With that cryptic comment, she walked inside and didn’t look back.
Izzy caught up to where I’d somehow frozen in the middle of the lawn and gestured to my house.
“I brought her lunch, it’s sitting in my front seat,” she said.
I nodded my head and turned back around, but not before taking one final look over my shoulder at where the woman had disappeared.
“Good,” I said. “Because all I have is chicken, brown rice, and veggies. I need to go to the store.”
Izzy made a gagging sound. “I need to start doing that again myself. I’m having trouble getting this baby weight off.”
“What baby weight?” I paused. “Your ass was always that big.”
Izzy gasped and socked me in the gut, but not hard enough to hurt.
“I can’t believe you just said that!” she screeched, a laugh following the outraged cry.
I grinned at her. “Yeah, that was mean. You walked right into it, though.”
She snorted. “I did.”
After dropping the baby carrier holding my newest niece, Allya, sleeping peacefully inside the front door, I walked back out to Izzy’s vehicle and opened the front door, pulling out the food that she’d brought with her for Astrid.
Apparently she thought me watching her for two hours required her needing food enough to last her throughout the weekend.
Hopefully she didn’t plan on leaving them with me that long.
I’d only agreed to two hours while Izzy went to her checkup.
Or whatever.
My mind had mentally checked out when she’d said ‘vagina’ and ‘birth control’ and ‘Rome’ in the same sentence.
My eyes automatically went to my neighbor’s house, as it was wont to do lately, and I nearly grinned when I saw her sitting on her front porch, looking innocent as hell.
She lifted her gaze and our eyes briefly met.
I knew exactly what was going to happen the minute that I went inside.
She was going to go lay in my hammock.
I’d noticed how she came home every single day, whether it be the middle of the night or the middle of the day, and immediately went to the hammock.
At first, I was thinking that she just sat in it to unwind, but the more I watched her, the more I realized that she was actually using it as a bed, and not a resting place for the moment.
She slept in it for hours.
And after the first couple of days of trying to run her off, I’d decided ‘fuck it’ and let her be.
And she’d ‘be’ for hours. Hours and hours, in fact.
I knew without a doubt that as long as it didn’t rain at all today, she’d be in it until early evening as she slept.
I also wondered why.
Was there a reason that she didn’t sleep inside? Was her husband a bad man? Was their marriage on the rocks?
I’d heard fighting over there yesterday, and the two had come out on the front porch on the way to their car. He’d been berating her for something that she’d done at work, and I’d secretly agreed with him.
Apparently, she’d helped subdue a combative patient and had gotten an elbow to the cheek for her trouble. He’d flat out told her that she was too small to be doing stupid stuff like that, and she’d reminded him that she was working and wasn’t allowed to make the decision ‘not to help.’
Whatever the problem had been, the thought of her being in trouble at work and not being able to handle the situation was extremely unsettling for me.
It was even more unsettling that I gave a shit.
I shouldn’t be paying so much attention to another man’s wife.
Which was why I practically yanked my gaze away from the eyes that were on my mind way too often and headed inside without another glance.
But did that stop me from peering out my kitchen window an hour later? No.
And the hour after that?
Again, no.
I was all too aware of exactly how long she was out there, and I wasn’t too happy about it.
Chapter 5
Of course, I speak my mind. My head would explode if I kept all this bitching to myself.
-Coffee Cup
Slate
“I’m not too sure what you want me to do,” I admitted to the man that had walked straight up to me and offered me a job.
He was also the father of my cute little married neighbor.
A cute little neighbor that had turned the sprinklers on the two of us.
Luckily Bayou had been at his bike getting some paperwork for me at the time, otherwise he’d have been just as wet as Max and I had been.
Max Tremaine. One of the co-owners of Free Custom Motorcycles.
Max also had a little side business going on that was much more lucrative—at least for everyone involved but them.
A few years ago when I’d been approached by Max—who’d visited me at the pen—I hadn’t known what to expect. Bayou had vouched for him, as had a few of my contacts. But it wasn’t until I really saw the difference that they made that I finally realized that Free was an organization that I really wouldn’t mind sticking my neck out for.
And sticking my neck out for them had happened quite a few times in the years that I’d been helping them.
It’d also cost me a few months extra time inside due to a little favor that I was working on for them.
I was happy to leave that joint—no doubt about it—but I was also kind of unsure about what I would be leaving behind.
Though, Max had assured me that Tray could take up the mantle where I’d left off.
And it wasn’t that I was doubting that the kid could do it. I was doubting that he’d stay alive while doing it.
“I want you to work with me,” he paused. “For me. Instead of with me. Whatever. It’s time that fresh eyes started working this business. And you have another member already here to help you situate yourself and find your place.”
He gestured at Hoax, who’d arrived not long after the sprinkler incident had happened.
I didn’t know Hoax well.
I knew Bayou. I knew Rome.
However, in my time on the inside, while apparently I’d been ‘patching in’ according to Bayou, I’d never seen the rest of the brotherhood.
