Chapter Sixteen
An hour later, Rooster had what he was looking for and Travis was asking questions that he knew he couldn’t answer. That seemed to be his token job lately, having answers that he couldn’t reveal.
“This is the high school football coach. What the fuck is going on?” Travis whispered as he held onto the papers he had printed for Rooster.
“I can’t explain that right now, I need this information, so I need you to let go of the fucking paper,” he whispered back.
It was stupid, the two of them whisper shouting at each other in Steele’s cave, but Rooster couldn’t afford to let someone else hear them. What if Liam heard and then he had to confess that he’d kept all of this a secret? That he hadn’t been completely on the up and up. It made his stomach hurt, but he didn’t want to cause emotional pain to anyone until he knew exactly what he was dealing with. It didn’t matter that he was waiting to get a bead on everything, to find out if what he thought was true was actually true. Liam wasn’t going to listen to that. He was going to do what every normal father did and react first, think later. That reaction would surely be against both Rooster and Drew, but Rooster didn’t know how bad that reaction would be. Liam could be calm, but he could also be as hot-headed as they came too. No matter how far the two of them had come in their friendship, he worried that this whole situation would set them back. Maybe it would all work out—maybe it wouldn’t, but Rooster was scared as hell to take that chance.
“Don’t ask me to keep secrets. You know what happened last time.” Travis referenced the secret romance he’d had with Jagger’s sister. It had been a bad deal when Jagger had found out by accident. Travis had ended up with a buzz cut and staples in his head. Neither one of them wanted to go there again.
Rooster nodded. “I know, I know. I’m asking you to let me tell Liam about this, and I promise you, I will do that in the next 48 hours. Is that good for you?” Rooster could tell just by looking at Travis that it wasn’t but he would make the exception this one time.
“Forty-eight hours, and then my mouth opens, big time.”
Rooster took the folder of papers that Travis had printed for him and was making his way out of the clubhouse when his cell phone went off. Roni. Fuck. He hadn’t heard from her in a day or so, and he really wanted to hear the soft tone of her voice. She would be a calming factor in this shit storm that had somehow made its way into his life. Getting into his truck that he drove back and forth to the school, he answered the call. “Hey.”
“Hey yourself,” she started, and he could hear uncertainty there. “I was wondering if you could make time to come somewhere with me this afternoon. There’s a couple of things I wanna talk to you about.”
He wasn’t sure he liked the tone of her voice. Now he was kind of regretting that he’d answered. What he didn’t need now was another issue to mess with, but trying to be with her meant being with her when the going wasn’t always so easy. “Sure.” He backed his truck out of the parking lot at the clubhouse and started down the drive. “Do I need to come get you? I’m leaving the clubhouse right now.”
“That’s perfect, I’ll be waiting on you.”
Rooster hung up and beat his hand against the steering wheel. He had a bad feeling about this, and this wasn’t what he needed on today of all days. Putting the paperwork that Travis had given him under the seat, he resigned himself into realizing that this whole situation just might suck ass.
Roni waited for Rooster to get to her apartment, watching out the window for what he would be driving. Sometimes he drove his truck, sometimes he drove his bike. Either way, she wanted to be ready when he pulled in. If she wasn’t, she was afraid she wouldn’t go through with the appointment she’d made, and she had to go through with it. She had to tell him the truth before they moved any further. She would never be able to give herself to him until she purged herself of the poison.
This was going to be the hardest thing she’d ever done. She’d told no one about this, not even Liam. He had his suspicions, but she’d never verified them and she’d never offered to talk about it. The only other person in the world who knew her secret besides the doctor that had performed the procedure was her dad. Even though she’d gotten closer to her mom in recent years, she’d never been able to tell her what had gone down, afraid that it would somehow harm the relationship they’d started to build with one another.
The other fear was that her budding relationship with Rooster wouldn’t survive. That was the main reason she’d stopped the physical contact between the two of them after their night at the swimming hole. She couldn’t handle it if he decided he could no longer be with her, if they could no longer build this relationship. That’s what they were going to work on today, and she knew she was a bitch for springing this on him, but in this, she had to make the decisions that were right for her. It was such a gaping wound in her soul that she knew she couldn’t think about him. He had no idea what had gone on, and he wouldn’t until she told him.
