Chapter 3
HOLLISTER
Her. Maybe it was how I left it. How beautiful, yet sad, she looked, staring back at me with that haunted look. The fire in her eyes had died, replaced with a vacancy that unsettled me. It’s a look I’ve seen before. Haunted me before. I hated seeing it, especially on her.
I knew she needed a break. Dom, either too oblivious to notice or simply didn’t care, wasn’t going to help his mom out.
I certainly couldn’t see her looking like that in front of all the vultures that circle society events in search of their next prey.
Her crying is an easy target. Now my brain won’t shut the hell up.
It keeps going over the message like it’s going to morph into something else. Something clearer. Maybe she’ll follow up with Just kidding, wrong number or forget that you received it and pretend I didn’t send it.
She doesn’t.
It just sits there. Loud, obnoxious, and demanding a response. My grip tightens around the throttle. I ride harder. Faster. Try to shake it off. The wind doesn’t help. Neither do Em’s reckless showboating nor Massimo’s dumb commentary.
The truth is, I don’t know what the hell I’m supposed to do. Do I reply? Say what? You're welcome? Do I ignore it?
That feels worse. Rude and cold. Something her son would do. It goes against how I was raised and the expectation that all communication, even unknown or unwanted, is met with a response. And if I ignore it, I am pretending it didn’t happen, and it did.
It definitely happened. She cried. I pulled her away to the men’s lounge for privacy.
What was I thinking?
Granted, I was a bit tipsy myself. Having knocked back more than one whiskey at the event, then had another with her.
She wanted to talk, and I listened. Rarely, if ever, did I see her vulnerable as I did that night.
She looked broken. Damage done by someone else long ago. Long before me, and shared whiskey.
Then the touch. I couldn’t keep from caressing her neck. Her pale skin shines. Smooth as moonlight. My fingers itched to touch it. To know what milky glass felt like. Fuck if it wasn’t the softest flesh I’ve ever felt.
That’s saying a lot with how much I fuck around. Now she’s thanking me.
What the fuck?
Most people in our world don’t thank you for anything. They nod. They toast. They move on. But Barbara Barrette, Babs to the world, doesn’t move on. She doesn’t do anything without purpose. It means something. I don’t know what.
Fuck me.
It’s Dom’s mom. That fact keeps rattling around like a loose screw in my brain.
Dom’s mom.
Dom’s fucking mom.
My best friend’s fucking mom.
He’s my boy. Trust is rare with a guy like him, and somehow, I’ve managed to earn his.
I know how protective he is of his family.
Always has been, even if he doesn’t say it.
Even if he rolls his eyes at the mention of her name or glares when people start asking about his family. He hates his dad. Sides with his mom.
And here I am, replaying every second of that night like it was a scene from a movie I’m trying to memorize. The way she looked at me, eyes wet, voice tight. The silk clung to her thin shoulders. Her breath ghosts out of her when she said he was supposed to love me.
Fuck.
What do I say to that? Like, I know what love is? The fuck I don’t. I don’t do love.
It’s a commodity that doesn’t exist in my world. Fools marry for love. The privileged marry for strategic alignment and to bring their legacies together. Marriages are brokered deals to benefit both parties. Love is for casual flings and pool boys. Neither are me.
I don’t want to cross a line. I don’t even know where the line is. All I know is she looked at me like no one else ever has. Not like my namesake. Not like her son’s best friend. Like we were equal. As if I’d understand her feelings since we travel in the same social circles.
Fuck, I haven’t thought of a woman this much, ever. I grip the brake a little too hard when we slow at the next light, and the back tire twitches under me. Diego glances back like he felt it. I wave him off.
“Just a rock, man,” I grumble through the mic.
Their replies are flying in one ear and out the other as I fixate on what to do.
We pull off for gas twenty minutes later.
I take my helmet off, shake the sweat from my hair, and step away from the group under the excuse of checking my phone.
I open the message. My eyes travel over it repeatedly.
Still just two words and no follow-up. My thumb hovers over the keyboard.
Delete.
That’d be the clean thing to do.
Pretend it never got to me. Protect Dom. Protect her. Protect me. Yet I don’t delete it, and I don’t reply either. I stare at it because, for the first time in a long time, I don’t want to do the right thing.
I want to be someone who makes a woman like that unravel, just a little.
For some unknown reason, she trusted me that night.
