by Unknown
“It’s like some lock sprang free in me,” he said gruffly. “In that hotel room. In Beverly Hills,” he added when he saw her perplexed expression. “There was a lot of stuff stored behind that lock, apparently. Given that,” he said, nodding significantly at the vanity table where he’d just made love to her like a time elapsed explosion.
“A lot of lust, you mean?” she asked cautiously.
He leaned down and brushed his mouth against hers.
“Just a lot, Es,” he replied gruffly against her lips. “Just a helluva a lot.”
He reached between their bodies and placed his hand on her outer sex, the gesture tender and possessive. She gasped, staring up at him. He cupped her face and kissed her softly.
“Now that that lock has been sprung, I don’t think I can close it again,” he said, his gaze running over her face. His hand moved in tiny circles on her sex. “I don’t want to.”
“I don’t want it, either,” she whispered. “But—”
“No buts,” he cut her off, his hand on her sex more firm and demanding now. She moaned, and he nipped at her parted lips. “You didn’t get a chance to come when I was living out my little fantasy there on that table, did you?”
“No, but…”
“I told you. No buts.” His fingers began to play her, gentle, firm and insistent.
She kept thinking of how he’d looked in the mirror, single-mindedly slaking his need. She started to burn all over again.
“We’ll be really late,” she gasped, straining against his hand and biting gently at his lips. He stoked the fire in her, taking her to a fever pitch so quickly.
“We’re already really late,” he said, sending a finger deep inside her as he continued to stroke her clit with his thumb. She tilted her head back and moaned. He kissed her neck hungrily. “A little later isn’t going to make a damn bit of difference to anyone but us.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The scene when they arrived at the Moto Café at around nine thirty was entirely unexpected.
“Oh my God,” Esme muttered from where she sat in the passenger seat. “It’s packed. It’s like a circus.”
“Yeah. The Vagabonds must be popular. We’re going to have to park down the road and walk a ways,” Jude said, driving past the café out of necessity. The parking lot was overflowing. An attendant was waving past cars and motorcycles using a pair of lit flashlights.
By the time they returned to the parking lot, this time on foot, the Café boomed and vibrated with the sound of an especially rowdy rock song. Esme groaned as they walked up the front steps to the entrance
“There are hundreds of people here. It’s going to be a bitch trying to find Z.”
As if to prove herself wrong, however, one of the first people she saw over the heads of the crowd was Z standing at the bar. He wasn’t hard to spot, as tall and intimidating looking as he was, wearing a simple black T-shirt over his cut torso, and a detailed sleeve tattoo embellishing his muscular right arm.
Jude looked in the other direction. She tugged on his jacket to get his attention. She nodded toward the bar.
Jude’s mouth flattened when he saw his older brother standing at the bar, holding a glass.
He grabbed her hand and they started to carve their way through the thick crowd. As they struggled through the mass of people, the song the band played came to a raucous end. The lead singer announced they were taking a break.
Z didn’t seem very surprised when Jude tapped him on his shoulder, and he turned to see them standing there. Instead, he rolled his eyes in a resigned kind of way.
“More folks from the home front coming to stage an intervention?” Z asked sarcastically, turning toward the bar and setting down his drink. He signaled the bartender. It was the same pretty blonde from last night. She nodded once at Z, her gaze darting to Esme and Jude standing behind him.
“It looks like and intervention might not be a bad idea,” Jude said grimly, nodding at Z’s glass.
Z gave his brother a glacial glance over his shoulder, his jaw hard beneath the short, trimmed and awesome-looking black beard he currently sported. Z had always been a thrillingly handsome devil, but he appeared especially fierce tonight, like he carried a fire around inside him.
“It’s Diet Coke,” Z growled.
“Right,” Jude replied just as coldly.
Z responded by picking up the highball glass with ice and a little liquid left in it, and shoving it in Jude’s midriff.
“Try it,” Z challenged, ignoring Jude’s muffled oomph at the jab between his ribs. For a second, the two brother’s identical wild-eyed, intense gazes did battle. Then Jude lifted the glass to his mouth and tipped it. He frowned.
