Lay It Down: Bastards MC Series Boxed Set (16 page)

I nodded. There was no way I was going to eat here with Will and his friends.

“’K. I’ll order us our usual.” Standing and glancing back at Will, he smiled. “See you round, Billy boy.”

I watched him head over to the counter before I turned back to Will. I didn’t know what to say to him. “You don’t like Thai.”
This was the last place I thought I'd see you
.

He shook his head. “Nope. But we’re in the middle of brainstorming and I was out-voted.” He sighed. “We need to talk at some point.”

I nodded. That we definitely did.

“Do you have plans tomorrow?”

Matty and I hadn’t talked about it, and I hesitated, glancing back to where Matty was leaning on the counter, talking to the hostess. He seemed to sense me watching him and turned his head, giving me a heart-stopping smile. I wanted nothing more than to go put my hands in his back pockets and make out with him as if we were a couple of horny teenagers. I grinned just thinking about it. His smile grew, as if he was reading my mind, and he bit his bottom lip. I almost groaned, catching myself at the last minute. I turned back to Will, shaking my head.

Will was staring at me, his mouth tight, cheek muscles twitching. “Well, if you do have some time, it would be great if you could come home so we can talk.” His voice was cold. He held out a hand to me. “Just call me, okay? Come on, let’s go talk to—”

I gasped, cutting him off. I had reached out to take his hand so he could lead me to his co-workers when I noticed one of them standing up and looking our way curiously. I let my hand drop, searching his face. The petite brunette was pretending to adjust herself in her chair, but I knew from the way she searched out the two of us that she was actually wondering why it was taking us so long. Why had he not told me she was there?

He at least had the courtesy to look ashamed. “I told you it was a work meeting.” He sighed again. “I should have mentioned that Rachel was here. I’m sorry.” He moved his hand to the small of my back, a move that made me glance over my shoulder at Matty. Will turned too. “Although you are here with him, so we're even. Maybe we could go on a double date some time.” His voice was ice cold again.

I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. I wasn't going to fight with him. “Can we please just get this over with?”

Will nodded and guided me to his table. I was able to greet almost all of his co-workers warmly, and more than half gave me a hug. I liked this group of men. I walked around the table, chatting with each of them, asking about children and wives, vacations and pets. Most of them joked with me, asking about the kids or telling me stories about something Will had done lately. The general consensus was that with our children gone, I was keeping Will busy with adult activities. Adult activities that made him show up to work super tired on Monday morning and left the bite marks on my neck that they were all graciously ignoring.

By the time I got to Rachel, Matty was walking toward the table. Will stood up, as if to keep me from talking to his whore, and introduced Matty as my best friend and co-worker, telling everyone how great Matty was. I almost laughed when Rachel’s eyes traveled over Matty and she licked her lips as if he was some sort of tasty treat. Will was still standing, introducing his boss to Matty, so I moved behind him and sat down in his chair to talk to his neighbor.

"Hello, Rachel! How are you?”

The young woman smiled politely at me, but I could tell she was uncomfortable. “I’m well, Jo. How are you? The house must be so quiet without the kids.”

Matty moved slightly, and I knew that he was paying more attention to my conversation than his own.

I let my eyes sweep over the girl. How old was she? Twenty-four? Maybe twenty-five? She was adorable, I had to give him that. The red sleeveless dress she wore wasn’t revealing, but it was form-fitting, with a coordinating belt buckled around her unbelievably tiny waist. The outfit was so different than the one I’d seen her in last weekend, I was relieved to know that she didn’t dress like a complete trollop at the office. She smiled at me, showing perfectly white, straight teeth. Her brown eyes held nothing but kindness.

I leaned in close so only she could hear. “I’m not at the house. I’m in a hotel, so any time you feel like going to the house, just stop on by. Will’s there alone.”

Her eyes got big, as if she didn’t know that I knew about her and my soon-to-be ex. Her mouth opened as if she was going to say something, then she closed it.

