Stupid, Tex snapped at himself, stupid, stupid, you fucking moron, are you trying to make this even worse for her? He wasn't sure he could be cocking this up more than he was. If he really focused, really tried, maybe consulted one of those wanna-be screenwriters that he remembered turning up at the B&Bs in Castello, sure that two weeks of peace would let them "complete their masterpiece," maybe then he could invent a way to make more of a fucking mess of this situation. But he would have to seriously work at it.
Castello was ruining him. That was the only explanation he could think of. He'd spent fifteen years making walls around the gut-wrenching pain and mind-numbing horror, the way his entire life had been destroyed in one moment, so many years ago. He'd thought he'd dealt with it, put it so far away that it wouldn't ever matter again, but it was turning out that just looking at Jessie was turning solid concrete walls into nothing but sand. He wanted her so badly, and not just to fuck her—although, holy crap, the way that loose tee stretched over her small breasts made him painfully hard—but to be close to her, to hold her, to share his pain with someone who understood. It seemed like the only way to move forward.
He had to either tell her the truth, right now, or he had to abandon all of this. And really, he had to tell her the truth, and then he had to let her decide. She'd had everything taken from her, as well. She had the right to make a decision now. He owed her that much.
He opened the door to the office. It barely deserved the name; it had been Polanco's office, but the old man hadn't really administered the farm. He'd had people for that, and he'd delighted in the distinction. The heavy old wooden desk and imposing leather chair had made him vaguely nauseated. They reminded him of his own father, and the lectures that had been delivered from behind it, telling him to man up and stop acting like such a girl and stop fucking crying already. He'd had Take and Sam Montgomery carry it out as soon as he'd seen it. Take thought it was fantastic, and had set up his own office out in the old barn. Tex had vaguely meant to get a smaller, less obnoxious desk, but he hadn't gotten there yet. Now, the office was set up with the same imposing, irritating bookshelves full of matching volumes that had probably been ordered as a set out of a catalog, a beaten up old sofa that he liked to sleep on when a bed was too comfortable, and a card table with a folding chair and a laptop set up on it. Very fancy.
Why the hell had he thought to bring her back here? Was he trying to punch himself in the nuts before he even got started?
He glanced back at Jessie as he made room for her to enter the room behind him, and saw her lifting a wry eyebrow. "Classy," she said, but it didn't sound insulting. Somehow, she made it sound like she was entertained that this was where he was bringing her. He liked that.
What would it be like to lean back on the couch and have her kneel over him, taking him deep inside and tossing her head with lust as he fought to balance his need to plunge deep inside of her with the desire to watch her bit her lower lip when he found her clit?
Down, boy. Breathe. Focus.
"Sorry," he said. "I know it's not much. You're probably used to much nicer surroundings."
"Not so much as you might think," Jessie said. She brushed past him to sit down in the left corner of the couch. Interesting. Sure, it was the more comfortable position, but it might also be considered the more provocative one. Most of the women he knew, if they wanted to make sure they weren't putting out any kind of vibe at all, would have chosen the folding chair.
Which isn't the same as her actually issuing an invitation. Stop it.
"I grew up in Castello," she said, and he noticed a slight emphasis in her words. He moved across the room and sat down in the folding chair, taking care to make his posture businesslike and unthreatening. "There's a weird back and forth in this town—in a lot of resort towns, I'd imagine—between the townies and the visitors."
He wasn't imagining it. She was challenging him. She was watching him carefully, her eyes ever so slightly narrowed and attentive. He kept his sigh strictly internal. This all would have been so much easier if he'd been able to be the man he wanted to be, instead of the man he was.
Take came in then, carrying a bottle of water so cold that condensation beaded on the outside. It wasn't a call Tex would have thought of, but of course Take would. A woman would be foolish to take an open glass from a stranger, especially in an unknown location. There were ways to tamper with bottles, of course, but the kind of jackass that would do that wasn't the kind of guy who'd be subtle about things, anyway. He'd learned over the years that the kind of dickless wonders who used rape drugs were opportunistic shitheads; he took a particular delight in pulverizing them whenever he got the chance. They didn't want to have to work to get what they wanted. Hell, that was half their fucking problem anyway.
