Honor and Redemption

by A. C. Bextor

  She’d be wrong about that. Leglas is hot, but in a demonstrative way. Healthy for me or not, I’ve imagined being with him the way I know he’s been with so many women before.

  Ruthlessly pulling at my hair. Cruelly biting the skin of my inner thighs. Aggressively teasing my clit while ramming into me from behind.

  My cheeks flush and my mouth opens as I start to say something, anything that will direct Leglas’s hungry gaze from mine. But I can’t.

  For the life of me, I love the way he’s looking at me.

  A man hunting for his woman.

  An animal in search of his mate.

  A hardly constrained Adonis waiting with impatience to carry his ward back to his lair.

  Blinking slowly, I swallow hard. Maybe I’ve had too much to drink.

  Leglas stalks toward us, each step more aggressive than the one before. He stops to where I sit, and I glare up. His large hand darts out, taking my drink from my grasp. He raises it to his lips, downing all that’s left.

  I probably didn’t more to drink anyway.

  “Holy shit,” Joz breathes. Inching her way toward Sunny, my gaze moves to hers and she smiles wide.

  I knew this day was coming. To be fair, I helped progress this along. Leglas and I have been growing closer as the weeks leading to months without Gypsy have passed.

  Drinking alone together into the wee hours of the morning. A chaste kiss in passing. An innocent touch that no one sees. A flirty wink between only us.

  Leglas holds me to him at parties, my back always to his front as he rests his hand over my belly, toying with the button of my jeans. Yet, other than a few intimate, close call moments between us, it’s been mostly our friendship that has deepened.

  I could be wrong, though. Judging by the way he’s visually violating every inch of me, I may have overplayed my flirting by a bit.

  “Sunny,” Sty calls again. “Let’s move.”

  “All right, all right,” Sunny snaps. “I’m going.”

  As she stands, her eyes widen as Leglas’s deep voice rolls from his chest. “You drunk, hammered, or straight fuckin’ blitzed?”

  Sunny releases a violent cough, but moves, making her way to Sty who’s standing across the room. “There’s a difference?”

  Leglas’s temple protrudes in time with the grinding of his jaw. When he slams his lids shut, I shrug and start to turn away. But when he opens those soulful dark eyes, I’m awestruck.

  Heat. Hunger. Promise.

  Bending at the waist, he braces his hands on either side of my chair. He runs his tongue along his bottom lip. “Yeah, Blue Eyes, there’s a difference. A big one.”

  “Yeah?” I whisper.

  “Yeah,” he returns. “One being if I let your mouth near my cock.”

  My nipples peak to the point of pain. “W-What?”

  “If you’re straight fuckin’ blitzed, I’ll carry you outta here and we can get to it the quick and dirty way, ’cause I know you’ll pass the fuck out when I’m finished ridin’ you.”

  “Oh my God,” Lane breathes. I’d think she was envious, but she’s with Elevent. And even though I think of him as a real and binding brother, I’m not blind to the fact that Elevent is hot. Hot in a way that’s all his own.

  Leglas pays no mind to my hesitation and continues. “If you’re hammered, I’ll use my mouth on you, but yours won’t get near me.”

  “Leglas!” Sunny cries, now standing at his back with Sty at hers.

  Ignoring her, Leglas keeps going. “If you’re only drunk, I’ll pin you down and get off with you, doin’ all the above and more.” He smiles coyly, and if a girl could orgasm with words, I’d have done it then. “I’m hoping to fuck you’re just drunk, ’cause that’d be my pick.”

  “Holy shit,” Joz utters low, then whispers lower, “You lucky bitch.”

  Leglas ignores Joz’s rambling, demanding, “So, which is it?”

  A shrill of heat rushes between my legs, and a tremble of anticipation glides up my spine. My heart races in my chest.

  “I’m only drunk,” I tell him, breathless, my gaze dropping to the zipper of his dark, worn-out jeans. “Really drunk, but still, I’m just drunk.”

  Leglas takes in a heaving breath, turning his head toward the others who now stand silent. They’re watching, waiting, determining if Leglas’s proposition is a serious one. If I’ll give him what he’s asking, but not quite asking.