I smiled at her when her eyes fell on Will and she looked as though she might slap him. “He didn’t tell you I moved out?”

Brown eyes snapped back to mine, and she shook her head.

Matty chose that moment to step close, offering his hand to the little woman next to me. She handed him her right hand, and he immediately brought it to his lips. Brushing the top of her hand, he winked. She giggled and flushed bright red. Seriously? Did he have no shame? But I could only grin.

"I'm Matt," he told her in a low voice, raising a suggestive eyebrow.

She sighed. "Rachel."

Giving her his beautiful, I-bet-I-can-get-your-pants-off-in-twenty-minutes-or-less grin, he told her it was nice to meet her. Not looking at me, he held her eyes. “Our lunch is ready, Joes. We should get back to the office.”

I grinned at him, standing up. “It was nice to see you, Rachel.” Avoiding looking at Will, I smiled at the rest of his co-workers as I made my way around the table. “Have a good lunch. I hope you get tons of work done.”

Will moved between Matty and me and grabbed my hand. Turning back to his table, he told them he was walking me out. I turned to give them one more smile and realized that Rachel wasn’t even looking at us; she was smiling at Matty, who was waving good-bye to her.

Will walked me to my car, holding my hand the entire way, even after we were out of sight of his friends. Apparently he wanted to keep up the charade. I tried to pull away once we were through the door, but he didn’t let go.

“Hey.” His voice was soft, and I turned to him. “Thank you. I’m sorry to put you on the spot like that.”

I almost shrugged, then the irritation I’d been holding in came out. “I come here every Friday, William. If you ever listened, you’d know that.”

“I do listen, Joey.” He sighed. “Maybe I wanted to see you.” His voice was still low, and he stepped closer to me. He ran his fingertips over my cheek and onto the side of my head. “You won’t return my calls.”

“I saw the look on your face. You were as surprised as I was. You didn't know you'd see me here.”

He shook his head. “I didn’t know Matt would be with you.” His thumb ran down my cheek to my jaw and lightly rubbed back and forth next to my chin while his fingers slid up toward my ear. “I wanted to see you. Not him. Not you with him.”

I realized suddenly that we were standing closer than we had been a minute ago. Had he moved or had I slid closer to him? I’d forgotten how much I missed his touch, and I closed my eyes for a second. He was so close I could smell his cologne. A familiar ache grew in my core. His fingers were soft, lulling me into relaxation. Then I remembered where we were.

I opened my eyes, surprised to see him watching me. “Did you want to see how I’d react being in the same room as her? Or maybe you just wanted us side by side, so you could see that you chose the right woman?”

Will tipped his head down toward me and sighed again. “Joey, I said I was sorry. I wasn't thinking.” He leaned his forehead into mine as his free hand held my shoulder. “I miss you.”

I heard the bell on the restaurant door jingle as Matty came out, holding our bag of food. He stopped short, hesitated a minute, then took two steps right to us. “Great performance in there, Billy boy. I almost believed you weren’t fucking Rachel.” He held his palm out to me, smiling. “Keys?”

I stepped back, letting go of Will’s hand and forcing apart the connection we were having, grabbed the keys out of my pocket, and handed them to my friend. Matty didn’t move, just stood next to us, almost between us, invading the bubble that Will had just created.

Will’s eyes turned to ice as he glared at Matty. “Mind giving me a minute with my wife?”

“I do, actually. Our lunch is getting cold.” He stepped forward, completely between Will and me. “None of them can see you, Billy, so you can drop the loving husband act. It doesn’t impress Jo.” He stopped, chuckling. “Unless you’re doing it to make me jealous. If you are, no need. I know who she’s going home with.” Matty cocked his head to the side. “If you’ll excuse us,” Matty drawled out slowly, “your estranged wife and I have plans.”

The way he said plans made me blush.

Will made a snorting sound and moved toward the door of the restaurant. “Call me when you decide about tomorrow, Joey.”

