, because, by that point, he’d dragged me into
the main room again, allowing me to see Jessie clearly.
His eyes clashed with mine, and for just a second, I didn’t see that blank
mask in his eyes.
I saw relief.
But the relief was gone in a flash, making me question whether I’d seen
what I thought I had, or if it’d just been my imagination. My stupid hope
getting the best of me.
“I brought a new card game!” Tommy announced to the room.
It was a party, yes, but this was a family one. One that meant it was only
club members, and their families here.
Thank God.
I didn’t think I could handle seeing a woman rubbing up against Jessie’s
side, as I’d had to see at the last event I’d been unfortunate enough to
attend.
“And what is this card game?”
Tally, Tommy’s wife, drawled from the opposite side of the room where
she was speaking with Sean’s new woman, Naomi.
My eyes skated away from the woman since she was glaring at me, too.
She had done so each and every time I’d made eye contact with her over the
last hour.
 “It’s called Would You Rather?”
Groans filled the room.
“What’s Would You Rather?”
That was from Big Papa.
“It’s a game that gives you two different scenarios, neither of them
good, and you have to choose which one you’d rather do. Such as: Would
you rather fall, smack your face on the ground, and lose two teeth or would
you rather sit down, fall asleep, and wake up with fire ants covering every
inch of your body and crawling down your urethra.”
The room went silent at Jessie’s son’s words.
My gaze flashed to Jessie, who was trying hard not to laugh.
“That’s very interesting, kid. I think I’d rather lose my two front teeth,”
Big Papa said.
“You can’t play this one,” Tommy Tom pointed at him. “It has adult
language.”
Linc’s eyebrow rose, just like Jessie’s did, and he grinned.
Then he looked over at his father and the two of them shared a secret
laugh.
My heart kicked at seeing the smile on the man’s face, and I clenched
my hands into fists as I tried to look at anything but the gloriousness of that
man wearing a grin.
Tommy walked forward and finally dropped his hand from around my
neck, allowing me to stand up straight for the first time in five minutes.
I stretched my shoulder out and took a seat, trying to ignore the fact that
Jessie and his son took a seat almost directly across the room from me.
Though they were as far away from me as they could get, they still were
in the same room.
And just like it always did lately, my heart started to pound, and my
cheeks started to flush.
 Memories assaulted me, and I pulled my phone out to give myself
something to do besides staring at my long-lost love, who now hated me.
Though my phone had changed a lot over the last fourteen years, I still
had his number stored in my contacts.
Though, that was irrelevant. I didn’t forget his number.
Each year that went by, I knew that number. Knew it like I knew my
middle name.
I pulled that number up now, knowing that he didn’t have it anymore.
I’d texted that number over and over throughout the years. One of the
many times I’d tried calling it, about a year and a half after he’d left, I’d
found it disconnected.
Now, the phone number was like my lifeline. Something I used when I
needed to escape.
To talk to the boy that Jessie used to be, not the man he’d become. The
one I didn’t know.
I pressed on his name in my address book, then typed out a text, hitting
send before I could even think about it.
It was such a habit, to share my life with the disconnected phone
number, that it never occurred to me that it actually might be in use at this
point.
But, like the dumbass I was, I continued to do it.
I hate the new you. I miss the old you.
***
Jessie
I watched her out of the corner of my eye, her brother’s bulky arm
wrapped around her neck as he kept her close to his body.
I should’ve fucking known, now that I thought about it.
Tommy Tom was actually Tommy Tomirkanivov. Ellen Tomirkanivov’s
brother.
 The girl that held my heart.
How I’d never put their two names together, was beyond me. My only
excuse at this point was that back then, I’d only ever heard Ellen pronounce
her name. Tom-kann-of.
When I’d started prospecting, Tommy had introduced himself as
Tommy Tom, and that’d been that. I’d read the name, of course, on ledgers
and such for the club, but I’d never put together the two names since what I
remembered hearing, and what I was reading, sounded completely different
in my head.
Goddammit, I was so fucking stupid sometimes.
“Do you want to play, Dad, or do you want to leave?”
I turned to study my son.
Fourteen years ago, Ellen had loved him. She’d been enamored with my
little black-haired pain-in-the-ass, and I’d been enamored that she was
enamored.
Now, watching him all grown up, talking to her once again, it brought
back memories that hurt too badly to dissect.
“I’ll stay for an hour or so,” I told him. “But I have to be at work at six,
and it’s already half past ten.” I gestured to a seat that was about as far
across the room as it could get from Ellen. “I don’t want to hear any
bitchin’ when we leave, either.”
Linc gave me a droll look.
“When do I ever complain when you need to go to work in the
morning?”
“Smart ass,” I grunted as I took the seat.
I tried, really I tried, not to look across the room to see where Ellen sat,
but I couldn’t help myself.
My phone buzzed in my pocket, but I ignored it, instead watching Ellen
out of the corner of my eye as she fiddled with her own phone.
Then cursed inwardly as I realized that I was watching her.
 Nothing good ever came out of that.
At least, this time, Sean had someone with him. It wouldn’t make me
feel absolutely terrible if I was caught watching her.
Though, seeing the haunted look in her eyes when she caught me
looking at her was enough to make me feel like I’d just taken a boot to the
gut.
But I’d done the right thing!
She was successful—although not in the field I thought she’d be
successful in—and was happy. I’d done the right thing!
Maybe if I kept telling myself that, it would be true.
I had to think that I’d done the right thing. Because, if I didn’t do the
right thing, I just caused both of us needless heartache.
I knew, on my end, that I’d done the right thing.
At the age of eighteen, I’d still had a lot of growing up to do. I’d made a
lot of mistakes. I’d almost fucked my life up royally.
Thankfully, I’d climbed my way out of the hellhole that was my old
hometown and started traveling wherever the oil field needed me.
Ideally, the oil field wasn’t the best place for a family. I’d had that
proven to me over and over again throughout the last fourteen years, as I
tried to juggle being a single father and working.
Sure, it would’ve been a hell of a lot easier with someone else to help,
such as a certain brown-haired goddess, but I didn’t have an easy life.
Neither did Linc.
We were dirt poor for the first ten years of his life, and even now, I still
didn’t have what I wanted. Until Linc was eight, we’d lived in a trashed out
bumper pull RV that was seconds away from falling apart. Each time I
hooked that bitch up to my truck, I feared that it’d collapse on the way to
where we were going, leaving us homeless and me fucked in the ass since
I’d had no back up plan.
 I worked my ass off. Went home. Blew off steam with my kid when he
was there, and when he wasn’t, I enjoyed the peace and quiet. In a home
that still wasn’t up to the standards that I knew Ellen had.
My phone buzzed again, reminding me of the message I received and
ignored earlier, and I pulled it out.
My heart started to pound as I saw the number.
It didn’t have a name attached to it. But I didn’t need the name. I knew
the number by heart. Had for fourteen years now.
I should.
I’d been ignoring the calls from that number for a very long time.
Though, at one point, I was weak and disconnected it, saying to myself
that I wouldn’t keep reading those messages.
But I felt it was my due.
Felt that the least I could do was read those messages.
I’d left her.
I should have to read her sad words.
But, over the years, as her anger at me dissipated, the messages came
slower and slower, but they were still there.
It was like hearing from an old friend.
I knew that, no matter what, they’d be there when I needed them most.
Time and distance didn’t matter.
And this was the same thing.
At least on her end.
I never responded.
I couldn’t.
Just like I wouldn’t this time, even though her words tore a hole straight
through my heart.
I hate the new you. I miss the old you.
 I couldn’t help it then. I had to look up. Had to see her.
Her face was blank. No longer was the phone she’d been playing on in
her hand. Now it was on the table beside her as she looked down at her
hands.
And I blew out a breath.
“Shit.”
“What?” Linc shifted in his seat to stare at me.
I shook my head.
“That from your secret messenger who you still won’t tell me about?”
he eyed my phone.
I pressed the home button and got rid of the message screen, then closed
it completely before shoving it back into my pocket.
My son laughed, and I smacked him upside the head. “Get your cards,
boy. And bring me mine, too.”
My son got up and reached for the cards that Tommy was holding out to
him. He didn’t notice the sad way that Ellen watched him. Nor did he see
the way her eyes flicked to me, and back to him, as if comparing the two of
us.
I just looked at her, blank faced, and studied her right back.
When she was seventeen, she’d been curvy.
Now, at the age of thirty-one, she was much curvier. Her hips were
round, and her breasts were a little larger. Her face wasn’t as angular as it
once was, it was rounder, almost angelic.
But that didn’t detract from her beauty at all.
No, she was fucking stunning.
So stunning that it took my breath away every time I looked at her.
Even now, in a faded blue jean skirt and a solid black baby doll t-shirt,
she was magnificent.
 “Here, Dad,” Linc said, interrupting my contemplation of Ellen’s
clothes.
I reached up and took the cards from him, smirking when I read the top
card.
“Would you rather smoke weed in front of a cop or be slapped in the
face by an angry mother who doesn’t want you dating her daughter,” I
murmured, shaking my head.
That sounded too close to real life for me to read aloud.
The next one wasn’t much better.
Would you rather leave your significant other behind to live a full happy
life without you, or would you rather stay together knowing that they’re
going to die in five years and you’ll remain single for the rest of your life?
I frowned.
“Okay, this is how it works. The first person to go, which will be me,
asks the person to his or her right a question. They have to answer one or
the other. Then it’s their turn to ask the question. They choose a number out
of this jar, and they ask the person that has that number the question. Simple
enough, right?”
Tommy Tom got nods and grunts of understanding from the men, who
looked less than pleased to be playing this game, and giggling laughter from
the women.
I picked up my beer and took a healthy swallow, wondering if I could
get out of this somehow.
I couldn’t read these questions to anyone.
Even worse, if I happened to pick Ellen, how the hell could I ask her
something like what was on these cards without making her burst into
tears?
Tommy Tom turned to Ellen, who was on his right, and grinned
manically.
 “Would you rather watch your mother using a vibrator, or never have an
orgasm induced by a person of the opposite sex for the rest of your life?”
Ellen made a gagging sound, and my lips twitched.
Linc, of course, being the loud mouth that he was, said, “I’d rather
watch my mother use a vibrator.”
Ellen’s eyes turned to him.
“You don’t even know your mother all that well, son,” I sat back in my
seat.
Linc shrugged.
“So, obviously, that one doesn’t apply to me.”
I rolled my eyes.
“I’d rather not have an orgasm induced by a man again,” she said softly.
Her voice hit me like a ton of bricks right to the center of my chest.
I snorted, as did the rest of the room.
Who did she turn that glare onto, though?
Me.
My lips twitched at the pissed off look on her face, and she caught it,
narrowing her eyes even further.
Would it be bad to tell her she looked like she was sucking on a lemon?
“All right, now you draw a number from the stack. And the person with
that number is the one you ask the question.”
Ellen did as Tommy Tom asked, and showed the number to the room as
she said, “Four.”
I glared at the stupid red four on my card, then tilted my head up to look
at the woman that was about to ask me something.
Great. I now had to politely converse with her without saying anything
inappropriate or letting on that I knew her beyond meeting her here.
“Oh, Dad! That’s you!” Linc said helpfully from my side.
 Ellen’s eyes tipped up as she stared at me with barely controlled glee.
Then, she lifted the card up to her face, and promptly blushed from the
tips of her toes to the roots of her hair.
“I can’t read this,” she hissed at her brother, turning on him with an
accusing look.
Tommy Tom grinned.
“Yes you can. Just do it.”
She licked her lips nervously, looked at me, and then cleared her throat.
“Come on, read it!”
That was Tally, who was laughing on the perch of her seat on the other
side of Tommy.
Ellen scratched her head.
“Would you,” she cleared her throat again. “Would you rather…would
you rather watch me have sex with someone or have sex with someone
while I watched.”
She read it so fast toward the end that I held up my hand and made a
‘repeat’ motion.
She gritted her teeth and read it again.
“Would you rather watch me have sex with someone or have sex with
someone while I watched.”
She about choked on the last two words, and it took everything I had in
me not to laugh at the predicament that her brother had put her in.
The only reason I was able to hold in the laughter was the look of terror
in her eyes.
She didn’t want to know the answer.
I could read the truth in her eyes.
She was scared of what I might say, and not because she cared that
everyone would know that, at one point in time, we’d been an item. But
because she didn’t want to know I’d be willing to do either one.
Which was the truth.
I wouldn’t. Not ever.
It didn’t matter how upset I was, I wouldn’t do that to her.
I wasn’t that type of man.
“That one sucks. Read another,” I finally answered.
Relief poured through her shoulders, but then Tommy Tom spoke,
pouring fat into the fire.
“You have to answer. Those’re the rules of the game.”
I shrugged.
“Then I won’t play,” I finally answered.
Tally’s eyes widened.
Linc snorted at my side.
Ellen looked down at her hands.
“Party-pooper. Ask him another one, Sis.”
Thankful that she would have a reprieve, Ellen flipped to the next card
and blanched even whiter.
She flipped to the next card, and then grimaced.
“Shit, I’m getting a phone call.”
Ellen stood up and answered her phone, walking out of the room
without a backwards glance, leaving the rest of us reeling.
“I think you found a winning game,” Tally laughed. “Operation
embarrass your sister is in full effect.”
Tommy Tom grinned.
“Shit, Dad,” Linc said. “I think I forgot my gear in the back of Atley’s
truck.”
I turned my annoyed glare on my kid.
 “I told you last week that if you ever did that again, the gear was
staying.”
Linc snorted.
“Yeah, I also remember you saying that if I ever forgot my backpack or
lunch you wouldn’t bring it to me. Yet, you’ve done that about eighteen
thousand times over my school career.”
I ruffled Linc’s hair.
“Let’s go then,” I grunted, standing up.
“Awww, not you, too!” Tommy Tom said. “You said an hour!”
“That’s because this game is stupid,” Big Papa grunted. “We will never
be in any of these situations, picking between which one of these crazy ass
things we’d rather do. Like, when will I ever be given the opportunity to
suck some woman’s tits in public? They’d run screaming, and I’d lose my
job in a fuckin’ heartbeat.”
Chuckling, I offered Tommy Tom my cards, as Linc followed suit.
I stopped beside the chair where Ellen had placed her cards, the four
slick pieces of hard paper falling to the floor in her haste to get out of the
room, and I realized exactly why she wasn’t willing to read any of them.
Would you rather have one day to do anything you wanted to do with me
or have mediocre sex with a famous actress of your choosing?
Would you rather lose your first love or live the rest of your life together
but hating each other?
Yeah, like I thought. Impossible to answer.
Not because I didn’t know the answers, but because I didn’t want to
voice the answers aloud and let everyone in the room in on exactly what I
felt towards the woman.
 Chapter 6
If you put me in a corner, I’m going to fuck my way out of it.
-Jessie to Ellen
Ellen
Several weeks later
I had only been back in the Mooresville area for less than a year. I’d
dated Sean for part of that time, but it’d been the last five months since
Jessie had come back into my life that had thrown my existence up in the
air. Five months since he’d told me to stay away from him.
Five months of wanting answers and getting none.
I was on edge. I was cranky. And honestly, I just wanted out of here.
So, I was leaving.
I’d called the movers. I’d closed up my shop. A shop, I might add, that I
didn’t even want to begin with. But hell, a woman had to make a living
somehow, even if it was doing a job that she hated.
“Are you sure about this?”
That was my landlord.
He was a fairly nice guy, but he expected way too much a month in rent
for a little shop that wasn’t even in the main part of town.
“Yes, I’m sure,” I said, finishing off the check for the early lease
termination fee.
“Okay,” he said, holding out his hand for the check. “You have until the
end of the month to get your belongings out of here, or I’ll be forced to sell
them to recoup all of my money.”
I refrained from saying that he wasn’t out any money, seeing as I was
paying nearly a thousand dollars for the early termination of my lease, but
instead I chose to stay silent.
 That was my go-to emotion lately.
When I wanted to scream, I stayed silent.
When I wanted to cry, hit something or complain, I stayed silent.
Hell, even my own brother had noticed the change in my behavior.
“Well, I’ll see you later, Ellen. I’m sorry to see you go.”
I waved at him, then turned back to survey what was left of my shop.
I needed to box up the bolts of fabric, but to do that, I had to go to
Lowe’s to get a few more boxes.
Sighing in frustration, I snatched my car keys from the counter,
pocketed my debit card and license and shoved my purse underneath the
counter. Then I walked outside, turned to lock the door and hurried quickly
toward my car to avoid getting completely soaked to the bone.
I stared at the old girl as I moved.
I really needed a new car.
One that started when I needed it to and wouldn’t break down when I
least expected it.
On that annoying thought, I got to my car, unlocked it, and got in.
After pumping the gas pedal a few times, I put the key in the ignition
and started it.
Thank God the motor turned over and purred to life.
It was iffy these days.
Sometimes, if I held my mouth just right, it would turn over and
surprise the ever-loving crap out of me. Like it had today.
But others, like when I was coming out of Lowe’s with a buggy full of
boxes, twenty minutes later, it didn’t.
I stared at the car’s dials, noting the full gas tank, and the good battery.
I tried it again.
And got the same result: nothing.
 “Shit. Shit, shit, shit,” I said, tilting my forehead sideways to the cool
glass of the window.
There were two things I didn’t want to do. One was call my brother.
And two was tell him why I was at Lowe’s buying boxes in the first
place.
If I couldn’t get my car started, then I’d have to tell him and deal with it
when he got upset that I was leaving.
But I couldn’t stay here anymore.
Although I’d have to tell him eventually—probably about ten minutes
before I headed out to my next destination—I didn’t want to do it now.
Because he might try to stop me, and I really didn’t want him to stop
me.
I wanted out of this stupid little town with its bad memories. I wanted
away from the man who made my heart hurt every time I saw him.
I needed space.
I needed something, anything, that would give me relief from all the
pain here.
A tap on my window startled me and I jumped as I turned my head to
see a pair of denim jeans staring at me through the window.
A well-filled-out pair of denim jeans.
I put my hand to the window crank and rolled it down before looking up
at the owner of the jeans.
And my stomach dropped.
“Yes?” I squeaked.
“What’s wrong with you, and why are you still sitting in the lot?”
I gritted my teeth, refusing to tell the man why I was sitting there.
My lips thinned, and I narrowed my eyes.
 “I’m not waiting all day. Either you tell me, or I leave you here to deal
with this shit all on your own.” His eyes narrowed on my backseat. “And
what the fuck is all this shit in your car for? You really shouldn’t be driving
around with this. It could get stolen.”
I looked up at the sagging headliner on the roof of my car, and
wondered if there was a law about killing your ex-boyfriend when he
provoked you on the first day of your period. Surely I could plead insanity
as a temporary disorder, right?
Then I decided that it probably wouldn’t be allowed. I was too
levelheaded, they wouldn’t believe that I’d done it in a fit of passion.
“I’m going to take that as a no,” he grumbled, then started to walk away.
I watched him go, my eyes on his ass, and wondered if I had it in me to
tell him to come back.
I knew I didn’t have it, though.
I couldn’t ask for help from him.
I couldn’t even be in the same vicinity as him, hence the reason I was
moving.
It was either leave or deal with having my heart ripped to shreds each
time I saw him.
I tried the car again, then dropped my forehead to the steering wheel
and listened to the rain hit the windshield.
My passenger side door was ripped open, and suddenly my entire car
was filled with a man that was entirely way too large to be jam-packed into
a seat that caused him to fold up like an accordion.
“You need a new starter.”
Jessie’s rumbled reply rippled through me, causing my heart to pound,
and my stomach to summersault.
He’d always had this effect on me, though.
I thought back to the first time I saw him, and the way our eyes had met.
 ***
I jogged down the steps of the library, taking them two at a time, as I
hurried in the direction of where my mother usually parked to wait for me to
get done.
I volunteered at the public library twice a week, and I was late for my
counselor’s appointment at the local college.
My mom would get me there, of course, but it’d be close.
Lucky for me, my mom drove like she was a player in Grand Theft Auto.
She pulled up at the curb of the library five seconds later, pushed open the
door and yelled for me to climb in.
I did, and we arrived with only two minutes to spare.
“Thanks, Mom,” I grinned as I pushed the door open to the van. “I’ll be
roughly an hour and ten minutes, give or take. Don’t wait for me. I’m going
to walk home.”
My mother nodded, waved and then took off once my feet hit the
pavement.
I headed for the steps.
The moment my foot hit the first step, I went face forward, falling hard.
I knew instantly that my palm was skinned because blood was leaking
down the length of my arm.
“Ouchhhh,” I whined, pushing up with my good hand to look over the
wound.
“Here.”
I looked up into the melted chocolate eyes of the most beautiful guy I’d
ever seen, and froze.
“Do you want this?” he asked again.
I finally tore my eyes away from his brown ones and looked down at
where he was holding a paper napkin out to me.
“T-thank you,” I said, reaching for it. “I appreciate it.”
 He shrugged and took a seat on the large brick accent wall that lined
the front of the college.
“No problem,” he muttered, dismissing me.
I bit my lip and pressed my hand with the towel in it down onto the
wound on my palm while trying not to be too obvious about watching him
as I walked away.
An hour and twelve minutes later, I came back outside to find him still
sitting in the same spot.
He was lying back on the grass, though, watching the clouds pass
overhead.
I walked carefully down the steps, attempting not to appear as if I was
watching him like a hawk, and I damn near managed it, too. That is until I
got to the bottom step and missed it completely.
Luckily, this time I caught myself on the iron railing that ran up the
middle of the steps, or I would’ve face planted again.
“What is it with you and steps?”
I bit my lip and looked over at the man.
“I’m gravity challenged,” I told him. “I don’t reserve this clumsiness
just for steps. I’ll have you know that I can also trip on air.”
His eyes finally turned to mine.
“You’re cute.”
My face heated, and everything I was feeling in that moment ripped
through my body and likely showed on my face.
Fascination, hunger, humor, a need to talk to this man more.
Yet I didn’t do any of those things.
Instead, I waved at him, not realizing that I’d see him every single day
for the next six months during my dual credit history class that the local
community college was offering to high school students who wished to start
their college degree early.
 Luckily, I was one of the five students to do that as a test sample from
my school, because if I hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have met the man
destined to change my life.
***
“Get out of my car,” I ordered the instant the memories cleared.
Jessie crossed his arms over his chest and stared at me, waiting for
something that I couldn’t figure out.
I tried to focus on anything but that wide chest—a chest that’d grown
exponentially since the last time I’d seen him.
“Negative,” he denied. “What I want to know is why the hell you’re
acting all weird.”
My eyebrows rose.
“Why I’m acting so weird…” I tested the words on my tongue, staring
at the man like he had a screw loose. “You’re telling me that you have no
clue why I’m acting weird?”
He gave me a look that clearly said what he thought about how loud my
words were.
“Why don’t you just go,” I said. “Before I say something I’ll regret, and
feel terrible for it later.”
His eyes were dark swirls of melted chocolate that made me want to
stare at them forever.
That’s why I looked away and stared out the window at the rain that was
sliding down the glass.
“I don’t see why we can’t both exist here and act like nothing ever
happened.”
I closed my eyes, hoping he would stop.
He didn’t.
“You’re making it hard to be around my own goddamn club. I’m a
fucking member now, and I can’t even go to an outing without worrying
about you and how shitty you make me feel.”
How shitty I made him feel.
He had to be joking.
I continued to ignore him, though, hoping against hope that he’d leave if
I didn’t open my mouth.
But what he said next had my spine straightening and my face turning
red.
“I can’t fuckin’ breathe,” he said. “I’m so scared that I’m going to break
you that I can’t even have fun.”
I turned my head slowly and stared at him incredulously.
Then my mouth took over, and the shit I never wanted to voice aloud
came out, letting him in on my own personal hell.
“Either get the hell out of my car, or I’ll fucking leave.”
He looked at me like I was a fucking moron.
I wanted to scratch his eyes out with the pointy end of my cell phone
charger, but that would likely mean I’d lose my only charger that worked
reliably, and he wasn’t worth the trip to Wal-Mart to replace it.
So, instead, I stared at him, fuming inside, while he stared right back.
I don’t know what he saw in my eyes, but whatever it was caused his
mouth to tip up at the edges in a semblance of a smile.
“Try your car again,” he said.
I did, staring at him while I reached forward and turned the key.
My car started up, and I wanted to elbow him in the jaw when a
mocking smile lit his face.
“See you when I see you.”
Then he was gone, jogging as quickly as he could to his motorcycle that
was parked underneath the awning just to the right of the sliding glass
doors.
 The last thing I saw before he started the bike up and roared away in the
pouring rain was the stupid Dixie Wardens leather vest that he’d just
recently been given.
Ten minutes later and soaked to the bone, I made it back to my store.
The moment I reached the covered sidewalk that started to line the small
shopping center, I marched straight past my shop and right into Mr.
Frederick’s.
Mr. Frederick owned an antique shop that was incredibly overpriced,
but he had some good stuff, and got a lot of business, despite overcharging
anyone with opposable thumbs.
The racket that preceded me into his shop had him looking up from
whatever he was working on, a clock or something. He stared at me with
knowing eyes.
“You changed your mind.”
I lifted up a lip and snarled, “Yes.”
He winked. “Just throw the papers in the trash. Rent’s still due in a
week.”
I walked right back out, and stopped dead in the middle of the sidewalk
where I saw Jessie on his bike, staring at me as I did all my stomping.
I flipped him the bird and fished out my keys.
The moment I was back in my shop, I ripped the first box I came to
open with my bare hands, breaking a fingernail in the process, and then
screamed.
“Goddammit, Jessie!”
I would not give him the pleasure of leaving and making it easy on him.
No sir-ree-bob.
My momma didn’t raise no quitter.
But first, I sent his old phone a text message just for good measure.
I might not be able to say to him in real life what I was thinking, but
over text messages I sure as hell could.
 I fucking hate you so much right now. I miss you, and you’re so close
that I can practically taste you. Stop being so mean to me.
***
Jessie
I watched her walk away from me in the rain, then looked behind me at
her car into the backseat where I could see her belongings packed to the
very top of the roof.
So, as I rode off into the rain, the wet rain stinging my cheeks, I
decided that no matter what it took, I’d keep my distance.
No matter what.
Obviously, though, I didn’t factor in the words or the tears. Because had
I, I would have realized sooner that it was futile to resist her.
***
“Well that backfired,” I muttered darkly after arriving back at my house.
“Fucking fuck.”
I threw my wet shirt in the corner of the room, and then started on my
pants.
My cell phone hit the floor with a loud thump, and I cursed as I
snatched it up.
The phone turned on as it did whenever it sensed movement on my part,
and I stared in fear at the number on the screen.
Shit.
Did knowing that I shouldn’t be reading the messages, messages that
were so personal that only the sender should be privy to the words, stop me
from reading this one and the previous five? No.
I fucking hate you so much right now. I miss you, and you’re so close
that I can practically taste you. Stop being so mean to me.
My stomach plummeted as I read the words, and I closed my eyes as
horror washed over me.
 I was being mean to her, and I couldn’t even help it. It was a knee-jerk
reaction at this point, and I couldn’t figure out how to stop to make it all
better.
More, though, it had to do with the phone calls I’d started receiving a
little over four months ago. Ones that I never thought I’d have to deal with
again.
Margot.
Linc’s mom.
My baby mama.
The woman who almost got my child taken away from me by the
government. Not once. Not twice. But six times over the last sixteen years
of Linc’s life.
The first two times were while he was still a baby, less than two years
old.
And here’s the real reason I was staying away from Ellen: Margot felt
like she owned me. Margot was my first girlfriend. She and I were in high
school when we first started dating.
I’d met her at my father’s house, and at the time, my young, naïve self
didn’t put two and two together. For example, her showing up at my house
for drugs. I was instantly smitten with her, and I never really thought about
why she’d been at my house. I’d only been thinking with my dick, and what
my dick was thinking was all I thought I needed at the time. We only had
unprotected sex once, but apparently, just like I learned in my sex ed class,
that was all it took.
But once she got pregnant, and I realized that Margot had a serious drug
addiction, I finally wised up.
I didn’t leave her, though.
No, I couldn’t.
Who could just leave a girl who was pregnant with your child? An
addict who used anything and everything against you?
 I’ll kill myself if you leave. I’ll kill our baby, too.
I’ll take these drugs if you’re not here to stop me.
I’ll purposefully run off this road and kill us all if you don’t stop
threatening to leave.
All of those things, and more, were words that she gave me at one point
in time or another.
The instant that Linc was born, though, I filed for custody of my child
and won. At seventeen, I’d had to move out of my parents’ house and into a
trailer in their backyard. At eighteen and a half, I had my own piece of
rental land for my trailer, assistance from the government, and a full-time
job.
And all of that time, Margot was there, dogging my heels, despite my
insistence that she needed to stay away.
Without the pawn of our child to use, she was unable to force me to do
anything.
So, instead, she amused herself by fucking with my life. Such as trying
to pick Linc up from daycare, and later school. Or calling my job and
telling my boss that she was my wife, and that something had happened,
and she needed me to come home immediately.
Things like that. Little things that were enough to drive me insane.
But then, things would slow down, and she’d leave me alone.
Which was what allowed me false hope when I’d first met Ellen.
Everything had been fine for about eight weeks into our relationship,
but then someone put a bug in Margot’s ear about us, and she was back.
Back with a vengeance that bordered on scary at times. But Ellen
weathered.
The first incident had come when Ellen and I had gone on our first date
with Linc. Margot had conveniently been warned of the impending date, no
doubt by my own parents since I had still been living on their land at the
time, and she’d shown up and thrown such a big hissy fit that everyone in
the vicinity of the diner where we were eating knew my business and heard
Margot’s lies.
The second time had happened when I’d finally convinced Ellen to go
on another date with me. She’d agreed, and we’d headed out to a small
restaurant. Margot had followed us there, from her perch of stalker central.
Then she’d ambushed us before going in, slinging insults toward Ellen.
Pointing toward Ellen as a home wrecker and a slut. Words that I’d quickly
taken Ellen away from, but not fast enough. The words had still sunk their
barbs deeply into my girl’s skin.
By the third time Ellen knew what was up. She steeled her spine and
gave it back to Margot just as hard as she’d gotten it. And I’d never been
more proud of her.
The rest of our small Southern town, however, had not. They’d seen
Ellen as nothing more than a slut, and soon those little words started to drift
back to her parents.
That was when Ellen’s parents started to enforce the ‘only at home’
rule. Where I was only allowed to come over when one parent, or the other,
was home, and only have a platonic relationship.
But we still snuck around.
We had fun.
She was my best friend in a dark and lonely world, and I needed her.
She made it through and came out the other side whole.
I’d thought that we’d be home free when Margot suddenly gave up, but
then her mother had happened, and I had no doubt in my mind that that was
all Margot’s doing. She may not have told Ellen’s parents outright about us,
but she’d given them enough information to enlighten them to the fact that I
wasn’t good enough for Ellen.
I’d bowed out gracefully, not wanting to hurt the relationship that Ellen
had with her mother or father. Not wanting to derail her dreams all because
I needed her.
 So, I’d left. And in doing so, I’d torn both of our hearts out in the
process.
What kept me away, though, was Margot.
Her constant interference in my life. In Linc’s life.
Now, though, with Margot back and baring her sharp little teeth, I
wasn’t sure that I wanted to bring Ellen back into the middle of the
shitstorm that my life was about to become. A-fucking-gain.
It was bad enough that Linc had to deal with it.
Bringing her in would only anger Margot more.
That, and I wasn’t sure that I could handle leaving her again. I wasn’t
strong enough.
Another thing that kept me away from her last time was the fear of
holding her back.
Now she was an adult. She hadn’t pursued her dreams for whatever
reason, and if I were to make a move right now, she was old enough to say
no.
But I couldn’t think like that. Couldn’t allow Margot to get her dirty
little hooks into Ellen.
I was already having a hard enough time getting Linc to see that Margot
wasn’t as she seemed. She had recently tried to reinsert herself into Linc’s
life. He was only seeing the nice side of Margot. He couldn’t see that below
her fake ‘nice’ exterior, she was a bitter woman who found it entertaining to
ruin men’s lives. And I couldn’t help him with this. He needed to see for
himself what kind of a person she has become.
 Chapter 7
What do you like? I like romantic walks down the gun aisle.
-Jessie to Big Papa
Jessie
“Oh, my God,” I grunted and hung up the phone. “This is a fuckin’
nightmare.”
I placed my hands on my head and leaned both elbows on my knees as I
tried to get my mind to wrap around what I’d just heard.
“What is?” Linc asked as he came in the room.
I looked up and studied my son.
He was tucking his crisp white dress shirt into his jeans, but his eyes
were on me.
This was making me sick.
Margot had showed up in my life—and Linc’s—like she always did.
Only this time, I couldn’t shield him from her. She’d gotten to him first,
and hooked him in with her lies and promises.
Now he was adamant on spending time with her, and I had no choice
but to let him, or I’d look like the bad guy.
“I’m going to tell you this as nicely as I can, but your mother just asked
me if I would send some money with you because she can’t pay rent.”
Linc opened his mouth to reply, but I held up my hand, halting what I
knew was about to come out of his mouth.
“When you were a year and a half, she borrowed money from her
mother, and by borrowed, I mean she stole her mother’s jewelry, hocked it
at a pawn shop, and then bought coke with the money.”
His mouth snapped shut.
 “Twelve years ago, your mother called me to ask me for money so she
could pay off her car note. I sent it to her because I felt sorry for her,” I
continued. “I followed her, though, because she pocketed the money and
was so fucking jittery that I knew that she wasn’t going to put that money
on her car note. I watched her walk into a drug dealer’s house, make a deal
with him, and then drive off without once even noticing I was watching her.
But before she drove away, she shot up in the car.”
He sighed. “What do you want me to tell her?”
“What I want for you to do is to not go there at all. I’d rather you didn’t
associate with the woman who’s just going to try to use you to get back at
me. I wish you’d use common sense, open your eyes and see that your
mother is not the kind of mom you want her to be.”
Linc’s lips thinned.
“She’s not a good person, but all I can do at this point is let you figure
that out for yourself,” I grunted as I came to my feet. Everything hurt.
