Jack

 

I got home later than I had planned—six days out on a bender, and it was like the whole world had descended on the shop. Invoices, bills, supply orders. Rinse and repeat.

 

Grath had taken care of the most urgent crap—again proving his worth as my brother and closest ally in the MC. We were good like that. Grath and I had joined the Iron Bandits MC the same year; pledged together, rookied together. He was an alternative man through and through: huge muscle-y motherfucker with badass written all over him, but he was actually an incredible artist with the ink, and a gay man to boot. At first I hadn’t been sure what to make of him, but the better I got to know him, the more I loved just hanging out with him. He was funny as fuck and loyal to his bones to the brotherhood. We were lucky to have him in our ranks.

 

The afternoon had basically sucked. Yeah, I’d been busy, but I really didn’t want to be there. I still had a headache from my days and nights with the bottle. I needed more sleep, and I couldn’t stop thinking about Ellie—hot, beautiful Ellie—and Peter, and Keith, and my head was spinning. I couldn’t make sense of any of it. I needed answers, and she was the only one who could provide them.

 

Realizing that there was likely no food in the house, I ordered a pizza for delivery and picked up some beers before heading home.

 

When I finally got there, it was like stepping into an alternate universe. I had seen earlier that she was straightening up my mess—which was excellent, as I was likely to wade through the trash for months otherwise. But she had really cleaned. Like, shiny countertops and sinks. Vacuumed carpet and rugs. Even the windows and my bathroom mirrors were missing their smears. And it all smelled fresh, like lemon. I started to feel better immediately. Who knew a clean place could do that?

 

But the woman in question, the angel of the evening, was nowhere to be found—at least, not in the common areas. A part of me fantasized that she was waiting for me in my bed, and I headed there first, half believing in the mental image of her naked between my sheets.

 

Of course, she wasn’t there. And I was a dumbass for even hoping that she might be.

 

I changed my shirt and then made my way over to the door of the second bedroom, knowing she had to be in there with the baby, silent though they were. I knuckled the door lightly, not wanting to wake Peter up, but loudly enough so if Ellie was awake, she’d have some warning I was coming in.

 

She wasn’t awake. She was curled up on the air mattress on the floor, which she had somehow managed to outfit with sheets and blankets and a pillow, with her baby tucked close in her arms. They were gorgeous together. I’d never been one to appreciate mothers and their babies before, but the sight moved me, somehow. Ellie’s hair was unbound and floated around her head on the pillow, the soft curves of her body phenomenally on display. Her face had lost all lines of stress.

 

She was amazing. I couldn’t help but stare.

 

After several moments, her eyes drifted open as if she sensed my presence in the room even in her sleep. It took her a minute, but she managed to get to a sitting position without waking the baby. She tucked him in with the comforter, placing a pillow between him and the edge of the mattress, and struggled a bit to get to her feet from the low ground.

 

“How long have I been out?” she asked. Like I would know when she fell asleep.

 

“No idea. I just got back a few minutes ago.”

 

“Oh, right. Um…” She looked around, a little bit lost. I figured her brain was still in sleep-mush mode. She was really pretty in her confusion. I was enjoying this a bit too much, and figured I had to shut myself down.

 

“I ordered us a pizza, should be here soon. You want a beer?”

 

“Yeah, that’d be good, thanks. And some water, too, if you don’t mind.”

 

“On it.” I left her alone, to follow at her own pace. She obviously needed a few minutes to get fully conscious again.

 

I got her a glass of filtered water from the sink, pulled two longnecks from the six-pack, and brought them all out to the living room. After the pizza guy came, I set the food on the coffee table and settled myself on one side of the couch.

 

Ellie came out not long after, her hair once again gathered into that high ’tail, and she wandered to the couch as if still in a daze. When she sat, she looked around as if she had no idea what to do next. I leaned forward, grabbed the water from the coffee table, and handed it to her. She took it two-handed, like a little kid, and guzzled it back as if she’d spent days in the desert.

 

Which, I realized, she basically had, living in her car in freaking Arizona. Lucky for her, it was only March, and the heat of summer hadn’t hit yet. But what she was doing with Peter was insane. Arizona would cook them up in the summer if they weren’t living in a real domicile with air conditioning. Plus, it was dry as fuck here, and she must have been suffering some level of dehydration.

 

First things first, I decided. “Eat up. We can talk after.” She nodded, and we applied ourselves to the food. It didn’t take long—after my day, I nearly inhaled a half of the pie in short time. She only ate half as much, but we were both done and ready for beers within minutes. Then I got down to business.

 

“How long you been living in that piece of shit pile of junk out there, Ellie?” I asked, trying to keep my anger from boiling over with just the thought of it.

 

“Not long, really. Just a few days. We’ve been on the road for most of it.”

 

“On the road. Huh. Coming from where?”

 

“Oregon. Portland area. I went back up there when…” she drifted off. I gave her a moment, but nothing else came out.

 

“When…?” I raised my eyebrows at her. The woman had some problems telling a story.

 

“Oh! Yeah, um, actually, I left Tucson really soon after Keith…” This time I knew she wasn’t going to go on. And I knew what she was going to say, but wouldn’t. So I finished her sentence for her.

