“We were worried.”
I bit the tip of my tongue and glanced back at King for help. He only snorted and held up his hands.
“Uh—”
Grant stalked nearer until he was almost too close for comfort. “Jamie was looking for you, said something about apologizing, and he was upset too when he found out you were gone.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’ll never see him again.”
“Who’s this?” King asked, coming around to our sides so he could scowl down at us.
Grant ignored him and grabbed me in a hug I sort of sagged into. He was warm and friendly like Forrest. “You’re part of this family, and I get that you’re in a club, and I get that you go off and ‘handle things’—” He said that part while glaring at King. “—but you have got to start answering your phone when people call and let them know what you’re up to. You scared me, and you upset Forrest.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, and he stilled. He leaned back until he pinned my gaze with his.
“You are?”
I nodded. “I’m tired. I think I’m going to bed.” I turned toward the stairs, but King was in my way, and he didn’t move.
“Uh, about that….” King flushed and cleared his throat, and Grant gave him a suspiciously encouraging smile. “There may be someone in that room now?” he added, like it was a question.
I gaped and stumbled back a step from him. “Wh—what?”
“Yeah. I didn’t… I mean, it’s a long story.” King cleared his throat and shared another look with Grant, who patted his chest.
“Oh.” I backed away from him, but he latched a hand around my wrist. I let him stop me, even though I wanted to go outside and find a pile of scrap metal and punch and kick until I either dented something or it just toppled onto me. Out already, after a couple of days away. King’s hand tightened on my wrist, and I focused on him until he smiled.
“I was wondering—Dallas and I were wondering—if you’d like to take the second bedroom at my cabin.”
Grant grinned but turned away, and when he swiveled back to face us, his cheeks were red. He kept shooting looks between the two of us.
“I mean… Dallas lives there too. So I can understand if you wouldn’t want to. It might feel a little cramped. And you might hear a few things every once in a while….”
“Yes,” I said, and my heart leaped. “Yes, I’d like to live somewhere else—” I clamped my lips closed tight and bit them on the inside. The last thing I wanted to do was say something wrong and give him the idea I didn’t want to be a prospect anymore.
“Yeah?” King asked, and he glanced around at everyone else.
“Of course he wants to,” Grant said and beamed at me as if I’d just done a wheelie on a sheet of ice—and landed it, too.
“Well, we, uh, I had Dallas take your stuff over there yesterday, actually.” King let go of my wrist to rub at the back of his neck, and then he started patting down his pockets as if he was looking for his lighter.
“You already knew I’d say yes?” I asked.
“Hoped,” King said quietly. He pulled his lighter out of one pocket and then a pack of cigs out of his back pocket. He put a cigarette to his lips, but Grant plucked the lighter from his fingers. “I know you’re not a little boy anymore, and fuck, maybe it’s too little too late, but I want to try. I like Forrest, but you’rehere. You’ve been here for a bit. I don’t want to see anything bad happen to you. I don’t like you in the clubhouse when I’m somewhere else.” He glanced toward the hallway, to the front, as if he could see something there that pissed him off, and I wondered if he was thinking about Barnes. My chest went light and happy and took me completely by surprise.
That concern was fucking touching, maybe one of the nicest things anyone had ever said to me in my life. While I still felt shaken with King on a lot of levels, this made me feel good.
Grant gave me a side hug.
“I’d like that.”
“Ride out with me,” King said, and he didn’t wait for me to answer him, just moved around me and sauntered off. Grant winked and gave me a little shove after him. Was this what having a family was like? Had they waited until I was out of town to do this? I thought maybe I should be mad about being manipulated, except it was too nice that King wanted to get to know me.
I was all the way back to King’s cabin, in a room with blue walls that still smelled a bit like paint, and on a firm mattress under soft sheets and a new green comforter—there was no bedframe yet, but that was fine—before I remembered Grant had told me to check my phone. Maybe he was just talking about answering for him, but the thought had me thinking about my phone and all the things I could do with it. I reached over to where my jeans lay on the floor next to the bed and fished it out of my pocket. Maybe I’d find some porn to jerk myself to sleep to, even though that wasn’t something I normally did. I was too lonely right now to let my mind wander, and a little scared of where my thoughts might go.
There on the screen sat a message I wasn’t expecting. There was no name for the number because it was completely unfamiliar to me.
The saddest thing the devil ever did was fight his way from heaven, because he was the brightest star.
