9. GIULIA
FUCK, I hated this place.
I really, truly did.
It was everything I remembered loving as a kid, but it was somehow worse as an adult.
As a little girl, it had been somewhere to escape my mom and dad’s constant arguing. There’d been a play area, and I’d been able to hang around with my friends all the time.
As a woman, I just saw everything my mom had despised about the clubhouse, and understood, totally, why she’d left. Seeing my brothers get absorbed in everything, pretty much like my father, made me glad Mom couldn’t see them, and it made me regret all the times I’d given her shit for making us leave.
Nyx had been spot on.
I had been a pain in the ass to my mom. I’d railed and rebelled and given her nothing but shit. Fuck, no wonder...
My throat closed as I thought about her heart attack. About how we’d argued the day before, and I’d slammed the fucking phone down on her like the bitch I was.
My last words to my mom were hateful, and there was no getting away from that. No getting over it either.
I pulled in a breath because I felt like I was suffocating, felt like I couldn’t get any air into my lungs, and then, he was there.
Awkward, but there.
I wanted to pull back, jerk out of his hold. I’d heard him head out of the kitchen, had thought I had some privacy, but no. He was there. The scent of him was overwhelming.
Sure, it was sweat, but it was clean sweat. And, unlike a lot of the bastards around here, he didn’t stink of the beer that was seeping out of his pores in the aftermath of a heavy drinking session the night before.
When his arm slipped around my shoulders, I didn’t think anything of turning into him. I didn’t know why, wasn’t even sure why I hadn’t slammed my foot into his instep... okay, so I knew.
Because it was Nyx.
I knew it without having to look.
Anyone else, and I’d have done worse than slam my heel into their instep. I’d have kneed them in the fucking balls.
But...
Nyx...
He was the one who tended to come into the kitchen when the harpies from hell were whimpering over my attacks. He never shouted at me, just shot me an impatient glare, and usually sided with me in the end. He called me out on my shit, but he never got nasty. Not even when I talked crap and gave him more snark than I should.
There was something about him.
Something hot, sure, but more than that. Something that I liked.
He was a dick.
I’d seen his cock already because that fucking Cammie slut was always chewing on it like a dog with a goddamn bone, and he was mean and snarled a lot, but— But what?
I didn’t know, but it didn’t stop me from turning into him, sweat be damned, and pressing my face into the tee he’d donned since he’d left the kitchen the first time. I appreciated the gesture, but when my tears soaked into the fabric, I whispered, “I’m sorry.”
He didn’t reply. I didn’t expect him to. He was a man of few words, and that was something I’d seen from not just watching him around the place, but also from his forays into the kitchen too.
He got more done with a glare than most guys did with a yell, and I appreciated that. After a childhood of hearing my parents shout at one another, I hated guys who yelled. It was an instant red card to a boyfriend who, during a fight, raised his voice.
I shuddered, thinking about how cruel I was with words because of that. I didn’t even raise the volume when I wanted to be cutting. I just said the meanest shit.
“Mom died thinking I hated her,” I murmured, not wanting to explain, and also not wanting him to think I was a pussy.
I got the vibe that he appreciated how strong I was, and sure, I was, but I was a pathetic priss too sometimes.
“We’d argued the day before she had her heart attack, and?—”
“She didn’t die thinking you hated her,” he replied, his voice gravelly but free from expression.
Hell, his entire being was free from expression. He wasn’t even holding me. Not really. He was standing there and letting me drape myself over him.
And, God help me, I appreciated that he was letting me be his scarf, because I was literally clinging to his neck.
I’d be ashamed tomorrow, as it was, I could hear my mom’s voice in my ear, and I just felt like a bitch.
“How do you know that?” I whispered.
“Because when she was here, Lizzie did nothing but raise hell. I highly doubt that changed in death.”
“We were mean to each other,” I admitted.
“What about?” He hesitated. “You don’t have to tell me that.”
I sensed he regretted his curiosity getting the better of him, and because he regretted it, and being the contrary bitch that I was, I muttered, “She was giving me shit.”
“About what?”
“She said by my age, she had a man and my brothers.”
He snorted. “That’s it?”
“Yeah, that’s it.” I pulled back so I could scowl at him. “This isn’t nineteen eighty-five. A woman doesn’t have to be shackled at fucking eighteen to feel like she’s hit the peak of her life.”
“Never said she did, but I’m laughing because I agree.”
Thatwas laughing?
He wasn’t exactly rolling on the floor pissing himself, just a little snort and a twitch of his lips constituted full-blown amusement?
It felt like an eye-opening moment, so I just blinked at him for a second. “Anyway, I was tired of her shit, and I gave her a double dose back.”
Another snort. “Why doesn’t that surprise me?”
I sniffed. “I take after her in most things.”
“Yeah. I know.” When his eyes dropped to my tits, I wanted to die.
Jesus.
Was he comparing my tits with my mom’s?
I covered my face with my hands. “Don’t tell me you had a crush on my mom when she was here.”
He cleared his throat, and that was answer enough.
“Great. Just fucking great.”
I twisted back around to avoid his stare because, sure enough, I’d inherited my mom’s massive tits, except fate had granted me a bigger set by one cup size and a round ass.
Motherfucker.
Literally.
“I’m okay now,” I said woodenly.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he blurted out. “I was only commenting on the fact your attitude is bigger than your?—”
“Don’t you dare say my boobs,” I hissed.
“Do I look like I have a death wish?” he grumbled. “Look, can we not focus on your breasts?”
That had me blinking, because whatever word I expected him to say, that wasn’t it.
Hooters? Sure. Melons? Maybe. Breasts? Nah.
“I wasn’t. You were. You were thinking I’m like my mom, well, I don’t spread my legs for bikers.”
His nostrils flared at that, and when he took a step forward, I wasn’t sure whether to be scared or turned on. My heart began to pound, and my throat felt thick as I stared at him, aware that I’d awoken a beast I wasn’t sure I knew how to handle, and then, someone blurted out, “Giulia, I’m hungry.”
It took me a second to realize it was my brother. He was the only one who would ask me for food outside of mealtimes, because North thought the sun rose and set on him, and because he was the apple of our mother’s eye, he usually thought he could get away with shit with me.
He was wrong.
I wasn’t sure if my throat worked or not, but I managed to garble, “There’s a fridge over there. You can open the door and make yourself something to eat.”
“You know I like your BLTs.”
My eyes were still on Nyx’s, still trained on him, and his on me, and fuck me, if my body wasn’t singing with adrenaline. I felt like the proverbial deer in the headlights, only, a part of me wouldn’t mind getting rammed down.
My cheeks flushed, and my entire body felt overheated, and then, he threw water on the flames by stating, “I think I could go for a BLT too.”
And if there was one rule I was picking up on, it was that I couldn’t push my luck with the council, even if I had more leeway than the clubwhores because I fed them good stuff. But at that moment, I figured my luck had run dry.
So, even though the last thing I wanted to do was make my dick brother a sandwich, I shuffled away from Nyx’s fiery hot stare and headed to the refrigerator I’d just directed North to so I could pull out the fixings for a BLT.
All the while, I felt as though I’d had a close call, so why the hell I was disappointed was something I’d have to figure out later.
When my lungs weren’t burning as though I’d run a race.