“You should do it,” I said.
“Do what?” Diesel asked.
“Grow a beard. You’d look good in one.”
His eyes danced between mine before he reached for his beer.
“I’d forgotten how good you were at reading people,” he said.
“You remembered my favorite flavor but not the one trait that pissed you off more than anything?” I asked.
He sat back into his chair and crossed his arms.
“Let’s say I picked up your fun little party trick as a way to make sure nothing like what happened to you ever happened again.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
His eyes began to dance around my body and I braced myself for impact.
“Your outfit is tight against your body but worn. Which means you wanted to impress me, but not give me the notion that you were coming to agree with anything I said. Your hair is pulled up and a bit dusty, which tells me you drove here with your windows rolled down. Which probably means you were blasting music and singing at the top of your lungs, judging by the slight hoarseness of your voice.”
My lips parted in shock as he continued.
“When you walked up to me, however, you had mud caked on the bottoms of your boots. It hasn’t rained in Redding for days. In fact, it hadn’t rained anywhere within a twenty mile radius of us for some time now, since the State of California has been in a drought. Which means you found yourself at the creek. Meaning, you found yourself at your thinking rock. That tells me you’ve been thinking just as much about this as I have. But the fact that you haven’t told me what you have been thinking about means you had the same idea as me before we even set up the date.”
“And how do you figure?” I asked.
“When I called this afternoon and you answered, I said we needed to talk. You said ‘we do’, but not like a question. As a statement. You’d made up your mind about this exact same plan on that little thinking rock you hiked to in those boots probably this morning, and I simply called at an opportune time.”
I was speechless at his analysis. He had gotten everything right.
“Your father wasn’t busy, was he?” Diesel asked. “He went with you to the creek?”
After I had shed enough tears remembering what happened, I got out my bed and headed to the creek that was near our house. It wasn’t far, but my father had insisted that he come along with me. He had thrown me the phone when he saw it was Diesel calling.
My eyes held his as I slowly nodded. I watch the grin slid from his face.
“It was my way of keeping you alive, Brynn. I hated the way you could read me. The way you ripped my mysterious facade away like it was nothing. So, I studied human behavior. Read up on human psychology. Devoured every single goddamn book I could get my hands on about it. Because it was the only way I knew to keep you alive.”
Emotion choked off my voice as my eyes fell to my uneaten chicken wings. Suddenly, I was no longer in the mood to eat.
“I thought about you every day,” I said breathlessly.
I fought back the tears that formed in my eyes.
“Every night, when I closed my eyes, I saw you. Felt you. Kissed you. I kept pushing forward on the days where it all felt hopeless because I thought maybe one day--”
I wiped at my gaze before I rose back up to meet his stare.
I wondered if this could actually work. If this fake fiancé thing would really give everyone what they wanted. It was no shocking reveal that I had loved Diesel in the past. I never admitted it to anyone, though I’d come close to telling him one time. We were in the shed out back behind the Black Hornets lodge. My father had told me to go retrieve something and Diesel followed closely on my heels in the dark. He filled me with his fingers and stroked me with his tongue, and had my father not interrupted us with coming to find me I would’ve said it.
I would’ve told Diesel I loved him.
He was right. About everything. Where I’d been. When I’d been there. What I had been thinking about. But why I was thinking it was wrong. He thought in terms of giving everyone what they wanted, but I still dwelled in a fantasy world. In a place where there was the slightest chance Diesel loved me back then, and still loved me now. Could he love me? Could it be possible that this was how Diesel and I ended back up in one another’s arms.
Had Diesel ever loved me?
“Brynn?” he asked.
His low notes pulled me from my trance and I reached for my beer to clear my throat.
“I don’t enjoy traditional diamonds,” I said. “I prefer gems, actually. They’re colorful and sparkly, and don’t come with the hefty price tag.”
His face fell stoic before he nodded his head.
“So, we’re going to give this a go,” he said.
“We are. We won’t get married simply because my father says we will, but we’ll make it appear as if things have worked out for the time being. My father will push for a wedding soon. Trust me. But I’ll stall him and keep telling him that if he’s going to force me to get married the least he can do is give me a wedding on my terms. That’ll get him to back off, give us some room to keep up the ruse, then once things work out with whatever the hell’s going on around here, we can have an epic fight and be done with it.”
Diesel nodded, but he didn’t say anything.
“Or I could fake my death again. One of the two.”
“That’s not funny,” he said.
“It’s a little funny,” I said with a grin.
“I buried you once, Brynn. I’m not doing it again.”
That was as close to an ‘I love you’ as I would ever get from Diesel. I hung onto the moment. Memorized the way his eyes pierced my gaze. Committed to memory where we were and what we were eating and what he was wearing. His tight white shirt covered in his leather cut that didn’t quite pull around his chest. Faded, worn blue jeans and thick black boots that stomped whenever he walked.
I took in all of it. Every single part of it. Because I knew I’d never get the real thing from him.
“In that case, I think this is necessary then,” Diesel said.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small box before he set in on the table.
“What the fuck is that?” I asked.
But all he did was grin at me.
“No, you didn’t,” I said. “You couldn’t have possibly known.”
