Red Hot Bikers, Rock Stars and Bad Boys

by Cassia Leo

  “You can’t know that. You don’t know Linton.”

  “I know Heath.”

  “No kid my age is letting their dad write facebook messages for them,” Thera said. “It’s not Heath. It’s Linton. And you’re paranoid.”

  “You don’t know Heath Galloway. He’s capable of manipulating Linton in ways you can’t possibly understand,” said Eli. “I got us out of that place because of what he did to my family. I never want to see him again, and I don’t want you to see him either. I’m only sorry that Linton is suffering the way he is, and that he’s trapped with that horrible man.”

  Thera rolled her eyes. “You’re sounding crazy. You know that, right?”

  “You won’t email Linton again,” said Eli. “And you won’t see him. Is that clear?”

  “You can’t tell me what to do anymore, Dad. I’m—”

  “Promise me, Thera.”

  He seemed so serious. Fine. If it made him happy, she’d promise. But he was completely overreacting. She was sure there was nothing dangerous about going to meet her cousin. What her father didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.

  ***

  1993

  Heath was waiting for Cathy after English class. He was wearing a plaid shirt under his faded jean jacket, and he was leaning against the lockers, smirking at her.

  He had a really sexy smirk.

  Heath’s hair was dark. It had a little bit of curl to it. It hung around his face, reaching nearly to his shoulders. His skin was dusky and brown. His eyes were ringed in a dark fringe of lashes. He was beautiful and scruffy all at the same time. Her exotic gypsy and the boy she’d grown up with rolled into one.

  She sauntered over to him. “Hey.”

  He raised his eyebrows at her appraisingly, his idea of a greeting. “Want to cut sixth with me?”

  “And do what?”

  He shrugged. His shrugs were eloquence defined. She didn’t think she’d ever seen someone shrug quite like Heath Galloway. Whenever he shrugged, he looked intense and committed, but also aloof and disinterested. She wasn’t sure how he managed to effortlessly embody such polar opposites in a single gesture. “Hang out. Smoke cigarettes. Drive around.”

  “I don’t know.” Cathy couldn’t figure Heath out. They’d been best friends since forever, attached at the hip when they were kids. But lately, she’d realized that Heath was attractive, and it had made everything extremely confusing.

  She hadn’t meant to notice how gorgeous he was. It had happened by accident. They were hanging out in the barn, and Heath was draped over the loft, blowing smoke rings at the ceiling. He’d smiled at her briefly, and suddenly…

  He wasn’t just her friend anymore. Suddenly, he was a man, with broad shoulders and blunt fingers and hair growing on his chin and on his chest and on his forearms. And he moved with this lithe grace that was extraordinarily masculine. His eyes were shadowed and expressive. His mouth was sensuous and inviting. His hesitance, which she’d always taken for granted, was now a tantalizing mystery.

  Now, whenever she was around him, he dazzled her.

  “Come on, Cathy,” he said, tugging up half his mouth in a wry smile. “You really going to miss anything in sixth period?”

  She tucked her hair behind her ear, shy around him in a way she’d never been. “Okay.”

  His grin widened, lighting up his whole face. He reached over and took her hand.

  Shivers traveled up her arm. He was touching her!

  She smiled up at him.

  He looked down at her.

  It seemed like they gazed into each other’s eyes for a long time.

  Then Heath said, “We should go, huh?”

  Cathy nodded wordlessly.

  *

  Cathy watched Heath park the truck at the edge of the cornfield. The sun was going down in front of them, and the sky had gone all neon pinks and purples. She and Heath had been driving around all afternoon, sometimes talking, sometimes not.

  She spent time with him constantly, but it was different lately. She felt it in the way she looked at him. But she wasn’t sure if he felt it.

  Sometimes, he looked at her in a certain way, and she thought maybe he was feeling it too. Like maybe he was seeing her differently as well. But then he’d do something like tickle her or burp really loudly, and it was just like they were kids again, like nothing had changed.

  Heath took the keys out of the ignition and tossed them on the dashboard. He got two cigarettes out of his pack and lit them both. He handed one to Cathy.

