by Nina Levine
I’d spent the day going over everything that happened with Hyde the night before. My heart warred with my head yet again, and while I felt uncertain about what to do, I knew deep in my gut exactly what I would do.
I’d keep seeing him. He’d worked his way that far into my heart already. But he’d have to step his game up, that was for sure.
Paperwork called my name that afternoon, but the front door bell tinkling dragged me back out to the front of the shop. I slowed when I saw Hyde standing near the front counter holding a tape measure.
Closing the distance between us, I nodded at the tape measure and said, “What’s that for, tiger?”
He didn’t miss my intent when I called him tiger. It was my way of letting him know I’d softened my stance since last night. We’d talk it over later, but for now, we could move forward knowing where we stood.
Jerking his chin, he said, “I’ve come to measure the space you want converted for this waxing room of yours.”
Surprise flooded me. I hadn’t seen that coming. Placing my hand on my hip, I cocked my head to the side. “You’re good with a hammer and nails?”
A sexy grin spread across his face. “I’m good with my hands, full stop. Anything you need doing, I’ve got it covered.”
“Mmm, the cost of the building supplies is a little out of my reach at the moment, but I’d be happy to put your hands to work in other ways.”
His arm slid around my waist so he could pull me close. “I’ve got contacts in the building industry. How about you let me worry about the cost for now?”
“No, I don’t ever let men pay my way.”
“I figured that already. That’s why I said for now. When you’ve got cash coming in from the waxing business, you can pay me back then.”
Every independent gene of mine wanted to say no, but the businesswoman in me knew this was a good deal. My independent side tried to win the argument, but she lost badly. That could also have had something to do with the horny side of me wanting Hyde spending time working in my shop. Possibly with his shirt off. Definitely with those arms of his on display.
“Okay, yes.” I pointed my finger at him. “But you agree to take my money, without argument, when the time comes, or I’m taking that yes back.”
He chuckled and dropped a kiss to my lips. “Deal.”
“And Hyde?”
“Yeah.”
“We’re going to talk about last night. Preferably tonight if you’re free.”
His mouth brushed my ear when he said, “You trying to boss me, sugar?”
“Damn right I am.”
His eyes met mine, and I couldn’t miss the earnestness there. “Tonight is blocked off for you.”
The fact he took this so seriously made me feel like I’d made the right decision. “Good. If you’re lucky, I’ll cook you dinner.”
Lines formed around his eyes as he smiled. That smile morphed into a cheeky grin when he said, “I like a woman who knows her place is in the kitchen.”
I smacked his chest. “You did not just say that to me!”
Laughing he said, “Calm down, red, I was just fucking with you.”
“You better have been. It’s gonna be a long night for you on my couch taking care of the hard-on I give you if you weren’t.”
“Sounds like any night I don’t spend with you,” he murmured as he let me go. “Now tell me where you want this room built.”
I’d been with Hyde for approximately two hours, and he’d managed to drive me almost to the point of not being able to hold myself back. No, scratch that. I’d been with him for exactly two hours and eleven minutes, and I was way past the point of not holding myself back.
We’d made it to my place after I closed up at the shop, and after putting steak in the microwave to defrost, I’d practically thrown myself at him. My intent for the night had been to talk to him first and then have sex, but the man was skilled at messing with my thoughts. Just by existing. It was maddening.
He dragged his mouth from mine and took hold of my arms that were around his neck. Pulling me off him, he said, “We need to talk first, sugar.”
My eyes widened. “You’re shitting me, aren’t you?”
His lips twitched. “I wish I was, but I’m not. I want nothing more than to fuck you right now, but it’s important to me that we discuss how you feel about last night.”
“Stop it.”
He frowned. “Stop what?”
“Stop saying all the right things. I was so mad at you last night, and I wanna keep feeling entitled to that, but you’re making it hard for that to happen.”
He continued to frown. “You wanna keep feeling mad at me?”
Ugh. Why couldn’t men just read women’s minds? Like, seriously, it would make life a whole lot easier. “No, but I feel so conflicted about you that it would be easier for me to feel like I was right to be mad.” I waved my hand at him. “You coming here and saying stuff like that, about it being important to you to talk about how I feel, well that makes it hard for me to hold onto those feelings of being right.” I mean, how often was it that a man actually wanted to discuss how I felt about the shit he’d done? Most men I dated wanted to move past their fuck-ups as fast as possible.
“You were right to feel mad, Roe. There’re no two ways about that. I don’t want to take that from you. But I do want to know you can move on from it. I’m not a fan of shit being thrown in my face later on in a relationship. We need to deal with this now and then never let it be rehashed in retaliation for something else.”
And that right there made me fall for him a little more. He may not have dated in years, but he certainly knew how to do relationships.
“I can move on from it, Hyde. I wasn’t sure last night because it had just happened, so I appreciated that you gave me the space I asked for.”
“You’re sure now?”
