Whisper Falls Page 13
So maybe she just needed to accept that and move on with her life.
Lucky tried to focus on the design he was painting on Spider Conway’s Harley Fatboy. Spider was an acquaintance of Duke’s, one of the many he’d sent Lucky’s way lately. Not surprisingly, the large, bald guy had requested Lucky airbrush a black widow and spiderweb on his gas tank, and then echo the webbing on the fenders. Lucky had fashioned the black widow after the one tattooed on the back of Spider’s head.
Using a curved template, he created tiny white swishes that would form the web—but his mind kept wandering. Because he knew he was screwing up with Tessa—bad.
He wanted her in his bed, but he couldn’t have that. And so he instead wanted her to be his friend—but if he wasn’t careful, he wouldn’t have that, either. He just . . . hell . . . he didn’t know how to be when he was with her. The more he was around her, the more he wanted her, and he’d come so damn close to kissing her by the waterfall that it had scared some sense into him. Just like Red’s little visit to Gravediggers over the weekend.
Seeing Red had reminded him that it was easy to get too relaxed. Maybe that was one reason he’d settled in a sizable city after leaving California. In a city, you didn’t relax. There were people coming and going—in your business, in your life—all the time. There were honking horns and sirens to help you remember that it was a trouble-filled world out there, and that you had your own fair share of that trouble.
Here, in Destiny, out here in the woods . . . it was so damn quiet sometimes that he could almost believe he’d moved into some other existence entirely—like the Devil’s Assassins were some figment of his imagination.
But that’s why it was good he hung out at Gravediggers—there, with Duke, much as he might want the DAs not to exist, he always remembered they did. There, surrounded by people he didn’t know very well but still had a lot in common with, he couldn’t forget who he was—and who he would always be.
Just then, he heard a bike in the distance, mounting the hill on Whisper Falls Road. More business—good. He’d take all he could get. He was doing fine on money, but he’d just started sending child support to Sharon, and he wanted to be sure he could give Johnny anything he might need.
When the motorcycle rumbled into his driveway, he stopped working and walked out into the sunlight. And—shit. He could scarcely believe his eyes. It was Red again. He rode an old Softtail that, like Red himself, had seen better days. What the hell was Red Thornton doing here?
Red killed the engine and lifted his hand in a wave. “Hey, Lucky—how ya doin’?”
Like before with Red, Lucky didn’t smile. “Doing all right. Didn’t expect to see you again, Red.”
Unfazed, Red motioned to the bike beneath him. “My baby here needs a paint job and I heard in Chillicothe you were the man for the job.”
Hmm—already word had gotten out nearly an hour away that it was worth driving here to get your bike painted? The news was great for business—but with Lucky’s recently renewed worries about being too easy to find, it left him slightly unsettled, too. “No offense, Red, but can you afford it?”
Red’s smile stretched from ear to ear. “Found my sister, and turns out she’s doin’ real well. Offered to buy me a paint job for my birthday next week—so here I am.”
“You won’t mind then if I ask for payment up front?” Normally Lucky didn’t—he figured the bike itself served as collateral if a customer didn’t pay. But he was sort of hoping to drive Red away, right back to Chillicothe—just because he was a reminder of bad times.
“Nope.” Red patted his back pocket, unoffended. “Got the cash right in my wallet.”
Hell.
From there, Red described to Lucky the paint job he wanted, and—finally concluding that Red’s money was as good as anybody else’s—Lucky pulled out a catalog of designs to show his new customer.
And the more he talked to Red . . . well, he didn’t like it, but the same as at Gravediggers, Lucky almost started feeling sorry for the guy. Red was immature for his age, and directionless, and too excited about a gift from his sister—but talking to him forced Lucky to realize Red had probably had a shitty upbringing and likely didn’t have even one friend. Lucky knew what it was like to feel you had nobody, so . . . shit, no wonder Red was so amped up about finding his sister.
