96. Chapter 96
“This is one of my old haunts.”
Jase parked the bike at Chums, a bar off the beaten tourist track outside of Monterey. He’d slung enough drinks there to almost make it a regular gig.
It would’ve been if he’d stayed with Chloe.
“Leave it to you,” Lindsey said. “We’ve passed dozens of nice places, and you bring me to the only dive.”
“Everyone slums it once in a while.”
“Is that what I’m doing?” Lindsey pulled off her helmet and shook out her hair in a way Jase looked forward to at every stop. “Chums? Isn’t chum bloody fish guts?”
He shrugged. “Why don’t you ask them?”
It was early, a quiet hour between daytime drunks and the night crowd. The perfect time to wring a few bucks out of the owner before Chloe stopped in for a drink. Charlie had texted Jase a week ago to tell him Chloe quit—“what did you say to her, man?”—or he wouldn’t have stopped at all.
“In and out quick, yeah?” Jase said, holding the door open and ushering Lindsey inside.
“Hey, man.” Charlie waved from behind the long, nearly empty, bar. Jase clocked a weather-beaten man on a bar stool and two hipster types sipping whiskey at a table by the window. No Chloe. “I wondered when we’d see you.”
Lindsey went down the hall to the bathroom and Jase set their helmets on the bar.
“Hey, yeah, it’s good to see you.”
“It’s too bad about your dad.” Charlie tossed a white rag over his shoulder. “I really hoped he’d pull through.”
“Yeah,” Jase said. “Me too.”
“You okay, man?”
“Fine,” Jase lied.
Charlie set his fists on the bar and leaned over it. “You’ve got some brass balls, bringing another skirt into the lion’s den.”
“What’s it to you?”
“It’s nothing to me, unless she’s available. If Chloe sees you with her…” Charlie whistled. “I wouldn’t want to be you. Or her.”
“Well, I’ll be long gone before she comes in.”
“No such luck, man. She’s in back, clocking in.”
Jase’s balls clenched in their sac. “Chloe’s here?”
“She works the night shift.”
“I—” he stammered. “I thought you said she didn’t work here anymore.”
“You know Chlo. She quits once a month. Whenever she needs fast money, she comes kissing my ass for a couple of shifts. Not unlike present company.”
“Her car’s not outside,” Jase said through the shock, having checked the parking lot for her vintage convertible.
“The ragtop? It’s in the shop. Hence the need for more shifts. She’s definitely dressed to make extra tips tonight.” Charlie set out a couple of shot glasses. “You need a drink, man?”
“I need a lot more than a drink if she sees me.” Jase downed the whiskey Charlie poured and set the empty glass out for another. “Speaking of money, I need to collect on the hundred you owe me.”
Charlie slapped his hand on the bar. “Here I thought you just dropped in to show off your new girlfriend.”
“Girlfriend?”
Charlie laughed and counted out twenties from the register. “I’ll give you this if you talk to her first.”
“Who? Chloe? Are you nuts? I’ve got to try to smuggle Lindsey out of here in one damn piece.”
“Is it serious?”
“What does that even mean?”
“Is your girl going to flip if you square things up with Chloe?”
“There is no squaring things up. Now just give me the goddamn money, Charlie.”
Charlie held the cash out, then snatched it back.
“Look, I don’t know what happened between you the last time you were here.
She’s not exactly the kind of girl who needs a shoulder to cry on—not like I’d mind.
But she was busting a lot of balls after you left, mine included, and I don’t want to know what she’ll do if she finds out you were here and didn’t see her. ”
“The only one who could tell her is you. If you can keep your mouth shut—”
“Keep your mouth shut about what?” Lindsey asked, walking up beside him.
“Nothing,” Jase said. “Charlie, this is Lindsey. Chucky’s about to pay me for some work I did a while back so we can afford to get to Santa Cruz.”
Charlie rolled his eyes and let Jase pluck the money from his fingers.
“It’s a pleasure,” he said to Lindsey. “If I could just borrow your man for a minute, there’s something he needs to take care of in back.”
“Fine. I got it,” Jase said. “You just take care of her.”
“Don’t worry, man. I’ll entertain your lady friend.”
Jase flicked Charlie the bird behind Lindsey’s back and hurried down the poorly lit corridor lined with doors for the bathrooms and stockroom.
“This is a very bad idea,” he said to himself. He knocked on the stockroom door. “Chloe, you in there?”
She came out of the women’s bathroom at the end of the hall instead.
A vision in fishnets, charcoal eyeliner, and bright red lipstick, with tattoos he’d toured enough times to know the roads through her ink by heart.
