Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
GHOST
Iwas shirtless and sweating like a pig, but the second floor was coming along nicely, albeit without stairs yet, because that was tomorrow’s job.
I was wiping the sweat off my face with my discarded t-shirt when I heard a yell, someone calling my name.
I moved over to the edge of the upper floor and leaned over, seeing Harley waving at me.
“What’s up, VP? Finally gonna help us out here?” My shit-eating grin disappeared the second he pointed toward the parking area, and I spotted a certain grey Peugeot sitting there. Elizabeth? Did she come back?
“You wanna get down here and go see your lady, brother? We can let you take a teeny tiny break.”
I was already heading for the scaffold, making my way down rapidly to join Harley, who quirked a brow at my appearance and tutted.
“You’re going to go over there looking like that?”
I reached for the t-shirt I’d been tucking in my pocket and cursed. It was still up on the roof. I couldn’t go near her without a damn shirt on.
“Fuck.” As I headed for the scaffold again, he called me back.
“Let’s grab a fresh one from your tent, brother.”
I cursed, trotting behind him like a faithful dog, my eyes darting to that car across the compound. Was she sitting in it waiting for me?
I stepped inside my tent, wondering why the hell he’d had to lead me here, when I knew exactly where my fucking home was.
I rummaged for a t-shirt, and grabbed a wash cloth, pouring some bottled water over it and wiping my face, then my chest and pits.
I sprayed deodorant on myself and dragged the t-shirt on, while he watched like some creeper.
“Enjoying the show, VP?”
He snorted, sitting on my bed in a move even more intrusive.
“Look, before you go out there, I just wanted to say that she took a big step, coming back here. Don’t make her regret it.”
I bristled at the implication.
“You’re saying I’m gonna fuck with her or something?”
He shook his head, passing me my cut.
“Of course not. Just don’t read too much into it, I mean, I don’t know the details, but I know something bad happened to her, obviously on a night I wasn’t here. Thing is, she might just be on a journey to healing here, so don’t go thinking she’s making a choice, yeah?”
I eased into my cut and smoothed the front, dragging my hands through my hair.
“So you’re saying she’s just using me as a tool to get better?”
He shrugged, standing up and heading for the entrance to the tent.
“It’s possible.”
I followed him, waiting until I caught him up, so I could look him in the eye.
“If that’s what she’s doing, if that’s what she needs, then so be it. She can use me however she needs to, if it helps her.”
“Don’t underestimate your own feelings, brother. You could get hurt.”
I nodded, offering him a fistbump as I started on my way to her.
“That’s the very least I deserve.”
I approached her car and she offered me a small smile, gesturing to the passenger side. She was going to let me in her car?
I walked around to it and peered through the window, giving her a second chance to tell me that’s what she wanted, because for all I know, she was saying she’d speak through the window. I heard the locks unlatch and she pointed to a carrier in the centre console, holding two coffees.
I took a risk and pulled the door open.
“Hey, Elizabeth.”
She smiled again. “Sit with me?”
I wasn’t about to say no to that, so I slid into the seat and stared straight forward, at the compound rather than her, because I needed her cues to tell me what the hell she wanted right now.
“You can close the door. It’s okay. I feel safe here, and that’s weird, but it’s what it is.”
I pulled the door closed, and twisted in the seat to look at her now, gratified to see that she was still smiling, her long hair pulled back from her face, her cheeks warm with colour, with life.
She looked really beautiful, at peace. It was probably far too soon for that, if it could ever happen, but she was really trying.
I was so proud of her, but that probably wasn’t something she wanted to hear.
“This is a nice surprise,” I finally said, lamely, and she rolled her eyes. Granted, it really was pathetic.
“I feel like a teenager on his first date.”
She pointed at the coffee, so I grabbed the one closest to me.
“It’s not a date,” she admonished, reaching behind her to grab a paper bag, offering me the contents. Cinnamon buns. She remembered I Iove them. I grabbed one and lifted it as evidence.
“Thank you. You sure this isn’t a date?”
Elizabeth reached into the bag and tore a piece off of the other one, tearing it into two more pieces before she slipped a piece in her mouth. She chewed slowly, staring at the other piece of bun.
“I’m not sure,” she finally said, eating the other piece, and reaching for her coffee.
“You came here for a reason though,” I prompted, and she nodded, cradling her coffee in both hands.
“The other day changed something. Something deep inside me. I had to see if it still felt like that here.”
“Like what?”
“Safe. Different. I don’t know. I don’t understand it, but I want to heal, and this seems to help.”
I nodded, glancing at the new compound arising from the ashes of the old club.
“It’s not the same place anymore.”
She turned to me then. “It’s not just the place, Ghost. It’s you.
I think, for so long, I saw your face in my head, in those horrific memories, and it tainted you for me.
Made me feel like you were a part of it, but I see things more clearly now.
I see that you were a victim like I was.
Not in the same way, but it’s something that happened to both of us, not just me.
That means we’re both due for some healing, and it also means I shouldn’t be blaming you. ”
ELIZABETH
Even the words felt like they were healing me.
Like maybe admitting I didn’t blame him for it was fixing that part of me that felt blame had to be assigned to anyone other than the monsters who attacked me.