Once Red had selected what Lucky thought was a pretty cheesy pirate design—he even tried to talk Red out of it, pointing him toward pirate flags instead of an actual pirate, with no success—Lucky decided to broach his least favorite subject with Red. When he’d first seen Red at Duke’s bar, he’d thought it meant trouble—but now it occurred to him that maybe, just maybe, talking to Red about his old biker gang wasn’t a bad idea. After all, where else could he find out information about them that might prove useful? Maybe he should see Red not as an annoyance, but as more of a . . . tool.
Red even gave him an opening as he walked back over to his bike, leaning against the seat. “Still can’t believe I ran into you after so damn long, Lucky,” he said, shaking his head. “Man, California seems like it happened in a whole ’nother life.”
Lucky could definitely relate to that. And since Red had turned the topic back to the old days, Lucky cautiously began. “Sometimes I still worry about all that shit coming back to haunt me. Know what I mean?” He made a point of meeting Red’s eyes as he spoke, to gauge his sincerity.
The other man appeared weary at the question. “Well, yeah—me, too.”
Lucky tilted his head, curious. “What did you do to be worried about?”
Red glanced at the ground, looked uneasy, then crossed his arms, shoulders slumped. “Let’s just say me and Wild Bill had a bad partin’ of the ways.”
Huh. Lucky would be damn surprised if it was nearly as bad as his parting with Bill.
And he almost asked about someone else then, about Vicki—how she’d been before Red had left, if she was still putting up with Bill’s crap—but he stopped himself. Wild Bill’s girlfriend had been attractive, and she and Lucky had—unfortunately—shared a raging chemistry. Though he couldn’t credit her with being especially smart or strong-willed when it came to taking care of herself. Hell, what had happened between them proved that. Maybe that was why he didn’t really want to know. Given all that had happened back then, he hoped she was okay, but he still decided it would be better to just move on to a different topic. “Did Bill ever make any more threats against me or Duke?”
“Not that I recall,” Red replied. “One good thing about Bill—he’s got a short memory.”
Lucky narrowed his eyes on Red. “If his memory’s so short, why are you worried about those times coming back to bite you in the ass?”
Red tilted his head and looked like he was thinking it over. “With a guy like Wild Bill, it’s hard not to worry. But on the other hand, I ain’t so sure it’s . . . what’s the word? A practical worry, a thing that’d really happen—know what I’m sayin’? The more time passes, the farther away I get, I figure what are the chances? So yeah, I worry, but . . . it’s probably a big waste of time.” Red shifted his weight from one boot to the other, and met Lucky’s gaze. “Hell, I been gone almost five years. And how long ago did you and Duke leave—nine, ten?”
“Just over ten,” Lucky confirmed with a light nod.
Now it was Red who changed the subject, and Lucky didn’t mind. “Seems like you two fellas are doin’ all right for yourselves.”
“We are,” Lucky agreed.
And maybe, if Red was right about any of this—Bill’s memory, the passage of time—Lucky could be doing even better for himself. Maybe Red made a lot of sense. Maybe Lucky was torturing himself for nothing. Maybe. It was weirdly comforting to hear somebody else express what he’d been waffling over and wanting to feel, wanting to believe, for a damn long time. Especially given that Duke saw things the exact opposite way, and it was partially his views that kept Lucky from letting himself move on. He’d been bold enough, comfortable enoug
h, to come to the place where his son was—and if he’d felt that was safe, maybe it was stupid to worry it would be any different where a woman was concerned, no matter what Wild Bill had said all those years ago.
“Well, I’ll be seein’ ya, Lucky,” Red said with a wave as he climbed on his bike to go.
“Dude,” Lucky informed him dryly, “you have to leave the bike if you want it painted. Whole process takes about a week.”
Red looked just as embarrassed as Lucky thought he should. “Shit, didn’t think of that.”
Lucky could only sigh. “So you don’t have somebody coming to pick you up?”
“Nope.”
