The Survivor and his Safe Place

by Rebecca James

  “Who’s in there with him?” I asked Skitz, whose real name was Adam.

  “Didn’t see,” he said from the couch where he was channel surfing. Since it looked like I wouldn’t be getting to go to sleep anytime soon, I decided to go on over to Dante’s and crash. After my shower, I barged into the bedroom to get my clothes. I thought I’d seen it all with Hung, but when I got a load of what he was doing, I thought I’d have to soak my eyeballs to get the image out.

  Grabbing some clean clothes, I got dressed in the bathroom.

  Straddling my bike in the garage, I texted Dante I was on my way and to leave the door unlocked for me.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Caleb

  I’d seen Axel coming up the drive in the middle of the night, so I wasn’t surprised to find him hammering on the dock when I walked the dogs around eleven.

  I’d puked on and off for three days after my last session with Dana, but that morning I felt a little more emotionally steady, and the thought of seeing Axel had my stomach fluttering.

  The dogs whimpered excitedly when they caught sight of the big man, and at the sound, the biker looked over his shoulder.

  “Hi.” He smiled at me, and my heart jumped. Gypsy, the Pekingese I was walking, took the opportunity to squat and take a shit, absolutely mortifying me. My face heated as, avoiding looking Axel’s way, I prepared the dog doo baggie to pick up her mess. After I’d tied the bag, I risked a glance at Axel. He was wearing a pair of old jeans and a white tank top that hugged his big torso and showed off his glorious muscles. I could see his nipples through the material and noticed the left one was pierced. Suddenly very hot, I bit my lip and hoped the boner in my pants wasn’t as noticeable as it felt.

  “Fixing the loose boards?” I asked stupidly because duh.

  Axel nodded. “I was hoping I’d see you today.”

  I caught my breath. “Really? Why?”

  Axel smiled. “I like you.”

  My head went light, and for a minute, I was afraid I’d pass out. Pulse racing, I seized the moment. “You want to have lunch with me?”

  Was I crazy? Could I really sit down to lunch with Axel alone? The other couple times I’d been alone with him had only been for a few minutes. My mind screamed at me to take the invitation back, but I couldn’t do it. He looked so surprised and pleased.

  “You’d be okay with that?” he asked.

  “Um…” God, what if I panicked and ruined it all?

  Axel looked around. “What about a picnic? We could eat out here. It’s a really nice day.”

  He was right: it was, and we could. I grinned. It was perfect.

  “Sounds good. I’ll finish walking these two and go make lunch.” Of course, Roxy, the poodle, decided she needed to shit right then, and I had to stand awkwardly waiting while she did and then scoop up her mess with another dog doo baggie while Axel waited.

  “Oh, my God,” I said to the dogs in a low voice after we’d walked far enough away from Axel that he wouldn’t hear. “Did you two really have to do that in front of him?”

  The dogs didn’t seem sorry in the least. They trotted along, stopping every so often to smell a patch of grass while I went over in my mind what I could pack for the picnic. Obviously, I hadn’t thought it through before I’d given the invitation. I knew I didn’t have a lot in the refrigerator or cabinets.

  A quick look in both when I got back to the shelter proved me correct. I picked up my cell phone and called Isaac.

  “You have anything picnic worthy in your kitchen?” I asked without preamble.

  “I’m sure I do. Who are you having a picnic with?” Isaac sounded understandably surprised since I never did anything with anybody.

  “Axel,” I said. “We’re going to eat by the lake.”

  Isaac was silent a beat before saying, “That sounds fun. Um.” I heard him going through cabinets. “Come on up here. I have a basket and everything.”

  “Thanks,” I said and started that way.

  Isaac had way more in his pantry than I did, which wasn’t all that surprising as I knew he liked to cook in his spare time. He helped me pack up Brie and cracked pepper crackers, grapes, plums, some mixed nuts, and a plastic tub of macaroni salad. He even had a checkered table cloth to put into the basket. I’d expected him to ask questions about Axel, but he didn’t.

  By the time everything was ready, it was close to noon. I carried the basket over to the lake, spread the checkered tablecloth on the ground, and began setting out the food with one eye on Axel’s muscular form as he packed up his tools.

