Savages Series Boxed Set

by Jessica Gadziala

  I'm embarrassed to admit how long I sat there and looked down at those sketches with a goofy grin on my face. Snapping out of it, I took them over to my jewelry box, slipping them in and storing them for safekeeping. I was always that kind of girl; I saved things. I had the movie stub from my first date when I was a teen and the label off the first bottle of liquor I ever tasted in a scrapbook. I had seashells from every beach I had ever visited in a vase in my dining room. I liked having little reminders of things that once made me smile around me.

  And, well, Paine's artwork made me smile. Huge.

  I showered as I thought of him sitting off the side of the bed in the very early morning light, scribbling those pictures for me before he left. It was infinitely better than waking up to a note.

  I decided then to only date men who grew up with single mothers, little sisters, and could draw from that point on.

  I had half-expected him to show back up before I left for work and had to suppress a surge of disappointment when he didn't. I left early and stopped to get coffee, buying an extra one for him and cursing myself for doing so. As I drove across town (my path to work making me pass his shop), I tried to convince myself to not stop, to not be that girl. Needy, borderline desperate to be around the guy she was crushing on.

  But I found myself pulling up behind his Challenger when I noticed the shop was open for the morning already. The shades were half-closed on the windows to block the brutally bright morning sun and, as such, I hadn't spotted the small group of people inside until I pulled the door and it was too late.

  "Oh," I said, taken aback when three sets of eyes fell on me. One set was Paine's light green ones. Another were very dark green ones on the face of a man with an old school kind of handsome mixed with a post-punk look: tattoos all up his arms and across his neck, gauges in his ears, plain white v-neck tee, tight black jeans, and black and white checkered creepers. To say the charming smile he was giving me was enough to melt any red-blooded woman's panties was an understatement. The final set of eyes were blue and belonged to a man Paine's size build-wise with blond hair in an undercut, pulled into a small bun at the crown of his head. He also had a blond beard and a knowing little smirk on his face. "Um, sorry to interrupt," I said, my words almost tripping over one another I was so flustered. I turned to Paine, thrusting my arm with his coffee out a little awkwardly. "I just wanted to say thanks for dinner. I, ah, need to get to work."

  He took the coffee from my hand, brows drawn together slightly as I yanked my arm back and turned to move back toward the door. Or, at least, I tried to make my way back toward the door. I failed because suddenly my wrist was snagged in Paine's giant palm and I was turned and pulled back the distance I had just created. "Fuck was that?" Paine asked when my gaze found his.

  "I'm sorry... what?" I asked, painfully aware that the other guys in the shop were staring at us. And while I couldn't see, I was pretty sure they were still smiling.

  "'Thanks for dinner, I need to get to work'?"

  "And coffee," I reminded him, trying to lighten the mood.

  But then what little space was between us was gone and Paine's face ducked down toward my neck, his breath in my ear where he said just loudly enough for me to hear, "Babygirl, I was inside you less than twelve hours ago. Can't even give me a good morning kiss?"

  "You have company," I reminded him.

  "Oh, honey, sugar, darling," one of the other guys said, making me jerk back to place him. It was the green-eyed, post-punk one. "Please tell me someone as gorgeous as you isn't wasting your time with this ugly fuck," he said, jerking his head toward Paine.

  Paine rolled his eyes. "Elsie, this is Shooter," he said, indicating the green-eyed one.

  He reached for the hand I offered, but turned it knuckles-up and leaned down to kiss it. To say I let out a girlish giggle would be a giant understatement.

  "And Breaker," Paine went on, ignoring both Shooter's hand-kiss and my subsequent reaction.

  I held out my hand to Breaker who took it as offered, shaking it hard before letting it drop.

  "Hey doll," he greeted me.

  "What?" Paine asked as I pressed my lips together to try to keep a smile in.

  "Paine... Shooter... Breaker..." I explained, shaking my head.

  "Johnnie and Bryan if that helps," Paine explained, waving at Shooter when he said "Johnnie" and Breaker when he said "Bryan".

