Yesterday at the grocery store he had begged her to buy him a package of little temporary tattoos.
And just this afternoon Melissa had caught her son getting ready to pee in the bushes.
Perfect.
The last thing Jett needed was to get attached to a man like him. Melissa’s spine had stiffened when she had first seen the Saints insignia inked onto the big man’s forearm. It wasn’t the club affiliation per se that bothered her. She didn’t buy into the all bikers are bad stereotype. But having been raised in a family who placed bets for a living, she had seen enough—she was no stranger to Sunday visiting days at County Correction.
And when it came to men like Crow, the danger didn’t come from the kind of man he was, but from where his priorities would lie. She knew first-hand what being a part of a brotherhood meant for guys like Crow.
And for guys like Jesse.
And what being a part of it meant for women like her, too.
Military wife or biker babe…love the man…love the life.
And pay the cost.
She had an American flag folded thirteen times and offered to her “by a grateful nation” to prove it.
No. Nothing good could come of getting attached.
Biker babe? Are we still talking about Jett here? Melissa blushed uncomfortably at the implication of her own thoughts.
***
“Hey, Mom. Look what I made,” Jett pushed through the door with Crow following closely behind him. He placed a wooden block into her hand.
Melissa felt her heart skip a beat when she saw an imperfect “M” had been created with nail heads on the board.
“I made it all by myself!” Jett beamed. Then he twisted his head around to look at Crow for approval.
Crow nodded to Jett then turned his eyes to Melissa. Though he didn't move and his expression didn't change, the air in the room suddenly crackled with heat so intense that Melissa had to resist the urge to fan herself.
She turned her attention to the little gift in her hand and inspected it thoroughly.
“What’s the M for?” she asked her son with a hint of mischief in her voice.
“Guess!” Jett played along.
“Marvelous? Monsters? Mud pies? Marvelous monsters making mud pies?”
Jett giggled and shook his head.
“No? Hmm.” Melissa turned the board over again.
“Marvelous monsters making mud pies in the middle of the Mississippi?” She asked with a thoughtful frown on her face. “Could that be it?”
Jett put his arms around her and shouted out gleefully. “It’s for Mom!”
“Well! How about that? Thank you, Jett. I'm going to put it right here on the windowsill.” Melissa smiled and caressed her son's hair.
Then Jett pulled away from her and looked at Crow, who was still standing in the doorway. The little boy pulled his mother down and whispered loudly into Melissa's ear, “Mom, you should thank Crow too because he helped me.”
Melissa threw a hesitant look in Crow’s general direction. “Thank you.”
“I need to do an inspection of the house at some point. Probably this week.” Crow spoke suddenly as he shifted his weight towards her.
“Inspection?”
The timer went off on the stove.
Crow watched her.
“Of the house?” Melissa grabbed the potholder off the counter and placed the hot dish on the stove.
Crow remained silent.
“This week?” she was sure she had squeaked out that last part.
“Lasagna?” Jett shouted out happily. “You made lasagna? You want to eat dinner with us? That’s okay right, Mom? If Crow eats dinner with us?”
“Jett, I am sure Mr. Mathison…”
“Name’s still Crow,” he interrupted. He leaned in closely, brushing against her side as he examined the noodle dish.
“Crow… has plans.” Melissa moved away from the counter and from him.
“I can’t remember the last time I had a plan.” He eyed her sardonically.
Before she could respond, Jett chimed in, “There's hamburger and sausage in it. Mom makes the sauce herself.”
“I’ll stay,” Crow said.
“You’ll stay?” Melissa repeated.
Crow’s gaze trailed over her face. Then he arched his brow and whispered in an amused conspiratorial tone to Jett, “Does your mom ever come up with her own words or does she just go around repeating everything everyone else says?”
Jett looked at his mother with thought and whispered back to Crow, “She ain’t much of a talker.”
“Isn’t.” Melissa corrected him automatically under her breath. Then she gave a small frown because her son’s words had hurt.
Jett read that look in her face and was immediately at his mother's side. He put his little hand in hers.
“It’s okay, Mamma.” Then he looked at Crow and said “She talks to me all the time, just not so much to other people.”
“I talk to Toni, and Mrs. Murphy, Jett. I talk…” Her voice trailed off and she wanted to disappear with it.
“But Toni’s your friend, Mom. And mostly she does all the talking anyway. And Mrs. Murphy’s your customer. You kind of have to talk to her.” Jett pointed out.
Melissa realized then just how small Jett must see their world. And she wondered when her six-year-old son had begun to feel like he had to make excuses for her.
“Jett, go wash up for dinner.”
She frowned as she saw her son look at Crow instead of her before he headed down the hallway. Crow responded to him with a reassuring wink.
“Smells good.” Crow turned to her.
“It… uh…uh… it’s my husband’s favorite.” Melissa answered. Then because it needed to be said, she added, “I should probably apologize for showing up at your house the other day unannounced and giving you the finger.”
“Probably?” Crow lifted an eyebrow.
“No, that’s pretty much a definite I guess.” Melissa sighed.
“And for what else?” Crow crossed his big arms across his chest.
