Chapter 16.
Spider I"d left it too long. As soon as Bash had called me, I had known that I had left it too long.
I should have told her that first day I saw her again. f.u.c.k, I should have told her when I"d first found out the truth. Instead I"d just hidden my head in the sand and left her alone. Too scared, too much of a chicken s.h.i.t to risk her rejection. So here I was, on my bike after driving over ten hours straight, sitting in the driveway of the house Willa had grown up in.
The sun had been up for a few hours now, and the car that had mostly done nothing but sit in the Hannigans" driveway since she had come back into my life, was sitting right in front of me. My heart unclenched a little knowing that she had made it here safely. I"d been terrified that she would have been so upset she would have wrecked.
The house was nice, out of the way and more like a cottage than anything else. The yard was full of plants but no flowers. Willa wasn"t a fan of flowers. She was allergic to bees and flowers attracted bees. At least ten birdhouses were spread around the front yard, and I knew it was to discourage bees just as much as the flowerless plants were. I made a silent promise then and there that if she forgave me I would buy her a house and build her a hundred birdhouses for our front yard.
I climbed off the bike and headed toward the front door. Trying the handle, I found it unlocked. Shaking my head I walked inside, but other than Willa"s car keys lying on the table by the front door there was no sign of her. Heading upstairs I figured she was exhausted after driving all night. I sure as h.e.l.l was.
Bash had reluctantly given me the address of Willa"s old house. He"d wanted to give Willa a few days to get her head straight, but I knew that if she had too much time to overthink the situation she would start imagining all kinds of stupid s.h.i.t. Stuff that would be so far from the truth she would never believe me when I explained everything.
The first door I came to upstairs was a room that had been painted pink with a gray boarder. There was a toddler bed against one wall, telling me this had been Lexa"s room. Bash had told me that Willa was selling her mother"s house, with nearly all the furnishings included since there was no need for them back in Creswell Springs. The next two rooms showed me a half bathroom and what must have been Bash"s room while he had been living here. It had been a small room, with just a bed and a few odds and ends, but it showed me that he had indeed had his own room.
The next door was the last one and it was also a good distance away from the other two bedrooms. Opening it quietly, my breath caught in my lungs as I found Willa spread out across the top of the comforter of the queen-sized bed. She had her head pillowed on her arm and she had one shoe on while the other was on the floor beside the bed. Her jeans were unb.u.t.toned but still on and her shirt had ridden up her back showing off that alabaster skin I loved to lick and taste.
It was her face, the dark circles under those long lashed eyes, and the tear stains on her cheeks that made me want to beat my head against the closest wall. Making her cry was the last thing I wanted to do. I was such a f.u.c.k up when it came to her and our relationship.
Jaw clenched, I sat on the edge of the bed and took off her remaining shoe before tugging off her jeans so that she could sleep more comfortably. Then I picked her up and pulled the covers back before tucking her in. I ached to lie down beside her then and there but I was a mess. A shower was in order before I could sleep. I didn"t want her to wake up and find me smelling of smoke and cheap perfume from Paradise City as well as blood and sweat from where I"d pummeled some college boy from trying to rape one of the girls who worked at the club.
By the time I returned from the connecting bathroom, I could barely keep my eyes open. I climbed into bed beside Willa and pulled her close, my eyes already closing from exhaustion as I fell into a deep, dreamless sleep...
The slap across my face had my eyes snapping open. A very awake, very angry Willa leaned over me. The glare on her face mixed with the hurt in her storm-cloud gray eyes hurt me more than the sting of her slap. I touched a hand to my cheek, letting her have her five seconds of redemption. She knew I wasn"t going to hit her back. I"d cut my own hand off before raising it to her.
"I don"t want you here," she yelled as she got to her feet and turned to look down at me. "Get your clothes on and get out."
