“Don’t be mad at your dad,” says Eli. “He’s wanted to tell you the truth since the beginning, but it was me and your mom that wouldn’t let him.”
I tear the tissue into smaller pieces. “But he still could’ve told me.”
“It was the terms of the adoption,” Eli says. “I agreed to give up my parental rights as long as your dad kept it quiet. He gave me and your mom his word that he’d never tell you. That’s how bad he wanted you in his life. That’s how I knew you were in good hands.”
My eyesight flickers between Eli and Dad. Pain wells up in me again. I care for them both. Otherwise I wouldn’t be so mad, I wouldn’t be so hurt.
Dad shoves his hands into the pockets of his khakis. “I didn’t only fall in love with your mom. I fell in love with you, too. Your mom was willing to walk away if I didn’t agree. I’m sorry you were hurt, but I’m not sorry for making the decision that kept both of you in my life.”
“I’m not sorry, either,” I whisper.
It’s all messed up. It’s all muddled, but if it hadn’t happened, he would have never been my father. And as much as I’m heartbroken at what I’ve lost with Olivia and Eli, I’m not at all sad that the man standing beside me now is my dad.
The world is made of multiple pieces. All of them moving alongside each other, sometimes never touching. Coexisting, yet not. How many of us live our entire lives inside a single bubble? Maneuvering in what we believe is a forward direction when it’s only in a circle among the same type of people.
My mother, my father and Eli lied. For whatever reason, they lied, and typically in my eyes, that’s a cringeworthy offense. But maybe the world isn’t so black-and-white. Maybe there’s room for shades of gray.
Without what has happened, there’s no doubt I would have stayed in the same bubble I was raised in and I’m not just talking about remaining in Florida. I never would have experienced anything new in life.
I take in the two men watching me, the two men waiting for my forgiveness. Eli and my father couldn’t be more different. Blond hair to dark brown. Blue eyes to near black. Medical school to a GED. Shirt and tie to blue jeans and a black leather vest.
But there’s so much they have in common. Both are hardworking, both intelligent in their own ways, both leaders within their communities and, more important, they both love me and I love them in return.
“What happens now?” I ask.
“You go home,” Eli says. “You were here longer than either your dad or I expected.”
I tangle the ends of my hair around my fingers. “And then what?”
“Life returns to normal,” answers Dad. “Your mom and I are ready for that.”
Per the club’s request, Mom stayed in Florida. Everything between the Riot and the Terror is in flux and they didn’t want another fireworks show if my mother made another appearance in Louisville.
And then I overheard a phone conversation between Dad and Mom. As much as she wanted to support me, she didn’t want to come to Kentucky. As she told my father, she left Kentucky behind years ago and she preferred to keep the distance. I saw the relief on Dad’s face—it was her way of saying she was still choosing him.
I peer over to Eli. “What happens to you and me?”
“You know how much I love shopping.”
I laugh and his eyes flash with amusement.
I bite my bottom lip and inhale deeply. I long for more than once a year. “That’s not good enough.”
Courage in going against my mother and father has always eluded me, but that was before all of this. If my dad can love and choose me through this chaos then he can still love me if I disagree. “I want to see Eli more than that.”
Dad and Eli do that thing where they look at each other again and I slice my hand in the air. “Nope, you guys don’t get to make these decisions anymore. I’m not asking if you are okay with this. I’m telling you.”
Eli scratches his jaw in that way that hides a smirk and my father folds his hands together and leans forward.
“What if I said you’re safer with things going back to how they were?” Eli asks.
“I’d tell you that it’s not your choice and that you aren’t the center of the universe.”
Dad laughs. Eli releases that grin that always makes me smile. “She really is her mother, isn’t she?”
“One hundred percent,” Dad answers with appreciation spelled out on his face.
Not true. “I’m also a little bit of both of you.”
Their smiles fade and it’s there in their eyes, the desperation that’s aching within me. They want to belong to me as badly as I crave to belong to both of them.
Eli readjusts in his seat and clears his throat. “Does this have to do with Oz?”
My cheeks flare red-hot and I can barely peek at my father, who is currently not blinking. “It helps, but there’s more to Snowflake than you or him. There’s Olivia and Cyrus and Violet and I have a cousin...”
I meet Dad’s gaze now. “Chevy’s strange, but he’s a cousin, and I think I’d like to get to know him. I think there’s a lot of people here I’d like to get to know.” My eyes drift over to Eli. “Some I’d like to get to know a lot better than I already do, plus my driving still needs some serious help.”
“Ignition, gas, brake,” teases Eli. “It’s not that complicated.”
“Says you.”
“Hey, you were able to drive when it counted.” Eli rubs the area where he took a bullet...for me. A bullet that secured my future away from my mother’s psychotic family.
“It’s your call, Jeff. Yours and Meg’s. I still want her to go home.”
I open my mouth to protest, but Eli strikes me with a glare that informs me that speaking in this moment is not an option. “There’s been too much chaos here, Emily. A lot of agreements have been made, but the dust needs to settle before I can be sure it’s solid. I love that you want to be a part of this family, but your safety is still the priority.”
