Chapter Twenty-Four
Red and Blue
Crystal
I didn’t realize how much time had passed until we walked out of the mall and it was dark already.
“Back to the house?” he asked, when we reached the bike.
It was a slap back to reality that I wasn’t ready for. It must have shown in the heavy breath I took, because he laughed and pawed the side of my face. “Peoria then?”
I snorted and shook my head, “We can’t run off to your suite every time we see each other. You already spent too much money on me.”
I glanced down at the ring again. The price he paid still made me shaky inside. I was walking around with three rent payments on my hand. I knew it was the right size, but still, I was afraid it would slide off or, somehow, get ruined.
He patiently stared into my eyes like he’d wait forever on me to make up my mind about our direction.
“You don’t know anywhere closer?”
He shrugged and glanced around. “There are hotels everywhere, are you ready to be put up for the night?”
“I want to ride with you,” I admitted, giving a little glance at the bike. I’d rather enjoyed the feel of holding onto him while the wind blew my hair and thoughts. “Can we go for a ride before we pick out a room?”
“Baby, you can be my backpack anytime.” He winked and kissed me like he was savoring every second of it.
I don’t know how I struggled to trust my own shadow most days but had no problems trusting him on two wheels at whatever speed he wanted to take us.
We coasted toward Darcy’s Pint, and I settled back, letting my hand rest on my knee while I took in all the sights that I’d driven past hundreds of times, but never really took the time to appreciate. His fingers brushed mine and he moved my hand to his hip.
I smiled and pecked the back of his shoulder, giving my cheek to his vest for a few blocks. When we reached the light, I sat up a little, and as he turned, my hand gravitated back to my knee. He reached back, claimed my hand and guided it back to his waist, making me inwardly giggle a bit.
I realized it was a thing for him and smiled as I tested my luck after a few moments and casually brought my hand back toward my knee. Before I could comfortably rest it, he gunned the bike a little and I panicked and grabbed at his waist with a squeak.
I felt the rumble of laughter even before I popped him on the shoulder and was rewarded with that cocky grin when he glanced back.
“Asshole!” I called over the wind.
“You love it,” he sang back.
He circled the city, navigating interstates and city streets alike.
It was so weird, when I was clutching him and that bike was roaring, I forgot about everything.
There was no dayshift-nightshift battle, and the rent was the last thing on my mind.
I didn’t even notice he’d taken the interstate south, until we were thirty minutes out of the city and the fields started to span forever.
“Where are you taking me?” I called.
He glanced back and took the next ramp.
“I don’t know. Home?”
“What?” I put one hand on his shoulder and lifted my ass half off the bike before I’d gotten the word out.
“Whoa.” He pinned my leg and pushed me back down. “What the fuck…?”
“I–I can’t go back there. It’ll cause problems.”
He walked the bike off the ramp to the gravel with us still on it while I sat behind him gnawing my lip and suddenly questioning my life decisions.
I didn’t have a means to take Joplin with me, and I wasn’t sure I could walk away from her twice. I clenched my teeth to keep my lip from quivering and realized I was gripping his shoulder a little harder than necessary.
He stood up and I shifted back with an abrupt gasp.
I thought I’d pissed him off, but those dark-blue eyes were shimmering with concern when he turned to face me.
“Why?”
The tension in my jaw grew until my teeth grated. I shook my head, clearing my thoughts and tried to cover my discomfort with a quick flash of smile and a dismissive shake of my head.
“Don’t lie to me.” There was a sharpness in his words that sent every thought in my head scattering.
I blinked to clear my vision, but it only made my eyes burn.
“You shake your head like the answer is nothing, but that can’t be true.
You’re shaking like a leaf, and your shoulders are curling inward with every breath like you’ve something to shrink or guard yourself from.
” His hands gripped my shoulders in a hug of a massage and slid off either smoothing them out and making a point of his words.
I lost control of my lower lip and those hot tears spilled.
I was hit with more emotions than I could process at once.
I’d spent an entire childhood wishing someone would notice my misery, or the pain in my eyes.
I’d spent an entire lifetime praying that someday, the father I’d never met would care enough about my wellbeing and save me and my little sister.
When he never came, and I accepted that we weren’t worth the time of seeing or saving, I put on the stage make-up that I wore as armor and hardened myself to the reality that nobody was coming. I was the only person in my corner.
It was too late for me, but if I could save Joplin…
I bore the secrets and shame alone and in silence for twenty years.
And now someone was standing in front of me and seeing. He was really seeing me. The truth, the pain, the ugliness of it all.
And honestly, I didn’t know how to feel.
Embarrassed. Elated. Crushed that it was a stranger, and not the family I always hoped would show back up.
On top of all of that, a little piece of me was awestruck that it was him.
A Steel Disciple.
Somebody who was a stranger a week ago.
He saw me.
I don’t know how I ended up in his arms, but he was rocking and shushing me on the side of the ramp while I let it all out in defeated sobs.
I didn’t realize how much I was carrying, until I collapsed.
“It’s over,” he whispered, while running his fingers along my hair line.
Tendrils of hair stuck to my tear-slickened cheeks, making him double his efforts as he tried to smooth it behind my ear.
“What is?” I asked, my voice breaking with my shaky breaths.
With my brain short wired, I was sure he meant whatever we had going on between us.
“Whatever you’re running from. Whatever broke you like this. It’s over.”
That single word stung so badly, I missed the sentiment of his statement.
He was right, I was broken.
