Rip

 

I should have known that screwing Jessi was just too good to be true. She'd led me to believe, that night, that she was the perfect sort of one-night stand. She’d pretended as though she didn't have a care in the world, as though she was reckless, as though nothing would change between us. But that couldn't have been further from the truth, I was coming to realize that Sunday morning.

 

She wasn't frosty toward me, per se. But she wasn't particularly friendly towards me either. I mean, she'd barely said good morning to me. It made me roll my eyes, but really, I hadn't expected any better from her, so I tried to convince myself that it really didn't matter.

 

It was her silence that bugged me the most. I didn't know why she wouldn't stand up to her father, or why she wasn't cracking jokes like she normally did. But it was driving me nuts.

 

It was only when she started to almost cry, after I'd snapped at her, that I started to wonder if maybe she had more feelings tied up in this than she had originally let on.

 

And that worried me.

 

See, I wasn't the kind of guy to deal with feelings. Sure, I was certain that I'd left a trail of broken hearts behind me. I was sure that there had been women who I'd slept with who had thought that maybe this was forever and who then had been disappointed when I'd moved on to someone new. But, usually, I was able to cut those women out of my life at the first sign of clinginess.

 

Not only was I not able to shut Jessi out of my life, given our current work situation and the shop, but I honestly didn't really want to shut her out either.

 

I wasn't sure what to do about that.

 

# # #

 

A few days later, I'd had about all I could stand of Mick's pointed questions about Jessi, because of course he knew that she had snuck out on Saturday night. There was no way that she was good enough at sneaking out that he hadn't been able to catch her in the act. And given that Jessi had already told him that she planned to come over to the Hounds' clubhouse, it must have been obvious where she had gone.

 

Of course, because Mick had no proof and because I was the only one helping him make his deadlines at the moment, he couldn't fire me. But that didn't mean that I was immune to his suspicions.

 

“Look, I like Jessi, okay?” I gruffly admitted one afternoon. I was working on changing the oil of another bike—a task that Mick loved to assign me, I had realized, given that it was notoriously messy. But I didn't mind; I liked getting my hands on things around the shop and making them run smoothly again. Oil was just one part of that.

 

Mick stared at me for a long moment. “Don't you lay a fucking hand on her, or I swear to god, Rip Harris, I will castrate you. I don't care what sorts of connections you have with the Hounds of Hades or anyone else, I will castrate you.”

 

I grinned a little, having expected that response. Of course the man was protective of his daughter. And it wasn't like I was any dad's idea of a good catch.

 

“Look, you want Jessi to be happy, don't you?” I asked him. “Trust me, I think I can make her happy.” I thought back to the other night in the alleyway and smirked a little. “I'm not asking to date her or anything like that, but she could use some friends outside of school. You said yourself that she's getting a little too full of herself hanging out amongst those collegiate kids. -”

 

“What would be in it for you?” Mick asked, rolling his eyes. “Of course—a good orgasm or two. You'd use my daughter like toilet paper and then you'd be done with her. I've heard your stories about your conquests. And my daughter is not going to be just another one of your whores.” His eyes glittered dangerously, and for a moment, I could see precisely why the Hounds of Hades did so much business with this man. I had a feeling that J.T. must respect him—and now I knew it was likely because the man was fiercely loyal and ready to go to battle if and only if it was necessary.

 

I paused, frowning. Because, see, normally that was the way I used women. He was right. He had heard enough of my stories. But at the same time, there was something about Saturday night that had left me aching inside, craving more of her body. I'd tried to go out with a different woman on Tuesday night, but I'd left midway through the evening, finding that I just wasn't interested in her and that I was comparing her curves to the ones that were always hidden beneath Jessi's work attire.

 

“You've already slept with her,” Mick realized flatly.

 

I was so startled that I dropped the wrench that I'd been using. “Yeah,” I admitted a bit sheepishly, not sure why I felt embarrassed to tell him that even though I had told him about all those women before.

 

Mick gave me a piercing look and then pointed a finger at me. “Rip Harris, I swear to God-”

 

“Hey, what's going on?”

 

Speak of the devil. It was Jessi herself coming into the shop just then, dropping her bag like she always did, seemingly oblivious to the tension in the room. Mick and I both swung around to face her, and I couldn't help staring, not with the leer that I normally fixed her with, but with something more appreciative of her beauty rather than her sexuality.

 

Clearly something was wrong with me.

 

“My afternoon class got cancelled, so I figured I'd come home and log a few extra hours,” she said. “And maybe then I could stay out past curfew one night this weekend?”

 

I was surprised to see her eyes flicker towards me as she said that last bit.

 

Mick looked like he wanted to get angry with her but was restraining himself. “Well, seeing as how you already disobeyed me and went out last Saturday night, I'd say that these extra hours count towards that,” he said.

 

Jessi stared at him in disbelief. “Dad,” she complained. “That's not fair! I-”

 

“You're walking on very thin ice, Jessi,” Mick interrupted. “If you want to continue going to university and-”

 

“Okay, okay,” Jessi said, but I didn't miss the half-desperate look that she shot my way. Was she hoping that I would intervene on her behalf? Was she maybe desperate to have me fill her up once more? I wanted to get her alone and ask her, but there was no way that was going to happen with Mick's watchful eyes following us around the shop.