"I"ll leave after we talk," I told her as I sat up, pulling the comforter and sheets up to my waist. It wouldn"t earn me any points to show off my hard-on while she yelled at me. I didn"t want to leave here without her, but if that was what she wanted after I told her the truth, then it was what I was going to give her. That didn"t mean I wasn"t going to keep pushing when she got back to Creswell Springs, though. I was ready to fight as long and as dirty as I needed to get her back.
"There isn"t anything to talk about. You"ve had the chick who you cheated on me with working for you for three years, didn"t bother to tell me, and I don"t like it. End of conversation."
"I didn"t cheat on you." My voice was quiet as I sat there following her with my eyes. She was pacing back and forth now, but at my confession she stopped and her whole face changed. Angry tears leaked from her eyes and her nose scrunched up as she prepared to blast me with her wrath. Or, as Raven would have called it-ugly cry. I hoped she didn"t cry.
"Liar!" she screamed. "You f.u.c.king liar. I walked in and saw it all. You had two girls-two f.u.c.king girls, Spider!-laid out with you naked as the day they were born."
"You saw what you were supposed to see, baby." I tried to keep my voice calm, but my anger over the whole episode even years later was enough to ignite my rage all over again. The night I"d learned the truth was the night I"d come the closest to ever hitting a female in my life. "Your bat-s.h.i.t crazy sister set me up. That night she knew that we had something going on between us. Knew that my feelings for you were a lot deeper than just someone I talked to in pa.s.sing. You saw her try to work her way into my bed that night. It was why you ran back to your room in the first place."
"Don"t try to turn this around. I know what I saw." But some of the anger seemed to leave her face to be replaced with confusion. "You were asleep with two girls..."
"I was pa.s.sed out. I"d drunk nearly a whole bottle of tequila because I didn"t want to face saying goodbye to you the next morning. I wanted to ask you to come to Creswell Springs with me. Or let me go back to Seattle with you. d.a.m.n it, Willa, I loved you and I was about to turn nomad for you. Would have turned my back on my MC, my friends and family. I would have let that all go so that I could be with you." I would do it now if that was what it took. Anything that would make her see what she meant to me, I would do it without hesitation.
"How do you know Tasha set you up?" she demanded, her chin trembling. I breathed a little easier as I saw something akin to hope in her gray eyes. Things might turn out okay for us after all.
"Topaz confessed the night she showed up at Paradise City. She hadn"t wanted to do it in the first place, but Tasha was scary as h.e.l.l when it came to forcing people to do what she wanted." I grimaced, remembering the shape Topaz had been in the night she had shown up in need of a safe place to heal and asking for a job. Tasha had worked her over really good, and Topaz would always have a few scars to remember Tasha Blackstone for. "Tasha had Topaz and some other sheep climb into bed with me, knowing that you would find them there. I was so drunk that I thought I blacked out and cheated on you, when all I did was fall asleep."
Willa bit her lip and sat down in the rocking chair beside the bed. Her fingers were trembling as she ran them over her face. "Why didn"t you tell me sooner?"
For over a year I had thought I had done the unforgiveable. It had haunted me and I"d thought I was unworthy of Willa because of it. As soon as I had found out the truth I should have been on the road to her, to get my female back. It was the biggest regret of my life that I hadn"t. "I didn"t know how to tell you. I had heard through a few people that you were having a hard time taking care of your mom. I was scared that you wouldn"t believe me and that seeing me would only stress you out more. When you showed up in Creswell Springs I was p.i.s.sed off at first. You had been living with Bash for over a year so of course I"d thought the same thing Raven did. That you and my best friend wouldn"t have been able to live together that long and not hook up."
Her glare returned. "Bash has only ever been a friend. He"s like a brother to me. Of course we got close while we lived here, but that was only because of Lexa. We both grew up fast when we had to learn to take care of a defenseless little baby. Plus he was hung up over Raven. He talked about her every day, and I saw how much he loved her." She shook her head and looked away, her cheeks filling with pink. "Taking our friendship further had never even crossed my mind because all I could think about was you."
