Xander
“What…in the actual fuck is going on?” I demanded, unable to decide if I was horrified, terrified, or pissed.
I wasn’t good at horror or fear, so I would have to settle for anger. Because seriously, what the fuck was going on?
“That’s a goddamn good question,” Mona said, and I could see her nostrils flaring. “What the fuck is going on?”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I asked, looking at her in disbelief. “You were told to leave me the hell alone, and you come up here without warning? You show up at my…is this a fucking birthday party?”
“A surprise birthday party,” Jake said, and while he was an idiot, he at least had the sense to look worried. “Didn’t think we’d be the ones getting a surprise, but—”
“Jake?” I heard Colin say softly next to me.
“Shut up?”
“That’s a real good idea right now.”
“I have been leaving you alone,” Mona hissed. “And I messaged you last week that I was going to come up here for your birthday, to take you out so we could talk. And then I sent a follow-up yesterday!”
“I don’t read your goddamn emails,” I shot back.
“Apparently you open them,” she said, cocking her hips and looking pissed.
God, once upon a time, the sight of her in her riding leathers, looking mad as hell, had been a surefire way to make me forget whatever stupid things we were arguing about.
The woman was a speed demon, and she only came alive when she was facing down danger…
probably why she had liked to fight me so much. “Because I can see you read them!”
“Because if I didn’t, you’d start calling me. At least if I pretend to read them, you leave me the fuck alone,” I snapped. “Fuck, I—”
Every one of these people had just had the door to my private life thrown open and everything inside illuminated…
literally, which made things so much worse.
All I’d wanted was to have a quiet night with Colin.
A chance, a way for me to…I don’t know, soak up the newfound warmth between us, to bathe in it without sex mucking it up.
Not that the sex was a bad thing, but discovering there was warmth without arousal was something I’d really wanted to explore.
Except, the whole thing I was trying to keep secret had been put on display…and to Mona? Jesus, I wasn’t going to wonder how this could get worse because holy shit, things could always get worse and I did not need that.
But it was bad, really bad.
“So, are we going to talk about…” Carter began, but Maverick slapped the back of his head, saving him from the consequences of what was undoubtedly a stupid fucking question.
“Get out,” Mona told them, and if I’d been a dog, my lips would have curled upward to show my teeth. “You fucking idiots, get out! I never should have let you talk me into—”
“The only person who gets to talk to my team like the fucking idiots they are, is me, got it? They’re idiots, well-meaning, goofy as fuck, stupid as hell, but they’re good men who do not need you telling them what to do,” I snarled at her and she shot me a furious look but I didn’t care.
“Do not play with me on this one, Mona, I swear to God.”
“I got this,” Colin said softly, laying his hand on my arm.
When I looked at him, he yanked his hand back as if I were covered in spines.
His look was guarded when he turned to the rest of the room, and I followed his eyes to see Mona staring at him.
If it were possible for her to have breathed fire across the room, Colin and I would have burned. “Guys…out. Cait, uh, probably you too.”
“No way in hell am I leaving him alone with this conniving bitch,” Cait snapped, crossing her arms. “I told her to make sure you knew she was coming, but she insisted. I’m—”
“I know you are not talking to me like that, or about me as if I’m not standing right here,” Mona said, rounding on her. “I don’t care if you’ve been waiting until I was out of the picture to make your move, you treacherous whore, but—”
“Excuse me?” Cait asked, and I stepped aside as the guys, except Jake, hustled for the door.
“No one has been waiting until you were out of the picture. You’ve been out of the picture for years, bitch.
And if I wanted him, I would have got him, but he doesn’t want me anymore than I want him.
You’re just the dumbass who seems to think that if there’s another woman in his life, it automatically means sex.
Looks like you should have been worried about more than women. ”
“Cait,” Colin groaned. “Please do not throw me under the bus right now, okay? Can we just—”
“Fine,” Cait snapped. “Jake, get moving. I don’t need you to hover over me; I can handle myself.”
Jake scratched the back of his head nervously. “If I’m honest, Cait, I’m more worried about Mona, not you. I don’t want you going to prison over her.”
“Excuse me?” Mona asked, whirling on him.