Sure, I’d seen them after I got out.
There were times that they all met at a restaurant in town and we all shot the shit.
However, I wasn’t ‘in’ just yet.
Not all of them trusted me, and Hoax was one of them.
Though I had a feeling that was his military background, and his suspicious nature, coming out in him.
I honestly didn’t blame him, though.
I was an ex-con. I was also not the most approachable of men.
I didn’t go out of my way to make myself known to them, either.
I hadn’t really wanted to be in a motorcycle club.
But Bayou and Rome had pulled me into the fold, practically kicking and screaming, and I’d had no other choice but to go with the flow.
I’d yet to put the ‘cut’ on, either.
And in everything that I’d done, that was likely the most suspicious—at least to the MC brothers.
I was too used to being a loner, though.
It wasn’t like I could put that vest on and become a different person.
“Why me?” I asked.
Max rolled his eyes.
“You don’t think you did much, but you did,” Max began. “Two years you informed for us. Stuck your nose into business that you didn’t have to, and whether you want to think it or not, that was a big fucking deal. We know that it’s every man for himself in prison.”
I didn’t say anything to that.
“Just fucking take the job,” Hoax grumbled. “What’s it going to hurt? Not to mention, you sit on your ass all day and live off your dead fiancée’s money. That’s got to burn.”
I turned only my head and stared at the man.
His words angered me, but I’d
be damned if I allowed him to see that they did.
“I don’t live off my ex…dead fiancée’s money,” I informed him. “Though you might think that I do.”
“Then whose money are you living off of? Because you only got one really big cash payout in the last ten years, and it was that,” Hoax countered. “Your parents own a cleaning business. You were a cop. You also didn’t have enough time to accrue that much fuckin’ money. Trust me when I say I know how that works. You got the money somehow.”
He was right.
But it wasn’t my dead fiancée’s money. Not really.
I’d done a job…and I’d gotten paid for it.
Two very different things. Not that I would ever tell them where or how I got the money.
For all they needed to know, that money was my fiancée’s life insurance payout.
“But you are right, at least partially.” I sat back in my chair. “I do want a job. Which is why I got one at a bakery.”
That was a total lie.
Though, not really. My Abuela had asked me to work for her part-time. Not because she needed help but because she thought I was wasting away inside of my house.
Max groaned and sat back.
“You’re going to work at a bakery?” Max asked incredulously. “I offer you a job, that’s mostly inside, fielding calls, running background checks, and doing mostly the same work that you were doing at the police department, and you want to work for a bakery? We have benefits!”
My lips twitched.
“Actually, the bakery does have benefits. In the form of cookies and bread.” My mouth twitched. “It’s only part-time,” I soothed his outburst. “I’ll give you Monday, Thursday afternoons, and Fridays. If I like it, I’ll leave the bakery. If I don’t, then I’ll still have my job there.”
Max held out his hand. “Deal.”
***
A while later, we were seated at a corner booth in a Mexican food joint that looked like it was carved out of a hole in a wall.
Hoax rolled his eyes. “If he doesn’t want the job, why force him to take it? The benefits aren’t that good.”
Max flipped him off. “They’re better than nothing. Now, let’s eat.”
Hoax looked down at the chips and hot sauce.
I reached forward and grabbed a chip, piling on the hot sauce.
I nearly groaned when I ate it.
There were a few things that I’d missed, but chips and hot sauce? That was definitely one of the biggest ones.
And still, after three months and two weeks of being on the ‘outside,’ it still wasn’t enough.
I would inhale three of these small bowls of the shit before I’d even realized that I’d done it.
My eyes caught Hoax’s pained ones, and my brows rose.
“What’s wrong with you?” I asked curiously. “Are you on a diet?”
Hoax’s eyes flashed with anger. “No.”
“He can’t eat tex-mex or it makes him shit,” Max explained as he dug into his own hot sauce. “And since we’re heading to a job after this, he can’t eat it. We don’t have the luxury of forty-five minutes for him to sit on a toilet.”
My brows rose as I shoved another chip into my mouth.
“Crawfish does that to me,” I offered. “Sucks, because I love crawfish.”
Hoax made a face, then sat back and sucked on his water.
“We’re not taking any piss breaks, either,” Max said, eyeing how fast he was drinking the water.
Hoax finished his water, then set it on the table with a sharp clack.
“Why are you giving me shit today?” he asked.
Max narrowed his eyes.
“Sam got you and your buddy to cover for him. He’s gone fishing every fuckin’ day this week. Do you want to know what I’ve done? Work. I’ve fuckin’ worked. And when I finally find someone I trust enough to do my part of this job, you try to run him away because you’re being a little bitch. If you want him to be a part of the club, why don’t you ask him to be a part of the club instead of just assuming that he’s shafting y’all? The man just got out of prison. He’s spent every single day for the last how many ever fuckin’ years shitting next to someone. Is it a surprise that he wants to be alone?”
Damn.
