Oxygen Deprived (Kilgore Fire Book 3) (28 page)

“The baby is being a rotten turd,” Annie offered as she stuck her head under Mig’s arm. “He takes after his father.”

Mig snorted.

“That’s what you say every time he keeps you up all night,” Mig said to his wife. “But then he starts walking two months before most kids, and you say he takes after you.”

Annie grinned unrepentantly. “Yeah,” she admitted. “I do
do that, don’t I?”

I skittered past them into the main room of the clubhouse.

The place itself was located just off of the Caddo River, a nifty little river/lake that ran from Texas all the way down to the Gulf of Mexico.

A long time ago the river was used to transport a plethora
of goods that were sold in the southern states. It was a main source of income for the small town of Uncertain, Texas
way back when.

However, over time, it had become just another river until a few years ago when bad things started happening surrounding all of the cities that had Caddo running through it.

It was suspected that the river was being used to transport illegal goods up and down the river.

Since the river was relatively unsupervised, a lot of the time people got away with their illegal activities.

Then The Uncertain Saints happened, effectively tearing a hole in the bad guy’s plans.

The clubhouse was deliberately put on the river, in a very popular part that saw a lot of through traffic.

The house stood on beams that lifted the entire thing a whole single story up in the air. It resembled more of a beach house than one you’d expect to see on the lake, but I loved it.

It wasn’t old, per se, but it had quite a bit of that old feel to it.

When the Saints had built it, they’d used quite a few old houses and barns to make it.

Now, although it was less than ten years old, it looked more like it was hundreds.

“Hey sweetheart,” my brother, Ridley, called.

I turned to find him staring at me with an expectant look on his face.

I sighed and pulled a Hershey’s bar out of my pocket and handed it to him.

“Happy?” I asked.

He glared at me.

“I don’t mind you living in my house…,” I interrupted him before he could get any more words that might offend me out of that stupid mouth of his.

“It’s our house,” I chided
. “It’s no more your house than my house.”

He shrugged.

“Papaw signed it over to me, and you know it,” he said, knowing it would rile me up.

I ignored him and walked to the cooler that was sitting out on the back deck that overlooked the river.

Lifting the lid, I reached for the Mike’s Hard Lemonade that my brother most likely bought specifically for me.

The ladies that’d recently started to become a permanent fixture in the Uncertain Saint’s MC were more wine drinkers.

I was most likely the only one that drank actual ‘wiener drinks’, as my brother liked to call them.

Apparently, there wasn’t as much alcohol in it, and he made it a point to tell me that all the time.

He hated that I always had my drinks at home, but never made it a point to grab his.

Yes, my brother and I lived together.

No, neither of us had anyone.

And yes, I brought men home.

My brother didn’t bring any women home, but that was more because he was still in love with his dead wife.

I’d just closed the cooler lid when I heard the new prospect.

Well, I didn’t know for sure if it was him, but the plain leather vest on the man’s back was a good indication he was the one my brother had been telling me about.

He’d been there for a while, but this was my first club party in well over six months.

He was a permanent fixture here, by now, and by the look of all the ladies crawling all over him, he was popular to boot.

Then he had to go and open that mouth, making shivers race down my spine with the deep, raspy cadence of it.

I immediately took my drink and headed the other way, not wanting to get caught up in the mess that was a prospect.

The Uncertain Saints didn’t let many people into their fold.

In fact, there were only six members total, throughout the entire club, and not one of them had the time or inclination to add more to their group.

I knew it had to be a special circumstance that made it possible for the men of the Uncertain Saints to even consider adding that man to the group.

Which meant he was fucked up.

And I didn’t do fucked up.

I had my own fucked up to deal with.

Kind of like quitting my job.

Two hours and four hard lemonades later, I was feeling quite nice.

I hadn’t thought about my job once, and I was having a great time watching the comings and goings.

“Why the long face?” The man I’d been studiously avoiding all night, Apple, asked.

I turned my face and shrugged. “Nothing.”

And at that point, there really was nothing wrong.

“You look like you’re about to kill someone,” the annoying man observed.

I shrugged, picking at the invisible lint on my shoulder before I picked up my spoon and shoveled another bite of the chicken spaghetti someone had made into my mouth.

It was pretty good, but it wasn’t like Papaw fixed it.

There was good, and then there was
good
. And this wasn’t it.

We sat next to each other in companionable silence as we both ate our food.

I glanced over at the man’s plate, and nearly laughed when I saw how much food was on it.

With the helping he’d gotten of the food mounded on the plate, I feared for the integrity of the Styrofoam that was straining to hold its form.

“What are you looking at?” He asked, not bothering to turn his face, instead he kept shoveling his food into his mouth, imitating a Hoover Vacuum

“I was just wondering if you left any for the rest of them,” I said absently, going back to my food.

“Everyone had already eaten,” he muttered. “Apparently, when you’re a prospect, you eat last.”

“Hmm,” I hummed
. “Imagine that.”

He snorted.

“Why are you a prospect, anyway?” I asked.

“Because I want to be,” he muttered, and I felt the instant coolness that came with the words.

I didn’t say anything else, only went back to eating my food.

The weird wall of tension between us slowly dissipated until the only thing left was awareness.

He was a sexy man.

He was tall with blonde hair that that I couldn’t decide whether it had a hint of red or not.

He had a blonde beard that was trimmed close to his face, but wasn’t over the top like some of the other’s in the MC.

He had light blue eyes that were rimmed with a hint of green, and a very muscular body.

Not Hulk muscular, but a nicely toned body that looked to be from working rather than working out.

Not that I didn’t think he did one over the other. He just looked like he didn’t go to the gym much.

