Survivor: Steel Jockeys MC (12 page)

She thought back to Sean, and the brief bit of information he'd offered about Joe's upbringing, or lack thereof. She hadn't asked about where he'd gone after his mother's death; certainly his options hadn't been ideal.

When they lost their parents, she and Kyle were lucky enough to have each other, which had saved them from being thrown into the system.

Joe hadn't had anyone, and he'd been even younger.

"Not about that, anyway. What..." she took a deep breath. She couldn't believe she was about to pry like this into Joe's past, but she reasoned it was necessary. If she was going to get to the bottom of his involvement in Kyle's death, if she was going to understand why he was the way he was; he was going to have to know more about him.

Her interest was--had to be--purely in the interests of giving herself the upper hand. She'd been so foolish at the rest stop, thinking about what her and Joe's life together might be like. That maybe she could coax him out of the Jockeys or she could fix him or shape him into the man she felt he could be, or should have been. He was unchangeable, and his past had made him that way. They may be on his turf, but from now on, she would have to make sure that every other advantage would go to her.

She'd awoken in the dark, disoriented. Momentarily, she forgot where she was. She fumbled for a light switch and almost tumbled out of bed in her desperation to get out of the dark. It was then that it occurred to her that she was expected to have dinner with the Curtis family, and that somebody had mentioned that Joe was likely to return there.

"Come on," Regan said. "Let's get you dressed."

"Oh, you don't have to--I'll just wear what I was wearing before."

"You'll find that a bit uncomfortable, considering those clothes are churning around in the washing machine as we speak," she said. "Come on. I bet you haven't changed for days and I know you don't have a change of clothes in that tiny little handbag of yours."

"No makeup, either," Ruby admitted in a small voice. "Well, just some powder and lip gloss." She'd been trying to do the best she could with it for a few days, praying nobody--least of all Joe--would notice the dark circles under her eyes, the unplucked eyebrows, and imperfect complexion--half greasy, half-ashen. Thank God she had a spare comb in there too because after so much time on the bike, trying to tame her hair would have been like taking a machete through the Amazon jungle.

"Ooh, fun! You know, I went to cosmetology school for like a minute. Show me the inside of your wrist." Bewildered and blinking, Ruby turned her wrist over, and Regan reached out her own hand. "Your skin is so..."

"Weird?" asked Ruby. She'd never known anyone, all through school, who had the same strange olive tone as she did--her father's fairness and her mother's darkness had combined to create something entirely different. Kyle, of course, had it too, and he used to joke that they were some kind of new species.

"Like Kyle's," laughed Regan. “We’ve got nothing even close. But I think you're definitely closer to my skin tone than Holly's. Wait here." She flew into the bathroom and came back with a train case full of cosmetics, dumped it down on the spare bed, and clicked it open. "Might be a little off, but I'll do my best. Besides," she added with a mischievous little gleam in her eye, "it's not like there's anybody special coming. Anybody who you're trying to impress," she added softly. She bent down and whispered in her ear. "He likes girls in leather pants."

"Regan!" Ruby exclaimed, rising to her feet. "I can't tell whether you think I have a thing for Joe, or whether
you
do."

Regan giggled. "I know, I know, I'm sorry! I'm terrible. But it's all in fun, I swear. Joe and I flirt all the time, but that's just who we are. He really is like my brother.”

“It wasn’t always that way, was it?” Ruby asked.

Regan sighed. “No,” she admitted. “When he came to live with us, I was fourteen. He was older, straight-up hot and a certifiable bad boy, and of course I was crazy about him. And even weirder, he was nice to me--which shocked me, because he was an absolute ass to Dad and Holly. He gave me cigarettes and rides on his bike--when Dad wasn't looking of course, because Dad’s a total hypocrite. And my girlfriends sometimes made excuses to come over here just to see him. Some of them still hang around the bar when he's there. I hate it. I mean, it's not like I'm jealous, but I just... don't want to share."

"You're a fun hostess, aren't you?" joked Ruby.

Regan laughed and nodded, "I try."

"Anyway, for the record, I’m not interested in Joe. I thought--” she swallowed. “Regan, this is going to sound weird, but..." The teen looked attentive. "I think you should be really careful around Joe. I know you think you know him really well. But...but people change. When they see stuff they shouldn't see, bad stuff...they change. Sometimes they can't help it. But I found out something the other day that convinced me that he's not what he seems."

"What?"

Ruby knew this was beyond what Regan needed to know about Joe, Kyle, or about what was going on with the Jockeys. She knew there was a reason Colt had wanted to shield her from it for so long, and he hadn't been wrong. "Nothing important. I just wish I'd known earlier not to trust so easily. No matter what they tell you. Or what they promise you." She must have sounded more intense than she meant to, because Regan dabbed the last of the eyeliner and got up slowly.

"I doubt you'll have any pants that fit me," said Ruby.

"No, because you actually can wear women's clothes," sighed Regan. "Rather than stuff designed for ten-year-old boys." She brought out a ruffled white blouse with silver threads laced through it.

"Isn't that a little low-cut?" Ruby asked.

"Hey, if you've got the assets, show them off," said Regan. She pulled out a draped heather gray-cardigan, one cut low with a lot of extra fabric in front. "What do you think of this?"

Ruby smiled a little, remembering what Regan had said about Joe liking leather pants. "Don't you have anything a little edgy?"

She'd been wearing cardigans, button-downs, and ballet flats for as long as she could remember. Probably influenced by her mother, who had excellent taste but was more than a little conservative when it came to her wardrobe. Compared to the raw juiciness of the girls Joe was used to, Ruby must have had all the appeal of dry toast. All naive and innocent, it was no surprise he thought she’d be easy to lie to. Her face burned again.