Jesus, Tex, focus. He pulled his attention back to the current moment, where Jessie was thanking Take for the bottle, surreptitiously checking to make sure it hadn't been opened before, and then taking a long, slow drink. Take glanced at Tex, and Tex nodded. "Thanks," he said. "Go ahead and close the door on your way out."
Take nodded, and pulled the door shut—but not latched—on his way out. And then it was just him, and Jessie.
It was funny. He'd wanted this for so long, but he'd been too confused, too torn up to navigate asking his best friend for permission to kiss his little sister, much less anything more than that, the thoughts that were half formed and confusing in and of themselves. That nascent need he'd felt to control and to be controlled. How the fuck could he have explained that?
"I grew up in Castello, too," he said. His voice was quieter than he'd anticipated, and he found himself leaning forward, willing her to listen and believe him, not get furious and slap him again. Though he owed her at least one more, no question, no matter what he'd said in the salon. He checked her, and there was no shock in her eyes. "I was friends with your brother." A flinch from her, but still no real surprise. "I don't know if you remember me," he said. He couldn't say the rest. Not out loud.
"Cody," she whispered.
And like that, the secret was out. All he had to do was nod.
They were silent for a long time, both of them. Condensation dripped off her water bottle and made little plop sounds on the tile floor.
"You left," she said, after a while. "And your name. Your name is different."
The second point was easier to address. "My parents divorced. My father was fucking his secretary. I wanted nothing to do with him, so when my mother remarried when I was 17, I took my stepfather's surname."
"And your first name?"
"Tex is my middle name. I don't know if you remember—they used to call Danny and me 'The A-Team.' And it hurt too much. Every time anyone said my name, I'd flinch. I asked my parents to start calling me Tex, and it felt better. It felt like-"
"Like you left him behind." Her voice cracked with tears. He looked at her, right at her, forcing himself to witness her agony.
"I didn't know what else to do," he said. "I didn't want to go, but there was no way my parents would let us stay here. They didn't see that they were uprooting me from everything I loved, everything I knew. In their minds, Castello had hurt me, hurt us, and we had to go." He shook his head. "Really, my dad just wanted to be closer to his law practice. And it tore them apart, a few years later."
"Let me clarify," Jessie said, and there was rage tangled with the sadness of her voice now. "You left me behind. You kissed me, and my brother died because of it, and then you left. Do you have any idea what I went through?"
The urge to protest that he knew, that he'd felt the same guilt and pain, that he'd been in agony for years, rose and faded. Fury wasn't rational, and letting her vent it now was crucial. The few therapist sessions he'd let his mom bully him into attending had reinforced that. "I'm sorry," he said.
"You're sorry?" she cried out. She flew to her feet, and he braced himself for another slap, but it didn't come. She stood, vibrating with tension and fury and fear and other emotions that danced across her face too quickly for him to identify. She rushed the door, her hand closing on the doorknob, but not turning. And then she turned, all but running into his arms. She kissed him so hard he almost lost balance, pushing the rickety chair over. He caught her waist, leaning into her, and letting the kiss happen, but trying not to add fuel to the fire. Trying not to think about tossing her down on the couch, unzipping, and shoving his dick into her wet mouth. She was wearing lipstick that was a dark burgundy color, and it would look fucking amazing wrapped around his uncut cock.
"I hate you," she said as she slid into his lap. "I fucking hate you for leaving me." His hands rested on her waist as if they were magnetized, and he opened his mouth to her as her lips came down to his.
