Chapter Sixteen
Rory
IF I HAD BEEN EXHAUSTED after my initial meeting with my father that afternoon, I was dead on my feet after the second one. My dad was an emotional vampire where I was concerned because I felt like I had zero energy left by the time I parked Raven’s car in the clubhouse parking lot. I wanted to fall into Matt’s bed and sleep for a week.
But with the emotional exhaustion also came a feeling of vindication. That first visit may have been a score for Derrick Michaels, but I had come out the winner. Matt was safe from my father’s manipulations, as were the rest of his MC brothers. Or at least, from the mayor. Royce Campbell was still going to be hanging around, and because my second meeting with Dad had just been him, me, and Mr. Jenkins, I doubted the creepy DA even knew what was going to happen in the coming weeks. If Dad wanted the money I had offered him—offered, because blackmail was a criminal offense, as Mr. Jenkins had explained to my father—then he wouldn’t say a word to anyone. Ever.
The way I saw it, this was a win-win for us all. My father was getting the money he had always been itching to get his greedy hands on, and with it, a shot at the governor’s mansion. I was getting my father out of my life for good, hopefully giving Creswell Springs a fighting chance with a new mayor, and keeping Matt safe. All at the same time.
Mr. Jenkins had tried to convince me to keep a little of the money for myself—if you could say a million dollars was a little. I didn’t want anything to do with that money now, but he had insisted that my mother would have wanted me to have something out of all of this. A million dollars was probably chump change to my father now that he was getting so much more, but for me, that money would go a long way. I was set for life with it to fall back on if I ever needed to.
At least, financially.
My heart was still feeling bruised and achy.
A tap on the window had me jumping with a start, and my eyes lifted to find Raven standing beside the driver’s door, her brows lifted in a silent question. Somehow, I found the energy to give her a tight smile as I climbed out of her car and handed over her key fob. “He won’t be bothering anyone again.”
That only had her brows lifting higher. “Do I need to get Bash and Spider to hide a body?”
“Not this time,” I said with a wink.
She didn’t look convinced. “Well, that’s about the only thing I can think of that could keep that dickhead from bothering us again. If he’s still breathing, then he’s still going to cause trouble.”
I pressed my lips together. For now, the only people who knew what was going on were my father, Gracie, and Mr. Jenkins. The fewer people who knew about what I had done—and what the mayor of their small town was doing—the better. I figured I could trust Raven with this, but ears were everywhere, and I didn’t want to chance any of it getting out.
Shrugging my shoulders, I turned for the back door that led into the kitchen. “You’ll just have to trust me on this. My father won’t be anyone’s problem from here on out. And if by some chance he is, then he would only be slitting his own throat.”
As I entered the empty kitchen, Raven hot on my heels, the smell of something delicious made my stomach grumble loud and painfully. It reminded me that I hadn’t eaten all day, and I was freaking starving.
“Matt came looking for you about two hours ago, but I told him you were running some errands for me. Bash called church, and they’ve been in there ever since,” the MC queen informed me as I crossed to the stove to lift the lid off one of the four huge pots of chili.
At the mention of Matt, my gut twisted, and I rubbed my hand over my stomach as the ache seemed to linger. “Thanks,” I muttered. “Is there anything that I can eat right now other than this chili? I forgot to eat earlier.”
“I’ll fix you a sandwich if you tell me what the hell happened today,” she offered.
“Or I could fix my own sandwich,” I countered, and she blew out a frustrated sigh as I pulled out meat and cheese from the fridge.
I didn’t even bother with bread. Just wrapped some deli meat around a few slices of cheese and started eating. Food didn’t help the gnawing ache in my stomach, but at least it shut the damn thing up. As I ate, Raven remained quiet, glowering at me. Having her look at me like that made me nervous. I had never seen it with my own eyes, but I’d heard plenty of rumors of how good of a fighter she was.
And how bloody she had made plenty of the sheep—and anyone else—who dared to step out of line.
“Your face looks drawn, and your eyes are red-rimmed,” she observed. “Tell me what happened? I can help you, Rory.”
I stuffed the last of the meat and cheese into my mouth and wiped my fingers on a dish towel. “All right, fine. I want to ask you something, and I want you to be completely honest with me.”
“I’m all ears.”
The deli meat was suddenly sitting heavily in my stomach, and I forced myself to ask the question I already knew the answer to. “You know Stephanie Campbell?” She nodded. “Did Matt sleep with her?”
Raven’s lips pressed together in a straight line, but I could see the truth before she even opened her mouth. “That isn’t any of my business.”
“Meaning you don’t know, or you’re not willing to tell me.” I nodded, not in the least bit stung at her refusal to speak against her cousin by marriage. “You’re loyal to Matt, so I understand. No hard feelings. I already know the truth anyway.”