“Jude?” Esme asked quietly.
“It’s just Diet Coke,” Jude said. He set the glass on the bar.
“You look like you’re disappointed,” Z sneered.
“Of course I’m not disappointed,” Jude defended angrily. “So sorry for worrying because I found you at a bar with a drink in your hand.”
“Is everything okay, boss?”
All three of them turned to stare at the bombshell bartender, who was again wearing black leather—this time a black vest. She looked at Z expectantly.
“Boss?” Jude repeated.
From behind Jude, Esme saw Z exhale heavily. Her curiosity soared.
“Z? What does she mean, boss?” Esme demanded, stepping in front of Jude and sticking two fingers into Z’s waist. He jumped and glanced down at her in a beleaguered fashion.
“Jesus, Esme, why are you always poking me?” Z asked, wincing and rubbing where she’d prodded him.
“Oh, is the big-bad-biker wounded?” she mocked, making a disgusted face. “Come on. Spill it. What does she mean boss? It’s not some kind of perverted sexual thing, is it?”
“Holy fuck,” Z muttered under his breath, looking up and appearing to beseech the high heavens to stop a lifetime of abuse.
“I meant it in the traditional sense,” the blonde bartender said from behind the bar, staring at Esme as like she was some kind of queen, and Esme was the blundering peasant. “He’s my boss. Z owns this place.”
“What?” Esme and Jude said at once.
But Z just shook his head and checked his watch. “I have to go and check on something with the band. Why don’t you two go and ask all your prying questions to those two over there. The pair of them are as nosy and interfering as you two, so you all should get along great.”
Esme peered across the room in the direction where Z gave an aggressive wave. She gave a little yelp of amazement when she saw Sadie and Mat DaRosa sitting on the opposite side of a booth at the rear of the large bar. They were so caught up in their conversation; there was no chance Jude and her were going to get their attention from here.
Z started to walk away, but Jude caught him by the arm. The brothers exchanged a charged glance.
“We’ll talk later. I’m busy right now,” Z said shortly before he turned and vanished into the crowd.
“I can’t believe it,” Esme said ten minutes later to Mat and Sadie. “Z made enough money from custom building motorcycles that he could buy this whole place?”
She’d plopped down next to Mat DaRosa when they’d gotten to the booth. Jude and Sadie sat across from them.
“We all should have had more faith in him,” Sadie said, staring down at her trademark drink: club soda, bitters, and lime. Sadie nodded significantly toward a heavily bearded guy sitting a few booths down from them.
“See that guy right there? He’s an editor for Motorcyclist magazine. He came over and started up a conversation with us because he saw Z sitting with Mat and me for a while. His magazine did a huge feature on Z. I guess Z was on the front cover of the issue that came out recently. He says that Z has become like a god in the motorcycle community. He’s built custom cycles for Christian Bale, David Beckham, and Jay-Z. There are a ton of other high profile clients who are on a waiting list, because he’s so in demand.
”
“He always was a talented mechanic,” Jude said.
“He’s more than a mechanic. He’s an artist and designer,” Esme said firmly.
She didn’t really know all that much about motorcycles, but being an artist herself, Esme had long recognized Z’s unique style and vision. “I think it’s fantastic,” she enthused. The band had started playing again, so she was leaning forward on the table, talking loudly so that she could be heard. “Here we were, thinking he’d escaped to California to lick his wounds, and the whole time he’s been a secret entrepreneur. Good for Z.”
“I agree,” Mat said, taking a sip of his beer. Esme thought her old friend looked especially handsome tonight, with his dark brown hair rakishly styled, and sporting some sexy dark whiskers on his chiseled jaw. He must have been out in the sun on his ranch recently. His skin looked even more bronzed than usual, the color in his face highlighting his vivid bluish-green eyes.
“He really put one over on us. We all thought he was struggling, and maybe in trouble, and here he is, king of his own domain and running a world-famous custom shop,” Mat said.
