A Love So Hard (Aces High MC - Charleston Book 2)

by Christine Michelle

  I knew my jaw had to be hanging low. My heart, once again, kicked into overdrive. Did he really just compare me to a goddess? Sweet lord, baby Jesus. Maybe they were just pretty words, but I couldn’t deny how they made my tummy flip in on itself. The man was something else. That’s why I couldn’t turn him down. He took two fingers and placed them under my jaw and lifted smoothly as he grinned at me. Yeah, he knew how those words had affected me. I definitely wasn’t used to playing games so I still hadn’t learned how to school my features like some people were able to do.

  He moved in closer sitting with me on the porch once again so that our knees were now touching and he leaned his body into mine, making eye contact. “Will you go somewhere with me tonight?”

  It took me a moment to clear the emotion that was clogging my throat, but when I finally got myself under control it was to croak out one word. “Where?”

  “Well, Miss Lucy Carter, I’m planning on taking you out on a date.”

  “A date?” I asked, curious, because I’d never actually been on a real date with anyone. I guess the night I ran into Double-D at a party and he spent the rest of his time there with me before taking me home had been the closest I’d ever come. I had ‘gone out’ with a boy in high school, but that’s all it had been. Us hanging out at school together, talking on the phone, and saying we were dating. We had never actually made it on out on a real date, because my dad had been firm on the no dating before I turned 16 rule and that particular boy had not wanted to wait for me. That was part of the reason I was so stunned and disbelieving of what Double-D had told me about his lengthy wait.

  “Yes, a date. You know, where I come to your home, pick you up, take you to dinner, someplace special, and bring you back safe and sound.” He left it there but then grinned before he leaned in and stole a kiss. It had just been a playful peck at first, but then his the blue of his eyes turned absolutely molten and began to bleed into the black as he leaned back in and gently nipped at my bottom lip, forcing me to utter a quick, “Oh!” in surprise. That gave him exactly the opening he needed and he took it. His tongue swept in and I moaned as our tongues twined together in a crazy dance I wasn’t even sure I’d knew how to do. As with another dance we’d had though, Double-D took the lead and for him it was like second nature. For me, this new kind of dance was amazing and just as magical. All too soon he was pulling back and tucking loose strands of my hair back behind my ears.

  “There,” he managed to say, though it came out a little staggered as if he was having trouble catching his breath now too. “Now, there’s no pressure. We already got the first date kiss out of the way.”

  “I thought that was supposed to come last,” I managed to say to him.

  His confident grin was back. “Only for idiots who are too stupid to realize they don’t have to wait.” He laughed, seemingly at himself, then. “Or idiots like me who had to wait far too long for other reasons.”

  “I wish I had known,” I began, but he stopped me by once again placing a finger over my lips and tracing the seam there.

  “No regrets, Lucy. It was meant to be this way. Think about it. We were already getting close, and your age was a big deal at the time. Maybe not according to the law, but to your dad and to the laws of my club it was. Besides, this way you got to finish up some schooling.”

  That took me by surprise. “Did my dad tell you that?” He appeared taken aback a bit by the question and narrowed his eyes on me.

  “Why would your dad tell me that?”

  I gave him a duh look and then laughed when he didn’t seem to get it. “How else would you know that I finished up some schooling while I was away?”

  He leaned in and kissed my cheek before standing. “Lucy, I never went one day without thinking about you while you were gone. Did you really think I was going to watch you drive away and never check up on you?” He raised an arm up in there air, which I found humorous, as it looked like he was trying to get permission to ask a teacher a question in school. Then suddenly a thud came from his extended hand and he grinned down at me as he offered up the damn newspaper I’d been out here waiting on. “Here you are, sweetheart. Now, get inside. I have shit to go take care of this morning. I’ll be back around four to pick you up.”

  “Four?” I questioned. That seemed early.