  “I have some hand sanitizer,” I told him when he approached. I could smell the sweat on him when he sat down. God, he was hot. I didn’t know if I was more terrified or turned on.

  “Thanks.” Axel pumped some of the clear gel into his hands and rubbed it in, gaze running over the food I’d put out. “This looks great. You’re spoiling me.”

  I blushed and tried not to stare at the sleeve of tattoos on his right arm. I’d noticed them before but had never paused long enough to really look. Someday I hoped to do it, but that day hadn’t come yet. I was much too shy. My attention was briefly drawn by the tattoo of a devil’s head on Axel’s upper left arm. Dante had one just like it—all the Hedonists did. This close, I realized the devil’s tongue was sticking out. For some reason, I found that even hotter.

  “Thanks for doing this,” Axel said around a bite of cracker and cheese.

  “My pleasure.” I smiled, thinking how unnatural it probably looked, as though my face had forgotten how.

  “I heard you arrive really late,” I said, determined to keep the conversation from becoming awkwardly silent.

  In the sun, I could see the flecks of brown and gold mixed together in Axel’s eyes.

  “I’m sorry. Did my bike wake you?” His voice was so deep but the tone so kind. He was a gentle giant.

  “No. I was awake.”

  “That was pretty late to be up,” he commented.

  “I had a nightmare,” I admitted before I could stop myself. I shouldn’t have said that. I should have made up something about one of the cats waking me up. He might know I was messed up, but he didn’t need to know the depths of it.

  I was relieved when he didn’t ask about it.

  “Hung and I share a room. When I got home from work, he had company, and I didn’t have anywhere to sleep. Skitz was on the couch.”

  “Oh. That…sucks.” Did that sound like a normal thing to say? I hoped so. Hard to believe there was a time when I’d had natural conversations with people.

  Axel ate another cracker. “I could have slept on the back porch, but since I was coming out here today, I texted Dante I was on my way and would crash in their guest room.”

  As I listened, I couldn’t keep myself from staring at the little nubs of Axel’s nipples under the cotton of his tank top. When I looked up, he was watching me, and I blushed crimson at the heat in his gaze.

  “That wasn’t very nice of your roommate,” I managed to say, amazed I’d been able to pick up the thread of conversation when I suddenly wanted to dig a hole and hide.

  “Yeah, Hung isn’t exactly what I’d call considerate.” Axel popped a couple grapes in his mouth and wiped the sweat off his forehead as he chewed, giving me a glimpse of the dark hair under his arms. Fuck, I was such a horndog. I guessed my body had never gotten the memo I was broken.

  Axel looked over his shoulder at the dock. “You ever swim in the lake?” he asked.

  “No, but Isaac and Dante do sometimes. You going to?”

  “I was thinking about it. It’s damn hot out here in the sun.”

  I spread some cheese on another cracker and handed it to him because I didn’t know what to do with my hands, and I found I liked doing things for him. The smile he gave me made me feel doubly good. Our fingers brushed over the cracker, and I caught my breath.

  “I could…well, nevermind.” At Axel’s questioning look, I explained, “I was going to say I could loan you
a pair of swim trunks, but no way mine would fit you.” My cheeks pinked up even more, both because I was yammering ridiculously and because thinking about Axel in a pair of my swim shorts made me crazy hard. He’d barely be able to get one of those muscular tree-trunk legs of his inside. When I realized I was thinking more about Axel’s anatomy and what it did to me than how nerve-racking it was to sit with such a big man, I froze in surprise. Luckily, Axel didn’t seem to notice.

  “I can swim in the buff,” he said, shocking me out of my stupor.

  Reaching for a bottle of water, I drank half of it down in one go. Imagining Axel naked short-circuited my brain, and it took me a few moments to think clearly again. Part of me wanted to throw my past trauma to the wind and be who I used to be. Lean over and kiss the man, consequences be damned, because I had no doubt that’s what the seventeen-year-old untraumatized Caleb would have done. But the twenty-one-year-old mess I was now couldn’t do it. As I ate a few grapes, I allowed myself to imagine it though. I didn’t think Axel would push me away. What would he do? Wrap those big arms around me and kiss me back? Even as my body heated at the thought, a spark of panic ignited in my chest, making my heart hammer.

