My knees braced for the impact right as Brayden slammed his little body into mine. My arms wrapped around him, and I rocked back on my heels, almost falling over onto my ass on the wooden floor in Meg’s house.
“Uncuh Rykie!”
I smiled. Something about this boy was so freaking cool. “Hey little man,” I said, scrubbing the back of his hair with my hand as I held him. “Sorry I worried you this week.”
He pulled back and frowned. “Mommy said you busy.”
I nodded and watched Meg smile at us from the doorway to the kitchen of their small, two-bedroom house. She wrapped her hands in a dishtowel with an easy smile on her face.
“I was, but I brought you something.”
Brayden’s dark brown eyes grew as large as saucers as I shook the yellow box of chewy chocolates.
“Milk Duds!” he shouted. He wrenched the box out of my hands and ran toward his mom, body slamming her into the wall like he’d done to me only moments before. “Can I have some?” he shouted again. Most days, Brayden had two volume levels—shouting and sleeping.
“Sure, babe, but not all of them.” Meg ruffled his hair and waved toward the kitchen. “Eat at the table.”
“But my movie on.” He pouted.
Meg kept a finger pointed at the table. I watched their easy banter and her firm eyes on Brayden and felt my skin begin to crawl all over again.
I knew exactly what Faith heard two days ago in the hotel. I knew exactly what she thought. If only she would have let me explain the truth, that morning might not have ended up in such a huge clusterfuck. Her eyes, her anger, and her sickening words were firmly cemented into my mind.
Brayden bounded off to the kitchen while Meg paused the cartoon movie on the television, apparently having reached some sort of compromise.
I pulled myself up from my crouched position on the floor and rubbed my hands on my thighs.
“You look like crap,” Meg said softly as she walked toward me. She gave me a quick kiss on the cheek before she pulled back.
“Thanks.”
She rolled her eyes and laughed. Two years ago when Byron died on the rig in an accident that I could have prevented, I had watched Meg’s easy smiles and laughter all but disappear. Lately, I’d noticed them coming back. Not often, but frequently enough to see that although she still missed her husband like crazy, she was not only surviving, but she was healing.
If only I could do the same.
My night with Faith had brought all my shit back to the front of my mind, and while the thoughts could normally be quenched with massive amounts of whiskey and pussy, neither of those sounded like something I wanted anymore.
I wanted Faith.
I wanted her free. I wanted her to smile. I wanted her happy. I wanted her in my arms.
I just fucking wanted her.
Instead, I screwed up—again. But with her standing so close to me, looking so goddamned beautiful, I couldn’t help myself. I broke the promise I made to keep my hands to myself and simply talk to her.
I had essentially raped her mouth like all of her asshole clients had the freedom to do.
“You want to talk about what went on back at home?”
I blinked and shook my head, Meg’s soft voice disrupting my wallowing.
“What?”
She laughed again and leaned back, resting her butt against the back of her light brown couch. “Come on, Ryker. You look like shit. What in the heck happened back home?”
Her eyes flashed concern as her voice softened. I had never told Byron, Meg, or Pete the specifics of why I had left home and refused to go back. I also knew that when I had to sit down with Meg and explain why I was leaving now, she’d be worried.
I scrubbed my hands down my face and exhaled loudly. My shoulders slumped. It was all so fucking depressing. “Nothing that can be fixed anytime soon.”
I blew out a breath and watched Meg roll a pink kitchen towel in her hands. She studied me for a beat before nodding. She understood. Some things couldn’t be easily fixed—or fixed at all in this case.
Although I wasn’t going to quit trying.
“Well,” she nodded toward the kitchen, “I’ve got lunch ready if you’re hungry.”
I was famished. After the disastrous night and morning with Faith, I had gone back to Daemon’s house only to be whisked away by Olivia who had some secret desire to get a tattoo. I barely managed to avoid Daemon kicking my ass once he found out. Then I got skunk drunk at the Nordic Lord’s clubhouse.
I had been surly. I had been an asshole to everyone who came near me, but I couldn’t stop seeing the desperation and the defeat in Faith’s eyes every time I blinked.
I wasn’t sure I’d eaten in days.
Still, I followed Meg to the kitchen and tried to smile for Brayden as he rattled on and on about his video games. All while trying to figure out how I was going to get Faith out from under Black Death while still being able to take care of Meg and Brayden.
It seemed impossible.
“I was engaged once.”
Meg’s eyebrows rose in surprise. I didn’t know why I was telling her this.