Trusted me again to text me, knowing I wouldn’t out her to her son.
To be honest with myself, I want to hear her voice in a quiet room.
I want to touch her pale skin again. See how soft it is in other parts.
Shit.
I hate myself for wanting that, but not enough to stop. So I do the one thing every idiot does when they are on the verge of making a bad fucking choice. I text her back.
What are you up to?
I stare at the words for a full ten seconds before hitting send. It’s dumb. Aimless. Sounds like a guy looking for a booty call. It’s a text I’ve written hundreds of times to check availability. To see how soon I’m getting laid.
This time, it’s a hundred different ways. My heart suddenly throbs when it delivers instantly. Like I’ve thrown caution to the fucking wind and texted back my friend’s mom with my usual booty call message.
I’m a fucking idiot.
No typing bubble. Thank fuck. Hopefully, she’ll ignore my dumbass. Better yet, block me. I would tell her if I had the self-control. But somewhere deep inside, I yearn for a response.
I slide the phone back into my pocket and turn toward the guys.
My gaze moves to Dom, sitting on his bike, helmet on, locked away in his own world as usual.
If he knew what I just texted his mom, he’d beat my ass.
Diego would probably jump in and take his side.
The twins would watch, try to get bets going in this dusty gas station parking lot.
I check my phone again.
Still nothing.
Good. It’s how it should be, how it needs to be. If she ignores me, it’s for the best. For all our sakes.
Then it vibrates, and I am startled. My slight yelp getting her son to turn my way, his black visor down, giving nothing away. I shoot him a careless smile and a shoulder shrug. He turns back to watch the store’s entrance, where Diego and the twins went in.
Pretending to care. Fashion show fundraiser.
I exhale slowly. Her voice bleeds through the message, cool, dry, too smart for the room she’s trapped in. Because fools and in-love pool boys never learn their lesson, I text her back.
Let me guess. Champagne. String quartet. Models walking like they haven’t eaten in months.
I hold my breath, waiting to see if she responds.
Close. No quartet. Rubbery chicken. Men twice their age stare at models half their daughters’ ages.
I laugh under my breath. Her humor is brutal and effortless. How am I just now noticing this?
You always this good at suffering with grace?
I look up to see Em and Massimo play fighting as they walk out of the store, jerky in hand, shoving each other like they’re still ten. One of them knocks into Diego, who doesn’t even flinch. He shoves them away and rips a bite out of a protein bar.
My phone buzzes again.
I’m good at a great many things.
She’s not flirting.
Dom’s mom is not flirting with me. I repeat that a few more times, willing it to sink in.
When it doesn’t, I glance at him. Sitting indifferently on his bike.
His head turned away from us. Looking at the open road.
They probably want to be on it, rather than listening to the twins argue or Diego trying to referee them.
I gaze back down at my phone screen. Re-reading the message.
She’s not not flirting either.
I thumb over the keyboard, then hesitate. Backspace. Re-type. Backspace and pause. If this were any other chick, I’d say you’d look good riding my cock. Or look good bent over or with my cock down your throat. Fuck. She’s not like the others. This is his mom, for fuck’s sake.
I must be out of my mind, thinking of her like that.
But damn, she’s hot. No, she’s not hot like some college chick.
She’s a woman, stunning, flawless like her skin, and is in incredible shape for her age.
I drag in a shaky breath. My cock is filtering between getting hard with possibilities and then shrinking when my mind goes back to Dom’s mom.
What are you good at?
The double text. So refreshing that she doesn’t know or follow the rule about double texting. Like, Dom hasn’t told her not to do it. It conveys too much interest or commitment. Yet, here it is. On my screen. Like she doesn’t know or doesn’t care.
I’ve never been with an older woman. Aside from watching MILF porn and thinking several women at these charity events could benefit if someone bent them over the furniture to straighten out their bitchy attitude.
But beyond that, never. It’s always been Dom’s thing.
Even now, with his TV lady, that’s what he kept a secret, aside from telling Diego. That still stings.
Three dots.
Then nothing.
I don’t know whether to run to her or ride away. I’m already in over my head. That night, I was buzzed, didn’t exactly know what I was doing. Today, I’m sober as fuck. Messing around with my best friend’s mom. I must be high or on something else to keep this going.
A triple text.
Sorry. That sounded a bit inappropriate.
Fuck.
It’s exactly how she meant it.