  Sunny smiles, but it’s a lie. She, of all the girls here, has questioned if Leglas would hurt me. Physically, he’s strong—a powerhouse. He’s taller than any brother in the club, and angrier at life more than most. He’s also the most uncaring about the women he takes to his bed.

  But I know different. I’m privy to Leglas in ways the others could never be, and I trust him explicitly. He’ll handle me with care, because I’m not like the whores and hang arounds. Leglas understands that Saint’s is my home in a way I’ll never leave. He respects this. Not to mention, he loves Pop like a father, and regards Elevent like a true blood brother.

  Tearing his gaze from mine, he looks at the crowd surrounding us. “You people wanna watch, or you wanna go find somewhere else to be?”

  Joz gasps. Sunny coughs. Lane giggles.

  Sty sighs loudly before saying, “You do this, it’s on you. She’s a big girl, but brother to brother, I ask you not to do this out here for anyone to see.”

  “Seriously?” Leglas clips.

  “Leglas,” Sty warns. “I’m askin’, not to interfere with whatever plans you got, but because she’s Cricket, and we both know what the two of you doin’ this says.”

  I don’t like Sty’s insinuation. I’m a grown woman who can make my own decisions on who I sleep with without having to ask anyone for permission. Nor do I need a warning.

  “I heard you,” Leglas returns, his body at ease in understanding. “Now again, you people wanna watch, or you wanna go find somethin’ else to do?”

  Under protest, my friends take their cue. Lane and Joz stand, dropping their drinks unceremoniously on the bar. All of them then file out in a single line, one by one up the stairs, Sunny dragging a reluctant Sty with her.

  My body is alive with anticipation. I’m curious of what the weight of this man would feel like on top of me. Wondering if my having sex with someone else will mean as much as it did my first and only time with Gypsy. My heart breaks knowing he isn’t here, isn’t coming back, and will never give me this himself.

  Pushing contemplations of Gypsy from my mind, I allow visceral thoughts of being with Leglas to surface.

  Leglas is wild.

  Untamed.

  Unreachable.

  I picture us in his bed, having sex just the same.

  When I attempt to close my legs in search of relief, Leglas pushes himself between them.

  “Babe,” he calls, his tone at ease. When I look up, he’s smiling down at me. Once he’s satisfied that he has my attention, his brows raise and he questions, “You good?”

  My answer stills on the tip of my tongue. What’s good? I haven’t been anything in years. I haven’t felt myself since I was thirteen, and Gypsy left the first goddamn time.

  I don’t get to answer before Leglas bends at the waist, carefully, but effectively lifting me to my feet. Once there, one hand positions to the back of my head, the other to my ass. With him pinning me in place, he brings his forehead to rest against mine.

  “Not dickin’ with this anymore,” he says softly. “Only so much a man can take.”

  He doesn’t mean this as a man looking at a woman. Leglas was there when Gypsy left. It was him who picked me up from the floor many times, carrying me to my room, all while cursing Gypsy to hell and threatening to break his neck should he ever come back to finish what he started.

  Leglas’s fingertips dig into my scalp. “I’m done watching you fade over a man who’s never comin’ back for you.”

  “Leglas,” I prompt, all thoughts of sanity and reason falling at his sincerity.

&
nbsp; “I’ll take care of you,” he promises. “If you want this, I’ll give you what you need.”

  “I don’t know what I need.”

  “I’ll give you what you deserve.”

  “I don’t know—”

  “For as long as I can, Blue Eyes,” he cuts me off. “I promise.”

  What he says is true. Leglas would. He’d give me anything I needed to get over Gypsy. He’d mold himself to me in a way I’d never want him to let go. But, the truth is, I’d never let him get that close. There’s no room in my heart, save for one man.

  “Okay,” I agree, and he smiles his smile—the predator about to pounce on his prey.

  Leglas’s hands cover my cheeks, his thumb running the length of my nose where he draws closer to kiss the end of it.

  Maybe this is what I need. Maybe being with Leglas will mend some of what Gypsy shredded. Maybe there is life after a girl’s first and only love—a different life, but a little less lonely just the same.

