Chapter Twenty-Two #2
“Working,” I answered, swallowing the lump in my throat as the hand at her breast shifted, the sheet dropping slightly. “Joey just stopped by.”
My mouth watered, my cock twitching in my jeans. She hummed and gave me her eyes. “Did he stop by to fire me?”
“No.”
A smile stretched across her face. “Sounds like you wouldn’t let him do that even if he wanted to.”
“You’d be correct,” I replied gruffly.
We’d been in bed all day, fucking and making love until we were both spent and passed out.
I woke up an hour ago, showered, and got to work.
When Joey knocked on the door, I had half a mind to shoot him in the foot, afraid he’d wake her up.
She needed her fucking rest, especially after the week she’d had.
“I missed another shift at the bookstore,” she grumbled and moved to the window, the afternoon sun drenching her. “I wonder if the town is surviving without my coffee.”
“You can go there anytime,” I reminded her. “The day isn’t over yet.”
She turned to me. “And leave you here so you can fold all my towels again?” she teased, referring to the morning I’d disappeared.
“No, I’d be going with you,” I told her. “Until we get the security systems in place, I don’t like the idea of you being alone, without the Red Snake boys or me watching you.”
Shifting her weight, she nodded. “Normally, I’d argue with you, but after being kidnapped at gunpoint once…I’m not in the mood to have that happen again.”
My jaw tightened. “Do me a favor.”
She blinked.
“Try to not bring that shit up when you’re standing across the room from me wrapped up in a sheet with my cum dripping down your thighs,” I suggested coldly.
Her cheeks heated, my favorite shade of pink covering them.
My eyes went to the bruise, anger simmering under my skin, driving my pulse.
“I can’t stand those memories, Margo. They haunt me. ”
Her brows came together as she moved toward me, not stopping until her chest was against mine, her arms at my waist. She tipped her head back, scanning my face. “They haunt you?” she whispered, searching for more parts of me, the parts I hadn’t given her yet.
My hand cupped her face, my thumb gently grazing over the bruise.
The cut was scabbed over, nearly healed, and the bruise was lightening.
It was no longer a deep purple, almost black, but blue now.
The outer edges were beginning to yellow.
Hopefully, by the time her birthday came around, she would be fully healed.
“How’s it feeling?” I whispered, ignoring her question.
She let me.
“I don’t feel anything. At first it was just a throbbing and then an ache, but now it’s gone.”
I nodded. “You wanna hit up Rossy’s?”
Her sage green eyes sparkled. “I’m ready to get my fucking life back on track.” She sighed, letting go of me and turning. As she rounded the couch, I felt the need to remind her she hadn’t lost anything.
“Baby, you have only missed a few days of your life,” I assured her softly. “You don’t have to chase anything or fix anything.”
Once more, she spun to face me, her smile wobbling slightly. “When you’ve lived the life that I have, Superman, missed days can feel like an eternity.”
It was a sucker punch to the gut. I nodded. “I understand that. Maybe not completely, but to some extent, beautiful, I do.”
She stared at me for some time. “When you’re ready to give me that, I’ll be here.” She paused before repeating the words I’d told her when I was buried inside her. “I can’t take it, Hayes. You have to give it.”
Then she went into the kitchen to grab a water bottle before walking down the hall.
It was only when she turned the shower on that I released the air in my lungs, a small twinge of panic poking me in my side.
An annoying reminder that even though I knew her darkness, she had yet to venture into mine.
Part of me was still unsure whether I should let her.
“Oh, thank God!”
Margo stiffened beside me, immediately leaning in as Sarah’s cry filled the entirety of the bookstore, which was currently filled with angry-looking customers, the scent of burnt coffee in the air.
We’d come through the back, and the second I pulled open the door, the awful scent hit us and my woman looked horrified.
All heads turned to us, some poking out from the stacks, curiosity painting their faces as they looked at me and then Margo.
A few pairs of eyes dropped down to our joined hands, studying them for a moment.
Finally, an older woman in a bright pink knitted cap and baby blue pea coat threw her hands in the air.
“You mean to tell me that I haven’t had my coffee tasting right all week because Miss Sass went and found some hunk?
” she asked, whirling and pointing a finger at Rossy.
He looked up from his book behind the register and assessed the scene.
His eyes landed on Margo, doing a double take on her makeup, then flicking up to my eyes. I gave him a subtle nod.
The old lady turned back to Sarah. “Sweet child, it’s time to leave the espresso counter and return to the books. Miss Sass is back, and I can finally have my oat milk Americano.”
I leaned down toward Margo. “Americanos don’t have milk,” I whispered.
“Mrs. Lambknots’ does,” she mumbled.
“Why does she call you Miss Sass?”
Margo looked at me, her eyes twinkling with mischief. “Because she wanted me to marry her son, a heart surgeon in Seattle,” she explained. “We went on a date once, but it only lasted twenty-minutes because as we were walking to the car, he tried to grab my ass.”
Now, it was my turn to stiffen. “Excuse me?” I asked, voice low.
She waved me off. “Don’t worry, Top Gun, I handled it. Anyway, I stomped on his foot with my brand-new heels, hit him in the throat, and went back inside. The next day, she came in with a sour look on her face and said, ‘Apparently, you’re too sassy for my boy.’”
I stared at her as she just kept going, ignoring the rest of the store as they either listened or moved to stand in line at the coffee bar, waiting patiently for her magic.
She blew out her cheeks on a sigh and shrugged.
