"Yeah, that"ll definitely help with your sleep," I said, sarcastically. Just because I"d stopped being a surgeon didn"t mean I stopped thinking like a physician.
He didn"t notice the sarcasm. "It helps turn off my mind."
I couldn"t help but ask. "Bikers do a lot of ruminating about things?"
"You have no idea," he said.
"My mind runs on a loop." Why did I just say that?
He closed his eyes, silent for a while, and I wondered if he had pa.s.sed out. "So you came back to West Bend, Junebug. Starting a bed and breakfast."
Junebug. Other kids had called me Junebug when I was young, and I"d hated it. Then Cade had called me the same thing, and it became my favorite name in the world. "I am. I bought this place. Just need to fix it up a little bit."
"Returning to a simpler life," he said. He ran his finger down the neck of the bottle and I pictured him running his finger down the length of me. "Do you remember when we used to plan to run my dad"s ranch?"
It had been my life"s ambition. I nodded. "Do you ever think of coming back home?"
"Every day," he said. Then, quickly, "Not really."
He looked tired. Sad.
"You look like you never left," he said. I felt naked under his gaze. Vulnerable.
I laughed, suddenly nervous. "You mean I look like a local again."
"No, that"s not what I mean, Junebug," he said, his gaze intense. "This place, it looks good on you."
"Well, you look different," I said.
Cade laughed. Axe. The name somehow suited his new persona. His biker persona. I"d always thought of him as a cowboy. Even after I"d heard he joined the Marines, I couldn"t shake the thought of him still riding on the ranch, back here in West Bend. "Not exactly what you expected, is it?"
"I didn"t expect you at all," I said. I didn"t mention that for years I"d fantasized about running into him. That was a long time ago.
"I hoped I"d see you again," he said. "But not like this."
I took a drag of my beer. "What is "like this" exactly?"
He was silent, his eyes studying the ground. "I needed to get Crunch and his family out of trouble. It"s nothing, Junebug."
It was more than nothing. I knew that much. "Are you in trouble?"
"No," he said, finally making eye contact again. "Yes."
"With the bikers?"
"Probably."
What the h.e.l.l was the appropriate response for this situation? "Well, that sucks, huh?"
Cade laughed, the sound warm, just like I remembered. "Yeah, it does. You want to join me?"
It took me a minute to figure out he was talking about sitting on the stairs. No, I thought. That"s the last thing I need, to get even closer to him.
But I stood anyway, moved beside him on the stairs. Bailey harrumphed and moved back up to her spot on the porch. As soon as she moved from between us, the proximity to Cade felt close. Too close. I didn"t look at him.
"So, what"s keeping you up at night then?" he asked.
What the h.e.l.l should I say to that? "Well, I"m not generally in the habit of telling all my secrets to every dirty biker that walks through my door."
He leaned forward. "Well, I"m not just any old dirty biker," he said. "Am I?"
"No, you aren"t." My heart thumped loudly in my chest.
"Well, I can"t promise I"m not dirty," he said.
I shivered, but not from the cold, biting my bottom lip. No, I"d bet he was all kinds of dirty now, wasn"t he? I sat there, feeling paralyzed by desire for this man I didn"t know anymore. The man sitting beside me was s.e.xy as h.e.l.l. And dangerous, I reminded myself.
And drunk.
I looked over at him, my eyes wandering from his hands, to the tattoos that snaked across his forearms to his biceps. An image peeked out from under the sleeve of his tee shirt, and I recognized the symbol. I reached over, lifting the edge of the fabric, squinting to see underneath. An Eagle Globe and Anchor, surrounded on each side by an "S." I dropped the sleeve, and looked up at him.
His expression was curious. "Something interest you there?"
"You were a sniper," I said. "I knew you were a Marine. I didn"t know any more than that."
He drew his arm away from me like I"d shocked him. "Yeah, and?"
I regretted seeing it on his arm. The way he looked at me just then, it was a mixture of wounded and defiant, like he was daring me to ask him more, but terrified that I would. I hated seeing that look on him.
"It was a long time ago now," he said. Clearing his throat, he took another swig from the bottle. He was silent for a while. Then, "I was going to get in touch, you know."
I nodded, swallowing hard. "Ditto."
He took another long swig of the bottle and offered it to me.
"No, thanks." I shook my head, wondering exactly how much of it he had already drunk tonight. A lot, by the looks of it.
"I emailed your aunt every so often to see how you were doing," he said. I just never could bring myself to - after what happened, you know?"
"I never blamed you," I said. That wasn"t true, not really. After their deaths, I had blamed anyone and everyone, especially myself. "We were just kids."
"Yeah," he said. "We"re not kids anymore, though, are we?" I could feel him looking at me, and I forced my eyes straight ahead. Don"t look at him. If I did, it would be all over.
"No," I said.
"We"re definitely both grown-ups now," he said, his voice thick. "And now we"re both back here."
He suddenly felt too close. "Why did you come here, Cade?"
"I already told you."
"Not to West Bend. Here."
"Why do you think I came over here, Junebug?" He looked at me, those piercing blue eyes hooded, then reached out, ran his finger along my arm.