  "And by Johnnie," Shooter explained, "he means Johnnie Walker Allen."

  "Like the scotch?"

  To that, he smiled. "Yeah, darlin', like the scotch. I had a dick of an old man too."

  Unsure how to respond to that, I gave him a small smile before turning back to Paine. "I really do need to get..."

  "You got another twenty minutes before you even needed to leave your place," he cut me off.

  "Well I, ah, left my coffee in my car," I tried. I wasn't sure why I wanted to get out of there so badly, but I did. There was something about being around a man you were sort-of seeing when his friends were around that made a woman feel a lot like she was at some kind of audition. And well, with names like Shooter and Breaker and the aura of badassery that was coming off of the men, I was pretty sure lame ole' me wasn't going to impress them.

  "Coffee in the kitchen. You know where that blueberry shit is," he said, waving a hand toward his open apartment door.

  "She knows where the blueberry shit is?" I heard Breaker's amused voice ask as I scurried quickly, but not quickly enough to look like I was running away, into Paine's apartment.

  I had just gotten the blueberry bottle out of the cabinet when a voice behind me said casually, "Alright, peaches, spill," Shooter's voice called.

  I jumped, spinning with the blueberry bottle held up like I might strike out with it. "Sorry," I apologized when his brows drew together at the action. "I've had some, ah, close calls lately. I'm on edge."

  "Paine filled us in," he explained with such a casual shrug that I was left to wonder if what was going on for me and was extremely strange was just usual and commonplace to them.

  "What did you want me to spill about?" I asked, turning to finish fixing my coffee before I focused my attention back on him.

  "How you're still here."

  "I'm sorry?"

  "Pretty girl, I'm sure it hasn't exactly escaped your notice the kind of man Paine is. Meaning the non-monogamous kind. You're a smart woman. You can spot a guy like him a mile away."

  "You mean a guy like you?" I countered.

  "Formerly," he said. "Found my girl. Been settled for a year now. But we aren't talking about me. I want to know how you got Paine taking you out to eat and making a big deal about you trying to rush out of here."

  "Honestly, I don't know. I'm not that special. I mean, compared to you guys, I'm painfully normal. I don't know what is, ah, making Paine act differently."

  "If you think you're not special, you're seriously fucked in the head, sweetheart."

  "I didn't mean it like that. It's just... I don't know. I don't get it eit..."

  "Oh perfect!" a female voice called from the store and I felt myself start.

  "Don't go for the blueberry bottle," Shoot grinned. "I can protect you from Paine's mother."

  "Paine's mother?" I asked, true horror evident in my tone.

  "This is gonna be fun," Shooter said, rubbing his hands together as he moved to stand in the doorway. "Hey Mama Gina," he called to the woman I couldn't see.

  "Shoot! Wow. One stop today. I wanted to invite you and Amelia and Breaker and Alex and Paine and, well, whatever flavor of the week he's got, to dinner Sunday night."

  Alright.

  I was mortified.

  Mortified.

  I wanted one of those sinkholes to open up right underneath Paine's shop and swallow me up into it.

  Whatever flavor of the week he's got.

  Flavor of the week.

  I was a flavor of the week?

  Was that possible?

  It seemed like it seeing as there
had obviously been women he had brought to his mother's house in the past. So if he brought them to meet his mom, it really wasn't a big deal that he took me to dinner and drew me cute little pictures that made me smile like a lovesick teenager.

  God.

  I was so freaking gullible.

  There was the loudest silence following her statement that I had ever heard before. I could tell all three men were shocked silent, given that they knew I was present and what I must have been thinking at that comment.

  "Ma," Paine's voice finally broke in, "hold up a minute," he said and I could hear his footsteps moving toward the apartment. My head was shaking no even before he crossed in. I'm a little ashamed to admit this, but I actually backed myself into a corner. "Come on," he said, holding a hand out toward me.

  "No." Nope. No freaking way.

