Chapter 12

I would like to donate fat instead of blood.

-Text from Reagan to Tyler

Tyler

“I’m going out to eat with a couple of friends from my old station,” I said. “Do you want to go?”

Reagan looked at me suspiciously. “My dad won’t be there, will he?”

I snorted. “No. Although your dad and I got along well, the two I’m eating with are a couple of guys that I graduated from the academy with and started with on the same day.”

She looked suspicious but ultimately decided to go with it. “That’s fine with me. But, just sayin’, I’m not hiding what we have from my dad if he asks or happens to see me.”

I shrugged. “I didn’t ask you to.”

Though, I was worried about it. Not because I felt like what we had was something that should be hidden, but because I’d have to explain to the man that I was starting to fall for his daughter despite my every intention not to.

It was a slippery slope and the more I tried to fight the pull of Reagan, the harder it became to resist her.

After spending two nights at my place, she’d decided that it was time to go home.

Which had infinitely pissed me off.

Not only was she in a tiny cabin with zero security, but she was also away from me—and now I couldn’t sleep.

I wanted her in my bed—permanently.

But I still hadn’t been able to wrap my head around it.

Tara had fucked me up. Made me think the worst, and question things I never would’ve been affected by before Tara had done her damage.

I didn’t like the guy I’d become—this jealous man that was always thinking in the back of his mind that things could go south at any second.

Reagan was a smart girl and she was nothing like my ex.

She didn’t have a deceitful bone in her body and I had a feeling that if she was having a problem with me like Tara had been, Reagan would flat out tell me that I was too boring for her and leave.

Yet, I couldn’t get those thoughts to turn off. Couldn’t make myself stop being jealous.

Kind of like now.

All she was doing was eating a breakfast burrito and the men in the restaurant around her were watching her like hawks as she stuffed as much food into her face as she could possibly manage.

Her mouth was opening wide and her moans were filling the air.

My dick was getting hard just watching her and I knew that I wasn’t the only one.

“Are you saying that you’ll go?” I asked through gritted teeth.

Reagan shrugged. “I guess.”

My lips twitched. “You guess?”

“I was going to go do a little research tonight on a certain tree now that the moss has grown back, but then I’d have to admit it to you and you’d know to look. I’ve decided I’ll just do it when you’re not paying attention and take it from a spot where your OCD can’t get the better of you if you happen to spot a missing patch.”

I rolled my eyes.

Then my radio squawked.

“10-13 at Kwik Stop on Main,” the dispatcher droned.

I sighed.

“Be at my place at six,” I ordered, looking woefully at the rest of my pancakes that I hadn’t finished.

There was no way I could take them, either. Not with the amount of syrup I’d put on them.

“What’s a 10-13?” she asked as she snagged my plate and started working on my pancakes.

I chuckled. “Theft.”

She held her thumb up. “I’ll pay. You go.”

Yeah, right.

“Bye, baby.”

Then I was gone, handing the waitress a fifty. “Hand the change over to her. Keep ten dollars for a tip, darlin’.”

Then I was gone, unaware that the women in the restaurant watched me just like the men watched her.

All of my attention was solely focused on only one woman—as it had for the last two weeks.

What the hell was she doing to me?

***

Later that evening, Reagan was laughing her ass off with the men at the table with me.

I was also proud as hell.

The group of friends that I called my own were brash, crazy and honestly hard to get a handle on. They were also very selective who they let into their group.

Reagan, however, had made the cut.

She was the only female in a table full of men, yet that didn’t bother her. Not even a little bit.

After being quiet initially, one of my buddies, Craft—a thirty-year veteran of the Kilgore Police Department—had recognized her and drawn her into the conversation by bringing up her dad.

Which, surprisingly, didn’t upset me like I thought it might.

Instead, I was happy. Fucking happy.

Why was I happy? Because I liked that she wasn’t sitting there, scared out of her mind to talk, because some douchebag made her think that it wasn’t okay to say what she was thinking.

I didn’t ever want her to feel like that when I was around—or even if I wasn’t. I wanted her to feel completely and utterly free to say what she wanted when she wanted. If she wanted to tell me I was a dick head who deserved to have his scrotum skinned, then that was what I wanted to hear.

I wanted her to feel safe with me.

I wanted her to love me.

I wanted her to…be mine.

I was so going to hell.

My feelings had changed in what felt like a heartbeat.

The moment that I’d made her mine over two weeks ago was the moment that I realized I couldn’t hide what I was feeling any longer. I wanted her. I needed her. And I was going to have her.