"Good." The thought that she couldn"t get me out of her head gave me hope. Maybe she had loved me just as long as I had loved her. I knew that her wanting to label our relationship as "just s.e.x" in the beginning had been her way of protecting herself. When she had agreed to make us something more I"d thought that she was learning to trust me.
Willa sighed and shook her head, but a small smile teased at her lips at my c.o.c.ky reply. "You loved me four years ago?" Her voice was soft, as if she was shy.
"More than anything. Which was why I hated myself for so long after that night. I would have given up everything for you, Willa. Everything."
A fresh batch of tears filled her eyes. "And now? Do you...love me now?"
"I never stopped." The words came out huskier than I expected as my throat clogged with emotions I wasn"t used to feeling. I never thought that telling a female I loved her would affect me so much. f.u.c.k, I never thought I would tell a female other than Raven that I loved her. It was kind of scary, but as soon as the words were out I felt lighter for some inexplicable reason.
Willa "I never stopped."
I felt as if I were still dreaming. Honestly, the dreams I"d been having before waking up to find Spider pressed against my back had been bizarre to say the least. The long drive through the night had been more than exhausting physically. Crying most of the way to Seattle had left me emotionally and mentally drained and I"d barely had time to use the bathroom before conking out on the bed that had once been my mother"s.
The dreams had started as soon as I was asleep. A little house with a huge backyard. A motorcycle in the driveway and three kids playing on the swing set in the front yard. I knew it was the future I"d wanted with Spider and would never have. I had woken up feeling so emotionally shattered that I"d been unable to contain the anger at having all of that ripped away by the man lying so peacefully asleep beside me that I"d slapped his handsome face. The slap had only made me feel a little better for a moment and then I"d started regretting it. I"d never hit him before, and didn"t want to turn into the kind of woman who took her anger out in a violent way. I wasn"t Tasha, after all, and my mother would have been so ashamed of me if she had seen what I had done.
Now, after hearing him explain that it had been my sister playing the worst kind of trick-which made a sick kind of sense-and having Spider tell me that he loved me back then and had never stopped, I was left speechless. My heart was cracked into a million pieces, but they suddenly didn"t feel like they couldn"t be put back together again. If I let myself believe him, then maybe he could rebuild my heart and fix the twisting pain in my chest.
"I never stopped, Willa. I"ve loved you from the first time I saw you. That sounds crazy, and if I hadn"t felt it first-hand, I would tell you that love at first sight doesn"t exist. f.u.c.k, I would tell you that love itself doesn"t exist. But that first day, as soon as I saw you, something changed inside of me. You made me different in a blink of an eye." He shifted on the bed, causing the covers to fall from his waist a few inches. I tried not to let my eyes drift from his face, but the temptation of seeing him in all his naked glory was almost more than I could handle. But this conversation was possibly the most important I would ever have in my life so I forced myself to focus.
"I tried to fight what I felt for you, but I knew it was a losing battle. Less than a week and I was practically begging you to spend time with me." He grimaced. "I knew for sure I loved you when you would sit through all of those Norman Reedus movies with me without complaint." Despite all the emotions churning through me a laugh escaped me at that last statement and he grinned. "Not even Raven will watch that much Norman Reedus with me, and she"s a huge fan of Daryl from The Walking Dead."
"Well, that"s where you have to understand the big difference between Raven and me." He frowned and I offered him a small smile. "I love you in a bigger way than Raven does."
The words had barely left my lips when he was across the bed and pulling me out of the rocker. He jerked me against his chest so hard that it sent us falling back onto the mattress. His lips sealed across mine, his tongue diving deep as if he were trying to brand me inside and out. Spider kissed me until I was breathless, his arms were like bands around my waist as he held on as if scared I would vanish if he let go.
