“One moment,” I said, hoping my voice didn’t sound like the train wreck that it probably was.
I opened the door, folded my hands in front of me, and smiled. Sheriff Jones didn’t look like he’d gotten much sleep either.
“Good morning, Renee,” he said. “You doing alright?”
“Oh, yeah, I’m fine, just… I like to come in here sometimes by myself and do some soul searching, that’s all. What’s up?”
“Oh, good. Well, heaven knows I should probably get some of that in. I just wanted to check in on you. I saw you walking up here and wondered if something was going on. I’m sure you heard the news of what happened last night.”
“No?” I said.
I hadn’t meant to play dumb—Sheriff Jones’ vague words had thrown me for a loop, causing me to say something that I didn’t really mean. But it kind of worked out in that I didn’t just blab out that I was familiar with it because of how the evening had unfolded.
“Well, the Anarchists—the Savage Kings’ rivals—are almost gone, save for one lone man. And that man struck last night. His capabilities are limited, but he wound up attacking the Kings’ base. I’m sick of the Anarchists causing trouble in this town.”
“I… can imagine,” I said. “But I’m sure you’ll get it cleaned up soon enough.”
“That’s the idea,” he said. “Anyways, consider yourself lucky you weren’t there. These violent behaviors… let’s just say I’m going to have to get the mayor to do a little good publicity for this town after this weekend.”
“I can imagine so.”
The sheriff nodded to me and started to close the door before swinging it back open.
“Oh, and one more thing,” he said. “How are things with Zane?”
It didn’t sound like there was any suspicion in his voice—but that didn’t mean that he didn’t have some somewhere.
“He’s more open than I would have thought,” I said. “But still very much Zane.”
“I figured,” Sheriff said with a disgruntled snort. “Be careful. He may try and score sympathy points with you and use that to flirt with you. Stay on his ass, alright?”
I smiled back, hoping that the smile would reassure the sheriff. It was for the best that he didn’t even suspect a thing—at least, not from what I can tell.
“You bet, Sheriff.”
3
Zane
“Alright guys. I thought that we’d dealt the Anarchists a fatal blow, but it seems like we have one final issue to take care of.”
How to get Renee Falcone.
Brock stood at the front of the meeting room, looking at the rest of the officers with resolution in his eyes. He, like the rest of us, was tired of the Anarchists making our lives hell—even if the Anarchists had devolved into an anarchist. He, like the rest of us, was looking for the final answer.
But me? I couldn’t get my damn mind off the woman who was supposed to be my therapist.
“Owen has been a pain in the ass for the soul reason that he defected, but now that he’s actively causing harm to the club as a lone vigilante, we need to pin him down and kill him. In some ways, I think this will be harder than just going after an entire club.”
Just as picking out one woman, especially a woman like Renee, is harder than picking through the crowd and letting the best option fall to you.
Damnit, Zane, keep your head in the game, come on now.
“So, with that said, I am open to any and all ideas for how we can get rid of this fucking nuisance once and for all. Any thoughts?”
My hand shot up immediately—but not because I had some great idea in mind, and not because I was normally the person who volunteered first. I just wanted to say my bit so that when I went silent and the rest of the club began speaking, suspicion wouldn’t fall upon me for being mute. Granted, I didn’t speak that much, but the last thing I needed was for this meeting to turn into some sort of pop quiz.
“Yeah, Zane?”
“Just do what we’ve always done, hunt the asshole town by town. Since it’s just one, we don’t have to worry about reinforcements.”
“Yah, and ya think that he ain’t gonna know that?” Parker said to me. “That just makes him hella more mobile. He ain’t gonna get caught so easily.”
“It’s just an idea,” I shot back to our sergeant-in-arms. “If you got something better, Parker, you go right on ahead.”
“With pleasure.”
Joke was on him, though. I wanted to stop talking so that my mind could go back to Renee; and anyways, it wasn’t like what I said was going to generate some magnificent discussion.
I had no idea why I was treating that girl so differently than the rest. Belle from before was almost a perfect example of how I interacted with my women. I’d flirt and have fun with them; I’d give them some of the best sex of their lives; and then that would be it. A few of them, Belle included, got the wrong idea and thought there might have been more than met the eye, but that was one them; I never lied about what I wanted.
But in this case, if I said I just wanted sex with Renee, I’d be lying to myself.
But why did I want more?
Maybe it was because we’d opened up and been vulnerable with each other? Maybe it was because I was forced to see her multiple times? Maybe because I’d helped her out last night?
The more I thought about it, the more I came around to the conclusion that it really didn’t matter why nearly as much as the fact that it was there. However, there was one thing that mattered above all else.
Whatever happened with Renee had to be kept an absolute secret. No one in the club could know. The club knew that I had to go to therapy on orders of Sheriff Jones, and the club knew that I had helped escort her to safety after last night, but that was the extent of it.
My persona as a player had to remain in front of club eyes.