  He chuckled as he started walking toward the curb. “Call me greedy, but I just got you back, and I want to spend all the time with you I can before I have to bring you back and drop you at your doorstep.”

  There went my heart again. Darn. I wasn’t sure I would survive a date with him much less if things went any further than that.

  I may not have been sure I would survive a date with Double-D, but that wasn’t going to stop me from going and appeasing my curiosity after all this time. My grandma had tried to convince me to date some of the boys I went to school with. That had been before she got so sick she didn’t have the energy to fight me on it anymore. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I wasn’t so crazy as to think that the little bit of nothing I had with Double-D had been so life altering that I’d stay a lonely cat lady my whole life in his memory. Forget that, especially after having believed the story Johnny had told me about him. The thing was, I had my first real taste of heartbreak with him. I don’t know why it had hurt so badly, and I couldn’t put words to it if I tried. There was just something about him. So, I chose to focus on school, caring for my grandma, and setting goals for myself instead of possibly falling for someone else. Besides, I loved being there to care for my grandma, but I didn’t love Florida. I wanted to go home, and I didn’t want the possibility of falling in love with someone to keep me forever in a place I didn’t think of as home.

  I had spent the first part of my day looking over the classified ads. There were plenty of places looking to hire Licensed Practical Nurses as well as a few oddball jobs in the medical field I might qualify for. I wasn’t super excited about any of it. When I had first applied to nursing school right out of high school I had been taking care of my grandma and was basically doing her at-home nurse’s job for her. It seemed like the thing to do at the time in order to better help my grandma since the medical community was too busy doing other things to help the aging woman. It had been my first realization that people didn’t always choose their careers based on the best the job had to offer. I always thought people in the medical profession were there because they genuinely wanted to help people. Maybe it was just a geriatric thing, but I noticed not many of them seemed to actually want to help the elderly. They were basically glorified babysitters until they died. It had been enough of a push for me to move in that direction, because I let my self-righteous indignation get the best of me.

  I had my degree now, and I wondered if I would end up being one of those people because I was dreading going to work in the medical field. I hadn’t been very passionate about the mechanical stuff my father had taught me, but I’d almost rather go be a mechanic than be the one stuck changing diapers, making beds, and well, those were excuses. I found out why those nurses seemed like they didn’t care. I’d grown attached to several of grandma’s friends and I’d lost three of them before I lost her. That was the part that bothered me.

  I was afraid of growing attached to patients only to watch them wither away. I was also afraid of being the person who didn’t have to get attached because I was so detached from the realities of my job. It had kept me in turmoil since before I left Florida. The alternative was to find something else that I could do, but I had no clue what that was. I still hadn’t found my passion. Maybe some people never did find theirs and they were doomed to a life of mediocrity as a result. I shivered thinking that it may just end up my fate. Then I let my grandma’s words wash over me. “You’re young. The only certainty in life is death. You have to take life by the horns, girl. Only you decide what your life will be like.” I remember her sweet smile as she went on to compare a person’s joy and contentment to the water in a well. “The minute you let oth
ers make decisions for you, your heart withers inside and your happiness well dries up. Make the choices. Feed the well. Do those things and I will never have to worry about you.”

  So, I was making at least one choice. It was one my grandma would probably be ecstatic about even though the rest of my family would hate it. It didn’t matter though. I was making the choice, and it was to wear the daring red dress on my date with Double-D and to hell with the fact that he might pick me up on his motorcycle. I’d just have to scandalize the southern belles when they saw my dress creep up my thighs as I straddled his bike, and his backside. I was 20-years-old now and tired of denying myself this part of life. I wanted to know what it felt like to let loose and have fun, but I also wanted to understand what it was like to be one of those couples I would see at the beach or on campus at school all the time. The reality of seeing those couples change over time hadn’t been lost on me. Just because they seemed happy in the moment didn’t mean it lasted, but knowing that I would see them happy again with someone else had actually eased my worries about dating a bit. People were capable of getting over a lost love. I would be too, and in the meantime I wanted to experience some of that happy.

