I offer my brother a smile and go grab the girl.
*
“Don’t even ask me to wear a helmet.” Tatum gives me a look as she puts the coveralls on over her clothes.
“Oh trust me, I know you. I also know how you feel about others forcing their opinions on you. If you want to ride with no helmet, that’s up to you.” I reach over, zipping her up. “I’ll just be a little extra careful.”
Her blue eyes soften as she looks me up and down. “Thanks for not trying to clip my wings.”
“Never what I wanted to do, Tate. Never in a million years. All I wanted to do was tame you a little and keep some of your spirit for myself. There’s nothing in this world I want more than for you to spread your wings and be the person you want to be.” I take the chance to step into her personal space, cupping her chin in my palm.
“I’d love to share it with you, but I’m scared to,” she whispers. “Nobody’s ever wanted to share it before.”
“I’ll earn the right to share. I don’t expect you to give it freely.”
“I’ll work to earn the right to share in your dreams freely too, Remy. Don’t think I expect for you to give me something I don’t work for.”
The moment is heavier than I expected it to be, so to get us back on track, I hitch my chin to my bike.
“Your steel horse awaits, my lady.”
It doesn’t even take us a few tries to get on together. We get on the first try and fit together like a fucking glove, even with the extra material of her coveralls between us. Her arms fit tightly around my waist and before I start it up, I lean back. “You good and comfortable?”
“Yeah.” Her excitement is palpable in her voice, marked by the way she tightens her arms around me, interlocking her fingers. “Don’t be safe, Rem. Give me a thrill.”
This girl of mine – my girl – she’s all about pushing boundaries, riding edges, and the drop in your stomach that says you’ve had a good time. That’s what she wants, and I can give it to her. It’ll be my pleasure to give it to her, in my own way.
As we’re pulling out of Cash’s shop, it’s quitting time at Walker’s. Neither one of us can miss the way everyone walks out of the bays, hollers at us from across the street, and generally makes a big deal about Tatum being on the back of my bike. When I gun it, it’s not just to give her a thrill, but to get away from all the damn prying eyes.
She squeals as we turn onto Louisville Road, before turning beside the high school, taking her to Highway 526, and further out into the county. Going this way is like going on a roller coaster, up and down hills, around sharp curves. She wanted a thrill, and I’m giving it to her.
As we go around a particularly sharp turn, her nails dig into the leather of my jacket, her thighs tighten on the bike, and she scoots closer to me.
“Scared?” I yell back to her to be able to be heard over the rush of wind around us.
“Never with you,” she answers back. The trust in her voice could potentially be my undoing, but after where we started, I’ll take it.
Approaching the end of 526, I turn right onto Highway 185, taking us to the small community of Richardsville. As I slow to enter the small speck on a map, she leans close.
“Where are you taking me?”
“You’ll see, somewhere I’ve never taken anywhere else.”
Truthfully it’s been a while since I’ve been here, but I know because the club watches it, it’s exactly how I left it. As I pull up into a small gravel driveway, she makes a noise.
“What is this place?”
I’m trying to look at it through her eyes. Is she seeing what I see, what I look at with the pride I have, or is she seeing how small it is, how old? We come to a stop, I shut the bike off, and we sit here in silence for a few moments.
“When Cash took custody of me, he found this place and kind of fixed it up, so he’d be able to have a place to come by himself. We lived in a little two-bedroom apartment, and I’m sure, especially looking back, private time was pretty hard for him and Harper to come by. He didn’t know who owned it, and it had been abandoned when he started coming out here. When I got my degree, he showed me this place, and I liked it. A little something that would be mine if I wanted it. He encouraged me not to do what he did. He encouraged me to find the owner and buy it outright, do things the right way. So I did, and little by little I started fixing it up.” I give her the explanation I’ve never wanted to share with anyone else.
“Why don’t you stay here?”
I shrug. “Truth is, I hate living by myself. I don’t do well knowing other people aren’t around.”