Unfortunately, now she was playing hard to get, reminding me around every corner that this was only temporary.

Honestly, I wasn’t sure if at this point that was what she felt herself, or if she was just repeating the words that came out of my mouth as a reminder to herself.

All bets were off, though. Slowly and surely, I’d reel her in, entwine her life in with mine and make her feel loved and worshipped while also not restricting her inquisitive nature.

“So how did you meet ol’ Tyler here?” Corban Bryant, a twenty-year veteran and Texas State Trooper, asked.

Reagan’s eyes twinkled as she turned to me.

“He pushed me down in the mud,” she teased, her eyes shining with an inner light that was practically daring me to spank her ass.

“You lie,” I snorted. “What she failed to tell you was that she was trespassing on my property and that she was stealing my shit.”

“Moss. I was ‘stealing’ moss. And he made me give it back.” She sneered.

The men at the table started to chuckle.

It was my ex-partner, Dade MacIntyre, who said, “I bet he scraped off that entire tree where you took the moss, too. Didn’t he?”

Reagan blinked wide-eyed. “How did you know?”

She said it sounding like she was so in awe that I had to laugh.

“Dade and I were partners for three years,” I informed her. “He knows me about as well as Rome…” I trailed off.

“And there’s the elephant in the room,” Dade said. “How’s ol’ Rome doin’ anyway?”

I shrugged and threw my arm around Reagan’s shoulders. “I don’t know, to be honest. Reagan and I saw him when we went out to eat a month or so ago. He didn’t look very happy, but I don’t know if that was due to the fact that he saw me, or that he finally realized that Tara was a vindictive woman.”

“Probably both,” Dade said. “I saw him at the hospital a few weeks ago. He didn’t look any more pleased that day, either.”

I wanted to ask badly about why Rome was there, but I chose not to open my mouth.

Reagan, however, didn’t have the same problem.

“Why was he there?” she asked as she dipped her chip into the hot sauce. The hot sauce that she’d poured so much butter into that it no longer resembled hot sauce as much as butter with a smidge of hot sauce added to it.

“He was there with a little boy. Did you know he joined a motorcycle club?” Dade asked.

My brows rose. “No. Which one?”

“The vest said Bear Bottom MC on it.” He shrugged.

If my brows could go any higher, they would have.

“That’s the one that’s affiliated with the Dixie Wardens. In fact, I think they are Dixie Wardens,” Reagan said as she tapped her finger absently on the table as her face pursed in a frown. “Kind of. Janie’s grandfather is a Dixie Warden. From Benton, Louisiana. They branched off into a chapter in Bear Bottom a few years ago. Their kids kind of took it over, and then went and changed the name because they felt like they had something to prove, and couldn’t do it by taking the easy way out and taking their fathers’ MC name.”

I grinned.

I knew exactly who they were, because I’d almost joined with Rome.

I was sad that he’d done it without me.

Sad about a lot of things when it came to Rome, actually.

I looked down at my lap where I was tearing apart my napkin, piece by piece.

If I were being honest, I was more upset about Rome than I was about Tara. I missed my friend.

A tiny finger poked my side and I looked to the side to see Reagan staring at me with worry on her face.

“You okay?” she mouthed.

I shrugged.

Okay was a relative term. Physically, I was okay. Emotionally? I didn’t think I’d ever get over losing my best friend—a man that had been there my whole life. A friend since I was a kid.

It was awful mourning the loss of someone who wasn’t dead.

Reagan frowned, moving her hand to rest on my thigh.

The move put her hand over what was left of the demolished napkin and I was forced to either remove her hand from my leg or stop tearing up the napkin.

There was one thing that I’d never be able to do when it came to Reagan Rose Alvarez and that was disappoint her.

I let the napkin go and then placed my free hand on top of hers while dropping the remnants of my napkin on the floor at my feet.

She relaxed into me, but before she did, I saw the determination on her face.

Reagan looked like she wanted to fix what was broken between me and Rome, but she couldn’t. Hell, even I couldn’t.

There were just some things that could never be fixed, even if the two parties involved had been best friends since they’d learned how to walk.

***

That night, on our way home, I got into a fight with Reagan.

And it all centered on the one man who continued to ruin my life.

She was repeating herself for the twelfth time when we pulled into my driveway.

“There has to be a reason he did it. From what I heard tonight and what I heard from your sisters since I’ve learned about Rome, y’all were thick as thieves. Wouldn’t one of y’all have shared that y’all were both seeing the same woman? It doesn’t make any sense,” she repeated as she unbuckled her seatbelt and followed me out of the truck.