Everything always hurt. “When she asks you for the money that she asked
me for, just tell her that I didn’t have it. Don’t tell her anymore or any less
than that. Also,” I held out my hand. “Give me your wallet.”
His brows rose.
“Trust me. I know your mother,” I told him. “Just give it to me.”
He held out his wallet, which was nearly identical to mine. It even had a
chain that hooked it to his pants exactly like mine did.
My kid was my kid, through and through. He wanted to be just like me,
and sometimes that was scary shit.
Why he would want to do that was beyond me. I wasn’t a bad person,
but I wasn’t the best guy either. I’d done things in my life I wasn’t proud of.
Made bad decisions that came back to haunt me later on. And, if I was
being honest, I wanted better for my son than I had. I wanted him to go to
college. I wanted him to play professional football. I wanted things for him
that I never got the chance to even dream of when I was his age.
 I took Linc’s wallet and extracted his credit card, debit card and all of
the money except for a twenty-dollar bill.
“She tries to make you pay, say that you only have twenty dollars. Pull
it out, hand it to her, and put the wallet back into your pocket,” I told him.
“Don’t leave it on the table. Don’t fall for the ‘oh, what’s that?’ as she
points in the opposite direction so she can check your wallet before she
throws it on the floor. Also, as a precaution, give me your keys. You can
take my old truck today.”
Linc’s eyes widened.
“But…you never let me drive that!”
That was true.
My truck was old. It was fast. And it was mine.
Linc had his own car, a 2014 Dodge Challenger. I’d begged, cheated,
scraped the bottom of my barrel, and cajoled the dealership into selling me
that car on my shit credit. And one bank had given me the loan, thank fuck.
It didn’t matter that I had money now. It mattered that, over the last
seven years, I’d come to a point where I couldn’t pay my mortgage for four
months, six different times. That I was late on credit card bills, and had
some that were getting paid off, but were still a long ways away from
having a zero balance.
It’d taken me quite some time to realize that credit cards weren’t the
answer. Unfortunately for me, that was a little too late to make a difference
on my credit score.
“Why?” he asked as I handed him over my keys.
“Because it looks like a piece of shit, even if it isn’t. Your mom would
see dollar signs if she saw your car,” I told him. “She doesn’t need to know
that it has a few miles on it. She will only see a cash cow, and she’ll try
everything to get you to give it to her. When you refuse, she’ll try to steal
your keys. And when she can’t do that, she’ll come over at night.” I
hesitated. “Probably should start putting it in the garage. Make sure you
clean out the clutter this weekend and start doing that.”
 Linc’s lips started to lift in a sardonic smile.
“You know her well, don’t you?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Been there, done that, got the t-shirt, didn’t like it, tried to
return it, but they wouldn’t take it back.”
Linc’s lips quirked. “Well, I’ll be going then. I’ll call you and let you
know when I’m home.”
I clapped him on the back as I walked him outside, nearly laughing my
ass off when he clapped his hands in glee as he walked up to my old truck.
“You could always take your old bike, too. It’d serve the same purpose.”
Linc tossed an ‘are you kidding me?’ look over his shoulder and yanked
open the door.
The outside was nothing special.
Outwardly, the 1978 Chevy C-10 appeared to be old, beaten up, and on
its last leg.
It was the inside that counted.
Under the hood of that old truck sat a 454 big block that growled like a
stalking panther. One slight touch of the gas pedal and you were going fifty
miles an hour without even blinking. At stop lights, you had to put the beast
into neutral to keep the motherfucker still. If you forgot what you were
doing just for a second, it was trying to shoot you into oncoming traffic.
Linc had driven it all of three times, and each time I’d been in the truck
with him to tell him what to do.
Now, he was sitting in the driver’s seat, petting the steering wheel like it
was a cat.
“Stop feelin’ her up and get your ass into gear. I can tell you from
experience that your mother’s a bitch to deal with when you’re late.”
I remembered that vividly, actually.
The one and only time I’d been late, due to Linc puking all over my lap
when he was about a year old, she’d freaked out on me the moment I’d
walked into the restaurant door.
She didn’t care that Linc had been running a slight fever. Didn’t care
that I’d gotten there as fast as I could and had even called her to let her
know I’d be late.
No, all she’d cared about was tearing me a new one for showing up late
and humiliating her by standing her up.
“We’re just going to the Dairy Queen,” Linc said.
I didn’t laugh.
I just held up my thumb but didn’t tell him that we’d just been going to
the Dairy Queen.
Let him realize his mom’s faults on his own time.
Big Papa’s words meant more than he knew.
If I could, I’d save my kid from all of his mother’s shit. I’d take him
away, shield him and make sure he never realized what an asshole his
mother was.
Linc hadn’t seen her in years, and the last time hadn’t been pleasant.
But through the eyes of a kid, a parent can do no wrong, and unfortunately
for me, Linc didn’t remember how bad those times he’d seen his mother
had been.
But Linc was his own man now. He wanted to make his own decisions.
And even if they were wrong, I’d let him make the mistakes.
There was no other way to learn from your wrongs if you didn’t make
any.
Linc started my truck up, and immediately started to laugh at the roar of
the engine.
“Can you handle it?”
He grinned and nodded.
“I’m headed out with the club. If you need me at all, call me, okay?”
 Another nod.
I ruffled his hair, causing him to curse, and me to smile.
There were, at least, a few things in life that were constant. My love for
Linc, and my want for other things.
Things that included a certain brown-haired beauty that was never far
from my mind.
***
An hour into our evening, shit hit the fan.
Ghost, one of the longest standing members of The Dixie Wardens MC-
Alabama Chapter, was visibly distraught.
I didn’t know much about the man.
He wasn’t the easiest guy to get to know, and he had the most
intimidating stare of all of the members.
I was able to get along with even Sean now, but Ghost was still a
mystery to me.
He didn’t talk. Didn’t often attend parties, even the ones that were
family-oriented. Didn’t even like being in the club as far as I could tell.
But I’d been in the club for a mere eight months. Likely, there was
something more going on, and what I saw with my own eyes was clouding
my judgment.
Even Big Papa had said that Ghost was acting weird.
But I’d never seen him like this.
“I need to ride somewhere, and I need all of you to go with me.”
Aaron, Truth, Tommy Tom, Fender, Sean, Big Papa and me all stared.
“Whatever you need, man. And we’re there,” Tommy Tom was the one
who spoke.
“We’ll stay back with the ladies. You go ahead and do what you need to
do,” Fender pointed to me.
 My brows rose, but I realized that, due to my son seeing his mother, it
was probably wise to stay back for the backlash that I knew was coming,
despite my desire to go with them.
My eyes trailed over to Ellen, and my stomach clenched.
God, she was beautiful.
She was nothing like Margot.
Where Margot was blonde, blue-eyed and mean as a snake, Ellen was
the exact opposite.
She had tanned skin, brown hair that looked like fire when she was in
the sun, and hazel eyes that changed from the greenest green to the darkest
brown, depending on the day and season. She dressed so cute and prissy,
while Margot wouldn’t be caught dead without a midriff baring halter top—
regardless of whether it was fifty fucking degrees out or not.
But what I loved the most about Ellen—yes, I fucking said loved,
always have, always will—was the way she never stopped smiling. She
never got down, even if everything in her life was turning to shit. By me—
mostly. By her mom. By Margot. It didn’t matter what happened, Ellen
never got down.
Except, apparently, for today.
She looked fucking tired. Like she was defeated and barely holding
herself upright.
“That okay with you?”
I looked up to find Sean staring at me.
“Sure,” I said without even knowing what I’d just agreed to.
“Good. Take Tally’s Tahoe. Everyone should fit into it sans you two.
Keep them at the clubhouse until we figure out what the fuck to do
afterward.”
I nodded once.
Though, I knew for a fact that the ladies would only remain still for so
long. They all had jobs. They all had lives. And most of them had kids who
wouldn’t like being cooped up for more than a day.
Twenty minutes later, the ladies were all loaded.
Both in the physical sense, since they were in the Tahoe, and in the
inebriated sense since they’d been drinking quite a bit tonight. Though none
of them were completely sloshed, thank fucking God.
“Ready, Freddy!
Me, I’d be angry or discontent. Naomi? She just rolled with the
punches.
Ellen, however, was a silent presence in the back seat and wouldn’t
even look at me.
“You okay?”
That was only directed at one person, and she turned her head slowly to
give me her eyes, and what I saw there was enough to steal my breath
straight out of my lungs. Again.
“Yeah,” she lied. “Fine.”
I didn’t believe her for a second.
But did I say anything? No. I let her stew. And being left to stew, she
became more and more mad, and I should’ve known that the pot would boil
over.
Fuck.
 Chapter 8
I went for a walk today because I stress eat and hated myself
a little bit. I took a bag of M&Ms with me because I needed
something to motivate myself to walk in the first place. Ate a
piece every ten seconds. Sometimes life is all about balance.
-Ellen’s real life thoughts
Jessie
I don’t know how it happened.
One minute I was sitting in the living room, flipping through the
channels on the TV in the main room of the clubhouse with Ellen sitting on
the couch perpendicular to me, and the next she was making a weird sound
in her throat.
I turned to look at her, and the moment our eyes met, she broke down
into sobs and ran from the room.
She was crying so hard that it took everything in me not to go to her.
Not to follow the sound of her sobs into the hallway where she’d been
given a room for the night.
My eyes went to the screen, and I realized that the movie that we’d
watched hundreds of times so long ago when we’d been together was now
playing on the big screen.
And I closed my eyes in dismay.
Shit.
I got up and walked down the hall, knowing that this was one of those
times where I needed to fix this.
I couldn’t do this anymore.
I had to explain my reasoning.
Surely if she knew, she’d agree.
 She’d realize that I wasn’t staying away from her to break her. Not to
humiliate her. Not because of Sean. I was doing it to save her, dammit!
‘“Ellen,” I started to say, pushing her cracked door open slightly.
She was lying on the bed, her face buried in a pillow, trying to stifle the
sounds of her sobs.
I felt sick to my stomach.
She held her hand up, trying to stop me from coming in, but I ignored
her.
I did, however, leave the door open for her to have some semblance of
openness, as if I weren’t shutting her in and forcing the issue.
“Get out,” she cried.
I came forward, not stopping until my knees hit the bed.
I lifted one knee and planted it into the bed, then leaned over until I
could brush her hair away from her face.
I was such an idiot.
All this time I was protecting her and never once had it occurred to me
that I was hurting her even worse in the process.
Sure, I’d realized she was sad.
But she had put on a good front these last few months. Ever since our
parting comments that last night we were alone together, I’d stayed away.
She’d opened up her business. She’d kicked ass. She’d shown up at MC
parties.
And overall, I thought she was getting better.
Then Sweet Home Alabama comes on, reminding us of old times, and
suddenly she loses it.
Though, if I admitted as much, that movie had been a killer to watch
over the years. Each and every time it came on, I changed the station.
Even now, I had each and every line memorized.
 It’d been a movie that she’d fallen in love with, and I’d watched it with
her because it made her happy.
Now, though, it was obvious that it didn’t.
Maybe she’d had the same problem over the years when it came to that
movie as I did.
“Ellie,” I started to say.
She shot up off the bed and glared at me.
“Don’t call me that. And get the hell out.” She pointed to the door.
“It’s my room,” I countered, crossing my arms over my chest and
standing there against her anger.
She ignored me and sat down on the bed, pulling her phone out to
ignore me as if that would make me go away.
I felt my phone buzz, and I pulled it out to see a text from Ellie on the
screen.
Ellen (8:24 PM): I need you to leave me alone. You’re breaking me. I
need to be let off the hook.
And suddenly, I was just as pissed as she was.
“You don’t deserve to be let off the hook,” I said in response to her
message.
She stood up and whirled around, confusion on her face.
Then her mouth dropped open as realization dawned.
“All of this time,” she whispered.
I deserved everything she threw at me and more as I read the destruction
on her face.
“I fuckin’ hate you,” Ellen growled out.
I gritted my teeth. “Well, I don’t hate you, even though I should.”
Her mouth opened and she stared at me with confusion.
Then, like the dumbass that I was, I went right off the cliff.
 There was no pussy-footing around the bush for me. No, I jumped
whole hog into the middle of it, telling her exactly what I was thinking.
“I’m not the only one to blame in this situation,” I told her. “You broke
me just as much as I broke you.”
Her mouth dropped open.
“How many times did you tell your mother that we were just friends?” I
challenged her.
Her mouth snapped shut.
“Yeah,” I said. “And how many times did you hide us? Jessie, get in
the closet so she doesn’t know you’re here. Jessie, let’s go to the next town
over so no one will see us,” I mimicked her voice. “Any of those sound
familiar?”
Her lips thinned.
“I loved you.”
I laughed a humorless laugh. One that hurt to hear, even from my ears.
“You loved me?” I snarled, my control breaking. “You loved me so
much that you moved on within a week. When I came back to apologize, to
tell you why I had to go, you were with someone.”
Her brows furrowed.
“I would never,” she snapped. “It took me three freakin’ years to move
on, and even then I sabotaged my own relationships. I couldn’t get over
you!”
“Does Mason Lyens ring any freakin’ bells?” I shot back.
Her brows rose.
“The boy that graduated with you? The one that you got into a fight
with me over?” She pursed her lips, and those cute little lines between her
eyebrows furrowed. “The one with the blonde hair and green eyes? The
football player?”
I nodded, gut tight.
 “That one.”
She shrugged. “Yeah, what about him?”
I crossed my arms over my chest and looked up at the ceiling, trying to
calm down.
“You were with him,” I accused her. “When I came back, you were in
his car, hugging him.”
Her mouth dropped open.
“This car?” she hissed, walking to the window and slamming the blinds
down with her fingers, revealing the car that’d been rubbed in my face since
I’d first seen her driving it.
My eyes flicked to the road, and my throat went tight.
“Yeah, that one.”
The thought of her still driving his car, the one that I’d envied in high
school, was enough to drive a freakin’ stake straight through my heart.
Each time I saw her get in and out of it was enough to remind me
exactly why I should stay away from her.
Anger overtook Ellen’s usually calm features, and she launched herself
at me.
I caught her easily, stopping the right hook that she had aimed at my jaw
with one hand, but caught an elbow to the forehead when she lifted up with
the other.
I grunted and caught her around the middle, restraining her arms down
at her sides so she couldn’t throw any more blows.
“I was buying that car so I could get to you, asshole!” she screamed, her
voice hitting an octave that shouldn’t have been possible. “I was coming to
you!”
My mouth dropped open.
My surprise didn’t stop her, though. No, she let me have it with both
barrels.
 “Seriously, it’s like you never knew me. Like you didn’t care like you
said you cared,” she hissed. “You don’t care what kind of a mess you left
me in fourteen years ago. All you care about is your own fucking self. You
don’t even have the balls to apologize. I left Sean because of you. I liked
Sean. But the minute you showed up, my whole freakin’ world changed. I
couldn’t lie to Sean. I couldn’t continue to live that lie. I’ve loved you since
I was a senior in high school. That’s fourteen years, Jessie!”
The raw emotion in her voice was hard for me to hear.
The bad thing was that when emotions started to swirl, I got angry. I
couldn’t and didn’t handle them well, so I lashed out.
“You don’t think I know that, Ellie?” I countered. “You don’t think that
was the hardest decision of my life? Because, let me just tell you
something. It was. I regret that mistake every single second that I fucking
breathe. Seeing you that first day I pledged to the club, it broke me. I was
holding on by a thread, and there you come, waltzing right back into my life
when I was barely breathing to begin with.”
Then she collapsed, and I nearly fell forward when she gave me every
single bit of her weight.
Her body shook in racking sobs, and I dropped down to my knees,
doing the only thing I could at that moment in time. Hold her.
“I texted you every day when you first left. And then I’ve been pouring
my heart out to you in texts for fourteen years.”
My eyes closed.
“I read every single message.”
She just cried harder.
 Chapter 9
I want someone to look at me the way I look at bacon.
-Ellen’s secret thoughts
Jessie
We fell asleep that way, her head on my shoulder, and my arm curled
tightly around her waist.
We’d done this exact move countless times. Though now, with fourteen
years between us, it felt so different.
I knew we needed to talk. Knew it, but the feel of her in my arms made
me feel like I was home for the first time in five thousand, one hundred and
ten days.
And yes, I’d counted.
I was a fucking fool in love. Had been for fourteen years and would be
for the next fourteen.
***
When I woke up, she was gone.
I assumed she was in the other room, so I got in the shower to rinse off
the day.
When I came back out, it was to find only Tally, Imogen, and Verity in
the kitchen. Ellen and Naomi nowhere in sight.
“Where are the other two?” I asked.
Verity, Truth’s wife, was the one to answer.
“I know that Ellen left in her car about an hour ago,” she said.
I stiffened at hearing that Ellen had left.
“As for Naomi, I assumed she was in her room.”
She was eyeing me like I’d done something terribly wrong, and I
instantly knew that they knew about me and Ellen.
 They might not know the whole story, but they knew enough to put two
and two together.
The clubhouse was big, but the walls were thin. They’d likely overheard
what we’d discussed. Mostly because neither Ellen nor I had kept our
voices down, and it was more likely than not, as all three women were
looking at me like I’d committed the ultimate sin, that they knew every one
of our dirty, little secrets now.
“Be back,” I muttered instead of denying their thoughts.
The truth was, Ellen had been with me.
And it pissed me off all over again that she’d leave without talking to
me first. Without hashing out what we both knew needed ironed out
between us.
Sooner rather than later.
I left the room and went in search of the illusive woman, wondering
whether I should be concerned or not that she wasn’t still here.
I stopped in the living room when I saw Fender.
“You see Ellen leave?” I asked as I passed.
He shook his head. “Nope. I was in my room on the phone with my
folks. Apparently, they’re coming for a little visit.”
I snorted.
Fender’s parents were very conservative. They hated that he didn’t
graduate college. They hated that he worked somewhere they didn’t
approve of instead of the family business, and they also hated that he rode
motorcycles and had tattoos.
“What about Naomi?” I asked.
“Room, the last I checked,” Fender said distractedly, staring at the
coffee table where he was working on a draft of a house. “She came out for
an hour or so for some tea. We commiserated on the fact that y’all were
fighting outside our rooms, and then she went back in there. I heard the TV
turn on and haven’t checked since.”
 I sighed.
I was pretty sure that everyone in the whole damn club would know
about Ellen and I by sundown.
Annoyed now, I walked straight to the surveillance room that was set up
off of the kitchen, and flipped on the monitor.
I rewound to two hours before, then fast-forwarded until I could see
what time Ellen left.
Then froze when I saw that Ellen had left, but Naomi was with her.
“Mother. Fucker,” I growled.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
“Fender,” I stepped out of the room. “Naomi’s gone.”
His head snapped up.
“You’re joking.”
I shook my head.
“Negative,” I said as I pulled out my phone and dialed Ellen.
Ellen didn’t bother with pleasantries when she answered.
“Yeah?”
It sounded like she was crying, and my panic level shot through the
roof.
“Ellen, where is Naomi?”
There was a large pause on the other end, and then a whispered, “I
dropped her off at home. I’m at my shop. Why?”
I immediately hung up and ran out of the house, heading for my bike,
and drove straight for Naomi’s place as my anger boiled beneath the
surface.
But the moment I pulled up outside, I saw the blood.
And I knew that something was terribly, terribly wrong.
 ***
Four tense hours later, I felt like a shaken up bottle of Coke as I tried to
sit in my seat and not go off on the man who’d done his level best to kill
anything left inside of Ellen.
Sean had yelled at her for being a part of something she—nor I—had
any clue was happening, and I was fuming inside.
“She’s probably dead in there, and you helped her get that way.”
I knew the man was devastated. Hell, I was devastated for letting it
happen. He’d told me to keep her there. I’d thought I had. So if it was
anybody’s fault, it was mine.
But as I listened to the nearly silent crying coming from Ellen, I’d
almost broken down and pulled her into my arms.
But I didn’t.
Only because Sean came out of the room right when I was about to
crack, demanding answers of me.
Answers as to why his woman had nearly died. Answers to why I’d let
her drive away with Ellen when she should’ve been at the clubhouse under
lockdown with the rest of the women.
Not that they were technically on lockdown. At least not that I’d
understood. Sure, there’d been some bad things happening to Sean and
Naomi lately, but not enough to where I thought I needed to guard the
clubhouse with my rifle while sitting on the roof waiting for intruders.
But you didn’t have me watching them! I wanted to growl. You just had
me take them all to the clubhouse.
Instead, I took the high road and started to explain. Giving every single
piece of information that I had and anything I thought might be relevant.
Then came the hard part, explaining how I’d found Naomi on the floor
in her house, bleeding and broken.
 Chapter 10
Hating your alarm when it goes off and you have to go to
work because you didn’t die in your sleep.
-Things people contemplate when they wake up and hate
their life
Ellen
I couldn’t say I was proud of myself.
After nearly getting a woman I liked killed, I wasn’t so sure that staying
near my brother was the best thing any longer.
Every time I was within seeing distance of either Sean or Naomi, my
stomach would plummet and I’d turn around, rushing to get somewhere,
anywhere, that they weren’t.
I deserved everything that was thrown at me.
The day I’d dropped her off at her car, her house hadn’t been empty like
we’d both assumed. No, it’d had some psycho killer hell-bent on hurting
Naomi in it, and the only thing that saved her was her dog.
I’d left her that to handle on her own.
She’d even miscarried their baby. Seriously, I was the biggest asshole
on the planet.
I looked down at my hands, wondering how long I would have to stay at
this club party that was supposed to be a celebration—one that celebrated
Naomi’s life and health.
Tommy Tom tried to tell me that Sean wasn’t upset with me any longer,
but honestly, there was no misunderstanding the anger in his eyes each time
they were aimed in my direction.
Though, I had to admit that wasn’t very often, seeing as I tried to look
anywhere but at him or his fiancée.
“Hey, are you okay?”
 I looked up to find Jessie staring at me.
I looked away.
“Fine,” I said, standing up. “If you’ll excuse me.”
Without waiting for him to apologize or tell me ‘it’d all be okay’ again,
I walked away and didn’t look back.
“Do you want to dance?”
I stopped when a man I didn’t know stepped in front of me.
He wasn’t anybody I knew, but since I could feel Jessie’s glare burning
into the back of my neck, I said yes.
“Sure,” I said. “Let’s do it.”
I happened to take a glance over my shoulder, and my belly tightened at
the pure masculine anger that was written clearly all over Jessie’s face.
He wasn’t happy that I’d been ignoring him. In fact, I knew that not by
the anger on his face at seeing me say yes to a dance with another man, but
by the numerous angry texts and voicemails I’d received from him over the
last two weeks since that night Naomi almost died.
The most recent one had only been an hour before.
My lips tilted up at the corners as I thought about that text.
Jessie (9:30 PM): If you don’t show tonight, I’m going to come over to
your place and drag you out by your hair. Then I’m going to sit you on my
lap the entire night, despite your protests, and hold on to you so you can’t
go anywhere or do anything. Don’t think I’m bluffing either. I’m on my last
shit, woman. Don’t disappoint me.
Hah!
Don’t disappoint him my ass.
I did end up going and not because he’d demanded it of me, but because
I’d already planned on it.
Not to mention I also came because my brother had asked me nicely.
 He’d told me that he missed me and that I’d been working too much.
I’d, of course, called bullshit. The man was a doctor, so if anyone was
working too much, it was him.
“Hey, you okay, darlin’?” the man who had asked me to dance asked.
I nodded, then offered him my hand.
He pulled me to the dance floor. The moment his hands went to my hips
to pull me in closer to his body, I went.
But in my mind it wasn’t a stranger’s hands on my hips, they were
Jessie’s. It was Jessie who was pulling me in close and telling me that
everything would be okay.
***
Jessie
“This is my jam,” I told Fender. “Turn it up.”
Fender stared at me like I’d grown a second head.
“This is Garth Brooks. You can’t jam to Garth Brooks,” Fender
contradicted me.
He also, I noticed, didn’t turn it up.
“I can do anything to Garth Brooks that I want,” I informed him loudly.
“I can sing to him. I can dance to him. I can jam to him. I can even fuck to
him.”
Fender stared at me for a few long seconds, then threw his head back
and laughed.
I got up and turned the radio up my own damn self.
“This is kind of harsh,” Fender said from my side. “Scaring the shit out
of the new man because he deserves it sounds like something you’d do.”
My eyes automatically went to Ellen where she stood next to her new
friend, a man who accomplished something I’d been trying to get her to do
with me all night.
Fucking A.
 “Yeah,” I grunted. “Will you hand me another beer?”
And the night deteriorated from there.
Sean took a seat at my side and I looked at him in question.
“I need to apologize,” he said. “Or, at least, Naomi said that I had to.”
My brows rose.
“I’m not the one that needs the apology,” I informed him. “Maybe you
should think about apologizing to Ellen.”
He sighed.
“I tried,” he grunted. “Each time I get near her, she runs away.”
I snorted. “That’s because you made her cry, and she thinks that you
hate her. And she hates herself because you told her she was the reason that
Naomi was in the hospital. Which, of course, she then blamed herself for
Naomi losing the baby. And in her mind, all of that equates to murder.”
Sean’s mouth dropped open.
“What? You wanted me to sugarcoat it?” I asked him.
He closed his mouth.
“Wait until she can’t go anywhere else and then immediately offer her
an apology. Don’t explain yourself. Just say that you’re sorry for the words
that you threw at her. Tell her she didn’t deserve to be spoken to that way,
no matter how upset you were, and just leave it at that. She’ll come around
eventually,” I continued.
Sean stared at me.
“And how do you know she’ll forgive me?” he challenged.
I grinned.
“She’s about to accept my apology, and I’ve had fourteen years of
pissing her off,” I informed him. “I definitely have the bigger hurdle to
jump over, though.”
Sean snorted.
 “Maybe you should offer your apology before she leaves and does the
dirty with another man?” Fender drawled.
I looked up in time to see Ellen being led to the bar where the man
gestured to the bartender.
“Fuck,” I growled, standing up. “Time for the big guns.”
Then, I did the most sacrilegious thing any country music lover had ever
done.
I changed a Garth Brooks song.
Searching for the song that I wanted, I grinned when the familiar tune
started to echo throughout the bar that we’d taken over for a celebration for
the night.
The moment the familiar opening chords of Sweet Home Alabama filled
the air, Ellen’s head snapped up, and her eyes immediately went to the table
where Fender and I had been sitting for the last two hours, controlling the
music.
Her lips thinned, but damned if she didn’t stomp away from the man she
was dancing with and storm straight out of the damn building.
“Now what?” Fender asked, a smile in his voice.
“Now,” I said, standing up and finishing off the last of my beer, “I go
try to figure out what has her ass chapped.”
Fender snorted. “Well, having a chapped ass is definitely something that
would have me acting like a crazy motherfucker.”
I flipped him off and strode out of the bar, still smelling the scent of
peaches—Ellen’s signature scent since she was a seventeen-year-old—and
tried to tell my dick to behave.
It didn’t listen.
 Chapter 11
Just because you have a beard, doesn’t mean you’re a man.
Vaginas can grow hair, too.
-Things you probably shouldn’t say to a pissed off male with
a beard
Ellen
I was on the verge of tears, this time due to the fact that the man I’d
been in love with since I was seventeen years old wouldn’t stop talking to
me. He wouldn’t stop texting me. He just wouldn’t leave me to my
depression in peace.
“Gonna run away every time the going gets rough?” came that
annoying, amused voice.
I picked up a rock and chucked it in the direction of the vacant lot
behind the bar that the Dixie Wardens had taken over for the night.
“What’s it to you?” I asked, bending down for another rock.
The man at my back took advantage of my position and slapped his
work-roughened palm against my ass.
Crack.
I yelped and spun around, indignation filling my features, and glared.
“What the fuck?”
He shrugged.
“You don’t want me to smack it, then don’t bend over in front of me,”
he challenged.
“So, that’s just…what the fuck, Jessie?” I might or might not have
screeched that, but dammit! I was just so damn upset!
Why did he have to talk to me like the past fourteen years didn’t
happen? Like he didn’t break my heart when he’d promised he would keep
it safe?
 His grin was that same grin that always used to make me weak in the
knees. Though, now it was even better. Or maybe I was older and my knees
were starting to give out.
Either way, having him give me that look—the one that promised me
sweet ecstasy—was enough to get me to put some distance between us that
I knew needed to be there.
Or, I would have if he didn’t catch me around the waist, refusing to
allow me that distance I had when I started to step away from him.
“Jessie,” I planted my hands onto his chest and pushed with all my
might, but he didn’t budge. I was still planted firmly in one of his arms.
“How about we hash this shit out,” he said while the saddest song,
Sweet Home Alabama, played on the outdoor speakers.
Jesus, didn’t they realize that people came outside to get the fuck away
from the noise?
“We’re not hashing anything out,” I denied. “There is nothing TO hash
out.”
He squeezed me impossibly closer, and dropped his mouth until he was
practically breathing against my lips.
His beard was tickling my skin and making my fingers ache to stretch
up and snatch him to me. But that would be bad.
Bad, bad, bad.
“I’ve missed you every day for fourteen years.”
My eyes closed.
“I’ve wanted to wrap you up in my arms like this, feel you against my
body, every single night since I was stupid enough to leave.”
I whimpered.
“I wanted to see you barefoot in our kitchen, raising our babies.”
My breath hitched.
“I wanted to see you walk across that stage to get your MD.”
 A tear slipped down my cheek.
“I wanted to be your first patient. But not at an actual hospital. In our
bed. With you on top of me. Making sure I was healthy for you.”
I gasped in a breath.
“But most of all, I wanted to talk to you. To share my laughter and my
life. I wanted you to hug me and kiss me at random times. I wanted you
back so bad that my heart hasn’t stopped hurting for fourteen. Fucking.
Years.”
Sit still, Ellen. He’ll let you go. Do not kiss him. Do not kiss him.
Shit.
I kissed him.
My lips touched his.
I lost control.
I threw my arms around his shoulders and pulled him closer to me. And
I kissed him like the last fourteen years hadn’t happened. Like I was his.
Like tomorrow would never come.
The second my mouth touched down on his, he opened for me, allowed
my tongue entrance, and gave back everything I had to give and more.
“I’ve missed you,” he gasped out, then took control.
And by control, I mean total and complete control.
He picked me up, forced my legs around his slim hips, and walked us
deeper into the shadows. I felt something hard at my back moments later,
and then he pushed his entire body weight into me, allowing me to feel for
the first time in a very long, long time exactly what I did to him.
“Goddammit,” he growled. “I’ve wanted this exact same scenario for
years.
Yet, here I am, between your legs once again, without protection.”
I froze.
 I knew just as well as he did where this was going. Knew where we
were headed. Had known the moment I fell asleep crying in his arms that,
eventually, we would get back here.
I’d fought it. Would continue to fight it…later.
I wanted him. I wanted this. I wanted to escape.
“You’re saying you’ve been bad these last fourteen years and don’t
deserve to be inside of me unprotected?” I asked him.
The words were said in such a way that showed my disappointment.
Maybe he had been bad.
Hell, it was likely he had been.
I hadn’t. I hadn’t slept with but two men since him, and each of those
times had been with protection. Nobody ever had me unprotected.
Why? Because that was for one man, and one man only.
The man currently pinning me against the wall.
My breathing was ragged. My breasts were heavy and aching. And we
wouldn’t even say what my vagina was doing.
If that particular part of my body could speak, the entire bar would’ve
known how much I wanted him the moment I’d spotted him in the bar.
“No, that’s not what I’m saying,” he said. “I’m saying that I don’t have
any condoms.”
My hopes fell.
He didn’t want to do it without the condoms. And I couldn’t blame him.
In this day and age, you couldn’t be too careful.
“But if you’re saying that it’s okay to go without, then honey, I’m
accepting. Because I’ve never not once not used protection with anyone but
you.”
And then he was shoving my dress up and sucking on my nipple.
 The cold December air hit my exposed skin, and the dual sensations of
Jessie’s hot mouth and the cold bricks and air on other parts of my body
were enough to send me flying.
I clung to his hair as my orgasm rocketed through me like a shot. I rode
the ridge of his cock, ground myself into him, thankful that I’d worn my
leggings so I could feel him better.
“Always were quick to shoot off,” he growled, then the pressure on my
back decreased. But only long enough for him to slip that devilish hand
down the back of my leggings, past my panties, and straight to my pussy.
He growled when he felt the wetness.
And I growled when he pulled away.
“What are you doing?” I cried out as he stepped away from me.
I heard his belt click in the darkness, and my over sensitized brain
started to realize that he wasn’t leaving. He was just stripping so that our
proceedings could move forward to the next logical step.
So, to help him, I bent down and removed my leggings and panties,
again thankful that I’d worn them under my dress tonight.
Before I could even straighten, he was back, and I felt the solid heat of
him at my entrance.
Our eyes met in the near darkness, and he pushed inside so roughly that
I cried out. But it was okay, because he was there to catch the cry with his
mouth.
“You feel like my dreams,” he whispered gruffly.
“You feel like you’re filling me full,” I whispered. “And you’re
everything that I remembered.”
He was, too.
He was so big that there wasn’t a single inch of me that wasn’t filled to
the brim.
He felt like he kept going and going, too.
 When he finally came to a halt inside of me, sheathed completely, I
gasped out at the feeling of such fullness.
No longer did I notice the cold. No longer did I care that we were
outside, only a few feet away from where people were passing us to walk to
their cars at the side lot.
Though, they’d really have to look to see us thanks to the darkness of
the shadows that crept around the building.
I could do nothing but hold on as he started to move. Slowly, at first, as
he felt like he was trying to savor the moment.
But then it turned into a fast and furious pace that neither one of us was
able to control.
I slammed my mouth down onto his as he bucked his hips, pushing his
hard cock into me faster than I could catch my breath.
My legs burned from holding them around his hips, but he must’ve
realized because he readjusted us so that he had control of one leg.
“Drop the other to the ground. Put your foot on top of my boot so you
don’t have to touch the dirty ground.”
I did as he instructed, and the awkward stretch with one leg up high and
the air, and the other one touching the top of his boot, was forgotten the
moment he started to move again.