  I couldn’t eat any more nor think of anything to say, but Axel made up for it, talking about the ducks and how Dante had told him Isaac had been enamored with the birds when he’d first moved there.

  “He’d never been out of the city.”

  I looked around the property with new eyes. “I bet that would be something, coming out here and seeing the wildlife and stuff when all you were you used to was concrete and pollution.”

  Axel nodded and filled his plate with macaroni salad.

  “Sorry, I didn’t think about dessert,” I said.

  “That’s okay. I’m not in the mood for anything sweet.”

  When Axel had eaten the last bit of macaroni off his plate, he stretched and stood. “I think I’ll swim now. Join me if you want.”

  My eyes widened. “You think that’s a good idea? I mean, right after you ate?”

  Axel chuckled. “I’m pretty sure that’s a myth.” He stripped off his shirt, muscles rippling in the sun. His body was a work of art. Other than the sleeve and the devil tattoo and what I’d seen on his scalp before he’d grown in his hair, his big body was devoid of ink. Although his chest and legs were hairy, his back was smooth and spotless. I wanted to touch every part of him.

  Suddenly, it sunk in that Axel was stripping naked, and I was just sitting there watching. I scrambled to pack up the food. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Axel kick off his sneakers, and I forced myself not to look when he lowered his jeans and underwear in one go and stepped out of them. I couldn’t help but sneak a peek, though, when he strode down to the dock. I was only human. The last thing I saw before he dove in was Axel’s magnificent, muscular ass.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Axel

  I liked to think I was a patient man, but I couldn’t sit one moment longer bedside Caleb without touching him, especially with the way he looked at me sometimes, like he wanted to lick me.

  So I’d gone for a swim. And maybe I was a little evil for flaunting my body in front of him, but I’d never been so proud of my muscles for the sake of impressing someone in any way but scaring them to death.

  What I wouldn’t give to lay Caleb on the grass and kiss him senseless, but I knew that would be a mistake. As comfortable as Caleb sometimes seemed with me lately, I knew his nerves had a hair trigger.

  I’d felt his eyes on me as I’d walked naked down to the dock, though, and had paused a moment longer than necessary before diving in. The water was cold there in the shade and helped get rid of the stiffy I’d developed.

  Leaning back in the water, I called out to Caleb, “Come on in! Water feels great.”

  He hesitated, and for a moment my horny mind imagined him taking off his clothes and joining me. The image brought a growl to my throat I had to suppress by sinking my face in the water up to my eyes. But in the end, Caleb smiled and shook his head, stood, and picked up the basket.

  “I’m going to take this back to the house,” he called to me.

  “Thanks for lunch!”

  Caleb waved, and I watched him walk toward the main house. He must have packed the food there, and I wondered if Isaac had been around when he had. What would Isaac think of me and Caleb having a picnic? That putting the two of us together was just asking for trouble? Or that I wasn’t good enough for Caleb? Both doubts were constantly in my mind.

  Caleb was perfect. And although many of the rumors about me circulating among the MCs weren’t true, I’d done my share of nasty things. I’d had my kinky moments. I’d beaten people bloody. My former club had utilized my looks and strength to the fullest, and I’d landed behind bars more than once on their behalf, loyal to a fault to those I’d sworn to love and protect, even if I hadn’t taken the final step and had their symbol tatted on my back. Blaze had approached me one night at a bar—a pretty fucking ballsy thing to do—and asked me what I was doing with those bozos. He’d told me he’d been watching me, that I was smart and so much more than just muscle. And then the clincher—he’d pointed out how the Rejects weren’t holding up their end of the bargain and had promised if I joined the Hedonists, I’d have a real family.

  I thought about it a while, but I’d really already made my decision. Once I’d joined the Hedonists, I took their tat with pride and never looked back.

  Blaze hadn’t lied to me. The Hedonists were the first real family I’d ever had.

  Still, even if what Blaze had said about me was the truth—and I wasn’t convinced of that—I was nowhere near good enough for Caleb Sullivan. I knew it, but I couldn’t stay away from him, especially now he’d shown me some attention.