I slammed my door and hit the lock button, then stalked up the front porch.

“Reagan, I really don’t want to fucking talk about this. If I had answers, I wouldn’t be in the boat I’m in. Unfortunately, I don’t. I probably never will, because Rome never gave me those answers,” I growled.

I opened the door to my house and found the damn dog lying on my couch, looking like he’d grown three inches in our four-hour absence.

Every fucking day I woke up and took him outside, he looked bigger.

He’d probably doubled in height since Reagan had brought him home.

At hearing our entrance, he flopped himself over, rolled off the couch and then stood at attention, waiting to see what we’d do.

Reagan walked to the back door and slid it open.

Sarge—what I called him, not Reagan, since she still couldn’t agree on the name—went outside and did his business.

Reagan didn’t bother to close the door.

The moment he was done, he waltzed right back inside, heading straight for my couch again.

I rolled my eyes, too upset to care if the damn dog was on my favorite piece of furniture and walked outside after Reagan.

“I don’t mean to sound like I’m hounding you…” she started as she followed me down the dock.

I growled in frustration. “Then why the fuck won’t you let this fucking go?”

She narrowed her eyes. “Because I want you to be happy!”

I stopped with one foot on the floating dock and one foot on the step that was stationary.

Now I felt like a giant dick.

“Reagan…” I started.

She wrapped her hands around my belly and pressed her forehead against my back. “I like you, Tyler. I don’t ever want to see you upset. If I can help, why wouldn’t I want to?”

I didn’t have anything to say to that.

But my anger over her questions dissipated in a cloud of dust.

“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “This is a sore subject. It’s hard to lose a friend after so long. It’s like losing a limb. Rome and I had never been separated for long. Then, all of a sudden, BAM. He’s gone and I’m lost.”

She moved her hand up and down my chest, soothing me.

“Do you think this dock would break if we were both on it at the same time?” she asked.

What a weird question.

“We were on it yesterday together,” I pointed out.

We’d been on it, fishing, as a matter of fact. Well, I’d been fishing. She’d been studying some book that had plants in it and jabbering incessantly about something that I still couldn’t quite grasp.

She giggled. “I meant, do you think this dock will break if me and you are fucking on it?”

Instant hard-on.

I reached around my back, hooked a hand around her waist and pulled her to my front.

Once she was there, I bent down and lifted her up, then stepped onto the floating dock, heading for the pad that was more like a massive floating bed.

Laying her down on it, I laughed when she shrieked as the water from the rain we’d gotten the night before soaked her through.

The material was water absorbent to an extent since it was meant to play on while in the middle of a lake or pool. Meaning it felt like a fucking wet bathing suit times ten.

“What’s wrong?” I asked as I followed her down.

She reached up and pinched my nipple, causing me to bellow in laughter as I pulled away, covering the affected nipple.

“Owwww!” I chuckled. “How the hell did you find it that easily?”

I mean, surely they didn’t teach women this in school—how to find nipples by pure instinct.

Reagan pulled me down and bit me on the lip. “I found it because I’ve been thinking about it all night long. You and your fucking nipples. Your cock. Your balls.”

I growled and leaned farther into her, pressing her deeper into the mat as I traced her lips with my tongue.

“What else were you thinking about?” I questioned.

She snaked her hands down my sides and pushed them under my shirt, running those small fingers over and up my back as far as she could reach.

“I was wondering if any of those guys thought we looked good together,” she whispered, pulling my head down to hers. “About how they would react if I moved to straddle your lap and ride you in front of them. Your fucking hand was driving me insane.”

I hadn’t been doing anything with my hand but placing it on her thigh.

“What did I do?” I asked.

“You kept running your finger along the inseam of my jeans,” she explained. “I kept wanting you to move it farther up—just a little bit—until you were touching a different seam.”

I stiffened my arms, pushing up until I could look down at her, the only thing laying on her now was my lower half—and my cock was more than ready to have her unclothed.

“I’m pretty sure that people are out night fishing right now,” I told her. “But…”

“But you want to fuck me, right here and now, damn the consequences,” she guessed.

I did.

I was so going to hell.

But, at least she would be there with me to keep me company.

“Take off your shirt,” I ordered.

She did as she was asked and while she was busy doing that, I followed suit.

Her back touched the wet material behind her and she hissed.

“It’s cold,” she cried out.

