“Baby, it’s just food.”
“Maybe to you, but it’s a treat for me.”
He was again silent and I was again worried I shouldn’t have told him that before he stated, “Your ex is a total fuckin’ asshole.”
I would use different words but he was right.
“It’ll get better, once I figure out how to go to school to be a hairstylist and then find a salon, clients, and start to get tips,” I assured him.
“Right.” His word sounded far from assured.
“But, also, it’s already better because I met you.”
“Rule,” he stated instantaneously.
His strange word made me blink at the lockers. “Sorry?”
“Rule. You can’t be like that on the phone. You can only be like that when I can kiss you.”
I lifted a hand and pressed it to the cold steel of my locker, leaning into it because my knees suddenly wouldn’t support me.
“You hear me?” he asked.
“Yes, Joker.”
“Right. Six. Text me what you like to eat. Later,” he stated tersely.
“Later, Joker.”
He rang off.
I took my phone from my ear and stared at it before I smiled at it and this was before I pumped it in the air three times happily.
Then I texted him my favorite Chinese selections, put my phone in my purse, locked my locker, and went about my business.
* * *
Joker’s hands in my hair pulled my head up which meant pulling my lips from his.
“We’re done.”
No! He still hadn’t even gone to second base!
It was after Chinese takeaway. After Joker played on the floor with Travis for a while, this consisting of Joker lying on his back in the narrow floor space available to him between couch and wall, allowing Travis to crawl all over him while giggling (this, incidentally, also made me gooey). It was also after Joker gave him his bottle while I futzed about. And last, it was after I put him down.
We’d been making out. It was hot and heavy. I’d just performed a miracle by forcing Joker from on top of me to our sides then maneuvering myself on top.
If he wasn’t going to go to second base, I was. So I’d gotten my hands up his shirt. His skin was silky. It was also blazing. And maybe best of all, it covered what could only be described as supple steel.
I couldn’t get enough. Of that. Of his hair. Of his tongue. Of his manly biker smell. I’d even run my lips over his beard to kiss his earlobe and the second I did it I wanted to do it again.
I could feel him hard against my belly through his jeans. I liked that feel.
How could he say we’re done?
“Just a little longer,” I cajoled, deciding now was a good time to run my lips over his beard again.
“Carissa,” he growled. “No,” he finished inflexibly.
I looked at him and blurted my lie semi-desperately, “You don’t know me, Joker. I’m actually a floozy.”
He burst out laughing.
It was the first time he did it. It was deep and sumptuous and hearing it was a multisensory experience, all of it good.
But it still peeved me.
“That’s funny?” I asked.
He focused on me. “Got here with food, were you in your LeLane’s shirt?”
“No,” I snapped, though I had no idea why he asked that question at this point in our conversation, and not only because he knew the answer.
“No. You got home and changed into a shirt that had more ruffles on it than anything I’ve ever seen.”
“It’s cute,” I retorted, worried he didn’t think the same.
“It is. So are you. It is you. My Butterfly in her wings. What it isn’t is what a floozy would wear to lure her man to fuck her on her couch in front of the news.”
It was safe to say he was correct, however I didn’t confirm that verbally.
“I didn’t say I wanted to go all the way,” I told him. “I just don’t wanna stop.”
“Carissa, you feel that against your belly?”
I bit my lip because I did.
“Do me a favor,” he said to finish.
He had a good point, a very good one, I was being selfish and I needed to cool it for his sake.
I looked away, feebly pushing away, suddenly embarrassed.
Joker rolled so I was trapped against the back of the couch and ordered, “Look at me.”
“This is embarrassing,” I told his throat.
“Don’t know how. Not a man who has you in his arms would think anything about you wantin’ more of him than that he’s fuckin’ lucky.” His words made my eyes lift to his. “You’re honest about that and don’t play games, that’s even better.”
“You really think that?”
“Yeah. I’m still not fuckin’ you on your couch. Not now. Not the first time.” He grinned at me. “Maybe the third.”
I pushed at his chest and did it again weakly but this time I did it for a different reason and I did it slightly grinning.
After I did that, I curled my fingers in his shirt and bent my neck so my forehead rested at the base of his throat.
His next words sounded against the top of my hair. “Next week, I’ll take you to a nice dinner. You can dress up. We’ll do it up right. Then I’ll give you what you need.”
“That’d be nice,” I whispered, and it would. It made me nervous but it also made me excited that I had a variety of things to look forward to: a nice dinner, a chance to dress up, a night with Joker… and what I needed.
It was safe to say Aaron dumping me at my age was a hit to my confidence. Then again, if that happened at any age, I suspected it would be.
I was never a girl to strut her stuff, but I was a girl who knew from Aaron’s attention I had some stuff. After Aaron, I figured I didn’t.
A handsome, manly man like Joker liking me, obviously attracted to me, wanting to spend time with me, and wanting to give that to me while respecting me was brilliant. It gave that back, the feeling that I might just have some stuff. And that meant a lot to me.
