Chapter 10 Bikers and Cake
KNUCKLES
“Cassidy Billups, what the hell are you doing here, girl?” I heard Jasper call out from somewhere around the corner. My feet wanted to take off a dead run to see if she was really there or if my best friend was fucking with me. I couldn’t, though.
Bigfoot, Grease, and I had to finish our discussion about how the latest shipment of shrooms was going to go down.
We had a big order that needed to get all the way to New York Fucking City.
Big city life seemed like enough of a ‘trip’ to me.
I didn’t understand why anyone there would want to alter their reality further.
I guess they’d probably feel the same about me and my small town biker life.
“You going to be good to head out on that run?” Bigfoot asked.
“Not happy about it, but I’ll get it done,” I agreed.
“Jasper?” I heard in response to Grunt’s earlier question. It really was her.
“I need to go see something, can we put a pin in this, prez?”
His eyes twinkled with humor as his head bobbed once indicating his agreement. I turned the corner only to come to a dead stop as I watched Grunt wrap his arms around the woman of my dreams - the one whose nightmares I probably starred in.
“Long time, no see, Cassy.”
“It’s good to see you, too.” Cassidy disengaged from the hug as she spoke and I didn’t miss the way her eyes tracked the surrounding area.
It was fucking obvious she was checking for danger - namely me.
I was such a cunt the year before when I saw her.
I had no clue that Simone had been lying about her all these years until Grunt took me aside after hearing what went down at Michael Billups’ wake.
He had wondered all along, ever since their initial blow up in high school if Cassidy had remained friends with Simone.
It was true their dynamics and behavior changed before graduation, but I thought it was just because Simone was paying penance for leaving Cassidy out of stuff and then for hooking up with me knowing I was her best friend’s crush.
“I was just explaining everything to Nell. I can pull around near the kitchen to offload everything and then get the hell out of here. She can call when you’re done, and I’ll see if I can get my brother to come out and retrieve all my dishes and equipment so that I don’t have to come back.”
Cassie didn’t have a fucking brother. What the hell was she playing at?
“That’s silly,” Nell told her but Grunt nodded. The fucker must have thought it was a good idea. “You worked hard on all of this, and you were telling me that you wanted to see the unveiling,” Nell continued to put her foot down about Cassidy sticking around.
“I didn’t realize that it would take place here, though,” Cassidy explained. Grunt and I knew why she would be uncomfortable on the club’s property, but Nell didn’t and Baffle wasn’t so locked into my bullshit that he had put two-and-two together yet.
“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of bikers,” he called out to her teasingly.
“Not at all. It’s just…” Her voice trailed away as I stepped further around the building and our eyes met on one of her scans. I stopped in my tracks again and Bigfoot and Grease flanked me and glanced around to see what the problem was. I tried to break the ice in the dumbest way possible.
“It’s almost time. I can’t wait to see what sweet, sweet Nell cooked up for us.
” I projected my voice, so they’d all be sure to hear me as I slapped my hands together and rubbed them like a greedy little kid on Christmas who was about to dive into all the presents under the tree.
Cassidy’s alarmed face made me stop dead.
My smile dropped as I watched her shake her head back and forth as if she could will me away.
Baffle mumbled something to the others but I couldn’t hear what he had to say.
I didn’t miss a word of what Grunt spouted, though.
“Why don’t you hop back in your truck, Cass?
” He moved so that his body was between me and the woman I wanted.
Dumb move for a best friend to make. “I’ll go help you unload, so you can get out of here faster. ”
“What the fuck, Grunt?” I yelled as my feet finally engaged again and I started to jog over to them before Cassidy decided the catering job she’d obviously taken with Nell was not worth whatever she had been paid.
I couldn’t get to her before she pulled off, but the passenger side of the truck would do.
I hopped up and tugged the door open just as it started to move. Cassidy hit the break.
“No! Nope, Nope, Nope,” she repeated while her head shook on an endless swivel. “Get your ass out of my truck, James!”
“Can’t do that, sweetheart.”
“I am not now, nor have I ever been your sweetheart.” She threw those words at me as her foot hit the gas again and I lost my balance and fell into the dash. Damn her. She did that on purpose.
“What if I told you that you had it all wrong, just like I did for all these years?”
“I’d say you’re making shit up to save face.”
“You’re wrong,” I shot back. How in the hell was I supposed to convince Cassidy that she was the one I wanted all along when there was so much history between us that suggested otherwise?
I couldn’t. She would never fucking believe me.
Worse, she might hate me more if she knew I had a thing for her and still ignored her back in the day when we were in school.
I didn’t think she would understand the logic I was playing with at the time because adult me didn’t understand what the fuck I’d been thinking back then either.
“You can help me unload this stuff on one condition,” Cassidy called out to me as she hopped down from the driver’s side of the box truck.
“What’s that?”
“No talking. We have nothing to say to one another and anything you could possibly have to yell at me is probably based on another lie cooked up by Simone. I always knew she was manipulative, but apparently, she was far worse or you were far dumber than I thought.”
That hurt. “Dumber” meant that she thought I was unintelligent to begin with.
I might not have been the sharpest tool in the shed, but I was at least in the top half of our graduating class.