  Accepting his offer, I whisper to myself, “I won’t know unless I try.”

  Four months earlier…

  I’m tired. So fucking tired. The last six days have been a living hell.

  The first night home was the worst.

  Between boarding the plane at my last duty station and hitting ground here at home, I’d caught only a few hours of sleep. In the mix of bringing all I owned back to the club, hauling it into my room, and getting reacquainted with the Saint’s crew and their women, I’d had but a few minutes of peace.

  Coming back was the right decision. I felt good in a way that I was content with my decision to leave the Army. I was hugged, back slapped, and welcomed back to Saint’s with excitement.

  Yet, as I celebrated my return with my brothers—more importantly, my return to her—Cricket was nowhere to be found.

  I hadn’t expected the girl I left behind to welcome me back with open arms, professing how much she still loved me. I hadn’t anticipated her acceptance and understanding as to why it took me so long to pull my head from my ass in regard to there ever being an ‘us’.

  However, I had, at the very fucking least, expected her to be there with the others when I arrived.

  She wasn’t.

  The more time that passed with no sign of her, the quicker I pushed through the ‘good nights’ and ‘see ya laters’ of those left at the bar. Once the room was clear, I took the stairs two at a time, then walked the never-ending steps down the long hallway to her room.

  On the plane ride home, I had hours to contemplate what I was going to say. To think of ways to tell her that she was the reason I’d left a military career I loved to come back to Saint’s.

  When I opened the door to her room, I didn’t find her in her bed, fast asleep and waiting for me as I’d hoped. Instead, her room was empty. Not just of her, but of all the shit she owned.

  Holding the handle to her door, looking around at the posters she’d left on the walls, I almost smiled. In that misguided moment of anticipation, I was naive to think that maybe Cricket had pulled one of her childish stunts and moved her shit to my room without asking. Even as a kid, she was always so persistent.

  As I turned around to head to my room, I thought back to years ago, and the way I’d found her in my bed, drunk and alone, waiting to be caught. And how exceptional our one night together was to me. I mentally kicked myself for never admitting that to her before.

  Unfortunately, I soon learned I was wrong about all of it. So very fucking wrong.

  Cricket wasn’t in my room. She wasn’t waiting for me as she always had. Her bright smile and gentle touch weren’t anticipating my arrival back as I’d hoped. Not even close.

  As my hand touched the handle of my door, I heard her familiar giggle, but the sound wasn’t coming from my room. Her laughter was coming from across the hall. Then I listened carefully, hearing his gravelly voice taunting her.

  Him. Her. Together. In his fucking room.

  Never, in all the letters she sent or the short calls I could get out to her, had Cricket ever so much as insinuated she’d hooked up with a brother.

  And she sure as fuck never mentioned that one.

  The woman I thought loved me without conditions, adored me without hesitation, and the one I thought would be here waiting as she always had, was in another man’s bed. She’d tied herself to a son of a bitch who didn’t deserve her and never fucking would.

  The VP of this club isn’t a good person, and a mediocre brother at best. Leglas is a manwhore, fucking his way through sluts and hang arounds.

  He’s the VP because he’s everything Elevent isn’t. Leglas is quick tempered and stubborn. He’s hard around the edges, never giving a shit what others think of him. He’s not afraid of getting dirty, morals and ethics have no value to him. And whether I like this or not, Saint’s is his life.

  But even with all his loyalty to those here, he’s still a fuck.

  Since happening upon that dose of stone-cold reality, I’ve avoided Cricket completely. She walks in a room, I walk out. If I enter where she and her girl posse are hanging, I turn around, heading in the opposite direction.

  To her credit, she’s given me space to lick my wounds while cursing fate and deciding how to feel. I’ve intentionally stayed lost in my head, hiding from the truth that I’ll never have her the way I should have long ago.

  Because I’m too fucking late.

  Ultimately, though, here we are, facing off against one another. Me, beer in hand, leaning over the bar, and Cricket standing in a pale pink robe that cuts low in front and high on the thigh, giving far more than a glimpse of her legs.