Really?
“And… for calling you an…” she hesitated.
“Asshole," Crow offered.
“Yeah and that,” she added uncomfortably. “I don’t usually say those things out loud.”
The corners of his mouth lifted just a little and Melissa felt adrenaline shoot through her body. She needed to move him along.
“I hope Jett hasn’t been bothering you. School will be out soon. I’m going to send him to day camp. Just a few hours a week. He wants to play summer soccer. My dad and grandfather are probably going to take him on a fishing trip, too, for a week or so. He’ll be busy.” Melissa stopped to catch her breath.
Why was he still here?
She let out a small sound of alarm as the heat of Crow's calloused palm penetrated through the thin cotton of her T-shirt, pressing against the area right under her breasts.
“Stop.” Crow commanded her.
“Stop?” She moved back and he moved in, cornering her.
“Yeah, Melissa. Stop. Stop being so skittish, stop thinking so much, stop looking so damn lost all the time that even a six-year-old kid can tell.” Then his voice gentled, “Baby, just stop.”
Baby
“I don’t do that,” she defended herself even as she had to look away.
“You do,” he said in a soft tone.
When Melissa looked back at Crow she saw something fleeting cross his face.
Pity.
He was looking at her with pity.
Oh god. First her son, and now this guy.
“When was the last time you went out?” He leaned back away from her then and against the door jamb.
“Went out?” Melissa shook her head. “What are you talking about?”
“Went. Out. When was the last time you pulled your hair down from that goddamn ridiculous bun, wore something other those ratty, dark, depressing clothes, put on a smile and stepped out?”
Ridiculous
bun? Ratty, dark, depressing clothes? Who does that? Who barges into someone else’s house, invites themselves for dinner and throw insults at a person all in the span of a few minutes?
“Let make me something real clear here. You having a few conversations with my son doesn’t even come close to giving you the right to comment on the way we live. You don’t know us. You don’t know me,” Melissa shot back angrily. “We’re fine.”
Now Crow’s eyes glittered hard in response and assessed her in the most demeaning and thorough way possible. He took a slow sweep from the top of her messy head to the bottom of her scuffed sneakers.
“Fine? Yeah I can see that.” Crow’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “Guess that pity-party look you got going on probably still has some play. Me? I like to keep my shit a little more private, but you’re right. What the fuck do I know?”
Melissa’s mouth rounded to form a stunned O.
“Get out,” she said in quiet rage.
Crow held her eyes for a long minute before he pulled himself away from the door.
“This isn’t over, Melissa. Not even close.” Then he pinned her with another bold look. “Oh and, by the way, the word you were looking for is was.”
“What?” Melissa’s voice shook with anger.
“It was your husband’s favorite, not is. Past tense, baby. Your man’s dead, sweetheart. Gone for good. And you hiding from that is gonna fuck you up and, even worse, it’s gonna fuck up your kid.”
And then with a loud slam of the screen door, he was gone.
***
Now Melissa sat alone on a bench in the garden breathing in the cool darkness. She wondered what else life had in store for her besides a dead husband, a foul-mouthed landlord who presumed too much, and a son who seemed to think she had lost her ability to connect with the outside world.
Melissa unwound her hair and released a sigh as the heavy curls cascaded through her fingertips
That goddamn ridiculous bun…
Although she had tried to dismiss the mean, insulting and extremely hurtful things Crow had said to her, Melissa knew that his words held some truth. That whole thing about Jesse being dead and her needing to move on…nothing new there. She had heard that same refrain sung over and over again by people who had a hell of a lot more right to sing it than Crow. She wasn't going to let that keep her up at night.
However, the personal attack on her appearance was another matter.
That had hurt.
Melissa's mind wandered through her wardrobe and she realized that except for that damn black dress she had worn to the funeral, she had not bought herself anything new since Jesse had died. Without even consciously being aware of it, she’d been wearing the same three dark, dreary outfits over and over again—faded black, or gray or olive green T-shirts and jeans that she didn't quite fill out like she used to. Her version of widow's weeds she supposed.
Is that what I’m doing? Closing up and martyring myself? Would Jesse have wanted that? But then Melissa knew if she was going to open that door, the next question would have to be,
Would he have even noticed?
Because sometimes, despite his reassurances to the contrary, it had seemed to her that Jesse’s trips home had begun to be nothing more than an obligation. Melissa knew that she and Jesse had stopped being what they had once been long before their story ended.
But she had held fast to the dream.
When it all began they had loved each other so damn much that she simply couldn’t believe that it was gone for good. Over the years in order to maintain peace in the house and keep Jesse's mind clear to do his duty, Melissa had learned to hold her temper and her tongue.
Until the last time.
Melissa and Jesse had argued bitterly and continually during that last leave until the angry words were all that remained.
And then he had died.
That last argument haunted her. She relived those condemning words over and over and over again until they festered in her mind.
She had tried to take back those words. She had tried to make it right. She had fought beyond reason and hurt and her pride and had desperately tried to repair that damage.
But it had been too late.