Then again, I fucked around with her best friend and got her pregnant when I was pining for Cassidy and knew I wasn’t good enough for her yet.
Maybe I was a complete fucking idiot after all.
I didn’t say a word as I got out of the truck and followed her around to the back. I would help her get everything set up, but she was wrong if she thought we weren’t going to have a chat while we did so.
“Be careful and don’t drop anything. I calculated the food based on the number of people Nell gave me and my crew are not around today to help make more if something happens.”
So, she had a crew. “Who all is in this crew of yours?”
She turned narrowed eyes on me and sneered as she pulled out a rolling tray and snapped everything into place.
The efficient way she handled the thing left me impressed.
The way her breasts jiggled as she moved sent my blood rushing straight to my dick.
We needed to talk, but my body wanted what I had long since denied it.
Youthful stupidity and Simone were no longer a hinderance.
I grabbed hold of Cassidy’s shoulders and pinned her to the wall near the door that led to the clubhouse’s kitchen.
“We are going to talk but after I prove something to you.” I didn’t give her a chance to come back with an angry retort as I slammed my lips down on hers and traced the seam of her mouth with my tongue.
The move surprised her enough that she gasped which allowed me into her mouth.
Fucking heaven.
I held her face clasped in both hands as I drank her essence down through that kiss. I could have come in my pants right then and there. This was what I had missed out on for all those years just because I was too stupid to go after who I really wanted back then.
As I pulled away, I whispered against her lips not realizing I said it out loud. “You should have been mine all this time.”
I did not see the slap coming but I felt the burning sting where it landed on my cheek just the same.
Cassidy looked equal parts shocked and angry, but I didn’t see on her face the same awe that kiss left me feeling.
Maybe she had gotten over her crush on me long ago, so much so that there was no hope to rekindle it.
Fuck.
I turned and stomped through the door to the kitchen and heard the ramp to the back of the truck as it was released and pulled out.
She had moved right on to business as usual.
I bypassed every other place in the clubhouse and anyone who tried to talk to me until I could lock myself inside the security room.
“What crawled up your ass?” Glitch asked.
“What are you doing in here?”
“I’m on camera duty right now.”
“Show me the kitchen door and loading area.” He pointed to the screen and I sat my ass in the only other chair in the small room.
There she was. My Cassidy. She pulled her silky, blonde hair back with something and managed to pull a large tray out without dropping it or tripping on anything.
A minute later, Grunt and Grease came around the corner and started to take her commands as she told them how everything needed to come off the truck and where to put it all.
“You have a thing for her?” Glitch asked and I ignored him as I continued to watch.
“You need to talk about it?” I heard Grunt ask her after Grease walked in to take another load of trays.
“Nope,” she grunted and continued with her work.
“I saw that kiss and the slap,” Glitch mentioned.
I turned to see that the smugness I expected wasn’t there. Concern shown in his eyes as he waited for me to say something. Anything. I had nothing to offer as I turned back to the screen to watch them finish.
“Someone else will be by later to pick everything up. Don’t bother washing anything, that’s part of the service Nell paid for.
Just make sure that everything gets stacked in an easily accessible spot near this door.
” Cassidy must have been used to giving no-nonsense orders to people. Grunt gave her a nod.
“Whoever comes will still have to check in at the front door and then drive around.”
“I will let him know.” She turned to leave but Grunt stopped her. “Cass, are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Listen, I don’t want to put you in the middle, but maybe you can stress to your friend that I don’t want anything to do with whatever scheme he has cooked up to get back at me for whatever the fuck Simone claimed I did in the past. The last time I spoke to her was the day I confronted her about only being my friend at school for some reason.
We literally never talked after that. She didn’t invite me to be in her wedding, I never knew there was a baby on the way, none of it, until he yelled at me about them after graduation.
I only knew that they had been seeing each other because I have ears and couldn’t help overhearing shit in the hallways at school.
I never saw either of them after graduation until last year when James humiliated me again at my father’s wake.
” She turned and swiped her sleeve over her face.
I wasn’t sure if it was to clear the sweat from working hard to unload that truck so fast or if she might have teared up.
“And, for fuck’s sake, I never even went to a college. I graduated with a bachelor’s degree through distance learning while I was working. End of story. If he has some big revenge plan, he’s pulling out all the stops on the wrong fucking person.”
“Pretty sure he knows most of that now, Cass. We had a long chat after he came back to the clubhouse the last time you saw him.” She said nothing in return as she climbed into the truck.
“Is that what the kiss was about? Weird way to get revenge on someone, man,” Glitch said as we both listened to hear if there would be anything else said.
“No. There was no revenge, but I guess I can see why she’d think that. Our last two conversations didn’t exactly leave her to think that I held her in high enough esteem to stick my tongue down her throat.”
“What the hell would make you do it then? You had to know a conversation was warranted first. I don’t even know the background, but based on what I just heard, that move was idiotic at best.”
“I know. I lost my mind for a minute. It’s hard to think when your dream girl is finally standing in front of you again, and it looks like she’s home for good, considering she’s working as a caterer for a club event.”
“Yeah, I guess. Grunt is on his way. No doubt, he knows exactly where you’re headed. If you’re not ready for a conversation with him, you might want to head out now.