by Chloe Cox
She knew it was a coincidence. Lots of people talked about dropping the ball when they screwed up. But coming from Gavin, it got inside her head and start bouncing around, messing up the place.
“What did you say?”
Gavin paused, his fork in the air, ready to demolish the rest of that key-lime pie.
“You’re not the only person to ever try to be something they’re not,” he said. “Never works, in the long run. They always screw up some other part of their lives.”
“Platitudes don’t work in real life either,” she said. “You can’t just do whatever you want when there are people who depend on you. That’s not how the world works.”
Gavin didn’t say anything. Just shrugged.
Infuriating.
“Tell me why Daniel Delavigne is trying to kill your club,” she said.
“No.”
“Aaron Black basically told me that he needs to see evidence that you’ve ‘changed’ before he supports Club Volare. How am I supposed to do that when I don’t know what you…?”
She’d almost said what you did.
Gavin wiped at his mouth with the back of his hand. He took his time. Olivia saw it for what it was—he was thinking.
When he spoke, his tone was final.
“It’s best to let the past stay where it belongs,” he said. “In the past.”
“And you decide what’s best?” she said. “That’s convenient.”
Gavin exhaled, his nostrils flaring.
At least she got to him the way he got to her.
They stared at each other as the sounds of the restaurant coming to life got louder, and closer. Olivia wanted to believe she would’ve won if the commotion that had been brewing at the front of the restaurant hadn’t finally made its way over to them and interrupted.
“Gavin, you dummy, I have been trying to call you,” Simone Delavigne said, all in a rush, and planted a hand firmly on their table, blocking Olivia. “And will you tell your friend Charlene that I am not the devil, and she should let me come and go as I please? Anyway, I’m going to bypass all the pleasantries and the lecture that you are undoubtedly about to give me to tell you that my daddy heard about your little party last night, he knows what it was for, and he’s calling an emergency session of the commission. He’s trying to vote you down right now.”
Sixteen
Gavin held the door for Olivia, so he saw it coming before she even opened her mouth.
“I’m coming with you,” she said.
“Nope,” Gavin said.
“Yup,” she said. She stood in front of Luke’s Chevy with her arms crossed. Wouldn’t have stopped him from backing out of the parking spot, but he understood the gesture.
“We don’t have time for this,” he said.
She said, “You want me stranded in public? Neither of us have cars right now, since you decided to return my rental, and you drove me here in this.”
Gavin scowled.
“Fair point,” he said. “But I don’t have to like it.”
He unlocked both doors and held hers open, more pissed off at himself than anyone else. Daniel Delavigne was a politician, and Gavin should have known to expect something like a surprise secret vote meant to screw over the club.
But involving Olivia would be crossing a line he’d promised himself he wouldn’t cross. He’d just told her to leave the past alone. Now he was about to drive her to it.
“Thank you,” Olivia said. She put her seat belt on, fast, but she wasn’t looking at him. She was pissed.
Damn it.
“Liv,” he said, “I told you I wouldn’t lie to you.”
She didn’t say anything.
He didn’t have time for this.
Someone pounded on the hood of Luke’s truck, and Gavin swung his gaze forward—Simone.
I’ll follow you! Simone mouthed.
Gavin yelled after her, but she was already trotting back to her own car in heels that shouldn’t have made it possible for her to move at any speed.
“Goddammit,” he said.
He started Luke’s truck and felt better as soon as the engine rumbled to life. Simone said the surprise meeting had started that morning and was scheduled to end at noon—he had about to ten minutes to beat that vote, or it might all be over for the club before it even got started. Gavin stared straight ahead and got the truck out on the open road, pushing the needle up into the red. He was frustrated, and that was a problem. It meant he was already more involved than he should have been.
“Liv, it ain’t personal,” he said.
“It’s none of my business,” Olivia said. She paused. “Except for the part where it’s harder to help the club if I don’t know why it’s in danger in the first place. But I know…I mean, I know it’s none of my business. Personally.”
He checked his blind spot, and stole a glance at Liv in the process. She was staring out the window, holding herself as far away from him as she could while in a moving vehicle.
Eight minutes.
Why was this so goddamn hard?
“It’s not just my past, Liv,” he said. “Dredging it up is only gonna hurt people who’ve already been hurt enough. I’m not doing it.”
He felt her look at him as he weaved between traffic, and felt his pulse tick up. He was going about eighty and kept his focus on the road, but there was something…
“I’m not going to let it mess with you, the club, or anyone else,” he said, his knuckles fading to white on the steering wheel.
“Is that why you asked for my help? To try to stay out of it?”
“Yup.”
“You want to know what Aaron Black told me?”
Every muscle in his body tensed.
“Figured you’d tell me if I needed to know.”
He could hear the slight smile in her voice. “He advised me to have an honest conversation with my Dom.”
Gavin took the exit as fast as he could.
“Good advice,” he said. “That scare you?”
“No. Should it?”