It wasn’t the worst thing ever; the chance to flirt and fuck more women was something I certainly wasn’t going to pass up, and as long as I was not committed to Renee, there didn’t seem to be anything wrong with it. But you know that if you do do something with other girls and Renee finds out, it’s going to be a bad look. So…
Guess she’s not going to know about club business, either?
That was a dangerous slope to start sliding down. But there only seemed to be slides of different degrees, and I figured the best thing I could do at this point was just go down the one that had the lowest degree of slope.
“… settled, then,” Brock said, bringing me out of my romantic stupor. “We’ll remain hunkered down for now but be better prepared. We had our chance last night, but it’s OK. We know what to expect now. Does anyone have anything else to say?”
I guess we’re playing defense, then.
Good. Means I won’t have to go on offensive runs and risk myself right now.
“Very well. Meeting adjourned.”
And with that, we all began to rise. Landon looked over at me and smiled in a way that made me think he knew what I’d been thinking about that whole meeting. I hovered by the entrance to the hall, waiting for him to come out.
“So,” he said when we had some semblance of privacy. “Did anything happen with the girl last night?”
“Hmm?”
“You know, the one that Owen shot at? The one that you got in the car with?”
Doesn’t realize that she’s the therapist, too. I realized I had an opportunity here to keep Landon in the dark—to do exactly what I said I would do. To keep up my image as a player.
“Oh, dude, you know something always happens,” I said, drawing a chuckle from Landon. “I’m a one and done kind of guy, baby! I gave her one, and now she’s done!”
“Nice!” Landon said, giving me a high-five. “Someone in the club has to be living these crazy stories out. We can’t all be boring, whipped men.”
I projected my laughter at that, and I noticed a few of the club members looking at me in bemused disbelief. From the perspective of keeping my i
mage up as the club player, I couldn’t say that this was anything other than a rousing success.
But I was setting a dangerous precedent for telling the club and Renee one thing and living out an entirely different thing. Plus, if the club ever made mention that I had bragged about “one and done” with her when I hadn’t even kissed her, let alone slept with her…
Look, I knew it was a little immature and stupid. But it was for the ultimate goal of protecting our privacy and making sure those around us didn’t know. If that wasn’t the best course of action, then I guess I just didn’t have the wisdom and experience to do whatever was best for us.
However, in the immediate term, I did know what was best for me.
I pulled out my phone as soon as I was alone, found Renee’s phone number, and pulled up our text conversation.
“Can we do an earlier appointment? Monday, maybe. I need to discuss what happened this weekend.”
I put my phone in my pocket and headed to my bike, anticipating that she wouldn’t respond to me until much later in the day. But before I had even made it to my bike, she’d already written back.
“Sure. 10 work?”
Oh, yes, it would work. It would most certainly work.
Hopefully, though, my need to keep my image wouldn’t crash the whole thing someday.
4
Renee
About the only way to describe that Monday morning session with Zane was “awkward.”
First, he tried to hug me when he entered the room. I had to pull back, but not before he had already begun to make contact with me. I had to remind him in the most professional tone I could that I was his therapist and not his friend, but that just made me condescending.
It also, frankly, made me feel like a little bit of a liar.
Zane and I then proceeded to have one of those sessions in which we talked about the incident, but not how it felt for us. In other words, we talked about everything that didn’t matter and avoided the one thing that mattered. How the hell are the two of us going to coexist with the way we’re feeling about each other?
To an outsider, to anyone other than a seasoned and trained therapist, it would have looked like a normal session, with Zane trying to figure out how to better handle his stress and confused thoughts from Friday night. To me, though? I was pretty sure that I talked to myself more in that hour than I did to him.
Not out loud. Not like Saturday. But that was even worse, because at least Zane would have an idea of what I was thinking if I did that. By keeping it all in my head, Zane was kept in the dark, and the two of us wore our masks.
“OK, so,” I said as our session came to an end. “Do you feel better about how things are right now?”
Zane put his hands on his lap, smiled like a school kid caught in a trap, and then chuckled.
“I mean, I think it’ll take time,” he said. “But I’m feeling pretty good! You know, it always helps to have a therapist who knows me well helping me out!”
“Yeah,” I said, unsure of how to respond to that in a manner that wouldn’t sound too unprofessional. “Yeah… yeah. Well, how are you going to unwind the rest of the day?”
Zane shrugged.
“Go do some work at the repair shop in the afternoon, maybe. Ride my bike around some. How about you?”
“Going for a walk tonight,” I blurted out.
We weren’t supposed to tell our patients details about ourselves and our personal lives. But, well, I’d already blown past that bridge earlier, hadn’t I? When I’d decided to tell Zane about my family and my love life, I was pretty sure that violated that rule to the highest degree possible.
“Going to go to the park. Probably a walk right around sunset. I’m still dealing with Friday a bit, and a good walk helps.”
“I see,” Zane said, the gears in his head turning in such obvious fashion that it was some small wonder I didn’t hear them turning out loud. “Well, let’s aim to just have our normal session on Friday?”
“Sure,” I said. “You do know you’ll have—”
“To pay?” Zane said, waving his hand in a dismissive fashion. “It’ll be fine. Once a week isn’t enough of seeing you.”