“Sorry, ma’am, I don’t doubt that any woman in Big Boss’ life is tough as nails, you’d have to be to survive being around him…no offense, Xander,” he said and when I narrowed my eyes at him, he cleared his throat. “But Cait’s the toughest woman I know, except for my momma…no offense.”
“None taken,” Cait said, and if it wasn’t because I was watching quite a few things in my life take a nosedive, I would have smiled at the affectionate twist of her mouth as she held out her arm to him. Jake took it and escorted her toward the door, her head held high as Jake flashed a smile at me.
I would deal with all of them later.
And that left one.
“Do you mind?” Mona asked, and I turned back to her, ready to start the apocalypse.
“Ma’am,” he began, and I stilled because there was a quality to his voice I had never heard before.
“You might have been used to people who are scared of you, like some guys here are right now, or ready to fight you like Xander and Cait…but I’m neither.
I have seen things and been through things that have haunted my dreams for years; some angry woman in an admittedly impressively well-fitting set of riding leathers isn’t going to strike fear into my heart. ”
She scowled, but I could see she was disarmed for a moment, because he was being so calm or because he’d somehow slipped in a compliment; I couldn’t say. He wouldn’t have long, I knew full well that her recovery time when surprised was pretty damn good.
“But I’ll say this, if you came here for what I think you came here for,” he continued steadily, tilting his head back and jutting his chin out. “Then maybe remember that, and instead of having a knock-out, drag-out fight with him, keep that in mind. Otherwise, what’s the point?”
I wanted so badly to reach out to him; he looked so lonely, standing there as he faced Mona without the slightest hint of worry or anger on his face. If anything, he just looked…tired.
“Go away,” she said bitterly, but it wasn’t a command; in fact, it almost sounded like a plea.
He nodded, giving me a look I couldn’t decipher, and then he was gone before I realized I’d never reached out to touch him. I didn’t know what was going through his head, but surely he had to know that nothing was okay right then. I would deal with him later too; how, I didn’t know, but later.
Which left me with only one issue to deal with, and I turned to her. “What the hell, Mona?”
“That…that’s how you’re going to start this?” she asked in disbelief, looking around the room as if she’d never seen it before.
My thoughts whirled because I realized she hadn’t seen it before.
Anytime I was at the outpost and she came to see me, she would stay in a motel, usually grumbling about how run-down the whole place was.
She would rarely come to the outpost to meet my team, and I would have to go to her wherever she was staying.
The only time she’d stopped grumbling about accommodation was when she realized there were a few ‘decent’, her words, Airbnbs for her to stay at.
She’d never been part of my life, not the outpost part anyway.
That fact had been the source of many arguments in the past. Because how do you have a husband with a life like mine, a job like mine, and not want to be even a cursory part of it?
How can you know what I do for a living, what I’ve dedicated myself to, and fight me tooth and nail because I want you to be part of it?
How strange she looked in her expensive leathers, among the worn-down clutter of the place.
I couldn’t remember the last time I thought of any place other than the cabin as home.
We’d shared places over the years, and while I’d fought to make sure I spent time with her every chance I got, it had never been enough for her or for me.
The cabin had become my home at some point, and perhaps that was what had really eaten away at her after so much time.
“You can be pissed at me all you want,” I said with a shake of my head.
“Oh, thank you for your permission,” she snorted.
I bit back my retort even as it clawed at my throat to be released. “But you were the one who assumed it was perfectly fine to come here and…I don’t even know what drove them to do this surprise party. They’ve never done that shit before. But for you to be a part of it? What the hell, Mona?”
“I’m your wife,” she snapped, but I knew her too well, and I could see the short-lived glimmer of doubt.
I knew better than to comment, not when I knew that feeling, felt only for a moment, was a surefire way to piss her off.
In fact, I could see her face contort as she doubled down.
“Your goddamn wife, and what do I get when I come to see you? To make…I don’t know, make nice for once; I find you shacking up with someone else?
And not just anyone, some guy? That’s how you choose to step out? ”
I sucked in a breath, hearing Colin whisper in my ear to take a breath and not give in to old habits. “It’s not cheating, Mona. Don’t push it to that point; don’t do that. It’s not fair.”
“Not fair is coming to see you and finding you making out with some fucking man,” she snarled.