The Neighborhood Series (The Neighborhoood)

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The Neighborhood Series (The Neighborhoood) Page 32

by Tarrah Anders


  I am starving, just for her.

  And she tastes absolutely delicious.

  She moans loudly, threads her fingers into my hair and pulls my head off of her as much as she can manage.

  “I need you; I want you, I can’t wait,” she pants.

  I move up her body and kiss her torso as I pull my boxers off then I stop instantly.

  “Fuck!” I expel as I lean my forehead against her shoulder.

  With her hands caressing my shoulder blade, she asks, “what?”

  “I don’t have a condom. Fuck!” I say into her skin.

  “My shorts, back pocket,” she directs with a flick of her chin.

  “A little Girl Scout, are you?” I lean up on my hands and look at her with a smile to which she just shrugs.

  I make quick with finding her shorts and in her back pocket are two condoms. I silently thank my lucky stars and rip off one square, begin to sheathe myself, then return to the space between her legs.

  “Are you sure about this?” I ask, hoping that she doesn’t turn this moment down.

  “Every night that you came into the diner was foreplay, I’m dying here,” she responds.

  I listen to the woman, line my cock up with her entrance, then slowly slide into her. Inch by inch, my cock is swallowed by her warmth and everything feels right.

  I pull my hips back and thrust into her, while she grabs me by the hips, angles her pelvis and wraps her legs around my waist as her hips meet mine from underneath with each delicious thrust.

  Soft moans and erratic breaths echo through the night air, mixed with the sounds of nature underneath the dark starry sky as goosebumps erupt on our skin.

  I drive inside her, my cock buried deep in her delicious body, as she clings to me with each movement of my hips as I alternate between fast and slow.

  She tells me when she’s climaxing and I’m following immediately after. I look at her as she’s glowing in the aftermath of her orgasm while I’m slowly moving my hips, milking the remainder of my orgasm. Once the final shudders of pleasure leave my body, I pull out of her and roll over onto my back while I remove the condom.

  We are both out of breath and at the same time we turn out heads inward and look at one another.

  “Hi,” she says in a breath.

  “Hi,” I reply.

  “I wanna do that again,” she smiles while she rolls on top of me, leans down and then kisses me as she takes my cock in her hand and strokes me until I’m hard again.

  I think I can really get used to living in Mercy.

  I sit on a barstool at The Neighborhood Bar on Sunday night, waiting for the evening shift. I was biding my time at the bar while having a beer before dinner.

  Wyatt pulls up a barstool beside me and signals for a beer himself.

  “Hey man, I feel like all we do is work together, and never really get a chance to actually talk,” Wyatt says.

  “You wanna paint my nails, bro?” I say laughing.

  “Only if you have black, wait no. Mags won’t like that,” he shakes his head.

  “Pussy.”

  “Have you seen my woman? She may look all nice and sweet, but she’s aggressive and dirty as fuck, man.”

  “Don’t recall if we’ve met, if she’s so amazing, where is she tonight?”

  “She’s meeting me here, stick around for a bit, it’ll be some special shit.” Wyatt takes a sip of his beer.

  “What, are you going to propose to her or something?” I joke, but when Wyatt doesn’t reply back to me, I swing my gaze to him. “Shit, you are, aren’t you? I’m sorry, man. I wasn’t meaning to make fun of you.”

  “Nah, don’t worry about it. But yeah. She is coming in from the city after working all day, to meet me here.” Wyatt replies.

  “So, you’re proposing here?” I ask.

  “I am. I met her out front of this bar, she came onto me in these seats, and so this place – has given me a lot. It gave me friends and family, a woman, and a job where I was treated like a person and not just a piece of shit.”

  “That’s cool man, I’m glad. So, what time is she coming?” I ask, just as the front door opens and in walks a beauty whose eyes zero in on the man beside me and it’s clear that she sees no one else.