The new angle had him dragging the fat tip of his cock against the
sensitive skin of my pussy.
It took less than thirty seconds of him filling me, more slowly this time
so as not to knock me off balance, to realize I wouldn’t last very long with
him like this.
And when his hands went back to my ass to tilt it up further, I exploded.
Stars burst behind my eyelids, and my body bowed toward his.
A scream caught in my throat, and before it could be released, his
mouth found mine again.
 My pussy rippled, drawing a strangled moan from his lips as he, too,
came.
Hot spurts started to pulse inside of me as he came. My pussy milked
his length, coaxing every last drop of essence he had left inside of him.
It felt like he came forever, but then again, I was damn near multi-
orgasmic by the time he was finished, too.
“Goddamn.”
I hummed in agreement.
He let go of my leg, and I dropped it to his other booted foot.
“Now what?” I asked breathlessly, loving the way his cock stayed
buried in my sex, my pussy lips wrapping around part of his length.
“Now,” he said, sounding reluctant. “I pull out.”
I whimpered, but didn’t protest as he did, only wished quietly that he
hadn’t.
But then a car door slammed, and a couple of giggling women passed
two car lengths away from us, making me realize what I’d just done.
“I haven’t done it outside since…you know.”
His chuckle was knowing.
“Since I fucked you on the field inside of the soccer goal?” he squeezed
my ass before patting it twice.
I nodded. “Yeah.”
His release started to roll down my leg, and I bit my lip, wondering
what I was going to do.
He saved the day, though, by pulling a handful of bar napkins out of his
pocket and handing them to me.
“Plan ahead much?” I raised a brow at him.
It was so dark, though, that the effect was lost on him.
 “Can’t say that I hadn’t hoped for it,” he agreed, placing me onto the
tops of my boots by picking me up. “Though, I’d planned to take you to my
truck.”
I used the bar napkins to clean up as best as I could, and took the
proffered panties and leggings he handed to me.
Once I’d slipped both on, he helped me into my boots before offering
me his hand.
I took it and stared at him, not admitting that I didn’t want to go back to
reality. I wanted to stay in the dark shadows and be happy for a few more
minutes.
Be blissful for just a little more time.
“Hey, pretty girl.”
My eyes snapped up to catch his.
“I missed you,” he whispered.
A tear slipped out of my eye.
“Please don’t leave me again.”
Jessie’s eyes closed at my words.
“Never.”
If only I could believe him.
 Chapter 12
The word ‘fuck’ is a form of meditation. The more you say it,
the more your throat chakra clears.
-True shit
Jessie
She was ignoring me again.
I glared at her back as she walked out of her shop, and I wondered if it
would be inappropriate to snatch her up off the street and throw her on the
back of my bike.
“Dad,” I heard my son call.
I looked up, startled to see him standing next to me.
“What?” I asked distractedly.
“Mom’s standing over there. We were calling your name for like two
minutes but you’re so spaced out that you can’t even hear us. What’s going
on?”
I finally peeled my eyes away from where Ellen was taking boxes out of
the back of a moving truck and bringing them into her shop.
What the hell was she doing?
“Margot,” I said congenially, even though there was nothing more in the
world that I didn’t want to do than talk to my ex-girlfriend who was still,
obviously, a drug addict if the needle marks on her arms were anything to
go by.
Disgust rolled through me, but I tried not to let it show.
My son was watching me closely, gauging my reaction, as was Margot.
It was obvious she enjoyed the fact that she’d snuck up on me.
And that I was having to see her at all.
 I’d been doing a bang up job at ignoring her and avoiding her when she
spent time with Linc.
It was something I couldn’t fucking stand, but since, by law, I had to
allow her visitation, there was nothing that I could do without taking her to
court. And then they’d allow Linc to make the decision on whether or not
he wanted to see her or not, but at this point, I knew he wasn’t fully
convinced that she was all that bad.
But all we needed was time. Margot would fuck it up somehow.
I knew it. She knew it. Hell, even Linc knew it.
“Hello, Jessie,” Margot drawled. “I’ve missed seeing you these last few
weeks.”
I surely doubted it.
We actually hated each other.
If there was ever a wrong person on this planet to have had a baby with
sixteen years ago, having it with this woman was the worst possible choice.
The evil glint in her eyes only helped hammer that point home.
“How was dinner?” I asked my son, ignoring Margot’s snide comment.
“It was okay,” he said. “The place we were going to go to was packed
because of the burger special they have every week, so we decided to go
somewhere else. It wasn’t Pickle’s, though.”
What I was able to deduce from that statement was that Margot had
done something last week to warrant them not going back this week.
Because it didn’t matter how long the line was. I’d go to Pickle’s and stand
in line for over an hour if it got me one of their burgers.
“Interesting,” I murmured. “Headed home?”
It was a school night, after all. And tomorrow was the last practice
before the games started. Usually, that meant Linc would be in bed by ten,
because he had to be at school by six in the morning for practice before
school.
I could tell by Linc’s face, though, that they weren’t headed home.
 At least not yet.
“No, we’re going to go to a movie.”
My brows rose. “Is that wise?”
Margot’s face twisted in anger.
“Yes, it’s necessary. Since he’s not going to be available on Saturday,
we’re spending a little extra time together today.”
I wanted to laugh at the venom in Margot’s voice, but I knew it
wouldn’t be the best idea.
She was already on edge, waiting for me to say something negative to
her.
I wouldn’t be doing that.
Not tonight, and not in front of my son.
“Yeah, that’s fine,” I said. “But I would think you’d want to go to bed
since you have to be up at five to get to school by six.”
Margot’s eyes narrowed.
“It’ll be fine,” Linc lied.
My lips kicked up in a sardonic smile.
“That’s what you said when you stayed out late with friends the night
before your last practice. When you were late getting there, the coach made
you run two miles.”
Linc’s face twisted at that memory.
“I threw up all over the ten yard line,” he grinned. “We’re not staying
out too late. I’ll be home by ten thirty if we go now.”
Linc started toward his car, but Margot stayed.
“You won’t win, you know.”
My brows rose at her words.
“I won’t win what?” I questioned.
 “You won’t win in turning him against me. I’m his mama. Mamas
always win,” she snapped. “He’ll treat me like a queen once he goes big.”
I didn’t call her a liar like I wanted to.
I would’ve, however, addressed her misconceptions that she thought I
would allow her to ride our son’s purse strings, but Ellen finally deigned to
notice that I was sitting on my bike outside her door.
“Are you ever going to come in here, Jessie?” Ellen asked from behind
me. “I feel like you’re watching my every move and it’s uncomfortable.”
My eyes left Margot’s to settle on Ellen, who was watching me with
what was akin to worry.
Shit.
She recognized Margot. She had to.
She hadn’t changed that much, body wise, her face, however, looked
like she was well beyond her thirty-two years of age. If I had my guess, I
would say she looked to be near fifty years of age with all the lines, wear
and tear.
“Yeah,” I said. “Be right in.”
I turned my eyes back to Margot to tell her goodbye, but the look in her
eyes made me freeze.
It was one I knew all too well. The Margot ‘I’m going to fuck with you’
look.
“If it isn’t your little virgin bride. My, but you haven’t aged a year!”
Margot called bawdily. “Oh, but Linc told me you were single and that you
have been for the last fourteen years. Is that because of little ol’ me?”
My gut tightened.
Ellen’s face, equally, showed her anger.
“Margot. Long time no see!” Ellen said sarcastically. “My, but you’ve
aged well.”
That was a lie.
 Even I could tell that Margot wasn’t nearly as pretty as she used to be.
Hell, even her clothes were trash compared to the riches she used to wear.
I got up off my bike and pocketed the keys before heading in Ellen’s
direction.
I read Ellen’s face as I walked, and knew when Margot was about to do
something.
“You know, he could’ve been mine,” Margot hissed. “I let you have
him. Maybe I should take you back to court. Show all those judges and
jurors what an inept parent you are.”
I stopped halfway to Ellen and turned, studying Margot’s face.
“He has food in his belly. He has a car. He gets straight As. There’s
literally not a thing in the world that he wants for. So no, I won’t see a judge
or any juror.”
“Oh, I’m sure I can think of something.”
“I can see you never took out the trash,” Ellen drawled as we watched
Margot walk away.
I grunted.
“I did. She keeps picking herself back up and insinuating herself in my
life,” I hesitated. “She’s also why I had to stay away from you once I
realized that you were back in this area.”
Ellen’s lip curled in anger.
“That woman’s been making your life a living hell for way too long,”
she grunted in affront. “Come inside. I can’t believe you’re letting your son
even get close to that woman.”
I followed her inside and stopped when I saw a dog on the floor in the
middle of her office.
“I’m not letting her do anything with my son. He’s sixteen, and he
expressed interest in getting to know his mother. Since, technically, she still
has visitation rights, I can’t do anything about it. And even if I did take it to
court, Linc is at the age where he’s allowed to tell the court what he wants.
And I know what he wants is to be able to see his mom,” I hesitated. “Big
Papa thinks that I should let Margot show her true colors and allow him to
figure it out by letting him spend time with her.”
I hunkered down next to the dog and stared at it.
“It’s a malamute or husky, I think,” she said. “I found it outside. And, as
to your problem with Margot. I think Big Papa gave you some sound
advice. Though I don’t see this ending well at all.”
I wholeheartedly agreed.
“I agree,” I told her. “Why don’t you know what kind of dog you have?”
She grimaced.
“It’s not mine,” she answered. “I really found it on the side of the road.”
I continued to look at the dog.
I didn’t care what she said, this wasn’t a dog at all. This was a wolf.
“Ellen, this is a wolf,” I told her. “Look at his fuckin’ eyes. They’re
fucking glowing. Huskies don’t have gold eyes like this. They have blue.”
Ellen snorted. “Whatever. I don’t believe you.”
I ran my hand over the wolf’s coarse fur, and he pushed his little head
into my hand.
“And I’m pretty sure they’re illegal as fuck to keep. Where did you find
it again?”
Ellen started to open a box at the counter.
I looked up at her and watched as she removed what looked like a
hundred pairs of colorful swatches.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Leggings,” she answered. “I’ve decided to bolster my income by
selling them.”
My brows rose.
“You’re struggling?” I asked.
 She shrugged. “There’s not much need for an interior designer here.”
My belly clenched.
“Why did you do that and not get your medical degree like you always
wanted to?” I questioned. “That was what you always planned. What
happened?”
She frowned. “Life happened.”
I didn’t believe that for a second.
“Ellen…”
She sighed. “I tried. I started to…but I just couldn’t. I dropped out
within the first year, found myself interested in this, and decided to pursue
this career instead.”
That wasn’t all of it. I knew it. She knew I knew it. And she practically
dared me to ask.
“What brought you back to Mooresville?” I asked. “Your brother’s
here, yes, but why did you bring something like that to this small town?”
And expect it to prosper was the part of the questions that I didn’t air
aloud.
But she knew what I was asking without my having to voice it.
“I needed a change. And Mooresville doesn’t have anything like what
I’m offering. I thought it might be okay, but apparently, I was wrong,” she
answered truthfully. “I’ve had a few customers, sure, but nowhere near what
I need to have a profitable business here.”
My stomach clenched.
“What are you going to do?” I asked worriedly.
She started to unpack the box into a wicker basket that looked like it
was used for laundry, and answered with, “I don’t know.”
I bit my lip, wondering if I should suggest what I wanted to suggest, or
if it would be a bad idea.
“Why don’t you go back to school?” I asked.
 She shot me a look.
“Don’t go there.”
I held up a hand. “It’s just that…”
“I said, don’t go there. Please.”
I sighed.
“What do you want to eat for dinner?” I asked.
Maybe I’d work up to asking about her plans for the future, once I fed
her. Maybe then she’d respond. Right now, it was more than obvious that
this was a discussion she didn’t want to have, and I’d give her that out…for
now.
“I’m not sure that I realized we were having dinner together,” she
answered, looking at me speculatively. “The only reason you’re in here at
all is that I saw a knock-down, drag-out fight was about to go down
between you and that nasty woman.”
My lips thinned.
“I fuckin’ hate her,” I admitted. “Down to my bones, I hate that woman.
She’s ruined my entire life, and all because I made the colossal mistake of
sleeping with her once, and only once.”
Ellen frowned. “I just don’t understand her obsession with you. You’d
think, after sixteen years, all of this would be getting old to her. But today it
looked like she had this vengeance within her. Like you’d wronged her
somehow, and she’s going to make sure you never forget it by making your
life a living hell.”
“I wish I understood it myself. I have no fuckin’ clue what’s driving that
hatred. I’ve literally done nothing wrong,” I hesitated. “Other than refuse to
get back together with her again. Though, at the time, it was due to the fact
that I didn’t want to date someone who was into drugs.”
She crossed her arms under her chest and leaned against the counter,
and I momentarily forgot what it was that we were talking about. The move
pushed her breasts up, causing them to peek out of the top of her semi low-
cut shirt.
 “Was Linc addicted to drugs when he was born?”
I shook my head. “No. Once I found out about the baby, I made sure she
cleaned herself up. I gave her all of the money that I got from working my
part-time job. She was a good girl when she found out she was pregnant
with our kid. I thought that having Linc would turn her around, but the
minute she had him, she left the hospital without telling anyone, leaving me
to raise Linc all by myself.”
She nodded.
Ellen knew that part.
“I just don’t understand why she would leave. There had to be another
factor there. If she was clean, why would she leave her new baby behind
like that?”
I shook my head.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I haven’t been able to ascertain her reasons
after all this time, and I doubt she’ll reveal them to me now. The worst part
is that she’s convinced that Linc is her ride to the good life. She’ll likely be
on her best behavior now.”
Ellen snorted.
“No, what she’s probably going to do is drag him down to her level or
get him in trouble by leaving drugs in his car.”
My mouth dropped open.
“You can’t tell me that you haven’t thought about that.”
My mind hadn’t gone there.
“I haven’t,” I said. “If she did that, he’d protect her, you know.”
My mind started whirling.
“Fuck!” I groaned as I dragged my hand down my face. “That would be
something she’d do, too. I can totally see it now. He does something to piss
her off. She leaves her shit in his car and then calls a tip in.” I shook my
head. “She really is that much of a bitch. She tried to do that to me once,
you know.”
 She did know.
Margot had done that to me about a month after Ellen and I started
hanging out. I’d taken her to the freakin’ hospital because she’d complained
about belly pains, and the stupid person that I was, I’d given her that ride
even though I’d known that I shouldn’t.
Two nights later, the cops came and searched my car.
Lucky for me, but unlucky for Margot, I’d cleaned out my car the day
before because I’d moved the car seat to clean out underneath it and switch
it with a booster seat. She’d, apparently, planted it in the car seat, just like
the bitch she was.
And the cops had taken one look at my booster seat, which could hide
absolutely nothing, and had left without another word.
Though, they had let the drug dog sniff around the car once before
taking off.
Thank God trash pick-up had been earlier that day, or it would’ve still
been at my house.
Because fucking Margot.
It was always all about Margot.
Before I could put much thought into it, I walked out the door, only to
hear Ellen running after me.
“Where are you going?” she asked worriedly.
I looked at her over my shoulder.
“To make sure my son doesn’t do anything stupid.”
She bit her lip.
“If you’ll give me two seconds to put the puppy into the back
storeroom, I’ll go with you.”
My heart started to speed in my chest.
She hadn’t been on the back of my bike in a very long time, and I
wanted to have her on it more than my next breath. Her arms wrapped tight
around my waist. Her head resting on my shoulder. Legs pressed snug
against mine.
Yes, I wanted that badly. Very, very badly.
“I can wait,” I told her gruffly.
She dashed inside, and I watched as she picked up the wolf—no,
definitely not a fucking husky—and took him into the back of her store
where she’d put him away to make sure he didn’t get up to any mischief.
She came back out moments later with her hair flying out behind her.
She stopped only long enough to lock the doors to her store and then
pocketed the keys before she turned and hurried toward me.
She stopped directly next to me, those hazel eyes more brown than
green tonight, and stared at me for a long second.
“My going with you doesn’t call a truce,” she said bluntly. “It’s only a
‘for now’ kind of thing. I still retain the right to be mad at you once we
know that your son is okay.”
My lips twitched.
“Duly noted.”
She hopped on behind me, and I handed her my helmet, which she took.
There was no arguing that she needed it on her part.
She knew better.
It’d been fourteen years, but she knew my stand on this.
If there was only one helmet, she’d have it on every single time. Why?
Because her head was prettier than mine.
It was likely a simple truth, but the truth nonetheless.
If we were in a wreck on the bike, there’d be no way in hell that I could
live with myself if anything had happened to Ellen because she didn’t have
the helmet. At least, if I gave her the helmet, it meant that she had more of a
chance if something were to go wrong.
 But that was not the way to be thinking when you had your girl on the
back of your bike for the first time in fourteen years, even if she was
reluctantly along for the ride.
“Are we going to go?”
That was asked directly into my ear, and I shivered as I heard her
whispered words so close to my neck. The place where she used to bury her
face when I made her come. The place where she used to whisper all of her
secrets, wishes and wants.
“Yeah,” I grunted, then started the bike up.
Her arms tightened around my gut at the roar of the motor, and she
squealed when I dropped it into first and accelerated out of the parking lot.
Her shout of exultation was enough to make my entire heart feel like it
exploded with happiness, unicorns, and fucking kittens.
It took me five minutes on the dot to get to the movie theater and thirty
seconds to realize that neither Linc nor his mother were there.
“Son of a bitch,” I grumbled, pulling to a halt at the very back of the lot
after making two quick rounds.
“How about you call him before you get all bent out of shape,” Ellen
suggested.
I glanced up at her.
“I guess so,” I grumbled, pulling my phone out of my pocket.
Linc didn’t answer on the first ring. Nor the second. Not even on the
fifth.
When I called a second time, he didn’t answer any of those times, either.
“Shit,” I grumbled. “Shit, piss, fuck, ass.”
Ellen giggled at my back, and I patted her leg.
“Not the time to laugh, darlin’,” I informed her. “How about you get on
your phone and ask your girls to keep a lookout for him. I’ll call the boys.”
She did as I requested without texting.
 “No Naomi?” I asked.
Ellen shook her head. “I don’t have her number.”
I frowned.
“She looked ready to move in the other day when I watched her go into
your shop,” I pointed out.
Ellen bit her lip, and then shook her head.
“I sold her some stuff for their new house, but she returned all of it
because Sean hadn’t liked the colors,” she explained.
I could read it on her face that wasn’t at all what she thought the real
reason for returning those items was. Clearly Ellen thought it was because
Sean didn’t want to have something of Ellen’s in his and Naomi’s home.
I, however, knew differently.
Ellen was still very much aware of those words that Sean had said to
her, in a moment of panic, weeks and weeks ago, and it didn’t seem like she
was any closer to letting it all go now than she was when those words had
been said to her.
Before I could comment on the hurt I could see in her eyes, my phone
rang, signaling one of the boys calling me back.
“You seen him?”
“I’m staring at your truck right now.”
Ghost.
He hadn’t been one of the ones I’d called myself, but apparently, Big
Papa moved fast.
“Where is it at?”
The words he said next had the bottom dropping out of my stomach.
“At the hospital.”
My hand clenched on the handlebar of my bike, and I stared at the
passing traffic on the road beyond and bit my lip. “You know if he’s okay?”
 “I think it’s his mom,” he answered. “From what I was able to gather,
there was an incident at the movies, and he had to drive her to the
emergency room.”
“Fucking A,” I grunted. “Thank you. I’ll be there in five.”
We arrived in four minutes to find Ghost standing out front with my
boy.
I parked under the portico and got off, walking quickly to my son.
“Dad…”
I gathered him up in my arms and squeezed him a little tighter than
normal.
“Dad,” Linc wheezed. “I’m okay.”
I let go of him and pushed him slightly away, keeping my hands on his
biceps as I studied his face.
“What happened?” I asked him.
“Mom…she…they won’t tell me anything other than she’s okay,” he
admitted. “In the parking lot, she was acting funny. When we went to buy
our tickets, she fell over and started to vomit all over herself. I did the only
thing I could think of.”
I brought Linc back into my arms, then shoved him in the direction of
my truck.
“Ellen,” I said, making eye contact with her. “Would you mind riding
with Linc to your shop and showing him your not-really-a-husky?”
And keeping him busy.
The words weren’t voiced, but I knew she got my drift as she nodded
and held out the crook of her arm.
Linc looked at her like she was crazy. “I’m supposed to offer you my
arm,” he pointed out.
My lips quirked.
 “Well, except for going out with Sean for awhile, I haven’t had a ‘man
on my arm’ for a lot of years. Sorry, I forgot how that etiquette works,” she
murmured, dropping her arm.
Linc offered her his arm, and she placed her fingers delicately along the
toned muscles of my boy’s biceps.
My gut tightened at the mention of her not having a man, and I growled
low in my throat.
“Ellen?”
Ellen stopped and turned, and I crooked my finger at her.
Her brows lowered, and she headed toward me with a curious look on
her face.
“Yes?” she asked, looking at me nervously.
“I’ll have to show you what it’s like to have a man,” I informed her. “I’ll
be back later. Let Linc take you to my place. Keep an eye on him, and if his
fuckin’ mother tries to call, you tell her to call me.”
She stared at me wide-eyed and had been since I’d practically told her I
would be her man.
So, without wasting any more time, I placed a chaste kiss—as chaste as
I could do when it came to this particular woman—on her mouth and
backed away.
She nodded, then started backing away without taking her eyes from
me.
I grinned, then, without another word, turned on my heels and headed
straight into the ER with anger a steady staccato at the back of my mind.
How could she? How fucking dare she? She’s a mother, for Christ’s
sake. She seriously couldn’t do this shit when she had my son with her!
I walked up to the front desk, and stopped in front of a man that looked
like he belonged there.
“I’m here to see Margot Tulane.”
 The man behind the computer jumped, obviously startled, and placed
his hand over his chest.
“You frightened me,” he murmured. “Let me look her up and see if
she’s able to receive visitors.”
I waited, albeit impatiently, for him to type the info into the computer.
When his brows furrowed, he got up and walked to the door that
separated him from the main part of the ER.
He pushed the door open and disappeared inside, but not far enough for
me not to hear what was being said.
“You got that overdose stabilized yet?”
“Yes and no,” came the reply.
“Is she stable enough for visitors?”
“Yes. For now. But if she gets upset, they’ll be asked to leave.”
“10-4.”
“Is it the father?” I heard another person reply.
“I don’t know,” the man I’d spoken with said. “He’s fuckin’ scary. So
maybe.”
I snorted.
Then the words that were said finally penetrated my angry mind.
“Sir?”
I looked up as my thoughts swirled inside my brain, and stared blankly
at the man I’d walked up on earlier. “Yeah?”
“You can follow me.” He nodded his head in the direction of the room
beyond him.
I nodded and fell in step behind him, my eyes taking in the large ER.
I’d never been back here before, thank God.
I’d been in the waiting room, but I’d never needed to be back here in the
treatment area.
 “She’s right through here,” he pointed to the blue curtain that was
shielding what lay beyond it from the rest of the room.
I gave him a head nod and reached for the curtain.
The sight beyond it didn’t surprise me. Didn’t affect me in any way as it
once would have.
Margot was lying in the bed, her bony body encased in a large beige and
blue hospital gown that had some fucked up pattern on it that whomever
made the damn thing obviously thought was nice. I didn’t know what the
hell they were thinking, because it absolutely was not nice.
All it did was make the patient who was wearing it look pale as fuck.
Margot’s eyes were closed, and her head was facing away from where
I’d entered through the curtain.
“You awake?” I barked.
Margot’s head whipped around, and she stared at me blankly for a few
long seconds before her mouth turned up into a semblance of a smile. “You
came.”
I snorted.
“Not really,” I grunted. “I came to make sure my kid was okay. It was
only after I made sure that he was and then sent him home with my woman
that I even gave you a second thought.”
Margot flinched.
“You shot up in the fucking car in between eating dinner with my boy
and watching a fucking movie?” I didn’t beat around the bush, sickened that
she would do something like that so close to our son.
She turned her head away.
I continued, not missing a beat.
“And you’re pregnant?”
The disgust in my words was evident, and she turned back toward me,
her eyes filling up with tears.
 “How did you know?”
My lip curled in revulsion.
“The nurse was kind enough to let me know.”
“It’s yours.”
Her heartbeat monitor started to beep faster.
I wanted to laugh at her.
I wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole, even if she was dying and
needed life saving measures. I’d never, not ever again, get involved with her
shit.
“Negative,” I shook my head.
“Sir?”
“Get yourself straight, Margot. Don’t fuck this up.”
“I can’t help it. I don’t have the support that I did last time.”
Fucking wonderful.
“And you won’t have it from me or from our son either,” I informed her
none too gently. “You’ll keep your poisoned claws out of my son, or I’ll do
everything I can to get your visitation suspended so that if you do attempt to
see him, you’ll be breaking the law.”
Margot’s tears spilled over.
“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
The nurse who’d spoken was the one who’d showed me back here. A
woman in her mid-thirties.
“Gladly,” I backed away. “I don’t want to be here, anyway.”
I headed back outside to the parking lot, and once the hospital doors
closed behind me, I dropped my head and looked at the ground.
That poor kid. That poor fuckin’ kid who’d done nothing wrong except
have the misfortune to have been conceived by the wrong woman.
Goddammit.
Goddammit!
 Chapter 13
In case you didn’t know, you have nice boobs.
-Things every woman likes to hear
Ellen
“We’re just lucky my mother didn’t name me something fucked up,”
Linc laughed, and the sight of it was still the same kick to the heart now as
it had been when his father did way back when.
I liked that Jessie’s son was happy. Healthy. Confident enough that he
could laugh at himself and not get offended.
“Lincoln isn’t a bad name,” I informed Jessie’s mini-me, even though
he wasn’t so much a mini as he was a slightly smaller version of his father
—but not by much.
“I guess if you say so,” Linc grunted and took a seat on the floor.
The puppy I’d found made a beeline straight for the boy once he saw
him on the ground with him, and I started to snicker when the dog attached
itself to Linc’s pant leg and refused to let go. He had been playing with him
since we arrived at his and Jessie’s house.
“This isn’t a husky, you know,” Linc looked up at me.
I groaned. “Not you, too.”
“I already told her that, Son,” a dangerously angry voice rumbled
behind me. “But she’s not buying it yet.”
Linc’s grin slipped off his face, and he stared at his father expectantly.
The look was one of a boy who knew his mother was in trouble. One
who’d seen his mother at her worst and was hoping that she was all right.
“She’s okay,” Jessie grumbled. “They think she’ll be released tomorrow,
but it will be into the custody of the county police officers.”
“Police?”
 Jessie’s face looked tired as he walked farther inside of the house. My
frisky little puppy abandoned his chew toy and ran at Jessie full tilt,
barreling into his feet and rolling.
Jessie looked down at the little rascal, looked back up at me, and then
bent down to pick up the rambunctious puppy.
“Yes, police,” Jessie confirmed. “That’s usually what happens when you
overdose on illegal drugs and go to the hospital. They treat you, and then
release you into the welcoming arms of the police.”
I snorted and stood, walking into the kitchen, trying to play it cool even
though being in the house of the man I still loved was tearing me apart
inside. My nerves were going haywire, and I needed something, anything,
to take my mind off the fact that I was freaking the fuck out.
My first stop was to the fridge where I grabbed Jessie a beer and handed
it to him.
“I can make us some food if you want,” I offered him.
Jessie’s eyes caught mine, and then he nodded. “I think I’d like that.”
A whole bunch of memories came flooding back to me. Some that made
me smile, and some that were bittersweet.
***
“I can cook for you,” I told the man staring at me.
God, my hands were sweating. I was so nervous and this wasn’t even
our first date!
Though, granted, it was the first time I’d ever been in a man’s living
quarters by myself, even if it was in a trailer on the back of his parents’ lot.
“That’d be good, because I can’t cook at all. Unless you count boxed
macaroni and frozen chicken fingers as cooking.”
I started to laugh, the tension leaving my body.
This was Jessie. He wouldn’t hurt me. He’d die before he hurt me. I had
nothing to worry about.
 Unless I allowed myself to think about that woman, the one who was
trying to unravel Jessie’s life.
I viciously tore my thoughts away from her, unable to think about all the
stuff that had happened today without getting furious all over again.
Linc, the poor thing, had no clue that his mother was as vicious as a
viper. He had no clue that when he was picked up today from the daycare by
his mother, that it would cause his father to become frantic with worry.
“Hey, you okay?”
Jessie’s worried words had me looking up in surprise to realize that I’d
drifted while thinking about the things I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t
think about.
“Just thinking,” I said. “Would you like chicken cordon bleu or fried
chicken tenders?”
Jessie’s lips pursed. “Do you know how to make gravy, too?”
I grinned. “Yes, I do.”
“Chicken tenders, then,” he answered almost instantly. “With mashed
potatoes?”
I started to laugh. “Yeah, I can do those.”
An hour later, I was sitting at Jessie’s tiny table for two, with Linc on my
lap, handing him pieces off of my plate.
Jessie was watching me, his eyes hot.
“What?” I asked him.
“You make it easy,” he answered.
“Make it easy to what?” I questioned.
“To love you.”
***
“Fried chicken tenders and mashed potatoes?” Jessie asked hopefully.
 “You still haven’t learned how to cook that after all these years?” I
teased.
His eyes became serious, for a few seconds, as he stared at me.
“No,” he answered. “What would be the point when I could never make
them as good as you can?”
A blush stole over my face.
“That’s very sweet,” I whispered. “Gravy, still, too?”
His eyes started to shine with laughter.
“What kind of a question is that?” he continued to tease me.
“Can you make rolls, too?” came Linc’s hollered demand from the
living room. “I like rolls.”
I grinned.
“I can,” I answered him, raising my voice slightly. “But it would require
an extra hour.”
Linc kicked his feet out in front of him and reached for the remote.
“That’s fine with me.”
I snickered and turned my gaze back to man-child’s father.
“He’s exactly like you. Just like I always thought he’d be,” I informed
Jessie.
Jessie’s face showed his pride. “He’s a good kid.”
“That’s because he has a good father,” I informed him. “Now, put that
dog outside, let him go potty, and then come in here and help me peel
potatoes while I get this bread started.”
Jessie sloppily saluted me, mostly because the dog on the leash in his
hand had a hold of his long-sleeved tee that, I might add, fit him like a
glove. “Bossy.”
But he did as I asked, taking the little booger outside.
 Ten minutes and some nearly completed dough later, Jessie walked back
in with my puppy on his heels.
“He’s smart.”
I looked up from where my hands were buried to my wrists in the dough
I was kneading, and nodded. “He really is. I’ve had him less than a day, and
through all that time, he’s never once peed or pooped inside the house or
my office. And when I tell him to be nice, he instantly stops playing so
hard.”
Jessie looked down at the dog.
“That doesn’t mean that the dog isn’t a wolf, though, woman,” Jessie
said. “You need to be careful.”
I looked at the playful little puppy. “We’ll see.”
There might be a slight possibility that the dog was, indeed, a wolf. I
had found him on the side of the road by the woods, after all. That didn’t
mean that I was giving the little thing up, though. He’d been shaking and
shivering when I found him, and who knew how long he’d been lying there
waiting for someone to help him before I came along.
No, I wouldn’t be letting him go.
“If you’re going to keep him, you need to give him a name.”
I contemplated the little ball of fur and pursed my lips.
“How about Spartan or Paladin?” Linc offered his two cents.
How he could hear us over the loud TV, I didn’t know, but whatever.
“The first one’s not bad. Paladin is kind of a mouthful.”
“Achilles?”
My eyes lit up at Linc’s other suggestion.
“I really like that one,” I cooed, dropping the dough onto the flour
dusted counter. “What about you?”
Jessie shrugged. “It’s good.”
 My mouth quirked. ‘It’s good’ was the equivalent of ‘I like it a lot’ in
Jessie speak.
“It’s settled then,” I grinned, rolling out the dough. “Achilles, it is.”
The rest of dinner went off without a hitch. We all sat down to eat, and I
watched my two companions dig into my food, moaning in reaction to the
taste and causing me to beam with pride.
I loved that they loved my food. Loved it.
Unfortunately, our night was cut short a few minutes after the last roll
was snatched off the pan.
“Shit,” Jessie grumbled, standing up and walking over to his phone.
He picked it up, said a few short words, and then grunted an ‘I’ll be
there’ a few moments later.
“Work?” Linc guessed.
Jessie continued to grunt.
“Yeah.”
I got up and cleared the plates, rinsing them off in the sink before doing
the same to the other dishes.
With most of them ready to wash, I left them to gather up my things
while Jessie got ready.
The moment he was back in the living room, dressed completely in head
to toe black, I had my purse in my hand.
“You mind staying here with him? Just in case?” Jessie’s quiet words
had me looking up from my nearly dead phone.
“I can do that,” I said, dropping my purse. “As long as you have a
charger I can use for my phone.”
I wiggled my almost dead phone at him, causing his mouth to quirk.
“You want to read, don’t you?”
I shrugged. It wasn’t a secret that I loved to read. Every moment that I
had free, I chose to read because I loved to escape to the alternate realities.
Other worlds where there was always a happy ending.
“I’m at a really good part,” I said in response.
Jessie shrugged on his jacket.
“There’s one by my bed. But you can’t unplug it because the fucker’s
plugged in behind the big-ass headboard that’s a bitch to move,” he said.
“Just make yourself at home. Hopefully, I won’t be more than a few hours.”
I bit my lip.
“Okay,” I murmured quietly.
He dropped a kiss on my mouth, then he was gone, leaving me with his
son watching me with a laughing grin on his face, and a dog chewing on my
bare foot.
“Are you laughing at the dog or your father?” I challenged the man-
child.
“Both?” he teased.
I sighed. “Didn’t I hear that you had early practice tomorrow?”
Linc winked. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Then maybe you should head to bed,” I wiggled a finger at him.
He saluted me. “Yes, ma’am.”
He did, however, scoop the dog’s leash up on the way and take him
outside for me once more. Once he was done, he brought the puppy back to
me, tugged lightly on the messy bun holding my hair up, and disappeared
down the hallway to his room, leaving me alone in Jessie’s house, wishing
things that I shouldn’t be wishing for.
