Happily Ever Alpha: Until Midnight

by Gwendolyn Grace

  "What the fuck do you want?" Brando had no intentions of budging as he crossed his arms over his chest.

  "Well, if it ain't the sidekick." Hunter flashed a grin at Brando that was meant to taunt. "I'm surprised your daddy lets you stay out this late."

  Brando's expression went from hard to murderous as he stepped closer to Hunter.

  "Enough," I shouted and hurried forward. "Hunter, quit it! Brando, please." Both men were squared up, chest to chest. Nostrils flaring and fists tightly clenched.

  "Hunter?" I repeated. Slowly he shifted his gaze to me.

  "She wants to see you." Then he returned his glare to Brando. I nodded, knowing exactly who "She" was. "I'll be outside," Hunter said before backing out of the doorway. "I love it when they hate me, man. It means they're thinking about me." His lips pulled into a slimy grin, then he spat on the concrete and walked away.

  Brando slammed the door and spun around.

  "What the hell is going on? Don't give me any of that bullshit about not being able to tell me. Hunter Knight is a piece of shit, and if you hadn't been here, he'd be on his way to the fuckin' hospital right now."

  I ran a hand over my weary face as I tried not to cry. When had I asked for any of this?

  With my shoulders slumped, I took one last look around the dining room, untied my apron, and pulled the restaurant keys from the pocket of my jeans.

  "I have to lock up," I said, void of emotion. Brando's mouth dropped open, and his face grew so red that his head looked like it would pop off his shoulders.

  "That's it? That's all you're going to say?" The veins in his neck bulged as he followed me outside. I set the alarm and twisted the key into the lock then gave the door a hard tug for good measure.

  A black SUV with dark tinted windows was parked right in front of the entrance. "I'll be right back," I said to Brando, putting a hand to his chest to stop him from following.

  "Wait a minute," he said as soon as he recognized the car. "Isn't that the same car you got out of the other night? No. No fuckin' way." Then he moved to stand in front of me as if he were trying to protect me and block me from going at the same time.

  "It's fine," I said, nodding to the car. "That's my mother."

  My explanation didn't help. In fact, it only added to his confusion. I stepped around him and walked to the car. Brando stood dumbfounded as he watched me pull the handle and get inside.

  My mother had always been a beautiful woman. Her honey blond hair fell in perfect waves over her shoulders, and the diamond studs in her ears glittered in the moonlight.

  "Carina," she said in a haughty tone.

  "Madelyn," I replied as I reached into my apron and pulled out my cash tips. I quickly counted my earnings, with my mother staring on, probably counting every dollar along with me.

  "Fifty percent, as agreed," I said and placed a small pile of cash into Madelyn's outstretched palm. She tossed the money into her expensive designer purse, not bothering to look it over.

  "You are ridiculous. At this rate, it's going to take you forever. Why don't you ask your fath—"

  "I said I would pay you back," I cut her off. "I'm giving you what I can."

  "Why are you always protecting him?" She shook her head, her lip curling with disgust. "Daddy's little girl. Funny that you called me to help fix your mess."

  "I'm taking care of it." I rolled my eyes. If I had gotten my father involved things would have turned out a lot worse.

  "What did I tell you, huh? Nothing but trash. Every last one of them."

  "You're wrong."

  "Am I?" One corner of her mouth curled into a smirk. "Actions have consequences, Carina. In the end, we all get what we deserve."

  "And what about you? What do you deserve? I'm your daughter, and yet you sit there looking down your nose at me. Ridiculing me. Enjoying my misery." My chest was heaving as I tried not to cry. I would've rather smashed my head against the tinted glass than give her the satisfaction. Madelyn leaned closer to me, her lips pinched tight and nostrils flaring.

  "You don't know the first thing about misery, little girl." She sat back and folded her hands in her lap. "Figure out a faster way to repay my money. You thought your problems were bad when the Asesinos were on your ass? That's nothing compared to my wrath." She could shapeshift from a regular everyday bitch to the queen of all bitches in record time. I also knew her threats were not idle. She'd almost succeeded in ruining my father.