“Well, don’t look at me,” Lucky informed him. “I got work to do. Better call your sister.” Then he lamented knowing he had to spend a whole additional hour with Red.
But . . . well, maybe it was worth it for the confirmation he’d gotten—the idea, the possibility, that maybe the past would stay in the past, that maybe he could slowly start letting himself accept that the nightmare that had started with the Devil’s Assassins was really over, at last.
And if it was . . . well, that would change a hell of a lot.
By Friday afternoon, Tessa was back at work in Lucky’s living room and kitchen. The weather was typical for April—drizzly, with a chill in the air—forcing her back into blue jeans and making her wish for more of those warm sunny days that had come so early this year.
As she tried to mount a new curtain rod over the wide front window behind Lucky’s couch, she realized she needed more than two hands. So even though she was doing her darnedest to be cool toward Lucky and not interact with him much, when he passed through the room, she was forced to ask for his help.
“Whatcha need, hot stuff?” he asked.
Standing up on his couch, she swung her head around to peer down at him—he sounded positively jovial. For crying out loud, which way is it, Romo? Are you mysterious and brooding or hot and flirtatious? “Could you hold this above the window while I stand back and check the length of the drapes?” The new drapery already hung from each end of the decorative rod.
“Sure thing, babe,” he said—then took the last crisp bite of a juicy-looking apple, chucked the core in the kitchen garbage can, and came toward her. Oh boy, he’s calling me babe again. And since when did seeing a guy eat an apple start turning me on? This attraction was becoming . . . painful.
As Lucky kicked off his shoes and joined her to stand on the leather sofa, they bumped slightly and his sock-covered foot ended up pressing right against hers as they executed the hand-off of the long rod. “Been meaning to tell you,” he said, “Johnny’s room looks great.”
Crap—his smile made her stomach go hollow.
She stepped down off the couch feeling a little numb, her head swimming. God, I just want to be under him. The need was growing more raw and intense by the day. She was tired of this roller coaster of emotions—but at the same time, it was impossible to resist staying on the ride to see where it took her. “I’ve been meaning to tell you how great the mural is.” Double crap—she hadn’t planned to give him any compliments, but her appreciation of the painting apparently overrode her intentions.
He glanced down at her, his vulnerable expression surprising—and somehow more endearing on such a big, tattoo-covered guy. “You really think he’ll like it?”
Tessa’s stomach curled inward. He didn’t realize it yet, but he was already being a great dad. And that made it even harder to be cool and aloof. “Of course he will,” she told him, unable to keep the sincerity from her voice. “It’s really special.”
“Good,” he said on a short nod. “And it was a good idea, so . . . thanks.”
As she stood back to study the drapes, she instructed Lucky to lift the rod a little, then to lower it back down a smidge. Once it was where she wanted it, she said, “Perfect. Now don’t move.” She’d use a level before screwing anything in, but for the moment, she rushed to mark the spots for the brackets with a pencil—one mark at each end—standing up on tiptoes. “You seem in a good mood,” she tossed out casually.
“Yeah, guess I am.”
“Better than lately,” she noted, eyes still on the wall she scored lightly.
“Maybe so,” he agreed, but left it at that.
“Why?” she asked pointedly. This time she looked up at him. “And you can set that down now, on the back of the couch.”
“Nothin’ I need to bore you with,” he said, lowering the curtains, then stepping down next to her on the floor. “Just . . . maybe starting to get rid of some old baggage that’s been weighing me down.”
Hmm. Her mind raced, so she followed it. This was the only way she’d ever find out anything more about Lucky Romo. “Female baggage?”
At this, her brawny neighbor grinned. “No, hot stuff, nothin’ like that.”
Okay, massive relief. He’d told her before that he didn’t have a woman in his life, but still . . . “Then did you . . . get in touch with your family or something?”
He lowered his chin and cast a chastising look. “No. And quit being so nosy.” But it came out teasingly, almost flirtatiously, making her chest ripple with fresh desire.