Dad massages the back of his neck and I venture to continue with him. “If I need to go home now, that’s fine, but I want to come back here, and if people from Snowflake happen to wander to Florida, I’d like the chance to see them. I’m not asking for your permission, but I am asking for your blessing.”
“This is going to scare your mom,” Dad says.
It will and I’m sure there will be times I’ll be scared, too, but... “I can’t let my fears or hers dictate my life anymore. It’s time I explore the world.”
Dad steps forward and kisses my forehead. His nonverbal gesture to let me know I’ve won. At least for now. Mom will battle this and Eli has a gleam in his eye saying that some old habits won’t die easily, but I’m feeling more in control of my destiny.
“So, we’ll work this out?” I say to Eli.
He nods. “We’ll work this out.”
Oz
OLIVIA DIED ON a Tuesday. It was sunny. A clear blue sky and a rare seventy-six-degree day in a late Kentucky July. All the windows were open in the house. Almost all the people she loved the most and who loved her in return gathered in her room.
Everyone but Emily.
The moment Olivia took her last breath, the shades of the window in her room billowed out with the breeze and the room filled with the scent of honeysuckle. Cyrus crouched beside her bed, placed their combined hands over his heart and then leaned down and laid his head on her chest. As he waited for another beat, another rise of her body for air, I counted.
One into two. Two into three. Three into she was officially gone.
She was fifty-eight years old and had lived a life so full that for a few weeks after her death everything surrounding me felt empty.
Empty until now.
My motorcycle rumbles beneath me and the wind blows on my face as I race around another
curve. Riding is therapy for me. It helps me to forget. Helps me to not feel, but what’s helping me heal are the two arms wrapped tight around my stomach and the delicate body pressed to mine. I let go of the handlebar and squeeze Emily’s knee. She’s home. Only for a week, but it’s a week I’m going to cherish.
We’ve flown past the cabin, the pond, the house my parents have started construction on and the trailer that now serves as our temporary home. Emily and I are going farther and faster than we’ve been before and I love how she sits high on the back of my bike enjoying the sensation of freedom.
The end of the road is in sight and I drop gears then ease to a stop. I kick down the stand and Emily slips off along with me. She smooths back her hair from the ride and glances around the thick woods. “How far of a hike is it?”
“A half mile. Maybe three-quarters. I can do this alone if you want.”
Emily’s lips flatten to a fine line. “No, Olivia left this for me to do. I had no idea she’d enjoy torturing me from heaven.”
I grin and Emily slightly smiles with me. We text. Talk on the phone. Video chat when we can. There’s not a day that we aren’t in contact, but having her here, being able to touch her body, seeing the emotion in her eyes, it’s a million times better.
A breeze through the trees and a stray strand of her hair drifts across her dark eyes. I move it and permit my finger to trace her cheek as I tuck the loose piece behind her ear. A red path lights up her skin from where I caressed her. A blush that brushes against my heart.
I unstrap the backpack I had attached behind Emily, swing it onto my shoulder, then offer my hand, palm up to her. “Do you trust me?”
She scans the green forest and the small path that cuts through it as if the boogeyman lies in wait. “Do you mind if I go first?”
An eyebrow raises. Emily’s terrified of the woods and that she’s agreed to this hike is huge. “Are you sure?”
She wipes her hands along her jeans. “Yeah. I need to do this. If you can apply to college and Olivia can fight the cancer for as long as she did and Eli can take a bullet, I can hike in the woods. Besides, I took on the woods in the dark for a few seconds that night I left Olivia’s. If I could do that then, I can do this now.”
“All right.”
She goes in and I’m not far behind. The path is narrow and the weeds high. We can only walk in tandem and, for a bit, we do so in silence. Each brief glimpse of her face shows strained panic, but my respect for her grows as she continues forward, confronting her fears.
A cloud blocks the sun and the forest darkens. Emily quickens her pace.
“I got in,” I say.
Emily stops so quickly that I almost ram into her. She spins on her toes. “Got into what?”
By the excitement gleaming in her eyes, she knows, but I say it, anyway. “Don’t go crazy on me. I’ll be a part-time student. I’m going to be doing most of it online, and I’ll have to drive into Bowling Green once a week for one class that has to be taken there.”
Despite my warning, Emily’s already hopping on her feet. “What are you majoring in? Just tell me what you’re majoring in.”
“Special education.”
Emily squeals. Squeals. Then throws herself at me. Her arms around my neck. Her soft curves pressing into me. I tangle my fingers into her silky hair and keep her locked in the hug. “I’ve missed you.”
She lifts her head and skims her fingers across my face. “I’ve missed you, too.”
Our lips are a few inches apart and I’ve dreamed night after night of our mouths and bodies moving in time together. Emily shyly turns her head away. We haven’t kissed properly since our night in my room. Kissing like that would require time alone.
We’ve been under Eli’s watchful eye since she arrived two days ago. It doesn’t help that I’m now sharing her with everyone in the club. Never realized what we experienced before will never happen again. Emily’s not just my girl, she’s now the club’s daughter, sister and friend.