  Brando's shadowy figure suddenly appeared just a few feet from the dark tinted windows.

  "Carina?" he said as he tried to see through the window. I would have called out a reply, except I knew he wouldn't be able to hear me.

  "Who is this fool?" Madelyn snorted, watching Brando pace the length of the car, his patience wearing thin. "I bet you didn't

  tell him, did you?" She lifted one perfectly sculpted eyebrow, and an evil grin slid across her lips.

  My mouth tightened, and my jaw clenched, but I didn't say a word. I learned long ago to control my emotions when it came to her. Madelyn Risto was like a viper ready to strike at the first sign of weakness.

  "It would be interesting to find out what he does when you tell him about—"

  "Are we done here?" I interrupted, not wanting her to speak the name. Especially knowing how much she enjoyed my agony. Wasn't it a mother's job to protect her child? To move hell and earth to see them smile?

  Madelyn studied me for a second, her icy blue stare raking over me before turning her head dismissively.

  I slid out of the back seat then closed the heavy door with a soft clunk before the car pulled away. The familiar ache in my leg reminded me of my stupidity and at the same time fueled me to keep doing what was right. My mother's coldness and disregard had broken my heart once. I rubbed the scar on my thigh, knowing I'd had nothing left to break.

  "Carina?" Brando walked to stand beside me. "What the hell was that about?"

  "Please," I said through clenched teeth as I turned to face him, "just leave me alone." I made a gesture between us. "I can't do this right now."

  He was a good man. He would see it as his duty to fight my battles. I couldn't allow him to get tangled up in my mess. It was something I needed to take care of all by myself, then get on the next thing smoking out of South Carolina.

  Brando looked as if he was going to say something, his head shaking rapidly, and his mouth was open even though he spoke no words. Finally, his shoulders relaxed.

  "You want me to just walk away from you?"

  "Yes," I answered quickly, on the verge of hysterics. "Stop coming to the restaurant! Stop drinking coffee! Stop smiling at me! Stop drawing me pictures!" I pulled one of his sketches out of my apron and tossed it at him.

  "Carina, I—"

  "Don't you get it, Brando?" My cheeks grew hot with anger and with fists curled at my sides I sent the final blow. "I just want you to stay away from me. Please. Forget I ever existed."

  "What?" His face contorted in different ways as he processed my words. Confusion transformed to hurt, then hurt became rage. The silent but deadly kind. When his composure returned, he lifted his chin. "Fine," he said sharply, picked up his sketch, then stormed to his car. I was in full sprint toward the stairs behind the restaurant when his massive car engine roared to life. He'd taken off so fast I couldn't tell if it was him or me who wanted to put the most distance between us.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Brando

  My breaths were becoming harder to draw. My lungs felt ready to explode, but I kept moving. I needed to be rid of her, to get her out of my head. The trees blew in the wind and ripples danced along the water as I ran along the bay.

  I just want you to stay away from me. Please. Forget I ever existed.

  Those words played over and over in my mind. Being with Carina was the one thing I would never forget.

  My first hard lesson on women came at eighteen. It was the summer after graduation when my high school girlfriend, Darcy, had shown up at the house in full-on
rage. She started smashing in the windows of my old pickup, the one I'd saved every penny I earned flipping burgers at a shitty fast food joint downtown. It took both Mack and me to wrestle the tire iron out of her hands before she could do any more damage. The entire time she screamed that I was a liar, over and over. Darcy had overheard some rumors that turned out to be partially true. I'd been planning to break things off with her for a while, but at that age, I was too much of a pussy to do it. Maybe I was kind of hoping she'd end it first. Either way, we were most definitely over after that. I made the decision right then and there if that was what happened when you got caught lying to a woman, I'd never do it again.

  A liar was the one thing no woman could ever accuse me of being after that. An asshole? Sometimes. Selfish? A little. Heartless? Never. Even when their eyes begged me to say things they wanted to hear, I refused. I never made promises I couldn't keep, never expressed feelings that weren't genuine, and I wouldn't go anywhere near those three words that could give more power than I was prepared to lose.

  Why? Because love was unfair, and it fought dirty.

