Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
PIGGY
Her scent haunts me. At least it feels that way. Lying in bed, I place my arm over my eyes and breathe. I would be at the club tonight, but I have to work tomorrow afternoon, so I’m supposed to be getting a full night’s sleep.
Except that’s exactly what evades me. Sleep. Throwing my legs over the side of the bed, I scrub my palms down my face and let out a heavy sigh before I stand. I’m not going to get any sleep anyway. I might as well go do something.
Once I’m dressed, I walk out of the house and toward my bike. I climb onto my machine and start the engine before backing out of my driveway, heading straight for the clubhouse. It doesn’t take me long to get there, especially at this time of night.
When I pull up to the gate, the prospect on watch jerks his chin, and without a single word, the gate slides open. I ride through and straight up toward the front of the building. As always, no matter the time, there are lights on inside, and I can hear music playing.
I make my way toward the front door. As I reach for the handle, I think about getting back on my bike and heading home. I don’t do that, though. Every moment in life is about the choices we make, and I tend to make the wrong ones when it comes to my personal life… like right now.
What I should do is go home.
But I don’t.
I walk into the bar, look around, and spot Daisy. She’s got her back to the wall and her head tipped as she looks down at her phone. I’m not sure what she’s looking at or who she would be texting at this hour, but it doesn’t matter either.
I move toward her and stop when I’m close enough that I don’t have to yell across the room. Sensing my presence, she lifts her head, her eyes finding mine. She jerks her head back slightly, likely not expecting to see me standing here in front of her.
“Don’t you work tomorrow?” she asks.
My lips twitch into a smirk. “You the keeper of my schedule?”
Daisy snorts. “Absolutely not. However, I do know you don’t sleep here when you’re working.”
She’s right. I don’t. When I was younger, I did, and I went to work hungover and still drunk more than once.
It’s dangerous, and it’s not something I’m proud of.
Some people may not think that being a cop is important to me.
They may think I just do it to protect the Reapers. But that would be a lie.
I love my job.
I love protecting people who can’t defend themselves. It’s who I am to my core and the main reason I’ve never left the force. I’ve made enough money with the club over the years that I could have left, financially, but being a police officer is my passion.
“Millie’s back,” I state.
Sure, the guys saw her at the strip club, but after I hauled her ass away and fucked her, nobody mentioned her again. Not that I was really open to a discussion. I wasn’t ready to talk about her, at least not to them.
“She is?” Daisy asks.
Daisy knows Millie because they went to high school together. At one point, they were friends. I don’t know what happened between them, but when Millie left, Daisy became a permanent fixture in the club as a whore. I watch as her brows snap together, then she frowns slightly.
“She’s working down at the Gilded Room Gentleman’s Club.”
Daisy takes half a step toward me, stopping when she’s directly in front of me, then I feel her palm press against the center of my chest. She tilts her head back slightly, her eyes focusing on mine.
“Millie is working there?”
I can hear the disbelief in her voice, and I have to admit it’s cute, but also, it makes me smile because I felt the same way the first time I saw her. But until I really watched her dance up there, I didn’t realize that she was made for the stage, or rather, a stage at all.
But Millie is definitely a force to be reckoned with when she’s up there, drenched in gold.
“She is, and she’s damn good at it. Been doing it in Vegas since she walked away.”
Daisy’s eyes widen as she stares at me, not blinking. She shakes her head a couple of times, then clears her throat. Something inside her has shifted, but I’m not sure what it is. She shakes her head as if shaking it out of her mind, whatever the thought was.
“Tell me,” I demand.
Maybe I didn’t come here for sex as a distraction as I thought. Maybe it was for this, to speak to someone who could understand exactly what I’m going through. Because if anyone could understand the relationship between Millie and me, other than my sister, it’s Daisy.
I’m not ready to bring any of this to Lainey yet. It’s going to piss her off that I didn’t, but I’m just not there yet. It’s going to open up so many hurts for my sensitive sister. She should never hurt. She’s the first person I swore to protect, and I will always do just that.
Protect her until my last breath.
Which means she doesn’t need to know about Millie yet. Soon, but not yet. I need to sit down and have a real conversation with her once I know what the fuck is really going on with the woman.
“Millie called me once, about a month after she left. I didn’t know what she wanted. I almost didn’t even answer.”
“But you did?”
I know my words come out sounding more eager than they should. I can’t believe it happened a decade ago, and she never told me a single fucking thing about it. I should be pissed, but I’m too curious to scold her.
“I did,” she whispers. “She told me she wanted to come home. Wanted to know what you were doing, or rather, who you were doing,” she says, then winces.
“And of course, you told her.”
When Millie left, I was angry. And I was fucking my way through all the clubwhores, even Daisy. I didn’t care about myself, about anything. I was hurt, my pride bruised, and I was angry… so fucking angry.
“I’m sorry, Piggy. I was so young and stupid. I had grand ideas of being an old lady, and she was gone.”
Tears fill her eyes. She blinks, but they don’t go away. They slide down her cheeks in warm, wet streams. The guilt is consuming her, and it shouldn’t. It was so long ago. I could be pissed off, but the reality is that I wasn’t in the right frame of mind back then anyway. It wouldn’t have mattered.
“I told her the truth. I didn’t have to, but I did. And I felt so proud of myself at the time.”
Shaking my head, I lift my hand and cup her cheek, sliding my thumb along her bottom lip. “Think nothing of it, Daisy. It was the truth, and there’s no shame in that, even if embellished.”
My lips curve up into a smirk, and I wink before taking a step backward. “She might like a visit. I can text you her address in Raleigh.”
Daisy’s eyes search mine, her lips curve into a small smile, and I can see the relief in her eyes before she speaks. “I would really like that, Piggy.”
Dipping my chin slightly, I head toward my bedroom, where I close and lock the door behind me before I walk over to my bed. I strip my clothes off and climb between the sheets, suddenly feeling exhausted.
Reaching down to my pants, I take my phone out of my pocket and find Daisy’s name. I send her a text. It’s just Millie’s address. She doesn’t respond. No doubt she’s a bit busy right now.
There were a few guys who were sitting around shooting the shit who likely want her attention and affections for the remainder of the evening.
Rolling onto my side, I look at the wall. It’s blank, there’s nothing there, but still, it makes me think of her. I’m pretty sure everything at this point makes me think of Millie. I’ve been able to push her out of my mind, but Millie being back here has brought everything barreling forward again.
Sleep finally finds me, thankfully. But then my dreams consume me, and they are all of Millie.
MILLIE
Lying on my pillow, I look up at the ceiling, watching it for a long moment. Tonight was a long night at work. My muscles ache, but at the same time, my mind is spinning when I should be too exhausted to stay awake.
Axton.
He was really there.
Inside me.
It was the best and worst moment of my life. The best because it was him, finally. After a decade of thinking about a moment like that, it happened, and it was better than anything I could have ever imagined, and I’d imagined it a lot over the years.
It was the worst because I know it can’t happen again. I cannot be with him again. Not like that. If I do, I’m going to fall in love with him, and I really cannot afford that in the slightest.
In truth, I never fell out of love with him. I probably never will, either. Axton Colter is and will always be the love of my life. Until my dying breath. And that makes me a complete and total masochist, because I slept with him—knowing there isn’t going to be anything more than that.
My heart wants it, though, even if my head knows it’s stupid as hell.