Just like everything Joker made it seem easy to give to me meant a lot.
“Now, it sucks, but I got plans tomorrow night,” he continued.
That did suck.
“Next day, you’re off?” he asked. I nodded, my forehead moving on his chest then I tipped my head back and caught his eyes. “You want, we’ll do something.”
“I want,” I said quietly.
He wanted it too. He didn’t lock that away behind his eyes. He gave it right to me.
And it felt like a gift.
He leaned in, touched his lips to my nose, my mouth, then he shifted and slid them along my cheek to my jaw.
He settled back beside me and caught my eyes.
“Now, I gotta go home, Carrie.”
Bummer.
“All right.”
He gave me a squeeze, and before I wanted it (way before) we were off the couch and on our feet. He took my hand and did the getting his jacket and going to the door taking me with him drill.
He cupped my cheek, brushed his lips to mine, and gave me his, “Later,” but this time, he added, “I’ll check in tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
“’Night, babe.”
“’Night, sweetheart.”
His face got soft before he moved into the walkway and out of sight.
I sighed, closed the door and put my back to it.
I wondered what his plans were the next night.
Then I decided to ask when he checked in the next day.
After that, I went to my room, took off my ruffly blouse and my jeans, hit the bathroom, washed my face, brushed my teeth, and went to bed.
I lay in the massive king with its gazillion thread count sheets thinking, without the promise of Joker being part of my day, I didn’t have as much to look forward to tomorrow.
I still looked forward to tomorrow.
And especially the next day.
But mostly the night next week where I got to dress up, have dinner with Joker…
Then get what I need.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Chaos Is Pussy
Joker
THE NEXT MORNING, Joker stood at the sink in the small bathroom that was attached to his room at the Compound and looked at himself in the mirror.
He’d fucked up, and if he didn’t sort it out soon, he knew he’d be fucked.
There was no doubt Carissa liked him. There was no doubt what they had was going somewhere, and this was because there was no doubt he was going to take it there.
The problem was, to do that, she’d eventually need to know his name.
Then she’d know him.
He did not like to think about how that shit would go down.
And he knew she recognized him, as did her ex.
More than once, he saw her studying him in a way where she wasn’t just looking at him. In a way he had to cover that shit, take her mind off it, lead her away from a realization that would be uncomfortable for both of them.
In a way that in part was now on him.
It was Joker who pretended he didn’t know her name. It was Joker who knew the beard, the hair, the bulk, the life he led, the easy openness he was giving her was not the Carson Steele she once semi-knew from high school. It was Joker who was deliberately guiding her into seeing Joker, and not Carson Steele. It was Joker who knew he had to give it to her. It was Joker who knew he should.
So it was Joker who was playing a game.
Carissa was not.
If it was him, some bitch played it like that, he’d walk away and not look back.
But Carissa was steady.
It was whacked, but with all that had happened to her, she had it going on.
There was nothing in her fridge or cupboards that had a brand label, not even the fucking ketchup, and she didn’t seem to care.
Not to mention she had a kid, it was her first kid, but she handled him and the responsibility of having him not like he was her first but like he was her fifth.
And as he remembered it, unlike her friends, back in high school she wasn’t rolling in it, but her family was comfortable. She’d had nice clothes. She drove a used but decent car to school. She didn’t seem to want for anything.
Now, it was not close to the same.
Last, her ex came from a family who was rolling in it, and still looked like he was far from hurting. But Carissa lived in a jacked apartment with generic shit in the fridge and stuff all around that reminded her of her failed marriage and all she lost and she didn’t seem to give a shit.
What mattered to her was her son. He didn’t eat generic. He didn’t wear cheap clothes.
And that was all she needed.
So maybe, if she could roll so easily with all that had happened to her, if Joker explained, she’d get it and he wouldn’t lose her.
He just had no fucking clue how to tell her.
“Joke?”
He looked toward the door and then went to it to see High standing just inside his room.
“Yo.”
High jerked up his chin and asked, “Heidi touch base with you?”
Joker shook his head. “Nope.”
“Fuck,” High muttered.
Heidi’s departure meant the Club was uneasy. The woman didn’t give them much, but at least they had a clue where Valenzuela’s attention was leaning. Now they didn’t have that.
“Hop’s lookin’ into turnin’ one,” Joker shared.
“Yeah. He spoke to one, she refused,” High briefed him. “He’s gotta be careful. The more he approaches, the more it opens it up to one of them givin’ that to Valenzuela.”
Joker had no reply because what High said was true.
“Pisses me off we hand cash to these bitches, they give us a shade above dick and the cloud remains,” High muttered. “We need to get proactive with this shit.”
High had not been totally on board with Tack’s change in direction with the Club. But then they’d all learned the hard way with the extreme shit that went down with Cherry years ago that they needed to focus on taking each other’s backs, not fighting within the ranks.
That didn’t mean High was the kind of man who preferred sitting around with his thumb up his ass.