“Yeah…but we haven’t heard how you guys ended up here,” Esme realized. “Did you drive over together?”
Sadie glanced up quickly at Mat, and then lowered her gaze.
“No,” Sadie said. “I drove over early this morning. I got lucky, talking to a mechanic at a gas station a few miles out of town. He knew of Z, and suggested I come here tonight. When I got here at around eight, Mat was already here, talking to Z.”
“I ran into some motorcycle dudes down on Main Street, and they’d heard of Z. They pointed me in this direction. I got here before the show started, so Z and I had a chance to talk. I texted you, man,” Mat said, nodding at Jude.
“Sorry, I haven’t been checking my phone much,” Jude said gruffly, his gaze flickering over to Esme. She smiled a little, thinking of why he’d been too preoccupied to check his phone much. When she realized she was doing it, she forced herself to un-grin.
“So you guys both came to try and talk Z into coming to the wedding, too?” Esme asked.
They both nodded.
“Why didn’t you call me?” Esme asked her sister pointedly, but Jude interrupted Sadie’s reply.
“So Z told you everything?” Jude asked Mat.
Mat nodded. “Most of it, I guess. That’s not to say that he was glad to see me here.”
“Why’s he keeping all this from us?” Esme demanded incredulously. “He should be bragging about his success, not hiding it!”
“Maybe he’s worried about failing,” Jude said after a pause. Esme saw that he was watching her with a steady, gleaming gaze from across the booth. She realized that he’d seemed very sober and weird ever since he’d learned about Z’s success.
In fact…all three of them were acting like they were at a funeral.
“Why are you guys acting so depressed? This is good news,” Esme exclaimed.
Sadie moved restlessly, brushing some of her silky blonde-butterscotch-caramel color hair over her shoulder. Some of the strands slid across Jude’s upper arm.
Abruptly, a rush of anxiety swept through Esme.
It hadn’t struck her once until that moment, given everything else that was going on. Esme stared at Jude and Sadie sitting side by side, their shoulders touching.
For a few seconds, she saw them like a stranger would. They were a spectacularly gorgeous couple. Even a few days ago, the situation would have immediately made her go on high alert with dread.
But now Jude and I are sleeping together. Involved. Everything’s different.
Isn’t it?
She saw Sadie glance up beneath long lashes, her gaze darting around. She’s anxious, too, Esme recognized. Self-conscious, just like she was at the house the other night before her mom called that meeting, when she was sitting next to Jude, and Jude was trying so hard to get her involved in the conversation.
“So we all came here to talk Z into coming back for the wedding?” Jude said grimly, leaning forward. “Did either of you succeed?”
“Not me,” Sadie said. “But Mat was making a little progress in convincing him, I think.”
Jude frowned. “I hope Es and I didn’t ruin any progress you made. I never actually got a chance to talk to him about the wedding before he was shooting off his mouth,” he said bitterly, glancing over and searching the crowd for his brother. Esme spotted Z’s dark head and wide shoulders.
“He’s up by his girlfriend again at the bar,” Esme said, standing. “I have to go to the bathroom. I’ll tell him on the way that you want him to come over to the table.”
Jude nodded.
“Jude’s looking for you,” Esme told Z a moment later, leaning in so her voice could be heard over the music.
“He knows where I’m at,” Z replied tersely. “Apparently, everyone does.”
“Stop being a bitchy baby. Jude came all the way here to see you. We’ve been looking for you for days.”
Z gave her a lancing stare. That look was scary as hell. Fortunately, she’d grown immune to it at about age six.
“He was worried about you, Z.”
“I’m thirty-two. Not some juvenile delinquent.”
“I realize that. I’ve been hearing all about your success.”
She went up on her toes and kissed his whiskered jaw. He looked taken aback.
“I’m proud of you. I always knew you had it in you. Not only to be successful. To be successful doing something you love.”
His intimidating expression softened a little.