  He closed the gap between us, his hips pressing into mine which pressed my ass into the counter hard. "I've never brought someone home to meet my mother. She was being a smartass. That's how she is. Now stop giving me a look like I kicked your puppy while declaring to the world at large that you've got the sweetest fucking pussy I've ever tasted."

  "Shut up!" I squealed, horrified, looking past him to the spot where Shooter was standing. But he was gone.

  "Hey," he said, his voice getting a little firm as his hands cupped my face. "Whatever the fuck is going on in that pretty head of yours, shut it down. You ain't some bullshit flavor of the week. I'm gonna prove that by dragging your sweet ass out there to meet my mother so she can personally invite you to dinner at her place on Sunday night."

  With that, he dropped my face, grabbed my hand, and turned away. With his strong hand claiming mine and outweighing me by a good hundred some-odd pounds, well, there was no choice but to follow him.

  Paine's mother looked, well, absolutely nothing like him. First, she was small. As in both short and thin. Paine was right when he said she certainly didn't have the hips to birth a baby as big as he was. Hell, I found it hard to believe her small body could carry a baby as big as Paine. She was just past middle age with pale skin and dark hair that she had cut in a way that didn't scream "mom!" but was actually pretty stylish. Her eyes were similar to Paine's, but not quite. Hers were such a light green that they were almost see-through. Paine's had a bit more depth and I wondered if maybe the father had green eyes as well somehow. She had on dark wash jeans that she had tucked inside her tan heeled boots that matched her sweater I could see underneath her winter jacket.

  She had been smiling huge at Shooter because of something he said and I got the overall impression that he was a real charmer. But her eyes moved over toward us when she saw motion and the smile faltered, fell, then reappeared but with drawn-in brows like she was confused.

  "Ma, this is Elsie. Elsie, this is Gina. Now you gotta explain to her that fucking flavor of the week comment."

  Oh, good Lord.

  Seriously, where was a good sinkhole when you needed one?

  "Oh, Elsie honey. I didn't mean anything by that," she rushed to correct her transgression. "He's never brought a woman to my table before because he's well..."

  "A bit of a ladies man?" I supplied, my voice a strange strangled imitation of itself.

  "I was going to say slut," she said bluntly with a smile, "but lets go with your term. I've been waiting close to twenty years for him to introduce me to a girl."

  "Well now you're introduced," Paine supplied, dropping my hand but only because he slid an arm around my hips, pulling me to his side slightly.

  "Do you have any plans Sunday night?"

  Normally, I would. I'd had the standing Sunday night dinner with my father since I first moved out to go to college. But since I kinda... killed that tradition a couple days before, I was free. "No plans," I said with a smile. If I thought the audition with his buddies was bad, an audition with his buddies and his mother was all kinds of torture.

  "Wonderful. Paine will pick you up and bring you to dinner. I don't need you to bring anything at all. Me and the girls have it all covered. Shoot and Breaker will be bringing their girls too so you won't feel like I'm interviewing you all night," she said with a knowing smile.

  "Sounds great. Thanks for inviting me."

  She gave me a smile then turned to her son, the smile falling. "Don't fuck it up before then," she told him firmly before turning to Shooter and Breaker. "See you guys Sunday. Elsie," she said, reaching for my hand and squeezing it the way only mothers do, "it was so nice to meet you."

  "Nice to meet you too," I said, then watched as she turned and left.

  "We good?" Paine asked when his mother got into her car and pulled away.

  "Um, yeah, we're good. I really do need to get to work now though," I said, glancing at the clock.

  "I'll walk you out," he offered. Well, 'offered' wasn't the right word because it wasn't an offer. It was him narrating events as he pulled me toward the door.

  "See you guys Sunday," I managed to call before the door slammed behind me.

  Paine pulled me toward my car, pushed me back against the driver's door, and slammed his lips down on mine. It was by no means a 'good morning' kiss. It was hot and hungry and promising all kinds of fun carnal things that he couldn't give me because I was almost late for work and, you know, we were in public.

  "I'm not even close to fucking done with you," he said in a deep, smooth voice before turning away and going back toward his shop.

  With a strange fluttering feeling in my belly and wobbly legs, I got into my car and went to work.