  Instead, I figured out how to navigate the battlefield. To appreciate love without participating in it. To make love without having to give it.

  All of that had been working out quite well for me until I laid eyes on a gorgeous redhead with a permanent scowl.

  Everything I thought I knew about women and myself had vanished. All that enlightenment and self-control nonsense hadn't amounted to shit.

  Carina had changed everything I thought I believed in and what I wanted in my life.

  The irony of it all was that I'd fucked around and fallen for the one person who didn't want anything to do with me.

  My legs burned as I forced my body just a few more feet, just around the corner, the driveway in sight. I slowed to a walk as soon as I reached the mailbox.

  "Shit." I panted, looking at my watch. Six miles. It was a lot longer than I intended to run, but my mind had been so cloudy with feelings and shit that I was hoping a long hard run would clear my head. I tried to focus on the ache in my legs instead of the one in my chest. I paced the driveway for a few minutes, pulling in air and waiting for my heart rate to slow down.

  "Hey," Mack said when I stepped into the garage. "You made it back. I was about to send out a search party." He chuckled, wiping black grease from his hands. Mack was always in the garage, tinkering under the hood of one of his cars. Except he hadn't been working on a car.

  "Since when do you collect bikes?" I nodded to the shell of a black Harley Davidson, most of its parts lying in pieces on the concrete floor.

  "I don't." Mack shrugged. "It's an experiment," he said, then picked up one of the parts and started looking it over.

  "I talked to Ma the other day," I said over my shoulder as I grabbed a water from the mini fridge.

  "Really? How much did she want?" He cut right to the chase, knowing our mother just as well as I did.

  "Eight."

  "Eight hundred?"

  "No, eight grand."

  "Shiiit." He stretched the word out. "What the hell did she need it for this time?"

  "Don't know. She skipped over that and went straight for the guilt trip." I cracked open the plastic bottle and gulped the water down like a man who had been lost in the desert for three days. I made that water bottle my bitch. It was cold and wet. Like rain pouring down over Carina's trembling face...

  "Take it easy, man. You all right?" Mack slapped me on the back a couple of times as I coughed and choked on a mouthful of water. I looked over to find him studying me with a glint in his eyes. "She's got your head all fucked up, doesn't she?" Then he threw his head back and howled with laughter. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and scowled at him.

  "Shut the fuck up," I grumbled. "I'll kick your ass." Though I knew he wasn't intimidated by me. He used to kick my ass daily when we were kids. Despite our shitty upbringing, we'd always been close. He was my big brother. My best friend and the only real family I could count on no matter what.

  He returned to his motorcycle parts, still chuckling intermittently at my expense. I went to one of the wooden stools and sat down. My legs felt a little shaky, and the ache in my chest was back. I debated on another run.

  "Look, I get it," Mack said, all the humor gone from his face. "It hurts like a motherfucker. The way I see it, you have two choices. You can take control of that pain, or you can let it control you."

  "How do I control it?" I asked, desperate to know the answer. To get rid of the ache. To go back to the night before she pushed me away.

  "Go and get your woman."

  CHAPTER TEN

  Carina

  Hot water ran over my face until my skin felt numb. I was avoiding reality. My tickets had been purchased, and I was packed. I'd been making the same trip every month for almost a year, and I wondered how much longer I could keep doing it. It was madness and I couldn't believe what my life had become. What was the legal limit on the amount of bullshit one person could handle before you ended up running stark naked down the street and howling at the moon?

  Brando would probably never talk to me again. I'd asked him to stay away and forget about me. After what we'd done together, I knew I'd never be able to forget about him. The memories made my nipples harden, the same way they did when he'd pinched them between his teeth. He'd worshiped me with his eyes, taking in every inch of me as if I were a rare work of art. My imperfections were forgotten. His mouth ignited passions I thought only existed in romance novels.

  Your skin smells like strawberries...Carina...will you let me have you?

  I picked up my strawberry scented body wash, pulled back the shower curtain, and tossed it into the trash bin. I would never use it again and not think of Brando. Tears welled in my eyes, but I forced them away. There was no time for a pity party. Things much more important than my selfish needs were at stake.