  She walks up to him, wraps her arms around his neck, and lays a kiss on his cheek. They’re complete opposites, she’s clean cut looking, something out of a 1950’s pin up and he’s tatted up with slicked back hair and looks like trouble. But together, they are the perfect pair.

  They complement one another and I smile to myself thinking how similar his situation is to mine. I look a certain way, people assume things just because I wear leathers, ride a bike and apparently have a grimace on my face. But I’m not a bad guy.

  Wyatt turns to me and holds out his hand for me to shake.

  “Watch this,” he says pushing his woman off his lap and with one of his hands, he brings her to the center of the room and clears his throat.

  Chapter Eighty-Seven

  Wyatt’s throat clearing caught Noah’s attention and he whistles loudly and asks everyone in the establishment to ‘pipe down’.

  A song plays on the overhead speakers that I don’t recognize, but I can tell it means something to her when her eyes light up and she covers her mouth.

  “I wasn’t prepared for you when we met, but you made me see that together, we were worth it. And because of that, I have memories that overwrote my past. I have friends, family and a place to call home, which is wherever I am with you. I want to continue to make memories, build up our family and eventually make your mother love me.” The room laughs. “Maggie dearest, will you marry me and make me the happiest man in Mercy?”

  Still, with her hand over her mouth, she nods repeatedly while tears fall from her eyes. Wyatt and her embrace then she kisses him all over his face, leaving lipstick marks in her wake. When she is finished, he grabs her hand and places a ring on her finger. Again, she covers her mouth and pulls him into another hug. When they finally separate, Wyatt holds up their joined hands and shouts; “a round of drinks on the house!”

  I make my way to congratulate them, then leave the bar feeling optimistic. If he can turn his life around, and start anew – then so can I.

  I walk into the diner and immediately spot my girl. She turns her head and smiles while I walk over to my booth and take a seat. A moment later, Nydia walks up to my table, places her hand on my shoulder and then stands poised to take my order.

  “How was your day with your sister?” I ask.

  “It was good, I told her about you, and she said that she already knew about you,” she said strangely.

  “How’s that possible?” I ask.

  “Small town, people talk,” she shrugs.

  “So, does that mean we can bypass my meeting your parents?” I joke.

  “Hardly. So, how was the proposal?” she asks.

  “Okay, that happened minutes ago, news couldn’t have spread that quickly.”

  “I mean, Mercy is a small town, but no. Wyatt was in here earlier nervous as ever and blurted out his plan,” she says with a laugh.

  “He was cool as a cucumber and it was good. She cried, said yes and then planted kisses all over him.”

  “How sweet,” she smiles. “So, what are you in the mood for?”

  “You,” I wink.

  “Food, Cooper. What do you want to eat?”

  “Same answer,” I wink.

  “You jerk. I’ll just get you whatever is on special, I don’t know why I ask anymore,” she says shaking her head and retreating to the kitchen.

  The front door opens and I hear loud boots against the floor, giving me a strange inkling that I know who those boots belong to. When I see them out of the corner of my eye, I take a deep breath and wait for him to sit across from me.

  “Well, it took a damn long time to figure out just where the fuck you went, you didn’t leave much information. But here I am, and I think we need to have a conversation,” his gruff vo
ice says. He takes my glass of water and drinks the entirety, takes my napkin and wipes his mouth, leaving a trail of dirt.

  “What do we need to talk about?” I ask him.

  “You skipping town, and then suddenly all of our businesses are raided, and half of the club is behind bars. Convenient, wouldn’t you say so?”

  Chapter Eighty-Eight

  “I think that’s just a coincidence,” I tell the prez, “I checked out mentally as soon as Eddy died. You saw me everyday man, I barely even know the totality of what the club does.”

  “I think you know, you just ain’t letting on that you know. You’ve been with the club since your teens, you grew up with us and have seen us change. While you may not have known about everything that happened under your nose, you have always been involved. One hundred percent involved.”

