by Meg Jackson
When Damon sat across from them, taking up a comical amount of space at the small table, they ordered a beer each. None of them seemed particularly eager to start the conversation, but Damon decided it would be a good way to start paying penance.
“Saw the news before I left,” he said, nodding to the waitress as she returned with their drinks. “You guys made the 6 o’clock.”
“Shit,” Cristov said, glancing at Kennick. “Names?”
“No,” Damon said, shaking his head. “Just ‘band of gypsies.’ And I don’t think the newscaster was buying it.”
Kennick cleared his throat and gave Damon the full story, the whole story, from Jenner’s call to buying the drugs and the guns to their getaway.
“What was with the gunshots?”
“We needed to make sure they had a reason to search the place,” Kennick explained. “Paid our good friend James to say that he saw Roper out there waving a gun around. And we got an alibi.”
Damon raised an eyebrow.
“We were at a strip joint all night,” Cristov piped up, looking slightly amused in spite of himself. “The girls weren’t too happy about that excuse, but the bartender at Jimmy Slick’s was very obliging.”
“Good. Clean,” Damon said, nodding and taking a sip of his beer. If he’d been a part of the planning, there wasn’t much he could have improved. “So it’s over?”
Kennick shrugged.
“As over as we can make it. You never know. They could pop right back, like weeds. But hopefully they see two for two as a pretty good reason to stay away.”
“Cost us a shitload of money, this whole deal,” Cristov grumbled. Damon glanced at his brother, his mouth screwed up to one side.
The kumpania was in good shape, financially. Much better shape than their choice of abode or thrifty ways would suggest. Their businesses brought in good money, they were savvy with saving and investing. There was always enough to provide for everyone and keep the communal pot loaded. And that didn’t even include the Volanis’ personal fortune, accrued over many years and generations of people who’d been pushed around – and saw wealth as a way to make sure they wouldn’t be pushed around anymore.
There wasn’t much he could say about the money that had been spent, so Damon turned back to Kennick.
“And Jenner?”
“I kept my word,” Kennick said, his voice gruff. “I got him out of there.”
“We’ll get him a lawyer,” Cristov said, less amused by this than he had been about the strip club. “If he plays nice and supports the story about Roper shooting up the joint, we might even get him a good one.”
“How about you, Damon?” Kennick asked, cutting to the quick. “You got any more loose threads?”
Damon swallowed, found it hard to meet Kennick’s eyes. He remembered how his brothers used to trust him. It hurt to be questioned like this. But he had done that to himself.
“Kind of,” he said.
“Kind of? That doesn’t cut it anymore,” Cristov snapped, his knuckles tight around his drink.
“I went to see him,” Damon said, not breaking Kennick’s stare.
“We know,” Kennick said. “Mina got his information for you.”
“I went to see him, and I got a video of him confessing to what he did. I don’t think it will mean anything to anyone. It’s probably not admissible evidence. But I’m going to take it to Providence, and I’m going to give my statement. That’s all I can do.”
“And it’s enough?” Kennick asked. Cristov was brooding, looking down at his pint. Damon shook his head.
“It’s not enough,” he admitted. “But it has to be. I have to let it be enough. I’m not going after him again.”
Silence lingered between the triad. Cristov glanced up at Damon, sucked in a breath of air.
“Is there anything else we need to know? Any more deep, dark secrets that weren’t worth sharing? Any other tea parties we’re gonna have to break up to save your ass?”
Damon saw the hurt in Cristov’s eyes. He shook his head again.
“I should have told you. I should have told you when it happened. I made a mistake. And I kept making it for twenty years.”
Cristov nodded absently, studying his brother. He looked tired, suddenly. Like all the energy it took to be mad at Damon was waning at last. His shoulders slumped and he leaned back.
“Well, you better not make mistakes like that again,” Cristov said. “Especially not if you’re going to be doing this thing with Tricia…”
At that, a devious sort of smirk crossed Cristov’s lips.
