“Oh, this is good,” Avery said once the guys were out of earshot. “The girls are going to love this.”
“The girls?”
She got busy replacing the detritus of her baking into the proper cabinets as she said, “You’ll learn that the club is a tight-knit group. When you belong to one of these guys, you become part of the group, and you get a whole chick posse by default.”
I thought we’d cleared up the assumption that Stone and I were together with the whole not-knowing-where-his-bedroom-was thing. Apparently not.
“Oh, no. We’re not—”
“Clearly,” she cut in. “Stone might have more capacity for patience than some of these guys, but even he isn’t going to install his woman in the house but let her sleep in another room.”
“But you just said…” I trailed off because I was not keeping up.
“You’re not his. Not yet, anyway. But, babe, you sure as shit still are.”
That time, I just blinked at her. I couldn’t say I was particularly experienced with men in general, and definitely not men like Stone, but what she was saying made no sense to me at all.
“These guys, the Disciples, they aren’t like most men. But trust me when I say I know a lot about men, and no man brings a woman to his place and moves her in for no reason.”
“I ended up in a bit of a situation. Stone’s just helping me until I can sort everything out,” I explained.
“Yeah, he’s doing that. But he also could have given you some petty cash and been on his way. Hell, I’m guessing he could have not helped at all. Am I right?” She didn’t wait for a confirmation on that. “Instead, he brought you here and is currently moving you in. I don’t know why he isn’t pulling the macho-man idiot stuff these guys like to and ‘staking his claim,’” she said that last with air quotes and a roll of her eyes before going on, “but I know you’re still his.”
“I’m not.”
She opened her mouth to continue the debate, but I took a page from Stone’s handbook and spoke first.
“Really. We aren’t. I knew Stone before he went away. And I liked him. A lot,” I admitted, my head lowering, the mortification still strong. “I asked him out, and he turned me down. I didn’t see him again until last night. My car broke down while I was driving around to find a motel, and he found me. He offered for me to stay here, but it was just because he’s a nice guy. That’s it, and I know it because…” I took a deep breath, deciding this woman I just met was going to be privy to all my humiliation for some reason. “Because last night I kissed him, and he shut me down.”
“Shit,” she muttered.
It wasn’t the word I would have used, but I couldn’t deny the effectiveness. I just nodded my head in agreement.
“I don’t mean to pick at the wound,” she said in a gentle voice, “but did he stop you when you leaned in?”
“No.”
She eyed me, then pressed, “So he kissed you back?”
He did a little more than that. I could still feel where his hands gripped me as he pushed me against the wall. I could feel every second of his lips and tongue taking mine.
With a cough to clear my tight throat, I answered, “Yes.” There was a flicker of light in her eyes that I knew was trouble, so I went on, “But he’s been in prison for a long time. I don’t think it was so much me as it was just any woman.”
I’d come to that realization as I’d laid in bed the night before, overthinking every moment since I saw Stone through my car window. He was a man that was probably used to having a woman whenever he wanted until recently. Now that he’d had his freedom restored, it made sense he would be eager to have that need satisfied.
Pushing that depressing chain of thought down again, I proceeded. “You seem really nice, so I really don’t want this to sound harsh, but I can’t hear any of that. He’s made it clear where he stands, and I need to let go and move on. But if you and ‘the girls’ want to hang out and talk about anything else, I’d love that. I just found out that the closest thing to a best friend that I had actually kind of sucked, so being welcomed to the fold sounds amazing. Just no Stone. Please?”
Without hesitation, she stated, “You got it.”
I loosened a breath and felt some of the tension in my body relax. She wasn’t angry or upset. That was good.
“I’ll set something up with the group so you can meet everyone.”
“That sounds great.”
And it did. It might not have been smart to build a group of friends that was so closely entwined with Stone, but I’d find a way to make it work.
“All right, let’s go upstairs and see what we can do with your room,” Avery said, already bustling out of the kitchen.
I followed, feeling grateful that even though my life had fallen to pieces yesterday, I was already finding the silver lining.
Late that evening, I was on the back deck with my textbook spread out in front of me. My life had gotten crazy in the last twenty-four hours, but that wasn’t going to keep the tests from coming. I was two weeks from finals, and then I’d be finished. If I passed these last exams and logged the last few clinical hours, I would have my bachelor’s degree in nursing.
I’d been certified as a registered nurse with my associate’s for a year, but I had immediately enrolled in a program to get my bachelor’s. I had hoped that I’d be working as a nurse by now, but unfortunately, none of the applications I had submitted bore fruit.
Until yesterday, I’d convinced myself that this might be a blessing in disguise. My job at the diner was not great, but at least the hours were steady. A nursing job might mean working nights that could be difficult with my schoolwork. Now, I was pining for the pay increase that even a starting job with my RN license would provide over my less-than-minimum-wage pay at the diner, particularly when the tips usually just weren’t great.