He needn"t have worried. I wasn"t going anywhere, ever. I believed him about Topaz and actually trusted that he loved me. Four years ago I"d been sure that he loved me until that terrible night. He had shown me over and over again how he had felt then, just as he had shown me repeatedly over the last two weeks. A man who rarely showed emotion, had made sure that everyone who entered Hannigans" was aware that I was his and he was mine. If that didn"t show me how much Spider cared, there was little else he could do to prove it.
"Spider..." I sucked in a few deep breaths to satisfy the burning in my lungs. He abandoned my lips so he wouldn"t smother me and trailed kisses down my neck. When he stopped to suck on the sensitive skin just below my right ear I had to concentrate harder to remember what I was going to say. d.a.m.n, the man knew how to distract me. "James..." That caught his attention and he raised his head.
"Hey." He smiled down at me, making my heart melt at the love shining out of those black eyes. Had it been shining the whole time? I"d refused to see it until now.
"Hi." I raised my hand and traced it over his nose, playing with the ring in the middle of it, and I raised my head to steal a quick kiss. "Can we finish talking before things get out of hand?" I was already on fire and my panties were soaking wet with my need for him. A few more kisses and I doubted we would be talking any more for a few days.
"What do you want to talk about?" His lips were no longer touching any part of me, but his hands were everywhere. Stroking up and down my sides, teasing across my throbbing nipples. Lifting the edge of my panties and tracing across the skin underneath.
Spider moved and his long, hard c.o.c.k nudged against my center. The heat from his erection forced me to bite back a moan. "I.... I... Umm... I forget."
His chuckle vibrated through his chest as well as my own. "You"re right. We do need to talk. I actually need to ask you something." He stood and moved toward the bathroom. d.a.m.n it! That man"s body was so beautiful. My mouth watered at the thought of running my tongue over every inch of male perfection standing before me.
I watched as he picked up his jeans off the bathroom floor then came back to me. After pulling something out of his pocket, he sat down on the bed beside me and I sat up, curious as to what he had in his hand. It was small, fitting easily inside his fist. With his free hand Spider grasped my hand and brought it to his lips. I blinked, not expecting him to do something so sweet. "I should have asked you this four years ago, but I was still a scared kid back then. Being without you for so long, wanting you and loving you but too scared of fighting for you has shown me what it"s like to be only half alive. The last few weeks have been great, but there is something we can do to make it better. To make this perfect."
My eyes widened and I realized that he was holding my left hand. Oh s.h.i.t! Tears instantly filled my eyes and my chin began to tremble as he opened his hand and showed me a platinum engagement ring with the biggest diamond I"d ever seen in my life. "Marry me, Willa. I don"t just love you, I need you."
"Oh my G.o.d," I whispered as he slipped the ring onto my finger. "It"s beautiful."
He grinned. "I want to tell you it"s a family heirloom, but it"s not. My uncle bought it for the girl he wanted to marry twenty years ago. She didn"t want the life that came with being an ol" lady. Razor couldn"t return the ring and didn"t want it to go to waste, so he gave it to my mom to keep for when I decided to get married. When she found out you were the same girl who I was moping around about over four years ago, she gave me the ring and told me to man up." Spider shook his head, and I couldn"t help but laugh. I"d recently met his mother and honestly she was the least mother-like woman in the world, so I could picture her telling her only son to man up and a h.e.l.l of a lot more. "I"ve been walking around with this thing in my pocket for over a week now."
I couldn"t take my eyes off of the ring. It really was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. The fit was nearly perfect, only slightly loose, but I preferred it that way. My monthly "friend" would make sure that the ring fit snugly for at least a few days after all.
"Willa..?"
I frowned at the strained tone in Spider"s voice and reluctantly raised my gaze to meet his. His face was cloudy with what looked like worry. "What"s wrong?"
"You haven"t answered my question, baby." When I continued to frown in confusion he blew out a frustrated breath. "Will you marry me, Willa?"