“Why?”
She’s inquisitive about everything, and I wonder if we’re supposed to get into the parts of life that suck so early in our new relationship. Deciding better of it right now, I try to turn the conversation toward another topic. “Let’s go inside, it’s cold out here.”
“Whatever you wanna do.” She smiles, grabbing my hand in hers and allows me to drag her to the small front porch.
“Before we go in, I want you to be prepared. I’ve done a lot of work to it, but it’s super small. Think of it as a tiny house, but bigger.”
“Remy.” She leans in, kissing me on the cheek. “I don’t care. You don’t have to impress me, no matter how much you think you do. I promise.”
I wish I could believe her, but it’s hard. I grew up thinking my worth wasn’t the same as others, and it’s taken me a long time to believe even a small portion of that isn’t true. “I am who I am, Tate.”
Realization flares in her eyes. “The same way I am, huh?”
“Yeah.”
She wraps her arms around me. “Then I’ll try to be as careful with you as you try to be, and thank you for inviting me to a place that’s obviously so special to you. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of it.”
“There’s never anyone else I’ve wanted to be a part of it. A year ago, I would have done this, if given the time,” I explain to her. “I just had to have time to wrap my head around what you were beginning to mean to me. It was a shock, ya know?”
“To know I want you?”
It doesn’t escape me that she says want, not wanted. Maybe I haven’t fucked up beyond fixing it. My voice is husky, letting the vulnerability only she can give me, shine through. “That you’d grown the fuck up, and you knew what you wanted. You have to understand about me, Tate. I don’t have experience. Not with the relationship bullshit. I’ve never opened myself up to it. Fact is, I don’t know how to do it.”
She entwines our fingers. “We can figure it out together, Rem. I can be patient.”
“Can you?” I raise an eyebrow, letting a smartass grin slip through.
Embarrassment blankets her face. “Regardless of what happened last year, yes, I can be patient.”
“Then I’m willing to learn how to move from me and you to us, if you’re willing to.”
“Before we walk through that door, I want a promise from you, Rem.”
Eyebrows raised, I bite my lip. “I’m listening.”
“Don’t ever assume I’m too young, too sheltered, or too much of a brat for you to be honest with me. I may not know much about anything, but I do know honesty has to be number one. If I’ve learned anything from the couples we’re surrounded by – it’s that. Always be honest with me, even if it’s something you don’t want to tell me.”
“Only if you promise not to push if it’s hard for me to talk about. You asked me why I don’t live here by myself, and I’ll tell you the answer, but it’s hard for me to talk about.”
“I don’t want to cause you pain,” she argues.
“A lot of my life is painful, Tate, that’s just how it is. But I want to make new memories, replace all the old shit. And I want to do it with you. We can do this together, I know we can.”
“Then let’s go in there, you show me this house, and then we can talk. Sound good?”
Talking has always made me clam up, but with her, I find that
I might be looking forward to it. “Let’s do it.”
I unlock the door both figuratively and physically as I step across the threshold and enter the house. With the same move, I also let her into my heart, and I hope like hell I haven’t made the wrong decision.
CHAPTER TEN
Tatum
I don’t think I’ve ever been as excited in my life as I am right now. Remy letting me into any part of his life is a huge step in the right direction.
“This is it.” He hits the lights.
I’m amazed at what I see; he was right, it’s very small. From where I stand in the doorway, I can see the kitchen, the living room, which looks like it doubles as a bedroom, and a door off to the side, that I’m assuming is a bathroom. There’s a window air unit and a fireplace that I can’t wait for him to light.
“Let’s shut the door and get some heat going in this place. There’s the fireplace and a wall heater. The wall heater can be turned on remotely from the clubhouse if it gets too cold,” he explains as he ushers me inside. “I had busted pipes once, and I don’t want to mess with that shit again.”
“Can we light the fireplace?” I have visions of romantically lying in that bed with his arms wrapped around me, the fire crackling as we discuss the issues there are for us to deal with. Do I think that’s exactly what’s going to happen? No, but a girl can dream.