God, I was thankful we shared a private office. I wouldn’t have wanted other people to see me blushing like I was. It was bad enough that Zane was seeing me blush.
“Well, I will see you on Friday, then. Stay out of trouble, now.”
“Never,” Zane said with a wink, heading to the door while humming a tune.
I didn’t bother to get up from my chair as he left. I waited until he had shut the door all the way before I let all the tension out.
At this point, I fully anticipated seeing Zane at the park tonight. In fact, a part of me almost began to hope that I would see Zane at the park. It was a dangerous game I was playing.
But it was also one of the first thrills I’d had in quite some time.
I got to the park at about half an hour before sunset, and the first thing I saw when I pulled up was a lone Savage Kings motorcycle, answering a question that really wasn’t much in doubt when I had arrived.
The only reason question then, now, was whether Zane would be waiting for me or if he “accidentally” bumped into me. We sounded like such middle schoolers trying to make this work, but, well, this wasn’t exactly a typical adult interaction, either.
I started on the trail, about a mile and a half loop, and kept my eyes trained for Zane. I didn’t see him anywhere for the first quarter-mile, so rather than continue to look for him, I decided to just try and stay present.
Easier said than done, of course, considering all that was going on, but if I was going to tell my therapy patients to stop and smell the roses, I had better do the literal same.
That was, up until the point when I heard someone jogging, turned around, and saw Zane approaching. I hadn’t seen him behind me, so he either had plotted to come up to me at this point, or I had missed an alternative part of the trail that he was on. And I knew this park pretty well; he had to have been hiding off trail, waiting for me to appear, to do this.
Creepy? Not really. For someone I didn’t like or didn’t have this oddball of a situation with, maybe.
“Well, fancy seeing you here,” he said, as if the whole thing was a surprise.
“I see you started listening during our therapy sessions,” I teased back. “What else have you learned from our sessions?”
“Oh, many things,” he said with a laugh. “I’ve learned to be more open and honest. I’ve learned that I need to take time to myself to reflect on my feelings. And I’ve learned when other people are hiding how they really feel. Including you.”
Guess we’re really getting right to it, huh?
“Listen, Renee, forgive me for being so straightforward, but I best operate by telling the truth and nothing but the truth, so that’s what you’re going to get here. You know I like you and think you’re attractive. I know that you’re attracted to me.”
“Oh—”
“Don’t even try,” he said with a laugh. “I know, I know, you have to be a professional and keep your distance. OK, cool. But you can do that while also acknowledging how you really feel.”
I went mute.
“Well, I’ll take your silence as assent then,” he said, patting me on the back and letting his hand slide lower. “You know I can be the keeper of secrets. You know that whatever happens between us, no one will ever know a thing about. You know—”
“I know, Zane, that that may be true, but it doesn’t matter,” I said, even as I wanted to believe that it did matter. “You’re handsome, sure. You’re funny. I can see why the women of Romara like you. But I can’t risk it. What would I get out of it?”
Thank God Zane had the good sense not to answer that question literally. The last thing I needed was for him to think he was being playful, only for him to come across as ignoring the topic at hand.
And there was one thing that, even in this moment of raw truth, I wasn’t go
ing to admit. I still didn’t like the Savage Kings. I may have come around to the idea of using Zane as a slow-burn means of reaching out to them and helping them, but that didn’t mean that I suddenly liked them.
“Besides, with all of that said, I still have to face myself. So even if no one in Romara knew, even if I felt really good in the moment, I’d still have to look myself in the mirror. I’d still have to face myself as a therapist, knowing that I had done something with a client of mine.”
“OK so then… don’t.”
“Don’t what?” I asked.
“Don’t look yourself in the mirror,” he said. “Hear me out. Just play a little bit. Pretend you’re someone else. Let’s… you know what? Friday night. Let’s go. Let’s do something. If you’re so concerned, instead of Renee, you can be, I don’t know, Rachel or something. It’ll be our little secret.”
“I—”
And then I cut myself off when I saw a man walking to us with a curious smile in the distance.
The sheriff.
“Hey!” I said, waving to him, trying to sound like I was in no way utterly flustered by everything going on. He waved back, but his wave was short and curt.
“Sup, officer,” Zane said, suddenly adopting a much cockier and playful demeanor. “Small world here, huh?”
“I’ll say,” Sheriff Jones said. “Renee? Is Zane bothering you?”
“Not anymore than the usual,” I said, trying to sound somewhat annoyed. “He thinks that he can woo me, but we’re working on him.”
“As if you think you can change me!” Zane said, bellowing in laughter.
It was all for show, but I couldn’t help but try and analyze the underlining truth of his words. No, he was right, I could not change him. But I sure could make the weight of his tendencies a little more balanced to good.
“Zane, may I remind you that this is the alternative for you spending a long time in jail,” the sheriff said. “You’re some good men over there, but—”
Promised Lust: An MC Romance (Savage Kings MC Book 18) Page 2
