I think it’s the neck and finger tattoos that really seal the deal for me. Even the knuckle tat that spells out LOVE across my left hand, it somehow doesn’t endear most people to me.
Me? I think it’s sweet. A play on words, my last name means lover, and I put love into everything I make. It was a no-brainer.
But others think it just adds to the fear factor that I tend to give people, maybe some relic of the shadows of my past that seep through, even when I try to tamp them down.
Could be that the hint of crazy that I had to rely on to keep me alive in prison has never really gone away.
Whatever the case, when people see me, they don’t fucking push me.
But in front of my sandwich counter is a face I haven’t seen in anage. A woman much, much smaller than me, even at her taller stature in those fancy heels. She’s someone who wouldn’t hesitate to put me in my place, no matter how intimidating I look, and a smile breaks out on my face at the sight of her.
“Aurora!”
My voice booms, no helping it, I’ve got a thing with volume control. When you’re this big, delicate isn’t really an option, unless I’m finishing a plate.
She always used to choose sophisticated calm over intense emotion, but she gives me a big fucking smile back today.
“Where ya been, loca?”
The man standing behind her, facing the other way, pulls up straight when he hears my voice. Dark hair, buffalo-checked shirt, I can tell even from behind he’s not a pretty boy, but I don’t know what to make of him yet. I didn’t even realize she had anyone with her until I saw his spine straighten.
When he turns around, what I’mnotexpecting is to see a baby strapped to his chest, over a Henley, layered beneath the open button-down shirt over it. A little baby girl floats, cooing as she hangs from the carrier strapped to the scruffy man with the grumpy face.
“It’s Rory now,” he says to me, voice gruff and colder than I’d like. He wraps a possessive arm around Aurora’s shoulders, and that’s when I notice the boulder sparkling on her hand.
“This where you been?” I ask her, pointing to the man and baby.
She nods, eyes softer than I’m used to seeing them, not seeming to mind that she’s got a second asshole attached to her side.
“I moved back home. To Smoky Heights.”
“Well doesn’t that just sound lovely.” Like something you’d hear in a fairy tale, or maybe see on a postcard.
“Thisis the bodega guy?” her husband, according to the band on his finger—and that aura offuck right off when you look at my wife—says incredulously, looking between his wife and me.
He doesn’t think we hooked up, does he? He’s acting like I’m a threat to his woman.
Could just be the generic vibe of danger most people pick up from me, no matter how good-natured I am these days. It’s not something I try to give off, but old habits die hard.
“Aww, you talked about me? How sweet.” I flutter my eyelids at her a couple times and hear a grumble from the guy she’s with.
Rory cuts me a look that says not to rile him up, and I back off, because after all those years of making her sandwiches, I’m not convinced she wouldn’t shove a heel up my ass if I pissed her off.
And considering it’s against my ethos to hit a lady, unless it’s a nice smack to the ass while I’m hitting it from behind, well… Better not push it.
“Name’s Wilder. Wilder Amante, good to meet you,amico.”
“Wyatt Grady.”
His handshake is firm, and I make an effort not to crunch his hand in mine out of respect.
“Visiting?”
She nods. “Indeed. Showing my face in the office, doing a number of in-person meetings, and bringing the best the city has to offer back home to tide us over until the next trip.” Her husband grumbles something I can’t hear, and she grins at him, love almost pouring out of her eyes in a way that I’ve sure as hell never had. Lucky bastard.
“So should I get in the car now or later?” I ask, waggling my brows.
Wyatt scowls, forehead pinching close to his dark green eyes. He’s a tough crowd.