I gasped. "Oh." In my daze over the beauty of the ring that was going to be on my finger for the rest of my life, I"d forgotten to do the most important thing. I threw my arms around his neck. "Yes, James. Yes, of course I want to marry you."
He blew out a relieved sigh and held me tight against his chest. "Thank G.o.d. I thought you were trying to find a way to tell me no." Spider buried his face in my hair. I felt a tremble shake his body and realized he really had been scared that I was going to say no.
"If you had asked me to marry you four years ago, I would have said yes." I pushed against his chest so that I could move back enough to meet his eyes. What I was about to say was important. "I never would ask you to give up your MC. Not then, and definitely not now. It"s part of who you are, Spider. It"s made you the man you are today. I love you."
"I love you too, Willa," he whispered. "More than anything or anyone."
"More than Raven?" I asked, but I was only teasing. I knew that what he felt for me was completely different from the love he had for Raven.
"A million times more than I love Raven," he a.s.sured me with a grin.
I leaned in for a kiss, but before our lips touched I pulled back. "We aren"t going to live in your apartment much longer are we? As much as I"ve come to love that bed of yours, I"m not a fan of that part of town."
"I"ll buy us a house. Any house you want," Spider promised.
"Really?"
He nodded, too busy tasting my neck to bother with words. My breath hitched as his talented hands cupped my b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "There"s a house for sale down the street from Raven"s house..."
"If you like it then we will buy it." He pinched my nipples, making me cry out in pleasure. "No more talking, Willa. I want to love you now."
"No more talking," I agreed. "I love you."
"f.u.c.k, baby. I love you, too."
Chapter 17.
Jet I was getting tired of having surprise visitors. Each visit only left me aching and a little more destroyed than I was before. Now, as I walked toward the visitor"s room with my hands chained together and shackles on my feet along with a guard trailing behind me, I wondered who had come to f.u.c.k with my mind this time.
Raven"s visit had at least left me with something to look forward to when I got out of this h.e.l.lhole: a niece or nephew who I was going to spoil as much as humanly possible. I knew that my baby sister was going to make a great mother. And as long as Bash kept her happy, then he would live long enough to see his second kid grow up.
It was Felicity"s visit that still haunted me and made my gut clench with a mixture of dread and hope. Hope that it was her in the visitor"s room. Dread that it wasn"t. When we reached the door to the visitor"s room a second guard waited to open it for me, but I shook my head. I needed a minute to prepare myself for whoever was inside waiting, possibly ready to rock my world all over again.
After a few minutes the guard got tired of waiting and opened the door anyway. I glared at him as I stepped through it and reluctantly glanced around until my eyes fell on the only person sitting in the room. My eyes widened and some of the dread I was feeling left as I spotted my brother. "Hawk?"
Hawk gave me a grim smile as he stood and we embraced quickly before the guard who had brought me from my cell separated us. "It"s good to see you, brother," Hawk said as we took our seats at the table.
"How are you? How"s Raven? Colt? Raider?" I shook my head, trying to remember the name of the girl who Raven had told me had become a big part of my siblings" lives, but especially Hawk"s. "How"s... Gracie, is that her name?"
The change that seemed to come over my brother"s face was so unusual for the man I knew so well, that if Raven hadn"t explained the situation to me, I would have been concerned. Hawk wasn"t one to live by his emotions. He had always been the most closed off of the five of us. So when his whole body seemed to light up at just the mention of the female"s name, I knew he was in deep. "Gracie is dealing with some things. One being that Uncle Jack just happens to be her grandfather."
I coughed, the air seeming to strangle me at the shocking news he had just delivered. "What the f.u.c.k?"
Hawk shrugged. "It"s a long story. One I would like to tell, but I don"t have time for today. When I called to get an appointment to see you they told me they only had a fifteen minute slot open." His jaw clenched and my gut churned as I saw the way his face went from bright and happy to closed off and menacing. "I got a call Sat.u.r.day night, Jet. Flick used a burner to call me."