“Rory…” she started, but then she closed her mouth and shook her head, as if thinking better of it. “That was years ago. You weren’t even here, so why does anything that happened with that bitch matter?”
I didn’t know how to answer that. She was right. I had been gone, but in my heart, we hadn’t been broken up. Matt had told me over and over again that it was the same for him. That no matter how long we were apart, to him, I was still his. I belonged to him.
But if that was how he saw it, then he hadn’t belonged to me.
And that was what was killing me.
I had always trusted him. When we had first gotten together three years ago, I hadn’t questioned his fidelity to me once. Since we’d been together again, I had still felt that loyalty. Had been so sure that he would never look at anyone else, let alone touch them. It was the in-between time, when we had been separated, that had jealousy clawing at the walls of my mind.
If Matt hadn’t told me he considered us still together while I had been away from him, maybe it wouldn’t have bothered me so much. But he hadn’t. And he hadn’t remained loyal to me during our time apart.
Out of sight, out of mind.
“Look, Steph Campbell is a whiny little bitch. She has nothing on you. All she ever does is run her mouth and go crying to her precious father whenever anyone so much as looks at her wrong. After I beat the snot out of her and that idiot friend of hers a while back, she learned to stay clear of us. Don’t worry about her. She’s not worth your time.”
“You fought with Steph and Casandra?” I asked, but the puzzle of how Royce had pictures of the two girls beaten bloody now made sense.
She shrugged. “One of them called me a sheep in my own bar. It didn’t end well for them.”
“I can only imagine,” I said with a smirk. For some reason, knowing that Raven had shelled out a beating to Steph made me happy as hell. I grabbed a water out of the fridge. “I need a shower. Dealing with my corrupt and dirty father has left some grime on my skin.”
“Are you ever going to tell me what happened with him today?” she called after me.
“Maybe one day,” I shot back, hiding a small grin when I heard her exasperated mutters to herself.
I went to Matt’s room, intending to take a shower, but I remembered that I had a suitcase full of some of my clothes and other items in the back of Raven’s car. But now that I was alone again, what energy the deli meat had given me seemed to evaporate, and I dropped down onto the edge of the bed.
Falling onto my back, I kicked off my borrowed shoes and curled up in the middle of the mattress and closed my eyes. With each deep breath I took, I could smell Matt, and that calmed my racing thoughts. I was torn up after finding out about Steph and him, but when it came down to it, I didn’t care enough about it to let him go. It hurt—hurt until my very body ached with it—but being without Matt would have hurt worse.
The sound of the door opening forced my eyes to lift. Matt slammed the door closed behind him. Seeing me on the bed appeared to surprise him, but as he looked down at me, most of his tension seemed to melt away. “Hey, baby. If I’d known you were back, I would have come down sooner.”
“I’ve only been here a few minutes.”
“I don’t like you going out by yourself like that. Next time, wake my ass up or take one of the guys with you.” He pulled off his cut and tossed it at the only chair in the room. Scrubbing his hands over his face, he sat on the edge of the bed beside me. “Santino’s guys might not know you’re with me yet, but they’re probably watching who comes and goes.”
I hadn’t thought about that, hadn’t even given it a moment’s pause during the time I had been out earlier. I had been too anxious to get the meeting over with my father, then too upset to care about my own safety at the thought of having to give Matt up. Now, I realized it was stupid not to think that whoever had blown up Matt’s truck was still out there, ready to attack and hurt the MC any other way they possibly could.
“Sorry,” I muttered. “It won’t happen again.”
He fell back beside me, his jaw clenched, his eyes on the ceiling. I could tell he was upset, but all I could do was lie there and look at him. I ate up the sight of how strong his chiseled jaw was, how long his lashes were, the dark stubble on his jaw and chin, and the side of his Cupid’s bow mouth that I could see. His neck was thick, veins standing out along it and his arms. Without his cut on, his chest looked massive underneath his thin gray T-shirt.
He was darkly Adonic, and just looking at him had my heart pounding against my rib cage. “Tell me what’s on your mind,” I urged as I put my hand on his chest.
Both his hands covered my much smaller one, but his touch was gentle, belying the strength that was simmering just below the surface, wanting to be let loose on the world. “I can’t talk about it, babe. Not yet.”
That stung, but I knew if it was MC-related, he wouldn’t ever tell me. “Oh,” I muttered and moved to pull my hand free. “Okay.”
“Rory,” he started, his hold on me tightening.
I stood, forcing him to release me. “I got some of my things from my dad’s house. I need to get them so I can take a shower and give Raven back her clothes.”
He shot to his feet. “I’ll get them,” he offered. “They’re in Raven’s car?”
“Yeah… Thanks.”
