Big Meat (A Recipe of Love Book 2)

by Paige Conners

  I follow him and stand on the patio looking around and enjoy how the black metal fencing allows you to see into the woods. I’m also pretty sure Boomer could hop over the fence if he really wanted to, so the fence was more for show and a matter of trust. Anthony’s patio is finally what I expect with a massive grill and a table with comfortable chairs. There’s a few pots on the porch with plants and herbs growing in them, which I actually expected too with how Anthony likes cooking with fresh ingredients.

  I finally turn and look at the silent mountain of man that has been carefully following me through the house. He was careful to make sure he didn’t get close enough to me to make me freak but stayed close enough to keep me aware he was there.

  “It’s so incredibly beautiful Anthony. I know you were talented with how you helped in the apartments but this is a work of art. I don’t know if I recommend inviting Frankie over though, you may find her chained to your island so she can live in your kitchen.” I admit and watch his face transform from tight and closed off tension to open and satisfied. His eyes are warm chocolate brown that I want to fall into. I walk straight to him and wrap my arms around him and lay my head on his big broad chest. I feel his hands slowly but surely wrap around me and hold me tight.

  “Thanks for not making a fuss about me bringing you here. I had to get out of the city. I’ll take you back later tonight. There’s just too many people and too many of them expecting me to talk to them right now. I don’t know what I would have done if I had to listen to another woman insult you today Lindsay.” I feel him turn his head and rub his cheek against the top of my head. I feel all the tension leaving me with his explanation.

  “Anthony, you know and I know, I could have destroyed all of those women today. I wouldn’t have even needed to raise a finger, I can’t let it harm your business though. I do think we need to keep you away from the front from now on though. Rose’s son Mike is still trying to become a model so I told her I would introduce him to a couple photographers I know if he will work the front for the next month.” I lean back enough I can look up and up some more until I can see his face. He has a baffled and frustrated look on his face that makes me giggle because I can see his thoughts clearly on his face.

  “Yes, he’s an idiot. Yes, he’s not even responsible enough to keep a goldfish alive. But he is pretty, and he knows if he fucks me over on this I’ll blacklist him quicker than he can say ‘Fuck me’ and beg forgiveness. I told him he can flirt with the women and bring any customs back to you, he’s not allowed to touch the register or any sharp and or pointy things. He’s just there as eye candy,” I explain. I feel him start laughing and watch it spread across his face. I can feel his laughter echoing through his chest and love feeling the vibrations.

  I go up on my tiptoes and reach up to tug on his beard. Anthony tilts his head back used to my shenanigans. My shirt rises up as I reach again for his beard and Anthony’s hand shifts sliding underneath my shirt. I freeze and wait to see the expressions that drift across his face. I watch confusion shift across his face as he explores my lower back with his fingertips trying to make sense of what he’s feeling. Next fear crosses over his face as he starts to figure it out. Finally bone deep sadness when he’s figured out what he’s feeling is all the scars on my back. The entire time he maintains eye contact with me, never once closing his eyes or looking away.

  “My poor Micina. Can I..,” he pauses and swallows fighting the tremor I can feel travel through him, “I need to see them. Please?” I am drawing deep shuddering breaths trying to calm myself down while I’m making myself look Anthony in the eyes. I know it’s time and I need to explain my past to him. I nod and turn and walk in the house, clutching Anthony’s hand the entire way.

  10

  Anthony

  I follow Lindsay into the house with my heart in my throat. I’ve thought nonstop about what she might have endured over the past month. I’ve been making myself sick with some of the things I was imagining. None of the things I’ve come up with could explain all the scars I felt on her back. I know what scars feel like, I have plenty of them on my hands from working with knives for so many years. They’re smoother and softer than the surrounding skin.