  And couldn't concentrate enough to get a damn thing done all day.

  THIRTEEN

  Paine

  Drawing helps me focus. It lets my mind find what's important through all the bullshit that was always rolling around. Elsie had shifted away from me in her sleep and I had managed to get up without bothering her. A part of me had wanted to stay, to climb back, sleep in, wake up with plenty of time, and fuck her senseless before we both had to get off to work. But that was exactly the reason I needed to get my ass up, hit the gym, and get myself some perspective.

  The sketch of the barbell was first. It was a simple explanation to where I went so she didn't wake up and freak out. It was also supposed to be the only one I left, but as soon as I put it down, the animated cutesy sushi came to me and I just started to draw it out. Obviously, it was something that was on my mind.

  First, because it was a relatively new experience for me. I'd shared coffee with women, or drinks at a bar. I'd even taken a few out to an early morning breakfast after an all night fucking. But I never just... took a woman to dinner. For the fuck of it.

  Second, because in doing so, I got to see Elsie. See past the pretty and the smart and the rich, all the things that assaulted you when you saw her. I got under that. I saw the funny and awkward and silly. I saw the way her eyes lit up when she talked about her sister. By all accounts, Elana seemed like her shit was whacked, she was all over the place. But it was clear that Elsie loved her fiercely and loyally. And, well, Elsie was a pretty level-headed chick. If she thought you were worthy of fierce and loyal love, then you must be, despite all the outward appearances of crazy.

  As I plowed through a rough workout, I couldn't shake the question why. Why Elsie was different. Sure, she was drop dead gorgeous. But I'd bagged beautiful women before. She was smart. That was also something I'd known before. The rich thing, that meant nothing to me. It wasn't like I was the kind of man who would ever let a woman take care of him.

  There was just a 'something', a thing I couldn't put my finger on, but she had it and I wanted a piece of it.

  Maybe it was her contradictions. Sure she was pretty, but she vegged out in ugly sweats and wore giant glasses when her contacts were out. She was rich, but she worked her ass off to take care of herself despite the trust. She seemed to have her shit together, strong, independent... but there was also a hint of vulnerability about her that made any good man want to protect it at all costs. She cared about
her body, but not in a way that made her deny good food when it was in front of her.

  And, well, shit, that woman wore a sexually confident vibe that a man could sense a mile off. And it wasn't the sad, desperate vibe you found on lonely women in a bar. It was something else, something infinitely more attractive. It was something that said she owned her sexuality, she liked to have sex if and when she wanted it with whomever she chose and that she didn't let it define her or in any way lower her.

  The sex? Off the fucking charts.

  Sure, there had been women in the past that I hit it off with in bed and spent more than one night with. Some that I called whenever the mood struck, alone and horny and in need of some headboard breaking, no strings attached sex. But that was clearly all it was.

  With Elsie, once I was inside her, I got this strange as fuck feeling like that was where I was supposed to be.

  Factor in that she could take it as hard and fast as I gave it to her, the fact that she gave good head (though it got interrupted), that her pussy tasted like fucking candy... yeah, no way was I going to pass up the opportunity to explore that with her.

  I showered and left the gym, texting Shoot and Breaker to meet me at the shop to talk about the Elana situation, see if either of them knew anything.

  Breaker got his name because he was good at breaking things. Mainly, people. That was how he made his living, through intimidation, through beatings. Shooter, well, obviously he was good with a gun. Meaning, he was the best sniper and contract killer on the East coast. I came across Breaker when he was squatting in abandoned storefronts as a teen. There was a certain connection street-kids felt for one another. Me and Break, we got along straight off. A couple years later, Breaker took in a younger Shooter like a little lost puppy. Breaker was, outside the gang, the best friend I had. So, by extension, me and Shoot got tight as well. It helped that we all lived outside the law; we understood one another.

  Through the years and me getting outta the gang, they were by my side. Both still worked their illegal jobs and, therefore, both had an ear to the streets at all times whereas sometimes my information was weeks or months too old to matter.