  How pathetic was that?

  Mood soured, I swam until I was exhausted, working off the sexual frustration that had built from Caleb’s eyes on my body. I wanted to pull myself up on the dock, find a patch of sunshine, close my eyes, and beat off. If I didn’t think someone might see me, I would.

  I forced myself to stop thinking about the long legs and tight ass that had been my last view of Caleb and concentrated on what a great guy he was and how much I’d enjoyed being with him. He didn’t deserve the pain life had handed him, and, for the millionth time, I wished I could take it all away.

  Finally too tired to swim any longer, I sat in the sun enjoying the relative quiet of the area until I was completely dry and could pull on my clothes. Returning the tools to the shed, I walked to the main house and entered through the back door to find Isaac cleaning up his and Dante’s lunch dishes.

  “Dante here?” I asked him, wanting to check if there was anything else my club brother needed done before I left.

  Isaac glanced at me over his shoulder. “He went upstairs to study for a test.”

  Dante was going to take the bar exam in the fall. We were all real proud of him.

  “I heard you had a picnic with Caleb,” Isaac said a little too casually, and I immediately felt defensive. Well, it wasn’t like I hadn’t expected it.

  “Yeah. It’s nice out. We had a nice chat.”

  Isaac gave me a side look heavy with unspoken thoughts I couldn’t read except to know they weren’t all that positive.

  “You have something you want to say, say it,” I said, leaning against the counter and crossing my arms over my chest. I knew the stance made the muscles in my arms bulge. I wasn’t trying to intimidate Isaac though. It was more about protecting myself.

  Isaac dried his hands on a dish towel before turning to face me.

  “I guess I’m just worried.”

  I raised a brow. “You guess you are?”

  Isaac let out a breath. “Okay, I am worried. I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to get too close to Caleb.”

  And there it was, the words my own conscience had been screaming at me.

  “I wouldn’t fucking hurt that kid for the world,” I said roughly. “I know he’s b
een through hell.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “I can’t believe you’re even saying this.” I raised my voice over his. It didn’t make sense that Isaac’s caution, which I’d anticipated, hurt so bad now that it had been verified. He was one of the few people outside my club brothers who had seen a side to me other than the tough one I showed the world. “You’ve seen how fucking careful I’ve been with him.”

  Steps pounded down the back stairway, and Dante appeared from around the corner. “What the hell are you yelling about?” One look at his boyfriend’s upset expression, and Dante turned on me like an enraged bull. “You better have a damn good reason to be yelling at Isaac.”

  I scowled, pushing off the counter to walk away, cool off, but Dante planted himself in front of me.

  “Back the fuck off, Durham,” I growled in warning, not in the mood for his bullshit.

  Although I loved him like all my brothers, Dante could piss me off on the best of days. For a highly intelligent guy, he could be dumber than dirt about some things. I told myself he knew deep down I’d never hurt Isaac, but the way he was looking at me right then had made me second-guess that knowledge. And on top of Isaac’s evidently low opinion of me, it was too much.

  “Not until you apologize to Isaac.” Dante glowered at me.

  “Dante…” Isaac began. The shakiness of his voice only seemed to make Dante angrier.

  Bitterness born of my frustration and hopelessness where Caleb was concerned doubled my annoyance with Dante, who was being an A-number-one hypocrite at the moment.

  “As if you ever used to give a shit how anyone talked to Swish when he was at the clubhouse. Hell, you never even knew his real name in those days. You were always too busy getting into some chick’s panties, trying to ignore the fact you were under Mommy and Daddy’s thumbs.”

  “Shut the fuck up,” Dante growled, shoving me backward.

  That was it. I’d had it. I went after him, and we grappled, knocking over a chair and sending plates crashing to the floor, Isaac yelling at us to stop over all the noise. Just as I’d raised my fist, planning on shutting Dante’s smart mouth one way or another, a shrill whistle split the air. I glanced up, scowl frozen on my face. Isaac lowered his fingers from his lips, and my stomach fell to my feet when I spotted Caleb’s pale face behind him.