“Thanks. I guess. That means a lot, coming from you, from someone who’s made a success doing something she loves. Hey,” he said, his face brightening, “I ordered some of your clothing for the shop—”
“I know,” she exclaimed, grinning. She twisted around, showing off the vest Jude had bought her there. “Jude got me this EsmeEs vest there.”
Z gave her a cool once over. “You’re like tightly packaged sin in that thing.”
“Thanks,” she laughed.
“So you were here earlier today? At the shop?”
“Yeah, that’s how we knew to find you here tonight. The sales clerk, Sherry Fairbanks, told us how much you like the Vagabonds.”
He rolled his eyes. “I should have known. Sherry doesn’t exactly comprehend the concept of confidentiality. I suppose she told you two that I know her from the local Alcoholics Anonymous chapter?”
“She didn’t, no. But that makes sense. She seemed pretty familiar with you, even if she wasn’t the type of lady Z Becket usually hangs with.” She glimpsed the blonde bartender serving a drink behind Z’s shoulder. “Someone like Bombshell Bartender, for instance?” She gave Z a significant glance. “You don’t have to worry about her blowing your cover, by the way. She clammed up when we were in here last night, looking for you. Claimed she didn’t know a soul around here who looked remotely like Jude.”
A thought struck Esme suddenly: the bartender had seen Jude and her making out.
“She didn’t…say anything about Jude and I being here looking for you, did she?” Esme asked, an alarm starting to blare in her head.
He glanced over his shoulder. “Erica?” Z asked casually. “Yeah, she said my brother and his girlfriend were in here trying to get information about me.”
Esme gave a mental sigh of relief. She could tell by Z’s careless attitude he hadn’t interpreted the bartender’s comment to mean girlfriend in the romantic sense. He just thought Erica had misconstrued their friendship. Their secret was safe for now.
“I’m off to the bathroom,” Esme declared. “Point me in the right direction, Mr. Entrepreneur?”
He hitched his chin. “Follow me. You can use the one in my office.”
“Thanks. Oh,” she called out, grabbing his elbow. “I forgot to tell you. I have a message from Ursa.”
He went completely still. His expression darkened. “What?”
Esme scowled at his return
ed edginess. “She told me that she really wants you to come for the wedding on Christmas.”
“Is that it?”
“Yeah…well, she wanted me to tell you specifically that she said so. What’s going on with you two, anyway? Why are you fighting so much?”
“Mind your own business, Es,” he growled. Despite his returned testiness, he grabbed her hand and led her, the crowd melting away from his big, intimidating figure.
A few minutes later, Esme locked and closed Z’s office door, as he’d instructed her to do when she’d finished in the bathroom. She was grateful he’d taken her to his private office in this vacant hallway at the rear of the restaurant, because she’d glimpsed the long line for the women’s restrooms. She turned right down another longer hallway, following the sound of the crowd and loud rock music in the distance.
“No! The answer is no, Jude.”
Esme froze in place, recognizing the hushed, pressured voice as belonging to Sadie. Twenty feet down the dim hallway, there were two public phones with privacy hoods protruding from the wall. Beneath the hoods, she saw two pairs of legs. She immediately identified Jude’s stone-washed jeans and the back of his near-black hair and the dark gray button down shirt she’d watched him put on earlier in their cabin. She also recognized Sadie’s killer black suede over the knee boots high. Sadie had her back to the wall, and Jude faced her.
“I’ve kept my promise and never spoken a word about it all these years,” she heard Jude say in a low, intimate tone. “I’m not comfortable anymore keeping it some dark secret. Is it really that big of a deal?”
“Big of a deal?” Sadie repeated, her voice sounding hollow with disbelief.
“It was a long time ago. And the damage isn’t irreparable.”
“You have no idea about the damage, Jude,” Sadie said, her voice low and trembling. “You don’t know the half of it.”
“I know you still have feelings—”
“It’ll never work,” Sadie snapped in a choked voice.
She sounded so miserable, Esme’s stomach clenched tight. Her sister was close to tears.
