Kellan (12 page)

I had to give her credit. I don’t imagine it was easy for her to walk through the bar with a bunch of bikers staring at her knowing full well what she’d been up to with me last night. She handled it though. Other than the little blush that crept up her neck and colored her cheeks, she bore the stares and knowing looks they shot me. Trial by fire and she was on her way to passing.
 

I wanted to bust every one of them in the face though. I wanted to take her in my arms, take her back to bed. Keep her safe and warm and all to myself.
 

“Any luck getting that shit van to start?” she looked at me over her coffee mug.
 

The van. I forgot. “Tate, you think you could see if you could give Mallory’s van a jump while we finish our coffee?”
 

Tate gave me a discreet nod. Mallory tossed her keys to him which he caught one-handed.
 

“Just give me ten minutes,” he said.
 

Then, just like that, we had the whole bar to ourselves. The rest of the guys made lame excuses and cleared out. She buried her face in her coffee mug, taking longer to drink it than was probably necessary. I couldn’t help that my eyes traveled from her toned arms to her delicate fingers that curled around the mug’s
handle, to her pouty pink lips. I couldn’t help that my mind went to the vision of watching her work those lips over me last night.
 

I balled my fist against my thigh and did a silent ten count. I was going to have to stand up here in a second and I didn’t want it obvious to her what I was thinking about. She sipped her coffee then finally set the mug down. She sat back in her chair and put her hands on her knees.
 

“Look.” We said it together.
 

Mallory laughed, shook out her hair and gave me the first genuine smile of the morning. It damn near melted me.
 

“Don’t worry, okay,” she said, putting her hand up, palm out. “I’m not . . . uh . . . expecting anything. The rest of your guys don’t have to clear out on my account.”
 

The minute she said the words, something slammed into place in my brain and probably every other part of me. Not expecting anything.
She
wasn’t expecting anything. I swallowed back what I wanted to say. Maybe she wasn’t, but it turns out I sure as fuck was. She was about to launch into a speech that I’d been trying to figure out how to give her. But all of that changed the second she sat down next to me. I wanted her. I was going to keep wanting her. The question was whether I was strong enough not to do anything about it.
 

“No good, Kel,” Tate poked his head in from the front door.
 

“Huh?” It took me a second to shake the cobwebs out of my head and focus on something other than this gorgeous girl in front of me. She was trying to act tough. Not let me see what she might really be thinking. I fucking hated it. I never wanted her to hide anything from me ever again.
 

“The van,” Tate said, coughing to clear his throat. “It’s not the battery. There’s something else electrical going on but that thing’s not going anywhere anytime soon.”
 

“Perfect,” Mallory said. “I’m gonna throttle Justin.”
 

“Don’t sweat it,” I said. I put a hand on her arm as she pulled out her phone. “Let me just take you home.”
 

Mallory’s mouth dropped; her lips formed that perfect ‘o’ I was starting to love.
 

“It’s far,” she said. “I live out by East Point. I can just have Justin come pick me up.”
 

“In what? That’s his shit van out there not starting. Come on, don’t be silly.” Before she could protest any more, I was on my feet and took her by the hand. I grabbed a spare helmet off the bar and took her outside.
 

I jerked my chin at Tate. “I’ll be back in an hour or so. We’ll head out to Heidi’s then and see what’s what.”
 

Tate nodded and went back inside. When I knew we were alone, I turned back to face her. I don’t know what made me do it. This could be a clean get away. She’d given me an out. But I knew something special when I saw it and Mallory Rhodes was something special.
 

I put my hands on her hips and pulled her close to me. She let out a little gasp that sent my heart racing. I brushed her hair out of her face and tilted her chin up toward me. For someone so small, her eyes blazed fierce. Almost daring me to kiss her. And I wanted to do so much more. Wanted to
keep
doing more. I wanted to take her back to my room and keep her there all day.
 

“Kellan,” she said. “Maybe you should just take me home.”
 