“Sorry,” she said, not really meaning it. “I just can’t help being curious about a guy who disappears for fifteen years.”
“Yeah, well—I’m ready to start focusing on the present, and the future. You should, too.”
And as luck would have it, she’d already been trying to do that in her own life—stop fretting over the past. So maybe she shouldn’t worry about his past, either? And maybe she wouldn’t—if he’d ease her present aches.
And the thought reminded her of the bigger, more universal ache plaguing her lately—the urge to grab onto life before she woke up one day, old and frail and alone. “Have you ever gone skydiving?” she asked him out of the blue.
He looked amused, cocking a surprised grin her way. “Nope—flying on my bike is a big enough thrill for me. Why?”
She bit her lip, tilted her head. “I just . . . kind of want to do it. And my friends think it’s crazy. But you seem like someone who wouldn’t be afraid of something like that.”
“I’m not afraid of much,” he stated plainly.
“So then . . . would you go with me maybe? Sometime?” Oh Lord, wait! Had she just asked him on a date? Oh brother, how had that happened?
And she was just about to yammer on, say something to let him off the hook—when he smoothly replied, “Sure, hot stuff—whenever you want.”
Oh. Okay. He hadn’t turned her down or made her feel stupid or rejected. Pure relief flooded her veins. Except, well . . . maybe she shouldn’t be all that relieved, since it wasn’t like she’d done what she’d really wanted to do: throw herself on him and rip his clothes off. “Good,” she managed to force out, her voice a bit too high-pitched. “We’ll do that. Sometime.”
He gave an easy nod. “So . . . any big weekend plans?”
Her stomach churned at the simple question. “Not really. You?”
“I’ve been hanging at Gravediggers a lot, over in Crestview.”
“Mmm,” she said, still trying to sound casual, cool, like the biker bar was just your typical friendly neighborhood pub.
“You ever been there?” he asked with a doubtful grin.
And she met his gaze, now letting her expression shift to self-deprecating honesty. “No.”
“You should come by sometime,” he said, still smiling. He was teasing her again, clearly sure she’d be afraid of such a place.
And even if she was, she met the challenge. “You never know, Romo, maybe I just will.”
He said nothing in reply, yet that severe chemistry between them kicked up a notch simply because they stood so close to each other for no practical reason—and neither of them smiled any longer. So she went to move past him, to retrieve the curtain rod brackets from a table across the room—but he didn’t step out of the way. “You need anything else, hot stuff?”
After which she pushed past him, her arm coming into solid contact with his, and the smell of his skin, the warmth of his flesh, nearly paralyzed her—but she stayed on her feet, glad her back was to him now so he couldn’t see the lust surely written all over her face.
“I’ll be out in the garage working. If you need more help,” he said.
Though she refused to let herself meet his gaze even one more time, certain it would be the death of her. “All righty. Happy painting. See ya later.”
That night, she called Rachel and insisted they meet for dinner at Dolly’s Café. Because Lucky was driving her crazy, and making her feel a little desperate. She’d tried to stop questioning why he hadn’t put the moves on her, but as she drove toward town, she couldn’t help pondering it further. Could it be because, like her, he realized how different they were? Or . . . maybe he thought a nice girl like her wouldn’t be able to have sex without making it a big, heavy, emotional thing.
Well, once upon a time that had been true, but no more. At moments with him, in fact, she felt like sex was all that mattered to her. She wasn’t especially proud of that, nor did she find it a particularly appealing trait, but at least she understood her mounting needs and could accept them for what they were. She only wished Lucky could see that, too, and perhaps even appreciate them.
She reached Dolly’s first, happy to find it relatively quiet on a drizzly Friday night, and by the time Rachel sat down next to her at the small, round table, Tessa felt like she was about to burst with frustration.
Rachel’s gaze instantly narrowed in concern. “You look crazed. What’s wrong?”
“It’s Lucky,” she said.
And Rachel nearly flew into a rage, her eyes going wide. “What did he do to you? I’ll kill him.”