  My life hadn't always been so troubled. I could remember happier times full of big smiles and warm hugs. Barefoot summers in Tennessee with my mother's family. The smell of Aunt Alice's flower garden and playing hide and seek behind Uncle James' hardware store with my cousins Asher, Trevor, Nico, and Cash. The Mayson family had been a significant part of my childhood.

  I was the youngest of the bunch and the smallest. I remember asking Uncle James if I could help at the cash register. His response was, "You're barely knee-high to a duck, Carina. How are you going to see over the countertop?" He chuckled and patted me on the head. After that, the boys went crazy with the nickname. "Knee-high...Knee-high." It honestly didn't bother me, but it sure upset my brother, Jamie. It was in his nature to be a protector, and I knew I could always count on him.

  I stepped out of the shower, wrapped a giant towel around me, then plugged in my hairdryer. Blowing out my heavy red locks would take forever, but I knew I needed more time to think. My trips were risky. One wrong move could jeopardize everything. Worst of all, I didn't want to give Madelyn the satisfaction of watching me fail.

  Though it was hard to imagine, my mother hadn't always been so...malevolent. She used to be happy. Her words were soft-spoken, her touches gentle. She laughed often and with love in her eyes. My father was the reason for that. The two of them were always holding hands and smiling at one another.

  They'd met their freshman year in college, though neither graduated because my brother, Jamie, was born before either had turned twenty. My mother's family believed in love and not just any kind. The Maysons had laid claim to an irrevocable connection that could only happen once in a lifetime. It was an indescribable feeling for those who had found it and an unfathomable idea to those who had not. Imagine having a special internal radar that could lock in on your soul mate? We're talking genuine love at first sight territory.

  The result was a massive revelation that could only exist when your heart recognized its home. That life-changing moment was known as the "boom." Nothing had ever sounded so scary and intriguing all at once. I used to wor
ry about locking eyes with other kids on the playground for fear that it would happen. It was torture to my eight-year-old psyche. It was terrifying to be around people with a magical power I couldn't control. What if my "boom" was someone I didn't want it to be and were they required to feel the same way about me? Who did I have to contact to reset my radar? Imagine my heartbreak when I'd chosen Anton Brooks from my seventh-grade study hall to be the one, only to have nothing happen. That's when I realized I couldn't tap into it or much less control it. There was no way to prepare for the power it would eventually have over me.

  I pulled on a pair of yoga pants and zipped up my warmest hooded sweater. It was always freezing on the plane. I glanced at the clock, relieved I still had time to catch the midnight ferry back to the mainland. My carry-on case was stuffed full of everything I would need for the next week, which also meant it was heavy. It landed with a hefty thunk on the wooden deck when I set it down to lock the door. The Fox family had been kind enough to rent me the little studio apartment above the restaurant. It had become vacant right after Jonna Fox had married and moved out. Before that, I was forced to live with Madelyn because my options were limited. I'd only just returned to Sea Whisper Island, and I foolishly thought my mother would be interested in reconnecting with her daughter. I had been wrong.

  The ferry dock was only a few minutes from Annette's Catch, so I dragged my overloaded suitcase behind me, the little wheels rattling along the sidewalk. The streets were quiet besides a few people strolling along the boardwalk. In the distance, there was the faint sound of a buoy bell clinking and the crashing of waves. The brisk night air blew across my cheeks and tendrils of my red hair swished around my face. I knew I was almost there as soon as the bright lights of the ferry came into view. As I crossed the street, a strong crosswind blew the worn ball cap from my head. I ran after it as it rolled and skittered along the sidewalk until I was able to pin it down with my foot. In front of me stood the ten-foot bronze statue of Captain Silver Eye. I examined the likeness of a man dressed as a pirate positioned proudly at the helm of his ship with one hand gripping at the wheel. It was an odd thing to see. While others barely spared the statue a glance, I grew up staring at the face of my five times great-grandfather. The Risto family roots ran quite deep on Sea Whisper Island. I wondered what The Great Captain Silver Eye would say if he could see what his family had become.