Kissing her in the salon had been wonderful, but this was unearthly. He knew she needed to guide whatever was happening here, that she was probably regaining control of an out of control situation in some incredibly fundamental way, but his desire to let her experience whatever she needed to experience was directly contradicted by his need to fuck her senseless. The weight of her in his lap was delicious and painful. Her fingers clawed at his hair, looking for something to grip—and then the lust collapsed like a balloon, and she was crying, sobbing even. She pushed herself up from him, and he took a moment to rearrange his cock while she couldn't see, and tamped down the fear and the panic at the idea that he'd thrown away his shot.
"How could you?" She wasn't asking him; he could tell that from her tone. She was asking herself how she could have done this to herself. How could she still want him so much, after so many years and so much pain.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I was a kid; I didn't get a lot of choice in the matter." It wasn't really the right thing to say, but he had to say it, all the same. "I was fourteen, just a year older than you. My parents told me we were moving away, and that the best way for me to heal was to do everything I could to forget Castello. Make new friends, meet new people, put it all in my past."
"And you listened to them."
"Did you listen to your mother when you were thirteen years old?"
She sighed, and something steely went out of her posture. She sagged against the side of the couch, but she didn't turn back to him. "I'm sorry," she said.
"I understand," he replied. "I've been angry about what happened for a lot of years. It took me a long time to realize my parents' decision to leave and to cut off all contact with your family was incredibly wrong. We should have been able to mourn together and heal together. But that's not what happened, and being angry about it wouldn't change that."
"Yeah," she said. He watched as she rubbed her hand over her forehead, swiped under her eyes, and then finally did turn back to face him. "When did you come back to town?"
This was just going to get worse. "Eight weeks ago."
She flinched like he'd slapped her. "And the first I heard from you was yesterday." Her tone was flat; it wasn't a question.
"That's right."
"Explain."
"There's more going on here than just me mourning Danny. I am here for other reasons. The club is here for other reasons."
"But you said you had information on Danny. You have to mean his death. What happened?"
He had to find balance between offering her a false promise and making the connection sound like even less than it was. "I may have a lead on the man who killed Danny."
Her eyes went from sad and conflicted to fever bright inside of a moment. "Tell me."
"No."
"Cody."
"Tex." He put a lot of emphasis on the name. It was foolish to insist on it from her, and it wasn't really a dead name, like Take talked about his name from before he'd joined the club, but it was still something that he didn't need to hear ever again. Not now.
"Tell me." She didn't argue about the name, and she made a small gesture. He chose to believe that she'd remember now.
"It's way too dangerous for you."
"Because I'm a girl?" She sneered the word out, and he remembered all the times he and Danny had thrown that at her when they wanted to be left on their own, when they were tired of Danny's kid sister tagging along wherever they went. Of course, that had been more when they were all younger, but clearly it had left a mark. "Because I'm just a silly little kid who doesn't know any better, who can't be trusted not to rat you out to her mom?"
"No," he said. "Because the man who killed your brother, my best friend, is a murderer. He killed your brother to cover up something horrible, and I don't think for a second he'd hesitate to do it again."
She stumbled back a pace. This wasn't her world, he reminded himself. She didn't deal in the brutal side of the law, where strong people sometimes had to do what was necessary to protect those the law didn't cover. It wasn't pretty, and it wasn't just, but it was true.
"Do you think for one second I wouldn't put a bullet through the heart of the man who took my big brother away from me?" she said, and a fierce grin stretched Tex's mouth. Maybe this was more Jessie's world than he'd ever dreamed. Maybe he would have a partner in this mess.
"I think believing you'll do it and actually pulling the trigger are two different things," he said, and he kept his tone just as level and careful as he would when he was talking to a new pledge. No condescension, just truth. "I think going down this road is hard, and coming back from it isn't possible. You may end up in the same town, but you're not the same person. And if you want to help me—Jessie, I'm not stupid enough to tell you no, but I don't think it's something you should choose lightly."
She considered his words, which was more than he expected from most people who were as angry as she was. He respected that. "Tell me what you can," she amended.
"How much do you know about your father?" he asked. Because this was where things would start getting very, very dicey.