Chapter 4
Nothing
She was dancing with Stoker. I sat at the end of the bar and watched her, curious about this woman, this girl, who made me feel something after so long. Of course, it shouldn’t have surprised me. Her older sister, Hope, had made my dick stir back in New Orleans, even if making out with her had been in the line of duty, so to speak. Still, Charity had accomplished something only Corrine had ever been able to do before. She’d stopped me in my tracks with one look. My heart stuttering in my chest like I was some teenaged fucking nerd boy who’s crush had spoken to him for the first time.
I didn’t know what bothered me more, that, or the fact that unpacking her things, I’d found nothing but evidence of a loving, driven, loyal and all around sweetheart of a young woman. The first thing I’d encountered was the carefully bubble wrapped framed diploma she’d received on graduation. I’d hung it for her, right over the bed, the first thing you saw when you walked into the room she would be calling home for the foreseeable future.
Helping Trike unload her shit was probably the creepy as fuck way to go about it, but that’s what I’d done. I’d learned a lot moving her boxes from the trailer into the Captain’s house. One, she was organized, every box neatly labeled in her clear, precise, handwriting. Two, she was a fucking minimalist. Three boxes of clothes, a couple of books, and a damn few of those judging by the weight. She had only one box of toiletries and one box labeled ‘personal items’ and that was it.
I hadn’t split anything marked ‘personal’ open, at least not on purpose, but the bottom had dropped out of the personal items box. Picture albums, a jewelry box that must have been something she’d had since she was a little girl, and a few other items of no consequence. The pictures that were framed, a few of the glass plates had broken, and the jewelry box had spilled out onto the bed where I’d gone to set it when the bottom of the box had given way. I’d cleaned up the glass and busted out the vacuum, careful to get it all while Trike had gone to work putting the top onto her Jeep before the rain could set in.
The hard top we’d stashed against the side of the house, and the paperwork for the little U-Haul trailer we’d found on the passenger seat of her rig. I’d had Trike it back to the closest one while I’d carefully put away Charity’s things for her. It was like once that box had split giving me a deeper glimpse into her life, I’d needed to know more. Before I knew it, over half the boxes contents were put where they belonged. Clothes hanging, and useless bedding relegated to the linen closet. I’d taken the time to run out and get her some useable bedding before heading to The Plank. She had a thing for the color blue, like light blue, so I’d gotten her sheets that would match her eyes.
She was all moved in, completely set, and I had some really mixed feelings about it. I turned on my bar stool and rapped my knuckles on the scarred wood surface of the bar. Trike loaded my glass with another double and I took a decent slug of it. I was way past the burning sensation and in that territory where the buzz was beginning to blur into a haze. Radar, slapped me on the back, hanging on me for a second before dropping onto the stool next to me. I only halfheartedly shrugged him off and he stared at me with that shit eating grin of his that screamed ‘I know something you don’t know.’
He kept right on staring, knowing that it’d eventually get under my skin, until finally, exasperated, I growled out, “What?”
“She likes you. Don’t ask me why; I mean, you’re an ugly fucker, but she started asking all kinds of questions. I think she’s the one, Nothing my man.”
“One what?” I growled and finished off my double. Fuck me, but I wanted to drink tonight.
“Come on, man. You should hit it. I mean look at her,” I shrugged him off of me as he tried to wrench me around on my bar stool to look in her direction. Except I didn’t want to look at her. I felt guilty as fuck that I’d almost let Corrine’s memory slip from my mind the last few hours.
“Seriously, bro?”
“Seriously, leave it the fuck alone tonight, Radar. I’m not into it.”
Radar shook his head, “Man, you can’t keep doing this to yourself.”
“I can, and I will. It’s what I deserve.” I slid off my stool by way of emphasis and made for the door. Fuck it. I’d walk home. I was in no shape to drive and Marlin would need the Subie to take his woman home, out of the rain. I’d given him my spare key to it when it was apparent Faith was a permanent fixture. She couldn’t ride all the time, not in the wet, and I couldn’t paint houses in the rain.
I pushed my way out the front door and into the downpour, tipping my head back to let the warm wet wash some of my guilt away. Not like it mattered, though. There was always plenty more where it came from.
“Don’t let him get to you.”
I whirled and looked at Hope; she was tucked back into the alcove next to the front door out of the water streaming from The Plank’s eaves. I’d walked right by her. She raised her glass and took a sip, raising an eyebrow at me over the rim. She’d quit smoking long before she’d ever hit Ft. Royal, but sometimes we’d catch her slipping out and standing where the smokers could be found. A ‘fresh air’ break, she called it, but really, I think it was because she would get overwhelmed in close quarters; she was just too much of a badass to admit it.
“I don’t,” I said.
She smirked, “Liar.”
“Whatever you say, Hope.” I started up the street, turning from her look of surprise. I’d never spoken to her like that, and I guess it was a mark of how far under my skin Radar had gotten.
Or was it really Radar at all? The little voice in the back of my head asked me. I told it to shut the fuck up and kept pounding pavement. About twenty minutes into my walk, and about ten minutes from home I cursed myself out hard.
Radar damn sure wasn’t the reason I’d noped right the fuck out of there. It was all Charity. It was all that fucking look in her eyes in the marina parking lot. I’d seen her hesitate, seen the dismay on her face, and when she’d looked up at me, it’d nailed my ass to the asphalt. I couldn’t tell you exactly what it was. Truthfully, I didn’t know if it had a name, but it was damn sure a look I remembered. One that Corrine and I had both shared once upon a time… back in the beginning.
I was past soaked to the skin by the time I reached my door and let myself in to my lonely house far too big for just one. It’d been perfect for my little family of three, back before I’d let everything be taken away from us. I went straight to the kitchen and cracked the seal on the bottle of Canadian whiskey on the counter.
I wasn’t numb enough for this. I wasn’t numb enough for tonight, and the storm, and everything that came along with the lightning and the rain. I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t have to see and hit the switch on the stereo on the kitchen counter filling my house with Stoker’s band’s angry fucking music. Something between hard rock and death metal blared from the speakers and I sank into it, grateful. I knelt down by my bike in the middle of my kitchen floor and wiped stray water off my face before picking up a socket wrench.
She needed maintenance, and I may not be able to fix my broken, but I could at least keep her in fine running order. At least until I needed sleep. I wanted sleep, but tired as I was, if I fell into bed before full exhaustion set in, I would have to relive it. I needed a sleep away from nightmares tonight; so I worked on my bike instead. I may be nothing, but at least with my bike and my club I had something.