Her dark eyes widened for a beat before she came at him.
The kiss lasted a second longer than it should have.
Fuck. Fuck. He’d put this to bed weeks ago, but clearly his body hadn’t gotten the fucking message. With the same iron will he’d tapped into to keep from touching Lindsey when his millions were at risk, Jase gripped Chloe’s waist and put some much-needed space between them.
“I see you still know how to say hello,” he murmured.
“I see you still know where to find me.”
She hooked her red nails around his belt and pulled him toward the bathroom. His dick, already pointing the way, wanted to follow.
“Chloe, wait.”
“Why? What’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing,” he said, prying her fingers off his pants before he did something stupid. Stupider . “I came back here to talk.”
“Talk?”
Chloe put her hands on her hips and jutted out her chin.
He recognized her skirt as the one he’d barely needed to lift to get underneath it on their last night together, but the shirt was new, and barely a few strips of red lace sewn together.
Charlie wasn’t kidding about the tips. The twenties in Jase’s pocket screamed to be stuffed between her breasts.
Not this one. Not today.
Three. Million. Dollars. Long, brown hair. Sundresses…
“When have you ever wanted to talk?” Chloe demanded.
Never. Those words had never left his mouth in her presence. The determined little minx reached for him again.
“I’m serious, stop.” More words he’d never spoken to her.
She dropped back. “What’s with you, Jase?”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry?” She crossed her arms, some of the hardness in a face that was all sharp angles and high cheekbones softened. “Is this about your dad?”
“Yeah. No.” He shook his head. What was this about again? “No. Well, sort of.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming? After last time, I figured you weren’t coming around anymore,” she said.
“I’m doing this thing for my dad, and I can’t stay.” He swallowed hard. “There’s something I need to tell you, and it’s complicated.”
“You don’t do complicated.”
“Tell me about it.” Jase studied her for a sign that she would be reasonable. He should’ve sold that kidney instead of coming here because he definitely wasn’t leaving with his balls. “I’m here with…someone.”
Yes. That was it. Sundress was in the bar with Charlie, and getting her out was priority number one.
“Someone?” Chloe’s eyes darkened a shade. “Not the woman who was just in the bathroom?”
“Yeah. She’s…” He reached for the least complicated explanation, which also happened to be the truth. “My brother’s ex-girlfriend.”
“What are you doing with your brother’s ex?”
“We’re riding to Santa Cruz.”
“You always say you never ride with women.”
“That hasn’t changed.”
“Obviously it has.”
“I’m doing it for my dad. I didn’t want you to get upset if you met her.”
“Why would I get upset?”
Jase didn’t answer fast enough, and she drew the obvious conclusion: “You’re sleeping with her.”
“Like I said, it’s complicated.”
“Oh, fuck you, Jase,” she snapped. “You’re such an asshole. Why would you bring her here? Did you think I was just going to blow you in the bathroom when you’re here with some other chick you’re screwing?”
“I didn’t ask you to blow me in the bathroom.”
“Then why were you looking for me back here?”
A fair question, considering how many times she’d blown him in that very bathroom.
“I wasn’t going to come here at all. I had some business with Charlie, and you weren’t supposed to be here.” As soon as he said it, he knew it was a mistake. “Christ, what I mean is, this isn’t how I wanted to do this.”
“Do what?”
“See you. It wasn’t supposed to go down this way.”
“How was it supposed to go down?”
He’d never planned on seeing her again. At all. Ever. Because he didn’t have enough sense to keep his hands off of her but he couldn’t give her what she wanted. What those narrowed eyes were still silently begging him for.
Why the fuck couldn’t he just love her?
She shook her head when he didn’t answer. “Fuck you, Jase.”
“Chloe—”
“Everyone always said you weren’t good for me. I can’t believe I thought they were wrong.”
“Hold on a minute”—he trailed her down the hall—“I’m sorry.”
She ducked into the stockroom and locked the door behind her.
“Chloe?”
He tried the knob and pounded once with his fist. She didn’t come back.
It really was over this time. It was always going to end. After everything they had been through, she was worth more than this. They all were, and this was what they got.
And I get the door shut in my face.
He might’ve been standing outside of Denise’s house with his sad brown sack of toiletries.
Nothing had changed except the state. Now there was nothing behind him to go back to in Ohio, and no safety net in California to land.
Nothing in front of or behind him besides endless miles between the only two points on the map giving his life meaning.
True freedom. It should’ve felt good, only he lost too much this time.
Now I really am a ghost.