 Chapter 14
Everyone’s fucked up. You just have to figure out what kind of
fucked up you’re into.
-Fact of life
Jessie
I arrived home, four hours later, to a dark and quiet house.
The sight of Ellen’s car still parked in my driveway was enough to make
my heart start racing as anticipation started to fill me.
I pushed through the door of my house and closed it quietly behind me,
being sure to disarm and then reset the alarm before I removed my boots
and padded quietly to my room.
My body thrummed as I moved. Knowing Ellen was in my bed—and
had been for the last four hours—was enough to make my cock thicken and
my body tense with need.
She’d smell like me.
Actually seeing her in my bed, though, was going to have me to doing
things to her that I wouldn’t normally do with my son in the house.
But I couldn’t help it.
I needed her.
After watching her cook dinner for me, her ass swaying to music that
only she could hear, I’d been hard. But thinking about her, warm and cozy,
surrounded in my scent, was enough to make my every brain synapse fire
thinking about her.
I pushed the door open and it hit something solid, making my brows
furrow.
Then I saw that little wolf-head pop around the edge of the door, and I
grinned.
“Come ‘ere,” I bent down onto my haunches.
 He came, walking sleepily into my arms.
Grinning, I stood up with him in my arms and walked back down the
hallway, this time going to the back door where I unset the alarm, walked
outside, and froze my feet off while I waited for the little wolf-pup to piss.
“Hurry up, boy,” I growled, shuffling from foot to foot.
The pup hurried; pissed three times, shit four times in four different
locations, and walked back to me.
I scooped him up and walked back inside, this time depositing him on
the couch.
He laid down with a contented sigh, leaving my room dog-free.
Thank fuck.
After resetting the alarm, I headed back down the hall, this time a little
less quietly.
The minute I was able to push my door all the way open, I froze at the
sight of her in my bed.
She was wearing a pair of my shorts, one of my t-shirts, and nothing
else.
Her brown hair was fanned out all over the top of my pillows, and she
had her face buried in the pillow on my side of the bed.
“Goddammit,” I muttered, finding it hard to breathe all of a sudden.
She didn’t stir as I closed the door—not quietly. She didn’t stir when I
pushed my pants down and the belt buckle clanged against the hardwood
floor. She didn’t even stir when I stripped my shirt off, then walked to the
bed and placed one knee into the bed next to her hips.
Stomach taut in eagerness to feel her skin against mine, I bent forward
and ran one long finger along the curve of her cheek.
She stirred, but only long enough to roll over onto her back.
Her arms went up over her head, and she murmured something so softly
that I could barely make out the words, and then I couldn’t breathe.
 Because the words that fell from her lips weren’t something
inconsequential. No, they were everything I’d been wanting to hear over the
last fourteen years. Words that I’d kill to hear in the light of day while she
was awake and coherent.
Words that set my blood on fire and made me want to yank those boxer
briefs of mine off her curvy hips and bury my face between her luscious
thighs.
Speaking of thighs…
I ran one rough palm up the outside of one of her thighs, and she
instinctively parted them, allowing my hand the freedom to move wherever
it pleased.
“I love you, Jessie,” the whispered words, barely audible, had my hand
clenching on her thigh.
There were those words again.
I bent down, examined Ellen’s sleeping face for signs that she was
awake, and whispered back, “I love you, too. Always have, always will.”
She didn’t stir, and I pushed down the hint of disappointment that I felt.
Those words, once I’d fixed what I’d broken inside of her, would make
me a very happy man one day. But until then, I’d be happy with the dream
declarations of love that Ellen gave me.
My hand started moving again, this time to the hem of my underwear
that she was wearing.
I grinned when I pulled the elastic band of the underwear down and saw
her tiny little panties.
“It’s like you knew I’d do this,” I murmured, taking a quick glance at
the clock.
Twelve o’ two.
Plenty of time to fuck her, catch four hours of sleep, and get up for work
in the morning.
 Grinning, I made short work of my own underwear, then started on
Ellen’s, not stopping until she was naked from the bottom down.
The shirt would’ve gone, too, but she had a death grip on my pillow,
still.
And all I really needed to do was push up her shirt and I’d have access
to her pretty breasts—breasts that I could tell were unbound underneath my
t-shirt she’d borrowed.
“Jessie?”
I froze with my hand halfway up her shirt.
“What are you doing?” she asked sleepily.
I grinned and straddled her outstretched legs, pinning her lower half to
the bed with my big, naked body.
“I’m about to fuck you.”
She shook her head, a small smile on her face.
“Did you turn that light on?” she asked, turning her head so she could
see the light in the corner of the room. One I never used because the little
dial was hard as fuck to turn.
“No,” I shook my head, not giving it any more thought. “Had to have
been you.”
Her mouth opened, but before the words I knew she was going to say
slipped out, I pushed her shirt up the rest of the way and dropped my mouth
down to her breast.
The moment my mouth touched down on her nipple, she hissed out in
surprise.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she panted, her hands going to my face,
fingers tangling in my beard. “I’m not quiet.”
I grinned, giving the turgid nipple a little flick of my tongue.
“No,” I agreed. “You’re not.”
“But your son is here,” she started to push my head away.
 I let her think she won, but only for long enough for me to switch to the
other breast.
And she stopped trying to push me away, and started trying to pull me
closer.
“Jessie,” she whimpered. “You know…”
Yes, I knew. I knew her breasts were extra sensitive. I knew that she
could orgasm from me sucking on her nipples alone.
I knew, if I continued this, she’d come, and come hard.
So that’s what I did.
I sucked, licked, nipped, tugged and pulled on her nipples. When I
wasn’t torturing one with my mouth, I was pulling or rubbing on it with my
fingers.
I’d built her up to a fury of writhing, needful woman, and I could tell
that she was on edge. It wouldn’t take her more than a flick of my fingers
on the tight bud of a clit and she’d come.
I knew it. She knew it. But I wouldn’t give her that escape.
Not yet, anyway.
I had fourteen years of things that I wanted to do to this body, and I
didn’t want what we had to end too fast. I wanted, no needed, this.
Needed her.
Needed my cock inside of her, filling her so full that she couldn’t
breathe, let alone speak.
“Don’t stop,” she cried out. “Please don’t stop.”
I knee-walked up the length of her body until my cock was poised just
above her lips, and my knees planted in the bed at her shoulders.
She opened her mouth and took the head of my cock in, but with her
arms pinned to her sides by my thighs, she could do nothing more but suck
as much as she could reach by just lifting her head.
“Suck,” I ordered.
 She did, just the tip, but it was enough to make my eyes cross.
My balls were dragging deliciously against the space between her
breasts, and I was breathing raggedly.
“Enough,” I groaned, pulling away.
She didn’t stop sucking, her eyes defiant, and I started to laugh.
“That how it’s going to be played?” I asked her.
She continued to suck, stopping only long enough to let her tongue flick
through the slit at the tip, causing me to curse in two different languages.
That was when I nearly burst.
Lucky for me, when I pulled away, she didn’t keep sucking, otherwise
she would’ve taken my release from me without my wanting her to.
“Wench,” I gasped, rolling until I was on my back.
The moment I was beside her she scrambled, her legs straddling my
body, in less time than it took for me to get settled.
“I want you,” she declared the moment she settled herself over my hips.
“Take it off,” I ordered, pointing to her shirt.
She licked her lips, but followed directions.
The moment the shirt fluttered to the ground, my eyes took in her body.
I groaned when she started to swivel those hips, grinding herself down
on top of me, and I had to bite my lip to keep from guiding her movements.
“Put me inside of you,” I urged.
She did, only after she got me thoroughly coated in her wetness.
She positioned me and then slowly slid all the way down until she’d
taken all of me.
“Oh, God,” I moaned, eyes closing in ecstasy.
The feel of her pussy clenching around my cock along with her weight
settling on top of me and her nails digging into my pectorals was enough to
send me careening rapidly down a path that would only lead to one thing:
me coming entirely too soon.
“Fuck, baby, you have to stop for a minute, just be still,” I informed her,
grabbing her hips and halting her movements.
She started to laugh.
“You never could let me take control for long, could you?” she teased.
Her hair was wild around her head, and the way she was looking down
at me was enough to make my chest ache.
“You’re so goddamn beautiful,” I told her as my cock started to twitch
inside of her. “This, the way you look right now, was an image that haunted
my dreams.”
She dropped down onto my chest so quickly that I grunted in surprise.
“Oomph,” I said as a quick burst of air exited my lungs.
“You always say such nice things,” she informed me.
Then she kissed me. Softly at first, it quickly turned wild.
Tongues dueling, teeth clashing.
My beard rubbed against the sensitive skin just under her jaw, and I
knew tomorrow she would have a beard burn there.
But I didn’t care. Not one single bit.
Her breasts rubbed against my chest, and I could feel her pebbled
nipples scraping through the hair there purposefully.
When she pulled back, we were both panting hard.
“You okay now?” she whispered, her hands lifting up to cup both
breasts.
I growled at the sight.
“I love that you have something more for me to hold on to now,” I
informed her, letting my hands drag down from her ribcage to her hips. The
moment they came to a stop at her thighs, I moved my thumbs in on both
hands to sweep over the soft lips of her sex.
“Though,” I found myself saying, “when you were seventeen, you
shaved.”
She blushed.
“I haven’t had a reason to shave,” she admitted. “When you came
around, I’d just heard that men liked it hair-free down there. When you left,
I didn’t see a reason to be doing it since I couldn’t find it in me to care what
anyone but you thought.”
A surge of possessiveness rolled through me at her words, and my hips
jerked up, pushing my hard cock so deep inside of her that she threw her
head back and cried out.
That was when the fucking wolf—the one that was supposed to be
asleep on the couch—started to howl.
We both froze.
“I told you it was a fuckin’ wolf,” I grumbled, stilling her hips once
again.
“Shut up!” she hissed, leaning forward.
The howling stopped just about the time that I heard my son’s door
open.
“Come in here, then,” Linc said.
I heard the click of nails walking down the hallway toward my son’s
room, and then Linc’s door closed.
“Do you think he heard us?” she whispered too loudly for it to actually
be considered a whisper.
“The wolf, or Linc?” I asked for clarification.
“Your son,” she hissed. “I know the wolf…dog…heard us.”
I snorted and rolled us, knowing that if I didn’t take over, we’d be here
all night talking about what people did and didn’t hear, and whether or not
they knew what we were doing in here.
If I allowed her mind to have much more thinking time, I’d end up with
blue balls as she forced me to stay away from her.
Linc was such a cock blocker. He had been one since he was a baby,
too.
“No,” I lied. I didn’t know if he heard or not. I didn’t really care, either.
“Now, lift your legs up and wrap them around my hips.”
She didn’t, so I took matters into my own hands and hooked both of her
legs in the crooks of my elbows, lifted my knees up under me, and started to
work my hips. My cock slid deeply into her and then retreated, following
my very slow, very controlled movements.
As long as I stayed slow and steady, I wouldn’t be pushed over the edge
too soon. I could hold on for however long I needed to.
I could…
Her pussy started rippling around me, and she threw her head back,
neck taut, as her orgasm stole over her.
With no other reason to hang on, I picked up the pace of my thrusts and
allowed myself to fall over the edge as well. My cock pulsed as my release
left me, filling her up with everything I had in me to give.
I grunted as she smothered her cry with her hands.
I collapsed onto her, but luckily I’d dropped her legs before I fell so I
only crushed her instead of crushing her and twisting her into a pretzel as
well.
“You’re fat,” she wheezed.
I chuckled darkly. “It’s called muscle, honey.”
I rolled over anyway, my dick dragging along the inside of her thigh as I
did, causing her to curse.
“I’m leaking all over your bed,” she informed me. “You get to sleep in
the wet spot.”
 I grunted.
“Looks to me like you’re the one in the wet spot,” I drawled. “Not the
other way around.”
She sighed.
I closed my eyes as a smile stole over my lips.
“You’re such a shithead,” she informed me haughtily.
The smile stayed on my lips as she walked to the bathroom.
I’d never been more thankful for moving than I was right then. If this
had been my old place, she would have had to walk out the door of the
bedroom and down the long, narrow hallway, past my son’s room to get to
the only bathroom.
But here, she was able to walk naked into the master bathroom and
clean herself up with no one but me the wiser.
What felt like thirty minutes later, she finally came back out, my t-shirt
swamping her curvy body, and flipped the light out as she moved toward
the bed.
The minute I felt her knees on the bed, she crawled up my legs and
planted herself on top of my body.
“Not that I don’t like this,” I told her. “But the bed’s not wet. I checked
while you were in the bathroom.”
She hummed in contentment, then wiggled so that she slid off the side
of my body, but was still mostly connected with me from head to foot. Her
head went to my shoulder, and one arm curled around my gut as she
allowed her fingers to run lightly through the hair that ran a straight line
down the middle of my belly as it widened at the top of my pubic bone.
“You’re hairier than you used to be,” she murmured into the darkness.
“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” I yawned.
She started to fidget, and then I felt her pull the blankets up over our
feet. “It’s an okay thing, I guess,” she hesitated. “I do like the beard thicker,
though. It makes you look scary.”
 Her leg lifted off of mine, and then I felt the blankets move all the way
up to our chests.
“Did you just pull those up with your toes?” I asked.
She snickered. “Yep.”
“Swear to Christ. Out of all the memories, you doing shit with your toes
was the one thing that kept repeating in my brain. It would come to me and
make me smile at times that I didn’t realize how bad I needed one.”
I felt her mouth stretch into a grin against my shoulder.
“I dated a guy once who made fun of my toes. Calling them long and
ugly. I broke up with him, and all I kept thinking, as I walked out, was how
you would’ve never made fun of me about them,” she whispered.
My hand that was resting on her ass clenched.
“They’re not ugly,” I told her. “They’re unusual, yes, but not ugly. I
think it’s cool as shit that you can do things with your toes that I can barely
even do with my hands.”
She sighed.
“I fucking hated him,” she said. “He was a nice guy, but I told him
about you. How you left, and he thought it was good riddance.” She took a
deep breath, then blew it out. “There wasn’t a single man I’ve dated since
you who stood a chance.”
I was quiet for a while, digesting those words.
“I’ve had two sexual partners since you. One, I met about six years ago.
We had an agreement. She was a widow, not looking for anything more
than I had to give, and we scratched the itch together when either one of us
needed it. We did that until she met someone early last year.”
I felt her freeze against me.
“And the other?”
I could tell she hadn’t really wanted to ask the question. Even more, she
didn’t want me to answer it.
 But she needed to know. She needed to know everything if we were
going to move on from this.
“I dated another woman once I moved back here. Her name was
Seraphina.” I bit my lip. “Nothing much came out of it but physical
release.”
She released a shaky breath.
“That sucks.”
I squeezed her tighter to me, and pressed a kiss onto the top of her head.
“It’s over,” I promised. “I haven’t seen her since you showed up five
months ago.”
I felt the tension leave her body, little by little.
“And you?”
She shivered, even under the blankets and I closed my eyes.
I knew the answer even before she said it.
“Sean,” she whispered. “Only once.”
I gritted my teeth.
That burned.
That burned bad.
But I couldn’t complain. I’d been the one to leave. I’d been the one to
ensure that what we had wouldn’t last.
So yes, she slept with a club brother. Yes, she had felt something for
him.
But now, she was with me.
She was in my bed.
She was tied to me.
I tried to tell myself that it didn’t matter, but I still felt the hot spikes of
anger, frustration and jealousy pulsing through me.
 Mine.
Mine.
Mine!
Ellen squeaked when my arm tightened slightly on her, and I loosened
my hold.
“That kills me inside,” I apologized. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt
you.”
“You didn’t,” came her muffled reply. “You should see my hands right
now. I think I drew blood with my fingernails listening to you talk about
that Seraphina person.”
I sighed and closed my eyes.
“I have to get up early tomorrow, and I know damn well that my kid’s
not quiet when he gets up, so if you think we’re sleeping in, you’re crazy,” I
told her bluntly. “Time for bed. Tomorrow will be time enough for the rest
to be discussed.”
“The rest?” she repeated. “The rest of what?”
“The rest of what we have to talk about,” I said. “Like the fact that you
and me are a thing. You’re going to be in my bed every night, or I’ll be in
yours. You can’t drive that piece of shit car you have anymore, either,
unless you let me have a look at it and fix whatever it is that’s making that
noise that I hear every time it starts up.”
She started to shake as laughter left her, and I took a deep breath.
When no arguments were forthcoming, I closed my eyes, and allowed
sleep to overtake me.
It was the best night’s sleep I’d had in fourteen years.
 Chapter 15
I’m convinced that the stupid chip in debit cards was sent to
this Earth to make my life a living hell.
-Jessie’s secret thoughts
Jessie
“Can you please, please, please, please take Achilles to my place on
your way to work?” Ellen pleaded. “I forgot that I have a client I have to
meet at her house at seven fifteen. Please, I promise I’ll make it up to you.”
I turned my wrist over to glance at my watch.
“You can leave him here,” I told her. “But if I take him, I’ll be a few…”
Ellen interrupted me. “I can’t leave him here. I have to take him to the
vet this afternoon, and to do that, I need to be able to get to him. I don’t
have keys to your place. And I can’t take a wolf errrrm, I mean husky, to a
client’s house.”
I gave her a pointed look.
She blushed profusely.
“I’ll take him, baby,” I told her. “But you better be thinking up
something imaginative to make this up to me.”
With a short, hot, wet kiss to her mouth, I stooped down and scooped up
the dog, then was out the door the next second.
Lucky for her he was small enough to be zipped up in my big jacket,
otherwise she would’ve really had some making up to do.
Rain or shine, cold or hot, I took my bike. The only time I took my
truck, lately, was if Linc needed to ride with me, and those times were
becoming fewer and further between.
Surprisingly enough, on my way to drop the little wolf pup off at Ellen’s
place, he stayed curled up in my jacket, not moving even once to get out or
move.
 By the time I was dropping him off at her place, I realized I didn’t have
a key, and had to leave him in the yard with a huge ass bowl of water, and
my snack cake I’d intended to eat on the way to work. I was, unfortunately,
late once I’d tracked down the water bowl.
That didn’t much matter, though. My boss would overlook a few
minutes of lateness due to me coming in last night when I sure as fuck
hadn’t wanted to.
Being the supervisor on the shift sucked balls sometimes.
***
“Yo.”
I flipped the helmet up and looked at Peters. “What?”
“That belong to you?”
I looked in the direction he indicated and found a grin forming on my
face.
“Yeah, that’s mine,” I said. “How did you know?”
“Got you written all over it,” he murmured. “That, and she’s glaring a
hole in your back.”
I snorted.
“Yeah, she does look pretty goddamned pissed,” I agreed, standing up.
My knees ached like a motherfucker.
“I’ll cover this for you until you get back from…that.”
I flipped him off and he started to chuckle.
“Fuck you,” I told him, pulling the gloves off that made me look like
my middle finger was a few inches long.
“I think you’d enjoy fucking her better, to be truthful.”
I sighed, choosing not to answer that statement.
There was no reason to goad him on. He was deplorable enough when
he was in a calm mood. Get him riled up and he was much worse.
 “Thanks, Peters,” I mumbled as I headed toward Ellen.
She was stomping toward me, her eyes lit with anger, as she hauled ass
across the muddy ground.
She didn't even notice when her heels sunk into the mud.
No, she just kept right on truckin’, straight through the mud, sticks, and
debris.
“What’s up, Ell…” she interrupted me by throwing out her hand in
anger.
“You put Achilles in my yard, and my landlord kicked me out! He made
me sign a fucking agreement promising that I would never bring pets into
the house! He could sue me!” Ellen bellowed.
I winced.
“Shit, baby. I’m sorry,” I reached for her.
“I have exactly forty-eight hours to get all of my shit out of there, or it’s
forfeited to his estate,” she snarled. “All because you took the dog to my
house when you were supposed to take him to my office!”
My brows furrowed in confusion.
“You told me to take him to your place.”
Now that she mentioned it, though, I had known that the place Ellen
was staying didn’t allow pets of any kind. In fact, that was one of the main
reasons I didn’t rent from them because I had an indoor-outdoor cat that
liked to do whatever the fuck he wanted. Having a house that didn’t allow
pets wasn’t going to work for us.
“No, I told you to take him to my office,” she snapped.
My brows furrowed.
“All I heard was ‘take him to my place’,” I informed her. “How was I
supposed to know you meant your office?”
“Maybe because I had him there with me yesterday!” she snapped.
 “And if you hadn’t come home with me yesterday, what would you
have done?” I questioned her.
She bared her teeth at me.
“I would’ve taken him to my brother’s place,” she answered instantly.
Shit!
“And now I don’t have anywhere to stay!” she wailed.
And that was when the water works started and I felt like a two-inch-tall
pile of shit.
“Baby,” I reached for her.
She came willingly, burying her face in my neck, uncaring that I was
dirty from a hard day’s work.
She hiccupped and sniffled, turning her face so that she could breathe.
“What am I going to do?”
There was only one thing I could do.
“Move into my place until we find you one.”
She stiffened. “I will not do that. No way. Nuh-uh.”
My lips quirked.
“Do you have any better options?” I questioned, letting my dirty hand
trail down to cup her ass. “You could always move in with your brother.”
She was wearing a white cream skirt that showed off every inch of her
delectable ass and thighs.
“I’ll think of something,” she snapped, her lip curled in disgust.
Then she was walking away from me, and I was left staring at a dirty
handprint on the curve of her ass.
“That worked out well.”
I turned to find Peters, as well as every other man that’d been working
on the pipeline with me, staring at me with admiration in their eyes.
“Fuck off.”
 “What are you going to do about her house?”
What was I going to do? I was going to fucking fix it.
The first call I made was to Linc to pick up some boxes. The next was
to my boss.
The third and fourth were to Tommy Tom and Big Papa.
We were going to move her whether she wanted to be moved or not.
 Chapter 16
If it weren’t for physics and law enforcement, I’d be
unstoppable.
-Every man’s secret thought
Jessie
I knew with the way Tommy Tom looked at me that he realized finally
who I was.
I also knew, with certainty, that I should’ve told him a long time ago
who I was to his sister. Maybe then he wouldn’t feel so betrayed.
I thought I’d have more time, though.
Thought that I’d have more time to get him on my side, to see that I
wasn’t who I used to be, before he figured it out.
The fist… I should’ve seen that coming.
The right hook I actually did see coming, but did I stop it? No, I didn’t.
Because I deserved that and more.
I’d been a stupid kid. A stupid, fucked up kid who didn’t have a leg to
stand on.
Speaking of legs, mine went out from under me at that moment, just like
they always did when I least wanted them to.
I hit my back and saw stars, barely able to keep my head up off the
ground in time for it to slam into the ground with the momentum.
“Tommy!” I heard Tommy’s wife, Tally, call out in surprise. “Why are
you hitting him?”
I rolled over to my back, barely in time to avoid a kick to the ribs,
courtesy of Tommy Tom’s booted foot.
“You motherfucker,” Tommy snarled. “You. Mother. Fucker!”
 I pushed myself up on my hands and knees, then went up to my knees
only and regarded the man that was going to become my brother-in-law.
“Your sister was kicked out of her rental,” I informed him. “You either
help me move her shit into my place,” I coughed, wiping away blood from
my lip. “Or you don’t. Either way she’s moving in with me.”
“You gutted her, man,” Tommy kept on.
My eyes closed and I looked away, my tongue darting out and licking
the line of blood that was still oozing from my split lip.
“I have a lot of reasons for doing what I did,” I told him. “I was in a bad
place. My fuckin’ psycho ex, who is still in the picture might I add, wasn’t
and isn’t a nice person. She’s a sneaky bitch who lies, manipulates and
steals to get what she wants. And when I walked in on your mother telling
Ellen that she wasn’t going to pay for medical school for your sister, like
she did for you, I knew that, maybe, it was best if I didn’t stay. Maybe it
was best that I go and give her that chance she needed to shine bright
without the fucked up cloud of my baggage hanging over her head the
whole way.”
“But that didn’t work,” Tommy Tom drawled. “And you expect me to
believe that, after all this time, all the shit between you both will be erased
now that you’re together again?”
I stood up, ignoring the way my knees creaked in resistance, and stared
the man right in the eye.
“I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure she’s happy,” I
promised him. “If she needs me to shoot my own self in the foot, then I’ll
damn well do it just to see her smile.”
“Awww,” Tally cooed. “Tommy, go fucking away. Let’s get her packed
up.”
Tally walked around her husband, shoving him in the gut with her
shoulder on her way, causing her husband to grunt in annoyance.
All to receive an ‘I’m not going to kill you—not right now but soon’
look from Tommy Tom. The moment I got the clear to proceed, I walked
around him and inside, giving him a wide berth as I did.
My jaw was aching, and by tonight, it’d likely be bruised, making it
hard to eat. But it’d be worth it. Every single second.
Ellen had a soft spot when it came to her brother, and right now, we
needed to work together to get all of her stuff out before the deadline hit us.
Tomorrow, though, when we were done. I knew all bets would be off.
He’d hit me with everything he had, and I’d be ready for him.
***
We were three hours into packing Ellen’s house when Ellen finally
arrived.
She was staring at the driveway to her house with her mouth hanging
wide open.
She had a pitiful amount of five boxes under her arms, and she was
staring at the massive stack of boxes ready to be loaded into the boys’
trucks with what amounted to awe.
Big Papa, who was on the phone with someone from his work, was
pacing the end of the driveway while he looked around worriedly.
The moment his eyes lit on Ellen, he grinned, waved her past him, and
went back to his phone call.
Ellen, on stiff feet, walked toward the group of men who were filling a
pickup truck bed full of her things, and came to a halt.
“Jessie…” she breathed. “What the hell?”
I jumped down from the truck and gathered her into me for a quick,
hard kiss. “Told you not to worry, babe.”
She blinked.
“You told me not to worry,” she repeated. “Okay.”
The last word was said so sarcastically that I nearly laughed.
“It’ll be okay,” I promised her.
 She bit her lip. “I don’t think…”
I pressed another kiss to her lips to silence her. “Go pack your clothes
with the boxes you have. We’ll talk once you’re done.”
She bared her teeth at me.
I lifted my hand and dug the tips of my fingers into her ticklish side,
causing her to squawk at me. “Ack!”
She dropped her boxes, and I started to laugh.
When I bent down to get them, she pushed my head away with the side
of her ass, and then picked them up herself.
The new position put me right in line with her ass cheek, so I did what
any sane man would do.
I bit that delectable piece of flesh.
Then took off before she could retaliate.
“Not funny, James!” she called at my retreating back.
I winked at her over my shoulder.
She snarled silently at me and followed the path up the walk to her
house. When she disappeared inside, I grabbed another box from the pile
and halted suddenly when I came face-to-face with an expressionless
Tommy Tom.
“What?” I asked him.
“You act differently around her,” he accused. “Like you’re fucking
human.”
I shrugged.
“Doesn’t mean that you’re off the hook.”
I raised a brow at him.
He growled something under his breath, grabbed his own box, and took
off.
 Before I could follow suit, Ghost appeared out of nowhere with haunted
eyes.
“How’s it going, man?”
I hadn’t expected him to answer me. If I were being honest, this was
something he never did. I didn’t know if it was due to me being so new or
the fact that he didn’t like me, but the man never spoke to me at all. When
he did, it was to relay something that somebody else asked him to relay.
“Fucking dandy,” Ghost grumbled. “Found my kid and wife, though.”
My brows shot up to my hairline. “I thought that they moved and you
couldn’t find them.”
He picked up two boxes and walked away without answering, leaving
me with the question of ‘is that it?’ before I followed behind him.
There was no talking again until well past lunchtime, and by that point
my belly was eating the inside lining due to its eagerness to have food
filling it.
“Babe,” I yelled at Ellen when she started to pass me.
She glared. “What?”
“Will you order some pizza?” I asked, placing the box on the tailgate of
Big Papa’s old Chevy Silverado. “Here’s my wallet. Just try not to spend
over two hundred dollars or you might need to use the credit card instead of
the bank card.”
Her lips thinned, but she took the wallet without a word and walked
away, only looking back once to glance at me to see if I was still standing
there watching her go.
I was.
I watched her until I couldn’t watch her anymore. Then continued to
watch until she passed by the large picture window in between the kitchen
and the dining room.
She paused and looked out, her eyes catching mine, and gave me a tiny
smile that told me this wasn’t nearly as bad as it could be. She could be
really pissed. She could hate me for inadvertently causing her to get kicked
out of her place and practically forcing her to move into mine. She could be
doing a lot of things right now, but she was calm, cool, collected and
helping us pack.
That was not the way I would think that a woman not keen on moving
in with a man would act if she really didn’t want to do what she was doing.
No, she wasn’t upset by this at all.
Not even a little bit.
***
“Dad, do you want me to take her clothes into your room, or the spare
bed…” I gave him a look, and Linc started to walk away, heading toward
my room with the box that held all of Ellen’s clothes.
“This is the last box,” Big Papa said, setting the cardboard monstrosity
down next to the other piled boxes.
I offered him my hand, and he took it.
“I got some news today while we were moving that you’re not going to
like.”
I waited for him to explain, and he didn’t leave me in suspense for long.
“Your ex made bail last night.”
My head tilted.
“How did she make bail already?” I grunted, not really surprised that
she found a way out.
“Had someone show to pay the big bucks.” Big Papa shook his head.
“They let her out of there yesterday. She sat in a jail cell for about three
hours before she was allowed to make her one phone call. A man showed
up to pick her up; supposedly he looked pretty rough, too.”
I gritted my teeth.
“Probably her fuckin’ dealer,” I grumbled, dropping his hand. “Maybe
even the baby daddy.”
 Big Papa shrugged. “Could be. I don’t know. Asked the man on duty if
he had any details on the man. He gave me his info he had to fill out to post
bail, but every piece of information was forged. License was fake. Pulled
the video feed, and the man knew not to look up at the cameras. Never got
a clear view of his face. We have nothing but the plate number at this point,
which we’re running.”
Fucking figured.
I nodded. “Thanks.”
He clapped me on the shoulder and headed for the door.
“She comes over here again, I suggest you file a restraining order,” he
advised. “That way you have something to fall back on when you take this
to court.”
“How do you know I’m taking this to court?” I questioned.
He opened the door and stepped through it. “Been a cop for thirty years
now, boy. I know this kind of behavior better than you, and you’ve been
dealing with it firsthand for going on sixteen years now.”
I grunted.
Big Papa’s smile was wry. “She’ll come around. What you need to be
thinking on is what you’ll say to your boy when you tell him that he won’t
be seeing her anymore.”
Big Papa’s eyes flashed to somewhere behind me, and I knew that Linc
was there. Probably had been for a while.
“See you tomorrow at church.”
Then he was gone, leaving me with my son, who was clearly not very
happy with what he’d just overheard.
“Dad…”
I held up my hand. “Tomorrow, after your game, we’ll discuss this.
We’re not doing it now. It’s nothing dire. Nothing that’s going to change in
between then and now. So please, for the love of all that’s holy, go to bed.
Get the rest you need. You’ve got a game tomorrow; I have to get up early
and get half a day in of work before I head to the game. And there are
fuckin’ boxes to unpack.”
Linc’s lips twitched. “She’s passed out on your bed. I only dropped the
box inside the door before I left her.”
“What about Achilles?” I started scanning the room.
He was nowhere to be found.
“Took him out before you got home,” he said. “He’s in my room,
sleeping on an old pillow.”
I nodded once. “When you leave tomorrow, let him out and then put
him on the couch,” I said. “Good luck tomorrow, boy.”
Then I pulled my kid into a hug that wasn’t made for pussies.
He groaned and squeezed me just as hard back.
“Love you, kid.”
Linc let me go, and then walked away. “Love you too, Dad.”
My fucking heart swelled, and I couldn’t keep the smile off my face as I
locked up and set the alarm.
Making a mental note to give the code to Ellen in the morning, in case
she wanted to leave and come back after I left for work, I headed to the
bedroom. Stopping just as I had yesterday to admire her sleeping.
Yes, I could definitely get used to this.
 Chapter 17
Apparently the adult response to an adult problem isn’t
sending a meme to fit the situation. Who knew?
-Things you shouldn’t do when you’re an adult
Ellen
I was living in a fairytale. My fairytale!
Everything that I’d ever wanted out of life was now my reality—living
with Jessie, having a child, Linc, and enjoying life.
I hadn’t realized out of the fourteen years that he’d been gone that this
was exactly what I was missing. Had I known this feeling—the one that
made me feel like I was walking on freakin’ water—was what I was
missing, I would’ve been lost.
“Are you almost ready to go?”
I looked over the rim of my cup of coffee, which I was enjoying while
sitting at Jessie’s island, and saw him standing there with his cut hanging
off of one shoulder while he affixed a gun to his hip. Moments later it was
covered by Linc’s jersey, the number 88 with ‘James’ on the back of it.
Then the cut covered the jersey moments after that.
“Are you allowed to wear that to a football game at a school?” I
questioned him.
He did up one button on his cut and shook his head.
“No,” he said. “But I’ll take it off and store it in my saddle bags.”
“You think we’ll get back before all that nasty weather hits us?” I
questioned him as I took another sip.
He nodded. “Not supposed to hit until one AM. Game’ll be over by
eleven, and we only have an hour drive back to the house.”
“Don’t you usually follow the bus home?”
He shook his head.
 “Not anymore.” He walked over to the coffee maker and turned it off
before turning around and leaning those trim hips of his against the counter.
“Linc likes to party afterwards, and if his old man is there, then that cramps
his style.”
My lips twitched behind my coffee cup.
“You’re his father and look like his older brother. I’m pretty sure you
don’t cramp his style, only enhance it,” I informed him.
He grunted.
“Ready then?”
I let the coffee cup drop from my lips after finishing off the last dregs,
then got up and walked around the island to rinse the cup in the sink.
The moment my hips were against the counter, he moved, aligning his
hips with mine and pressing me even deeper into the counter.
I barely contained the urge to moan.
“When you were seventeen, and we did the dishes together, I had this
fantasy.”
My lips pulled into a devilish grin.
“And what was that fantasy?” I questioned.
