by Jax Hart
“Thanks.”
I take a long sip feeling the beer at the back of my parched throat. Smith grabs the keys to my truck off my desk. “I’m driving.”
“Where we goin’?”
“Out.”
I shrug. In some ways Smith is the perfect friend. He’s company without feeling the need to fill pauses with idle shit. We just hang in silence half the time, both of us completely cool with that. Smith is as big as I am. He’s also ex-military. He also has Daddy issues.
“Shit,” I smirk.
“What?”
“Nothing. I just realized the two of us are gay as fuck. All we do is fix broken shit and workout.”
“I know. That’s why we’re going out tonight. We’ll head up the coast to San Fran.”
“…like I said…”
“Fine. We’ll go south and hit up LA.”
I shrug. It’s a long ass ride but I’ve got nowhere to be. I need to head north not south. But thinking about returning to Springdale brings back heavy shit I’m still not ready to face.
Smith turns into a bar/lounge high up on the hills somewhere toward Malibu. “We’re both in worn jeans and work boots.”
He shrugs. “They’ll let us in.”
I never liked being the center of attention. But Smith was right, not only did we get in, but we got one of the best tables on the back-deck hundreds of feet above the rolling cliffs below. “I feel like a piece of prime rib at the butcher’s shop.”
“Roll with it. Maybe we’ll get lucky. It’s been too long for me,” he takes a long pull from his beer.
The two of us are an anomaly. As happy hour winds down the outdoor bar is full of either guys dressed in khakis and expensive polos or guys still wearing suit pants with their dress shirts rolled to the elbow. Smith and I on the other hand, with our beards and tats are definitely outlaw bad boys. And the women are devouring us with their eyes, just knowing we’re just as bad in the sack…
The sun is sinking over the Pacific. Palm trees with fairy lights twinkle at dusk. It’s prime hunting time. I grin, catching a saucy blonde checking me out. She’s clearly here with someone else but that doesn’t stop her from eye-fucking me over the rim of her wineglass every two minutes. Smith orders food and I sit and drink, hoping the alcohol will burn away the pain seeping in around the edges of my heart. The heart that’s been locked up and put away.
Like moths to a flame, women come to us. After five rounds, I’ve loosened up and let one sit in my lap. Smith pulls out two Cubans. We’re getting lit and sit like Gods with hot women all over us.
But it feels fake as shit. When she runs her hands over my pecs, I shudder feeling turned off instead of on.
What is wrong with me? I pull out my wallet, throwing a few hundred on the table. “We’re out.”
“What?” Smith pulls his lips of the side of the girl’s neck who is in his arms.
“You heard me. I’m not feeling her…” I point to the woman who gasps. Pain fills her baby blue eyes mirroring a fraction of the pain that broke through the damn and is suddenly flooding me.
I’m drowning.
Drowning.
I’m so sick of it all. These broads who just want to ride dick not caring about whose it is. I don’t want some skank who sucks more than a Hoover.
I need a friggin’ lifeline. I throw my head back and look at the stars. “Fuck you, old man. You’re probably laughing your ass off now, eh? Look at me, free but still out here all alone.”
A large hand lands on my shoulder preventing me from reaching the truck. “No brother. I called Will. We’ll crash with Creed here.”
I throw my hands up in the air, not giving a fuck. Nothing matters when you realize your life’s one big open highway and you let it keep going nowhere. I should’ve pulled off back there… should’ve found a good girl and made a life with her. I should’ve called my old man last Christmas, instead of letting his phone ring and hanging up like a pussy when he finally answered.
“What happened to ya’?”
I turn finding Will pulled up in an SUV with a cigarette dangling from his lips. “That shit will kill you.” A thousand memories hit me at once, knocking me back on my heels.
Will. Rog. My old man. The three of them are Creed legends. Too big to fail or fall. And yet my old man did. Unlike, Rog, Will’s aged. His tan face is wrinkled to shit. His long hair white. But he’s still raw and rough just like he always was.
He shrugs. “Everything will. It’s just time, brotha.” Will drives to Creed’s clubhouse and the men are holding a remembrance of sorts. Everyone raises a glass to “Big John,” my old man. They all worship him like he was some friggin’ icon. I guess to them he was… but to me… he was just an angry drunk half the time I was home.