  Boomer rams into my legs shoving past me so he can lean into Lindsay’s legs. I love this dog. He must be picking up on her emotions and wants to help her. English Mastiffs are extremely loyal and overprotective dogs. He is who herds her to the couch and keeps bumping her until she sits down next to the chaise lounge thingy. He jumps up on the couch in this normal position before looking at me. His face clearly communicated, “I got her here now fix this.”

  I sit down on the chaise and bump my knees into Lindsay’s playfully before I take her hands in mine. “Okay, Lindsay I don’t know how to make this easier on you. Tell me how to help. We both know I suck at communication, but I’m really good at listening. I will never ever judge you, Lindsay. Never.” I vow squeezing her hands gently trying to push my feelings through her hands.

  She gently pulls her hands out of mine. I hope and pray I didn’t push her too far. She reaches up and rubs her thumb between my brows where I probably have frown lines. Her hand is so tiny and dainty on my face, barely covering my eye. She makes eye contact and is looking deep into me I’m guessing trying to determine my sincerity. She lets out a low breath and turns her back to me and pulls her shirt over her head showing me her full back.

  I bite my cheek as hard as I can to keep myself from making any kind of noise. She has dozens of thin scars cross-hatching her back. I lean forward and run a finger down one that runs from her right shoulder down to the bottom of her ribs on her left side. I fist my other hand and wish I didn’t keep my nails as well trimmed. I need some type of pain to help keep me focused. I recognize the scars as coming from a whip and I want to rage. She sits perfectly straight and lets me examine and trace every scar. I see four further down that are smaller and wider than her other scars. All four are exactly the same size and when I get close I see the tiny holes from where stitches were used to close these wounds.

  Lindsay starts to tremor either from me examining those four scars or having me at her back for so long. I quickly lean in and indulge myself by kissing the highest scar of the four before pulling her shirt down and easing her around so her back is to the couch. Reminding myself to move slow and gently I cradle her hand in mine and kiss her knuckles. It takes me several tries to finally choke out the only thing I need to know at the moment.

  “How?” I whisper.

  “It’s a very long and ugly story. Can you grab me a glass of water real quick?” she answers while looking at Boomer who has laid his big head in her lap. She reaches up and starts petting his side. I slowly stand up and head to the kitchen. I don’t want to make any fast moves and startle her. I run my hand over her hair gently loving the kitten soft feel of the short orange and yellow hair at the very top of her head before heading into the kitchen. I shove my head into the freezer for a second to try to force myself to cool down. I grab two bottles of water and walk back in and instead of sitting down where I was I sit in my normal spot beside her with my legs stretched out on the chaise. I pull her into my side and hand her one of the bottles of water before draping my arm around her. I hope I’m doing the right thing, but I’m moving in the dark with no idea what direction to go in.

  “I don’t know the best way to do this so I’m just going to blurt it all out and then you can ask me questions if you have any. Is that okay?” she asks looking up at me with her eyes swimming with tears. I want so badly to kiss her and tell her forget about it, keep her secrets. Her eyes should be shooting daggers at someone not flooded with tears she won’t let fall. I know we have to talk about her past if we have any chance of a relationship. I nod and pull her back to my chest. I’m hoping not having to see my facial expression will somehow make it easier but this way she can still feel me and hear my heartbeat reminding her who she is with.

  “Okay. God this is so hard to explain. My mo
m ran out on my dad when I was little. At least that’s the story I was told the entire time I was growing up. I still don’t know for sure anything about her except I apparently look like her, at least according to him. Not now with the crazy hair and piercings and tattoos and stuff but with my natural brown hair. She didn’t want the trouble of raising me. My father, well who I was told was my father, he didn’t want me until he realized he could use me for labor. For as long as I can remember he never showed me any kindness. I did all the cooking and cleaning for the tiny house we lived in.” She shudders in a breath and trembles under my arm.

