Chapter Twenty-Seven
Ayda
You hear things. Growing up in a town with a predominant residency of bikers, it’s to be expected. No matter how many rumors I’d heard, nothing prepared me for the fear I felt watching the altercation between Drew and the other group of bikers.
I could barely breathe as Drew stormed past me as though I wasn’t there. When everybody filtered in behind him, I began to feel more and more out of place. The ringing in my ears, due to the anxiety and the motorcycles, didn’t seem to be going anywhere. As the warmth of the sun found me as the last of the crowd passed, I stumbled farther onto the porch, my trembling hands reaching for the railing as my eyes scanned where the other bikes had been.
I felt a presence behind me, but I knew who it was without them having to say a word. I pushed my trembling lips together and ignored the disappointment that ran through me. I knew who I’d wanted to be there, but I was too stupid to see that I was nothing. This group of men, these women who flooded around them, they were all family and I was the outsider here. I was a stranger who didn’t belong.
“Come on inside, darlin’,” Deeks said gently, his hand cupping my elbow. My hand clung to the wood of the rail, mysudden limited understanding flashing between him and the ray of sunlight I’d found.
“What just happened?”
“The same thing that’s been happening for centuries.”
I raised my eyebrows and turned to look at him.
“Rivalry. It traverses histories and species. Ain’t nothing to be done about it.”
“You see more than you let on.”
“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that. I like being the dumb fuck around these parts.”
Deeks peeled my hands from the rail and led me in through the door and into the encompassing darkness. He didn’t take me into the thick of it, but rather led me to a curved couch in the corner and perched me on the very end of it. His eyes moved to the group and back to me, his silent question remaining unsaid as I nodded in agreement. He needed to be with his family and I needed to get my thoughts in order.
The moment I was alone, I crawled back into the corner and pulled my legs up against my chest, just watching as people moved around me, filtering toward Drew, talking to him quietly while squeezing his shoulder. All the while he was drinking straight from a bottle and staring stonily at the wall ahead of him.
It seemed like no matter how many times I replayed the events that had happened just beyond the doors, I couldn’t wrap my head around the look the other man they’d called Cortez had given me, or Drew’s reaction to it. The longer I let myself think about it, the colder my blood became. Bringing my head against my knees, I tried to hide the sudden shiver that the malevolence had sent through me. I had a feeling that those eyes would haunt me for a while.
“You look like shit,” Kenny said, dropping down beside me and handing me a bottle, his other arm sliding along the back of the seat I was occupying.
“Fuck you, too.”
He snorted, obviously undeterred by my insult. He may have taken it all in his stride, but I sure as hell couldn’t. I claimed the bottle and took a mouthful before handing it back as the heat of the liquid began to make me feel a little better.
“Really weird morning, huh?”
“Weird’s one word for it.”
Kenny laughed and drank from the bottle in one long stream, the bittersweet stench of the whiskey permeating everything. “You okay?”
“Absolutely. I just have to keep moving,” I said, pushing up and wobbling before heading toward the kitchen to clean up from breakfast. I started throwing plates away and gathering cups on my path, my eyes flashing to where Drew was visibly ignoring the men around him who were trying to talk, his jaw set in stone. The place had come to life, men moving around the place like a swarm of ants. Some paced, some were on their phones, but all of them were agitated. All I knew was that I was best to stay out of the way.
It was a terrible, drunken rendition of one of my all time favorite songs that pulled me from my cleaning duties. The lyrics coaxed me from the laundry room and I was standing at the lip of the corridor, my shoulder against the wall, watching a mass of middle-aged men playing air guitar and air drums. The mood had lightened for most of the group, but thedarkness that permeated from the corner Drew inhabited was toxic. There was a girl on his lap, her body draped over him while he fed himself from the bottle of whiskey still clasped firmly in his fist.
The irrational surge of jealousy was a hard pill to swallow, even as he seemed uninterested and stared off into the darkness. His hands moved over her flesh, his fingers curling into the skin of her ass, making her giggle. For a moment, I wasn’t sure if it was jealousy or pity, but the moment the girl tipped his head back and devoured him, I knew. I knew because the need to drag her away by her hair was an itch in my fingertips. I’d never felt so violent in my life, and I wasn’t quite sure I liked the way it made me feel.
“Ayda, you’re back,” Kenny said, the words slurred as he staggered toward me. He propped himself up against the wall with one hand. It was placed strategically by the side of my head, allowing him to lean in and intoxicate me with his breath alone.
“It would appear so.” I stared at his strange eyebrows rather than his eyes so he wouldn’t get the wrong idea. The mood may have lifted a little, but that didn’t mean shit in terms of volatility. With Deeks nowhere in sight and Drew otherwise indisposed, I was feeling a little exposed and vulnerable. “How about I go make some food to feed the masses?”
“Don’t leave,” Kenny breathed, his finger trailing down my cheek. “You can’t anyway, we’re on lockdown.”
“Stop it, Kenny.”
His arm gave way, whether on purpose or from his alcohol consumption, and his body swung toward mine. I pressed myself against the wall to avoid him, my head turningto the side. I regretted it the moment I did. My eyes met Drew’s across the room and all I saw was a cold emptiness shining back at me. His lips curled into an even colder smile right before he stood and hoisted the girl over his shoulder, one hand firmly grabbing her ass, while the other gripped the neck of a whiskey bottle. Then he was gone into the sea of bodies.
My hands met Kenny’s chest as he stumbled, and I managed to push him upright. I began searching his face, trying to find something there that would save me from the inexplicable stab of pain and rejection in my chest, but there was nothing. Not with Kenny, anyway, and that terrified me, because the alternative wasn’t something I wanted to deal with.