If he had stabbed me it would have hurt less. My hands clenched into tight fists and I bit back a string of violent curses that would have the guard calling a premature halt to the visit. "Is she okay? What did she want?" And why the f.u.c.k was she calling Hawk? Sure they had gotten kind of close-closer than I"d ever seen Hawk get to another human being. But I"d thought it was because I had made Hawk a part of something that few people knew about. That he had bonded with Felicity over the loss of our child-his niece or nephew. Could it have become more? Had Hawk hooked up with my female?
"She didn"t know who else to call. She needed a favor and I was the only one she could think of to get it to you in the right way."
"What the f.u.c.k does that mean?" I bit out. The right way? "If she needs a favor she could just call me, or better yet, come and see me."
"She couldn"t call you because the calls are monitored." Hawk glanced over my shoulder at the guard who was one of the better men that worked at San Quentin. He was on someone"s payroll other than the warden"s. Since I was a powerful a.s.set to his boss, then I knew that I was safe with the man. However, that didn"t mean he needed to know my MC"s business.
Another pain stabbed through me and I had to remind myself that Angel"s Halo was no longer my MC. I"d given up the club and the life that went with it for reasons that I wasn"t sure I still had. Felicity was through with me, for good this time. Or until I found her.
"Don"t question this." Hawk leaned forward and lowered his voice. "Just listen because I don"t have much time left." I nodded and he went on. "Flick is working for a family that has a little girl..." As Hawk quickly told me what had happened, my whole body seemed to seize up and I knew before he had even gotten to the real reason Felicity had asked him to see me what the favor was going to be.
Having sweet, loving Felicity Bolton ask such a favor was enough to tell me how desperate the situation was. My jaw was so tight that my entire face started to ache. "Just get the word out. Let the right people know what the motherf.u.c.ker did and he will be taken care of within a few days..."
I glared at my brother. "If Flick is asking me to do this then I will do it personally. But you know that if it"s not done right I won"t be getting out of here in a few weeks like I"m supposed to." It was a warning, for him to break the news to our sister gently if it came to that. Raven missed me as much as I missed her. I felt like I had raised her and she was more my kid than my sister. "We"re talking a lot longer than a few years here, Hawk. I could spend the rest of my life in here if I don"t do this right."
Hawk pounded a fist into the table between us. "Which is why you need to do what I suggested. f.u.c.k this, Jet. If it wasn"t because of Flick I never would have even come here. You can do this without having to spend the rest of your life in this h.e.l.lhole."
There was a knock on the door and I knew that the visit was over. Grimacing, I stood and backed away from the table. "Tell Flick not to worry anymore. It"s done. She should know that I would do anything for her."
"She shouldn"t be asking this," Hawk growled. "As much as I love that girl, I hate her just as much right now."
"Don"t. Hating isn"t an option. Loving her isn"t either. Love your Gracie, not Flick."
Hawk"s eyes nearly bugged out of his head. "Are you s.h.i.tting me right now? Brother, you have to know that Flick-"
I cut him off. "I don"t claim to know anything anymore, Hawk. Tell Raven I love her." With a nod of my head at the guard he opened the door and I walked back to my cell, already planning how I could handle this without getting an extension added to the time I was already serving.
The situation kept me up all night, and by morning I was calling in a few favors that would have done not only myself some good during the time I had to spend in San Quentin, but would have been good for Angel"s Halo down the road. I just hoped that after this, Felicity would realize she meant more to me than I had stupidly tried to make her think.
The yard was busy, as it normally was midmornings. There were men pumping iron on one part of the yard, while some were just sitting around getting some sun before having to spend the rest of the day either in their cells or doing their work duties. I sat at a table with the men I normally stuck with. They offered me protection from rival MCs that I"d p.i.s.sed off over the years while I stood as a symbol of their own protection to their people on the outside.