Gavin hit his first red light and slammed on the brakes. He threw his arm out between Olivia and the dash, across her chest. Unnecessary—she wore a seatbelt. Her skin was warm where he touched her, and there was a bead of sweat between her breasts, where her white dress scooped down low.
It was too easy to forget himself when he was touching her. He moved his arm, found the gearshift.
Looked at her.
“I was a dumbass when I was young. I didn’t know there were some things I wasn’t any good at.”
Olivia bit her lip to keep from smiling, and it didn’t work.
“You? Arrogant?” she said.
Gavin grinned. The light changed. He peeled the hell out of there.
“Good to see you smile.”
“You don’t get off that easy,” she said. “What did you suck at?”
“I’m a great Dom,” he said, taking the last turn down Period Street towards city hall. “But I’m a bad boyfriend.”
“And yet you never lie?”
“Nope.”
“And—”
Gavin brought the truck to a skidding stop.
“It stays buried,” he said. “You respect that, or we’re done.”
The way she looked at him did something to him. She wasn’t disappointed or mad; she didn’t look like she thought it was just a challenge. She looked worried.
“Ok,” she said.
“Ok?”
Olivia nodded. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…” She looked down at her hands for a second. “I know what that’s like,” she said softly.
Gavin stared. He forgot about the clock on the dash.
Olivia looked up, and smiled. “Holy crap, that convo is so much easier when it’s not with an actual boyfriend. I mean, not that it’s even no strings attached, obviously, but…”
“Lower stakes, more honesty,” he said.
Olivia leaned back in her seat, looking at him and smiling slightly. “Yea
h,” she said.
Then she looked at the dash.
“Gavin!”
He ripped the keys out of the ignition and tossed them in Olivia’s lap.
“Wait,” she said. “I’m coming—”
“No,” he said, with the full force of his voice. Shit. He hadn’t meant to startle her. “Delavigne doesn’t play by the rules with people like me, and I’m about to go trespass the hell out of an official government function. You are not gonna have any part of what he’s likely to do in response.”
“But—”
“Non-negotiable,” he said. They locked eyes. “You will not spend a night in jail for this. That is a goddamn order, Liv.”
Funny thing was, after last night, he half expected her to listen to every word he said, and then do the exact opposite.
Ok, well, first things first. I have to move the truck.
Gavin had practically stopped in the middle of the street to make his point, then he’d run off on foot. So now Olivia was looking for the freaking parking lot in a giant truck that did not belong to her, still in the grip of that tingling warmth that washed over her whenever Gavin used that voice, and still thinking about the look she’d seen on his face.
He’d felt something.
And he was totally going to screw this up. Politics required the ability to be subtle, and Gavin was going to charge in there like King Kong. Meanwhile, dramatically appealing to emotion in monologue form was literally part of her job description.
And damn it, it was Olivia’s decision if she was going to risk spending the night in jail. So why was she still sitting in this giant truck covered in dry shampoo?
Why am I so afraid to just…
Her phone rang, and she actually yelped.
“Jack!” she said, leaning back into the seat. “Oh my God, you scared me.”
“What’s the deal, goober?”
“You called me,” she smiled. “But I’m going to have tuition transferred by the end of the week, ok? So don’t worry about it. I’ve just been busy.”
“Yeeeeaah, that’s not what I’m calling about,” Jack said.
He sounded good. He sounded healthy.
“Oh, also, tell Dad I’ll have the last loan payment soon,” Olivia said. “Not like, super soon, but I think it’ll be ok. How’s the shop?”
“Liv.”
She sighed.
“First, tell Dad yourself,” Jack said.
Not going to happen.
“Second, are you kidding me?”
“It’s not my favorite topic to talk about with my little brother, Jack,” Olivia said. “Or with anyone, to be honest.”
Olivia rubbed at her forehead. She had been dreading this. Brandon had been a great big brother to Jack, and that meant so, so much, given their family situation. And now it seemed like none of it had been real, and Jack was just collateral damage. And it felt, somehow, like that was her fault too.
“Are you ok?” Jack asked.
Olivia smiled. “Yeah. I will be. I just…I hope Brandon’s ok, too, you know?”
There was a pause.
Then her brother said, “He is ok, Liv.”
“Jack, you know you can’t believe the internet about stuff like this,” Olivia said, smiling.
Her brother didn’t say anything.
And then the other shoe dropped.
Into the bottomless pit that had just opened up in her stomach.
Olivia said, “You’ve talked to him, haven’t you?”
“Yeah, a couple times. He’s ok. I mean, he’s not great, obviously, but he’s ok. So don’t worry about that.”
Olivia closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the headrest. She wasn’t sure what to feel. But she was pretty sure it was about to be terrible.
“But you’ve talked to him?”
“Yeah. I just got hold of him first is all, Liv,” Jack said. “Don’t take it personally.”
Her sweet, dumb brother thought she was upset with him?
She thought about the last time she’d tried to call Brandon. It had been the day after he’d been outed, on the way to Charlie’s. And then all the many, many times before that, each and every one of them ignored.