  By the time 4 pm rolled around my belly was a jumble of nerves. My mother was mysteriously missing from the house and I wondered if that was my father’s doing. I had put on the red dress that clung from the top of my breasts where a slight push of cleavage was attempting to overflow and it continued to cling all the way to my waistline where it flared out dramatically coming to a halt just above my knees. It was the perfect dress for dancing in and I could just imagine the old school dances where your partner would spin you out and pull you back in making the hemline flair. I grinned at the thought as I checked myself out in the mirror. I wore red lipstick to match the dress even though it was a look I had never attempted before. I always thought that with my light blond hair and nearly gray-blue eyes – a color my grandmother had often referred to as stormy blue – it would wash me out somehow. In combination with the smoky look lining my eyes it added a dramatic flair that made everything pop. I didn’t have to add to the blush on my cheeks. The Florida sun had kissed my skin leaving behind a golden tan and the slightest hint of a burn still lingered across my cheeks and the bridge of my nose.

  The sun also meant my freckles had darkened, but I had always loved them so I didn’t care to hide them under a bunch of makeup. Instead I left the rest of my face bare. My breasts had grown a bit over the past couple years, but I was still just a full c-cup. However, the strapless push-up bra I was wearing under the dress probably made it seem I had moved up into the d-cup territory. I had a brief flash of guilt for that. What if the guy you were going out with was truly expecting those d-cup play toys and all he got were c-cups? Would he look at you and just shout, “nice try tiny tits, but I wanted breasts too big to cup in my hands!” I laughed at my own thoughts. I didn’t think so anyway. Men were men and they liked boobs. I didn’t think it much mattered what size they were unless they were trying to be vulgar buttholes with one another.

  It also shocked me to think of my body that way. I was still a virgin, having decided against dating while in school and caring for my grandma. Sure, there was a part of me that was ready to finally get some experience and feel the things other women had spoken about around me. I wanted to know if the things I’d read in my grandma’s romance books were true. Would I scream his name? More importantly, why would I scream his name? I’d given myself orgasms before. I wasn’t a nun, after all. The thing was, I’d never uttered more than a quiet whimper as I did so I definitely couldn’t relate to the screamers in the books I’d read. I was probably jumping the gun anyway. There was no way Double-D was going to want to do anything with me tonight. It was our first official date.

  I kept right on thinking that until I heard the knock on the door and went to answer it. The minute I swung the door open I heard two words that made me rethink exactly what Double-D might expect.

  “Holy fuck!”

  Quickly, his hands were wrapped around my arm and he was using his body to push me back into the house. “Sweetheart, I can’t take you out like that.”

  “What?” I cried out, affronted. “Why the heck not?” My initial shock was turning toward anger as he closed the door behind himself and then leaned back on it taking me in from head to toe.

  “Lucy, I cannot be responsible for how many men I have to kill tonight if I take you out looking like that. Jesus.” He scrubbed his hands down his face, closing his eyes as he did, as if he could wash away what he’d seen. When he reopened them he shook his head. “Please, for me, could you think about changing into something else?”

  I stomped my foot as my hands flew to my hips and my scowl let him know I was anything but pleased with that request. “I went out and spent money on this dress and this lipstick this morning. Now, you want me to change, because you don’t like it?” My voice had gone up even though I tried to keep the harpy-shrill tone my mother was known for out of it.

  “Sweetheart, it’s not that I don’t like it,” he explained as he launched himself off the door and put his hands in between my arms to grab my waistline just above where my hands were still perched on my hips. “I fuckin’ love it. You look amazing. Exquisite. You look like something I should never, in a million years, be allowed to touch. The problem isn’t me or what I think. The problem is going to be the line of men you’re going to leave waiting and hoping that I fuck shit up with you, because they’re all going to want their turn.”