  She took it. Heath lit her cigarettes so often that she wasn’t even sure if she knew how to do it herself sometimes. She put in her mouth and took a deep draw.

  This was touching his lips and now it’s touching mine.

  The thought gave her flutters in her stomach.

  “The, uh, sky’s kind of pretty,” said Heath, staring at it.

  “Yeah,” she said. Since when did Heath care about sunsets?

  They were quiet again, sitting in amiable silence, smoking and staring as the sun sank and the sky grew darker and darker.

  All at once, she couldn’t handle the way she felt about him. It was tearing her up inside. It was crushing her. There was only one way to be free of it. She had to tell him.

  She tossed her cigarette out the window of the truck. “I just keep thinking about how it’s always been you and me, Heath. You ever think about that?”

  His face was shadowed, his eyes dark. “Sure. I guess.” He blew smoke at her face, utterly aloof.

  She reached over and took away the cigarette.

  “Hey,” he said. “What the fuck?”

  She tossed it out the window too. “I think you should kiss me.”

  His eyes widened.

  She plowed forward before she lost her nerve. “To see what it’s like, you know?”

  “You’re crazy, Cathy.”

  “Like you’ve never thought about doing it,” she challenged him, acting more bold than she actually felt. For all she knew, he didn’t even see her that way.

  He reached across the truck and touched her hair.

  Shocks went through her suddenly. Oh.

  His dark eyes captured her own, deep and endless, like staring into the blackest night, a void that went on for eternities.

  “It just seems right, doesn’t it? Like we’re connected?” she whispered.

  He swallowed. His face inched closer to hers.

  She parted her lips.

  He tucked her hair behind her ear, fingers trailing over her cheek. “Cathy. All I think about is you.”

  And then he was kissing her.

  His mouth was hesitant on hers, but he possessed her as well. Just like the way he shrugged, his kiss was a bundle of opposites. Sweet but hard. Slow but consuming.

  And when their tongues touched, she felt herself fall apart inside. She’d never even imagined such a feeling. So pleasant, so pure. So raw.

  His arms went around her, tucked her up against his chest, the smell of his jean jacket all around her, and she fit into him there. Perfect. Right.

  It was like finding the place she’d always belonged, even though she’d never known what it would feel like to belong there.

  She wrapped her arms around his neck. She thrust her fingers into his curls.

  He gasped against her mouth.

  And she kissed Heath until the sun was long buried behind the horizon and the sky was full of glittering stars.

  *

  Once Heath started, it seemed like he couldn’t stop kissing Cathy. He’d been thinking about it for so long. He wasn’t sure how long. Maybe a year. Maybe more. Maybe since the first time he’d noticed her mosquito-bite breasts, when she was eleven or twelve, and they were swimming in the creek behind the house in their clothes. Maybe he’d wanted to kiss her then.

  Heath didn’t think so. That first realization had just been… strange.

  She was Cathy. He hadn’t wanted to think of her as a girl. Not back then. He hadn’t wanted to think
about girls at all. From what he could see, getting into it with a girl was the stupidest thing a guy could do. Girls made guys crazy. They made them do stupid things.

  Like Floyd Earnshaw, for instance.

  Guy’d killed Heath’s mother. In front of Heath. He’d been drunk and crazy and cruel.

  Sure, he’d sobbed over it. Sure, he’d blubbered and apologized.

  But Floyd should be in jail for that.

  He would have been, if Heath hadn’t kept his damned mouth shut. If he and Cathy both hadn’t. They’d been kids. They’d been scared.

  And damned if Floyd didn’t kiss his ass now. He treated Heath better than he treated his own son, Matt. Heath got whatever he wanted. The truck he drove, the new CDs of the bands he liked, the comic books he read. Whatever he wanted.

  And what Heath wanted the most was for Floyd to keep his damned hands off Cathy.

  Which he mostly did, except if he got too drunk.

  Then Heath had to intervene. He’d yank Floyd away from his daughter, tell him to lay off. Always with that threat, Heath’s ace in the hole. You leave Cathy alone, or I’ll tell everyone how you killed my mother, you jackass.