I smiled. “Yeah. I suppose that’s what I should just do. But what do you want me to do?”
 

She hesitated. I watched her chest rise and fall with her heavy breaths. Her eyes darted across my face, filled with a thousand emotions and her racing thoughts. She was doing all the things that I should do. Thinking. Weighing risks. Trying to choose the right thing.
 

I wasn’t going to force her, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to let her go. Before she could say anything, I leaned down and kissed her. She sank into me for a fraction of a second before her back went rigid and she pulled away. Her eyes flashed fire.
 

“Take me home, Kellan.” Her voice came out as a choked whisper. It tore at me a little because I knew she wanted more from me, just as I wanted more from her. For now though, I’d give her a little space.
 

She smiled, stepped back and took the helmet from me. I climbed on my Harley as she snapped it on. My skin prickled when she climbed on behind me and slid her arms around my waist. It took everything for me to maintain my self-control as she pressed her chest against my back. I revved the engine and pulled
out. I’m not going to lie. I floored it a little harder than I needed to. Just enough to make Mallory squeeze me tighter as we roared off toward the highway.
 

The ride was smooth. The weather perfect. Mid-seventies, blazing sun and blue skies. It was the kind of day I wanted to spend doing nothing but ride. I felt Mallory’s breath hitch from the thrill of the speed. I was careful. Played it safe. But Mallory squealed with joy every time I took a curve and it was hard not to just tear off and let her rip.
 

She pointed the way as we got near East Point. She directed me down Charleston Street just past the factory district. Her neighborhood was old and starting to turn, but the houses were still kept up. The yards neat and clean.
 

I felt her stiffen as we came to a little white ranch house with brick red shutters. An old VW Bug sat on blocks in the driveway.
 

“This is me,” she said as I pulled up behind the Bug and killed the engine. Mallory let me go and slid off the bike so fast she stumbled a little. I reached out and caught her by the elbow.
 

“Thanks,” she said. “You better get going. You told Tate you’d be back within the hour.”
 

“Don’t worry about Tate,” I said. “Let me walk you in.”
 

Mallory stiffened as I swung off the bike and walked toward her. She gave a nervous glance toward the house that got me worried.
 

“Everything okay?” I asked. My back went up. Something wasn’t right here. She was jumpy. My fingers played at my side belt loop. I usually carried a piece but this morning I didn’t. I was starting to regret that.
 

She put on a fake smile and nodded. “Yeah. I’ll just see you next weekend, okay?”
 

“Mallory?”
 

There was movement toward the front of the house. The screen door swung open and chaos poured out.
 

“Slut! Don’t think you can run around on me and crawl back here any damn time you please!”
 

The guy was big. Almost as tall as I was. Barrel chested with a shock of white hair and a face like a bulldog. He ran at Mallory and I put myself in front of
her, hands up. I’d drop the old guy if I had to but I could see in an instant that his eyes saw something in front of him that just flat out wasn’t there. There was a tiny flicker of fear in them, but more than anything, his eyes were dead.
 

I knew that look. God. I fucking knew that look. His eyes darted left and right as he searched for some threat on a battlefield he’d probably left more than forty years ago. He wore a tattered white tank top leaving his bare arms exposed. Though he waved his fists, I could make out the tattoo clearly on his upper arm. An army flag. A date. Vietnam.
 

Mallory stepped from behind me. “Dad! Focus. Nobody’s running out on you. It’s just me. It’s Mallory.”
 

“Who’s this asshole?” he said, swaying on his feet. He had a beer in one hand and a baseball bat in the other. He seemed a little more present and I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing.
 

I grabbed Mallory’s arm, meaning to pull her back behind me. She put her hand up though. One on my chest, the other on her father’s.
 

“He’s just a friend, Dad. Kellan. His name’s Kellan. He gave me a ride home.”
 

