“Isla,” Shade says, his voice filled with concern.
The tenderness makes tears spring, and I’m so confused about this swirl of feelings, I don’t know which way is up. I try to hold myself together for just a few more minutes, so I don’t ruin things.
“I’m fine. It’s fine. I just…I kept that part of my life away from this place. I got a job, I’m earning money. I stopped looking so hard for a man to take care of me and decided to take care of myself.” I stub the toe of my boot into the ground. “But maybe it’s best if we…you know…just stay civil and kinda ignore one another.”
Confusion is etched on Shade’s brow. “Isla, we don’t need to be strangers. If your uncle comes back again, come get us, we’ll?—”
“Honestly. There’s no need. I’ll see you guys around.”
And with that, I run up the steps to Nanna’s house, let myself in, and bolt the lock behind me.
3
JACKAL
“Well, that was fucking weird,” I say as Garrett stares at the door Isla just slammed in our faces. “Did you piss her off when we were at the clubhouse?”
“Barely talked to her,” he replies. “Couple late-night chats at the bar when I couldn’t sleep and she was shook-up from whatever she’d been doing.”
I know this to be true. My Bear has never slept with a woman. He’s bi, like me, but has just never acted on it, and now that we’re together, he doesn’t want to. Before I met him, I was in polyamorous relationships with three other people. Love is love is love and all that. Garrett, on the other hand, feels like love and loyalty go hand in hand, but only between two people.
At first, I wasn’t sure I could do monogamous, but it was one of his conditions. And I felt he was worth restricting myself to one man for.
“What do you make of all that, then?”
I think of what she just said.
The club. Who I was and what I did there. I guess…I’m trying to leave all of it behind and forgive myself for it…
“Think it’s as she said. Family rift. Someone died. She got the house. Uncle doesn’t like it.”
I roll my eyes. “Not the house shit, although, we should put some cameras on our place and make sure at least one points to hers to give her a bit of insurance in case she needs it. I meant why she seemed almost scared of us.”
We walk back to our home. “Think she’s regretting her involvement in the club?” Garrett asks.
“Seems like it.” I glance back over at the windows of her house. “You think someone messed with her? Is that why she left?”
“Define ‘messed with’?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. I’m drawing a blank. I mean, I don’t love that she moved in less than twenty-four hours after we did, since we’re gonna have to make sure she doesn’t see us together.”
“We’re together right now.”
“You know what I mean.”
Garrett lets me go first up the steps. He likes my ass in denim, and I don’t mind him looking. “I do,” he says. “But we can’t change what it is. Plus, that house is both a money pit and a wreck.”
I look at the state of our hallway with its scratched flooring, a hole in the drywall at fist height, and no light fixture. Just a bulb dangling from an electrical wire. “I mean, so’s ours.”
“Yeah. But we bought this as a project to do together. Isla will probably sell it and flit off to live somewhere else within a month.”
“Maybe.” But the words still sit heavy as I kick the door shut with my boot.
Garrett cups my cheek. “Trust me, she’ll move out, and maybe some lumberjack with good genes will move in across the street.”
I drag him to the armchair we moved from our rental this morning and shove him down into it. It’s situated in the center of the family room off the kitchen because we were just in the middle of discussing its placement when we heard the first shot.
I drop to my knees and place my elbows on his thighs. “Why? You looking to replace me?”