  A chill runs across my skin, but before I could say anything, Nydia is right there at the end of the table.

  “What are you involved in, Coop?”

  “Nothing babe, I don’t even know what this is about.” I reply to her and smile. “Can you give us a few minutes?”

  With concern in her eyes and a bit of annoyance, she turns on her heel and heads to the breakfast bar.

  “Nice little piece right there,” The prez says watching her.

  “She’s not a piece and leave her out of whatever the hell you are thinking,” I sneer.

  “I could use a little fun while I’m in town, you sure about that? I know you usually don’t share, but why not just this once, for me?”

  “Fuck that. With all due respect, I think that you’re here with some wrong information. I don’t know the extent of the shit that happens in the club. It was clear that when Eddy died, that I was out of my element and made plans for a hiatus from the club to catch my bearings.”

  “I think it’s quite a loosely planned story there. While I know that you are working here, it’s mighty suspect of you to be conveniently out of town, the only member of the club, when our spots get raided and members get tossed by the man in blue.”

  I hold up my hands and say as evenly as I can, “I swear, I had nothing to do with any of whatever went down. I barely know what the Rebels are into,”

  “But you know something, and that’s all that they need to start any kind of investigation into the club and you damn well know this,” The prez leans in and sneers. I can smell the tobacco from his leathers and the stale beer on his breath, making me hold my breath as it wafts across the table as I lean back.

  “I’m not sure what to say, man. I’m telling you; I don’t know enough to be able to leak anything to anyone,” I say crossing my arms over my chest. “I wouldn’t even if I did.”

  He gives me a look over, stands up, then leans down and points his finger at me.

  “I might stick around for a few days, check out the scenery. I’ve got my eye on you, kid.” He stands tall, pats me on the shoulder and then leaves the diner.

  I move out of my booth and go to the breakfast bar where Nydia is standing filling salt and pepper shakers. She looks up and I can see the apprehension in her eyes. Her expression is far from the normal welcoming and happy to see me one that she usually gives me, and I feel like I just got sucker punched in the stomach.

  I sit myself down on the stool and lean in towards her on my elbows, so I can somewhat talk to her privately.

  “No, not here,” she says flatly.

  “It’s not what you think––.” I’m cut off by her holding her palm up to me.

  “I said not here, Coop. This is my work and that looked like a whole lot of trouble,” she says not meeting my eyes. “Exactly, what I do not want.”

  “That was just a mix-up,” I say.

  “I think you need to go home. I have work to do and I asked Rick to bag up your dinner.”

  “Nydia.”

  “Cooper,” she finally looks at me, “just give me a few days,”

  I don’t want to argue with her. I drop my head, turn on my heel and leave the diner.

  Hours later, I’m sitting on the seat of my bike while I wait for the diner to close up. Per usual, the back door opens and Rick leads Nydia out. They both look up at me, he says something to her that I can’t hear, she shakes her head and then he goes inside.

  I see her take a deep breath and then walk in my direction.

  “Cooper, I’m tired,” she says in a sigh.

  “I know, and I’ll let you head home, but I just want to make sure that everything is okay with us?”

  “I don’t know. I told you that I don’t want any trouble or to be with anyone that’s not a positive influence, and none of the interaction that I saw and heard sounded good.”

  “I’m being falsely accused,” I reply instantly. “They have a rat in the club, but it isn’t me. I don’t know enough to be that person. He thinks it’s me since I’m out of town as soon as everything started to go down, but I swear that I had nothing to do with it.”

  She eyes me warily and then shifts her weight. “Let’s just cool things down until this issue of yours cools, until he leaves town?”

  “So, you’re telling me that you no longer want to see me?” I ask for clarification.

  She sighs and meets my eyes, “I was very uncomfortable with what happened tonight, it goes against everything that you’ve told me in the weeks since we’ve met. I think that I just need to take a step back right now.”