I didn’t like the grip he had on that baseball bat. Except it turned out I was watching the wrong thing. The beer bottle went flying right past my ear. I dodged to the right just in time. It shattered against the curb and the noise it made seemed to pull the old guy even further back from whatever waking nightmare he found himself in.
 

“Whoa. Hang on there, Mr. Rhodes,” I said. “What’s your dad’s name, Mallory?”
 

“Cocksucker!” he shouted. Then he spit on the ground just near my feet. Okay, so maybe his nightmare was over. Maybe he was also just an asshole.
 

“Please just go, Kellan,” Mallory whispered as she turned to me. Her eyes filled with pain. “He’s all right. He probably just woke up too fast. He’ll come around in a minute or two.”
 

“Like hell,” I said.
 

Just then, another car pulled up alongside the curb and Mallory put a hand to her forehead, the other on her hip. “Hey, Mitch!” She made her tone bright, but the pain was still in it.
 

A young kid, maybe twelve years old, took a tentative step out of the back seat. He was wearing a baseball uniform and he had Mallory’s pale eyes and sandy blond hair. I wondered if that was her real color too. He looked from me to Mallory and to her dad, surveying the scene. He didn’t so much as flinch. It was clear this kind of thing was status quo at the Rhodes’s house. His back stiffened and he turned to the driver of the car, flicking two fingers. The middle-aged woman behind the wheel looked worried, but she nodded, put the car in gear and drove off. Apparently, she’d seen a version of this spectacle more than once as well.
 

“Yours?” I said to Mallory.
 

Mallory stepped forward and put a protective arm around the kid.
 

“Gross,” he answered for her. “Mallory’s my sister, not my mom. We’re a fucked up family, but not that fucked up.”
 

Mallory smiled and cupped a hand over Mitch’s mouth. If it weren’t for her bat-swinging, bottle-wielding father, I could have had a laugh over all of it. As it was, a small line of worry creased her forehead. I knew that look. I came from a volatile home life too. My gut twisted looking at Mallory and her kid brother. It had been different in my house. When I got old enough and strong enough, I’d thrown my own father out on the street.  All it took was one punch back and he was gone. But who was here to stand up for Mallory and the kid? God. With every passing second, this girl was making it harder for me to just walk away. But I’d seen every inch of her. Whatever was going on here, he wasn’t laying a hand on her.
 

She let go of the kid and went up to her dad. She put her hands on his cheeks. Her dad’s eyes focused in and out, then back in. A sweet smile lifted the corners of his mouth and he kissed her on the forehead. Wherever he’d gone to, he was back now.
 

“Why don’t you go inside with Mitch?” she said. “I’ll be along in a second, okay?”
 

Her dad gave me a hard look but the aggression was gone. He put a heavy arm around Mitch’s shoulder, making his body sag. Then the two of them walked back into the house together.
 

“Thanks for the ride,” she said, turning back to me. She rubbed beneath her eyes, maybe wiping away a tear that threatened to fall. But she kept her face blank.
 

I leaned against my bike and smiled at her. God, she was something. She stood there on her front lawn looking scared and strong all at the same time.
 

“You sure he’s gonna be okay?” I asked.
 

Mallory slid her hands into her back pockets, looked toward the house then back to me. Shrugging, she took a step toward me. “He’s got his good days and bad days, just like the rest of us.”
 

“Your mom around?”
 

Mallory’s eyes went to the ground when she answered. “Not anymore. She died a few months after Mitch was born.”
 

I wanted to grab her and kiss her again. But she had her armor in place. She kept a few feet between us and wouldn’t meet my eyes. I didn’t know how long her dad had been like that but my heart cracked a little thinking about Mallory at thirteen or fourteen or however old she’d been when she put her mother in the ground. Now, here she was, all by herself, trying to hold shit together with her bare hands while her dad drank himself into the ground and her kid brother in the mix.
 

“Hey, look,” she said, finally meeting my eyes. “We’re okay, right? I don’t want you to think I’m going to weird out on you after what happened last night. We got it out of our systems. I’m not going to be a problem.”