Phoenix
Fucking kidding me, right?
Finally found someone I thought I could do something long-term with and... fuck, seriously.
Seriously!
I didn’t drive in traffic so much as I just weaved through it, ignorant of any and all traffic laws. If any cop had caught me at this moment, I could have easily gotten about a dozen different tickets for who knew what violations. None of them, though, felt as cruel or cold as what Jess had just done to me.
She couldn’t have, I don’t know, fucking told me that little piece of info before I took her for a hike? Before I spent time at the sandwich shop? Before I bared my soul to her about my father? Before we had sex?
And now she was going to run off to live in some other fucking place?
Was it any wonder I had trust issues with anyone else? Like, how the fuck was I ever supposed to believe anyone else ever had my back when my own father and the most recent woman I’d fallen for had turned out to be harboring serious secrets?
Fucking bullshit.
The only thing I knew as I left the parking lot was that I was leaving Jess. And I was not going back to her.
I started driving toward the Gray Reapers’ clubhouse, but that was more because I didn’t know where else to go. I didn’t want to go home, not with her scent still lingering there. You think I wanted to have a constant reminder that she’d slept in my bed? Yeah, change the sheets, but a woman’s scent wasn’t the kind of thing that you just washed off; it was the kind of thing that remained, as much a part of my conscious memory as it was actual scented particles.
I couldn’t get a fucking drink, not at this early in the morning, not from a bar—and besides that, Tom’s Billiards was the only fucking place I could think of, and I’d never bothered to exactly learn Jess’ shifts.
Actually, come to think of it, I hadn’t bothered to learn much about Jess. We’d only been on two dates.
And yet... and yet, the intensity of everything that had happened, the vulnerability that we had shared, everything that had transpired had left me feeling like we’d been dating for two months, maybe even longer. I had never clicked with anyone as fast and as deep as Jess, and I felt pretty confident in saying she felt the same way.
Which made it all the more fucking painful that she saw fit to tell me she wasn’t long for Ashton too late.Because she was scared.
Like it fucking matters.
I hoped seeing the Gray Reapers’ headquarters would clear my mind up some, but all it did was further inflame my annoyance at everything. This was the one space where I felt like I could be myself... and even then, it was only because the last place I’d felt that way had...
Well, it was a little more complicated than the one-line answer, wasn’t it? But that was a real bitch to admit when all I wanted were simple, one-line answers. Everything felt like a real bitch right now.
And it was made all the worse by the fact that the usual comforts—alcohol, pussy, a long evening bike ride—weren’t going to calm me as they usually would have.
I killed my bike and stormed into the clubhouse, found an open chair, and plopped down on it. A few of the club members were making casual conversation, and Owen started to say my name, but as soon as he merely looked at me—not even made eye contact with me, just saw my sulking present—he shut up and turned away.
I sat there and stewed. I had no plan. I just wanted to wallow in anger. I just wanted to sit here, “meditate,” and lose myself in my rage.
“Phoenix.”
I looked up at Cole. Cole looked... actually, like a fucking good leader. His voice had concern, but he wasn’t intimidated by my scowl or murderous expression. He had spoken to me as a man, not as a boorish President who needed to show how awesome or how detached he was.
You are no Lane.
But that doesn’t mean I want—
“I need to talk to you and Owen. Alone.”
Oh, so now we want privacy? Guess we’re not going to have our meetings out in the open, huh?
I was just being a dick. No one could escape my wrath, so I guess I needed to just keep it shut inside. Cole deserved a lot of things, but he did not deserve my anger.
I got up from my chair, put my hands in my pocket, and motioned for Cole to lead me wherever. But he didn’t move. Instead, he tilted his head to the side, as if he was supposed to magically understand whatever request I had made of him. I groaned, told myself to stop acting like a whiny bitch, and walked over to him.
“Everything’s not all good, I take it,” he said.