Brayden was in bed and we’d been sitting in silence for the last hour, me drinking beer after beer, Meg slowly sipping a glass of wine.
I couldn’t stand the damn silence anymore.
Slowly, she smiled. “Are you going to tell me about her or just leave me hanging?”
I planned on changing the subject and forgetting I brought it up in the first place, but Meg’s sweet smile pulled it out of me before I could.
“Her name’s Faith,” I exhaled heavily. My hands gripped my beer bottle before I pulled it to my lips and took a long drink. I decided to let go. For once, let everything hang out there. Meg wouldn’t understand, but she’d listen.
I fell back into the couch and closed my eyes. I could see Faith as a kid with her long black braids and her skinned knees because she insisted on wearing dresses while playing as rough and tough as us boys. When we wore holes in our clothes, she took the cuts to her knees without complaint.
“I think I fell in love with her when I was ten,” I started, and then I kept talking. I told Meg everything. From the time when I knew I wanted to marry Faith to the night I finally got her to agree. I told her about my plans to leave Jasper Bay and take Faith with me, to Faith’s worry about leaving her mom. And last—once Meg had continued to replenish my alcohol, instinctually knowing I needed to be on the cusp of drunkenness to continue talking—I told her about that night. The night everything went to hell.
The night my life changed and the night I lost Faith.
Then I told her about the hotel room.
And by the end of it, my tongue was heavy, my words were slurred, and my cheeks were wet. I didn’t realize it until I scrubbed my unshaven cheek with my fingertips and came away with moisture on them.
Jesus. I was crying? I couldn’t remember the last time I cried. I didn’t know if I had ever cried.
Silence filled the room when I was done. My eyes were closed and I reveled in the darkness behind my closed eyelids.
“You’re going back for her, right?”
I slowly peeled one eye open and tried to focus on Meg. She was a bit blurry, but I saw her wipe away tears off her own cheeks. Great. Now I’d made Meg cry, too.
I leaned forward, rested my elbows onto my knees, and dropped my head into my hands. I shook it back and forth, trying to erase… something. Pain, heartache, fear… I didn’t know, but something had to give inside of me before I exploded.
“I told Daemon I’d head back in two weeks to help clean up some other stuff going on with the club.” Throughout the story, I’d given Meg the full version of how I’d been raised. No one in New Orleans knew my full background. When people learned you came from an outlaw-type family, they tended to make judgments. Not that they were always wrong, but it had never been who I was.
It had also never been someone I wanted to be or something I wanted to be a part of, but now, sitting in New Orleans, I felt the pull to go home. To take care of everything Daemon was struggling with. To help my family and to take care of Faith.
“I’ll be okay if you go, you know.”
My eyes snapped to Meg. She looked uncertain even as she bravely spoke the words. Her chin wobbled like Brayden’s did before he cried.
“Meg.” I shook my head.
She raised her hand to silence me.
“I know you, Ryker. You’ve made these promises and you’re loyal and you’re determined.” Her voice shook with tears as she left the chair and moved next to me onto the couch. Her gentle hand on my leg made my body tense. “But I can do this without you.”
Tears swam in her eyes. I couldn’t look away.
“I made my choice, Meg.” And I had. I had promised Byron, and I would keep it. Maybe someday when Meg was ready to move on, I’d be willing to let go. But as I saw the fear in her eyes when she told me to go, there was no way that time was now.
She nodded and swiped at her cheeks. “I know. I know you did. But I want you to know that when you go back in two weeks and you help your brother I don’t expect you to come back.”
She stood before I could reach out and grab her hand. To reassure her that I would always come back for her. I would always come back for Brayden. The beer had slowed my reflexes and my responses until I was left alone, sitting in the dark living room.
And still, all I could think of was Faith.
There was something about the oil rig that calmed me. It always had. Maybe it was the confined space—the knowledge that you could only go so far. Your mind had to be in the game one hundred and ten percent or someone could get hurt. It wasn’t a fucking game when you were on the rig.
And the men were close. Fourteen of us spent two weeks together, twenty-four hours a day. I had bonded with them like brothers, at least most of them. Pete and I were two of the youngest guys on the rig. Some were older and thought we were peons and treated us as such. Most were cool, though.
So it had taken me a week to figure out why the only place I felt like I belonged since I left Jasper Bay suddenly felt like a cage without walls—a platform barricading me in.