After the door shut behind him, I went into the bathroom and started the water for my shower. I barely waited for the water to warm up before I was standing under the spray, letting the powerful jets bite into my tense muscles. I leaned my forehead against the wall of the shower, closing my eyes as I tried to put the day out of my thoughts. Tears spilled from my eyes, but I refused to let myself sob.
I didn’t hear the door open, but the rush of cool air into the steaming shower had my head snapping around. The water flooding down onto my scalp masked the fact that I had been crying as Matt shut the shower door and pulled me into his arms. I went willingly, my lips meeting his halfway as I accepted his hungry kiss.
I wanted him to erase every thought of him with Steph that had tortured me all day long. Wanted him to love me and make me feel like I was the only woman he had ever—and would ever—touch. His hands caught my ass, grinding his rock-hard cock against my stomach for a few seconds before lifting me. My legs wrapped around his waist, my hands holding on to his shoulders for dear life as he pressed me back against the wall under the spray of the shower.
Water cascaded down his back, and it felt like we were hidden from the world with it acting like a waterfall.
Matt entered me quick and hard, but I was ready for him. My body opened to accept him, welcoming him home like it had been years since I had last felt him deep inside my body rather than just hours. I clung to him as he pounded into me, making my ass bounce against the tiled wall.
“Look at me,” he commanded in a voice rough with the feral need I saw shining out of his blue eyes when I lifted my lashes to meet his gaze. “You are mine, and I’m yours. I always have been. Always will be. Nothing will keep us apart. Not your damn father, and not that fucking bitch Steph.”
I jerked at the mention of her name, anger rising in me. Raven must have told him what I had asked earlier. Damn it. I hadn’t been ready to talk about Steph with Matt. Not yet, maybe not ever. Because I didn’t want him to think about his time with her.
And now he was talking about her while he was fucking me.
I beat my fist against his chest, once, twice, but he didn’t even flinch. “Don’t say her name while you’re inside of me.” I pushed at his shoulders, wanting him to release me, but his hold on my ass only tightened, and he thrust into me deep and hard, making my breath catch.
“I’m sorry I fucked her,” he growled close to my ear. “I’m sorry if that hurt you.”
“If?” I half snarled, half sobbed.
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking straight right after you left. Wasn’t thinking, period. I missed you so goddamn much, baby. It was killing me, driving me fucking insane, because I didn’t know if you were safe or not. Didn’t know if your bastard of a father had hurt you or what. I was pissed and hurting, and when I saw her, all I could think of was getting back at your father and that motherfucking DA.”
“Stop,” I sobbed. “I don’t want to hear this.”
“I got drunk, and I stayed drunk, Rory. I was fucking wasted when I did what I did with her, but it meant nothing, and I hated myself when I finally came to my senses. Maybe you weren’t here, but in my soul, you were still mine and I was fucking yours. Even then. My insanity lasted for all of two days, and then the red began to clear and I got rid of her. I couldn’t even look at myself in the mirror for weeks afterward.”
I closed my eyes to block out the tormented look on his face, but I couldn’t shut it out. Could see that same lost and tortured look on his face after I had left him.
“I loved you then, and I love you now. And I’m so fucking sorry I had sex with Steph, that I hurt you by doing that.” He kissed my shoulder, then my neck, making me shiver and clench around his cock that was still rock hard as it sat deep inside my body, unmoving. “I would change it if I could, but I can’t, baby. I fucking can’t.”
I pressed my forehead to the center of his chest. “I always knew you wouldn’t stay celibate. You’re not a monk, Matt. I just… It’s hard to digest when the proof of who you were with while I wasn’t here is shoved down my throat like my father did today.”
“I’m sorry, babe.” Slowly he began to rock into me, keeping the pace steady but no less mind-numbingly delicious. I tried to fight the pleasure, tried to keep my body from melting more and more, but it was hopeless. He knew exactly how to make my body respond to him, how to draw out every little whimper and sigh.
“I love you, Rory. Only ever you. Don’t think of that bitch. Don’t ever think of her because, until Rave told me about her just now, I had completely forgotten about her. She means nothing. No one—fucking no one, girl—means anything to me but you.”
“But it hurts,” I cried, my nails biting punishingly into his shoulders. “It hurts so bad.”
“Fuck, I would take it away in a heartbeat if I could. Don’t let this ruin us, baby. Don’t let this come between us.” He stopped moving, his cock completely still inside of me, which drove me a little closer to the edge. “I won’t lose you over her, do you hear me?”
My head fell back against the tile, and I looked up at him with tears clinging to my lashes. “You won’t,” I whispered. “Because as much as I hate the thought of you with her, I can’t let you go. I love you more than I love myself, and I can’t give you up. Ever.”
Relief filled his enthralling eyes. That look, and feeling how hard he was inside of me, told me without words that he loved me, that I mattered the most to him. That was all I needed right then. What I would always need.