  Her cheeks are red and her eyes are swimming in frustration. As she crosses her arms over her chest, the robe rides higher, revealing more of her creamy skin.

  “What’s up?” I prompt casually, bringing the bottle to my lips and catching my reflection in the bar mirror, noting that I’ve looked better.

  Cricket’s in no mood for small talk. I know this as she tersely replies, “Just wondering how long you plan to avoid me.”

  Forever, I want to tell her.

  Instead of giving her the God’s honest truth, I save myself the headache and lie. “No one’s avoidin’ you, Cricket.”

  Cricket exhales with anxiousness. I turn my head and catch her gaze with mine. She’s no longer fuming. She’s straight pissed.

  “Years,” she snaps, dropping her arms and kicking her leg out to the side. Biker bitch code for warning.

  At this, I prod, “Say again?”

  “Years, Gypsy,” she repeats. “I waited for you.”

  Shit. Not this, and not now. I don’t have it in me to battle with her about a past I can’t change, or clue her in on a future I fucked up.

  “Cricket—”

  “Don’t!” she shrieks. Shaking her head, she asks, “Do you remember the first time you left?”

  Fuck yes, I remember.

  Even being that Cricket was a kid, I knew how she felt about me leaving. I knew that with me gone, her days would be full of empty shit to do with Mom or the girls. I knew how much she’d miss me. I was stupid not to tell her that missing my brothers, my parents, and the club would hurt, but the biggest hit I was taking was leaving her behind.

  “Cricket, I—”

  “Stop talking,” she orders, and I do. Taking in a calming breath, she presses, “When you’d come back for leave, each time I thought, ‘This is it. This time Gypsy will finally see me. He’ll see how I’ve grown.’”

  I knew this, too. When I’d come back for the holidays, or to use up some saved leave, it’d be Cricket waiting either out on the front stoop or just inside the door. Sometimes, she’d run to greet me. Other times, especially as she started to get older, she’d hold back and wait outside my room, if only for a chance to say hello.

  Cricket was the one constant I had. No matter how fucked-up my head was, she was always there. One look, one laugh, or one playful hug, and I was free from stress and able to be myself.r />
  Setting my beer down on the bar, I turn to fully face her.

  “Then you’d leave, having not saw me at all. It hurt…” She takes a deep breath. “I would think, ‘God, what’s wrong with me? Is it because I came from such a shitty place?’”

  “Stop it,” I order. “You know I don’t give a shit where you came from. Not one fuckin’ person here does.”

  Ignoring my truth, she continues. “As pathetic as I was, I’d sit in my room and think of ways to get you to see me, or at least notice I existed.”

  Christ. I know where this is going.

  “Then…” She stops again. “I thought, ‘Well, if there’s any way to know, to really know how he feels about me, that has to be it. I have to give him everything.’”

  She’s talking about the night she gave herself to me. We never spoke about that night again, keeping it to ourselves, not ever mentioning it to others or each other. That night was ours to keep, separate from all the other bullshit here.

  I thought she understood where my life was heading. Never once did she make me feel guilty for my choices. Not one time did she question my commitment or where it stood because she already knew.

  I was wrong. In letting that night relish in only her memory, she’d been holding pieces of herself back. What she didn’t know was that same night had me questioning all the choices I’d made until then and after.

  I fell in love with Cricket the night before I was set to leave again, and by then it was far too late to stop what I would’ve never seen coming.

  Disgusted with myself, I let out a tortured, “Baby, please stop.”

  Cricket winces.

  “Deep down, I knew you’d never want me. Not to keep, anyway,” she strikes as confession. “I’ve always known I was a prop to your life. A complement. Someone who needed you.”

  My voice cracks as I commit, “Cricket, you’re so much more than that.”

  You’re everything I always had, but never thought I wanted.

  As if I hadn’t spoken, she pushes forward. “But I also knew if I gave you that, I’d have a memory of you to remember.” A broken laugh escapes. She slaps her hand to her forehead and her focus drops to the floor. “Shit, listen to me! How ridiculous is it that I gave something of myself just to keep a part of you with me.”