“Sure can, but let’s turn the wall heater on to take the chill off while we wait for the fire to catch up.”
I have a seat on the couch as I watch him turn the wall heater on and then squat in front of the fireplace, building a quick stack of logs and using fireplace matches to get it going. His eyebrows draw together, and he’s completely concentrating on the project at hand. There’s a sexy tilt to his head, and the way his jaw is set adds to the hotness of the situation. When his eyes drift up to mine, I’m embarrassed that he caught me watching. A knowing smile spreads across his face, and I love that I was able to put it there. He stands up, shrugging his jacket off and throwing it on the back of the couch. “It should warm up in here pretty quick, if you wanna take the coveralls off.”
Standing up, I fumble with the zipper, before I tug it down enough to get the arms off and slide the rest off my body. Those were a lot warmer than I realized as I run my hands up and down my arms.
“You cold?”
“A little, but it should be fine when the chill wears off.”
He grabs a blanket draped across the bed, comes over to me, has a seat on the couch, pulling the blanket around him, and opens his arms up so I can snuggle against his side. “Body heat will help keep us toasty.”
Closing my eyes, I wrap my arms around his waist and tuck in. Who knows when I’m going to get this chance again? That’s what I’m telling myself about this whole situation. If I don’t appreciate what I have, someone else will.
“How have you been doing?” Remy asks softly. “Tell me what’s been going on with you. I hear stuff through the club gossip, and I try to pay attention, but it’s not the same as hearing it from your lips.”
His interest warms me just as much as his body heat and the blanket. “You probably heard I did that semester at Western. It wasn’t my thing.” I shake my head. “Everybody was all about trying to go to frat parties.” I shiver at the memory. “Been there, done that, and never want to do it again.”
“Glad to hear it.”
I laugh, because I can imagine just how glad he is. “If it wasn’t that, they were getting ready to go out, get drunk, and find a guy to hook up with.”
“That didn’t appeal to you?”
I have to be totally honest with him. “My one try at that, Rem? Sucked as you know, you probably don’t know how much it sucked, but it was enough for me to know I never want to do it again. Next time it’s going to mean something – not only to me, but to the person I’m with.”
“I think that’s a good idea.” He quietly agrees, no judgment in his voice. “There’s one thing that’s bugged me since the whole incident.”
“Yeah?” We may as well talk about it, and get it out in the open. If it remains an elephant, it’ll smother us and we’ll never have a shot.
“Did he hurt you?” he clears his throat. “I wanted to ask you back then, and a lot since then, but it was so awkward and we were so pissed off at one another. Then I wondered if I even had the right to ask you. My heart and brain argued with each other that I lost the right the night you walked away from me, but then my heart would want to make sure you weren’t battered and bruised by the whole thing.” He shrugs. “I don’t know. If I’d been able to man up, I would have asked, and it’s always been something I’ve regretted.”
“He didn’t hurt me.” I put his mind at ease as best I can. “The act itself? Yeah, that hurt. I don’t think he gave two shits if I was ready or not, and I knew that going into it. There were no illusions on my part. Well, that’s a lie,” I amend. “After what you and I shared on the couch at the club party, I thought I’d feel something more than pain, but I just never adjusted to his size.” I dip my head, putting it on his shoulder. “There was none of the excitement, none of the arousal I’d had with you. Stupid me thought that any man could probably do that to me, not so much the case.” My voice is low as I admit a secret.
His sharp intake of breath is audible in the room. The only noise competing with us is the fire cracking, just like I’d hoped it would be. “While I’m sorry your first time was shit, it makes my chest want to puff out that you haven’t felt the way you feel about me with another man.”
I smack him lightly. “Not like I’ve tried a lot, Rem. I’ve been out on one date since last year, and it was a disaster. I’d pretty much given up and was ready to live with Addie the rest of my life.”