I wouldn’t let myself dwell on any of that, though. The finish line was right in front of me. After years of wanting nothing more than to achieve this goal, I could finally taste it. Soon, I’d be able to live out my dream of being a neonatal intensive care nurse.
“Still in school, then?”
I bit down on the inside of my cheek at his question. Perhaps I had underestimated how hard it would be to share a house with Stone. Tracking the sound of his steps as he approached, I gave myself a mental pep talk.
You can handle this. You’ve faced far worse than an unrequited crush. Time to toughen up.
“Just one last round of finals,” I replied.
Stone knew all about my plans. I’d still been working on my associate’s when we met, but I knew then what I would do when I finished. He’d listened to the whole plan, and he’d been the first person not to question if it was the right one.
“You know what you want, you know how to get it, and you’re making it happen. That’s fucking great, Evie.”
“Does that mean you have graduation coming up?”
It was a logical question, but it felt foreign to me. The surprise of it made me look up at him.
“No. This part is all online. There’s a graduation I could attend if I really wanted to in Seattle, but I already stated I wouldn’t be walking,” I explained.
He’d meant to make small talk, but that was out the window. His attention was fixed on me, his brow furrowed. “Why would you do that?”
“Why travel all the way to Seattle for it?” I countered. “It would be one thing if I was going with a bunch of family to watch, but I’d drive all that way just to walk across that stage alone.”
“You can’t say you’re going now?”
“I don’t know. Probably not. It’s too close now.”
“Find out,” he ordered.
What?
When I didn’t hop to doing that, he repeated, “Go on wherever you have to and find out if you can still walk.”
His tone brokered no argument. This was the president of a motorcycle club, the man who had to be firm enough to lead a group of men most people would never question. Yet, I couldn’t help but do just that.
“Why?”
“You worked your ass off for this, you deserve to be there.”
“Stone…”
“And if you don’t want to go alone, then I’ll take you.”
Where his command had failed, that managed to silence me because it was too much. It didn’t say helping someone you knew out when they hit hard times. He was talking about traveling hours away to celebrate a pivotal moment in my life, the kind of event that family went to, the kind of event you attended for someone that you loved.
My mind a mess of words I wanted to say, my gaze fixed on the books spread out in front of me. Soundlessly, I closed them and stacked them up. Only once that was done, only when I’d had a minute to get some semblance of order to my mind, did I look back to Stone, who’d watched every movement.
“Thank you,” I started and saw that catch him off guard. “You’ve done a lot for me, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to repay you. But you don’t have to do this. I don’t want you to. The ceremony isn’t important to me, but if it was, I wouldn’t want to be there with someone who just went because they felt bad that I’d be there alone.”
Stone was going to butt in, I could see it. Since it had worked earlier with Avery, I sallied forth before he could.
“You’re really sweet, and I appreciate it that you want me to have that, but we both know how I feel about you. I’m sorry that I’m making this complicated, but those feelings are still there for me even though I know they aren’t for you. So you being at something like that for me, it would only make this more difficult.”
Knowing I couldn’t withstand much more, I went to grab my things and get out of there.
I didn’t get the chance.
Before I could so much as turn away from him, Stone had my wrist in an iron grip.
“You seriously fucking think I don’t feel that shit?”
His face looked like it was made from pure fire, and it silenced any words I might have drawn up.
“You think I sat on that stool every fucking day you were there to stand there smiling across from me just for the food? Because I’ll tell you right now, I didn’t even fucking taste that shit. I was there for something I needed a fuck of a lot more than food. I was there to see that cute smile on your perfect fucking face.”
I wasn’t smiling then. Even though his words were exactly what I wanted to hear, the harsh way he said them scared me.
“I told you that day you offered me that invitation to get everything I’d been wanting for months, and I told you again last night, I’m trying to do what’s best for you. Now, I’ll give it to you even more straight. You’re twenty-seven. I’m forty-four. You’re beautiful and smart; you’re sweeter than any woman I’ve ever fucking met. I’m the president of a fucking MC. I’m a fucking convict. And you know I didn’t earn that time, but I’ve done plenty of shit that could have gotten me the same rap sheet. I’m too fucking old and too dirty to even think about having you, but I do. I thought about it for eighteen fucking months sitting in that cell, and probably the only thing that kept me sane was picturing your face. But you’ve got your whole fucking life ahead of you, and I’m not going to stain that.”
He stepped closer to me, one hand coming up to run callus-roughened fingers down my cheek.
“I’m not for you, even if it fucking kills me to admit it. But one day when you find the man that is, you’ll be glad I did. And I’ll still probably be wishing that man was me.”
Before I could begin to process all he’d said, before I could say even one word to stop him, he turned away and left.