“So what do you do?” I asked curiously.

“I’m a game warden…and a lumberjack,” he muttered, slurping up another forkful of chicken spaghetti.

“A lumberjack?” I asked. “Is that even a real occupation anymore?”

He turned to look at me.

“Yes.”

One word was all I received, and I knew better than to continue on that line of questioning.

“I’m in school to become a paralegal,” I told him, sensing a change of subject was needed.

“Yeah,” he said. “I heard.”

“You did?” I asked in confusion. Had I already told him that?

No.

He nodded. “Your brother, Ridley, told me.”

I blinked.

Ridley didn’t often talk about me to other people.

I was a very private person, but then again, having what I had, and experiencing what I did, was the reasoning behind that.

“Oh,” was the only thing I could think to say.

“He said you hate doing it,” he continued.

I snorted.

“Yeah, you could say that.”

“Then why do you do it?” He persisted.

“Because I need the job…and the money,” I said, raising my brows at him.

And it was hard to find a job that would work around my ailment.

“What’s so bad about it?” He asked, pushing his plate away from him.

It was completely empty, and looked almost as if he’d licked the damn thing.

“You really wanna know?” I asked.

He nodded.

“Well, my day started off a little like this: I walked into the building to hear a man say, ‘You’re always looking for a man to sweep you off your feet. Well, let me tell you something, woman!’” I imitated the way the man had sounded. “’Sweeping is your job!’”

And that had been the turning point…the fork in the road, as one would say.

“I knew, as soon as I heard the man say that, that it wasn’t going to be a good case.

“Then he’d gone and proved me right by continuing to manipulate the woman over and over again, forcing her to agree to his edicts, all because he had money and she didn’t,” I sighed, and dropped my head into my hands. “I hate it. But I like it all at the same time. I like seeing my clients win. I like seeing the kids get what they deserve.”

Apple nodded.

“I’m not a full time lumberjack,” he said finally, going back to our earlier topic. “But my dad’s business is his livelihood, and if I’m not there to do it, he can’t pay the bills.”

That made more sense, and I now had a reason for him and his reluctance to speak more on the subject.

He got up and grabbed himself a beer from the cooler, as well as another drink for me.

He handed them both to me as a commotion at the font of the room had me smiling at one of the men’s wives, Tasha, giving Casten, another member, the smack down.

She was a fireball, that was for sure.

“Thank you,” I muttered, reaching for the bottle to twist the lid off.

He took it back out of my hands and twisted the top of effortlessly before handing it back to me without another word.

I thanked him again before taking another sip.

I was going to regret drinking in the morning, that was for sure. But I couldn’t figure my own mind out, and to do that I needed to let go a little bit.

“Are they fighting about goats?” He asked.

I nodded. “She wants some, and he doesn’t.”

“I can tell that,” he muttered
. “
But don’t they live in the city?”

I nodded. “She saw a video last week about a goat as a house pet. The owners even took them on walks and everything.”

“Interesting,” he said. “I have goats.”

“You do?” I asked.

He nodded. “Yeah, but they’re not pets, that’s for sure.”

I smiled, unable to help myself.

Seeing this big badass in his tight red t-shirt, faded blue jeans that had holes in both the knees, as well as where I guessed his keys were held in his pockets, with his tight leather vest really made me want to laugh.

He was the exact opposite of what I expected him to be when I walked into the clubhouse today.

Fun, came to mind.

I drank my lemonade, smiling from time to time when the man had something funny to say.

And when he was asked to help him start picking up the trash, I didn’t even hesitate. I just helped him.

My brother gave me a weird look, but ultimately ignored me for the conversation he was having with a few men from the police department.

People started to leave, and the only ones left, by the time I thought it sufficiently clean
enough, were
my brother, Peek, the president, and his wife, Casten and his wife, Mig and his wife, Apple and me.

“Thanks for the help,” he said genuinely.

I shrugged and picked up a new bottle of lemonade from the cooler, then sat on the only open seat, which happened to be the fireplace ledge.

Apple started to lean against the mantle, but I moved over slightly giving him room to sit next to me.

Although it was a tight fit, he didn’t complain.

“Thanks,” he said.

I nodded, too busy smelling him to say ‘you’re welcome.’

“I think we should go on a fun run two weeks from now,” Peek interrupted my perving
, bringing everyone’s attention to him. “We haven’t gone on one in a couple of months, and now that everyone’s finally free of babies and shit, I want to go. To Arizona.”

“What’s in Arizona?” I found myself asking.

It’s not like I was invited to go.

In fact, I hadn’t
ever
ridden on the back of a motorcycle.

My brother was too scared of the possible consequences of me falling off during one of my ‘fits’, as he liked to call them, that I never bothered asking him anymore.

I peeled the label off my bottle, completely forgetting that I’d even asked a question until the room got silent around me, finally making me pull my head up in confusion.

They were all staring at me.

Even the newbie.

“What?” I asked.

My brother was the one to answer.

“Mr. Prospect here just asked you if you wanted to ride with him to Arizona,” Ridley grinned
, making it sound like he knew I would turn him down. “And to answer your question, nothing’s in Arizona. We just like to go to different places and see the sights.”

My brother’s face looked so supreme, so sure of himself, that I wanted to knock him down a notch.

He was always doing that, acting like he knew what was best for me, and it was suffocating.

So I put my foot into it.

“I’d love to,” I agreed, turning my head to see Apple staring at me expectantly.

His eyes showed surprise, and then satisfaction…and then worry.

He looked over at my brother, then back to me.

“Am I missing something?” He asked.

I grinned.

“No,” I denied
. “Not anything important.”