I bristled at his touch. The nerve of him, thinking he"d come over here and get laid. After all this time, that"s why he came over here? And drunk. I wasn"t exactly a teetotaler, but when your parents are killed the way mine were, you get a little touchy about booze. Cade should have known better.
And still, even with all that, his touch made me shiver.
I needed to get away from him. I stood, leaning against the porch railing. "I hope you didn"t think it was a good idea to drink most of that whiskey and come over here for ex s.e.x."
He smiled crookedly.
The s.h.i.thead.
Then he stood, bottle in hand, stepped close to me, and leaned in. I could smell the alcohol on his breath. "Don"t tell me you"re not interested."
"f.u.c.k you, Cade." This Cade, the drunk, arrogant, criminal one, was nothing like the one I"d left behind in high school.
This one was just an a.s.shole.
"I"ll f.u.c.k you when you beg me, Junebug," he whispered. He stepped back and winked, then started down the steps. He turned around, wobbled a little as he walked backwards toward the field. "Don"t forget, I know you. I know what makes you beg."
f.u.c.k him.
Beg him? He had to be kidding. I wouldn"t beg him for anything.
Axe "Uncle Axe!" MacKenzie launched herself into my arms, the way only little kids can do, with no reservation. "Eew!" she yelled. "You"re sweaty!"
I swung her around in circles in the gra.s.s, until after a few turns I started to feel nauseous. It had been a couple of days since the last time I"d had something to drink, but I swear I still felt hung-over.
"Of course I"m sweaty," I said. "Uncle Axe has been working like a dog all day long."
"Because your dad made you?"
I looked over at my dad, talking to April on the porch. "Yeah, something like that." My dad hadn"t kept up with the fence around the property, and I"d spent all morning since daybreak repairing fence posts. I leaned in close to MacKenzie, and spoke to her in a stage whisper. "But don"t tell anyone- I kind of like working here."
She giggled. "Me too, Uncle Axe! Mr. Austin let me help him feed the horses!"
"Did he now? You know, when I was a kid, I had to muck the horse stalls."
Her brow wrinkled. "What"s mucking?"
"Mucking is where you clean all the horse p.o.o.p out of the stall."
"Eew!" she yelled. "Horse p.o.o.p is gross!"
"It is," I agreed. "Just imagine if you had to clean it out of the barn."
"Was your dad punishing you?" she asked. "My dad wouldn"t make me clean up horse p.o.o.p."
"Nope, it was just part of growing up with horses on a ranch. But you should go tell Mr. Austin he was punishing me, making me do all those ch.o.r.es," I said. "He"ll laugh." As she scampered off to talk to my dad, I stood there and drank it all in. I was sweaty and covered in muck and grime. My shoulders ached after hours of digging holes in the hard ground, and my back kept reminding me I wasn"t twenty years old anymore.
Despite all of that, I could feel this place beginning to permeate me, eating away at all the s.h.i.t from Los Angeles, the s.h.i.t from the club. It had been a long time since I felt alive. More days than not over the past year, I"d felt dead.
I watched MacKenzie tug at my dad"s sleeve as he stood there, talking to April. I should feel happy, watching all of them relaxed, having fun. But I didn"t. Instead, a feeling of fragility washed over me, this sense that everything could change in a moment. One extreme meant the pendulum would inevitably shift.
Crunch caught my eye from the other side of the field, and walked over to where I stood. "Man, you look as bad as I do."
He was right. He was covered head to toe in dirt. But he was standing there with a stupid, s.h.i.t-eating grin on his face, and that made me smile.
"You look like you"re having fun," I said.
"It ain"t bad, you know? I could get used to this." He stopped and dropped the spool of barbed wire he was carrying for the fencing. "Look at Mac and April over there. I don"t think Mac has been this happy in ages."
"The country is good for kids."
"Yeah," he said. "It"s not just that, though." He kicked up a dirt clod with his boot. "It"s just that- I"m grateful for what you did for us, for April and Mac."
"Not a thing," I said. That was exactly the opposite of what it was.
"No, I want you to know-" he stopped. "I don"t know that I would have done the same as you, if the tables were turned. I probably would have shot first and then asked questions later."
I shrugged. "Maybe, but I doubt it. You"d have done the same, I think."
"Sometimes I wonder if I have it in me anymore," he said. "I"m tired of all the s.h.i.t, you know?"
Did I ever know. I was exhausted.
"Does your dad know what"s going on?" he asked.
"I told him some of it."
"I feel bad," he said. "Putting him in danger by being here."
"We don"t know that we"re even in danger."
Crunch laughed, the sound harsh. "We"re in danger. I"m sure of it."
"We"ll get in touch with Blaze. As soon as we can."
"You think we can trust him? He"s the Veep," Crunch said. "He and Mad Dog, they have to be tight, right?"
"I know Blaze," I said. Or I used to know Blaze. "Blaze will be with us. I know he"s not okay with this play by Mad Dog. He doesn"t want this kind of life, all the cartel trouble."
I thought about the conversation we"d had right before the cartel vote.