He pulled the blue t-shirt that I’d had tucked into my jeans—one I’d
borrowed from Linc that was his when he was in the eighth grade and had
‘James’ and his number 88 on the back—and let his fingers drift along the
soft skin of my belly.
His rough hand skating across my smooth, slightly rounded belly felt
delicious.
I could also feel the long column of his cock pressed against my
backside, letting me know that whatever this fantasy was, he was really into
it.
“Well,” he said. “It has to do with a football game, you sitting on my
lap, and a blanket wrapped around us.”
 I shivered as the tips of his fingers dipped below the waistband of my
jeans.
“We’re not doing that at your son’s state finals football game.”
He started to chuckle as he ran his lips along my jawline.
“No,” he agreed. “This was when we were younger. Obviously, I know
that we can’t do it now.”
I was nodding my head in agreement when he said, “But, at halftime,
we could go under those bleachers.”
A shiver worked its way down my spine at the images his fantasy
brought to my mind even though I declined his suggestion.
“I can’t do it at a football game,” I told him. “But right here, right now,
I’d allow you to do whatever it was in your fantasy that you wanted to do to
me.”
His growl of agreement came about right before both of his hands were
on the button fly of my jeans. My pants were down around my ankles, and
he was dropping to his knees behind me before I could even register it had
happened.
“Bend over the counter, baby.”
I did, offering my sex up to him on a silver platter.
The moment his beard came into contact with my legs, I bit my lip. My
eyes drifted closed, and I got lost in the way his tongue started to do
naughty things to my pussy. The way he licked a straight line from the tip
of my clit all the way to my back entrance.
“Oh, God,” I breathed, reaching up to hold onto the faucet that was
directly in front of me.
“Not God, baby,” he growled. “Just Jessie.”
Jessie spread my cheeks apart with his thumbs, allowing him more
access, and growled when he tasted the heat of me.
“You’ve tasted like fuckin’ honey since you were seventeen,” he
informed me. “Glad to see that hasn’t changed.”
 My face flushed with heat, and I opened my eyes and gasped in surprise
when I saw someone out in Jessie’s front yard.
“There’s some guy outside your house,” I told him breathlessly.
Jessie stood, but not before he got one last lick in from clit to ass first.
As he stood up behind me, he was undoing his belt and jeans, shoving
them down hastily to just below his ass.
I couldn’t take my eyes off of the man in the front yard.
“That’s Jackson,” he told me, reaching forward and drawing the
window shades.
Then I felt his hard cock up against my entrance, and I nearly cried out
in surprise and a little bit of pain when he drove straight inside of me, not
pausing to wait for me to adjust like he usually did.
The countertop at my hips kept me from moving forward to control the
feeling, and even if it hadn’t been there, his hands clamped on my hips
would’ve kept me from moving even if I had wanted to.
The thatch of pubic hair met the curve of my ass, and I groaned at the
sensation.
“You feel like all of my dreams come true,” he growled, burying his
bearded face into my neck.
I uncurled my fingers from the faucet and lifted it up to wrap around his
head. “You’re much better at this than I remember.”
He chuckled darkly against the skin of my neck as he pulled his hips
away before swiftly bucking back into me.
I tilted my head sideways and bit the fleshy part of my bicep, trying
extremely hard not to cry out with each of his thrusts.
But when his hand tangled in my hair, pulling my mouth away from my
skin, I could do nothing but stifle my scream.
“Fuckin’ love hearing those sounds.”
That was good, because I couldn’t stop.
 He felt so good…so freaking big inside of me that I could barely keep
my legs up beneath me.
Then he bent his legs slightly, changing the angle of penetration, and I
saw stars.
“Oh my God, Jessie, yes, there,” I whimpered.
He growled, pulling my hair tighter, as he started assaulting my neck
with kisses.
“Pull your shirt up.”
I didn’t delay; I just did as he asked and pulled my shirt up around my
ribs. The moment I did, he started fucking me in earnest. Hard, fast, precise
strokes. Each plunge and retreat caused the head of his cock to drag along a
particularly sensitive spot that had me climbing higher and faster toward
explosion. So damn high and so damn fast that I was scared to come back
down.
But then I did and nothing else mattered.
Nothing.
My orgasm rushed through me as I burst into a million tiny fragments of
sensation. Aching pleasure soared through me, ran straight through my
veins, and pumped into every single cell in my body.
I even felt that orgasm in my toes.
And just as I was coming down, he pulled out, and I felt the hot spurts
of his come on my back and ass. Felt it sliding down my skin, funneling
into the crack of my ass.
He grunted twice as he spurted, decorating my skin with himself.
“Fuck.”
He said it so quietly that I almost didn’t hear it.
Almost.
I leaned over the counter and rested my head against the faucet as he
grabbed a towel from the drawer next to my hips.
 He cleaned me up, wiping his release from my body, growling as he did.
“I wish I could leave that there all day,” he told me. “But I don’t think
you’d enjoy being wet all day.”
He was right. I wouldn’t.
And it was sweet of him to think of me. Because had he come inside of
me, I’d be leaking him for hours to come, even if I did my best to wipe him
out of me.
“Go clean up while I take care of your wolf.”
I snorted and waddled to the bathroom, I’m sure in a most ladylike
fashion. He was nice and didn’t laugh or snicker in any way, leaving me my
dignity.
And as I looked into the bathroom mirror as I prepared to go to him five
minutes later, saw the flush on my cheeks that he’d left there from the rasp
of his beard, I realized that I was so freakin’ gone already. So gone that I
never wanted to find my way back to the person I was only just yesterday.
***
“Oh, my God!” I screamed, jumping up. “You could’ve killed him!”
I was sitting directly behind the fifty-yard line with Tally on one side,
and Imogen on the other. All of us were standing now as we watched all of
the huge football players peel themselves off of the dog pile one by one.
There was a lot of pushing and shoving as the players tried to jostle the
ball from whoever’s hands had it, and my heart started to pound.
One. Two. Three. Five. Seven players peeled themselves off the pile.
Then, finally, I saw the black jersey with the number 88 on the back.
“Move,” I ordered Linc.
Linc didn’t move at all.
That’s when I saw Jessie make his way back up to the top of the railing.
It was the same place I’d seen him in all those months earlier, at a pre-
season game when Linc had been hurt previously.
 The first day that Jessie had come back into my life, and by default,
Linc.
This time I was a whole lot more concerned.
This time Linc meant a whole lot more to me.
“Move,” I repeated.
Linc rolled over onto his side, and I took a deep breath.
When he got his legs under him, I dropped my hands to my knees.
Then, when he was all the way on his feet, the ball still in his hands, the
entire home side of the stadium erupted in hoots, hollers and applause.
But not just because he was okay, but because he’d gotten the first
down.
“What now?” I asked the two women at my sides.
“Well, where they’re at right now, they can kick a field goal,” Tally said.
“Or they could try to run the ball for a touchdown. The touchdown would
put them ahead of the other team. The field goal would only tie them.”
“What do you think they’re going to do?” I asked as Linc walked back
to the sidelines to his coach.
I saw Jessie get down out of the corner of my eye, and turned my
attention to him.
He had his head in his hands as he watched Linc walk/limp toward the
sidelines.
I didn’t wait for the women to reply, instead made my way to my man.
The moment I was close enough, I squirmed my way in between him
and Tommy Tom, who was being fairly chatty today compared to how he’d
been yesterday.
Jessie’s arm curled around my waist and he pulled me to him, but he
didn’t say a word as he waited for Linc to come back on the field.
My stomach was in knots.
 This game, the state finals for their school’s division, was a nail-biter.
I’ve never, not once, seen a game this close.
There’d been less than three points between each team the whole game.
The home team—Linc’s team, even though they were at a visitor’s field—
had scored first. The visiting team had scored not even five minutes later,
and they’d been trading points back and forth since. Now with only four
minutes left in the fourth quarter, I didn’t know who would win.
They were behind, twenty-one to twenty-four, and Linc had just gotten
the first down.
But he was also not walking as fast as he normally did.
“Do you think he’s hurt?” I whispered worriedly to the man at my side.
Surprisingly it wasn’t Linc’s father who answered, but Tommy.
“He’s fine,” Tommy said with a surety that I wish I’d felt, too. “Making
‘em think that he’s more hurt than he really is would be my guess.”
I bit my lip and wondered if that really was the case.
Linc came back out on the field as the time-out that they’d called ended.
“Shit, shit, shit,” I murmured to myself. “I feel like I’m going to throw
up.”
The wind blew, and I winced at the bite of the frigid air.
“Fuckin’ cold as fuck,” Tommy grunted as he pulled his toboggan down
lower over his ears.
I looked at my brother and snorted. “You should’ve worn a heavier
jacket,” I informed him haughtily.
My brother nudged me, but stayed there next to me, trying to share my
warmth.
I didn’t complain, though.
It was twenty something degrees and the windchill was making it feel
closer to fifteen degrees. Any warmth, at this point, was better than nothing.
 I was just happy it wasn’t raining in addition to the strong gusts of wind
whipping through the stands.
“Here we go,” Jessie stood up a little straighter.
I turned my attention back to the field, barely opening my eyes wide
enough to see, and started to chant ‘you can do it’ in my head.
I’d been saying it aloud, but I kept getting funny looks from everyone
around me because I sounded like the dude from The Waterboy each time it
left my mouth.
The center snapped the ball, and Linc caught it.
The moment the ball hit his hands, Linc went down hard when an
opening in the offensive line allowed one of the other team’s linebackers
through.
“Shit fucking hell,” Jessie grunted.
Tommy leaned forward in aggravation, too.
“Kid’s a machine, man,” Tommy said as Linc stood up.
Jessie grunted in reply and tightened his arm around me tighter.
“Go baby! You can do it!”
I turned to see the woman I’d been trying hard all night to ignore
standing in the front row, blocking the view of the people behind her and
causing them to have to stand if they wanted to see what was going
themselves.
Selfish cow.
I turned away and tried to ignore her, but her voice was so fucking
annoying.
And, to be honest, I was a little bit pissed.
I’d been to more of Linc’s games this year than she had, and I wasn’t
even Linc’s mother. How convenient now that Linc starts getting the
attention of college scouts that she finds her way out of the woodwork to
ride on his coattails.
 Thank God Linc had Jessie for a father, because I knew he wouldn’t
allow Margot to get her claws into him.
“Pass the ball.”
I whipped my head around in time to see Linc throw the ball, and I
gasped.
“Wow, that’s a really far throw!” I crowed.
Jessie’s eyes followed the ball, and I felt him tense.
The ball sailed for what felt like forever, straight into the waiting hands
of a player from the other team.
“Son of a fucking bitch!” Jessie growled deeply.
“What a shame,” came that annoying voice from behind me.
I looked away from the game, my heart sinking, and watched as Margot
slipped away through the crowd with a fucking smile on her face.
What a bitch.
How could she be smiling like that and not feeling terrible?
I looked back to the game in time to see Linc running, his legs looking
so powerful in motion, his arms pumping quickly, as he raced toward the
man who was making his way easily down the field while the other players
were still gathering themselves off the ground, seemingly unaware that the
ball had been intercepted by the other team.
But Linc was.
The crowd all around me was going wild as the opposing player ran as
fast as he could down the field toward the end zone.
Nobody saw Linc coming, though.
But I sure did.
I saw Linc hit the player hard.
I also saw the ball fly up and out of his hands as Linc dove for it.
 Then, before it could even register with anyone what the hell was going
on, Linc had the ball in his hands and was running toward the opposite end
of the field.
And no one, not one single player, was in a position to stop him.
There was confusion all over the field as players tried to scramble up
and into action.
Nobody but Linc and one other player, who was clearing a lane for Linc
by knocking opposing players out of his way, seemed to recognize that Linc
was just seconds away from scoring.
By that point I was jumping up and down, screaming so loud that my
throat hurt.
Tommy and Jessie were doing much the same, as well as the other
members of the Dixie Wardens who’d been able to attend tonight.
When he finally made it into the end zone and threw the ball down so
hard that it bounced high into the air, I was out of breath.
“That’s my boy!” Jessie cried loudly, pointing at Linc with one
outstretched finger.
Linc pointed back, almost as if he were waiting for Jessie to do it, and
held a fist high in the air.
Jessie followed suit, and I realized that something silent had passed
between the two men.
I loved that they shared something like that.
“Holy shit,” I breathed as I finally caught my breath. “That was epic!”
Jessie turned to me, a smile on his face a mile wide, and winked.
Fucking winked.
And there went my panties.
“You’re incorrigible,” I informed him, patting him lightly on the chest.
“And I hate to do it, but I have to pee like a racehorse. All that jumping
around nearly did me in.”
 I’d been holding it for what felt like forever, and I probably should’ve
gone at halftime, but I had stopped myself when I saw all the women
heading in that direction. Now I didn’t have any other choice.
So, after offering my lips, which Jessie readily took, I scooted out of his
hold and continued down the stairs that led off the bleachers.
I rounded the corner of the bleachers, and I came to a sudden halt.
Why? Because there was Margot.
I tilted my head down and tried to pass her hoping that she wouldn’t see
me, and I thought I succeeded.
I even made it into the bathroom and relieved my bladder under the
assumption that I’d dodged that bullet.
But when I came out of the stall and saw her leaning against the wall
across from it, I gritted my teeth.
She was waiting for me.
“I see that you’re here.”
I didn’t know what to say to that that wouldn’t sound sarcastic, so I kept
my mouth shut.
I moved down past her and walked to the end of the row of sinks that
was nearest the exit, ignoring the bite of the cold water hitting my cold
hands.
“I’m talking to you.”
I looked at Margot, who was only inches away from me, in the mirror.
“I see that,” I murmured softly.
Women were coming and going out of the stalls behind me, and I
wanted to hurry so I didn’t miss any more of the game.
Especially after I heard the roar of the crowd a few seconds later, and I
cursed the woman who was now standing in the way of my exit.
“Why are you here?” she snapped.
 I threw the paper towel away and turned around, my intention to go to
the other exit even if it would lead me in the opposite direction of where I
needed to go.
I did not want to talk to this woman.
I did not want get in a fight with her when I knew damn good and well
that it wouldn’t end well.
But as I exited the bathroom and started stomping my way around the
building, she came up behind me and grabbed a hold of my hair, giving me
no other choice but to stop.
“Let. Go. Of. Me,” I ordered, turning my head to stare at the woman
who had a death grip in my hair.
“I was talking to you, bitch.”
I gritted my teeth, then reached up and took hold of my hair right above
her clenched fist.
Then, with a vicious yank, I pulled it away from her.
I didn’t miss the surprise in her eyes as I did, either.
Nor the leftover brown hairs that were still in her clenched fist.
“I realize that you want to have a conversation. But I don’t want to talk
to you. I want to watch the last few minutes of the game,” I ground out,
starting to turn.
“They’ll lose. Or, at least, if Linc knows what’s good for him, he’ll
throw it like he’s supposed to,” Margot snapped. “So I believe you have
plenty of time to talk to me. You won’t miss anything good.”
I blinked.
“I…”
“Don’t,” I snapped. “Don’t.”
“I…” She opened her mouth again.
I held up my hand.
 “Right now, I’m seconds away from beating the shit out of a pregnant
woman,” I said. “So, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll let me leave
before I do something stupid that’ll get me put in jail for the night instead of
celebrating Linc’s win with my man and his son.”
Margot’s eyes flashed hot with anger.
“You listen here,” she hissed.
I turned and walked away from her, this time moving a hell of a lot
faster than Margot did, weaving my way in and out of the crowd quickly so
she couldn’t stop me again.
By the time I reached Jessie’s side, there were twenty nine seconds on
the clock and the other team had the ball.
Jessie didn’t even look down at me as I made my way up to his side. His
eyes were solely focused on the field and the defense as they tried to keep
the opposing team from scoring.
And they did, but I barely was able to finish watching the game as
worry spiraled through me like a freakin’ out of control tornado.
What had Linc done? Had his mother forced him to do something?
Had I misheard her? Surely, I’d misheard her.
Jessie’s arms left me suddenly, and he hooted his excitement as the last
few seconds finally melted away from the scoreboard.
Then the crowd around me went wild.
Too bad I was a worrywart and couldn’t figure out what in the hell I was
supposed to tell the man who looked incredibly excited at his son’s
accomplishment.
Dammit!
 Chapter 18
I don’t even believe myself when I say I’m only going to have
one glass of wine.
-Face of Life
Ellen
I nervously waited in the parking lot next to the other old ladies—who
weren’t old, might I add—and fidgeted. I was working through whether or
not to inform Jessie now or later about what happened with Margot, and I
was clearly drawing the attention of the ladies at my side.
“So you never really told us what happened between you and Jessie,”
Tally said. “It’s obvious that there was something there between the two of
you before, but you’ve never really said anything about it.”
I looked at Naomi, warily, as she stared at me with the same curiosity.
“Jessie and I were together when we were in high school,” I murmured
softly. “He left. End of story.”
“A woman like you doesn’t wait a lifetime and leave a man like Sean,
for someone that she isn’t still in love with,” Naomi pointed out.
I cleared my suddenly dry throat.
“I still feel like there is this animosity between us, and I’m not entirely
comfortable telling you more than I have,” I told her the truth. “That’s not
to say that one day I won’t be, but you intimidate me.”
Tally snorted. Imogen, on the other hand, looked at me like I was nuts.
“Do you really think that’s going to stop us from getting the truth out of
you?” she questioned. “We realize that you’re not entirely comfortable with
us. You feel like you don’t belong, but that couldn’t be further from the
truth. You’re just as much a part of us as anyone standing here. You may
not be married in, but you’re ours.”
“I don’t know what you really want me to say that will make you feel
better,” Naomi started almost the moment that Imogen finished. “Sean is
my world. Though, he wouldn’t be if you hadn’t left him. I can’t say that
I’m happy you caused him pain by leaving him, but I can say that I will
forever be grateful that you knew it wasn’t right for you and left him before
you broke him.”
I bit my lip.
“And,” she continued. “I don’t blame you for what happened to me.”
My eyes went wide.
How could she not blame me for what happened to her? She’d lost a
child because I’d taken her away from her safe place. Sure, I’d done so on
her insistence, but it’d still been my doing.
“I can see that you blame yourself, but you really shouldn’t,” Naomi
murmured softly. “Everything that happened that night was of no one’s
doing but a madman’s,” she explained. “Sure, it was more my fault that I
went off and did something stupid, but in no way, shape or form did I ever
blame you for what happened to me and neither should you.”
I looked down at my toes and wondered how long was acceptable to not
say anything. Because had I opened my mouth right then, my voice
would’ve cracked with unshed tears.
The gift this woman was giving me wasn’t something she realized yet.
I’d always been on the outside. Always.
In grade school, I’d been Tommy Tomirkanivov’s little sister who
everyone thought was a little bit weird because she would rather read than
play. In high school, I’d been the band geek who knew how to play a mean
clarinet but was too scared to compete so I never went to any of the football
games.
And then I’d met Jessie. He’d been the one and only person in my
whole entire life that had known me for me. He hadn’t cared that I’d rather
read than watch a movie. He hadn’t cared that I was a little on the weird
side. He only cared about me.
I never once doubted his loyalty to me.
 But he’d been the only person besides my family—and even they were
iffy sometimes—who cared about me enough to bring me into his life.
And now, here were these women, offering me a place among them.
I didn’t know what the hell to say. I couldn’t form coherent thoughts.
“We’re all crazy here.” Tally threw her arm around me. “Welcome to the
crazy girl club. The wine is fine.”
I snorted and tilted my head.
“Was that wine in your cup?” I challenged her.
Tally batted her eyelashes at me.
“I turned twenty-one. I should be able to drink whatever and whenever I
want,” she shot back.
I snorted.
“I think that’s all kinds of illegal, but whatever floats your boat,” I eyed
the Yeti tumbler in Tally’s hand, wondering if it did, indeed, contain wine.
“You’ll never know,” Tally teased, upending the cup and taking a
healthy pull.
I giggled and turned away, surveyed the parking lot.
It was still going strong as the boys made their way out of the locker
room.
I saw Linc and bit my lip, my eyes automatically moving to where
Jessie stood next to the rest of the men who’d been able to come with us for
this last game.
Jessie disentangled himself from the men and started toward his son.
The moment the two of them were within arm’s reach, Jessie threw his arms
around Linc and lifted him straight off his feet.
I found myself grinning widely as I watched them.
“Jessie makes me nervous.”
I looked over at Naomi.
 “Really?”
She nodded.
“Me, too,” Tally said. “I tried to talk to him when I first met him, and he
was so standoffish that I stopped trying almost immediately.”
I sighed.
“Jessie doesn’t talk much, even to me,” I finally explained. “He’s a
quiet person who likes to watch and read the situation before he places
himself in the middle of it. That’s not to say that he won’t hold a damn
lengthy conversation with you if you ever pique his interest.”
“Are you saying that I’m boring, Ellen?” Tally drawled.
I shrugged. “He has particular tastes. Not to mention he doesn’t like
chatter boxes.” I paused. “That really used to bother him when it came to
his ex. He used to tell me that I was a breath of fresh air because I didn’t
demand attention every single second of the day,” I snorted. “I don’t know
if you noticed, but when he’s at parties, he’ll never be the center of
attention. And God help you if you try to throw a surprise birthday party for
him. I think if I ever tried that, he’d get up and leave.”
The wind kicked up then, blowing the game roster that I’d received at
the front gate straight out of my hand.
“Shit,” I said, running after it.
The paper kept tumbling further and further away, and by the time I
caught up with it next to the back of the bathrooms over thirty seconds later,
I was over fifty feet away.
“Fucking crazy ass weather,” I grumbled to myself as I bent down to
pick it up from where it’d stopped against the brick of the building.
“No.”
I froze when I heard the familiar bitchy voice of Margot.
“I can’t. I told him to do it, but I can’t help it if he didn’t listen to me.”
I looked over my shoulder to see how far away from the crowd I was
and realized that the closest person to me was still a good distance away,
and I doubted that they’d be able to hear me over the excitement of the
crowd.
The damn band was playing their drums, and I could feel the pulse of it
in my very bones.
But I could hear Margot talking to someone. Though, possibly it was
due to the fact that the wind also shielded the worst of the wind from me,
causing me to be able to hear a little better than I had when I was standing
in the middle of the parking lot.
“Time for plan B, then,” the man suggested.
His voice sounded silky and smooth, almost as if he were a
sophisticated, refined gentleman.
It was the voice of a man that I would never expect to be around
Margot, let alone talk to her for any length of time.
“Plan B won’t happen for a while. I have to have this kid to use it as any
kind of leverage against him.”
My mouth fell open.
Then I started to get angry.
I peeked around the corner very carefully, and nearly came face-to-face
with a well-dressed man in a zipped up Under Armour pull over, slick black
track pants and tennis shoes that would probably glow in the dark.
Lucky for me he was looking down, shielding his face from the wind
that I could feel coming around the corner.
“I didn’t want this kid. You told me that you’d take care of it. When you
didn’t, you then convinced me we could make some money; I trust that you
can do that. However, I’m not going to lose my job over the fact that you
can’t get your son to follow simple instructions,” the man seethed. “I’ve
already fallen for too many of your tricks. I think it’s time for you to just
pay me back, and we leave it at that.”
The sound of the band suddenly stopped, and that was when I saw the
rain.
 It was heading my way and soaking everyone still standing in the
parking lot within seconds.
I cursed myself in my head and when I looked back at the two people
who had been busy discussing whatever illegal things they’d been
contemplating, they were gone. Both were running away, each in opposite
directions.
I turned around and sprinted toward Jessie, who was looking for me
with a slight frown marring his face.
The moment I came into view, his eyes took in my wet appearance, and
gestured me over.
“Tommy came in his truck. You ride home with him, okay?” He pointed
at my brother, who was waving me forward.
I nodded once quickly, my teeth starting to chatter.
“Go.”
Then he was sprinting to the opposite side of the parking lot where his
bike was the only one left.
I watched only long enough to see him start it, and then the wind started
to howl again, forcing me to get into my brother’s truck or risk dying from
exposure.
The entire drive home I worried about him, even when I saw him and
the other two men with him pull off under an overpass to block themselves
from the rain.
***
The ride to Jessie’s place was slow, and by the time Tommy dropped me
off after having done the same thing for Imogen and Naomi, I was damn
near exhausted.
I trudged up to the front steps, and I was surprised to find the door
already unlocked.
“Hey,” I said, startling when Linc yanked the door open for me.
He grinned.
 “You look like a drowned cat,” he informed me.
I sidestepped him and bent down to pick up Achilles before turning to
the child of the man I loved.
Linc read my expression, and the smile on his face dimmed.
I’d been thinking for well over an hour, and I didn’t know what to do.
Didn’t know what would be the right way to approach what was on my
mind.
Which was why I trudged right in, and I didn’t beat around the bush.
Jessie would’ve been proud of me.
“I need you to do me a favor,” I said to Linc. “I’m going to ask you this,
and I want you to tell me the complete, honest to God’s truth. And, if you’re
ready to share anything else with me, I’d be willing to listen.”
Linc looked up at me in surprise, his eyes wary.
“Yeah?”
I licked my lips nervously. “Did your mom tell you to throw the game?”
I’d surprised him. The look of shock written all over his face was
enough to confirm the fact without him actually having to say the words.
He didn’t realize that anyone knew, that was for sure.
“H-how…”
“Your mother made a comment,” I said. “Would you like to explain it
better to me before I tell your dad?”
Linc’s jaw clenched.
“Do you have to?”
I nodded.
I did. He knew it. I knew it.
This relationship between me and Jessie was too new to not share
something this important.
 “I have to,” I murmured, taking a seat on the couch. “If I don’t, then
this’ll always be sitting between us.”
He looked away, absently staring at the window while I assumed he
tried to collect his thoughts.
“My mom’s a bitch.”
I didn’t say anything. There was nothing I could say to that. She was
and always would be.
“I never wanted to see her.”
My brows rose at that, and I gestured to the couch. “Come sit down and
tell me everything.”
“I’d need a beer to tell you everything,” he muttered under his breath.
So that was how I started getting Jessie’s sixteen-year-old son drunk.
 Chapter 19
Buying one when you really want two.
-Gun control
Jessie
I parked my bike in the driveway next to Ellen’s piece of shit car, and
idly wondered if she’d notice if I traded it in for a new one.
Of course, I knew she would notice. What I wanted to know was if
she’d give me a hard time about it or if she’d just let me do it. I was hoping
she’d just let me do it. Eventually, I would wear her down, but if she went
down without a fight it’d be safer for her.
A peal of laughter had me looking up at the house, and despite being
chilled to the bone and soaked to the skin, I found a smile on my face as I
heard my son’s laughter paired with Ellen’s giggles.
I was happy that the two of them got along so well. Of course, I
expected it’d happen. Linc was a good kid, and he genuinely liked
everyone. Ellen was the exact same way, and I never thought that they
wouldn’t treat each other with kindness.
Once I had my bike situated, I jogged up to the front door and opened it,
coming to a halt in the doorway when I saw my son with a beer in his hand.
My brows rose as I took in the scene.
Ellen was curled up on the couch, her head was half hanging off of it,
and she had a beer in her hand that was hanging precariously.
The not-a-dog was biting her hair from where he was lying on the floor
next to the couch, and Ellen wasn’t paying enough attention. Either that or
she plain didn’t care.
He was staring up at the ceiling with a smile a mile wide stretched
across his face. He was laughing deeply about something, and it was only
when I heard Ellen say, “And she called me a selfish bitch when you were
two. She hated that I was feeding you cake, when you so obviously were
allergic to cake. Your father,” she wiped tears from her eyes with the bottom
of the beer bottle. “He looked at her and told her she was ‘fuckin’ fucked in
the head’ if she thought you were allergic to cake.”
My brows rose. I was surprised that Ellen remembered that. The very
next day was the day that I’d left. I would’ve thought she’d have blocked
that out purely to protect herself. That day was one of the best days of my
life, and it was a precursor for what happened after it.
“Do you think Dad’ll be mad about my mom?” Linc sobered.
And that was when I realized that my woman hadn’t let my underage
kid drink without reason.
I’d noticed that there’d been something off with the both of them today,
but with the winning of the game, as well as the fucked up winter weather,
I’d not gotten a chance to ask either one of them what was wrong.
Now, well now was a different story.
“Why do you think I’d be mad about your mom?” I asked my son.
Linc lifted his head and let out one of those exaggerated, teenaged boy
groans. The kind that clearly said to anyone who heard it that life as that
teenager had known it had just ended right before their eyes.
He dropped his head back to the carpet, and I barely resisted the urge to
laugh.
“Son of a bitch.”
“Language, boy!” Ellen sat up and glared at me.
“Why are you lurking there like a weirdo in the doorway?” she snapped.
“Go get changed so I can tell you about what new fucked up low your baby
mama stooped to now.”
My brows rose.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Ten minutes later, dressed and finally warm in a pair of sweatpants and
nothing else, I walked out to see Ellen working on a new beer—her third if
the bottles on the table next to her were any indication—and my son
nowhere to be found.
“Where’d he go?” I asked.
“He took the dog out,” she answered as she got up. “Do you want a beer
or some coffee?”
She eyed me warily, studying me from head to toe as if to ascertain that
I was okay.
“I’ll have some coffee,” I said. “Then I’ll have a beer.”
She walked to the kitchen and got started on that without me even
having to ask her, and she was placing the steaming mug in my hands thirty
seconds later.
“Now sit, so I can tell you.”
I hesitated, rethinking my decision to not have a beer.
“Is this bad?”
She nodded without saying a word.
I detoured to my cabinet where I kept the liquor, and splashed some
Bailey’s into my coffee.
She didn’t say a word as I returned to my seat on the couch and sank
down into the comfortable cushions.
“Go ahead and lay it on me,” I ordered warily.
She sat down on the coffee table directly in front of me and placed her
beer down next to her thigh before returning her gaze to me.
“I ran into Margot at the game in the bathroom.” She bit her lip. “She
was rude, like always, but this time, she also made a comment that caught
my attention.”
“What kind of comment?” I was almost scared to ask.
“She made it sound like she asked your son to throw the game today.
And by asking him, I mean she actually did tell him to do it.”
 Anger started to churn in my gut.
“So, I asked your son, and he told me that that wasn’t the first fucked up
thing she’s done.”
“You mean other than overdosing on the way to going to the movies
with him?” I snarled, standing up and starting to pace.
She caught the coffee that I’d forgotten was resting on the arm of the
couch and placed it on the table next to her other thigh.
“She’s been blackmailing him,” she started. “Forcing him to see her
even when he doesn’t want to.”
“How?” I ran my hands through my hair.
“By telling him things that a mother shouldn’t be telling her son,” she
muttered under her breath. “She’s pretty much used you against him.
Telling him things that she would do to you if he didn’t comply with her
wishes.”
I snorted, unsurprised that she would sink to such low levels.
“She threatened to take you to court and have her rights given back to
her,” Ellen continued. “Then, when that was no longer working, she forced
him to go with her places, to act the devoted son, all so she could use him
later on as a pawn in some new betting scheme she had going on with her
dealer.”
“How did she do that?” I asked. “By forcing him? He’s not a small kid.
He didn’t have to do any of this. He could’ve come to me at any time.”
“When he started to, she threatened to plant drugs and a gun in his car
while he was at school, and then turn him in the authorities.”
The words were said, but I couldn’t fucking believe them.
“That fucking bitch.” I turned around and headed in the direction of my
room. My destination was my closet so I could get dressed, and then go find
this bitch and let her know what she’d done to fuck up.
But before I could even slip my pants off, Ellen was there, halting my
progress.
 “I think you need to call Big Papa, and then once you talk to him, call
the school and let them know what’s going on,” she said. “What I don’t
think you should do is go off half-cocked and make matters worse for either
you or Linc.”
I gritted my teeth.
“She messed with my kid,” I growled through clenched teeth.
“She did,” I said. “And I think that you need to be very careful what you
do right now.”
She was right. Of course, she was right, but I couldn’t wrap my brain
around it all.
“Is there anything else?” I asked very calmly.
“No.” She hesitated. “Well, yes, but no.”
I turned around and looked at her.
She backed up until her knees hit the bed.
I kept coming, forcing her to sit down.
I went down with her, my hands going to either side of her chest as she
fell backwards.
“What?” I asked, my face inches from hers.
“I saw them when I ran after my flier earlier.”
“When you chased that paper after the game?” I guessed.
She nodded.
“What happened?”
“Margot was there, talking with some man who was all decked out in
Under Armour. He looked like a coach actually.”
“What did he look like exactly?”
“He was about your height. Skinnier, more of a runner’s build. He had
dark hair, more brown than black. His skin was tanned, and he had really
dark eyes and a scar on his nose.”
 I knew instantly who she was talking about.
“That’s the special teams coach for Linc’s team,” I grunted and pushed
myself up, standing by the bed and staring blankly at the wall.
“What did he say?” I needed to know everything.
This was bad.
“He was talking about throwing the game at first. He was pissed off that
Linc didn’t do what he was supposed to do. I also think he’s the baby’s
father. But when I mentioned some of this to Linc, he didn’t seem to know
that the two of them had any connection at all.”
I rubbed my forehead thoughtfully with my hand.
“I’ve never heard about any problems on Linc’s end from him,” I finally
settled on. “But this needs to be discussed tonight, and I need to hear it all
from Linc before I make any more moves on my end.”
“I’m here.”
I looked over to find Linc standing in the doorway.
“I never knew Coach Rhodes knew Mom. He’s never once approached
me about her or anything to do with throwing the game like Mom did to me
yesterday,” he said.
He was staring at me like he used to do when he was in trouble and he
knew it.
I gestured him forward.
He came, and I threw my arm around his neck and pulled him to me.
He may be nearly my height and just a few pounds short of me in
weight, but the boy was still my baby. He always would be.
“We’ll figure this out, son,” I told him. “But you did the right thing. You
knew what was right, and you didn’t fuck anything up too badly.”
“That pass to the other team. That was by accident, but nobody will
believe me when they find out that Mom blackmailed me into throwing the
game,” he whispered.
 I looked into eyes so like my own.
“What did she hold against you to get you to follow her orders?” I asked
carefully.