I sit at the bar, waving off the sweetbutts offering me their “condolences” while also offering much more. Story after story about my old man and the shit that went down when he was Prez go long into the night. I never knew him at all. Never gave him a chance.
Pink birthday balloons are half-deflated but still hang around the room. “Here.” I take a bottle of top shelf whiskey and find a comfy chair in the corner of the room. I punch a balloon out of the way and take a seat. I hate birthdays. And the reminder crashes me back to the last time I saw my old man. It was my birthday… that day I rode out of Springdale. Karma comes full-circle and it punches me in the gut. I dunno whose birthday it was but I bet it was a shitty one if they were connected to Creed. I learned that the hard way years ago.
After dawn breaks, I find Smith tangled up with two women in a guest room.
“Wake up you slut,” I snicker, kicking him in the ribs.
“What?” Oh, hell.” He groans, wiping a hand over his eyes.
“I hope you wrapped that shit.”
He winces, seeing what I’m seeing. In the morning light the two broads are train wrecks. Make up is smeared. Hair is tangled.
“They looked good at 2 a.m.,” he shrugs.
“Yeah, I bet they did. Let’s get the fuck outta here.”
I wait for him in the truck. He gets in five minutes later with his hair still dripping from a shower. We drive to a diner and fill up on coffee and the lumberjack special.
“God, I could sleep for hours.”
“Long night?” I smirk.
“There was two of them.”
“I know. I saw. Damn, Smith I never knew you were such a man-whore.”
“Occasionally. I had quite the dry spell. I should be good for another few months. How ‘bout you? Score anything?”
“Nope. Those club girls ain’t my type. They remind me of someone from my past.”
“An ex?”
“Nope. The woman tore my family apart. Some who bitch named Dee.”
He blows out a breath, “Yep. That’s why I love ‘em and leave ‘em. We got the garage, we’re tight with Creed… I don’t need anything else.”
“Yeah,” I agreed despite the hole in my chest the size of a crater on the moon. I had everything and yet it felt like I had nothing at all.
DOWNLOAD
ROQUE
Jax also writes HOT MAFIA ROMANCE
DOWNLOAD
I'm no prince on a white horse, I'm the villain wearing black Armani. I'm at the top of my game and no one will bring me down. Survival is what I do sweetheart. So be warned, you're about to fall for the bad guy. The anti-hero... Prepare to get crushed.
He think he's the tough guy. He's the head of the Salvatore Crime Family. So what? I'm the dark princess born to rule. I'll overthrow the dark king and make him beg for my mercy. By the time I'm done with Roque Salvatore... his black heart will be all mine.
For free books and giveaways join Jax’s newsletter here!
AUTHOR LINKS:
PRIVATE FB FAN GROUP:http://bit.ly/2Ijngbi
AUTHOR PAGE: https://www.facebook.com/SilverfoxPapi/
AMAZON AUTHOR PAGE: https://www.amazon.com/Jax-Hart/e/B0711XTMDN/
Newsletter: http://bit.
ly/authortjaxhart
Royal Bastards Mc Series
Erin Trejo: Blood Lust
Chelle C Craze & Eli Abbott: Bad Like Me
K Webster: Koyn
Esther E. Schmidt: Petros
Elizabeth Knox: Bet On Me
Glenna Maynard: Lady & the Biker
Madison Faye: Filthy Bastard
CM Genovese: Frozen Rain
J. Lynn Lombard: Blayze’s Inferno
Crimson Syn: Inked In Vengeance
B.B. Blaque: Rotten Apple
Addison Jane: Her Ransom
Izzy Sweet * Sean Moriarty: Broken Wings
Nikki Landis: Ridin’ For Hell
KL Ramsey: Savage Heat
M.Merin: Axel
Sapphire Knight: Bastard
Bink Cummings: Switch Burn
Winter Travers: Playboy
Linny Lawless: The Heavy Crown
Jax Hart: Desert King
Elle Boon: Royally Broken
Kristine Allen: Voodoo
Ker Dukey: Animal
KE Osborn: Defining Darkness
Shannon Youngblood: Silver & Lace
Royal Bastards MC Facebook Group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/royalbastardsmc/
Website- https://www.royalbastardsmc.com/