“You know, Ricky was about ready to kill you for putting me in this situation,” he went on. “If you do anything to put Tricia in harm’s way, she’ll be making baby food out of your spleen.”
“That’s disgusting, Cristov,” Kennick said, sneering and leaning away.
“I won’t,” Damon said, knowing that Cristov was joking but taking it seriously. “I’ll never put Tricia in danger. Again.”
She’d almost died for his sins once. He wasn’t going to let that happen again.
“So it’s serious, huh?” Kennick asked. Damon nodded.
“You know, Kingdom’s a damn small town, but we sure know how to make it smaller, don’t we?” Cristov said, smiling again. “Shit, can’t I have a girlfriend without my brothers marrying her sister and best friend?”
“I’m not married yet,” Damon pointed out, letting a grin spread over his own face.
“I had Kim first,” Kennick argued at the same time, their words meshing together. “Me and Kim’s the whole reason there’s a baby in your girl’s belly.”
“Actually, I think my extremely virile equipment is the reason there’s a baby in Ricky’s belly,” Cristov retorted, smiling over the top of his glass. Kennick groaned.
“Ugh,” Damon joined in, not wanting to have to think about his younger brother’s “extremely virile equipment.”
“Can you believe this guy is going to be responsible for raising another human being?” Kennick directed the question at Damon, gesturing to Cristov.
Cristov slapped Kennick’s hand away and leaned in slightly.
“The next rom baro, to be precise,” he said. Kennick blanched.
“Shit, I didn’t even think of that…” He turned to Damon again, looking horrified. “Someday, a little Cristov might be running the kumpania.”
“He’ll be great,” Damon said, looking at Cristov with a newfound and bittersweet pride. “We just have to make sure he doesn’t stick his head out of any car windows. That’s what messed this one up so bad…”
It happened so quickly that Damon couldn’t even figure out when it happened. One moment, he was looking at his brothers from far away. The next, he was back with them, back where he belonged. His brother’s banter faded slightly as he watched them; Kennick had waved for a round of shots, a belated celebration of Cristov’s big news.
Family forgives. Family accepts. Family will let you come home.
Maybe not all families, but Damon’s family.
And that was all that mattered.
46
While Damon was patching things up with his brothers, Tricia was catching up with her best friends. She and Damon had checked out of their hotel early and gotten a room in the same hotel as everyone else. Kim and Tricia were enjoying makeshift cocktails from the mini-fridge while Ricky downed an apple cider vinegar concoction that made Tricia gag from across the room.
“It’s good for me,” Ricky insisted, though she grimaced with each sip.
“Says who?” Kim challenged.
“The internet,” Ricky said. Tricia eyed her friend, who wasn’t showing yet. Ricky said she was two months in.
“Soon enough, you’re going to look like a watermelon with legs,” Tricia mused.
“Well, hopefully my new boobs come in before that,” Ricky said, rising and going to the mirror beside the bathroom. She pushed up from below on her meager chest, giving herself cleavage that would di
sappear as soon as she let go. She looked back at the girls with her eyebrows raised. “What do you think?”
“I don’t know, you might not like the back pain that comes with it,” Kim said, arching her own back. Tricia nodded her agreement.
“But I’m sure Cristov will appreciate it,” she said, waggling her eyebrows.
“Please,” Ricky said, flouncing back to sit on the bed. “Have you seen what boobs look like after breastfeeding? I’ll probably scare him off every time I take my shirt off…”
“Oh, come on,” Kim said, rolling her eyes. “Cristov would screw you if you were forty pounds overweight and had a lazy eye.”
“That’s true,” Ricky said, primly. She glanced over at Tricia, a wicked grin on her face. “So, what’s with you and the lug?”
Tricia smiled right back.
“He’s a good man,” she said. “Must run in the family.”
“Well, he might be good in some ways, but he can’t organize a bookshelf to save his life,” Ricky said. Tricia’s brow furrowed in confusion, and Kim shot Ricky a look.