“I highly doubt he told her what he did to me—and I to him in retaliation—but now she calls me that and I think her jackass of a son is still single. But she is all alone in this town and barely sees him, and I don’t have the heart to tell her about that.
So I just let her tease me.” She paused and looked over to the counter.
“When she comes in, she always puts a ten or a twenty in the tip jar for me.”
I couldn’t respond because Sarah was there, crashing into Margo, her face wet with tears. Margo shot me a wince as she returned her friend’s hug, both of them shaking due to Sarah’s sobs. Margo put her hand on the back of Sarah’s head, stroking her light brown hair. “I’m okay,” she whispered.
“Promise me,” Sarah demanded. The sound was muffled, but the meaning was there, sharp as a knife.
Margo not wanting to tell her friends about her past was her business, a boundary of her choosing.
But I knew she could only go so long before the lies started catching up with her.
Now, I was here, watching it in real time as she stood at a crossroads.
Bury it and lie or uncover it with the truth and release it.
A voice I hadn’t heard in a long time sounded off in my head like a war cry.
Same goes for you too, asshole.
Grinding my teeth, I tore my eyes from the women just in time to find Dominic stepping through the front door.
His dark eyes met mine as he adjusted his hold on the giant duffel over his shoulder.
Mrs. Lambknot was now looking at him, mouth open.
Then she turned to another local and muttered something.
Both women nodded in feverish agreement.
“Sarah,” Margo wheezed, patting her back. “I have to go make coffee before the locals start rioting.”
She lifted her head and wiped her eyes as she smiled at me. “Hello, Hayes.”
I tipped my head to her, returning the smile. “Sarah.”
Her brown eyes lingered on my smile for a moment before she snapped out of it and turned to Margo. “Please take care of that line before I set this building on fire. I need to go take care of the shipment from yesterday.”
“Where’s Cardinal?”
“She had a wedding dress appointment with Pam this morning. Carrie wants Pam to design it for her.”
Margo clicked her tongue, impressed. “Hell yeah to Pam.”
“Good morning.” Both women jumped and looked at Dominic, who was now beside me.
Sarah’s eyes went wide at the sight of Dominic. “Uh, hi.”
“Are you doing well, Mrs. Humbly?” he asked, his voice like velvet.
She nodded slowly, her brow furrowing slightly. “I guess?”
Margo stepped in the middle of the small circle we’d created and tipped her head back to me. “I need to get to work,” she softly declared. “Do you want anything?”
I glanced at the line. “I’ll wait until the mob is gone.”
She laughed and kissed me on the cheek.
When she was gone, Sarah was still staring at Dominic, but he was studying me.
“That’s nice,” he noted.
“What’s nice?” Sarah asked.
We both turned to look at her. I raised a brow and Dominic said, “Hayes and Margo. It’s nice.”
Sarah rolled her eyes. “Oh, please don’t tell me you’re surprised about that. Carrie and I have been waiting for a year for this to happen.”
I cleared my throat, my head ticking to the side. “Say again?”
She ignored me, focusing entirely on Dominic. I knew he was the prettiest one out of the Red Snake crew, but this was a little excessive. “Now, what are you doing here?” she asked, her tone accusatory.
Fucking hell. My eyes went to my friend. “Did you piss her off or something?”
“No,” Dominic drawled. “Not to my knowledge, at least.”
“You never come here anymore. It’s been over six months since you came in by yourself,” she accused, throwing her hand out, gesturing between us. “And now, you’re here with a big scary bag and a serious look on your face. I don’t like it.”
“Rossy’s already been informed,” I told her. “Everything is under control.”
“Is it?” she challenged him. “Because my friend just came into work, holding your hand, wearing makeup for the first time in over a year after not returning calls or texts for days. She never wears makeup here, only to the Buoy. Margo missing days of work, not answering any of our calls, two bounty hunters, a broken habit, and that duffel scream that something is up.”
“Sarah—”
She lifted her finger at Dominic. “No. You and my husband hit it off. We got used to you coming over every Sunday for the game, and then you just stopped. Then you stopped coming around for our weekly book chats and—and I’m mad at you,” she huffed.
“Christ on a sugar plum, you’ve missed the last six book club meetings! ”
Sundays for the game?
Weekly book chats?
Book club?
“Sarah,” he murmured. “I’m sorry for not being around. Something came up in my life, and I had to step away to deal with it. I promise I’ll be at the next book club.”
My head jerked toward him, brows snapping together.
What the hell? What came up?
The bookstore manager looked genuinely hurt. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, doctor. It’s rude.”
“I’ll reach out to Michael as well,” he assured. “You have my word.”
“What in the fuck is going on here?” I asked, my eyes bouncing back and forth between them.
That seemed to snap her out of it, and she turned her pink-painted nail to me. “Nuh-uh. You tell me what’s going on.”
I shook my head. “It’s not my place, Sarah.” She opened her mouth to disagree, but I cut her off. “It’s Margo’s. She is going to tell you everything, but give her a chance to get settled, yeah?”
A deep sigh left her as she gave in. “Okay. Yeah, okay. I just…after what happened last year, I just—”
“Nothing is going to happen here,” Dominic declared. “Everyone is safe.”
The bell above the door chimed and we all looked to see who it was. Carrie walked in first, beaming as she looked over her shoulder at Pam, who was carrying a fresh bouquet of flowers.
“No one is going to get hurt. Not again,” Dominic declared, his voice no longer smooth, but finite, like stone.
The voice of my dead copilot filled my head again as I looked over to Margo behind the counter.
You couldn’t even save me. What makes you think you can save her?