“She said either I throw the game or she’d kill the baby.”
I closed my eyes.
“She threatened to kill herself once a week when she was pregnant with
you,” I told him bluntly. “But if she does that, then she fucks her leverage
up,” I explained. “The one and only time I thought she was serious about
what she said, I called the cops and told them what she threatened. They
kept her in a psychiatric hold at the hospital for over a week.”
His eyes widened. “So yes, I’m sure she was betting on you not saying a
word to me about any of this. That way, I couldn’t share what she used to
do to me, and the ways I used to handle her.”
His head hung.
“You’re a kid, Linc. You shouldn’t have to deal with this kind of shit or
with a mother who’s a dick head. Unfortunately, we don’t all get that lucky.
But you, my son, were dealt a pretty shitty hand when it comes to mothers.
You’ve got one of the worst, in my opinion. But from now on, I’ll deal with
her. We’ll go up to the phone store in the morning and change your
number.”
“But…”
I held up my hand. “She won’t be able to call you. You can give all your
friends your new number, and it’ll be okay.”
He shrugged.
“And if see your mother coming around, I want you to go in the other
direction. Also, don’t allow yourself to be alone with Coach Rhodes. I
know you have practices, but walk away if he tries to talk to you by
yourself.”
His eyes were hard as I said the last part, and he nodded.
 “I never was near him much, anyway, since he was the kickers’ coach.
I’ll also have to be around him in the spring though because the other
coaches teach baseball and soccer, too,” Linc offered.
I nodded in understanding. “That’s good, because if you see him, I want
you to go the other direction. I’m not sure how long it will take to have this
handled, but it may not be automatic. He may be free to work in the
meantime.”
“The holidays are here anyway, Dad. There won’t be any need for me to
see him until the beginning of January.”
I grunted in reply. “Good. Now take that damn wolf and head to your
room. I have some calls to make.”
***
I watched Ellen across my house, talking quietly with the woman Big
Papa brought with him, and grinned.
“You better be careful. They’ll bring the girl into the fold and you’ll be
forced to settle down,” I told Big Papa.
Big Papa grunted in reply. “Yeah, fuck no.”
I snorted.
“You’re never going to settle down?” I asked him.
The door banged open, and Ghost walked in, a scowl on his face that
would’ve made him intimidating to just about anyone.
“I’ve done the wife thing before,” Big Papa said as he watched Ghost
stalk toward us. “Got Sean out of it, but yeah, the act of allowing someone
to have that power over me again is enough to give me hives. I’ve never
found anyone like you have. Like my boy. Maybe that’ll change if I find
that, but right now, Lila makes my dick happy.”
Before I could reply to that announcement, Ghost walked right up to me
and halted my words in their tracks.
“Dealer’s dead.”
My head whipped around, and I stared at him in shock.
 “You’re fucking kidding.” I really hoped he was joking, but the look on
Ghost’s face was enough to cause me to start cursing.
“Motherfucker,” I growled. “How’d that happen?”
“Gunshot wound to the head,” he answered. “But he was also found in
his fuckin’ car, which was stuffed with enough heroin and weed to supply
the entire fucking state. So, right now, it’s looking like a vigilante crime.”
“Except it wasn’t.” I knew it wasn’t. “My kid’s in the middle of this
shit, man. I need you to help me figure it out.”
I didn’t know anything about being a cop, and I certainly didn’t have the
skills of one. I’d been a kid raised on the wrong side of the track. I had no
special skills that would help me in this situation. I also didn’t know anyone
who could help me beside these men.
“You don’t have to worry,” Big Papa said. “Ghost here’s a wizard at
finding shit out. He’ll piece it together, and we’ll get to the bottom of this.”
I was staggered by the relief I felt at the knowledge that these men were
going to have my back.
My son was right. Joining The Dixie Wardens was totally the right thing
to do for us. We weren’t alone anymore, and as I looked over at Ellen,
hearing her laughter, I realized that I never would be again.
 Chapter 20
How do you politely tell someone you want them naked on
top of you? Asking for a friend.
-Text from Ellen to Jessie
Jessie
“He what?” I snapped, turning to the man at my right. “What did you
say he was doin’?”
The coach nodded.
“Saw her pull up here and try to pick him up from practice. When he
wouldn’t go with her, she freaked out and tried to force him to get in the
car. Luckily, a couple of the other players were there, or she might’ve
actually accomplished it.”
I gritted my teeth and stared at Linc.
It’d been two weeks since I’d found out about Linc’s mother’s attempts
at blackmailing him to do things no sixteen-year-old should ever have to do.
Two weeks of searching for her, only for her to drive right on up to his
school, where he was at his practice, and nearly force him away.
The one good thing I could see in all of this was that Coach Rhodes, the
drug dealer that’d died with his million dollars worth of drugs on him, was
no longer a problem I had to worry about. Essentially, while Linc was at
school, he was safe.
Or at least I had thought he was.
“Go get in the car,” I ordered him roughly.
Linc walked to his car and got in. Lucky enough for him, he got into his
car and sat there, waiting for the inevitable, on my end. If he hadn’t, things
would’ve ended a hell of a lot worse than they had.
“I can’t file charges against her because they said she’s not doing
anything wrong…yet. I’m trying to get a restraining order against her now,”
I told the coaches who were watching me with wary eyes. “She’s a
manipulative bitch who will do anything in her power to accomplish
whatever it is that she’s trying to do, even if she has to use my son’s back to
do it. I appreciate you calling me, but until I can figure this out, Linc will
be coming straight home after school and won’t be attending off-season
practices.”
Linc wouldn’t miss much. Off season was really just a way for the
coaches to keep the kids in shape and sharp. Linc wouldn’t have that
problem. He never slacked.
Both coaches nodded, their faces chapped due to the wind that was
assaulting the open field around us.
Coach King and Coach Martin would have likely come in hours ago,
due to the cold, but they’d waited for me to arrive from work.
Unfortunately, I’d been over two hours away, and none of the other club
members could get off from what they were doing to help me out. And
Ellen was working, and no way in hell would I call her and insert her into a
situation she might not be able to extract herself from.
I couldn’t feel the cold at all.
I was numb from Margot’s latest stunt.
She had no fucking morals. Attacking my kid at school was something I
never thought she’d do.
“Thank you for calling me and watching out for him,” I told the two
men, offering them each my hand.
They shook it, and I nodded at them before heading to Linc’s car.
He looked at me warily.
“Drive straight home,” I ordered. “I’ll be right behind you.”
After receiving his nod, I angrily walked to my bike and started it up.
When he pulled into traffic, I pulled right behind him, staying on his tail
the entire way.
When he pulled up to the house, I pulled up behind him, got off the
bike, and held out my hand for his keys.
 “You won’t be needing those,” I informed him. Anger at Linc’s mother
made my voice come out sharper than I intended. “I’ll be taking you to
school, and one of the boys from the club will be picking you up until I can
figure out what in the fuck to do about her.”
Linc was angry. Really angry.
“She’s pregnant, Dad. What do you want me to do? I can’t fucking deal
with that when she holds a goddamn knife to her stomach and threatens to
kill a baby!”
I looked at my son, really looked at him, and finally saw what he was
trying to hide.
“You think she’s going to do it.”
His head fell forward.
“I would’ve gone with her to stop her from doing that.”
“She did that to me, too, when she was pregnant with you. Used me up
and nearly hung me out to dry. I was only a good lawyer’s final trick away
from prison, and the only thing that saved me was the fact that she wanted
to save her ass more than she wanted to punish mine,” I informed him.
“Called her bluff finally. I’ll never forgive myself for that, but I wasn’t sure
what else to do anymore. Nobody would fucking help me. I was a dumbass
kid who wasn’t well liked. Nobody at my side to do anything about it but
me.”
Linc looked up at me.
“But you don’t have that problem,” I said fiercely. “You’ll always have
me.”
Linc nodded, and then, without another word, he turned around and
walked away.
He didn’t even greet Ellen when he passed her as he made his way
inside.
“What happened?”
 The concern in Ellen’s voice had my anger dissipating. Not all the way,
but enough that I could think clearly once again.
“Margot decided to try to force Linc to go with her after school. When
he wouldn’t, she held a knife to her stomach and threatened to kill the baby
she’s carrying. He went to get in the car, and two of his coaches saw him.
They stopped him, then called me,” I growled. “I got there, they explained
the situation. I don’t know what the fuck to do anymore.”
“You may not, but I do.”
I flinched, not expecting to hear Ghost’s voice coming from inside my
house.
“What do you have?”
He handed me a paper.
“A court ordered psych evaluation,” Ghost said. “That’s probably why
she got desperate enough to try to get your kid in her car after the warning
you scared her with.”
I bit my lip, and Ellen’s head turned toward me slowly.
“Warning?” she asked carefully.
“Warning,” I confirmed.
She sighed and looked back toward Ghost.
“I don’t even want to know.”
Ghost’s lips twitched.
“That’s good, darlin’,” he said. “Because I’m sure he wouldn’t tell you.”
I barely contained the urge to pinch the bridge of my nose.
“There are some things, Ghost, that you shouldn’t tell a woman.” I
laughed under my breath. “How about we go inside and have a beer. You
can tell me what in the hell you did, and I can offer my thanks.”
Forty-five minutes later, I was finished reading the paperwork that
Ghost had handed me, and I stared at him.
 “These practically say that she’s going into this with eyes wide open.
She’s openly admitting to trying to kill herself, multiple times, and she’s
also admitted to taking drugs to try to quiet the voices that she hears in her
head,” I said, dumbfounded.
Ghost nodded.
“And she’s going to turn them in. I made sure of it.”
“How?” Ellen asked.
“By giving her no other choice,” he said. “I’m fucking tired of it. We all
got problems of our own, and you don’t need her adding to your shit.”
“What did you say to her to get her to agree to this?”
His grin was evil.
“Better you don’t know that.” He stood up. “She’s got until tomorrow to
do it, or I fuck up her life worse than she’s ever done on her own.”
With that he left, not waiting another minute for us to argue.
“I don’t know what to say,” Ellen whispered. “I feel hope, but I also
feel, I don’t know, maybe a weird sort of pity that I can’t quite make go
away.”
I stood up and walked over to the back door, whistling for Achilles so
he could go outside.
He came barreling down the hall, and I assumed that he’d been outside
Linc’s door, which was where he stayed if Linc was in the house.
“Don’t feel pity for her,” I said softly. “This is the best place for her, or
at least, the best place that doesn’t actually involve a grave.”
Her brows rose.
“Not to mention that it’ll give that kid of hers a chance to be born
healthy if she’s actually getting proper care to ensure that.” I paused. “And
my kid’s safe, you’re safe, I’m safe. We’re getting a break from dealing
with her and her shit. I can’t find a single fucking thing wrong with
whatever he had to do to get her into that place.”
 With that I walked outside and didn’t come back in until I was sure that
Ellen had gone to bed.
That night, as I laid beside her, I went through a riot of emotions.
One thing I wasn’t feeling, though, was pity or compassion for the
woman whose sole purpose in life seemed to be to wreak as much havoc on
mine as she could.
It hit me then. What I was feeling so intensely was free. I was free, and
the relief that came with that realization would have brought me to my
knees had I not already been lying down.
For the first time in sixteen years, I was free to live my life without
looking over my shoulder for her to ruin whatever good that I’d managed to
make or find for myself.
And in feeling it for the first time as an adult, I realized that I would be
willing to do just about anything to ensure that I continued to have this
feeling for the rest of my life. Even if I had to go to hell to accomplish it.
 Chapter 21
I’m a lady in the streets, and asleep in the sheets.
-Meme
Jessie
Life went pretty much back to normal once Margot was admitted, with
Ghost’s help, for psychiatric treatment. Of course, the doctors and nurses
didn’t know that she wasn’t there of her own free will, but I didn’t care.
After all that she’d done to us, I was fine with it and thought it was a
perfect time for her to go away and not come back. I just wished that she
didn’t have a kid on the way—my son’s half sibling—that I was constantly
worrying about.
But since there was nothing I could do about that until the baby was
born, I went about living my life.
And I enjoyed the hell out of it. For six days.
Life wasn’t all roses and rainbows, but I was really hoping for a longer
reprieve before the next problem came up.
“You’re what?” I repeated.
“I’m at Linc’s school. I need you to come down here,” Ellen repeated
for a third time.
“Why?” I asked again.
I’d asked ‘why’ and ‘you’re what’ three times now, and her answer had
been the same each time. If it had been something serious, they would have
called me, right?
I pulled the phone away from my face and flipped through the call log,
quickly realizing with horror that they had called me. Five times, in fact.
When they weren’t able to get me, they must’ve called Ellen, who’d
been Linc’s emergency contact.
 A blissful time where nothing had happened. No near kidnappings. No
problems of any fucking kind.
Nada.
Until this.
“Just come,” Ellen growled out of the speaker. “And try to do some
meditation on your way.”
With that cryptic comment, she hung up, and I was left staring at my
phone.
“Feisty,” Big Papa said. “I like it.”
I let my eyes trail over to him.
“Apparently, I need one of those fancy Bluetooth helmets because I
can’t be missing calls like that,” I grumbled.
Big Papa grinned. “I’ll ride with you. I gotta split off when we get to the
road for the school, though.”
My brows rose as I shoved the phone into my pocket.
“The woman again?” I asked.
He shrugged. “She passes the time.”
I snorted.
“Whatever you say, boss,” I laughed.
His grin was hard.
“It is whatever I say,” he snapped.
I held my hands up and was about to say one thing more when a loud
roar passed us.
My eyes automatically went to where the biker had passed us, and my
stomach started to do somersaults.
“Ghost,” I murmured.
Ghost was going so fast that I couldn’t make out his license plate, and
when he passed a cop, the cop did nothing more but let him pass because
there was no way in hell he would catch him.
“Shit,” Big Papa growled. “The thought of going to see the girl was
lovely while it lasted.”
I rolled my eyes at Big Papa’s use of the word ‘lovely.’
“Let me know if you need anything,” I told him as I started up my bike.
In response, he gave me a half-assed salute and started his own bike.
I rode away before he did, headed straight for the school and the
inevitable anger that I knew I’d be feeling shortly.
Ellen wouldn’t tell me to check my anger if I wasn’t going to be feeling
it.
***
I watched the video of my son getting slapped, punched, kicked and
beaten by a fucking girl, and then looked up at the principal.
“Let me get this straight,” I said carefully. “You want to suspend my son
for fighting, which will result in him forfeiting his chance to play in any
spring scrimmages, when he was the one who was assaulted and he didn’t
lift a single finger in his own defense against this girl.”
The principal shifted in his seat.
“We have a zero-tolerance policy…” he started to say.
I held my hand up, stopping him before he could repeat the same thing
he’d said over and over again for the last fifteen minutes.
“Do you know what school district we live in?” I asked him carefully.
The principal look startled.
“No.”
I grinned.
“Collerville, the next town over actually,” I said. “We pay this district
over fifteen grand a year so he can come here,” I told the principal. “The
reason for that is so he can graduate with an associates degree in science.
He wants a leg up when he starts his college career. He doesn’t need to
come here, though, like other kids do.”
I felt Ellen slip her hand into mine.
Linc and I had chosen this school when we’d first moved back here
because of the school’s excellent graduation rates and the college credits
they offered. Not to mention that Linc was very interested in science and
technology, and this place offered advanced classes in both subjects.
“That has very little to do with what is going on here,” he said. “This
fight was instigated in front of the entire football team, cheerleading squad,
as well as some parents. I have no other choice but to…”
I held up my hand again.
“He did nothing wrong. You can see the entire video there.” I pointed to
the cell phone. “Had my son fought back, she would be a fuckin’ pancake
on the ground. But he didn’t. He let that girl hit him. Let her slap, spit, and
punch. He moved away, she followed. He restrained her when she cut his
face.” I stood up, placing both of my hands on the principal’s desk, and
leaned over it. “You called me away from work, a job that doesn’t give me
paid time off to deal with bullshit like this, and then you have the fucking
nerve to tell me you’re going to suspend my kid?”
The principal’s jaw hardened.
“I have no control over…there’s a zero-tolerance policy!”
I finally smiled, letting him see the top row of my teeth. Clearly, it
wasn’t a smile that anyone wanted to see aimed toward them.
“Would you like to explain to your school sponsors next semester why
the state’s fucking star quarterback, my son, is at a different school?” I
asked. “Because if you suspend him for something that was not his fault,
then I’ll move him out of this shithole that I pay way too much for so fast
that you won’t even see me coming.”
“Mr. James…” The principal, the little weasel-eyed fuckwad, started to
stand.
 “No.” I shook my head. “I’m taking my kid home, and tomorrow when
I return him to school, if he’s not welcome to walk through those doors,
then I’ll be getting his transcripts and enrolling him in Collerville before the
sun finishes cresting in the sky. Do you understand that?”
I could tell that the principal didn’t believe me, but with my words said,
I gestured to my son, who still had a bleeding scratch on his face, and
walked out the door.
I was met with the coaches out in the parking lot.
“What’s going on?” they asked.
“What’s going on is that they’re suspending him, and that the principal
doesn’t believe me when I say I’ll enroll him in Collerville tomorrow if he
does,” I snapped.
The coach’s eyes widened.
“I’ll have a talk with him,” Coach King promised.
I nodded my head.
“Make him understand,” I grunted.
Ellen caught up with me as I stalked across the parking lot to the guard
shack that housed the old geezer of a guard who wouldn’t be able to do a
damn thing if any of these kids wanted to leave. “Yo.”
The old man looked up.
“I need the gates opened so my son can leave,” I gestured to where my
kid was getting into his car.
The student parking lot was blocked off so they couldn’t leave during
the school day, but it was likely that it would only hold them in as long as
they wanted to be there. My kid wasn’t leaving the wrong way, though,
which would be to hop the curb and drive through the grass. I didn’t want to
give this fucking school another reason to keep him from attending classes
tomorrow.
“Do you have a pass?”
I just stared. “No.”
 He shrugged, then hit a button on his desk that opened the automatic
gates without another word.
I grunted in thanks and turned around, only to come to a sudden halt
when I saw Ellen standing behind me.
“Are you going to work?” she asked, head tilting.
I nodded.
“You want to grab some lunch first?” she asked.
She sounded so hopeful that it was hard to tell her no, but since I’d
already been off work for half the morning due to a toy drive the club was
holding, I couldn’t be any later than I was.
“I can’t.” I reached forward and caught her hip with my hand, pulling
her in tight. “But tonight, after I have a talk with my son about what went
down today, we can…”
She shook her head.
“Club party, remember?”
I grimaced.
“Yeah, now I do.”
She chuckled and wrapped her arms around my neck, pulling me down
to her lips.
I went willingly, and kissed her just like she wanted, much to the delight
of the school kids around us who’d just run by during some sort of cross
country practice.
“Gotta go, baby,” I said against her lips. “I’ll see you tonight.”
She let me go, reluctantly I saw, and walked away, giving her hips an
extra sway to show me what I was missing.
“You shouldn’t tease, you know,” I called behind her as I backed away
in the direction of my bike that was in the next parking lot over.
She looked at me over her shoulder on her way to the visitor’s parking
lot near the front door of the school.
 “Teasing is what I do best.”
***
The party was in full swing by the time I was finally finished with work.
The toy drive we’d held earlier had been for a family in our community
who’d been displaced due to a fire, and the party was in celebration of
nothing specific.
Every once in a while, the club decided to let their hair down and party,
though this one would be tamer than most due to the children in attendance.
Though, considering it was a Thursday night, not much would be
happening besides light drinking since the majority of the club members
and their wives had to go to work tomorrow.
The moment I stepped through the door, all eyes turned to me.
I paused, waiting for it, and shook my head when it did.
“Look who finally decided to play hooky!” Sean crowed from his spot
on the couch.
His wife, Naomi, was sitting on the arm of the couch. His large arm was
wrapped around her waist, and he was holding her there, not that she would
leave even if he hadn’t had a hold of her.
I gave him a chin lift.
“Not everyone has a cushy job like you that gives them off every other
day,” I shot back.
Sean’s job wasn’t really cushy. He was a paramedic, and he worked
hard while he was at work. He deserved the entire forty-eight hours off after
some of the nights he had.
Sean chuckled and I started to scan the room for Linc and Ellen. I found
them in the corner of the kitchen. They were both talking and laughing over
something. When Ellen pointed, I followed her finger to find the wolf dog
on the floor eating a bone that looked like it was the size of its entire body.
Shaking my head, I walked toward them. Ellen brought that wolf
everywhere. Literally everywhere.
 She treated it like it was a fucking toy poodle despite the fact that we
now knew it was a wolf. A week ago, Ellen had finally broken down and
taken the dog to a vet. Not wanting to miss the news that the dog was, in
fact, a wolf, I had gone with her.
There they’d taken one look at the animal and had said they couldn’t
treat a wild animal. When Ellen had said that she’d gotten the ‘wolf’ from a
‘breeder’, they’d relented. Though, she straight up lied when she said that
the dog was only half wolf.
I’d given her shit about that when we’d left, but apparently, she’d
known it was going to happen.
After I’d pointed out that it was a wolf, she’d done some research and
had found out that in the city of Mooresville, you weren’t allowed to have
wild animals as pets.
Since she wasn’t keen on giving up the wolf, she’d looked up breeders
from out of state and had started blatantly lying to everyone who asked
about him.
“Your old lady has a wolf in my house.”
I looked up at Aaron, trying to ignore the way thinking about Ellen as
an ‘old lady’ made me feel.
“She thought it was just a dog when she first got it,” I told him.
He snorted. “I don’t see how that’s possible. The thing looks like a
fuckin’ wolf.”
I shrugged. “She’s telling everyone that it’s a wolf-dog. So let’s go with
that.”
He gave me a droll look.
“Yeah, let’s,” he said. “’Cause then I don’t have to report a wild fucking
animal in my own home.”
I grinned.
He grinned, too, until Linc started laughing and caught his attention.
“I saw the video today,” he said.
 I winced.
I’d seen it, too.
Twice more because it’d been posted all over social-fucking-media.
“I recommend filing a police report,” Aaron said. “I can help you out
with that in the morning.”
I grunted in reply.
“I was thinking the same thing myself, but was waiting to hear what the
deal was before I strongly suggested it to my kid,” I informed the man at
my side.
“I’m assuming that by strongly suggested, you mean force,” he
chuckled. “But I agree with you. That wasn’t cool, and Linc’s lucky nothing
worse happened. Apparently, this is the new thing going on in the area.
Antagonizing the biggest guys to see who can get them to snap. A lot of
times it doesn’t always end like it did with Linc. I highly suspect that was
what was going on there.”
I grimaced.
“Exactly what we fuckin’ need,” I grumbled to myself. “Fucking
teenagers being stupid.”
I’d been a stupid teenager once, but I’d never been that stupid.
“I’ll ask him what it was about later tonight,” I grumbled. “And try to
enjoy the rest of the party since y’all are already two hours into it.”
Aaron’s grin was unrepentant. “I only got here fifteen minutes ago, and
it’s at my own house.”
That was obvious since he was still in uniform. His dog, Tank, was
soaking up the attention across the room, and creeping closer and closer to
Achilles.
“Your dog is about to meet a wolf,” I pointed out.
Aaron’s eyes followed my gaze, and he grinned. “Tank’s a curious little
shit. Plus, there’s another dog in his territory. He won’t hurt the pup,
though. More like let it know who’s boss in this place.”
 Tank finally made it across the area and stopped with his face only
inches away from the wolf pup’s.
They looked at each other, sized each other up, and then each started to
bark. Though, Achilles’ was more of a howl.
The entire room froze at the noise, and I started to chuckle. Aaron had
obviously found it funny as well.
“He’s never met someone like him before. I’d bet he’s trying to
determine the smell, and why he’s different.” Aaron was grinning wide.
Before the noise could get any louder than it already was, I walked over
to break up the bark/howl fest and scooped up Achilles.
The moment he was in my arms, he calmed, but he bared his teeth at the
much larger Tank.
“He’d eat you for breakfast, wolf,” I told the pup. “Time for you to go
visit the great outdoors.”
Tank growled as I passed, and I snorted at the ornery other dog.
“You’ll have to remember that you can’t waltz into a bigger dog’s
territory, and think you’re allowed to be there.” I told the pup as I made my
way outside. The moment we were in the yard, I let the wolf go, and he
immediately started to investigate.
I heard the door open and close behind me, and knew before she’d even
wrapped her arms around me that it was Ellen who’d followed me out.
 Chapter 22
May your coffee kick in before reality does.
-Coffee Cup
Ellen
The door clicked softly behind me as I followed Jessie out.
“You look tired,” I murmured to Jessie’s back as I wrapped my arms
around him from behind.
He grunted in agreement.
“I feel fuckin’ worn the hell out,” he agreed immediately, wrapping his
large, callused hand around my hands that were locked around his gut.
“Didn’t help that today was humid as fuck, though. Wearing that mask and
all those clothes makes it hard to breathe as it is. Add in ninety percent
humidity like it was today, and I was ready to get the hell gone before I
even got started.”
I ran my nose along the muscles of Jessie’s shoulder blades. They
rippled underneath me as I did it.
He smelled of Jessie—a light scent of salty sweat, the deodorant that he
put on in the mornings after his run, and a spearmint scent that was
probably from the gum that he chewed while he was welding.
He hadn’t had a chance to go home and shower, and he was still in his
work clothes.
He wasn’t too dirty, though, meaning he actually got to do his job today
—which was boss people around instead of covering for someone that
didn’t show. That in and of itself was a miracle, because it wasn’t often that
everybody showed up.
“My boy have anything else to say to you today?” he questioned me.
I shook my head and let him go, ducking underneath his arm to stop at
his side and study Achilles as he made circles around Aaron and Imogen’s
small but well maintained yard.
 “No, not really,” I shrugged. “I got home from work and he was shut up
in his room. He didn’t come out until it was time for us to leave. Though,
we did have a fairly good talk on the way here.”
“About what?” He looked down at me, giving me his full attention.
His large brown eyes were almost black in the dim light of the setting
sun, and I couldn’t resist leaning up onto my tippy toes to place my mouth
against his softly.
“Not about what happened earlier in the day, but about other things.
About how he’s not the only one being played like a violin when it comes
to his mother and her situation,” I finally said, dropping back down to my
heels and willing my belly to stop turning somersaults at Jessie’s nearness.
“I explained to him that when he gives in to her by doing what she wants,
he is also putting you in the position to do what she wants because you’d do
whatever you had to do to make sure he wasn’t hurt. I also told him that she
knows all of this, and she’s counting on being able to use him to get to
you.”
He snorted in agreement. “You got that right.”
Achilles finally went to the bathroom, then walked over to the steps that
led up to the patio area where Jessie and I were standing and collapsed in an
exhausted heap at our feet.
“He also told me that he wants to go to school close to home,” I said.
“LSU, as a matter of fact.”
He tensed.
“That was where I wanted to go, too,” he said quietly. “That was the one
place that I always had my sights set on.”
I smiled gently, giving him a light squeeze where my arm was wrapped
around his back. “I know. You used to talk about that place like you wanted
to live there. Though, from what I understand, you hadn’t been there but
once when you were fourteen.”
He nodded. “I was fourteen. One and only time I’ve ever visited there.”
 My smile was sad, because I knew that Jessie was every bit as good of a
player as his son. Jessie could have been a star player at Louisiana State
University.
“I wish you could have had the same chances that Linc has,” I said.
“But, for that to have happened, he wouldn’t be here so I won’t complain.
You’ve raised a really great kid, Jessie.”
I found my lips turning up into a grin.
“Kid’s given me more gray hairs in his short life than I ever imagined
I’d have,” he commented. “But I wouldn’t trade him for a freakin’ thing.”
“I’m proud of how well you’ve raised him, and you should be, too,” I
continued. “He’s polite, respectful and honest. He’s everything that you
used to be at his age.”
His lips twitched. “I was a bad kid. Linc, on the other hand, is
everything I never got the chance to be.”
***
Jessie
She snorted delicately and turned so her front was pressed against mine.
“You were a good kid dealing with a shit situation. You did the best you
could with what you were given, and you managed to come out of it on the
other side whole. You have a wonderful son who you’ve molded into the
fine man he is becoming, and you did it all on your own.”
The last part was said into my chest, and I had to work to keep from
growling in appreciation at her words.
“It means a lot to hear you say that, baby,” I rumbled quietly.
“Sometimes I think I’ve fucked more things up when raising him than I’ve
done right, but I agree, he’s a good kid. I don’t know what I’d do without
him.”
She tightened her arms around me, and I lifted both of mine to wrap
around her back, holding her to me tightly.
“My parents said I would fail,” I told her. “Said I’d kill him in the first
two years. I actually saw them a few months ago.”
 She stiffened slightly in my arms and looked up at me worriedly.
“You’re shitting me.”
I shook my head. “Nope. Saw them at the airport, of all places, right
after I moved back down here. They were heading home from a funeral, and
I was picking Linc up after he came home from a football camp in
Tennessee.”
She tilted her head back and looked up at me. Those hazel eyes of hers
were a deep dark green today. “Well?”
I snorted.
“Didn’t even stop to talk to them. Walked right past them while my
mother stared at me in shock.”
She touched the silvering hair right at my temple.
“Other than a few lighter hairs,” she teased. “And a few more muscles,”
she let her hands trail down my shoulders to my forearms. “You haven’t
changed at all in fourteen years.”
I snorted and yanked her even closer.
“You’ve changed,” I told her. “Your thighs are a little thicker,” she
gasped in outrage, “and that ass of yours is even juicier than it used to be.
When you wear those yoga pants, it makes me want to rip them off and
shove my way inside of you.”
She shivered.
“That wouldn’t bother me, to be honest,” she teased, trailing her finger
down the center of my chest. “In fact, I’m ready and willing whenever you
want me.”
“So like right now?” I asked. “If I asked you if you’d bend over and put
your hands against the brick wall, you’d do it?”
She licked her lips.
“In a heartbeat.”
“And if I unbuttoned those jeans and pushed them down to your ankles,
and slipped a finger inside of you, you’d let me?”
 She buried her face into my neck.
“I’d let you do whatever you wanted to do. If you asked me to jump, I’d
ask how high.”
The grin on my face was more of a leer rather than a smile.
When I fisted her hair with one hand, and let my other trail down the
length of her backside, coming to a stop with my fingers just barely
brushing the seam of her pants just over the heat of her, she started to shake.
“You are mine to do with as I please?” I rasped.
A loud burst of laughter came from the house, and we both froze.
“As long as you keep it to the shadows,” she whispered. “I like your
club, but my brother’s one of them, and I’d hate for him to get an eyeful of
you shoving that cock into me.”
I growled and moved, pulling her with me further and deeper into the
shadows.
“One of these days, we’re going to have spontaneous sex in our bed,” I
told her. “But that day’s not today.”
She laughed quietly, gasping lightly when her back met the brick of the
house.
I pulled away only long enough to twist her around, and she pressed her
face lightly against the brick of Aaron’s house.
“Do it,” she ordered.
I did it, letting my hands trail down over her breasts and waist on my
way down to her jeans.
Jeans that weren’t actually jeans.
“They’re leggings,” I growled.
“Yeah.” I could hear the laughter in her voice. “They’re jeggings.
Leggings that are made to look like jeans.”
I peeled the leggings down her thighs, stopping only once to run my
hand lightly over her rounded ass before I shoved them down to her ankles.
 “Beautiful,” I trailed one finger down the crack of her ass, feeling the
silky fabric of her thong.
“Hurry,” she ordered.
I smacked her ass.
“Don’t rush me,” I ordered, following up with another smack to the
other cheek—just so they’d match.
She breathed out shakily.
I took that as consent and hooked my large fingers into the tiny
waistband of her panties, and slowly pulled them down her thighs.
As I moved, I bent down and trailed my tongue down one cheek of her
ass, causing her to hiss in a breath.
“Gonna fuck you,” I told her. “And you’re going to be quiet or I’ll
stop.”
I sank my teeth into the flesh of her ass, causing her to moan.
“Gonna sink my cock so far inside of you that you’ll feel it in your
throat,” I informed her. “You’ll be feeling me for the rest of the night.
You’ll have to sit there and speak with your friends—your brother—with
the feeling of me still inside of you. And when we get home, I’ll use that
wetness to fuck you again.”
A low keen started in her throat.
I stood up and unbuttoned my jeans, the roughened skin of my knuckles
brushing painfully against my hardened cock.
The clink of my belt buckle seemed loud in the night, and I could feel
tiny goosebumps breaking out over Ellen’s hip where one of my hands
rested.
“So do you want it hard and fast?” I pushed my underwear down so that
my cock popped free of its confines. “Or do you want it slow and deep?”
I pushed my erection into the soft padding of her ass, biting my lip to
hold back the groan of need tearing through me.
 “You want to know why I like your ass like this?” I asked.
She shook her head, but didn’t say a word.
“When you were seventeen, you were smoking hot.” I trailed my lips
down the side of her face, my beard causing her to breathe out shakily when
it met her skin. “But I was always afraid to take you too hard. I was scared
to give you all of me because I didn’t want you to break.”
Her shaky words were nothing less than what I expected.
“I won’t break. Then or now.”
I fisted my cock and started to draw a line up and down her ass, painting
her flesh with the pre-come that was leaking out of the tip.
Then I lined my cock up with her entrance, and slowly started to push
inside.
The position she was in had me entering her differently than I usually
did, and my already widespread legs were pushed even further out to
accommodate our height differences.
But the moment her wet heat touched the tip of my cock, swallowing it
little by little, I no longer cared.
All I wanted was to be enveloped in her heat. To get lost in her and
never find my way back out.
“I know you’re on birth control,” I told her. “But when I’m inside of
you, bare like this, I want my seed to take root.”
She pushed back against me, causing me to slip further inside of her.
“You like that idea too?” I guessed.
She made an ‘uh-huh’ sound in her throat.
“When you marry me next year,” I said, and she froze. “Yeah, we’re
getting married.” I pushed until I was fully inside of her, the curly matte of
my pubic hairs pressing against the soft skin of her ass. My balls nestled
between the globes of her ass. “I don’t have a ring. Yet. But I will. And
when all of this bullshit is finished in my life, we’re going to make this
right. You’ll be mine the way you were always supposed to be.”