“He is a good man,” Kim said, leaning in to Tricia. “Intense, though, right?”
“Kind of,” Tricia said. “But then again, he’s always making those jokes. It kind of takes the edge off.”
“If you can even call them jokes,” Ricky said. “He must have something else to take the edge off if you put up with those all the time…”
Kim stifled a giggle and Tricia threw a pillow at Ricky, feeling like she was slipping back into their lives – seamless, sure, and steady. The feeling was very welcome.
“I don’t know,” Tricia said, looking down into her drink and smiling. She shrugged. “I think I love him. I mean…I do. But that’s crazy, I’ve known him like five minutes…”
Kim put her hand up to stop Tricia’s sentence. “We know the drill, Trish. You can’t surprise us with what those boys can make you feel.”
“So you approve?” Tricia asked, the question seeming to come from nowhere. She hadn’t meant to ask it, hadn’t even thought that their approval would matter to her. But she had asked it, and now she waited with surprisingly bated breath for the response.
“Duh,” Ricky said. “You can date whoever you want as long as he makes you happy. And if the person you date happens to keep you close to us…well, that’s even better.”
Kim nodded along, and Tricia smiled. But that opened up a whole new issue. She had missed her friends, but she still didn’t quite feel prepared to go back to Kingdom. It had been so hard to be there, and this trip had proved to be more stressful than relaxing. She didn’t feel like she was in any better shape than she was when she left.
But her friends wanted her home; that much was clear. Kim must have noticed the bittersweet nature of her smile, because when she spoke again, her voice was soft.
“Why did you go with him, Trish?”
Tricia sighed. She knew why. She didn’t want to hurt the girls, though. They’d worked hard to make her homecoming pleasant.
“I didn’t feel good in Kingdom,” she said. “I loved being with you again, I missed you so much…but I just didn’t feel like I was home. I felt like I was a stranger in my own town. And it just felt…wrong.”
Ricky nodded.
“Do you feel like you can come home now?” she asked. Tricia looked up at her and shrugged.
“I don’t know – not…not really,” she admitted, worried about how her friends would react. To her surprise, though, Ricky just smiled.
“Well, whenever you do feel ready, we’ll be there,” she said, reaching out to cover Tricia’s hand with her own. “But you sure as hell better come back when this little womb-goblin decides it wants a taste of fresh air.”
Kim’s nose scrunched in horror.
“Womb goblin? Geeze, Ricky…”
Tricia collapsed into laughter, relieved and grateful all at the same time. It was all she needed to hear. Now, she just had to find out how to tell Damon…
Well, she could think of at least one way to soften that blow.
47
“How did it go?”
He heard Tricia’s voice call from the bathroom as the door shut behind him.
“Well,” he said. “Very…very well.”
“Oh, that’s so good,” she called.
She heard the clunk of keys hitting wood, pictured him emptying his pockets. She took one last look at herself in the mirror, turning, seeing herself the way he saw her. She knew she really shouldn’t tax his body more than it already was. He could still rip his stitches. But she planned on doing all the work, and she never had managed to repay him for that night in the tent. She smiled.
“Fuck,” he muttered as she walked out of the bathroom. She was naked, her skin slightly dewy, her hourglass figure on full display. The blush on her cheeks only made her more enticing as she stood in the doorway, leaning one hip against the frame, curves like a racetrack – and his heart was her very own racecar.
“That’s the plan,” she said, eyes lidded as she walked towards him. He was still standing in front of the little wooden hotel table, and as she approached he spread his arms out, wanting to feel her bare flesh, her feminine warmth. She slipped into his embrace but busied her hands at the bottom of his shirt, pulling upwards until he was bare-chested, his torso of tattoos and old scars and the bandage cutting across it all exposed to her lips.
She started to kiss his collarbone, her hands on his waist, her lips moving downward steadily. She could feel the stiffening of his spine, his blood pulsing; she skipped over the bandage, kneeling before him.