  “I didn’t go to school like normal kids so I didn’t know anything was wrong. I never went to the doctors. Truthfully no one had any idea I even existed until I was around ten years old. There were a couple of teens out riding around on quads, and they ignored the no trespassing signs. You actually remind me a lot of them. They found me mowing the grass and based on my clothes and bruises they could see something was wrong, without thinking twice they scooped me up and drove away. I tried to fight them off, but I was so small and undernourished that I wasn’t able to. The cops went to the house to arrest my dad, but he wasn’t there.” I can feel her shaking, and the sound of her tears is killing me. I want to tell her to stop it’s enough, but I know there’s more to the story.

  “There was no record of my birth. I knew what I had been told my birthday was but there was no record of a female child born at a nearby hospital that matched up, so I must have been born at home. They had armies of shrinks and specialists work with me to get me caught up to where the other kids my age were. Thankfully I have a high IQ and had no trouble with all the learning stuff. I learned how to act from watching television and observing other people. After two years, when I was actually ahead of where I needed to be academically I was placed in a foster home. I know there are lots of horror stories about foster care, but the family I was with was actually really great, we just never fully bonded and I knew I was just there temporarily. I worked my ass off because I knew if I had good grades I might get a scholarship which was my only chance of going to college.” Lindsay finally stops trying to hold herself up and collapses on my chest. I feel her tears soaking into my t-shirt and rub her shoulder and neck while she cries. I don’t want to risk touching her back and setting her off.

  “I won an essay contest. I wrote about my childhood, and how could a human being slip through the cracks for ten years. I got my picture in the newspaper and a scholarship. What we didn’t expect was the story to go nationwide. This was in the early days of the internet and there wasn’t social media so it didn’t get as big as it could have. Apparently my dad saw the story and was afraid of being arrested, even after seven years had passed. The story mentioned what school I went to so it was easy for him come, find me and kidnap me.”

  “He only had me for a couple of hours. They found us at an abandoned building. He tied me up and whipped me for disobeying him and running away. Then he stabbed me in the back four times with a hunting knife, to repay me for stabbing him in the back. I guess someone at the school saw him shove me into his van and what direction we drove off in. They were able to launch a manhunt instantly and started searching empty or abandoned properties nearby. I was lucky that they were able to figure out he would want something isolated and found me as quick as they did.”

  “The cops ended up killing him when they rescued me, so we had no way of getting any answers. When I was in the hospital one of my med students was from Philadelphia and kept telling me how great it was. When I got out and graduated I applied to every college in Philly and luckily got into Temple.” Lindsay is crying so hard I am worried if I’m going to be able to understand her if she tells me anything else.

  I’m filled with impotent rage right now. I know she needs me more and needs me to stay calm. I’m so fucking mad that I can’t right any wrongs for her. There’s no bad guy for me to go after. Her bad guy was killed, she’s stuck with scars both on her body and her mind that I know I can’t erase. It’s been ten years for her, and I don’t know what I can do other than not give up on her. I haven’t given up on her in the six years since I started thinking of her as my little hell kitten so that part is easy, but I know that I will literally be fighting a ghost and that is something I don’t know if I can do.

  “I’m so proud of you for surviving that, Lindsay. You’re so incredible strong. Thank you for telling me, babe.” I murmur to the top of her head. Her cries are starting to quiet down and I don’t know if she fell asleep so I don’t want to be too loud just in case.

  “You don’t feel any different about me?” I barely hear her whisper as she anxiously starts playing with my shirt.

  “Of course I do. I’m even more in awe of you. I understand your obsession with your safety better now. I get why you don’t want anyone behind you or to grab your arms. Seriously though I am completely amazed at how much you’ve overcome. I always knew you were brilliant and now I just have more proof of that. Now you have a decision to make Baby, do you want to stay here for dinner or do you need Frankie? We can go back into the city if you need her right now.” She pulls back and looks at me with wonder in her eyes.

  This is one of those times that I wish I could read her mind, I’m not sure if it’s my accepting her past making her look like that or my offer to take her to Frankie. If it’s the latter, I don’t know why she’s shocked I know how much they mean to each other, I’ll admit up until recently I was a little jealous because I wanted just a tiny amount of Lindsay’s attention. I’m not dumb enough to want to come between them, just to be included more.