 

“…after he was killed.” I forced myself to say those words. I never let myself avoid them, or use euphemisms that sugar-coated reality. I saw her flinch, but I didn’t have it in me to coddle her grief. I had too much of my own grief. And anger. I had a lot of anger about it.

 

“Yeah. After that.”

 

“How did you know him?—I don’t mean, I mean, obviously—” Fuck. I was babbling. I just wanted the full story.

 

Lucky for me, Ellie seemed to automatically know what I meant, and she cut me slack. “You know where he lived, that neighborhood? I was bartending at the Red Trick Pony, you know it? He’d come in sometimes, we’d chat. He was cool. We got along. Your brother—he was a really good guy, you know?...He was a really good guy.” Her voice faded off and it was clear she was drifting in a memory.

 

“Yeah, he was. So, what, you and he were together then? For how long? ‘Cause, I gotta be frank with you, he never mentioned you to me. Sorry if that hurts, but it’s true. So seeing you today, and with the baby, it’s all…it doesn’t make much sense. I need more. I know for a fact my brother was careful.”

 

“Yeah, well…I’m not surprised he didn’t mention me. Except maybe as a friend? I don’t know. We really were just getting to be friends. You know, we got on well, and just casually, at the bar. But, uh…” She took a deep breath, then looked me right in the eye. “Okay, this is a long and weird story, and I need you to just bear with me through it, okay?”

 

“Got all night, Ellie.” Why in the hell was she being so hesitant? It was all I could do not to yell out, “Just start talking, woman!” But that seemed like it might be counter-productive. I shifted my jaw around to ease my tension.

 

“Okay. So, it started in Portland. I don’t want to give you all the nitty-gritty, but I left there about a year ago, the first time. Well, not quite a year. In May, last year. Came here, to Tucson, got a place, got a job, started working, met Keith. That much you know. Thing is, I ended up bringing extra baggage with me, that I did not intend to bring. This guy—Brian—he’d been someone I knew, or had known, back up in Oregon. We had dated briefly, but things got weird, and then bad, and I broke it off really quickly, but he…”

 

“Let me guess. He didn’t want to let you go. Was he stalking you? He followed you here?”

 

“Yes, and yes. And one night at the bar, at the Pony, he saw me talking and laughing with Keith—nothing was even going on—but Brian, he got upset about it. And he got in Keith’s face, which was just stupid of him—you know how big your brother is—ugh, sorry! …was…” Her face started to crumble, and she turned away.

 

“Yeah, Ellie. I know. It’s okay. Go on.”

 

She took a minute, then picked up again. “Well, Brian was spouting off a bunch of ugly shit about me, just verbal vomit about Keith being my next victim and me being a … you get the idea, right? Just a whole lot of unpleasantness. And Keith, even though he really didn’t know me, he got protective, and he stood up and just loomed over Brian—who’s not that small, he’s way bigger than me, but still, nothing compared to Keith—and Keith just laid into Brian. Didn’t take much, and Brian was on the floor. It’s all kind of jumbled now, in my head. I’m not sure how long Keith was hitting him, but by the end of it, Brian’s face was all messed up, and he was humiliated. I’ll be honest, I was kind of glad to see it, and I was super grateful to Keith. Brian had it coming. He’d had it coming for a long time. I was really, really grateful to Keith. It was the first night in a bunch of months that I felt…safe.”

 

I got it. So I looked at her. “I read you.” I nodded. “I know my brother. So, following that, Keith woulda made sure you got home and…”

 

She nodded back and gave me a tiny little smile. “Yeah. And…But we weren’t about that. It was just that one night. He was really good to me, and after following me home and making sure I was okay, I asked him in for a drink, as a thank you. And we did some shots, and then…” She clearly didn’t want to finish that sentence, either.

 

“Yeah, babe, I got the picture. But it still doesn’t all add up yet. Keith was careful—”

 

“Condoms break sometimes, Jack. You must know that.”

 

“Oh, fuck. Yeah…You weren’t on the pill?”

 

“Hi, personal question. And no, I wasn’t. But I am now. Any other intimacies you need me to share right now?”

 

“Whoa, don’t get your back up. It’s a fair question. Go easy.”

 

“Okay, I’m sorry. I’m not really used to answering to anybody else. You’re right. You deserve to know what’s what, and why. I want to be honest and open with you about it. I do. You just surprised me. I don’t even know why. Sorry.”

 

“Stop apologizing, babe. It’s okay.”

 

We sat there a few minutes, each in our own thoughts. I was the first to break the silence again.

 

“So, after that night, you and Keith never…”

 

She shook her head with gusto. “No. Definitely not. No. Just that one night. Not that it was bad—but it wasn’t—no. No.”

 

She was flustered, and it was damn cute to watch. Her color started rising again, and she was fidgeting with her sleeve again. Damn, this woman had some tells. It was close to hysterical, just to see her squirm.

 

But I was relieved to hear that she and my little brother had not been in the midst of some crazy big love story, so I let her off the hook easily. I just needed to clarify one more thing before I’d be happy to end this conversation. “What about Keith? Did he want more with you? Or did he feel the same as you felt about the whole thing?”

 

She chuckled. I looked at her expectantly, my eyebrows raised.

 

She leaned in close to me, and shared, like it was an insiders’ secret, “His exact words were, ‘Ellie, that was really great. Let’s never do it again.’” And she laughed, right into my eyes.