“Really though? Not possible at all?”
“We just talked about this. I just agreed to it. I just told you what kind of ring I wanted through all of this.”
“I knew you in high school, Brynn. You never stopped wearing jade and those fake pearls of yours.”
“You didn’t,” I said.
“Open it.”
My hand reached out for the box and I cracked it open. And tears rushed my vision the second I took in the beautiful ring. The dainty white gold band boasted a jade gemstone. The band of the ring on each side boasted of four miniaturized deep-sea pearls, sparkling with their milky beauty underneath the dim light of the wing-and-bar restaurant we sat in. Tears rushed my eyes. It was the most beautiful thing any person had ever given to me.
And the entire premise behind it was fake.
“Brynn,” Diesel said with a grin. “Will you be my temporary fiancé?”
I tried not to let the pain of his question show upon my face. I plucked the ring from the velvety box and slid it onto my finger. A perfect fucking fit. I closed my eyes as a smile slid across my face and I envisioned the engagement I’d played out in my mind so many times as a child. Every time Diesel’s tongue tangled itself up in mine, images of him proposing to me after high school burst onto the forefront of my mind.
I’d practically memorized his entire speech.
But none of that mattered now.
“Yes,” I said as playfully as I could. “I’ll be your temporary fiancé.”
I forced myself to finish dinner and Diesel gladly paid. He escorted me out with his hand on the small
of my back, selling the deal in front of those in the restaurant. His hand felt warm. Hot against my back. He guided me out to my car and opened my door, then helped me in before shutting it beside me. I struck up my car and my music began to blast. A sound that made me jump and scream before slapping my hand against my lips. Diesel’s shoulders shook with his laughter as I reached for the volume knob, turning it down as Diesel’s laughter ramped up.
“You still listen to Matchbox Twenty?” he asked.
“I’ll never stop,” I said with a smile.
I pulled out of the parking lot and watched Diesel watch me. His eyes stayed locked onto my car until I disappeared over the hump of the road, making my way back to my father’s house. I had a twenty minute drive ahead of me to get back to my house. To get back to telling my father that Diesel and I had agreed to get married. I even had a ring to sell him on the whole story. Then, my part of the charade would start. I’d have to get my father to hold off on a ceremony until all of these pieces were wrapped up.
And until then, I could unleash the tears I kept at bay throughout my dinner with Diesel. What I wouldn’t give for his proposal to be real. What I wouldn’t give for him to actually want to date me again. There was no use in lying to myself any longer. No use in trying to sell my mind on a lie my heart had already confirmed as nothing more than a fallacy.
I still loved Diesel.
And it seemed as if he had never loved me.
Chapter 9
Diesel
After I watched Brynn leave, I had blasted out a text message to the guys that we needed to have another church meeting tomorrow. I knew I was running them ragged, but now that things were in motion with Brynn and myself, I had a promise to hold up on my end.
Motorcycles rumbled off in the distance and I smiled. It was my favorite sound in the fucking universe. A brotherhood coming together at the drop of a hat to piece their lives together and get their asses out of trouble. I thrived in environments like these. Where every second was determined by how cogs in a machine reacted to one another.
The door of the lodge burst open and it flooded with my men.
“So, what’s the verdict?” Rock asked.
“You really need to back up,” Brewer said. “You’ve been riding Diesel’s ass lately, and you need to stop.”
“He’s got that itch up his ass to protect his family like we’ve all got,” Grave said.
“How did the date with Brynn go, Diesel?” Knox asked.
I drew in a deep breath and turned around so I faced the men I called family. Though looking out into their faces and not seeing Mick stung. I didn’t feel sorry for his fate. In fact, I was glad he was dead. And I was glad Rock got to be the one to pump him full of bullets. But sometimes, in the blackest of night, I’d pull out pictures from when Mick was a prospect and I’d wonder where the fuck I went wrong with him. Where I’d betrayed him along the way or what signs I had missed.
I wondered if I was fucking up with Brynn, too.
“The date with Brynn went well,” I said. “And I talked with Dean. Everything’s on track and the Black Hornets voted this morning in a unanimous agreement to help us fix our shit. Which means all of us will have a meeting to fill them in on what’s going on.”
“So, you’re marrying Brynn,” Knox said.
“It seems that way, yes,” I said.
“How the fuck did you get her to say yes?” Knox asked.
“Wait, so you’re actually going to marry her?” Brewer asked.
“That was the deal,” Grave said. “So, you’re engaged or some shit?”
“Holy fuck, you guys. Diesel’s getting married,” Rock said.
“I mean, there are worse women to marry,” Knox said.
“Does that mean you’re gonna finally get your dick wet?” Grave asked. “Because you’ve been an uptight little bitch for a few months now.”
My eyes leveled with each of my men as I clasped my hands behind my back.
“Listen very carefully to what I have to say. Because I’m choosing my words wisely,” I said. “Brynn and I are engaged.”
“Yeah,” Grave said. “You just fucking said that.”
“No, no, no,” Knox said. “I get it.”
My eyes leveled with my comrade as a grin spread across my cheeks.
“You sneaky little shit.”
