Chapter Thirty-Three
Ayda
Ididn’t tell anyone I was leaving. Each footfall fell harder than the previous one and carried me to the door. I ignored any comment and snide remark thrown at me as I kicked the barrier out of my way and stepped into the glorious sunshine of a brand new day.
“I’ll pay you for last night,” I mimicked in a deep baritone as I jumped off the porch and headed to the gate. “Fucking prick. Thinks he’s God’s fucking gift when he’s the devil. The fucking devil himself.”
I tried to open the gate as fast as I could, but got frustrated when it resisted, and I kicked the damn thing with fury before gathering myself together and sucking in a breath.
I was torn between tears and growling out a string of profanities.
The tears were from frustration, but I wasn’t going to let him see he’d got to me.
How could I have seen two completely different sides of the same man in less than twenty-four hours?
The man that had just spoken to me like I was a hooker wasn’t the same man I’d shared a bed with.
The Drew I’d been introduced to this morning was bitter and cold.
There hadn’t been an ounce of remorse for the way he’d treated me.
He had more sides than a dodecahedron—kind, hurt, bitter, in pain, angry, open, shut, drunk, sober, hot and cold.
The list was becoming endless. I knew how he’d made me feel last night; he’d made me feel that way before.
But all of that was pushed further and further away the more he spoke that morning, until all I felt was cold, solid anger.
This wasn’t who I was, and it was the very reason I knew I could never go back there.
I didn’t like who I was when I was with him.
My fingers tangled with the gate as a ghost of mourning the loss of that comfort fled my system.
I was gripping the thing with my head hung when I felt someone reach around and flip the lock for me, his sad sigh echoing the one that forlornly left me.
“Go back inside, Deeks.”
“You know I can’t do that, sugar.”
“Yes, you can. You just don’t want to because this makes your life easier.”
“It also keeps you alive while you have a target on your back.”
Stepping through the gate, I headed toward my car while Deeks headed toward his bike.
He knew there was no way in hell I was going to let him in my car with his logic.
I wasn’t in the mood to listen, and I sure as shit wasn’t in the frame of mind to dwell on the fact that the threat on my life was very real.
All I was interested in was getting home, washing the scent of him off me and working myself into oblivion.
I’d barely unlocked my car door when my hands slapped on the roof of my car. “I didn’t ask for any of this, Deeks.”
“Honey, you know I respect the shit out of you, but that’s just bullshit. Those fools in there can’t see past their own noses, but I see more than you think I do.”
“I’ve never underestimated you.”
“Oh, but they have.”
I raised an eyebrow in his direction before climbing into my car. This had started out a really bad day, and it wasn’t going to get any better.
Drew’s expressions played on a loop in my head all morning.
My thoughts replaying the whole argument again and again, my own look now matching the scowl he’d worn.
It didn’t improve my mood in the slightest, and although Deeks seemed to accept that he was the target for my irritable disposition, it didn’t mean he was the only one on the receiving end.
I’d thrown a plate at Rusty because he scrambled rather than poached an egg order.
I’d snapped at Janette for being kind enough to deliver my order, while accusing her of thinking I was incapable.
Poor Sam had used the wrong swinging door, almost sending a tray of coffees over me and had to leave the kitchen for thirty minutes after I called her a babbling idiot.
My anger was misdirected, but volatile, and the moment Maisey Sutton strolled through the door, it reset itself and aimed its crosshairs directly onto her.
If ever there was a perfect time for her to walk in, I felt as though she’d been served to me as an act of divine intervention.
Nothing could abate the anger I was feeling in my chest.
“Sweet Jesus,” Deeks mumbled as I rested my hip on the counter where I’d been grumbling about refilling his cup for the millionth time. He apparently hadn’t felt the same way about her being there. “You picked the wrong day to walk your ass back up in here, Sutton.”
“Shut up, watch dog,” Maisey said haughtily, with a yappy bark added on for effect.
She was wearing another one of her polyester blend wannabe outfits, which was being tugged into shapelessness by her discomfort.
She slipped into a booth, set her bag on the surface, and eyeballed me with attitude. “Well?”
“Well what?” I snapped back, folding my arms. “You want me to applaud the fact that you made it to the other side of the room in your fake ass shoes without them breaking under your fat ass?”
“Careful, sweetheart. You’re looking a little green around the edges.”
I barked out a laugh. “Sorry, honey, delusional isn’t my style.”
“Whatever. I want a sweet tea. Think you can manage that?”
She wasn’t sitting in my section, but in that moment, it didn’t really matter all that much. Deeks watched me, half with curiosity and half with concern as I tipped an imaginary hat in her direction and went about filling her request.
I ignored the mumbled speech from Deeks and sauntered across the linoleum floor with purpose, stopping short of the booth before tipping the ice and tea filled glass on its end, directly over her head.
She was on her feet as quickly as she had been the last time she’d been in, her screech of indignation making me laugh aloud.
I think what scared me the most was my lack of remorse in that moment.
There wasn’t so much as a twitch of guilt for what I’d just done, even as she skated around like a deer on ice.
“You stupid little bitch. Have you forgotten who my husband is?”
“The old, saggy balled, washed up, chief of police? I wouldn’t brag. He’s hardly a catch.”
Deeks’ laughter was louder than I expected.
He’d followed me over and was preparing himself to break things up again.
This woman had made a fool of me once, but I was a fast learner, and this time I was prepared for anything she threw at me.
