Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 76807 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76807 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Had he always known?
If he did… what did he think of it?
Would he have been alright with it?
“You’re looking a little gray,” Brooks said, head cocked to the side.
Honestly, I was feeling green, so gray seemed a bit of an improvement.
“Is it wrong that I don’t want to know right now?” I asked, looking up at him.
“No, it’s not wrong. This is all… a lot. And none of this is going anywhere. We don’t have to know anything else right now,” he said, already reaching to toss the papers back into the box. We didn’t need them anymore anyway. “I promised you lunch,” he said. “And you look like you need something in your stomach.”
“I could eat,” I agreed, even though I was a little too queasy to actually be hungry right then.
I just needed some space to compartmentalize all of this.
Then I would be ready to finally know the whole truth of what Clay had been hiding from me for months. Or longer. I had no idea.
“Tacos?” he asked.
“Does anyone ever say no to tacos?” I asked, forcing a smile I didn’t quite feel.
“And after you have some food in your stomach, we can find a field somewhere, and I will let you give the bike a go.”
Early morning coffee and an epic sex session followed by an actual date with the guy of my dreams followed by ticking off a bucket list item?
It was practically the best day of my life.
If not for the dark cloud hanging over us.
Involving a gun.
Illegal cash.
And whatever the hell was on that flash drive…
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Brooks
She wasn’t ready to learn what Clay was into.
And, honestly, I fucking got her hesitation.
I mean, I’d known Clay as well as her, if not better, since there was shit a man said to his friend that he didn’t share with his sister, and I was having a really fucking hard time reconciling the Clay I knew with the one who was using carefully hidden code, had a gun that had likely been fired, and a shitton of less-than-legal cash lying around.
Sure, we hadn’t been close in years.
People changed.
I mean, look at me.
He never voiced it, but I was sure there was some part of him that had always been disappointed with me for taking the path I had in life. As much as he knew that the military life was not for me.
But joining the club had, whether I’d realized it when I’d prospected or not, driven a wedge. Because I’d gone from being as open as two friends could be, sharing all the big and small shit, to having secrets. Since, when I’d joined the club, it meant there was a lot of shit about my life that I couldn’t share with Clay.
Honestly, if I looked back at the cracks in our friendship, I had to admit that they really first started to etch when I’d gotten patched. When something life-changing became less of a prospect and more of a reality.
Then, little by little, we grew in different directions.
I got busier.
I got more secretive.
Things didn’t feel as, I dunno, natural between us as they once had.
So if I was capable of this much change, how could I claim that it wasn’t possible that Clay had as well?
But my gut wanted me to believe that the Clay I’d always known was the same one he’d been at the time of his death.
If for absolutely no other reason than the fact that getting involved in shady shit meant he put his sister in danger. And I couldn’t picture any version of Clay who would do that.
It had been different for me.
I didn’t have a kid sister.
Or any other siblings.
And while my parents were gone now, we hadn’t been close when I’d first prospected either.
I hadn’t been putting anyone other than myself at risk when I joined this lifestyle.
I guess, though, I couldn’t claim that anymore, as I looked at Cali perched on my bike, kicking up the stand, then shifting her weight side to side to get a feel for how the bike felt under her control.
Because being with me inherently put Cali at risk.
If I was a wholly unselfish man, I would let her go for her own protection.
The problem was, I wasn’t sure I could be that self-sacrificing. Not now that I had her, now that she was beginning to mean so much to me.
I mean, Caliana always meant a lot to me.
But our relationship becoming physical added a new, more complex layer to that.
“Okay. I’m gonna give it a go,” she said, giving me a look that was equal parts excited and terrified.
“Just go slow,” I reminded her. I’d been over all the basics already with her perched in my lap, following my instructions in getting to know the bike. “And if you get freaked, just bail. You won’t get too roughed up on ground like this,” I said, waving down to the thick, uncut green grass. “Tick bite, at worst,” I added for some levity.