Through every morning safety meeting, my mind swam with thoughts of Faith. Wondering what she was doing—who she was doing. If she was safe or hurt. If Cain or Black Death had punished her, filled her back with more lashes and scars. Every night I closed my eyes only to be bombarded with the picture of her back and the poorly healed marks.
I couldn’t fucking get them out of my head.
I couldn’t get her out of my head. The smell of her. The softness of her hair. The beautiful skin. The way, when right before I ended that horrific and manhandled kiss, she had briefly leaned in and accepted what I was doing to her.
Her tongue. Her taste.
Her waist.
Her long legs.
Skin and lips I had once worshipped.
Faith was everywhere.
“Hey.”
I lifted my head from the table where I was eating dinner in our mess hall. Pete slid into the spot across from me, his plastic food tray clanking on the plastic table top. “You’ve been quiet since we got back.”
I stuffed a forkful of pot roast into my mouth and chewed. It was damn delicious. The chefs on the rig were cool as shit and took requests from the men for meals. Whoever had requested pot roast was my new best friend. It melted in my mouth and reminded me of my mom’s home cooking back when life was good and easy. It also provided me the added bonus of ignoring Pete.
He meant well. I knew that. It didn’t mean I could think of a response that he’d understand, though.
I shrugged.
“Meg called me last night.”
That got my attention. My fork froze right in front of my mouth. “Yeah?”
“She’s worried about you.”
I shrugged again. I knew that. She had tried to talk to me a half dozen times before I left for the rig last week. However, I had the benefit of going five years without talking about all the shit that haunted me. I was a master at avoidance.
“I’m good,” I said and shoved the fork in my mouth.
Pete eyed me warily before settling into his own meal. “The thing is,” he started around a mouthful of food. He pointed his fork at me while he chewed and swallowed. “Is that you’re not. I’ve seen you this week and you’re distracted. Which isn’t only bad for the men on the crew, but you’re acting like…”
“Don’t say it,” I warned him. I knew what he was thinking—that I was acting like I did after Byron died. We’d been in the crow’s nest, fifty feet above the platform of the rig, drilling new pipes down to the drill floor, which was beneath the water. There were hundreds of feet of pipe stationed up there where we had to walk over empty space. It would take one false step to fall. The work was dangerous. It took skill and concentration. I still didn’t know what happened. Maybe it was the strong wind gust, maybe Byron had been distracted, or maybe I hadn’t been paying as much attention as I should have.
Regardless, his one misstep took him crashing down to the platform floor where he died instantly.
Pete was undistracted by my warning and scowl. He kept talking, and the more he talked, the more I wanted to reach across the table and choke him.
“Byron’s death wasn’t your fault, as horrible as it had been—none of the men blame you.” I’d heard that before. I’d heard that same thing from Daemon over a week ago about my part in my dad’s death. What they forgot was that even if the blame wasn’t on me from other men, I still shouldered the burden. Byron had been my friend, my crewmate, and my responsibility. “And I hate to say this, man, but Meg isn’t your responsibility, either.”
“What the hell?” I growled at him.
Pete set his fork down and pushed his plate away from him, resting his elbows on the table. He looked so at peace. How could he be so relaxed when those few words made my entire body coil in rage?
“Look—”
“No, you look.” I pushed up to my feet, bracing myself with my palms flat on the table. My chest heaved. My throat constricted. My pulse thrummed in my ears. “Byron made me promise to look after them if anything happened and I’m doing that.” I leaned down, towering over the guy sitting all chilled out in front of me, not intimidated by my size or my anger. “But don’t you fucking think for one second she isn’t my responsibility. It’s a promise I made and it’s a promise I’ll see to the end.”
Pete sucked in a breath. “Have you ever thought that it is the end?”
My eyebrows pulled in. “What are you talking about?”
He stood up, holding a stance much like mine, but without the frustration and anger. Out of the corner of my eye, our crew watched us. Fights weren’t allowed on the rig. One thrown punch and you were gone—fired. For the first time since I’d worked on the rig, my hands itched to break that rule.
“She’s strong, man.”
“I know that,” I bit out.
“Maybe what you need to consider is that you babying her, you taking care of her, isn’t needed anymore. Maybe what Meg needs is to learn to move on, to take care of herself, without worrying about disappointing someone else—disappointing you.”
He wasn’t making sense. I knew Meg was strong. She was independent and sweet. But she had Brayden, and Byron never wanted his son to grow up without men in his life like Byron had. I was doing what he wanted.
And I would continue to do it for as long as I could. I just had to figure out how to make it all work.
“Fuck you.”