 I pulled out, and then shoved roughly back inside.
“You also never answered me about wanting it rough, or slow,” I
pointed out.
“Rough.”
One word, filled with so much emotion, was enough to send my good
intentions straight out the window.
Some switch seemed to flip in me, and I began to buck feverishly into
her, taking her so roughly that her arms collapsed under the strain.
I saved her from face planting into the brick, but only long enough that
she could plant her elbows and brace herself.
I hooked an arm around her waist to help, and then fisted my hand in
her messy bun again, pulling her hair back so I could suck lightly on her
neck.
“I want to fuck you like this every day for the rest of my life,” I
growled, nibbling lightly. “Want to be buried inside of you when you wake
up in the morning. See your eyes alight with pleasure as I take you so hard
that you can’t draw in a steady breath.”
I bucked my hips, pulling my cock in and out of her tight heat so fast
and hard that she could only hold on.
The tight walls of her pussy clung to me like a second skin, protesting
when I withdrew, and welcoming me when I pushed back inside.
“And when you’re pregnant with my baby, I’ll bend you over the bed
and fuck you just.” Thrust. “Like.” Thrust. “This.”
She came.
She came so hard that it was nearly painful on my end.
Nearly.
The only thing keeping me from coming within seconds of her was
wanting to feel her orgasm rush over her. I loved the way her muscles
clamped down tight. The way her skin broke out in goosebumps, and the
way her breathing would hitch and momentarily stall in her chest.
 Then there was her heart, which always started to race.
The way her head would fall backwards, exposing the cords of her neck.
And when that long, low moan left her lips, I finally let go.
Poured myself deep inside of her, where one day my seed would take.
“Oh, God,” I groaned as my ab muscles clenched. “You’re so fucking
beautiful.”
The growl that left my lips moments later was enough to cause the wolf
—which had been lying quietly in the middle of the yard—to perk up.
Then he started to howl.
“Son of a bitch.”
I pulled out of her, causing her to curse and bend for her pants.
The moment we got everything back into place, the back door opened
and Tank rushed out, followed by Aaron, Tommy and Big Papa.
I emerged unrepentantly from the shadows and stopped beside Achilles.
Tank was staring at the still howling pup like he was a nuisance that he
wanted out of his yard, causing me to grin and bend to pick the beast up.
Achilles nestled his head into the crook of my throat and went limp—much
like a cat—and the boys that had followed Tank out started to chuckle.
“Looks like you’ll have a lovely wolf for a lapdog once he’s grown,”
Big Papa said. “Good luck keeping him off of you.”
I snorted and turned to find Ellen—cheeks pink—standing on the edge
of the shadows, a clearly uncomfortable expression on her face.
I grinned, and the grin spread so wide that the men turned around and
looked at her, causing her further embarrassment.
“You suck,” she growled under her breath, then turned on her heel and
stomped inside.
The men turned and looked at me, Tommy’s eyes narrowed quite a bit
more than the rest of them.
 “Could we make a promise now that neither one of us does that when
the sibling is around, please?” Tommy asked. “I’d hate to walk in on that.”
I grinned. “I don’t know,” I told him bluntly. “I’m not sure if I’d be able
to keep that promise.”
Tommy made a gagging sound. “I gotta go back inside. I can’t sit here
and look at you right now, knowing what you just did to my baby sister. It
makes me want to beat you.”
I started laughing, and Tommy flipped me off.
“You’ll push him too hard one day, son,” Big Papa pointed out. “Then
I’ll have to save your pretty face.”
I snorted. “I don’t have a pretty face.”
Big Papa snorted.
“My kid’s birthday is tomorrow. Are we still allowed to have a party for
him at the clubhouse?”
The change of subject didn’t go unnoticed by the rest of the men, and
Big Papa rolled with it.
“Anything you want, man,” he said. “Were you able to get him that
computer?”
I shook my head. “No. I was about two grand short.”
“What computer?”
I looked up to find Ellen standing in the opened door leading inside, a
phone in her hand.
“Linc wants a computer that I can’t afford to get him for his birthday,” I
told her. “Who’s on the phone?”
She held it out to me. “A lawyer I assume you contacted. He says he’s
willing to take your case pro-bono. He said he’ll see you tomorrow
afternoon around five o’clock if that’s convenient for you.”
My heart warmed and excitement poured through my veins.
 I may not be hurting as bad as I used to, but I still wasn’t a millionaire. I
was paying off my debts, slowly but surely. I’d contacted the lawyer once
Margot was admitted to the drug rehab/psychiatric facility to find out what
my options were. I’d bluntly told him that I couldn’t afford much on my
end and that I couldn’t afford to fight Margot in a court battle.
Apparently, he’d taken pity on me.
“Thanks, baby.” I held out my hand for the phone. “Why’d he call
you?”
I’d put her down as an alternate phone number when I’d called, and I
was glad that I did.
“He says your phone’s going straight to voicemail,” she handed the
phone to me. “Tell him you’ll meet.”
The eagerness for me to meet the lawyer wasn’t lost on me. She’d been
pressuring me to do it for over a week now, and I was more than willing to
give her that boon.
“Thanks, baby.” I took the phone and held it to my ear as I walked
further into the yard, Achilles still planted in my arm like an infant.
“Hello?”
“Mr. James?” a woman’s voice questioned.
“That’s me,” I said.
“I’m calling to let you know that we’ve got you a meeting set up with
Mr. Cantos tomorrow afternoon at five. Please don’t be late, though,
because by that point he’s already had a long day at the office. He asks that
you bring copies of your last six bank statements along with any other
official documents you have pertaining to your son’s custody. He also wants
any information you have on Ms. Tulane’s whereabouts over the last few
years as well as her financial status and any other information that you think
would be helpful to Mr. Cantos.”
I barely contained the snort. ‘Ms. Tulane’ aka Margot the bitch who
didn’t care about anyone but herself, didn’t have financial status. She had
no money whatsoever, and hit up anyone she could – in addition to me and
her kid – for the money she needed. If she couldn’t get it the easy way,
she’d get a job, but she only held it long enough to get her what she needed.
In fact, I wasn’t a hundred percent sure where the hell she even got the
money to support herself from.
And if I was being honest, I didn’t much care as long as it wasn’t from
my pocket.
“10-4,” I replied. “And I won’t be late. My boss knows I need this.”
And he did. I’d been level with my boss. I’d told him all about my
troubles with Margot. Told him all about Margot’s past antics and that with
the way that things were escalating, I knew she wouldn’t hesitate to bring
her shit to my door—work or home.
If she had a purpose in mind, she would go out of her way to make sure
she was benefitted, even if she had to fuck me—or Linc—over to do it. It
didn’t matter that it was my job that paid the bills, and provided her with
that money. Hell no, she didn’t give a shit. I was just a means to an end for
her, and unfortunately, so was our son.
“All right. See you tomorrow, Mr. James.”
Then she hung up, and I was left shaking my head at her abruptness.
Grinning, I turned around and zeroed in on the group that was on the
back patio, this time Ghost, Big Papa, Aaron, Tommy, Ellen and Imogen
were standing on the porch. They were discussing something, and it was
only when I got up to them that I heard what it was.
“No, you will not buy my son that computer,” I disagreed the minute I
understood. “Because that’s not how this shit works.”
Big Papa snorted.
“Son…” Big Papa started.
I shook my head. “Negative. No arguments here. This is mine to buy
him. I appreciate your willingness to do it, but I will get it done. It may take
me half a year, but I’ll do it.”
And that was final.
 Chapter 23
When fighting with me, remember that I have beautiful tits,
and I’m not afraid to use them.
-Text from Ellen to Jessie
Ellen
I bit my lip as I watched the guy at Best Buy ring up the exact computer
that Linc had been told he would need to continue his design projects.
He wouldn’t actually be gaming on the gaming computer that I’d just
bought but designing games. He’d learned the basics at school, and he
picked it right up, teaching himself through YouTube videos.
I winced at the total.
“That’s going to be four thousand, two hundred, and sixty-four dollars,”
the man checking me out said. “Would you like to buy Microsoft Word for
this, too?”
I quickly shook my head. “No.”
Another hundred bucks would push me over the limit on my credit card,
and I wasn’t going to do that. Plus, if he wanted to, he could just use a free
service for that if he needed it.
“Here,” I handed him my card.
The man ran it, and I breathed out a sigh of relief when it went through
without any problems.
“Alrighty, then,” he said. “Do you need help taking this out to the car?”
I looked at the box that was sitting on the floor, then looked up at the
man.
“Yes.”
The box was as big if not bigger than I was, and I damn well knew I
couldn’t lift the thing into my trunk.
 “Okay, if you’ll let me help this customer, I’ll get right on th…”
“I’m with her.”
I looked up to find Ghost standing there watching me with a huge grin
on his face a mile wide.
“I don’t think I’ll need that help anymore,” I told him. “I’m pretty sure
Ghost can handle it.”
The guy that rang me up stared at Ghost for a few short seconds, and
then nodded. “Yeah, I’m sure he can handle it, too.”
And that was when I saw the appreciation in the man’s eyes. He was
staring at Ghost like a slab of beef.
I kept my chortle inside as Ghost picked up the computer effortlessly,
then started walking out without another word.
I followed him out, my mile long receipt that included the warranty that
I’d gotten for an extra two hundred dollars on it flapping in the wind.
“I was on my way to get this, gathered some cash from the boys,” Ghost
said. “Though, I was going to put it on my credit card, too. But I see that
you beat me to it.”
I nodded, surprised to hear that many words come out of Ghost’s mouth.
“I wanted to get it for him,” I replied as I hurried to get in front of him.
“Seemed like if I was there for all of the rest of Linc’s birthdays, it
would’ve added up to this.”
Ghost grunted.
“It’s going to piss Jessie off.”
I didn’t argue with that. It would piss Jessie off. Greatly so.
I opened the door to my car and stepped away, allowing Ghost the room
to maneuver the big box into my car. When he had it in place he said, “I’ll
follow you to Jessie’s, and we will get this set up.”
I grinned in excitement.
 I’d wanted to do that, too, but I didn’t have much knowledge about
computers. I’d also told the Geek Squad guy that I didn’t need any help
with the programs due to the fact that I wanted to have it in place before
Linc arrived from school.
“That would be awesome,” I said, jumping up and down in excitement.
“I’ll see you in a bit.”
I arrived at the house ten minutes later, and Ghost pulled in beside me,
staring at the house with a longing look on his face.
“What is it?” I asked as I stepped out of the car.
“Nostalgia,” he muttered, almost to himself. “Got the keys?”
I held up my key ring and he nodded.
“Go unlock the door and we’ll get started.”
I did as directed, and walked to the middle of the living room and
stared.
“I don’t know where to put it,” I said. “I didn’t think much about
furniture when I was buying it.”
Ghost grinned.
“It’s a good thing the boys bought a desk. They’ll be here in a little bit
to get it set up. In the meantime, I’ll use the tabletop to do what I need to
do.”
And that was how I had nearly the entire club, sans Aaron who was
working, at Jessie’s house, getting his son’s big birthday gift ready to go.
We’d just gotten the computer settled on the desk in Linc’s room when I
heard the front door open and close, signaling either Linc’s or Jessie’s
arrival.
Since both were supposed to be home around the same time, I had no
clue who to expect as I turned to face the door.
Seeing them both walk in was a surprise—but still a good one.
“Oh shit, Dad. You got it!” Linc crowded. “Thank you!”
 Jessie took one look at what we’d done, then turned and stalked in the
opposite direction.
The back door slammed, and I looked at Ghost in concern.
“Go. It’ll be okay.”
I did, but I didn’t have the same confidence that Ghost did, apparently.
I was biting my lip when I pushed through the back door and looked at
him.
The moment he saw me, he opened his mouth to say something, and
then closed it again.
I could tell that Jessie was mad. So mad, in fact, that he couldn’t even
find the words to speak what he was feeling.
“Jessie,” I said. “It’s not that big of a deal.”
Jessie’s eyes narrowed, and I wondered if that pulsing vein in his
forehead bothered him when he got like this.
“Not a big deal…” he murmured carefully, his voice so tight and
controlled that I wondered if he would lose it.
The door behind me opened and closed, and Linc appeared at my side.
“You helped dad get it?”
I ignored the words and focused on Jessie.
“Exactly, not a big deal,” I repeated.
“Dad…” Linc tried to interrupt. “Dad…”
Jessie held his hand up, silencing Linc so effectively that I would’ve
applauded him had this not been such a volatile situation.
“Go back in, son. I need to talk to Ellen.”
Linc didn’t go inside, but he backed away, torn.
He, apparently, could sense the mood, too.
“I’ve done it all by myself for fourteen years now, sweetheart, and I’m
doing just fine. Take it back. I was going to get it for him for Christmas.”
 I refrained from saying that Christmas was just a little less than a year
away.
I crossed my arms over my chest.
“No,” I refused. “I’m not taking it back. You can kiss my ass, and Linc
can be happy with the stupid computer.”
“You will take it back. That’s my kid, and if I say he can’t have the
computer, he can’t have the computer.”
I gritted my teeth as irrational anger started to pour through me.
Suddenly, I was mad. So mad, in fact, that I let him have it with both
barrels.
“It’s my due!” I screeched, likely sounding like a flaming harpy, but I
didn’t care. I was so goddamned mad that I couldn’t help it. “It’s my due!” I
repeated.
Jessie froze, his anger all but freezing in the realization that this was
something that I was just as passionate about as he was.
“Ellen…”
I shook my head.
“No,” I snapped. “You stole fifteen years of presents that I would’ve
given him. Fourteen years, Jessie James. That’s half of my lifetime, and
nearly half of yours!”
His lips thinned.
Linc shuffled warily as he tried to figure out what in the hell to do.
It was good that he was just standing there, because had he given his
father a target, he would’ve likely blown to pieces and thrown the new
computer in the trash.
“Ellen,” Jessie said, startling me with the softness in his tone. “Go take
a seat on the couch.”
Before I could comply, his phone rang, causing him to curse.
 The moment he answered the phone and started to speak shortly to
someone on the other line, Linc turned to me.
“He’s being called out for an emergency,” Linc said. “He’ll be gone half
the night.”
My brows rose. “Does this happen a lot?”
He shrugged. “I guess. They’re putting a new forty-two-inch pipeline in,
and Dad’s the big wig top welder who’s over everyone else. Someone calls
in, he’s the one to take their place if they can’t find anyone willing to take
the shift. He’s paid more, but he also has to deal with more shit than he
thought he would have to. We’re hoping, once this pipeline gets finished,
that it’ll slow down.”
I swallowed, suddenly sorry that this boy, who was only seventeen, had
to deal with his father being gone half the time.
Jessie grunted and dropped his hand from his ear, shoving the phone
into his pocket before transferring a look between me and Linc.
“I gotta go in,” he said without preamble.
Then he was gone, leaving me to watch him leave, wondering whether
this round went to him or me.
Fifteen minutes later, Linc and I continued to stare at each other in
wariness.
“Dad had it rough after he left you.”
The son of the man who I was still in love with and an exact replica of
Jessie at the same age, looked at me with such wariness in his eyes that I
almost reached out and pulled him into my arms.
I had a feeling a badass teenager on the way to adulthood wouldn’t
appreciate that, though.
“Are you okay with this?” I gestured to me and then the house around
me.
Linc’s grin was ferocious. “Happy as fuck, to be honest.”
 I glared at his use of such a naughty word, not that I didn’t use it myself.
But he was now seventeen. Weren’t seventeen year olds supposed to watch
their mouths?
“I don’t need a mom, Ellen,” Linc said into the silence between us. “But
a woman who my dad loves, who makes him happy—and who also cares
about me?” He stopped, staring at me for a few long seconds while I took
my time to catch my breath and control my tears. “Yeah, I’d like one of
those.”
My grin split into a full-out smile. “Thank you, Linc.”
He threw one arm around my shoulders. “How about we order pizza,
then play on my computer!”
I snorted. “How about I order pizza and open a bottle of wine while I
watch HGTV and you play on your computer?”
He winked down at me. “Sounds like a deal.”
***
It was hours later when Jessie finally made it home.
I was in bed, lying on the side that I’d used since the first night I’d slept
in the same bed as Jessie, facing away from the door when he came in.
He was quiet, so quiet that I knew he thought I was sleeping.
He toed off his boots near the door, and then stripped his clothes off at
the end of the bed.
All the while he watched me.
The light streaming in through the slightly open bathroom door gave
just enough illumination so I could see almost everything—including the
look in Jessie’s eyes as he watched me sleeping in his bed.
I also didn’t miss the erection tenting the front of his boxer-briefs as he
let his jeans fall to the floor. Nor the way he trailed his hand down the
length of his tightly honed belly to dip underneath the waistband of said
boxer-briefs.
 He palmed his erection, all the while not taking his eyes off of me once,
and slowly stroked himself.
I resisted the urge to squirm—barely—and watched him.
Wetness pooled between my thighs, and I had to restrain myself from
rubbing my thighs together.
I was bare underneath the covers, and just the top of my breasts peeked
out over the blanket covering me.
He pushed his underwear down, giving me a good view of his firm
erection, and what a fine erection it was. Long, thick, hard and veiny.
Veins that I liked to trace with my tongue…
I shifted unconsciously on the bed and rolled to my back, my bare leg
poking out from beneath the blanket.
The move, although rather innocent, didn’t seem like it as I watched
him watch me.
I could tell that my breasts were exposed, and that if he cared to
investigate any further up my leg, he’d find me naked as the day I was born.
I bit my lip to keep from moaning as he slowly lifted the covers from
my body, allowing him to see exactly what I’d wanted him to see when he
came tonight.
I wanted him to find me—naked and willing—in his bed. I wanted him
to forget all his problems, and use me in the process.
I wanted to be his girl. I wanted to be his old lady. I wanted to be his
wife. His confidant. His person. I wanted him to be the Johnny to my June.
My best friend. I just plain wanted him. The good, the bad and the ugly.
And as soon as he saw that I was completely naked underneath the
comforter covering his bed, he no longer cared that he was waking me. He
took what he needed, and I gave him everything that I had to give in return.
He put his knees on the bed, dropping himself onto his belly as he
settled between my splayed thighs.
Then he took a slow, tentative lick, followed shortly by another.
 And I knew he knew I was awake.
Maybe he had all along.
The look in his eyes told me he wanted this, and badly, so I spread my
legs further and gave it to him.
Allowed him to eat me—lick, suck, and nip—to his heart’s content.
Not that it was a sacrifice or anything. Jessie Ryan James was a fucking
God when it came to the art of cunnilingus.
He was skilled and generous, and those two qualities gave a woman the
perfect man who would see to her needs first before he saw to his own.
And that was exactly what Jessie gave me.
Twice.
And by the time I was gasping in pleasure, he was ready for one thing.
My pussy.
He rolled me over to my stomach and then snatched a pillow from the
top of the bed.
He shoved it unceremoniously underneath my hips, and then knee-
walked up the bed between my thighs.
When I felt the hard knob of his cock press against the puffy, engorged
entrance to my body, I was already on the verge of keening.
“You’re killing me,” I gasped as he held himself still after he’d breached
my entrance with the head of his cock.
He moved his body over me, hovering on his knees, his fisted hands
resting on either side of my head, and growled.
I tried not to squirm and push for more of him when he clearly had a
plan in mind. A plan that appeared to include squirming and pleading.
Instead he surprised me by saying the three words that I’d been longing
to hear.
“I love you.”
 A smile overtook my face, and I lifted my arm, reaching back to rest my
hand on his bearded face.
“I love you more.”
He thrust fully inside of me, and I closed my eyes. Not intentionally,
mind you. It was a reaction, and something that happened every time this
man filled me.
“You pissed me off today,” he said, dropping down so that his mouth
was only inches from my ear.
I placed my hands over his, threading our fingers together holding him
to me. “I know.”
“But you were right,” he growled, bucking his hips into me.
“Yeah?” I panted, too turned on to gloat.
“Yeah,” he rasped, letting his beard trail down the line of my neck. “But
I think we both know that. Don’t we?”
I nodded.
He was right that I was right. I knew it. He knew it. The members of his
MC knew it.
It was just a hard pill to swallow when you couldn’t provide something
for your kid that they so desperately wanted. But we were a team now, or at
least I hoped we were.
But with each thrust of my man’s hips, those thoughts drifted away
leaving me to focus only on the feel of Jessie inside of me. By the time I
was climaxing half a dozen strokes later, I was ready to do just about
anything—say just about anything—to get the man to finish me.
And finish me he did. Thoroughly so.
 Chapter 24
Remember when I first started driving and everything was
scary to me? Now I can drive with my knee going 80 miles an
hour eating a taco.
-Things a father never wants to hear
Jessie
I was running late, and I was riding over the speed limit by about thirty
miles an hour.
But remembering Mr. Cantos’ secretary’s instructions not to be late, I
didn’t care if I was riding like an idiot at this point. Mr. Cantos was doing
me a favor, and I’d be damned if I showed up late when he was taking time
out of his busy schedule to see me.
I made it with five minutes to spare and hurried into the offices of
Carson and Cantos Legal Services like the hounds of hell were on my ass.
I was unsurprised to find Ellen already there. She’d asked me last night,
after I’d gotten home from work if I wanted her to be, and I’d immediately
agreed. I needed her. I wanted her there, and there was no reason she
shouldn’t be, not at this point in our relationship.
Very soon, she would be my wife, and I wanted her to know now what
she meant to me.
Hence the reason for her being here. Though she looked a hell of a lot
more put together than I did.
I still smelled like smoke and sweat from work.
But the moment she saw me, not even my sweaty, dirty clothes deterred
her from rushing into my arms.
“I missed you,” she informed me the moment her body met mine.
I dropped a kiss to her lips, lifted her a few inches off the ground for a
good hug, and reluctantly dropped her back to her feet moments later.
 “Missed you, too,” I said. “Are they ready for us?”
“Yes,” someone interrupted. “Mr. Cantos will see you now.”
The voice was familiar, and I immediately recognized her as the no-
nonsense secretary from the phone.
“Sweet,” I grunted and walked up to her.
She pointed to a conference room on the left just across from her office.
“If you’ll both go take a seat in there, I’ll have Mr. Cantos meet you
there momentarily.”
I nodded and tugged on Ellen’s arm.
“Let’s go.”
She went willingly, and followed close to my side as we each took a
seat at the large eighteen-person table that dominated the room.
“Big table,” Ellen surveyed the space. “They could use some new
curtains and a lighter paint color, though.”
I grinned at the interior designer. “Why don’t you suggest that to him?”
She tossed me a look. “Yeah, and ruin your pro-bono case?” she
snorted. “I think not.”
I winked at her and pulled her closer to me.
“How was work?”
She shrugged.
“Okay.”
I looked at her, studying her face, as I realized that she hated work but
likely didn’t want to talk about it.
I wasn’t one to dance around delicate subjects, though.
“Is there a reason you can’t go back to school?” I asked curiously.
She bit her lip, then shook her head.
 She looked torn, as if she didn’t want to think about it because if she did
then her dream might slip through her fingers if she thought about it too
hard.
“No.” She cleared her throat and looked away. “It’s because I’m scared,
and I don’t want to go back to school for that long.”
I knew that. I’d thought about going back to school multiple times over
the last fourteen years, but not once had I scrounged up enough courage to
do it.
“What about becoming a nurse. I hear that’s only a two-year program.
Four if you want to get your bachelors. From there, you can go back to
school at your leisure and get your nurse practitioner’s license.”
Her brows rose as she listened to me explain what she could do to
satisfy this need inside of her. A need to do a job that she loved. One that
she felt gave something back.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” she admitted. “But it might take
something other than me wanting to go back to school to get me to go.”
“Like a nudge in the right direction?” I asked. “I think you won’t have
any problems once you decide to go. You’ll love it. And if you’re smart and
diligent about it, you’ll get done before you’re pregnant with our first
child.”
She started to laugh.
“What if I wanted your babies inside of me now?”
“Then I’d say that’s fine,” I explained. “We’d just need to find a
bathroom first.”
She struck me on the arm with her open palm.
“We can’t do that here,” she gasped in outrage.
I grinned unrepentantly.
“We could…”
“Hello!” Came a deep elderly voice. “I apologize for not getting here
sooner. I was reading over some letters provided by someone pertaining to
your case.”
I didn’t bother to ask who that was. It was likely Ghost, but the man
wouldn’t know him by that name. Ghost went by something different with
the club than he did in his day-to-day life, though I hadn’t figured out what
it was. The one and only time I’d actually tried to figure it out, I’d been
foiled at every possible turn by Ghost.
“All right, let’s get this started. Who wants to start first about when this
all began?”
***
Ellen
Jessie seemed to hesitate.
“How about you begin the day you met Margot.”
And that was how I’d learned every little detail that had happened over
the last seventeen some odd years of Jessie’s life, and what he had to endure
in dealing with this woman who was clearly off her rocker.
Two hours passed as Jessie explained, Mr. Cantos interrupting him
every few minutes to ask questions pertaining to what Jessie had just said.
It continued on like that until a little past eight, and by that point, I was
sick to my stomach and barely able to keep my tears at bay.
Jessie had endured so much. Gone through so much. Put up with so
much.
This man had literally thrown his life away just so his son could live a
good life. It hadn’t always been glamorous, but Jessie had made it work the
best he knew how.
“Well, Mr. James,” Mr. Cantos said as he sat back in his seat and
looking at us both. “It seems to me like you’ve done everything you could
to make sure she was happy. When that didn’t work, you distanced yourself.
Yet, she continued to pursue when it was evident that she was nothing but a
nuisance who didn’t have your child’s best interest at heart.” He paused and
studied his notes for a long moment. “The things she’s done more recently
are going to help our case the most. With her overdosing in the car on the
way to the movies with your son, as well as the other tid-bits of information
you’ve helped me with, I feel that we have a strong case. There’s not a
judge in the county that will turn down your charges as well as your desire
to have a restraining order.”
I breathed a sigh of relief, and moved my hand to rest over Jessie’s still
clenched one.
He dropped his head and stretched his neck left and right, all the while
he continued to stay silent.
“Jessie…” I looked at him. “Did you hear what Mr. Cantos said?”
He cleared his throat. “Yes, but I just feel like, even getting the
restraining order against her and stopping her visitation won’t be enough.
She’s not going to be happy about that once she gets out.”
I digested that for a moment.
“No,” I said. “But right now, Linc is seventeen. Maybe when she does
finally get out, he’ll be eighteen and an adult, and this will all be a moot
point.”
Mr. Cantos grunted, his bushy eyebrows lowering in concentration.
“That’s true. He’s seventeen now, and from what I’ve been able to find out,
she’s voluntarily admitted herself to this program that she’s currently in.
She won’t be let out for at least three months as they process everything,
and by that point I should have all of this taken care of and ready to go. The
day she walks out, she’ll walk straight back into the courthouse and be
served with the restraining order, as well as the visitation cessation order.
She’ll be allowed a lawyer, but this is open and close, in my opinion. They
won’t give anything to a woman that so recently left a psychiatric hold.”
I tried not to squeal with happiness knowing that that woman wouldn’t
be able to sink her claws into Linc or Jessie any longer.
But before my excitement could be expressed, Jessie’s phone rang.
He pulled it out of his pocket and pressed ignore, but the moment it
settled down, it started ringing again.
He muttered something under his breath.
 “I have to take this,” he apologized as he stood. “Whatever you need
from me, let’s go ahead and get started. In the meantime, if you need any
other answers to any questions, Ellen has full recourse to make any
decisions on my behalf that she needs to.”
Pride at his words swelled in my body. He trusted me with his kid. That
was enough to make my throat tighten.
Mr. Cantos nodded at Jessie, who disappeared not even a moment later
as he answered the phone.
I tried not to listen in, and likely would’ve managed to accomplish that
had Jessie’s voice not rose.
“You make sure she has twenty-four seven guards. She could be doing
this because she wants out of there.”
I stood up and turned to survey Jessie’s angry face where he stood in the
middle of the lobby, and I turned to find Mr. Cantos doing the same.
“I…”
He grinned at me. “It’s okay, ma’am.”
I nodded and hurried in the direction of Jessie, stopping just short of
being on top of him as he listened to whomever was speaking on the other
end of the phone.
“I’ll be there in twenty.” He growled. “Call my son and tell him he’s
grounded at either the house or the clubhouse until further notice.”
Without waiting for an answer, he hung up and turned to me.
“Margot is having her baby and she’s on the maternity ward at Central,”
he grunted. “I don’t want to…”
I held up my hand.
“You don’t want her to be up there without you watching to make sure
she doesn’t do anything stupid.”
He nodded.
“And you want me to go home?” I guessed.
He shook his head.
“No, I want you to come with me.”
My brows rose. “Really?”
He nodded again.
“Well…okay then.”
 Chapter 25
I never said I’d die without coffee. I said other people would.
-Ellen to Jessie
Jessie
I arrived at the hospital over an hour after Margot had and marched up
to the maternity floor in time to overhear two nurses speaking in hushed
whispers at the nurses’ station.
“They’re going to have the NICU team on hand. Not only is the baby
over eight weeks early, but they suspect that the baby will be addicted to
drugs—heroin.”
“Wasn’t she in a psych ward at Clemens?”
Clemens was the private facility that was detaining Margot and was also
a highly-sought after program.
“They believe someone was supplying her with the drugs while she was
there. They tested her blood and found it.”
I walked past the two women toward where I heard the cursing. It
wasn’t hard to find her. She was screaming so loudly and angrily that the
entire maternity ward could probably hear her.
I rounded the corner and strode into the room that she was in just in
time to see her throw a cup of ice chips across the room.
“Don’t touch me!” she screamed.
I barely dodged the ice in time so I wasn’t wearing it.
“Margot,” I said. “Please behave and allow these people to do their
jobs.”
“Get out,” she screeched.
I looked up at the ceiling.
 “The baby is yours, and you’re supposed to protect me. Why won’t you
help me?” Margot hissed.
Was this woman stuck in the past or something? That baby wasn’t mine.
I hadn’t allowed my cock anywhere near that woman in seventeen years.
Since the first and only night I’d been stupid enough to get it anywhere near
her.
I opened my mouth to deny her accusations when she went fuckin’
crazy. Again.
She ripped the IV out of her arm and started to stand up, but again, a
nurse was there to thwart her.
“Get off me!” Margot screeched.
“She needs to be sedated,” another nurse yelled.
“Can’t sedate her,” the doctor who’d been between Margot’s legs when
I came in said. “She’s crowning, and whatever we give her, at this point,
will affect the baby.”
My stomach knotted.
Then I left the room.
They had things in hand. There was no reason I needed to be there at all.
But when I came out of the room, it was to find a wall of Dixie Wardens
standing there waiting for me.
“How’d you find out about her?” I asked Ghost.
He shrugged. “Contact at Crazy Central called me and told me she tried
to kill herself. Took some drugs that weren’t hers, so they were monitoring
her, and then she went into labor.”
I winced.
“That’s Margot,” I grunted. “Destructive. She doesn’t give a shit who
she harms in the process.”
That was always Margot’s motto. Fuck everyone and everything but her.
 She was stupid to get pregnant again. She should’ve had her tubes tied a
long damn time ago.
Margot screamed again, something so vulgar and acidic that I couldn’t
stand it.
“Let’s go to the waiting room,” I mumbled. “I don’t want to hear that
anymore.”
They followed me out, Aaron, Ghost, Fender, Tommy Tom, Truth and
Big Papa.
All of my family was there, and I wasn’t alone.
Then why did I feel so alone?
Even seeing Ellen where she was sitting in the waiting room speaking
with the other old ladies wasn’t enough to bring me out of this funk.
I couldn’t stop thinking about the innocent life that was just entering
this world.
Linc was almost done, but this baby, he or she didn’t even stand a
chance.
***
Ellen
I sat in my little corner of the waiting room and watched down the
length of hallway.
I didn’t know what I was looking for. Why I was still there.
I should go home. Everyone else had.
Jessie had.
I’d even started to leave with him.
I’d gone as far as to get in my car and start to head out behind him, only
to come to a stop in the exit of the hospital parking lot, staring blankly at
the road in front of me.
After a few long moments, I’d backed up and returned to my previous
parking spot.
 I’d then returned to the waiting room, and had been waiting here ever
since.
I heard the chimes over the overhead speaker signaling a baby being
born, and my eyes flicked up just in time to see the double doors at the end
of the hall open.
That was when I saw my friend, Aerie, pushing a clear incubator down
the hall toward the elevator that was directly to the left of where I was
sitting.
Aerie had seen me when I’d arrived, and we’d exchanged greetings only
long enough to know that she was there to watch over the premature baby—
Margot’s premature baby.
I stood up and stared, eyes fixated on the baby I could see inside, and
what I saw made my heart literally drop.
She was shaking. Shaking so hard that her body looked like one giant
pulse of anger.
And oh God, was she tiny.
“Aerie?” I whispered licking my lips. “Is that…”
I left the last words hanging, but she knew what I was asking.
“Yes, this is your husband’s daughter.”
I closed my eyes, not correcting her misconception, and then reopened
them with a new determination.
“My fiancé,” I lied. “He had to go for a breather. But if you don’t mind,
I’d love to come. To make sure she’s not alone.”
Aerie’s smile was soft.
It always had been though.
Aerie had been my first ever customer, when I moved back to
Mooresville, and we’d hit it off almost immediately.
I’d made a good friend in her, and I never once saw her when she
wasn’t smiling.
 Right now, though, I could tell she was just as heartbroken over the poor
child’s condition and suffering as I was.
“Of course,” Aerie said. “But you’ll have to gown up. And we’ll have to
get you a badge.”
I followed along and got on to the elevator that would take us to what I
later learned was the NICU.
The entire floor was dedicated to those that were sickest in the hospital.
Only a small portion of the floor was designated for the NICU, though.
“We had to supplement her oxygen in the delivery room. We were able
to stabilize her on a nasal cannula for now,” Aerie said the moment the
doors swished open. “And her Apgar was really low.”
I knew what that was, and it wasn’t a good thing.
“How are her oxygen sats now?” I asked.
My eyes went to the monitors that were sticking to the small girl’s frail
body, and my heart stuttered.