“I’m still concerned about your temper, but you said you would work on that, and I believe you. I’m not the kind of woman to hold a grudge so this won’t be thrown in your face every time we have an argument. And I know you’ll always fight for what you believe in. I just don’t want you to lose your temper over something like a guy checking out my tits or a guy calling me names.”
“I do fight for what I believe in, but I need you to understand exactly what that means.” The way he said that raised red flags, but he was right—I did need to know what I was dealing with here.
“Okay, tell me.”
He watched me with an intensity that showed how serious he was about this conversation. “There will be days I come home from club work with black eyes or broken ribs or bloody clothes. That, I can’t change. Not even for you. I won’t talk about that shit with you and I won’t ever discuss club business with you. We need to settle that before we even begin something. If you can live with that, I’ll work on my temper and do everything in my power not to knock the fuck out of any asshole who comes near you.”
I wasn’t dumb; I knew how bikers worked. What he said didn’t surprise me. What did surprise me, though, was my willingness to accept it. I couldn’t deny it—I wanted Hyde in my life. He desired me for exactly who I was, and he never made me feel like I needed to change myself for him, even when some of the things I said and did frustrated him. To find a man like that was everything as far as I was concerned. The rest could be worked on, but you could never change whether someone wanted you for you. They either did or they didn’t.
I placed my hand against his chest. “I can live with that.”
He watched me quietly for another few moments. I couldn’t read his thoughts, so I wasn’t sure what he would say or do next.
Finally he wrapped his hand around my wrist and moved it to his ass. “Now you can get back to blowing my mind with that mouth of yours.”
Chapter 28
Hyde
I stared at the bottle of whisky on my kitchen counter. I’d been staring at it for the last five minutes. My body screamed for it, but my head told me if I had a
ny chance at getting my shit together, I needed to empty the bottle down the sink. Memories of my mother drinking at six in the morning flashed in my mind. Her passed out on the couch in the afternoons when I’d come home from school. Her yelling at anyone who tried to help her. It was like a goddam assault with these fucking memories. They punched me in the gut and told me I’d become her.
I was an addict and a mean one at that.
Unscrewing the lid, I picked up the bottle and drained it down the sink. My hand shook a little, but I ignored that. I wasn’t a fucking alcoholic. I could live without this shit.
“You kicking your habit?”
I glanced up to find Charlie standing in the kitchen doorway. Her eyes were firmly on the bottle I held. There was no point denying I had a problem. She was a smart kid. “Yeah.”
She came closer, her eyes lifting to mine. “Good.”
We were like two fucking peas in a pod. Both unable to say anything else, but there was a tension or an emotion or some shit surrounding us that I knew we both felt by the way we silently watched the bottle empty.
My heart raced in my chest. I had to kick this fucking habit, if not for myself, for her. Screwing up my relationship with her the way my mother had with me was not something I wanted to do.
When every last drop had trickled from the bottle, I threw it in the bin. She nodded slowly when I found her eyes again. She then broke through the tension when she said, “That shit’ll kill you eventually.” They were the words I’d said to her about smoking.
I inhaled sharply and then let the breath out. “Yeah, it will,” I agreed. Not wanting to talk about this any longer, I said, “You want some eggs for breakfast?”
She sat on one of the stools at the counter. “We got any bacon left?”
We.
It fucking melted my cold heart. I’d lived my life without her in it for so long and hadn’t thought a moment like this would ever happen. My resolve to kick the whisky to the kerb strengthened.
Pulling the bacon from the fridge, I said, “Yeah. You want cheese in your eggs?” I’d watched her scrambling some eggs, and she’d loaded cheese and chives in there. “And chives?”
If I hadn’t been watching her so intently, I would have missed the look that ran across her face for a split second. She hadn’t expected me to know that. She didn’t acknowledge it, though. “And onion, please.”
That was possibly the first time she’d used her manners willingly with me. I’d pulled her up on it repeatedly, and she usually rolled her eyes and added a please or a thank you.
I reached for an onion. “You got it, sweetheart.”
She sat watching me in silence while I cooked. It wasn’t until I placed her eggs and bacon in front of her and pulled up the stool next to her that she said, “What time did you get in last night?”
Charlie had been here for almost two weeks and not once had she asked anything about my whereabouts. I always made sure to know what she had planned for each day, but she didn’t seem to care about anything I did. This was another first for her.
I poured sauce on my plate. “I just came home about an hour ago.” I’d stayed at Monroe’s after we’d cleared the air. She’d kept me awake until just after three. When I’d left her, she’d complained that she probably wouldn’t be able to walk today. Knowing my woman would think about me every minute of the day when she tried to walk or sit or do anything made me one happy asshole.
“So you’re seeing Monroe now?”
“Yeah.”
“I liked her.”
I glanced her way. “Her advice pay off with that little shit you’re dating?”
She rolled her eyes. “Why do you hate on him so much?”
“I don’t trust him.”
“You don’t even know him.”