His laugh shakes the two of us. “How is living with Addie going?”
“Good,” I answer honestly. “Neither one of us know what the fuck we want to do with our lives, other than binge on Netflix. So right now, it’s working out well.”
“You’ll figure it out. College isn’t for everyone, it wasn’t for me, but I owed Cash. He worked his ass off for me to have that option, and I couldn’t disappoint him.”
“You’re a good brother.” She grabs my hand in hers and traces the lines of my palm.
“He’s a great brother. He took care of me when no one else would.” I realize now that our friendship before was a little on the superficial side, that while I called her one of my best friends, I didn’t trust her with shit. I didn’t allow myself to open up to her, didn’t let her understand the fucked-up situations I’d been in, or give her any emotion that was truly real. This time I’m giving her all of it.
“Does this have to do with why you don’t like being alone?” she questions softly. “I don’t want to push you, but if you want to talk about it, we can.”
“You told me about something that was less than pleasurable for you. I can tell you something that’s less than perfect about my life.” He taps my hip, motioning for me to get up. When I do, he lies down on the couch and opens his arms for me. “But when I talk about this, I want to be comfortable, and I can’t be comfortable looking in your eyes, having to face you.”
Those words break my heart. They give me an insight to a less than confident Remy, and probably the kid he was. He’s turned into an amazing man, and I’ll make it my mission to prove it to him. I stretch myself out on top of him. Wrapping my arms around his waist, I rest my cheek on his chest. “Whenever you’re ready to talk, I’m ready to listen. We can lie here all night if you need to.”
“Sounds good to me.” He uses his fingers to push my hair back from my forehead. When he snags a tangle, I hiss. My hair must be a mess from the ride.
“I probably look awful.” I lift my chin up to see his face. “I completely forgot about grabbing a brush.”
“No way,” he mumbles. “You’re beautiful no matter what.”
“Stop flattering me, you’re gonna give me a big head.”
“W
e don’t want to do that, Lord knows you already think highly enough of yourself.”
I pinch his stomach, kind of pissed there isn’t a huge amount of extra skin for me to pinch.
“Ouch, that fuckin’ hurt.”
“Just remember,” I say as I open and close my fingers, “I got good pinchers.”
“Duly fuckin’ noted,” he says as he captures my fingers in his.
For the longest time we lay there, and I’m almost lulled to sleep by the beat of his heart, the cadence of his breathing, and the peace I have being around him. Just as I’ve closed my eyes, his deep, quiet voice pulls me back.
“When I was little, it was up in the air if Cash and I would have things.” He starts, almost as if he’s unsure of what he’s saying. “And when I say things, I mean necessities. Cash ran the Trail, which was a race for money down Louisville Road, for us to have food. Sometimes he kept the money and paid bills himself, other times he gave the money to Mom. He learned pretty quickly not to do that. She’d use the money on her flavor of the minute, or to get high, or drunk. She never thought about the two kids she had living under her roof.”
“You don’t have any good memories of her?”
“If I did, they’re gone. There were times in my life I know she got clean, I know she tried to do the right thing, but she lasted for all of a month. Something always took her off track. Whether it be a bill she couldn’t pay, an asthma attack for me, or something just not going her way. The worst would be when my dad would show back up. He and Cash hated each other, so Cash would make himself scarce, which left me alone with the two of them.”
His tone is breaking my heart, and I can sense it’s getting more difficult to talk. “Rem, you don’t have to tell me everything tonight.”
It’s almost as if he doesn’t hear me. “It was easier when I made myself invisible. If they couldn’t see me, then I wouldn’t be a target. Even in my room, I wasn’t safe. It wasn’t until I started locking myself in my closet that they forgot about me. But the darkness?” He shakes his head, seeming to try to rid himself of the memories. “I hated it. It scared the fuck out of me. It was my safety, but at the same time, my biggest fear. I learned how to deal with it, but my asthma got worse. Cash became of age, and he got custody of me.”
Hurricane Page 7