Rooster’s truck pulled in the parking lot, and she quickly grabbed her bag and exited her apartment, running toward it like she was meeting him for a date. He reached over to the side and opened the passenger door for her and she climbed inside. She leaned over; kissing him the lips and letting herself linger there. She had to hold onto it, just in case he decided he didn’t want it anymore after what she was about to put him through.
“I’m happy to see you,” he told her, and the way he said it almost made her cry. He really was happy to see her, and she hoped that he would still be happy to see her within an hour, after she had completely changed his life.
“I’m happy to see you too,” she answered, reaching over to grab his hand. She needed to hold onto something, to keep him with her, just in case.
“Where are we headed?”
She didn’t want to tell him exactly where they were going. She wasn’t sure if he knew of the place or not. Roni figured he may have, after so many people in the club had employed the services of Doc Jones, but she wanted to keep this a secret for as long as she could. She gave him directions, but never told him the name of where they were going. As they pulled up in front of an old farmhouse, he cut the engine but kept his hands on the steering wheel.
“Wanna tell me why we’re at Doc Jones’?”
Roni swallowed hard against the lump in her throat. “Because I have some things to tell you and I think you have some things to tell me. Instead of inadvertently hurting each other, maybe we can work through whatever it is with the help of a third party that doesn’t know either one of us.”
He could see the appeal and was actually happy that she’d thought about this, but that didn’t mean he was shot in the ass about going to see a shrink. “If that’s what you think we need, we’ll do it, but I have to tell you…I’m worried.”
“I am too,” she admitted. “There are things I should have told you, but I haven’t, and I need some help to get through those things. That’s all this is. If you have anything you want to discuss while we’re in there, we will. But I want to make sure that I get everything out in the open, and then you can decide if you still want to be with me. When we leave here there will be no hard feelings and I have a backup ride in case I need it.” Her mouth was bone dry as she said those words to him. Meredith had promised she would be around, just in case shit went south.
“What the fuck is it you’re going to tell me?” He couldn’t think of anything that would ever put him in that kind of situation with her. He had to wonder what she was hiding and how long she’d hid it. He had foolishly thought they had learned from keeping secrets before. “I don’t want there to be any secrets between us either, and we’ve both made mistakes. We get it out in the open here, and then we let it go.”
She bit her lip, not wanting to get out of the truck because she knew that once she stepped out of this cocoon her life would possibly change and maybe not for the better. “I hope you’re still willing to say that after I tell you what I need to.”
“Roni.” He turned her face so that they looked each other head on. “Don’t make assumptions about me. No one knows how they are going to react to certain situations, and judging by the way you’re acting, this situation sucks. At least give me the benefit of finding out what it is and processing it before you lump me in a group with other people.”
“I can do that.” She cleared her throat and glanced back at the house. It was then she noticed that an older looking lady had come out on the porch. “I think that’s her. She’s probably wondering what we’re doing sitting here in the truck instead of coming in.”
Rooster’s heart pounded as he opened the door and slid from the driver’s seat onto the ground. He felt indescribable as he walked around the truck and held out his hand for Roni. She was much slower coming to meet him, but he’d expected that. She obviously had something that she didn’t want to admit to him and it was weighing heavily on her. Little did she know his own secret was weighing heavily on him. Maybe this was something they both needed, a blessing from above that she’d decided to do this. Either way, whatever was going to happen would happen, and it appeared it was going be this afternoon. He gripped her hand strongly in his as they made their way to the front porch where the older woman stood.
“Rooster and Roni?” She asked, wanting to verify before she let them inside.
“Yes, ma’am.” Rooster held out his free hand for her to shake and watched as Roni did the same.
“I was beginning to wonder if the two of you were going to come in.” She smiled warmly at them.
“We thought about turning tail and running all the way to Mexico,” Rooster joked. “But running away from something never fixes it, and if we’re here, we have something to fix.”
Doc Jones nodded at the two of them. “That’s what I like to hear before you take the first step into this house. If you know you have something to fix and you’re open to it, then this will be much easier. Should we get started?”
Roni looked down where her hand was still clasped with Rooster’s. He squeezed it in a comforting gesture. “Yeah, let’s get started,” she said quietly.
She had no doubt that this would be one of the most emotional afternoons of her life, but she was ready for it. With him by her side, she could do anything, and well, if he decided not to be there after this was over, she could still do anything. She would just have to lick her wounds in private and then figure out a way to move on with her life.