  “Well, I have heard all day about how great your big meat is, so why don’t we have dinner here,” she jokes as I hug her. I know then that we’ll be okay and figure this out somehow. My girl is a survivor and a fighter. I’m hoping that now that she knows I don’t think she’s weak or a victim she’ll be willing to fight for us. We’ve known each other for ten years, I know just because I want us to we can’t instantly jump to marriage.

  11

  Lindsay

  “Ok whore, spill. I know from my spies that you left with Anthony on his bike. I also know it was four hours later before he dropped you off. Now did you guys decide to go to Atlantic City and play blackjack or did you go back to his house and play hide the salami?” I smack my head repeatedly on the desk in front of me as Frankie curls up in one of the chairs in my office.

  “By spies I’m assuming you mean his aunt Rose. I’m going to have a talk with Joe. He must not be doing his job if you’re this interested in my sex life.” I give up and save all my work and close my laptop. I knew Frankie would be coming to drag answers out of me at some point today, I can’t even blame her. I would and have done the same damn thing.

  “That’s unique coming from you, Miss Live Action Porno fan,” Frankie quips. I give up and start laughing hysterically. I may have walked in on Frankie and Joe more than once, and I may have taken a few minutes to enjoy the sight before I left. What can I say my hetero lifemate is pretty, and Joe is a hottie, watching the two of them together is beautiful.

  “Shut up, bitch. We didn’t play hide the salami. We went to his place, by the way it’s amazingly gorgeous. Now that you’re better riding in vehicles you need to have Joe take you out. You’ll want to live in his kitchen.” I get up and walk over to the couch I keep in the office for days when I just catch a short nap in the middle of the night, instead of sleeping like a normal person. Frankie joins me sitting on the opposite end we both turn sideways pulling our knees up so that we’re leaning on the back of the couch and facing each other.

  “I showed him my back and told him about growing up.” I close my eyes and lay my head on my knees. Frankie knows how much I hate talking about my past. People normally treat me differently after they know. They’re either very gentle with me because they’re worried I’m fragile, or they drift away from me like I’m contagious or something. It will kill me if Anthony does either of those, but s
o far he seems to be handling everything pretty well.

  “How did he take it?” Frankie asks as she starts to play with my hair. I hear her open and close the drawer on my side table and hear the metal ping noise that means she’s opened one of the containers of pomade I keep in there. I get sent all sorts of fun samples of stuff for me to keep or to give out to people that will help the companies with marketing. I smell ginger and know she must have grabbed one of the new water based pomades I haven’t used yet.

  “He took it pretty well. He actually went on, what for him is a bit of a rant about how strong I am and how it only makes him more impressed with me. We’ll see if he still feels the same after he has slept on it and is away from me. He offered to bring me to you which definitely earns him brownie points.” When I feel her hands dragging the pomade into my short hair, I go ahead and lift my head facing her. I wonder what she’s going to do with my hair this time, you would think with hair this short I could only put it in a couple of styles but Frankie is an artist in all things and works miracles with my hair.

  “Babe, I’ve known Anthony for almost twenty years. I’m pretty sure the man would cut off an arm before he did anything dickish that could hurt you. Despite the fact that he’s more likely to grunt or growl at people he’s a pretty enlightened man, just not so good at the talky-talky stuff.” She pulls back and tilts her head in an adorable fashion as she examines my hair. “Did you tell him you love him yet?”

  I jolt and pull back and start picking at my thumbnail before answering, “No one said anything about love. He just moved me from the friends list to the woman list, it’s way too early to even mention love. No, love’s off the table.”

  “Lindsay, stop. Come on Babe. Stop and look at me,” Frankie demands forcing me to look at her. “Is this a normal freak out or a panic freak out? You’re starting to hyperventilate.”