He chuckled, and it rumbled from his chest like the roll of thunder from a summer storm. “You didn’t have to. Anything you can’t say while I’m driving equals shit that’s gonna distract me or piss me off.”
I couldn’t argue that, and it annoyed me. “Can we just go?”
“How did he hurt you?”
“You’re making assumptions.”
“No. You said you made a scene and that y’all were late because of it. You never do that shit, so Porter either pissed you off or he hurt you.”
How I forgot certain things, I’d never know, but somehow I always forgot how well Rafferty knew me. It was equal parts annoying and endearing. Mainly annoying because I never knew what to do with that from him.
I took a deep breath. “It’s over and done, Rafferty. I appreciate your friendly concern, but no joke - Porter isnotworth your time or mine.”
He pressed his lips together and stared past my shoulder, out the window. After a lengthy moment, his eyes met mine. “Did you tell your parents how he hurt you?”
Acid filled and churned in my stomach like a washing machine full of my secrets. I straightened. “They know I’m an adult, and haven’t pried.”
His left eye narrowed at me. “Hard to say what’s worse: the fact you’re a pain in my ass or how much I like feeling that pain.”
My mouth fell open. “Oh my God. Did you really just say that?”
He closed his eyes and his lips slowly tipped up before he opened them again. “Tell me. Please,” he whispered.
Something in his whisper made me crack. “You can’t get mad and you can’t tell Dad.”
He lowered his chin as his eyes turned shrewd. “I’m not agreeing to that. One, because I’m already mad that he hurt you. Two, because whatever you’re about to share… if it were Jasmine, Simone, Gabby, or any brothers’ daughter - the brothers would pummel the shit outta me for keeping it from them. And I’d deserve that.”
He was right, and that was the biggest reason I didn’t want to tell him. Even though I knew it all came from a place of love, the overbearing, overprotective thing got old. I tossed my hands up. “Nobody can protect all of us all the time.”
He reverted back to his gentle whisper. “I need you to tell me, so I can stop imagining shit. What spin did he put on assholes making assumptions about bikers?”
I didn’t want to give Rafferty all of this, but I had to get it out there and be done with it. “He got physical with me in the car and wouldn’t immediately stop when I told him to.”
Rafferty’s eyes danced side to side for a couple beats. “Did he rape you?”
I closed my eyes and sucked in a breath. “No. It didn’t go that far, but it was the reason I insisted we stop off just before the accident.”
Abruptly, Rafferty sat back in his seat, leaned his head against the headrest, and stared forward at the public bathrooms. “He didn’t violate you in any way?”
“He didn't listen when I told him to stop,” I murmured.
He turned his head toward me. “What does this have to do with Cal?”
I gave him a questioning look.
“You said he didn’t know Cal was a real biker. What’s that got to do with this?”
My stomach twisted. “People outside our world make assumptions about bikers, and those assumptions extend to the kids of bikers.”
“I’m still lost, Lex. You two had broken things off. Why would he try something in a car with two other people?”
It seemed I’d have to tell Rafferty the last thing I wanted him to know about me.
Inadvertently, I’d saved my virginity.
Though I wouldn’t call it saving, so much as an inability to give it up due to poor circumstances. It wasn’t that I was religious or highly principled about it. Crazy as it sounded, I never intended for this to happen.
Yet, happen it did.