  I want to yell and scream that I’m innocent, but I know that acting out would be stupid of me, so I just nod.

  “I will respect that, but I don’t want to leave without it being said,” I say.

  “What?” she asks, her impatience clear.

  “I just want to say that I’ve done nothing wrong, I’m here and I’m not intending to leave Mercy. And most importantly, I don’t want to give up on you and me.”

  “A few days, just give me a few days,” she says quietly, turns and walks around my bike to get into her car.

  There’s nothing more that I can do or say. I told her the truth and I hope that she believes that I’m not the bad guy. I’m not the guy who brings trouble with him, and I’m the guy that I’ve told her that I am.

  Chapter Eighty-Nine

  Two days later, I’m sitting in the shade at the end of the workday across from the work site. I’m covered in a mixture of sweat and sawdust. I’m drinking a bottled water and staring down at the diner down the street. I want to go inside, have my usual dinner and banter with Nydia and wrap my arms around her at the end of the night.

  The roar of a motorcycle echoes through town and soon enough, the prez makes an appearance. He looks both ways and once his eyes land on me, he steers his bike in my direction and parks beside me.

  His leg swings around his bike and he takes a seat on the curb beside me.

  “So, I’ve done quite a lot of talking with our brothers back home,” he begins.

  “Yeah, and?” I say sourly staring straight ahead.

  “And I need to apologize to you.”

  He surprises me and I swing my gaze in his direction.

  “You got to understand that your sudden absence and everything came at the same time and it was under the assumption to more than one that it was more than a coincidence. I’ve known you a long time kid and I knew your father. I should have known that would have been out of your character, and I’m sorry that I didn’t believe you and take your word for it.”

  “Appreciate it, Prez.” I say. “Mind me asking what went down?”

  “A prospect, he wasn’t really who he said he was. He and the brother who vouched for him are no longer with the club. As soon as it was known it was them, they disappeared. But not by the club’s doing, I believe that the men in blue are protecting them.”

  “So, what’s happening to the club?”

  “We’ll be in a transition of sorts, but since you are out here, I don’t want to bother you with any details. You gonna be hanging out here in this town for a while?” he asks.

  “Yeah,
I think I will.” I nod.

  He smiles and pats me on the shoulder before standing. He approaches his bike and then turns to me. “You know, you always have a home with us, right?”

  “I do, thank you.” I reply standing. I move closer to him, extend my hand out and smile.

  “Take care, Coop. Take care.”

  Epilogue

  I’m sitting at the bar at The Neighborhood with Wyatt, when there’s a tap on my shoulder. I turn and come face to face with a nervous looking Nydia.

  “Do you mind if I have a seat?” she points to the barstool beside me as I nod.

  “How are you?” I ask her.

  “I’m good, and you?” she asks.

  “Pretty good.” I reply, wanting to dive in and tell her everything, but trying to play it cool.

  “Well, I heard that the guy who came in the other night had left town?”

  “I’m not sure if I’ll ever get used to how fast things spread in a small town,” I say smiling as I turn in my stool to face her. “Does that mean we’re done with taking this step back?”

  “It wasn’t just about that. I mean it was, but I think I was playing into expectations, and I’m sorry about that.”

  “I get it, appearances and all. But all I can say is that guy, the bad boy that you kinda pigeonholed me into, isn’t the man that I am. Never has been.”

  “I know and I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions that you were. I should have talked to you about it, listened to what were saying and should have given you the reasonable doubt.”

  “Thank you,” I reply.

  “So,” she places her hand on my wrist, runs her hand across the top of my hand to the tip of my fingers, “do you have any plans for tonight?”

  Her back slams against the wall just inside her front door, she is caged between my arms with my body pressing against her. Her hands wrap around my neck while our tongues tangle in a rush as if it’s been years that we were apart. I pick her up and she wraps her legs around my waist, while I move through her home making my way to her bedroom.

 

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