“Wait,” he said, holding her shoulders and looking down. “You don’t need to…”
“I want to,” she cooed, looking up at him. “I want to taste you too, Damon. Don’t be selfish.”
He bit back a smile, then a groan, as she undid the button of his jeans while licking down his taut stomach, dipping into his bellybutton and then following the light trail of hair downward. Her knees hit the floor as his jeans hit his ankles, and he was firm before her, throbbing and hard. She kissed his thighs, pulling down his boxers until he was fully unclothed.
She kept kissing all up his thighs and in the warm crook where his legs met while her hand traced the length of him, her fingernails only barely raking along the soft, silky flesh. She let her tongue trace up the side of his thigh to the base of his shaft, and then up the length of him to the swollen head. He shuddered as she licked back down, teasing him slowly, feeling the knots in his thighs as she held herself up against them.
“Tricia…” he moaned as she drew her tongue along the bottom, back to the head, where she just barely flicked her tongue, catching a drop of pre-cum from the tip. She licked her lips with it, leaned in and spread herself around him, feeling the throb of his desire as she sucked on the head of his cock, tracing her tongue around the rim and flicking over the tip. Her hand gripped the base of his cock, squeezing gently, then firmly, then gently again.
His hips jerked once, and she moved in closer, taking another inch of him into her mouth, letting her tongue bathe him in warmth and press against the veiny underside. She felt his hand fall to her head, burying itself in her hair, as she leaned in, taking him inch by inch, as far as it could go – which still left a few inches in her hand. She began to bob her head back and forth on his cock, using the slickness of her mouth to lubricate the base.
She moaned, tasting him all the way down her throat; she loved the sensation of him buried in her mouth, loved the way he tightened and groaned as she pressed him further back, until she was almost gagging on him. His hand on her scalp was steady but undemanding, guiding her speed as she fucked him between her lips, massaging him with her tongue, sliding him down her throat. She pulled back once to take a gasping breath, then impaled herself on him again, stroking him with her hand as she slid up and down.
Suddenly, his grip on her head increased, and looking up she saw that he was staring at her wild-eyed. He was always in control o
f himself…except for now. Because of her. Because of what she was doing to him. He held her head in place, his hips beginning to move against her; her pussy was already dripping desire as he began to fuck her mouth, taking what she’d offered him and making it his own. With another man, she might have felt used. With him, she felt aroused; she wanted it like this, with him in control, growling and primal and raw.
He fucked her throat with abandon, refusing to let her pull away, sliding his cock deep inside her until her nostrils flared and tears threatened her eyes. She gripped his thighs for support, tried to keep her tongue moving as he ravage his mouth. It was his to ravage. Her whole body was his to take, however he wanted. His movements sped up, became erratic and jerky; she could almost feel his balls churning as his arousal peaked. He shoved her head down, further than ever, and held her in place.
He groaned as he came, shooting warm jets into her throat, past her tongue; she swallowed desperately, loving the feel of his pleasure in her throat, the way his vein under his cock throbbed with each burst. She breathed ragged through her nose, taking it all until he pushed her away, the sensation too much for him. She licked her lips, smiling up at him; to her surprise, though, his eyes were still wild with desire, and he reached down and pulled her to her feet.
Spinning her around, he tugged her onto the wooden table and reached between her legs. Her surprise dissolved into pleasure as his fingers found her slit, wet and hot and ready for whatever he had to give her. He held his own cock in his hand; it was half-erect, and he began to stroke it.
“Not done with you,” he growled, moving in closer to whisper into her ear. His lips landed on her neck as his fingers plunged into her pussy.
“Be care…ohhh,” Tricia cried, her back arching violently as he pushed his fingers against her g-spot, curling them in the exact right spot to make her drip. She leaned back onto her hands, spreading her thighs wide for him. When she looked down out of the bottoms of her eyes, she saw that his dick was hardening again, and felt her body flush with excitement. But his fingers weren’t finished with her, either; he curled them again, pressing hard against her until her hips actually lifted off the table.