  I was stunned stupid. Seriously, I had no clue how to respond to that. I thought he was exaggerating, first of all, because I looked good, but not lines of men waiting for him to screw up good. I found myself rolling my eyes at the thought.

  “Nope. You’re not going to do that,” he muttered. “Fine. You can be responsible for what happens when I take you out looking like that. It’s a good thing I brought my car though. No way would I put you on the back of my bike in that. Your dress would be nothing more than a trail behind us and you’d have everything on display in the wind.” I could have sworn he groaned as his eyes closed for a moment. I wondered if he was thinking about what that would look like.

  I glanced down and remembered my fanciful musings about dancing in it. He was probably right. The damn thing would be blown back so far everyone would know what color panties I was wearing. “Yeah, I didn’t think about that,” I admitted.

  “It’s fine, sweetheart.” He pulled me close and it was the first time I realized that he had definitely been affected by what I was wearing tonight. Obviously, he’d said he was, but the proof was definitely there in his pants and ready to attack. Suddenly, I was back to being nervous. I may have been ready to get over being a virgin and having no experiences, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to do it with the weapon he was hiding behind his zipper. Luckily we were moving back out of the house and towards his car as those thoughts assailed me and I didn’t think he would be any wiser about the fact that I had just visually molested his obvious package. I chuckled as he opened my door and I sat inside his Camaro with the red and black paint job. He couldn’t really be that large, right? I’d heard girlfriends tell me about how men always over-exaggerated their sizes. Maybe men’s briefs were like women’s bras and there was a little extra there to help size them up.

  “What’s so funny, pretty girl?” He asked, and it hadn’t been lost on me that he needed to adjust himself as he sat.

  “Nothing, just something I was thinking about earlier,” I mumbled.

  “So that means you’re not going to tell me?” He glanced over at me then, hands paused where he had been about to turn over the ignition. A fiery blush made it’s way up my neck and settled into my cheeks causing his grin to grow wider. “Ah, no need to tell me. You were just checking out the merchandise, huh?” I dipped my head so that my hair would cover my flaming embarrassment while he continued talking. “It’s a ’78 Z28. I know she’s pretty, though she has nothing on you.
All the girls want to ride in her, but sweetheart, you’re the only person with tits that’s ever sat in that seat.”

  At first I was completely confused, but then I turned just in time to see him laugh and wink at me. He was attempting to change the subject so I wouldn’t have to feel bad for checking out his package – and not the one we were sitting in – though it was beautiful. “I don’t blame you for ogling her. She packs a lot of muscle.

  “You’re impossible,” I tossed back. His plan had worked though. I was smiling instead of trying to hide behind my hair.

  “I meant it though. No one outside of Merc has ever ridden in this car before. I got it three years ago. Figured I’d need a project to keep me busy. She was a heap when I got her, but I’ve been fixing her up ever since.”

  That perked up my interest. “Merc?” I asked.

  “Friend. Brother,” was his answer as he tapped his chest over where his name would be if he had been wearing his kutte. Then I asked, “You did all the work yourself?”

  “Not all of it,” he explained looking slightly sheepish. “I don’t know shit about transmissions, so I had to get help with that.”

  “My dad?”

  “Yeah,” he admitted.

  “How did that go since you thought he sent me away?”

  “Not well at first, but we agreed to not mention you. I couldn’t ask questions and he wouldn’t answer them. Once we figured out neither one of us was going to disrespect those lines, he helped me get it fixed up.”

  “Good, because I like it a lot.” I beamed a giant smile at him as I ran my hand across the dash. “What did you name her?”

  It was his turn to blush, something I never thought I’d see on the tough-as-nails man. “LuLu,” he offered up so quietly I almost missed it.

  “What did you say?”

  “LuLu,” he finally stated louder. “I couldn’t have you to spend my time with and she was the only thing that took my mind off of you, so she got your name, because even she wasn’t powerful enough to get me to stop thinking about you completely. Not even when I really wished I could.”