Max really had hit that nail right on the head.
Hoax’s eyebrows went up.
“I’m not trying to get him not to take the job,” Hoax countered. “In fact, I would like him to take the job so I could stop listening to you whine like a baby.”
My lips twitched.
“And yeah, so I’m a little salty that he won’t come to club functions. That’s my shit to deal with, not yours. But we’ll get there. If you’re wondering why I’m having a bad day, it’s because my wife decided that she wanted to kick me out of the bed last night because I ‘move my toes too much.’” He sighed and brought his hands up to lace behind his head, displaying a new tattoo on his bicep. “Do you know how fuckin’ hard it is to not laugh at her weirdness?”
Max’s lips twitched as he reached for another chip.
“When Payton was pregnant with Harleigh,” he said. “She used to hate being touched on her lower back. When I used to walk next to her, that’s where my hand automatically went. One day, we were walking in the middle of the mall, and all of a sudden she just stopped and burst out crying. It took her fifteen minutes to stop, and all the time we were standing there, people were looking at me like I’d just called our relationship quits or something.”
My lips twitched.
“So you’re saying your daughter gets her dramatics from her mother?” I asked curiously. “Because this morning as I was leaving, I started my bike, which happened to be parked really close to the hammock. It woke her up, and she stomped into the house like I’d just started it in her bedroom and not next to the hammock that’s on my property that she refuses to stop using.”
Max chuckled.
“That would be my Harleigh Belle,” he said, shaking his head as a laugh kicked up the corners of his lips. “She was my pride and joy…still is, really. Her brother is great. Love that boy to death…but Harleigh is my baby girl. That’s why it kills me she’s already learned some lessons the hard way.”
I frowned. “What?”
“You didn’t know why she sleeps out there?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No. I just figured she was weird.”
Hoax snorted in laughter.
Max shook his head.
“Harleigh was in college when her roommate’s boyfriend decided to break into her room and nearly rape her while she was sleeping,” he explained. “Ever since, she has had a fear of sleeping alone. Honestly, I’m convinced that’s why she works nights. That way she can sleep during the day.”
Irrational anger started to course through me, all for a woman that wasn’t mine.
“What happened?” I asked, leaning away from the table of food and pinning the man with my eyes.
“Nothing really. Her best friend, Dre, walked in on him in the act. Dre had been home due to a stomach bug. Their roommate’s boyfriend hadn’t realized that he was there. Dre pulled him off of her and beat the absolute shit out of him,” Max said. “But ever since, Harleigh’s been traumatized. Scared of her own shadow.”
I could imagine.
Harleigh was a small girl.
It wouldn’t take much to overpower her.
Not much at all.
“Dre’s there,” I found myself saying.
Max shrugged. “Having Dre there helps, but she’s not willing to admit that she has a problem, so she pretty much just sleeps outside. Though that was something she’s done forever, so it doesn’t look as suspicious to everybody else. I know my baby girl, though.”
I felt my stomach clench.
Again.
I hated that.
I hated it even more that I could do nothing for her.
Nothing but allow her to sleep in the goddamn hammock.
“What happened
to the roommate’s boyfriend?” I found myself asking.
“Jail,” he answered. “He was one of the ones you informed on for us.”
I wish I’d known that while I was there. I would’ve fucked him up extra just for the pure joy of it.
Hoax muttered something similar, and we shared a knowing smile. “If I’d have only known…”
***
It was an hour later that I was walking into my Abuela’s bakery and being surprised for the second time that day.
It wasn’t because of the fact that my grandmother glared at me over her cookie display case, but because of the fact that none other than my pain in the ass neighbor was sitting in one of the booths in the far corner of the room.
“What are you doing here?” came from my grandmother.
I turned to her, ignoring my neighbor and how much I wanted to pull her into my arms, and turned to my grandmother.
“I’d like a couple of those,” I pointed at the cookies.
My grandmother huffed and pulled four out of the case, putting them onto a plate and handing it to me so hard that one of the cookies almost fell to the floor.
I caught it with my expert skills, then took a big enough bite that half the cookie was devoured.
“It’s good,” I muttered around a full mouth. “Though the bottom’s a little burnt.”
My grandmother huffed indignantly. “You lie.”
My lips twitched.
“You have any milk?” I asked.
My grandmother didn’t sell milk at the bakery. Something in which I’d been urging her to do for a while now.
I mean, who the hell would be able to eat something sweet and not want milk to chase it down with afterward?
However, she’d tried to sell milk before and it mostly ended up going bad, and she lost money on it.
Now she no longer sold the milk, but always kept some in the back for when I’d come.
Or used to.
The way she smiled slowly, she apparently still did.
“Thank you,” I grinned.
My grandmother couldn’t contain her smile.
“Go sit down while I grab you some,” she ordered.
I did as she asked, taking a seat clear across the room from where my wayward neighbor sat, and pulled my phone out of my pocket.
F-Bomb (The Bear Bottom Guardians MC Book 9) Page 5