I blamed him, and I blamed myself. I was young, I was na?ve, I was too trusting, I was too weak.
Fuck that. They were monsters, and I was their prey, but so was he.
Their enjoyment came as much from breaking him as it did me.
Returning here seemed to offer clarity I’d never had before.
Maybe I should have returned before now, or maybe this was the right time for it.
Just the right time and place. In this place that had been the wrong time and place.
Was it some kind of epiphany? A full circle kind of thing?
“I know this won’t mean a thing to you, but I’m so fucking proud of you. You’re taking back your life, the power they took, and it’s fucking incredible.”
He was staring at the lid of his coffee as he spoke, but somehow I knew the reluctance to meet my eyes didn’t come from cowardice, but from fear. Fear that I’d take the words the wrong way, or throw them back at him. Instead, I merely thanked him.
“Thank you. I know this isn’t a quick fix or something, but it feels like a line has finally been drawn, and I’m on the right side of it. I hope it was okay to come back like this.”
He grinned at me, his beautiful blue eyes on mine again, the relief evident in the relaxed smile and the way his eyes mirrored his happiness.
“It’ll always be okay. If you want, I could show you around when we finish our drinks. Thank you, by the way. This was the break I desperately needed, in more ways than one.”
I bit my lip. I hadn’t missed his shirtless self earlier when the other guy went to fetch him.
While I didn’t feel anything remotely sexual right now, I was able to appreciate how strong and manly he’d looked.
Sweaty and dusty, and thoroughly strong and capable.
Maybe those were things that should unnerve me, but they weren’t.
The more I was around him, the more I remembered the things I felt before.
The way he seemed to calm me on the inside.
The way his smile was slightly crooked, and his eyes twinkled with suppressed laughter when he was being cute.
The way he’d always opened doors for me, and pulled out chairs.
The gentlemanly side that had won me over so fast.
“I missed you,” I said softly, realising as I spoke that the words were true. I had missed him. I’d missed the person I’d been falling for, even while I half blamed and half hated him in those early days.
His smile widened, and he rested his coffee on his knee, his fingers trembling just a little.
“Fuck, I missed you too. I know this isn’t for me, but you’ve given me so much just by trusting me a little again. I never thought we’d sit in the same space like this again and just talk.”
I gulped the last few mouthfuls of my coffee and set it into the holder, pointing at the new structure he was building.
“Why don’t you give me that tour?”
We left the car, and he walked me through the grounds, pointing out the guy he called a prospect by the gate, a term I vaguely recalled from a year ago. He pointed out the curious camping setups, explaining that he was living in one.
“One of our new brothers owns a company that rents them out. It’s weird as hell, but it’s home for now.
That’s the Pres’ temporary office, and the temporary tech hut, and this?
” He stepped up in front of the new building, still looking like the bare bones of a structure, but with clearly defined holes where doors and windows would go, and all kinds of markings chalked on the concrete floor as we stepped inside.
“This would be the offices over here, and that’s where the bar and party area will be,” he explained as he walked back and forth to point things out.
“This is where the stairs will be, up through that hole there, and this… I worked on these walls. I helped build this, and it feels good to put something new and decent here. It needed to be burned down, and rebuilt. It’s cathartic, I guess.”
He led me back outside to the scaffold, and pointed upwards.
“That’s how we get up there at the moment, while we’re prepping for the stairs to go in. It’s actually pretty cool up there.”
I glanced at my flat heeled boots, and eyed the structure.
“Will you show me?”
His eyes widened, and he glanced around us, like the answer to that question was on the ground, or on a wall somewhere.
“I’d have to help you up there, Elizabeth. Because it’s just been us workers, and we’ve had equipment to lift things, we didn’t bother with anything too elaborate. We just climbed up here.”
He’d have to help me. He meant touch me.
He meant he’d have to put his hands on me.
Something about this place, the very same place where it happened, was making me stronger.
Making me want to be brave. To keep pushing myself.
Even if he touched me right now, it wouldn’t be in a sexual way.
It would be to facilitate me getting up there.
“How easy is it to get back down?”
He shrugged, pointing as he spoke. “Pretty much the same. You climb up to that part there, and then use the ladder the rest of the way. It’s a few steps up, but there’s nothing to hold onto.”
It seemed like a risky way to come and go, but that’s men for you. Why put in railings and safety measures, when they’ll just precariously balance a ladder in a death defying way and risk their lives?
“I want to.”
He laughed, shaking his head at me. “That means I’ll need to take your hand, and help you up to there, a couple of steps, then I’ll follow you and help you with the ladder. I promise I’ll keep it to a minimum.”
Screw it. I wanted to be brave, so I nodded and stepped up in front of the first step.
“Let’s do this.”
He reached for me, then froze midway, his eyes meeting mine, questioning, tentative. I nodded and offered my hand, and he stared at it for a moment, his own fingers trembling as they slid under mine, and gently grasped it.
We both released a heavy breath and he laughed, a ragged edgy sound.
“Fuck me. You’re really doing this.”
I nodded, tugging on his hand. “Come on, I want to see the view from up there.”