“It’ll eventually play out one way or another, brother,” Joker told him.
“Yeah, and it’d be good that happens now rather than when I’m in the position of havin’ to stick a Valenzuela soldier with my knife, doin’ it from my wheelchair in a nursing home.”
Joker grinned at him.
High’s head jerked as he caught it.
Then he crossed his arms on his chest and asked, “Things good with your Butterfly?”
Joker leaned against the jamb and held his gaze. “Mostly.”
“Not lettin’ you in her pants?” High asked.
Joker nearly laughed.
Never in his life did he think he would be in the position of putting the brakes on a hot little piece, especially that piece being Carissa.
But he was.
He didn’t share that with High.
He just said, “That’s not it.”
“What is it?”
“We went to high school together. We knew each other. Now, she doesn’t remember me,” Joker told him.
“Got that part of the story from Rush,” High replied.
“I haven’t enlightened her.”
High nodded even as he noted, “Also got from Rush she digs you.”
“She does, but, brother, I’m into her in a way that will hold for a good long while. She’s gotta know me. A woman played this scenario the way I’ve played it with Carrie, she’d see my back.”
High’s focus on him deepened. “I take your point.”
“I gotta come clean. I just don’t know how.”
“You mean you don’t know how without pissin’ her off so she takes off.”
Joker nodded. “That’s what I mean.”
“This is what I know, Joke,” High said, and his sudden change in tone made Joker brace. “You gotta be the man you are. You can’t be anything else. And she’s gotta get the man you are and want him, nothing else. To give her any shot at doin’ that, you can’t hold back who you are. Any of it. Then it’s down to her. She wants the man you are, fuck-ups and all, she sticks. She doesn’t, you don’t want her.”
Joker matched his tone when he confided, “I’ve wanted her since high school.”
“Why, ’cause she’s got a great ass?” High fired back.
Joker felt his jaw clench and through his teeth he replied, “Not even close.”
“Then come clean,” High returned. “You read somethin’ in this woman that she’s the one for you. You saw it in her all the way back then. She might make it tough on you, but if she’s that girl and you’re it for her like she is for you, this will be a bump in the road, but then you’ll ride steady.”
“Yeah, me and her and her ex who’s suddenly interested in reconnecting,” Joker muttered.
“Now that shit’s yours,” High declared, lifting a hand and stabbing a finger Joker’s way. “Word is he’s done her wrong in a way he’s not a man. You take care of your babies even if your ex is a bitch and you gotta do it through her. You eat that shit for your kids. His ex ain’t a bitch and he’s eatin’ model pussy and hangin’ his baby momma out to dry. Her ex is not a man, you’ll have no problem takin’ him down however that needs to be done.”
“Carissa isn’t the type of girl who would dig the way a biker would make his point by pissin’ around his patch,” Joker pointed out.
“That’s not what I mean,” High replied. “What I mean is, not a lotta women want a limp dick in their bed, no matter the way that limp dick comes, he’s rollin’ in it or whatever. You are not that man. She sees that, she’ll put up with him because her kid shares his blood, but that’s all he’ll be to her. You man up for her and her kid, you’ll be the rest.”
He hoped like
fuck that High was right. About all of it.
His phone in his back pocket rang and when it did, High asked, “You good?”
There it was. That was it.
His brotherhood.
That was why he joined. That was what he wanted.
It was just that, until recently, he hadn’t availed himself of all they could give.
Another fuck-up that he wouldn’t perpetrate again.
“Good, High. Thanks, brother,” Joker murmured, pulling his phone out of his jeans.
“Right, then later,” High returned and took off.
Joker looked at his phone, took the call, and put it to his ear.
“Tack.”
“Yo, Joke. Lee called in. Got a lock on your Robinson.”
Joker moved to his dresser, where there was now a bowl with his change in it. Change that used to be scattered everywhere, even on the floor.
He grinned and replied, “What’d he give you?”
“Teacher, like you said he was before. A high school in Highlands Ranch. Tenured. Married. Pays his taxes. Five years into his current mortgage—”
Joker cut him off. “I dig that Nightingale was thorough, but I don’t need to know that kinda shit.”
“Clue me in. What do you need?” Tack asked.
“He got a family?”
“Married. Once and still. They been that way for eleven years,” Tack told him.
“No kids?”
“Lee didn’t mention kids.”
“I’ll call Lee.”
There was a pause before, “Got it.”
“And Tack?”
“Yeah.”
“Thanks,” he muttered, grabbing his wallet and shoving it in his back pocket, loading the chain onto his belt.
“Anything, Joke,” Tack muttered back and disconnected.
Joker picked up his keys, shrugged on his cut, and moved to the door, his attention back to his phone, his thumb moving to Nightingale’s contact.
He listened to the rings long enough he figured he’d get voicemail before Lee answered on, “Joke.”
“Lee. Callin’ for some follow up on Robinson,” Joker told him.
“What do you need?” Lee asked.
“He got kids?”
“Nope.”