Page 2 of Zeppelin
I’ve never been in a position like this, and itundoesme.
I swallow the vile taste in my mouth. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Decay’s face darkens. It’s not just a trick of the streetlight or a passing shadow. It actually happens. “Jack would have wanted me to take care of you. It would have been one of his last wishes, if he’d had time to make them. What my brother wanted in life I would have done anything to give him. He would have done the same for me. hedid. Time and again.” He swallows and it seems as loud as a gunshot in the silence out here. “So, you’re going to tell me, or I’ll stalk you like your worst nightmare until I know the truth.”
“Fucking hell,” I hiss, uncharacteristically crass. I’m so shocked by that blunt, creepy as hell pronouncement, that I have zero filter. “What are you going to do, force me to take a piss so you can test it?”
His hard, chiseled face breaks into a grim smile like he’d enjoy doing it.
God. He has to be joking.
Has to be.
He’s wasted, for one. Pretty much everyone at a biker celebration of life is bound to get ripping drunk. Jack didn’t bring me to any of the club’s parties, and when we got together, it wasn’t here, but Bronte has been to a few. Even just a regular Friday night can get pretty rowdy around here. Not like at some clubs, but there’s still no shortage of drinking, weed, cigarettes, loud music, and the club women who aren’t wives or girlfriends.
I can smell the whiskey from where I’m standing, but as that smile goes on for a beat too long, I wonder how drunk Decay really is. He has every reason to want to forget why he’s here, orto let go and celebrate his brother as a send-off, but maybe he only had a few drinks.
Another beat of silence, and I know he’s not joking about any of this.
Grave and I might not have been in a relationship, and he could be an overgrown man-child who did stupid things like put firecrackers in my niece’s birthday cake, but he had his sweet moments too. I’ll cherish those times forever. I do miss him, even if I didn’t love him. We were friends, I guess. Sort of. I did have some feelings for sure. I absolutely wish that three days ago, the club’s Prez, Tyrant, didn’t have to call me and tell me that Grave rolled his truck just outside of Hart. His stupid, dumb, jacked-up truck that he loved to the point of being obnoxious about it. He wasn’t wearing a seatbelt, which is pretty much just classic Grave right there, and he was ejected out the windshield and was killed instantly.
I still haven’t recovered. My emotions are all over the place. My hormones are a wreck, and my brain is even worse, trying to sort all this out.
The only way to get Decay to drop this and leave me alone is to beawful. I don’t have it in me to hurt him or stab daggers into him, especially right now, but if that’s what it’s going to take, then that’s what I’ll do.
I tap my foot like I have better places to be. I mean, I do. I’d like to be back inside, with my sister and Dominic, but at the same time, I don’t want to hide behind them. Bronte’s my older sister, but she doesn’t need to fight my battles for me.
“Is this like a thing because I was with your brother? You want me just because he had me?”
Decay has the same bronzed complexion his brother did. Grave liked to joke about it being a welding tan, but I know it was all the time he spent outdoors, even when he wasn’t on his bike. All the color drains out, the golden hue melting into a sickly gray. “That’s disgusting and vile.”
“Mmm. At least we agree on something.”
“Are you callingmedisgusting and vile?”
“No, but you are immature and annoying.”
“You loved my brother.”
“I didn’t,” I choke. At least that’s the truth, but the most painful one to get out. “I’m sorry, but I didn’t.” I have to look down at the thin strip of sidewalk here because I feel like the world’s biggest asshole saying something like this at someone’s celebration of life. “Ilikedhim. I liked him a lot. But I didn’tlovehim. We didn’t have time to fall in love. It was about us being good together in certain ways, but in a lifetime? As partners who make it and are there for each other and grow old? That wasn’t going to happen.”
“There wasn’t anything wrong with my brother,” Decay snaps.
I have the courage to pull my eyes up. “I didn’t say that there was and I’m sorry if you took it that way. We were just different people who worked in the short term and wanted different things in the long run. Do you understand?”
“Did he know you were pregnant?”
So much for his attention being diverted.
Decay reads my silence the exact wrong way. “He would have married you. He would have done the right thing. Despiteyou thinking that we’re meat-headed idiots, he would have done whatever you wanted. Supported you financially. Been in the baby’s life. It would have been a good thing,” he stops, slowing his breathing while he tries to get himself under control. Maybe he’s doing the military counting thing. I could use some of that while I stand here and pretend like I’m not freaking out. “I could still make it a good thing.” He thumps his chest, smacking his leather jacket with the massive patch of the stone angel with the bowed head on the back. I know it well. Obviously, Grave had the same one. “You should take my offer. Who else is going to want a woman with baggage like that?”
“A baby isn’t baggage, you asshole!” I shut my eyes, literally gasping dramatically at myself. Did I seriously just blurt that out because he goaded me? “I mean—hypothetically.” I tack on lamely, knowing it’s far, far too late for it.
Decay drops his voice. His expression changes from edgy to something that borders on concern. “Have you told your family?”
“They knew about Grave.”
He sighs and rolls his eyes at my obtuseness. “I doubt they approved.”