  But Heath lived down in the tenant house, and sometimes he didn’t hear it, or he didn’t know it was going on.

  Cathy never complained, but he saw the bruises. She’d shrug and ask for a cigarette, saying, “I got in the way of Daddy’s fists again, you know?” And then she’d laugh, like it was a joke.

  Heath didn’t think it was a joke. And he wasn’t going to let it last forever.

  He hadn’t had a plan before. But now, with Cathy in his arms, her body small and sweet against him, he knew he couldn’t let her get hurt again. They were old enough. They could keep the farm going without Floyd. Heath was going to turn him in once and for all. No statute of limitations on murder, right? And there was no reason for Floyd to stay here, beating on his daughter and getting drunk night after night.

  When they were little kids, Floyd had served a purpose. He’d allowed Heath and Cathy to stay together. He’d been a legal guardian. He’d fed them and clothed them. (Sort of, anyway.) Now, he wasn’t needed.

  Heath guessed it had happened to him too. He was going crazy over a girl, willing to throw everything out of balance to keep her safe. But it was different. She wasn’t just a girl. She was Cathy. She was his everything. They’d grown up together. They were inseparable.

  And now she was pressed close, her skin so soft under his touch, her lips eager against his. And he was trying his damnedest to say goodbye to her. But he couldn’t stop kissing her.

  He’d managed to pull away long enough to drive back up to the farmhouse. Then he’d leaned over to give her a kiss goodbye.

  That had been an eternity ago. All he wanted to do was kiss her forever.

  The light on the front porch of the farmhouse came on.

  Heath ignored it. And Cathy did too. She just moaned softly, running her hands over his back, making him feel shivery, making him want to pin her down and kiss her harder.

  A banging on the truck’s window. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

  Heath raised his head from Cathy and glared defiantly at Floyd Earnshaw. “What’s it look like, Floyd?”

  Floyd ripped open the door to the truck and yanked Cathy out of the cab.

  She stumbled and fell onto the ground.

  Heath leaped out after her. “Hey, watch it.”

  “Watch it?” Floyd grabbed Heath by the collar and slammed him up against the truck. “You shut your mouth, gypsy trash. And you better keep away from my daughter from now on, you hear me?”

  Cathy was tugging at her father’s sleeve. “Daddy, don’t. Just leave him alone.”

  Heath grinned. “I’m not keeping away, Floyd. You can’t keep me away from her.”

  Floyd shook Cathy off like an annoying insect. He dug his fingers into Heath’s neck.

  “Oh, that’s the way,” Heath said, his grin widening. “Why don’t you just strangle me… Daddy?”

  Floyd let go of Heath right away, like he’d been burned.

  “That’s what I thought,” said Heath, shrugging his clothes back into place and stepping away from the truck. He looked over Floyd’s shoulder. “You okay, Cathy?”

  She was brushing herself off. She nodded.

  Man, she was so pretty, it hurt. Heath wished he could touch her again, just one last kiss before he left. But that would be pushing it. He didn’t need to make Floyd even angrier.

  So, he jumped back into the truck. “I’ll pick you up for school tomorrow, all right?”

  “Okay,” said Cathy.

  “I don’t think so,” said Floyd. “Cathy, you can take the bus.”

  Cathy rolled her eyes. “Whatever, Daddy.”

  Heath would pick her up at the bus stop, then. And maybe they wouldn’t bother going to school. Maybe they’d drive to the police station instead, and maybe they’d tell them a little story about what happened to Wanda Galloway. Maybe Floyd would be in custody by tomorrow evening. Heath smiled grimly thinking about it.

  He backed out of the driveway, watching as Cathy headed inside the farmhouse. Floyd shot a look over his shoulder at Heath. It was venomous—full of hate.

  Heath fought the urge to flip the old man off.

  He hoped Cathy would be all right. Ever since her older brother Matt had left for college, Cathy had been alone in that house with Floyd. Heath used to stay up there right after Mama died, but in the past few years, he found he couldn’t stomach being under the same roof with the man who killed his mother, and so he’d taken up residence in the tenant house, where they used to live.