The comment about her husband, however, seemed to be the one to tip the scale.
This time, I threw the first punch, the flash of pain in my knuckles making me swear as I decided I was all in and threw my body at her.
The war cry must have alerted the people in the kitchen to exactly what was going on, because as Maisey threw me to the side, I saw them filter from the room and hurry towards the two of us.
Deeks was the first to stop me, his thick arm a bar across my stomach as he hauled me to my feet and back.
I sagged against him, my body giving up long before my head did.
My hands felt swollen as they hung by my side, but the rage continued to boil my blood.
Irrational hate for this human being was the only thing in front of me.
“You haven’t heard the last from me. I will charge you with assault.”
I scoffed in her direction. “I’ll be in the cell next to yours, my mood not improved and no one to break us apart. You may have married the chief of police, but that doesn’t supersede your record, dumbass.”
I didn’t hear Deeks laugh this time. I felt it as he pulled me farther back. I hadn’t even realized my legs were treading air.
“Get out of here, Maisey.”
“Yeah,” I reiterated. “And if your husband asks what happened to your face, tell him to come talk to me. I’m pretty fucking sure he’ll be interested in why you’re stalking me.”
“This ain’t over, skank. I still have friends in The Hut.”
“Friends who have probably fucked Drew since you’ve been gone. Sure.”
I knew I’d managed to get under her skin. She ran the strap of her bag over her shoulder three times before she spun on her spiky heel and marched out. I was breathing so heavily, my ears were ringing, but that wasn’t to say I missed the look on Rusty’s face.
“You. Go home and sort your shit out, kid. Calm the fuck down. Come back when you can act like an adult.”
“Rust—”
“Go. Home.”
No matter how much I needed the money, I didn’t argue.
With a quiet apology to Janette and Sam, I grabbed my things and slipped out the back door.
Deeks, who seemed to be a permanent shadow, followed me out without saying a word and slipped a cigarette in his mouth while he mounted his bike.
He wasn’t judging me, he was just being, and even with my mood, I appreciated him for what he was doing.
Today, he was a silent companion, and a slightly misconceived, hairy and overweight version of my conscience.
It seemed as though I was quite the metaphor for my life these days.
All day I had been mulling over the fact that Drew had too many moods to conceive.
I’d spent hours agonizing over the fact that I didn’t know him at all and berated myself for being so goddamn stupid.
I had accused him of not knowing who he was, when here I was, completely lost and unable to recognize myself or a single decision I had made. What did that make me?
A hypocrite? Absolutely. An idiot? Certainly. A defeatist?
Fuck.
I was almost half way home when I realized I didn’t want to be in the house alone. I was craving something normal. Something that I’d had before all of this shit quite literally went to the dogs. I wanted to go and watch Tate at practice like I used to do before Mom and Dad had died.
Easing my car to the shoulder, I turned around slowly, waving to Deeks that I was okay, and headed for the road that would take me to the Babylon Bulldogs’ practice field.
The boys were moving around in perfect precision as I pulled up. Their formations were comfortingly familiar. It was something I’d seen run since I was old enough to sit on my daddy’s shoulders at a game.
The little huddle of coaches off to the side had me stepping out of my car and up to the fence to watch closer before I was chased away.
Deeks’ motorcycle gave off a deafening roar as he pulled in behind me, which meant all eyes on the field were now turned to us, which was about the same time I noticed that Tate wasn’t there.
Tate wasn’t there.
I was about to launch into full-scale panic when I turned to stare at the man behind me, the only other person who would know why I was so distraught.
He knew as well as I did that there was a target on my back—that someone wanted to hurt me to get to Drew.
What if they were using Tate to get to me?
“Deeks?”
“Relax. He ain’t here because he’s still at the club, kid.”
I didn’t respond. I was already swinging around my car door and slamming it closed. I was halfway down the highway when I saw him finally catch up with me, his head shaking as he tore along on my tail.
He was smart enough not to stay as close as we pulled up.
I had slammed on my breaks only inches from the gates, my car skidding and kicking up dust as I threw her in park and twisted the keys from the ignition.
He was still climbing from his bike when I slipped through the opened gates, my name sounding exasperated as it fell from him.
Drew had kept my brother out of school without my permission.
I’d only just hammered on the door when it was pulled open by a surprised looking whore.
She was already moving in to try and stop me when I almost knocked her off her towering heels.
I heard Deeks mumble to let me go as I rushed through the already inebriated crowd and around the back corridor to Drew’s office, tearing through it until I reached his bedroom door.
I didn’t bother knocking. I burst inside and scared the shit out of a whore in the middle of a striptease, while my brother jumped from the bed like he’d been burned.
Gripping the handle with every ounce of control I had, my eyes turned to Drew Tucker who remained lounging on his mattress, right beside where Tate had been.
“Tate. Go and get in the fucking car. Now!” I said without so much as looking at him.
He wasn’t about to argue. He knew me well enough to know I wasn’t fucking around, but Drew didn’t.
He opened his mouth, his cocky smile worn with the confidence only he could exude.
This was his house. His rules. I understood that and I still had enough sense to see that formidable side of him.
The thing he was going to have to understand in that minute, however, was that Tate was my brother, and I was in a maternal mode that could move mountains.
I flashed Drew a warning, begging him to not say something that would force me to contradict him.
I didn’t want to undermine him in his home, around his people.
It would be disrespectful, but if he fucked with my family again, I would accept any consequence in order to defend them.