I looked down at her breasts—always unbound—and saw how hard and taut her nipples were. Yes, indeed, it was cold.

“What do you think would happen if I turned you over and pressed these pretty titties to the mat?” I asked. “How hard do you think I could get them?”

As I spoke, I circled each nipple with the tip of my pointer finger, not quite touching the tips, but just enough that she was straining to get me where she really wanted me.

“They’d probably fall off,” she teased, shivering.

Tonight was cool and pairing that with the fact that the material beneath her was wet, she was on the verge of being too cold.

I lowered myself and placed my warm upper body along hers.

“Can’t have you getting too cold then,” I murmured as I plastered my body against hers.

She moaned as my skin met hers and then started to grind up against me.

“Your pants need to go,” she ordered. “And then so do mine.”

I laughed and went to an elbow, easily pulling my belt and button loose.

The zipper, on the other hand, was a little harder due to the stiffness of my cock, but I made it work and pulled my length from my jeans and then pressed it against her.

“But, if yours come off, then I can’t tease you,” I explained, running the ruddy head over the length of her jeans.

She moaned. “That’s not fair, Tyler.”

She tried to wiggle and get her hands up underneath her to pull them off, but I stilled them. “Not yet.”

She hissed out a frustrated breath. “Why must you torture me all the time?”

I grinned and moved until my mouth was once again inches from hers. “Because I like to see you fall apart.”

She laughed. “Why?”

I smoothed my hand up the length of her side, coming to a stop at her breast where I cupped the perfect little handfuls and then dropped my mouth to the pebbled peak. “Because I also like to put you back together.”

Then I dropped my mouth to hers and let her feel the need in my kiss.

I pinched her nipple, ground my cock against her and pulled her hair.

Once I was done, there wasn’t a single part of her upper body that hadn’t been explored by my mouth.

Oh, and she was a jabbering mess full of desire.

“Tyler.” She quivered in anticipation when I hooked my hand around the maddening jeans and yanked them down without undoing them. “So, help me God, if you don’t fuck me soon, I’m going to scream.”

I pulled the jeans completely from her legs, tossed them somewhere behind me and settled myself against her bare self.

“No underwear, Ms. Alvarez?” I teased.

She shook her head. “Easy access.”

I growled. “As for the screaming part…it doesn’t matter what I do…you’ll be screaming either way.”

Then I notched my cock head at her entrance and pushed inside without hesitation. I slid in to the hilt, not stopping until she took everything that I had to give.

“Oh, fuck me,” she moaned.

I grinned and pulled out slightly, only to slam back inside.

She gasped and wiggled. “You’re going to kill me.”

I winked. “What a way to go, baby.”

Her eyes went shimmery in the near darkness and I could see the far away light illuminating my porch shining in her eyes.

But before I could investigate what was there, her eyes closed and she breathed out deeply.

Her body did a full-on shiver and her legs wrapped around my hips, urging me harder.

I didn’t give it to her.

The slow rock of the dock underneath of us swayed with my movements and any harder and we’d be making goddamn waves.

I didn’t want to make waves. I wanted to fuck her slow and steady. I wanted to feel her pussy clench around me and feel every single one of her muscles tighten and release, showing me without words how I was making her feel.

“I’m going to come,” she breathed. “I’m so close.”

I didn’t stop what I was doing.

When you were doing something right, you never stopped.

I closed my eyes and dropped a kiss to her collarbone, ignoring the way there was water sloshing underneath my elbows, as well as the way that my knees were completely soaked.

I could vaguely hear the sound of a boat motor in the distance, but even that wasn’t enough to make me stop when I felt her start to ripple around me.

Whenever we came together like this, I was grateful that I didn’t have to wear condoms—that she was protected. I’d never experienced this—the way she made me feel—because I guess on some level, I’d never been able to trust anyone enough to take that step.

But with Reagan? I couldn’t imagine any it being any other way.

Her nails dug into my neck and scalp and the sharp pinch of one nail poking into the skin of my neck and causing my skin to break wasn’t even enough to make me slow or stop.

The moment that my balls were wet with her release and we were making a slippery mess, I finally let loose of my control.

My body locked and my slow, even movements became jerky and erratic.

My deep, long strokes became shallow stabs.

Then, my release took hold and dragged me into the bliss, too.

I growled into her throat, burying my face deep into the crevice, wondering idly if I’d ever be able to let this girl go.

And, at that moment in time, I wasn’t scared of the answer that I kept coming up with.

Hell no, I’d never be able to let her go.

Nothing but everything with her would do.