In an instant, all the humiliation and hurt from getting dumped came back in one sharp, focused point right in the middle of her chest. She hadn’t even realized how much easier it had been over the past few days, being occupied with Gavin and the club, until she got nailed with it all over again.
And then she thought, Screw this.
Brandon got to do whatever he wanted, and he was ok, while she was trapped in this truck trying to save a club she wasn’t brave enough to join, a career she didn’t really want, and a family business she hadn’t seen in ten years, and all she got for it was the world’s worst case of blue…ovaries?
“This is bullshit,” she said.
“Hey—”
“Not you, goober,” she said. “Never you. You I love, for some crazy reason. And I’m really glad Brandon’s ok, and I hope you two can still…I mean you should still be friends. You know that’s ok, right? I’m actually really kinda happy about that.”
“Are you really ok?”
“I’m better than ok,” she said, and kicked open the door of the truck. “I just have somewhere I need to be.”
Seventeen
Gavin stared straight ahead. He didn’t trust himself to speak yet.
She had gone and done it. She’d pushed her way into that meeting and she’d said all the right things, and then right after that she’d said all the wrong things, and she’d messed with things that should never be messed with.
And it had worked.
“Gavin.”
Neither of them had gotten out of the car. They were just sitting in the club driveway, Gavin’s hands still on the wheel.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Gavin looked at her, and his Dom instincts kicked in all over again. Olivia was feeling too many things at once, too. But she’d been running on empty for a while now, and it showed. She was about ready to collapse if she didn’t get some release. It made him want to give it to her.
He snorted, and looked ahead again.
“I’m really, really sorry,” she said.
“No you’re not.”
“No, you never do think I have any idea what I’m talking about, do you?”
“I told you, specifically, to stay in the car. You do the exact opposite, you do worse than that, you crash a private meeting, and now you’re sorry? Bullshit. You did exactly what you wanted to do.”
He didn’t realize what he was saying until he’d said it, but damn, that was it. Olivia Cress had finally done exactly what she wanted to do.
That was an improvement, in its way.
He looked over at her again, perched in the passenger seat of Luke’s truck. She was squeezing the ‘oh shit’ handle up above, and her lips were pressed together tight. But she was flushed. Glowing. She looked fucking amazing.
Something had changed.
“Well, it worked, didn’t it?” she said.
He had to laugh.
It was true. Now they had a few more weeks, because Aaron Black had been impressed with Olivia’s speech. But that didn’t come free. She had no idea how much damage she’d caused.
“You don’t know everything,” Olivia said.
Couldn’t argue that.
He’d been sitting with whatever the hell it was he was feeling for a minute now, but what she’d just said made it come together. He’d made a mistake by letting himself get this involved with her in the first place, but then he’d thought he could trust her.
He wanted to trust her.
Which was way fucking worse.
Gavin exhaled. With that realization, he was fully under control again. Now he could deal with Olivia, the sub who had yet to submit.
We’ll see about that.
Stubborn, arrogant, bull-headed son of a…
Olivia stopped. She’d been trying
to think of the perfect retort to whatever condescending thing Gavin was about to say to her, but now she’d started to cool down. And that was because Gavin had been quiet for a long time.
That…was not what she expected.
She expected Gavin Colson to rake her over the coals. She expected him to march her out of there and…
What?
Olivia thought about what he’d done the last time she’d “broken a rule.” Stripped her. In public. Manhandled her. Brought her so thuddingly close to orgasm that she’d cried when she’d finally gone to bed and touched herself. Just the thought brought back the feel of his rough hands on her bare skin, of his scent on her body, of the way he’d…
But that was part of the game.
What had he called it? “Deliberately transgressing against the rules we negotiated?”
Yeah, I definitely did that.
Hell, that was half the reason she did it in the first place. Which meant Gavin Colson was right, again. Olivia tightened her grip on the strap above and looked to her left. Gavin’s hands were still on the steering wheel, but he’d loosened his grip, judging by the relaxed muscles in his forearms, the way his hands rested on the wheel. You’re looking at his hands again.
But there was something else. He looked…sad? Disappointed?
“Gavin, I really am…”
She stopped. Something about his face—he wasn’t just angry.
Was he hurt?
Oh my God, I am a jerk.
“So this isn’t an excuse, but I wasn’t thinking about you at all,” Olivia said. “Oh God, that sounds worse. Ok, so, you’d said you wanted me to stay here because you didn’t want me to get arrested, which for the record would have been totally bogus, because I am a grown adult who can decide when she wants to get arrested on my own, thank you very much,” she went on, taking a nice, big deep breath and hoping that she really did just see a smile flash across Gavin’s face, because what she had to say next was a big deal…
“But I didn’t realize you wanted me to stay out of it because…”
Gavin turned his head, and studied her. His eyes were bright, but unreadable. Olivia swallowed.
“Because you’d asked me to stay out of your past,” she finished. “I’m not that person. I respect people’s boundaries, and I keep my promises. Except, obviously, ten minutes ago, when I didn’t think. I just…I’m sorry.”