  Maybe it hadn’t been smart to make out with Cathy in front of the farmhouse, rubbing Floyd’s nose in it. But he hadn’t been able to resist kissing her again. God, kissing Cathy had been so good, more amazing than he could possibly have imagined.

  He was at the bottom of the driveway when he heard Cathy scream.

  As quickly as he could, he put the car in drive and sped back up the farmhouse. He barely put it in park before he leaped out, ran to the farmhouse, and ripped open the door.

  Cathy and Floyd were at the top of the steps.

  Floyd had her up against the wall. He was pummeling her, driving his fists into her stomach. “Why can’t you be a good girl, Cathy? Why can’t you be a good girl?”

  “Get your filthy hands off of her,” Heath yelled, taking the steps two at a time.

  Floyd didn’t stop. “Don’t you know what he is, Cathy? Do you know what you’ve been kissing? You know who you’ve been—”

  Heath tore the man away from his daughter. “You bastard.”

  “You shouldn’t touch her, boy,” Floyd said hoarsely. “It’s a bad business, I tell you.”

  Heath didn’t think. He was full of rage at this man, who had murdered his mother, who was hurting the girl he loved.

  Heath hurled Floyd down the steps.

  Floyd cried out, a keening, rasping sound.

  His body thudded against the stairs. There was a crunching noise.

  Floyd tumbled over himself, head over knees.

  Once.

  Twice.

  And then he was still.

  *

  Cathy rushed down the steps to her father’s inert form, screaming the whole time. She knelt next to him. “Daddy?”

  She nudged him.

  It was like poking bread dough. He didn’t move.

  She let out a whimper, covering her mouth with one hand.

  Heath was still at the top of the steps. He stared down at her with his black eyes.

  Cathy put her hand on her father’s chest and shook him. “Daddy. Daddy, wake up.”

  Heath moved forward, lithe as a cat. He began to descend the stairs with liquid grace.

  She stood up, shaking. “You killed him,” she whispered.

  Heath closed his eyes, his sooty eyelashes fluttering, dazzling her even now, in this moment of all moments. He paused on
the steps, and he was hesitant again, slumping his shoulders, dropping his head. “I didn’t mean…”

  She couldn’t hold herself up anymore. She fell back into the railing, and the first sob ripped through her body, echoing in the stairwell.

  “He wasn’t exactly a very good father,” said Heath. “He was hurting you. He was using you like a punching bag when I walked in here.”

  She turned on him, suddenly furious. The anger gave her strength, energy she didn’t know she had and she was on her feet then, running up the steps to meet Heath, pounding on his chest with tightly clenched fists. “He was my daddy. You never had one, so you can’t understand. But he was my only daddy, and you took him away from me.”

  Heath grabbed her wrists. “Like he took Mama?”

  She looked down at her father’s twisted body, remembered his rages. Remembered the sight of Daddy’s hands around Mama Galloway’s throat all those years ago. Hiding in that closet with Heath, both of them so afraid.

  She turned back to Heath. “You planned this. You were waiting for this. You wanted to kill him.”

  “No,” said Heath. “No, it was an accident. I wanted to report him to the police. I never… But he was hitting you, Cathy, and I couldn’t take it anymore. No one should ever hurt you.”

  She peered up at him, and he wouldn’t meet her gaze. Instead he shoved his hair behind his ears and stared at his feet.

  “You did it for me?” she said.

  “Yes.”

  She nodded. Of course he had. Heath was her protector. Hadn’t he stopped her father before, all those nights when Daddy had gotten drunk and taken his fists to her? Heath wouldn’t let anything happen to her. Ever.

  So, he’d killed her father.

  If she told anyone that, they’d take Heath away from her. And what would she do without her protector?

  “It was an accident.” She nodded slowly. “An accident. He fell down the steps. He was drunk, and he lost his balance.” She looked up into Heath’s eyes, making it clear to him that she’d stick to that story.