“Babe.” He tipped my chin up, pulling me from my thoughts.
His head shifted and a smile lingered, as he studied my face with a question in his eyes, “Why did you check out on me? What did I s–? What are you running from?”
I sucked in a breath like he’d suddenly bared me to the world. I was good at holding things in, but he was more accurate and invasive than any therapist child services had ever sat me in front of.
‘Invasive’ wasn’t the word for it, even if I felt vulnerable. It wasn’t his fault he could see me.
“How do you know? How do you know I didn’t just want to…” I shook my head, unable to think clearly enough to further a hypothetical or a lie or whatever I was doing.
“Dance? You ran away from a roof over your head, a loving family, and three square meals to dance the dayshift and stress over weekly rent money for a room you’re not proud of?”
I wanted to slap his face, my mouth snapped shut and I wet my lips.
“Babe,” he whispered, palming my cheek again.
He gently brushed the tip of my nose with his and I gritted my teeth to keep another round of tears at bay.
“I was being sarcastic. I know whatever you left is uglier than what you’re taking refuge in.
What I don’t know is why you won’t tell me who…
Because if this is a person that is keeping you from your home, and loved ones– Give me a name, and I’ll see it etched in granite.
I fucking told you, there is nothing I wouldn’t do for you, or give to you… ”
I laughed, rolling my eyes at his antics, “Right, and what, you’ll kill someone for me?”
He shrugged, and said it so nonchalantly, I knew he fucking meant it.
“Unless, you want me to teach them what it means to be dead but still breathing. Yeah. I will. Whatever you want, that’s what the fuck I want.
” He lifted my hand, and the sapphire and diamonds glinted in the moonlight, as he kissed my knuckles and stared up at me from behind that rock, “I want you happy, and I don’t want to ever see you this fucking scared of going anywhere again.
When you go, I go. Even if I’m not there, baby, my name will ride with you. Do you understand that?”
My lower lip quivered, but a smile won over just before I lost the battle to keep my head up. His finger found my chin and steered my gaze back to him. “Whoever it is, whatever it is… it died ten minutes ago, you just haven’t realized it yet, babe.”
The interstate traffic buzzed below us, it wasn’t the constant blur of it that came with the city. The ramp was dark save for a light at the end and one at the top, making it feel like we were in our own little world.
“Tell me his name.” His tone was so gentle and those eyes implored, but I didn’t know what to tell him.
“There are too many monsters to name, Anthony. My mom kept a variety of dick around, most of them weren’t nice.
Her boyfriends were always assholes, and the sad thing was you never wanted her to get rid of him, because the next one was almost guaranteed to be worse.
It’s like she was always…” I raised my hand in an incline, “There was never any going backwards for her. I just– You want to do something for me? Just… let me know if things get bad for her?”
“Who?”
“Joplin. My sister. If you hear something about her, just tell me. That’s all I want you to do. I don’t want to upset things. I don’t want trouble…” His face fell, like I’d asked for the impossible.
“I meant it. I don’t want something happening that might put her in a worse position…” I insisted and he eventually nodded.
“Anthony, she’s all I have…” I needed to know he heard me.
Those dark-blue jewels lifted and locked on me so fast it scared me a little.
I brought my leg over the bike to stand in front of him, and he stepped toward me, preventing my dismount.
His tall frame came in close, and I cowered.
A tiny, startled sound caught in my throat as I leaned back toward the handlebars.
“Don’t do that,” he whispered, his fingers tangling in my hair.
My breath caught, as he came closer and planted a kiss on the top of my head.
“Don’t ever cower from anyone, and definitely not me.” His firm touch slid down my face and cupped my jaw.
I’d never been kissed so tenderly. As quickly as I’d froze, he melted the fear away.
“Tell me you’re mine,” he whispered, his mouth moving beneath my ear to lay another kiss along my neck.
The soft touch of his lips teased over me, while he repeated his demand.
“I am,” I huffed, while his stubble trailed my chest. He reached under my sundress, hooked my underwear, and skimmed them off my hips with a tug.
“I think you forgot,” he murmured, his words were playful, but his eyes were so serious.
I almost laughed, but then he tossed the underwear to the ditch and my jaw dropped.
“Hey,” The word caught in my throat, as he snuggly grabbed my pussy and started to massage.
“Hmm?” His brow rose, and he rocked the heel of his hand against me, making my knees dance as my body and mind warred.
I swear I thought the world around him was glowing.
Blue and red.
I heard a car door and my eyes widened, my thighs snapping shut in a panic around his wrist. He smothered me with a kiss. I tried to say his name, but he deepened the kiss and stuffed two fingers into me.
My back arched and I blushed so badly I felt the warmth in my cheeks. I was terrified I was about to be arrested, but desperate for more.
“They don’t see us,” he whispered, when my legs relaxed.
His hand climbed from my chest to my neck and he hugged before cocking my neck. Everything in me short-wired when I saw what my brain had already guessed.
There was a police cruiser and a car at the bottom of the ramp. I wrapped my fingers around one side of the handlebars and scrabbled at the air until I found his vest.
“Ant–” I managed, just as he stuffed and curled those long, blessed fingers inside me. I closed my eyes and wadded the leather of his vest in my hand. I was terrified I’d encourage him rather than ask him to stop.
Who was I kidding? If he stopped, I’d climb him right now.
Cop be damned.
“Whose?” he demanded, and his fingers pushed me right over the edge.
I came, with my freedom on the line, one word on my lips.
“Yours.”