The email that Melissa had begun penning to Jesse almost as soon as the door closed behind him remained unopened and unread. He had died before he could read her sad apology. Her husband had left this life bearing the weight of her thoughtless, selfish, angry words in his heart.
There were some acts in this world that were truly reprehensible.
And unforgivable.
Sending your husband off to war with hate in your heart, even for just a minute, had to be high on that list.
And Melissa despised herself for it.
She looked longingly at the bottle of wine now and thought about pouring herself just one more glass. She would have loved to let the chardonnay act as a shield against the nightmares that threatened her sanity on nights like this.
But she shoved the bottle aside. The day ahead was going to be hard enough without adding a hangover to it. Melissa had always been a lightweight when it came to drinking. Jesse had teased her about it often.
Jesse.
Melissa looked up into the inky night sky just in time to see a star shoot across the heavens. Her eyes softened and her heart skipped a beat at the beauty left by its blazing trail. She closed her eyes, tilted her head and blew out a kiss. Then with a sigh, Melissa corked up the bottle and headed back into the house.
Chapter 12
The next morning Crow glanced out the window to see Melissa and Jett walking down the driveway towards the school bus stop. Melissa had outfitted her son to the max in rain gear and Crow couldn’t help but shake his head. The kid was covered from head to toe in water-repellent plastic—a brightly colored kiddie umbrella, a neon green raincoat, a frog-head hat and dinosaur-printed boots. Crow could see Jett’s mouth moving at the usual non-stop rate while Melissa held his hand and nodded the way she usually did when she walked with him.
But there was something off with her today.
While Melissa had armed her son to the teeth against the light rain, she hadn't even bothered to put a jacket on. Usually, she was fully dressed whenever he saw her. This morning she was wearing pajama pants and a too-big hoodie. With a sad slope to her shoulders and a tilt to her head, Melissa had the look of someone who already had had a very long day. And the day had barely begun.
Concerned now, Crow watched as Melissa put Jett on the bus and stood looking down the road long after the bus had disappeared from view. Then she began to trudge back down the driveway, her flip flops splashing in the muddy tire ruts. Crow scrubbed a hand over his jaw when she didn’t even bother to avoid the puddles that she had steered Jett so carefully around just a few minutes earlier.
We’re fine.
Crow had woken up to find those words still heavy on his mind. He had gone to bed feeling like shit about what he had said to Melissa and he had woke up the same way. Starting an argument with her had been the farthest thing from his mind. He had even felt a quick burst of satisfaction when he saw how she had smiled at the little nail project.
And he had been hungry for a taste of whatever it was that smelled so good coming from that little kitchen of hers.
But instead of home-made, she fed him that you don’t know us crap.
Fucking straight he didn’t know her.
How the hell was he supposed to make that happen? Crow had experienced a lot in his life, but rejection from a woman was definitely not one of them.
And if Crow had any doubt about whether or not they were fine, it was gone the minute that Jett had jumped to his mother's side to comfort and reassure her. At six years old, the boy felt he had to take that on.
Nothing fine about that.
But still those words he threw at her were totally out of line.
He knew that saying those things, whether they were true or not, was a major dick move on his part.
&nbs
p; And now remorse had set in and he had a fleeting thought that he should go talk to her.
And maybe even apologize.
But the word sorry did not exactly roll easily off his tongue.
As the early morning thunder rolled and lightening split the sky, Crow made a decision. He went downstairs, grabbed his tools and headed next door.
Crow paused in front of the cottage's large picture window to see that Melissa had settled deeply into the sofa with her hands palming a steaming cup, the wet hoodie replaced with a tank top. Her shoulders were covered by the throw blanket that she kept on the back of her couch.
And she was laughing.
Or crying.
He couldn’t tell which.
When she pointed the remote to the television Crow looked past her to the screen.
What he saw filled him with an instant fury. What the hell was she doing?
Crow made his way to the front of the house and pounded loudly on the door. No goddamn answer. He waited for maybe a second and a half before he began banging again. Then again. Then finally in a rapid succession of pounds.
After what seemed like a million years, but was probably just over a minute, Crow finally heard the chain lock slide free. The creak of the door thundered loud in his ears as Melissa opened it just a fraction of an inch. When she saw him standing there, she groaned.
“What do you want?” She stood mostly behind the safety of the door. Her voice sounded hoarse and her eyes were red.
“Had some time this morning and thought I’d come over and look at that sink.” Crow shoved his foot in the door.
“Sink?” Melissa scowled at him and increased the pressure of the door against his foot.
“Yeah, Murphy told me you were having trouble with… uh…leaking pipes.”
“I’m not…. they’re not…” Melissa looked confused. “No leaks.”
“Mind if I come in and check?”
He pushed the door open and stepped in, causing her to stumble backward. Crow reached out to steady Melissa and stop her from falling.
“Yeah, I mind,” Melissa wrenched herself out of his grasp and moved to shut the door on him, but it was too late. Crow was already halfway into her living room.
Her eyes met his in an angry stand-off until Melissa abruptly surrendered out a heavy sigh. “The rain is getting my floor wet.”
Taming Crow (Hells Saints Motorcycle Club) Page 7