Matty turned to me, a weird look on his face. “Tomorrow?”

I walked around the front of the car, to the passenger side, and eased into my seat, explaining as I went. “I told him I wasn’t sure. I didn’t know if we had plans.”

I pulled the seat belt across me, looking up when Matty stayed silent. He smiled, then his hands cupped my cheeks and he pulled me close and kissed me softly. His lips worked against mine, teeth catching my bottom lip and making me moan. I grabbed at his shirt, pulling him close, kissing him back. I was breathless before he pulled away.

I opened my eyes, not even sure when I’d closed them, to see him grinning at me. “What was that?”

He smiled again. “That was me kissing you. Because I can.”

I raised my eyebrow. Matty was so weird sometimes.

But he only smiled. “I have Sam this weekend. I would love it if you join us tomorrow, but I understand if you need to work things out with the douchenozzle.” He pointed his thumb back at the restaurant. “Right now, I just want to go somewhere I can kiss you.”

I smiled as I leaned into him again.

“Yeah, here works.” He laughed, pulling me toward him.

Will, or any of his co-workers, could have walked out and caught us, but at that moment, none of them even crossed my mind. 
 

15

I sang along to the radio as I drove home the next morning. It had been a few weeks since I’d been there, but it had been my home for so many years that I was able to get lost in my thoughts and my car practically drove itself. I smiled, thinking about Matty and the day we’d had yesterday. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had such a fun, relaxing day filled with laughter and kisses. We’d spent the majority of the day on my couch, talking and cuddling. It had been wonderful.

I didn’t know how to classify what we were. He was my best friend, which explained the ease of our time together and our ability to talk about everything or nothing. And now we were
involved.
I laughed at how absurd that sounded. We were best friends enjoying everything the other had to offer. Everything. Thank God I was so comfortable with him; if I wasn’t, I would be too embarrassed to ever look him in the eye again.

I was surprised when I pulled into my driveway; the trip didn’t seem to take long at all. As I looked at my house, sitting in my driveway, panic struck. It looked cold and lonely, even though there were planters filled with wild flowers welcoming visitors and it was sunny and already seventy degrees outside. It didn’t feel like my home anymore. Had things in my life really changed that much in just a couple of weeks?

Will opened the door and stepped through, holding up a hand in greeting. He smiled and bounded down the front steps. “Good morning!”

He had entirely too much energy this morning. Great.

He pulled open my door before I had a chance to and stood on the other side, waiting for me to get out. “Did you have breakfast yet?”

I shook my head. Matty and I had taken Sam to dinner and the movies last night, and because Taylor was still at the house and Matty didn’t want Sam in the hotel with us, we’d taken him back to Becky’s afterward. Sam hadn’t seemed upset that he had to go back to his mom’s, but Matty had promised that he’d be there to pick him up before Sam got out of bed. True to his word, Matty had left before I got up this morning.

Will smiled. “Good. I made you some.”

He’d made me my favorite breakfast—homemade waffles with fresh strawberries and whipped cream with a side of maple bacon. They were delicious, and we made comfortable small talk throughout the meal. The kitchen looked just as it had when I’d left, and for a few minutes, it was easy to pretend everything was back to normal.

Will didn’t waste any time once we were done eating though. “We need to talk about the papers.”

I put my coffee mug back on the table and looked at him. “What do you want me to say?”

“I want to know if you really want to get divorced.”

I gaped at him. “Me?”
Yeah, okay.
“I’m not the one who served you.” I narrowed my eyes at him. “You wanted this. Not me.”

He turned his coffee cup in his hands. “You wouldn’t talk to me.”

“So your answer was to serve me with legal separation papers? To divorce me?” I shook my head angrily. “I needed space. You want freedom. Two totally different things.” He tried to interrupt, but I moved my hand, cutting him off. “What—do you want me to tell you I’m miserable? Do you want me to beg you to change your mind? ‘Cause I won’t do that.” I stood up, grabbed our empty plates, and walked to the sink.