Page 48 of Renegade

He hadn’t been like that growing up; I’d always been considered the scrappy one. If I really thought about it, his surliness had appeared not long after the whole thing with Patrick.

Maybe I was responsible for creating a monster.

Something flickered in David’s gaze and he exhaled slowly. “Don’t let me ever catch you near my wife again. Are we clear on that?”

He quickly agreed and escaped the hallway back out into the bar.

I slapped a hand lightly on David’s back. “You alright? You wanna step outside for a minute?”

He shook his head. “I wanna stay and dance with my wife.”

I waved away the concerned staff and turned back to him. “I think that’s a good plan, but first, take a walk with me outside. Let’s clear your head before you Hulk out on us. Then, we’ll grab another round and you can get that dance.”

In another life, where things weren’t completely fucked up, I probably would’ve made a kick-ass parent. Pulling David out of a rage couldn’t have been much different than calming a toddler after a tantrum.

Shit, it was probably easier to deal with the toddler.

Lauren

May 2014

I waited until the guys separated before following Elizabeth back out to the patio. She was in the exact same spot I’d been only an hour before, staring vacantly over the railing toward the pond.

I reached for her hand. “He’s gone. Nobody had to throw any punches. Mike’s calming David down now—that was Landon, wasn’t it?”

She reached into her purse and grabbed a pill bottle. She popped one in her mouth before taking my drink and swallowing it down. “Anxiety medication—Look, Lauren, I really don’t want to talk about it right now, but yeah, that was him.”

“What was he doing here? Did he know you were going to be here?” My pulse started to race with panic.

I wanted to tell myself that I’d simply been watching too much Investigation Discovery, but it didn’t look good. First, he’d waited for her after work and then her house had been broken into. The police had no leads, but she and I both suspected it had been Landon. Him showing up tonight didn’t seem like much of a coincidence.

Elizabeth rubbed her temples and sighed, “I don’t know why he was here. I didn’t start things up again if that’s what you’re wondering.” She lowered her voice as she said the last part, as if David might pop up out of the pond at any moment. I pictured him spitting out a snorkel, before screaming, “I knew it!” The thought made me purse my lips together in order to remain serious.

Elizabeth looked sincere and based on the way her hands were trembling, she really hadn’t planned on seeing him tonight. I squeezed her hand again. “I believe you. I just don’t understand why he turns up here tonight and what—busts a move on you?”

She was given a reprieve from my questioning when David and Mike walked back up.

Mike.

I still couldn’t believe it. When I saw him standing in David and Elizabeth’s living room, I was almost certain that I’d been hallucinating. The man that no other man could compete against was right in front of me.

He’d apparently been spending all of his time in the gym since I last saw him—the man was rock solid muscle. His biceps were straining to break free from his dress shirt and it took everything in me not to jump on him. While his hair was shorter, I’d been more than a little pleased to see that he still had the beard.

He’d seemed just as speechless to see me as I was him. It dredged up all those lustful feelings I’d been trying to keep buried for the last four years and changed my entire game plan.

I’d convinced myself that I could have casual sex while on my quest to find Mr. Right, but Jack—Mike—had always been the one. Now, I didn’t know what the hell I was supposed to do.

I knew I was tempting fate when I’d felt his eyes on me back at the house. I’d taken my time getting the champagne out of my car, knowing he was watching my every move.

Unfortunately, my confidence had faltered a bit by the time we got toNick’s. Elizabeth once shared, after several glasses of champagne, that she hadn’t slept with David until she had a ring on her finger. Sandra swore that soulmates didn’t exist and said,“You just have to get it, get it, get it until you can’t get it anymore.”

Those were her exact words.

Sandra had also convinced me in Galveston that Mike was a man who only wanted one thing. Unfortunately, I hadn’t been able to get Elizabeth alone long enough to pick her brain.

I’d grown up not knowing my father. From what I’d been able to piece together from Monica over the years, I’d come to the assumption that he’d been a one-night stand.

Did I want to end up like Monica?

---