“What?” Grave asked.
“Oh. You’re engaged,” Rock said.
“Holy fuck, you’re good Diesel,” Brewer said.
“What the hell is everyone going on about?” Grave said.
“He’s agreed to marry Brynn,” Knox said. “You know, agreed, but not planned yet?”
Grave’s mouth finally opened as the reality dawned on him.
“Don’t say anything,” I said. “Just know I have it under control. Brynn and I are engaged, and things are on track. But our end of the bargain is we keep her safe. No matter what. So, if I can’t be with her, trust and believe I’ll be calling on one of you to take my place.”
“We’ll have our phones on us,” Rock said.
“So, does this mean we get to take you out and celebrate your pending nuptials?” Knox asked with a grin.
“Oh shit. Bachelor party. Hell yeah, we are,” Grave said. “Time to clear our schedule tonight and take our boy out!”
“I’ll need to run by and go check on Monroe before I do anything. It’s rough leaving her side when she’s this far along in her pregnancy,” Knox said.
“Oh, we won’t be going out until late,” Grave said. “The girls can get together at my place, if they want. Everly’s been itching to see them anyway.”
“If Monroe goes, you know she’ll crash there,” Knox said.
“And she’s always got a bed in my home, Knox. And Brewer? Rock? Let your women know them and their kids are welcome tonight. They can all keep one another company,” Grave said.
“Piper will be happy to hear that. She doesn’t have a lot of friends around here, so it’ll be nice to get her out and about. Especially since Ana and Gavin are around the same age,” Rock said.
“I’m pretty sure they’re in the same school around here,” I said with a grin.
“Hey. I’m getting on board with this whole dad thing, but I’m not there all the way yet,” Rock said.
“It’s an adjustment, but it gets easier,” Brewer said. “Sort of.”
I shook my head at them as a chuckle bubbled up my throat.
“So, girls and kids at my place while we go out for drinks?” Grave asked.
“Sounds like a plan,” I said.
I hung around the lodge for the rest of the day until the guys all gathered back to go out. Any excuse they had to party, they took. And I didn’t blame them for it. We were going through a shitstorm and didn’t have much time to spend as a unit. All of the backyard barbecues and throwing back beers hadn’t happened in almost a fucking year, and it seemed as if it had been even longer than that. So being able to go out with them and shoot the shit for a while seemed nice.
Especially after my date with Brynn.
It had killed me to buy her that ring. Because it was the perfect ring for her. In any other circumstance--in any other world--I would’ve gotten down on my damn knee and proposed to her right then. Watching her walk into that damn wing place and go toe-to-toe with me and my food exposed me to the harsh truth that had loomed over my head for well over a decade.
Not only had I loved Brynn then, but I still loved her now.
Calling her my fake fiancé cheapened it. Made it seem like a sham. When really, I would’ve given anything for it to be anything other than that. But I understood where Brynn was coming from and I got it. She wanted love. Romance. That one true destiny or some shit. And while I didn’t believe in any of that book-peddled romance, I did know what Brynn deserved. I also knew what she didn’t deserve. And what she didn’t deserve was to be forced to marry someone out of a deal and nothing else. She deserved her perfect wedding. Her dream man. Her restaurant. The
life she wanted.
Her body language called to me that night. She was open to me. Open to the ideas and the possibilities. But just as quickly as she opened herself up, she shut herself down. Especially after giving her that ring. After passing by it in a jewelry shop that afternoon, I bought it on the spot. If she agreed to the engagement, I’d give it to her. And if she didn’t, I’d simply return it. Or gift it to her. The damn thing was practically made for her. It didn’t deserve to sit in a fucking window until dust collected on it.
It would be nice to get a drink with the guys and drown her frown out of my mind.
I led the guys into town and we ducked into our regular spot. When we took over Redding, the bar had been failing. It was run by an owner that didn’t give a shit about the look of it, the feel of it, or the employees working in it. So, we bought him out. Paid him one hundred thousand dollars to turn over ownership to us, and we fixed up the damn place. Got some decent chairs in there. Fixed the tiled flooring. Put in a bar that wasn’t particleboard and crumbling at the edges. Hell, Knox got his ass in there and put together a damn cocktail menu before training all the fucking bartenders that worked there.
Grave got into the kitchen and made up a little menu of really tasty shit, Brewer took care of the draft beer selection, and Rock promoted the damn thing until we filled it every night. It was a second source of legitimate revenue for us, outside of the mechanic shop, and it was a great place to hang out and celebrate.
We renamed it Skull and Bones, and we’d owned the damn thing ever since.
“A round of shots for the engaged man!” Grave exclaimed.
Everyone in the bar erupted into cheers as I shook my head.
“Shots! Shots! Shots! Shots! Wooo!”
The crowd cheered as all of us slammed back a flaming shot that was a specialty for the bar. All of us were passed the latest beer we put on tap a few weeks ago, chasing yet another shot back as we sat at the bar. I walked around and talked to the patrons. Shook their hands and made sure they didn’t need anything. And before I knew it, Knox was pouring another shot down my throat before pouring a beer down it to chase.
Diesel (Dead Souls MC Book 5) Page 6
