Page 58 of Flirt

Gabriella grabbed the glass of wine I had set on the table, then sat down beside me. She curled her legs to the side and leaned her head on my shoulder. “She had an exciting day. We all have.”

“In the best of ways,” I said, and lifted my arm and placed it around Gabriella’s shoulders.

“Oh, yes. As a matter of fact, you’re not the only one who owes Justin. I think I do, too. If he hadn’t talked about the short time he lived here, I wouldn’t have brought Sawyer to see where her dad had lived. Heck, I had never heard of Shades Valley before Justin spoke of it,” Gabriella said absently and took a sip of her wine.

My brows furrowed, and I asked, “Justin spent time in Shades Valley?”

She leaned forward to set her glass on the table, then snuggled back into me before she answered sleepily, “Uh huh.”

“Fuck me, his name hadn’t even registered when I read the letter. When you mentioned him before, you referred to him only by his first name. Hell, my brothers and I went to high school with a Justin Sawyer.”

“Max, what are you talking about?” She lifted her head and looked at me, confusion showing in her eyes.

“The Justin Sawyer I knew transferred into Shades Valley High as a Junior. We were in the same homeroom along with Coast and Devil. He was our friend, and he hung around with us all the time. Hell, we taught him how to ride a motorcycle. Back then, Dare had an old bike, the damn thing finally gave out and he bought a new one. Instead of junking it, the others and I asked if we could have it to work on. The first bike we ever rebuilt. Justin worked part-time after school because all he ever talked about was aging out and hitting the road. We’d told him he would need a ride, and since we all had bikes, he could have the one we were working on. He bought the parts and helped us work on the bike. Took us over two months to get that bike done. My dad took him to get his license. I had never seen him smile that much as he did when he held the license in his hand.

“He was smart and easy-going unless you pissed him off. Sometimes we would forget he had been in the system since his parents died in a car accident that he had survived. The authorities hadn’t been able to find any relatives, so he went into the system at five years old.

“The Swanson’s house was his tenth foster family. They hated when he started hanging around with us. He didn’t give a shit what they thought, though. By the time he came to them, he knew more about the system than they did. The system turns out three types of kids; shy and withdrawn or hardened by life. The third is the small percent, the ones who refuse to let the system break them and go against some hefty odds to succeed.

“Every time we would go by the Swanson’s house, they would threaten him with being pulled, and the next stop would be a group home. The threat only showed how much they didn’t know or even try to get to know Justin. By the time graduation rolled around, each of us had turned eighteen. My brothers and I knew we would either sign up for the military or go to college. Justin wanted no parts of either, so we tried to get him to prospect for the club once he graduated. He told us he would think about it, but we knew he wouldn’t. Justin had told us numerous times that he planned to get as far away from here as possible when he aged out. And he did. Hell, the diploma was probably still warm in his hands when he left.

“When I asked you what brought you here from Vegas, you said it was because you visited the area, liked Shades Valley, and decided to move and build a practice here. I never thought to ask what brought you to Washington, to begin with. I just assumed... Hell, I don’t even know what I assumed. I do know it’s a small fucking world.” I picked my beer back up, guzzling the room temperature liquid while I processed the new information. My woman was a vault when it came to sharing anything personal. When she did share, it seemed to be the bare minimum.

I watched Gabriella swipe at the tears on her cheeks, then she sighed and said, “I had no idea. It really is a small world. Justin told me about growing up in the foster care system and his parents’ death, but he never talked much about the families he lived with. I decided to come to Washington and visit where he was born, which was Gransville. The only other place he mentioned that I recalled was Shades Valley. Probably because when he mentioned it, he said his time living here had been the best. I assumed he had finally been placed in a home where the people actually cared for him. He never mentioned anyone or the family he lived with or why it was the best for him. Just that it had been.”

“Damn, I really do owe the man. Because of him, I have you and Sawyer. You wouldn’t have come here if he hadn’t moved away,” I said and shook my head at how life worked sometimes.

“Max, the bike—”

“Yeah, he left on it. I don’t figure he still had it when he met you. We might have rebuilt and replaced parts, which was enough for him to ride around here. But with the trip to Vegas, surely the bike hadn’t lasted that much longer after he had gotten there. We’re better now at building and rebuilding them than we were at seventeen.” I laughed, then asked, “Did he buy a new one?”

“No, he loved that bike. I never understood why, until now. The bike is stored in my dad’s garage. After he died, I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it.”

“Wait until I tell the others all this. They’ll be surprised, but what will really shock them is that you have the first bike we ever rebuilt together. That bike was where we got the idea of opening a shop one day. Just damn,” I said and pull Gabriella closer. “We are really going to have to work on your ability to share information about yourself. It isn’t like you would be giving up information detrimental to the nation’s security.” I laughed, and she elbowed me.

“Well, it isn’t as if I intentionally withheld the information about Justin. In my defense, though, growing up my dad would tell us that there was no reason for everyone around us to know every detail about us. My dad stressed it constantly to me and my brother and sister to watch what was said to others, even if we considered them close friends. Hell, even other family members if the information didn’t involve them directly or wasn’t life or death.”

I chuckled and gave her a brief squeeze. “Hell, your dad sounds so much like mine and the brothers’ dads that if I didn’t know better, I would think you grew up around an MC...or maybe the mob,” I said the last, and my chuckle turned into full out laughter. Still, when I noticed Gabriella just stared at me, instead of laughing along, my laughter died as quickly as it had started.

“Angel, seriously,” I said, then let my head fall back against the couch. I raised my free hand up and pinched the bridge of my nose between my finger and thumb. After a few seconds, I dropped my hand and raised my head, and looked down at her. “You said your dad managed a casino.”

She started picking at my shirt as if she were removing lint. “He does for my uncle...Marco Tanucci.”

I placed a finger under her chin and lifted her face until she looked at me. “Marco Tanucci, the Boss of the Tanucci family in Las Vegas, is your uncle?” I asked.

“Yes,” she answered and dropped my hand away from her and began to laugh. I laughed so hard my eye started to water. “Shush, or you’re going to wake Sawyer.”

I rubbed my hand down my face and worked on getting myself under control. When I sobered up, I shifted both of us until we faced each other on the couch. I placed a hand on each of her cheeks, then leaned forward and gave her a soft kiss.

“Oh, Angel, we aredefinitelygoing to have to work on your communication skills,” I stated and smiled.

“It’s not like I wouldn’t have told you before you met my family,” she said disgruntledly. “And I don’t know why you were laughing.”

“Because the first thing that ran through my mindwasthat our wedding would be anything but boring,” I told her and watched the expression change on her face. “Don’t look so worried. I’m sure everyone will behave during the ceremony. Now the reception, well, what could happen between a bunch of bikers and mobsters in the same room with an endless supply of booze.” Gabriella planted her face on my shoulder, and I wrapped my arms around her as my body shook from laughing.

---