I pushed off from the table, tossing my food tray onto the top of the garbage can where it clattered and rattled and thankfully didn’t knock the rest of the pile over.
Then I pushed through the doors and made my way to the platform where I could dangle my legs over the edge, seventy-five feet above the water, and forget everything.
Night had fallen and I was still standing on the edge of the rig, a fishing pole firmly fixed in my hands. When requested, the chefs would save the leftover food from meals and mix it with enough water into a five gallon bucket. It became our fish bait that we’d mash into fist-sized balls and rig to our poles. It felt disgusting and smelled worse, but it worked.
I had ignored Pete when he showed up hours ago, pail and poles in hand. I continued ignoring his smug presence when he handed me my pole and we began fishing two hours ago.
We hadn’t caught shit. And while the calming act of fishing generally gave me a sense of peace, my muscles tensed while I waited for Pete to start talking again.
“Byron’s death wasn’t your fault.”
I glared at him from the side of my eyes and went back to focusing on my fishing pole. “We’re not really going to do the pussy shit girl talk, are we?”
“No need. Meg already told me everything.”
Everything? I wanted to ask exactly what everything meant. Instead, I rolled my eyes. “Fucking women.”
Pete grunted. “Sounds to me like you’ve got one back home waiting for you to pull your head out of your ass and save the day.” My lips pressed together into a firm line. Like hell I was going to let him talk to me about Faith. He squeezed the nasty leftovers into a ball, reset his hook, dropped it seventy-five feet down into the water, and kept talking, this time with a sarcastic grin. “You could be like an armored knight and all that bull-shit.”
I felt a tug at the end of my string and yanked it up quickly. Came up empty. “It’s only a name, Pete.”
“Doesn’t mean you’re not needed somewhere else.” He turned to me. “I get what you did for Meg. I get the promise you made to take care of her for Byron. But Meg?” He wiped a line of sweat off his forehead. “Meg’s strong as shit. I’ve known her since we were kids. I’m not saying she doesn’t appreciate the help or feels like she needs it, but that girl can stand on her own. Byron and you—you have that protector mentality and want to do it all for her—which is admirable. But it’s not necessary. She can move on. She simply needs someone to let her.”
“So you can move in?” I checked my growl and took a step away, reeling in my own pole. Fucking lousy night for fishing.
“Fuck you, Knight. She’s like my sister and always has been. I’ll help her if she needs it, but she also needs to learn she can be everything Brayden needs, too. She needs the freedom to move on.”
He had a point. I knew it, but I couldn’t imagine walking away from promises.
The little shit was also right. Not only about Meg. Her innocence and sweetness might have made her seem weak, but she picked up after Byron’s death and did what needed to be done in order to keep caring for Brayden and keeping his life as settled as possible.
He was also right about me. About Faith. I had more important shit that needed to be dealt with. The way Faith walked away from me that morning in the hotel still burned a hole in my chest. My fingers itched constantly to take one shot at Cain. And I needed to be on solid ground to do it.
Even knowing that, I stared out at the black Gulf, unable to agree with Pete. There was nothing to see. No land, no lights—just utter blackness with the only sound being the waves hitting the base of our rig in the moonlight.
“I don’t want to leave Brayden. It’d kill him to have another man leave his life.”
“Going home to where you belong doesn’t mean you’re leaving him.”
Again, the fucker was smarter than he looked. Maybe I hadn’t given his intelligence enough credit by figuring he could be on a billboard being used as man candy. The thought made me grin.
“Yo, Knight!”
Pete and I both turned to see John, the medic on our rig, screaming my name from a doorway.
“You have a phone call on the SAT phone!” he shouted.
I nodded and bent down to pick up my pole, but Pete stopped me. “I’ll take care of the stuff. You go get your phone call.”
I thanked him and jogged off to the office, breathless by the time I reached the SAT phone receiver in the main living quarters.
“This is Ryker,” I said, my mind already swirling with who could be calling me on the phone.
“We got problems,” Daemon’s voice cracked through the phone, and my blood ran cold as he started talking without letting me say hello. By the time he was done explaining the information Antonio Sporelli shared with Daemon about our dad and Liv’s mom, Cherry, having an affair and that being what led to Bull hiring out a hit on them instead of it being Black Death as we assumed in the first place, I was ready for murder.
So when Daemon brought up the plan to take Bull out, I growled, “That fucker’s mine,” into the phone.
Bull was the ultimate reason for all of our lives falling to shit. It almost made me smile thinking of putting a bullet in him.