I put my cutlery down and turned my body so I could face her. “A man doesn’t need to know a boy to see him for what he is, Charlie. You forget that I’ve been where he is now. I met your mother when I was sixteen and chased the shit out of her trying to get in her pants.”
Her eyes widened. “Oh God, I don’t need to know about your sex life with Mum.”
I hid the smile that provoked. “What I’m trying to say is that I know all the sixteen-year-old-male tricks. I know he’s trying to get in your pants, and I don’t fucking trust him not to hurt you.”
She sat with that for a beat and then said, “So you and Mum were together from sixteen?”
I frowned. “She never told you about us?”
“Not really. All she ever really said was that you guys got married at nineteen and had me ten months later. I tried to ask her stuff, but she always got sad whenever I mentioned you, so eventually I kinda stopped asking.”
I smiled as the memories came back. “I’d always seen your mum around school. She was the chick who used to tell teachers to fuck off, the girl who smoked down the back of the school, the one who the boys all wanted a shot at. She never looked twice at me until the day I involved myself in an argument she was having with one of the school bullies. She’d stood up for the kid he was roughing up. I knew she didn’t have a chance in hell of winning against him, so I stepped in and helped. Of course, that pissed her off, that I took over, but she at least knew my name after that.”
Charlie had stopped eating, too, and rested her elbows on the counter, chin in hands. She appeared to be enjoying this conversation. “You beat that bully up, didn’t you?”
I chuckled. “Not fully, but I had to show him that messing with Tenille was a bad idea.”
“So how long after that did you two get together?”
“She kept me hanging for a good month or so. Your mother was smart. By the time she finally said yes to a date with me, I was like a fucking puppy following her everywhere.”
“I can’t even imagine that about you.”
“Oh, you better fucking believe it. Tenille fucking owned me.”
She pushed off the counter and sat ramrod straight on her stool. “How could you leave her, then?” The question fell from her lips softly, almost as if she was scared to ask it.
This was the question I’d prepared for over the years. I’d lain awake countless nights unable to sleep, imagining having Charlie back in my life. I’d pictured our reunion, and this question had played in my mind like a broken record. But sitting face-to-face with my daughter and trying to express my reasons was far different from doing it in my mind.
“I’m not sure you’ll ever be able to understand this, but I did it to protect you both. I got myself into some bad shit and threats were made against our family.” I didn’t want to get into too many of the details with her. Hell, I didn’t want her to know that this shit went on in the world, but I had to give her something to help her grasp it.
She sat in silence, and I held my breath waiting for her response. Finally, she ran her fingers through her hair and said, “You’re right. I’m not sure I’ll ever understand that. Mostly because—does that stuff really happen in real life or just in the movies? But, I know you’re a biker, and I’m not clueless, so I know you’re into bad shit.” She paused. “I still don’t get how you could leave Mum if she owned you, though. And you left me, too.” Her voice wobbled on that last bit, fucking slaying me.
“Fuck, Charlie, adult shit doesn’t make sense half the fucking time. When you love someone the way I love you guys, you do anything to keep them safe. I’d rather you both be sad than dead.” When she didn’t say anything to that, I added, “I’ll always regret what happened back then. If I could take it all back and be the father you needed while you grew up, I would. But life doesn’t give you a second go at shit, so here we are, stuck with my choices in life. You’ll never know how happy I am to have you in my life again. I just hope you’ll give me a chance to show you that I can be a father.”
“It’s weird for me because I already have a dad.”
She still referred to Craig as Dad, and rationally I understood that, but the possessive side of me fucking hated it.
I figured she would always call him that, and I’d always be Aiden to her. I just had to find a way to make peace with that and allow her to have us in her life however she needed. Not how I needed.
I nodded. “I’ll always be grateful to him for what he’s done for you.” That, at least, was true. “But you need to know that I’m not going anywhere. I don’t care how long it takes you to accept me. I won’t be leaving again.”
She took a deep breath and then exhaled. This had to be a lot for her to process. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
She picked up her cutlery. “Yeah, okay, I get it. You’re not gonna stop bossing me around. But just so you know, it’s hard enough having two parents telling me what to do. If I’ve gotta put up with you, too, I’m gonna need something in return. Like balayage or some shit.”
“Yeah, good try, sweetheart. You think I don’t value my balls? Your mother would fucking kill me if I paid for that.”
“Ugh. Well, you’re gonna have to come up with something. I’m not down with having three of you all over my shit unless I get stuff out of it.”
My kid was the fucking shit. I couldn’t have asked for a better one.
“What the fuck is balayage anyway? It’s a weird fucking name to call a hair colour.”
She rolled her eyes at me. “Oh, Aiden, you have so much to learn.”
Chapter 29
Hyde
I arrived at the club an hour later with the intent to talk King out of the plan he had for the day. Turned out his plan had already been altered. In a way none of us saw coming.
Marx had stumbled into the clubhouse an hour or so before me, almost unconscious. He’d taken a severe beating before he arrived and had lost consciousness soon after arriving. Our doctor was with him while King paced his office.