“Better now that we’re controlling the oxygen flow,” she answered as
she tapped buttons into a wall panel.
I followed her in and she directed me to a sanitation station.
“Go there, wash your hands, and get your gown on,” she ordered. “I’ll
send someone for you.”
I nodded and did as directed, waiting at the glass that overlooked the
large room once I was finished.
Everything I saw inside made my heart race.
There were four babies inside right now, and every one of them was
tiny. All except one, which was the size of a small car.
Not really a car, but he was huge. So huge, in fact, that I wondered why
the hell he was in there.
“The baby was born with a hole in his heart,” a quiet voice said from
beside me.
 I looked up to find a woman dressed in hot pink scrubs staring at me
with curiosity.
“That’s terrible,” I murmured. “Why is he alone?”
A sadness overtook the woman for a few short seconds, and then she
shook herself out of it.
“The mother put him up for adoption. It was planned well before they
knew he was sick, so it’s not because he was sick that they did. Though, the
parents that did adopt him are on their way here all the way from the UK.
They’re supposed to arrive within the next two days.”
A smile flashed across my lips.
“That’s good news. I hate seeing him all alone.”
She nodded, watching me carefully.
“I don’t usually let non-parents in here, but Aerie said your husband is
the baby’s father, correct?”
I felt like shit for lying to her, but nodded anyway.
I couldn’t leave that baby here all by herself. My gut was telling me not
to leave her.
“Yes,” I told the first of many lies to this woman. “He’s the baby’s
father. The mother…she’s not so good.”
The nurse snorted.
“I figured that out the moment Aerie wheeled that baby in here shaking
like a tiny little leaf in the middle of a thunderstorm.”
I turned my attention back to where Aerie had wheeled the bed.
They’d transferred her to an open bed with lights above it. There were
half a dozen machines surrounding the small girl, and there wasn’t a single
piece of the girl’s skin that wasn’t now flushed an angry red.
“I don’t know much about medical issues, but I’d love to sit here, offer
her anything that might help.”
The woman’s smile was warm.
 “My name is Estella.”
She held her hand out to me, and I shook it, feeling slightly guilty that
I’d lied.
“Come on in. I’ll give you the rundown.”
***
I shouldn’t have been surprised that he’d found me.
He was freakin’ Superman when it came to me.
I felt him come up behind me before I saw him. I’d been there for about
an hour, watching and agonizing over the poor child’s screams.
“Why did I know I’d find you here?” he rasped as he looped one strong
arm around my waist and pulled me back against him.
I leaned my head slightly to the side to rest it against his bearded chin.
“You know me well,” I told him.
We sat there and watched the baby for a minute. Her cries never abated.
“If she was in that place for as long as she was, wouldn’t you think that
she’d be better than she is right now?”
“From what I understand, detoxification takes a while. Days three and
four are the worst, and she’s only been in the treatment facility for four days
and some change. The baby didn’t have a chance to get it all out of her
system.”
I bit my lip, wondering what he’d think of what I had to say next.
I’d done a lot of thinking in the last hour, and I was dead set on doing
what I knew I needed to do.
“She’s dealing with something that she didn’t know that she’d have to
deal with,” I told him. “So I’m going to give her the love she deserves.”
“Ellen…” Jessie hesitated.
I held up my hand. “I’m doing this, and you can’t stop me.”
 Before I could even finish telling him how it was, he wrapped me in his
arms so tight that I found it hard to pull in a breath.
“I fucking love you,” he growled. “Sometimes, when I don’t think I can
possibly love you any more than I already do, you go and show me that I
was wrong and I can. But this baby is going to have a lot of problems.”
I knew that. Boy, did I know that.
“She’s so tiny and in so much pain,” I whispered.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “But she’s also so far from okay that it’s not even
funny.”
I didn’t reply for a long moment, but when I did, I knew he was
listening.
“I want her,” I said. “Want to take care of her so bad it hurts. This baby
needs a fighting chance, and we’re going to give it to her.”
“If I do this…” He hesitated. “It would tie me to her for the rest of my
life. For the rest of hers. I’m not going to leave her. She’ll always be mine,
which will also mean that Margot will have another tie when it comes to me
and my life. The restraining order might be in place, but she’s still going to
come around.”
I stared at him, his eyes reflecting what he thought of continuing to deal
with Margot.
“If you don’t do this, then how will we live with ourselves?” I asked.
“She already thinks this is your kid for some reason. You and I both know it
isn’t. Linc knows it isn’t. Your club knows it isn’t,” I swallowed. “That’s all
that matters at this point.”
Before he could reply to that, the nurse, Estella, joined us.
“You’re the daddy?”
I watched him clear his throat, stare at me with fear in his eyes as he
struggled with doing the right thing.
The moment he decided to take that leap, I saw it. I knew that this
would no longer be a debate between us.
 “Yes,” he answered, nodding solidly. Surely. “I’m her father.”
“It’s nice to finally meet you,” Estella grinned. “Now that you’re here,
we have a few questions. We’ve already received the okay to add this lovely
woman to the approved visitor’s list by doctor Tommy. Anyone else that
you would like approved, you can fill out on this little card,” she tapped the
card attached to the bed that the baby was in. “And I’ll check with it. If
they’re not on the approved visitor’s list, I’ll give you a call. Your verbal
approval will be enough until we can add them to the list. Now, am I to
understand that the mother is not approved?”
Jessie grunted. “You got that right.”
Estella frowned. “Okay. I’ll get that added to her chart as well. Another
thing we want to go over with you,” she started to point things out. “This is
the feeding tube. A lot of times when drug addicted babies are first brought
in here, they’re given a feeding tube because they find it hard to eat. We
can’t have that on top of all the other struggles they’re experiencing, so we
inserted the tube after her bath. From now on, she’ll be fed this way until
the doctor believes she’s ready to move on to a bottle. She will also have
oxygen on until she is able to maintain her oxygen saturation. Right now,
she doesn’t need to have a tube down her throat for breathing, but it can still
happen. ” Estelle continued on explaining about the tubes and lines.
And all through this, Jessie still hadn’t looked at the baby.
My stomach knotted at the realization.
“The crying is going to continue, unfortunately, until her system is
cleared of the toxins that the mother introduced to her through the
placenta,” she continued. “So don’t be alarmed. It’s scary, and she’s in pain,
but we’re monitoring her levels, and if anything is needed, we will provide
it for her immediately. We want her to be as comfortable as possible.”
I agreed with that assessment. I’d spent the last hour trying to sing to
her, but it hadn’t helped the slightest bit.
“Feel free to ask us if you have any questions.”
And with that Estella was gone, leaving me with Jessie, who I might
add, was staring blankly at the wheels at the bottom of the baby’s bed.
 “Why won’t you look at her?” I asked him quietly.
The words so low that they were barely audible, even to my own ears.
“Because thinking about everything she’s been through while hearing
her cries makes me want to go down a floor to where Margot is and kill her
with my bare hands. Just wrap my thick fingers around her throat and
squeeze the life out of her.”
My belly flipped at the thought.
“Guess it’s good that she’s under guard then, isn’t it?” I grumbled.
That was when he took a deep breath and finally turned his eyes toward
the tiny little baby.
The little girl who weighed less than a five-pound sack of potatoes.
Not at the monitors. Not at the stickers and signs attached to her
incubator. But at her. At the little girl he’d just agreed to take under his
wing for the rest of her life.
And I saw him deflate.
An expression of utter devastation took over his face the moment he
first looked at her. He took in how tiny she was, and the way her tiny little
body was shaking and gasping as she cried—something that’d been
happening the entire time that I’d been in the NICU with her.
His face turned to stone, but his eyes—those were so deeply disturbed
by what he saw that I wasn’t sure that it was a good thing.
“From what we were able to receive from the mother’s doctors, she was
addicted to heroin, methamphetamines, as well as prescription drugs. Is that
correct?”
Poor Estella had no clue what she was disrupting.
“Right,” Jessie cleared his throat. “How long will she cry like this?”
Jessie’s fists were locked tight at his sides as he stared at the screaming
baby, barely taking in breaths.
 “On average, drug addicted babies, heroin specifically, have about a
two-month hospital stay when they’re born this prematurely,” Estella
explained. “More or less depending on how she does. This one is a fighter,
though.”
“She will be.” Jessie words were a promise.
“You’re welcome to stay for the rest of tonight since she was just born
but they’re pretty strict about the nighttime hours here. Visitation hours are
quite lenient in the daytime, but they close at eight PM sharp. Doors open at
eight AM.”
Jessie nodded.
The baby continued to shake and scream her tiny little lungs out.
And by the time the sun rose, I knew two things for certain.
One, that no-name baby girl just made a connection with a man who
would fight to the death for her. Two, I was so in love with that man that I’d
do the same for him.
 Chapter 26
Morning breath is why doggie style was created.
-Fact of Life
Ellen
“Why do girls pee sitting down?”
The question out of the little boy’s mouth had me turning to stare at
him.
“Uhh,” I hesitated, unsure what to say to the kid that wasn’t mine.
“Daddy says it’s because girls are lazy.”
I continued to blink, unsure what to say to this little boy whose father
was so freakin’ intimidating that I didn’t want to naysay him to his kid.
Jessie caught my hand and pulled me to him, stopping me in front of the
large wooden doors leading into the judge’s chamber who was going to give
us a ruling on Margot’s mental health, as well as issuing the restraining
order. Oh, and let’s not forget the matter of custody of our little fighter.
“Why is it that I can’t leave you alone for two seconds before you have
men hitting on you?” he questioned me.
I looked at him skeptically. “You’re just a barrel full of laughs today,
aren’t you?”
He read my body, the tension that never seemed to go away as I waited
for the other shoe to drop, and cursed low under his breath.
He pulled me to the side of the big wooden doors, and pushed me into
an alcove that was as private as we could get in the middle of a crowded
courthouse.
“Talk to me.”
His eyes were intense as they stared at me, waiting for me to explain my
misgivings, and I just couldn’t hold it in anymore.
 “What if she comes to her senses and tells everyone that Lydia isn’t
your kid? What if she takes her away after we’ve just gotten to know her?”
I started to panic. “I love her, Jessie. I love her. I can’t lose her.”
His grin was wide at hearing my words, and I wanted to smack him for
not taking my worries seriously. That’s all he did was tell me not to worry.
‘It’ll be okay, Elle. Don’t worry, Elle. I have it covered, Elle.’ Well I wanted
freakin’ answers!
“I was going to tell you this later, once we got the judge’s decision—
which I have no doubt will be in our favor—but when we leave here, we’re
getting married.”
My mouth fell open.
“Jessie,” I hesitated.
“Everyone that matters is waiting outside, waiting for us to get finished
here so they can witness it.”
“My parents?” I asked, trying not to be too hopeful.
Though I never saw eye-to-eye with them, they were still my parents.
They’d gotten better with age and had even had various conversations with
Jessie and Linc over the past months that we’d been together.
We weren’t all the way there yet, and they still thought that I was
destined for greatness even though I had everything I wanted to have, but
we’d get there. I had no doubt about it.
“Your parents are here. Your brother and sister. The rest of The Dixie
Wardens MC. They’re all here, just waiting for the verdict.”
I looked away.
“And how do you know that we’ll get what we want?” I asked
carefully. “What makes you think that she won’t come back? Figure out
that we’ve lied about all of this?”
I wasn’t happy about lying. In fact, I felt downright awful about it. But
then I watched Lydia struggle to do something that she should’ve been able
to do at her age, and all my misgivings about the wrong I was doing were
no longer there.
 Margot fucked up.
She ruined something that could’ve been beautiful with her selfish need
to get her next fix. To get whatever she wanted despite what she had to do
to get it, and I wasn’t feeling sorry for her any more. If I had to lie, cheat or
steal to keep Lydia from ever having to see that bitch again, then I’d do it.
“Honey,” Jessie leaned in until I could only see his eyes. “The Dixie
Wardens own this town. Just leave it at that.”
So I did.
All the tension that I felt in my body slipped away, and I was left with a
feeling of calm.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s do this.”
Jessie leaned back, and his smile was beautiful.
“That’s what I want to hear.”
Thirty minutes later, Jessie and I left with four restraining orders. One
for me, one for Linc, one for the baby, and one for Jessie. They would only
last for five years, but it was enough. In five years, I’d renew it, and
continue to do it until either I died or Margot died.
We also left with full custody of Lydia.
My heart was so full.
Now all I needed was Lydia to get out of the hospital.
 Chapter 27
Chocolate doesn’t ask silly questions. Chocolate understands.
-Ellen’s secret thoughts
Ellen
My father hugged me tightly on one side, while my mother smoothed
back my hair.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to have a few minutes for a conversation
with you and Jessie before y’all go through with this,” my mother said
softly.
My insides turned to jelly.
“That’s fine.”
It didn’t matter what they said at this point, even if it was to tell me that
Jessie wasn’t good enough for me.
I knew in my heart that he was, and they weren’t going to change my
decision.
We were five minutes away from our appointment—one I was still
reeling over—to get married, and my parents stopped and bombarded me.
I hadn’t seen them much since I moved back to our hometown. They
were both excited to see me, as I was them.
But I was also wary, especially now that they said they needed to speak
with us.
“Sure,” Jessie said.
I looked over at him to see him smiling softly. Not a trace of annoyance
or anger was in his face at all.
It was as if he didn’t care that the people who broke us up fifteen years
ago were here. He was that secure in our relationship that he believed
nothing could change it.
 And he was right.
“Good,” my father said. “Let’s go over there. I don’t want anyone to
hear me groveling.”
Tommy, who was standing next to us but speaking with his wife,
snorted.
My father shot him a look.
Tommy’s grin went even wider.
“Shut up, boy.”
My father walked away while Tommy’s shoulders shook, and I found
my first real smile since my parents walked up two minutes before.
I loved Tommy. He always took care of me by finding a way to de-
escalate the situation before it got too hot.
Jessie took my hand and we followed my parents into a small room I
hadn’t seen before I was standing in it. A break room of sorts.
Then my mother broke down and started crying.
Shock lit my features.
“Mom…”
“I didn’t mean for you to do this,” she whispered. “I just wanted the best
for you.”
I sighed.
“What your mother is trying to say is that she wanted what was best for
you, and at the time, Jessie had some bad shit swirling around him.” He
held up his hand when I would’ve argued. “I know it wasn’t his fault. We
didn’t realize that until much later, but at the time, we only saw the fact that
he had a baby and his parents were obvious drug dealers. We should’ve
researched it a little harder, but instead, we tried to push him away before
he could hurt you. It was wrong of us. We should’ve dug past the surface,
but we didn’t. Not until it was much too late.”
Jessie’s body was taut.
 “We didn’t know that you were in trouble. We only saw what was on the
surface. What we heard in town, when we should’ve trusted our daughter to
know her head. We should’ve trusted you.”
My father said that directly to Jessie, and I watched as the two had a
silent face off.
“I know how it looked,” Jessie finally said, relaxing slightly. “My
parents were deplorable. I was in a bad place, and to be honest, it might’ve
been the best thing at the time. It forced me to wake up. Forced me to make
decisions in my son’s best interests instead of my own. I might’ve brought
her down with me and that wasn’t what I wanted. It was never what I
wanted for her.”
My dad nodded his head.
“That doesn’t make it all right,” my father said quietly. “And I’ll spend
the rest of my life trying to make it up to you two.”
My mother was crying silent tears, and it took everything I had not to
throw my arms around her and tell her it was okay, because it wasn’t okay.
Not even close. Eventually, I would forgive them, but Jessie and my
relationship was too new to forgive them yet.
But Jessie was a better person than me and offered my father his hand.
“I’d like your permission to marry your daughter.”
Jessie’s words sent a silent sob through my system.
“You have it,” my dad said, then he looked at me. “I’m not sure there’s
much of an aisle, but I’d love to walk you down to where Jessie is waiting
for you.”
My mouth formed a small smile. “I’d love for you to do that, too.”
And that was how I got married in front of my family and new friends,
to my best friend.
***
I darted behind some people when I saw Sean heading my way, and
headed with my head down to Jessie—who stood across the clubhouse
speaking quietly to my father and Tommy.
He was facing away from me, so he obviously didn’t see my discomfort,
otherwise he would’ve saved me.
Or, at least, that was what I told myself.
I looked over my shoulder and realized that no longer was Sean so far
away. He was directly behind me…and I had nowhere to go.
He cornered me, and I started to panic.
“I’m not going to hurt you, honey,” Sean said, reading my dread.
I eyed him warily, turned around and stared at him.
“I know. But the last time you cornered me, you yelled in my face,” I
winced. “I’m still really sorry, Sean. I never meant anything bad to happen
to your family.”
Sean’s face showed pain at my words, but he surprised me when he
apologized. To me.
“I’ve tried to do this a hundred times, but either it’s not the right time, or
you look so scared of me that I don’t want to freak you out. Now that
you’re married, I want you to know a few things.”
I bit my lip and nodded.
“I never should have yelled at you in the hospital,” he said. “I never
should’ve done that, and I regret it every day. I was scared, and you were a
convenient target.”
My shoulders sagged. “I know you didn’t mean it,” I lied.
He snorted. “You were always a shit liar, but thank you for trying to
make me feel better about it.”
I smiled.
“While we’re apologizing, I’m also not mad at you for leaving me. You
did us both a favor, and I should thank you every day for the rest of my life
for putting me on the path to meeting Naomi.”
My cheeks started to heat.
 “I was selfish. I should’ve never dated you. Every man I’ve ever gone
out with was always compared to him,” I said, staring at the him in
question.
My husband.
My husband.
I looked down at the ring on my finger and breathed out. “Sean?”
The big man looked at me, sorrow for what he’d made me go through
written all over his face.
“Yeah?”
“Let’s put this behind us. I just got married. It’s time for a celebration.”
His grin was a combination of relief and happiness that looked good on
him. “I think I can handle that.”
Sean gestured with his hand, and all of a sudden Jessie was back at my
side. Sean slipped away, and I stared at the man who’d left me on my own
to deal with a man he knew I was nervous to be around.
“You’re so going to pay for this later,” I told him.
His grin was nothing short of maniacal.
“I’ll be looking forward to it.”
 Chapter 28
I’m unable to fully relate to someone until I hear them say
‘fuck.’
-Jessie to Ellen
Jessie
“I have everything I ever wanted,” Ellen murmured into my chest.
I grunted.
“Not everything,” I said. “Elle, it’s time to have that talk.”
She sighed.
“I don’t want to have the talk,” she started to pull away.
I held her to me, refusing to let her leave.
“You don’t have to become a doctor,” I said. “But imagine working with
those babies every day.”
I felt her still.
“I saw your eyes light up,” I said. “Every single time you saw a new
baby go home, I saw how happy you were. You get as excited for each of
those babies when they meet a new milestone as you do when your own
child does.” I paused and let my hand drift up her back. “I know that you
want to do this, why don’t you do it?”
“My business…” She started to say.
I snorted.
“Your business can be run without you,” I told her. “It’s been doing that
for quite some time. You haven’t actually gone to a client’s house and
designed anything since we’ve been together, and the stuff you have on sale
at your shop can be sold without you there. Hell, Justine has been doing it
since you found out about Lydia.”
She pursed her lips and looked away. That’s when I knew I had her.
 “Baby,” I said, turning her head to me. “Do it.”
She bit her lip.
“I’m scared.”
I ran my fingertip along the line of her forehead.
“Being scared is something we can work with. I believe in you, baby.
It’s you and me now. I will catch you if you fall.”
“You think I will fall?” she teased.
I shook my head. “No. I think you will fly.”
 Epilogue
I’ve mastered the art of bouncing back.
-Jessie’s secret thoughts
Jessie
Eight years later
“Mom!” My daughter came running into the kitchen, her hand covering
her head. “Does this need stitches?”
Lydia lifted her hand from her head. The moment she did, blood started
to ooze down along her hairline to the curve of her chin and to the newly
tiled floor.
“Uhhh,” Ellen said, turning her head to the side with the tip of one
finger. “It certainly looks like it. Why don’t you go get my med kit from the
bathroom?”
Lydia trotted off only to come to a stop once Linc came barreling
through the door.
“Mom said I need stitches!” Lydia told her older brother.
Linc looked down at Lydia’s still bleeding face.
“You also need to grab a towel so you don’t leak all over the fuckin’
floor,” Linc said laughingly.
“Linc!” Ellen growled, pointing her knife at him. “Watch that dirty
mouth of yours.”
“Sorry, Mom,” Linc growled. “What’s for dinner? I’m starving.”
“You’re a professional football player,” I cut in. “Why are you starving?
You have enough money to buy a fuckin’ grocery store.”
A carrot hit me on the forehead, and I turned my gaze back to my
woman.
“Was that necessary?”
 Ellen’s lips twitched. “Wipe up that blood, and stop cussing. It’s crass,
dammit.”
Linc snorted.
“I am rich,” Linc said, grabbing the paper towels on his own and wiping
the blood up himself. “But I still feel like I shouldn’t spend it. Like, if I do,
I might need it again one day and not have it.”
I laughed.
“Your financial advisor has you fixed up well into your nineties with
only what you made this year,” I told him, then stood up from the kitchen
table to grab the bag that Lydia was hauling by one handle, dragging it
along the floor, and smearing the blood into the grout lines of the kitchen
tile. “Maybe, if you stopped giving it to us, you’d feel like you had more
money.”
Linc grinned.
“You didn’t think I’d be able to do it, did you?” he challenged me.
“I knew you’d be able to do it,” I countered. “But I didn’t think you’d
think I was stupid enough not to give it back to you in some way.”
Linc’s eyes narrowed just as Ellen threw all of her cut up veggies into
the pot that she was about to start cooking the stew in. “You better not have
given it back.”
I grinned. “I didn’t. I started a college fund for your children.”
“I don’t have any children,” Linc countered. “At least none that I know
of.”
Ellen slapped him on the arm with a wet towel.
“Watch it, boy,” she ordered. “I specifically remember giving you the
birds and the bees talk when you were sixteen. I even showed you how to
roll a condom on a cucumber.” She stopped next to Lydia and pressed a four
by four piece of gauze against her cut.
Her concentration was amazing.
 I was so proud of her for finishing nursing school and going on to
become a licensed nurse practitioner.
***
“Why did you use a cucumber and not a banana?” I asked her, leaning
my hips casually against the counter and crossing my arms over my chest.
Ellen’s lips twitched. Her eyes flicked from me to Linc and back again.
“Because a banana wouldn’t be proportional to what he has to work
with,” she explained.
My brows rose. “Why would you know what my sixteen-year-old son
was working with?”
Her lips twitched as she continued to disinfect the cut. “I didn’t know. I
was only assuming the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.” She looked at my
dick. “Or eggplant from the vine.”
I snorted.
“Eeeeewwwwww,” Linc whined like he was ten instead of twenty-five,
slapping his hands against his ears. “That’s so gross.”
“That’s life,” I countered. “What time do you leave to play on Sunday?”
Though Linc now lived over two hours away in Louisiana, he still made
it a point to come over every week, even if it was only for a couple of
hours.
At twenty-one, he’d been drafted by the New Orleans Saints as a first-
round draft pick. He’d, of course, been ecstatic. But no one had been more
ecstatic than me.
And, ever since, he’d been smashing the records of some of the best
quarterbacks in history.
This year was the first year, however, that he was going to the Super
Bowl, and I could tell he was nervous. Just looking at him, I could see the
way he held his body strung so tight.
“Tomorrow,” Linc answered. “What about y’all?”
 “We’re leaving tomorrow, too,” Ellen answered as she got her suture kit
ready. “Though, we’re driving. We’re going to spend some time in
‘Nawlins.”
I snorted.
Ever since Ellen had learned that Linc was going to be a player at LSU,
she’d done her best to learn the culture of New Orleans. Then, when she’d
found out that he’d been drafted by the Saints, she’d been in hog heaven.
She loved the area, and I knew that, if there ever came a time when we were
looking for a new place to live, New Orleans or something in the
surrounding area would be where we went.
And not even because Linc now lived there, but because she loved the
culture so much.
It’d been where we got married—for a second time. It’d been a private
ceremony, just her, me, Linc and Lydia. It was where she’d told me that she
was pregnant, and also where her water had broken with Laura, our third
child.
“Is the rest of the club going?”
“You think they’d miss one of their favorite members play in a fucking
Super Bowl?” I asked. “Of course they’re fucking going.”
I was hit in the head with a roll of medical tape.
“Hey!”
Linc grinned.
“I hate that I can’t fuckin’ ride my bike anymore without people trying
to run me off the road for a goddamn autograph,” he grunted. “My publicist
tried to tell me I couldn’t wear my cut, either.”
I started to laugh.
“Let me guess, you told him to shove that opinion up his ass?”
Linc was dedicated, that was for sure. He’d known at eighteen that he
wanted to be a member of The Dixie Wardens MC, just like his old man,
and he’d accomplished it at the age of twenty-one.
 He would have accomplished it sooner if those first three years playing
ball in college hadn’t kept him away from home more than he’d intended.
Although, it put him in a good place to be spotted by NFL scouts, so we
really couldn’t complain.
“Mommy!”
My head snapped over in time to see my three-year-old daughter
leading two police officers in the room—Aaron and Big Papa.
“Yo,” I said. “What’s up?”
Laura threw herself into my lap, and I caught her before she could hit
her face on the table.
“You mind if we talk outside for a minute?” Aaron asked.
“Puppy!”
I looked over to see Achilles start growling ferociously at Tank.
The two dogs had never figured out how to get along, though they never
went further than a few growls.
I was pretty damn sure that Achilles could take Tank if he really wanted
to but that was because Tank was getting on in years.
“Yeah, that’s fine,” I said, standing up.
I placed Laura in my chair and handed her my phone.
She opened it like a fuckin’ pro and went to work doing what she
always did on my phone—which was go to some animal sounds game and
start making as much racket as a three-year-old could make.
“Be back in a minute, baby,” I said to Ellen as I passed.
Her eyes caught mine, and I could clearly read the fact that she expected
to be apprised of whatever situation brought the two men over here without
a warning.
I had a feeling I knew though.
 Eight years ago, I’d gotten a restraining order against Margot and full
custody of our daughter, Lydia.
Margot had been sent back to the psychiatric facility and had later been
sent to prison after she’d tried to murder her doctor…twice.
The last seven years she’d been in a minimum-security prison for
women, and I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of her since.
That didn’t mean that she didn’t constantly write letters to the kids.
Letters that I promptly intercepted and then destroyed as soon as they hit
our mailbox.
Lydia didn’t know that she wasn’t our blood child, but one day she
would—though that day wasn’t today.
It was still something that Ellen and I bickered about—telling her. I
didn’t think that Lydia needed to know at all. Ellen thought it was
something she needed to hear from us rather than finding out herself later
on.
We’d tell her in time, I supposed, but right now wasn’t that time.
Hence the reason Big Papa and Aaron likely didn’t want to talk in front
of our children.
It wasn’t a surprise when Linc followed us out, though.
“What’s up?” I asked.
Aaron spoke first.
“Margot was shot to death outside of a halfway house when she tried to
rob a woman. The woman, who had a license to carry concealed, feared for
the safety of her children and herself. She pulled out her gun, and shot her
dead center in the chest.”
I blew out a breath.
“Shit.”
I can’t say that I was upset about her death, but I could say I definitely
felt some relief at the news. It was freeing, in a way, to know that that
chapter of our lives was over.
 No longer having to worry about that woman and what she’d do next
was an enormous weight lifted off my shoulders. It was enough to make me
want to yell out in relief.
“That sucks,” Linc grumbled under his breath. “Guess we won’t have to
renew the restraining orders after all.”
I slapped my hand down on my son’s back.
“I’d offer to go for a ride with you, but I don’t want your coach to kill
me if you fall off and break a nail before Sunday’s game.”
My kid flipped me the finger. “Fuck off.”
I snorted.
“Language!”
We all looked at the closed door.
“How the hell does she do that?” Linc asked.
“You’ll eventually find out, son, that women have eyes in the backs of
their heads.”
“And, apparently, ears like a goddamn wolf’s.”
***
Ellen
I walked tiredly up the stairs that would lead us to the box seats that
Linc had reserved for us to use for the game today.
I stared at the stairs and wondered idly what the hell I was doing.
I had no clue why I’d taken the stairs, but when I took a seat beside the
man that was sitting at the top waiting for me, I realized that I wasn’t the
only one nervous.
“Have they kicked off yet?” I asked hopefully, taking a seat beside my
man.
Jessie looked up at me.
“No,” he sighed. “I feel like I’m going to throw up.”
 I couldn’t help it. I threw myself into Jessie’s arms and buried my face
into his neck.
His beard tickled my skin, but I didn’t pull back from the death grip I
had on him.
“It’ll be okay.”
“Yeah?” I challenged him. “Then why the heck are you in here instead
of the box thingy?”
Jessie pushed me back so he could look at me.
“Because this is where you are.”
“Mom!” our two heathens hollered, as they burst through the door at the
same time.
“What?” I looked over Jessie’s shoulder at my two girls, my eyes
lingering longer on Lydia as I studied her features.
Unless you knew about it, you couldn’t tell that eight years ago she’d
been born prematurely with a drug addiction. Now she was a normal,
healthy eight-year-old who played soccer and ran so fast sometimes that I
was scared she’d hurt herself.
“Laura threw her hotdog down into the bleachers, and she ate mine
while I was using the bathroom.”
I dropped my forehead down onto Jessie’s shoulder.
“They’re your kids,” I said. “You deal with it. I’m going to sit right here
and try not to freak the hell out.”
He started a rumbling chuckle, and then I found myself moving through
the air despite my desire to stay exactly where I was.
“I don’t want to go,” I moaned.
Jessie ignored me.
“You’d be devastated if you didn’t get to watch Linc win his first ever
Super Bowl,” Jessie countered.
I sighed.
 “You’re right.”
And I would’ve been.
Approximately four hours later, I was staring at Linc’s face on the
Jumbotron as he accepted the Vince Lombardi Trophy with a wide smile on
his face.
“Who do you want to thank for all of your success, Linc?”
Linc looked up at the box. Though he couldn’t see us, he knew we were
there.
“My dad for catching hundreds and hundreds of passes so I could hone
my skills…and my step-mom for pushing me to always be a better person,
even when I didn’t want to be. I don’t know if I’d be here right now if they
didn’t believe in me.”
A sob caught in my throat.
“Well, fuck me in the ass,” Big Papa said from behind us. “But that boy
sure does know how to tug on the heartstrings.”
That’s about when I started to sniffle and snort as tears of happiness
started to roll down my cheeks.
“Does she sound like Miss Piggy to you or is that just me?”
I flipped my brother off, then buried my face into my husband’s
shoulder and cried while the rest of our friends laughed.
Then I sent him a text message.
Ellen (6:24 PM): I love you.
He replied back within seconds.
Jessie (6:24 PM): I love you, more.
 What’s next?
Beard Up
(Yes, Ghost’s Book!!)
7-27-17
Prologue
Women are like bacon. They look good, smell good, and taste
even better. Unfortunately, each piece will slowly kill you.
-Face of Life
Ghost
“Fucker’s deader than a doornail,” a man said, sounding almost amused.
Someone snarled, and I tried to turn in the direction of the sound, but
my limbs wouldn’t cooperate.
“If you have nothing to add to this, you may leave,” a cool, calm voice
practically purred. “Doctor?”
“I have a pulse back, but I have had a pulse three times and he’s coded
in the back of the ambulance twice. He was pronounced clinically dead on
scene, and then resuscitated himself on the way to the morgue. It’s very
likely that his lungs are fried, and nothing will help him. The respirator is
breathing for him, and keeping the blood circulating through his system via
the machine. If I take him off, though, it’s highly likely that he will
succumb to the injuries he’s sustained,” the voice, whom I assume was the
doctor, said.
“Keep him on it. Find him some lungs,” someone, the man who’d
sounded deceptively calm earlier, ordered.
“Sir,” the doctor interjected. “It’s not as simple as just finding him
some lungs. Someone has to die before he can have his lungs.”
“So make someone die,” the calm man said, sounding so very practical
that it was hard to listen to him.
 “But sir,” the doctor objected.
“I don’t care what you have to do, but if you want to continue breathing
yourself, you’ll do it. You’ll make it happen, because I need him. I need
him, or the whole operation that I’ve spent the last decade planning will be
for not. Do it, or die. Simple as that,” the man ordered flatly.
Silence proceeded that statement, and I realized that whomever that man
had been had left the room, and me.
“This guy needs to die,” the man that had been reprimanded earlier,
said. “It’d be a favor to him if he did. His life will be terrible. No woman
will ever want him again. Not when those scars heal.”
“His life is already terrible, Kershaw,” the doctor said softly. “The boss
guy won’t let him go, just like he won’t let the rest of us go. Plus, he’ll get
reconstructive surgery, and the majority of these scars will be taken care
of.”
“No fucking shit. You should pull the plug. Give him a way out of
this,” Kershaw said, disgusted.
“You know I can’t. He’s got my family on his radar, just like he has
yours. And this guy’s,” the doctor said gruffly, gesturing towards me, the
injured patient. “He’d have them, too, if they weren’t so protected.”
Family? Did I have a family somewhere?
“His mind. I think it’s going to be fucked up. When I got him out of
the morgue, he’d gone fucking cold. There’s seriously no way that he’s
going to come back as anything but a vegetable,” Kershaw said.
The doctor grunted in reply.
“At this point, at least, he wouldn’t be able to remember how much he’s
missing. Seems kinder than having to see your wife and kids every day.
Watching them go on with their lives without you,” the doctor’s voice
sounded choked.
“Sorry man. Didn’t mean to bring it up,” Kershaw replied. “Fucking
A, I hate this job. Fucking Hill. Fucking Government project bullshit. I
never signed up for this.”
 “Nobody did,” the doctor explained. “Don’t you know that by now?
“I know that, one day, Hill’s going to get what’s coming to him, and
when that day comes, I’m going to have a front row seat in a recliner with a
bag of popcorn on my lap and a beer in my hand.”
“When that day comes, Kershaw, we’ll all likely be dead,” the doctor
countered.
There was silence for so long that I thought they were gone, but then
Kershaw said two more words, and those words would haunt me for the
next two years.
“Or free.”