“So when you start school are you still going to work for the security company?” she asks casually, as if the answer doesn’t matter to her, but it does. Working for the security company puts me in harm’s way and it means I still carry a gun. I understand why Emily’s gun-shy.
“College costs money,” I respond. The gun’s not currently on me as I only carry it when I’m on a run. Since Emily arrived, I’ve kept it in the safe in the clubhouse, but I’ve caught her searching for it when my back’s to her.
“Humph.”
I snag her hand and angle her to face me. “Even if I had the money for school, I’d still work for them. Not full-time, but when they needed me. This isn’t just a job. It’s a family business and even though I’m not blood-related, I’m family.”
Emily sags. “I know. It worries me.”
“Don’t be. I can ride circles around most of those guys.”
Emily rolls her eyes and the path widens enough that I can walk beside her and hold her hand. She’s worried about the Riot. Things have been quiet with them. Maybe it will stay that way. Maybe it won’t. Either way it won’t change how we live our lives.
The forest gives way and we stumble upon the tiny campsite. It’s not much of anything. A shack with four walls and a roof. Emily opens the door and recoils. “There’re spiders in there.”
I’d bet there’s a few snakes, too. “It’s used mainly for hunting. It’s also where a member can lay low if he should need it. I can’t say it’s been used like that since Eli got in trouble.”
Emily kicks at a board hanging off the outside of the shack. “I don’t get it. Honeysuckle Ridge. Honeysuckle Ridge. That’s all Olivia talked about. What was so amazing about this place that Olivia was dead set on me finding it?”
The bag on my shoulder grows heavier. I take her fingers again and lead her away from the shack. “Come on.”
It’s a short trip, but this time there is no path. I have to help Emily over a fallen tree and I walk in front so I can push down the overgrowth, but it springs up as soon as I lift my foot.
We step into a clearing and beams from the sun highlight the open stretch of grass. “This is Honeysuckle Ridge.”
Emily sucks in a breath as her eyes drink in the world around her. “Wow.”
Wow is right. Below us is the world. Thick trees. A view of the river. Far off in the distance I could point out my high school, the steeple to the church on Main Street. Even farther on the left I could show her the general area of Olivia’s cabin and the long stretch that led us to Olivia’s, then my place and that eventually brought us here: Thunder Road.
I don’t do any of those things. Instead, I lay out a blanket, sit and motion for Emily to settle beside me. She does and my heart squeezes. The sunlight hits her hair just right and pieces of it shine. She’s too good, too beautiful to be my girl. “What are you doing with me?”
She tilts her head. “Why would you ask that?”
“Daughter of a doctor, straight As, to be honest, completely out of my league. Special-education teachers don’t make bank.”
Emily rises to her knees and slowly inches toward me. The twinkle in her soft eyes pulls me in and the hypnotic sway of her hips engulfs me further into her spell. Her fingers whisper against my face. “I’m with you because you’re strong and brave and you love people with a ferociousness that I have never encountered before.”
Her hands drift to my shoulders and on impulse, my hands cup her waist. She’s exactly like I remember—warm, sensual.
“Besides that, I love the way you look at me and I love the way you make me feel beautiful inside and out. Plus, you’re missing a very important fact.”
My eyebrows furrow together. “What’s that?”
“Technically, by blood, I’m more gangster than you.” The utter tease in her voice causes me to sweep a
n arm around her and roll her onto the blanket.
“More gangster than me?”
“Your parents are probably concerned I’m going to taint your pure soul.”
We both laugh and the motion causes a vibration between our bodies. The day’s warm, not hot, but my blood definitely increases in temperature.
“I mean,” she continues, “it was me that kissed you first and then I blackmailed you into helping me and I’m pretty sure I seduced you that night we spent together.”
“You’re right,” I whisper. “I’m completely unable to resist your evil charms.”
“Well, if that’s the case, why aren’t you kissing me now?”
Not willing to miss this invitation, I lower my head to hers and lightly brush my lips over her mouth. Everything inside me tightens, heightens and becomes aware. She tastes so sweet. Her kiss like heaven.
We’re alone on the ridge. Very alone except for the birds in flight and the trees surrounding us. It’s a slow exploration. Hands recalling areas so glorious that every touch deserves the moment. There’s no rush. Neither of us are hurried.
A shirt over my head. Her tank top used as a pillow. Bra straps lowered and us leaving lingering kisses on every spot within reach. Other pieces of clothing are eased down and slipped off. A breeze blows over the hill and goose bumps form along her exposed skin.
I cover my body with hers and we’re moving. A rhythm that builds in a steady progression. The urge is to beg for more. Emily’s bold but she’s inexperienced. There are places I want to take her. A million ways I long to worship her body, but we have time and Emily is a forever type of girl.
Emily hooks a leg around mine and lets out a soft moan that causes me to apply pressure to her hips. Our mouths move, our touches grow more intense and instinct pushes us to the brink. Emily encircles her arms around me, cries out and I bury my head in her neck as the world shatters.
I slide off her while keeping her tucked close. We both breathe hard as we share long kisses that say more than words ever could.