"My Dad doesn't let me do edgy."

"He lets Morgan do edgy."

Regan made an exasperated noise. "He lets Morgan do
everything."
She grinned almost evilly. "Except the one thing she really wants."

"What's that?"

"Watch her when Joe walks into the room. You'll know." She paused then added, "Mostly by the way my dad is sending out death rays from his eyeballs."

"Your dad is a strange man, isn't he? He's so conservative when it comes to his daughters. He's like a tax accountant trapped in a biker's body."

"Yeah. Before he had me was a different story, though. You can't see it under all the whiskers, but once he actually got part of his ear chewed off in a bar. He never found it again."

"The bar, or the ear?"

"Hmm," she said, her voice muffled from within the closet, having been distracted, Ruby reasoned, by the search for something edgy. "I don't--wait." She snapped her fingers and disappeared over into the spare room. She returned with a pair of black leather pants that looked tantalizingly close to Ruby's size. "Here's something that used to be my mom's. Wish I had her body. Instead I got my grandma's." She laid them in Ruby's lap. "Well?"

Ruby got up and held them up to her body. She had to admit, the material was as supple as the seat of Joe's motorcycle when she slung her legs over it, and they were teasingly close to being her size. She could tell without even checking the tag. But she'd also never worn leather pants before in her life.

"Joe does like you, though." Regan lowered her eyes and fiddled with the cap of a lip gloss. Ruby was kind of charmed by the way Regan could talk her ear off, then suddenly get all sweet and shy. "He has two ways of looking at women. The first one is all about the trappings. And it’s not just looks. It’s money; it’s power. That's not you."

"Thanks."

"No, listen. As gorgeous as he is, he can use girls." Ruby opened her mouth. "He doesn't like to, but sometimes he does. And I don't blame him. When you come from nothing, you've got to use every trick at your disposal." Regan was staring off into space. Ruby struggled with the zipper on the pants, bending down to take it between her teeth when Regan wasn't looking. "And the other way?" She asked through a mouthful of metal. Success. She zipped herself in, feeling instantly taller, sleeker, and sexier. And utterly unlike herself.

"The other way is when he wants to know
you
. Then he looks past. Right into the heart." She looked at the floor, then raised her eyes, but it wasn't Regan that Ruby was seeing all of a sudden. It was Joe, looking at her the same way, with that earnest and intelligent confusion, as if he wanted to unwrap her and taste her all in one bite.

"When I first met him, I would have killed for him to look at me like that." Regan laughed a little bit and dipped some more powder on the puff. She frowned as she ran it lightly over Ruby's eyelids, then frowned as Ruby started coughing. "Ah, but it's okay. Wasn't meant to be." She'd gone over the same spot three times, and the dust was beginning to crowd Ruby's sinuses. It was obvious that Regan, when her mind was somewhere else, tended toward distraction. But Ruby suspected it wasn't Joe to whom the teenager's thoughts had wandered. "Oops. Powder was lesson two, and I never made it past lesson one."

"Dare I ask what lesson one was?"

"Eyeliner," said Regan, her face buried in her kit. "Gosh, I'm jealous of your eyes. They're, like, insane. They're not green, they're not gray, they're not hazel...they're like...grazel."

"Grazel," repeated Ruby. "I like that."

"Kyle had the same ones," Regan said softly. "And--" She seemed to swallow her words.

"What?"

"Never mind." Regan's face had gone a little red under her makeup, and she quickly cast her eyes back down to her work, dipping the brush into the powder and tapping it almost fiercely on the side of the container.

"I guess you're right," she sighed. "None of us are quite what we seem."

"More pinot?" asked Holly, holding out the bottle.

She'd already drank a third of her glass, knowing there was a fine line to walk between loosening up and losing control. At the end of the table, Regan was taking quick sips, as if she were afraid her parents would change their minds about letting her have any. Only thirteen-year-old Morgan, who was like a miniature version of her mother, right down to the blonde pixie cut and triple-pierced ears, had been denied a taste.

Earlier, she'd clattered into the room, thrown her black leather XOXO handbag down on the sofa, and started whining about a party she was going to miss that weekend since Holly had apparently grounded her for getting too many detentions at school. Ruby had known girls exactly like Morgan as a teenager. The ones who got invited to every party, who skipped class, and talked back to their teachers. The girls who started drinking, smoking, and having sex before Ruby had even known what half of that stuff was.

Of course, it wasn't surprising to Ruby, looking at her family. From gigantic, red-bearded, red-faced Colt, who had foregone the wine altogether and was on his third glass of Jack, to tattooed Holly. Then there was Regan, who, while she looked fairly conventional, worked at a biker bar surrounded by rough, dangerous guys twice her age. She understood now, with her button-down clean-shaven businessman father and Suzy Homemaker mother, that she never had a chance.

"But why does
she
have to be here?" Ruby had heard the teen complain to her mother earlier, when she’d thought Ruby wasn't listening.

"Because she's Kyle's sister, and she needs help. That's why. And if I hear another word from you about it, you can forget about going to
next
weekend's party, too."

A big sigh was all she'd gotten in return, but it was enough to make Ruby uneasy the next time she encountered the girl. After what Regan had told her about her feelings toward Joe, she had an inkling about why her welcome toward Ruby had been less than warm.

But still, it was Morgan she had to keep her attention on at dinner--Morgan, and Regan, and Colt--anyone, in fact, besides the young man seated directly across from her at the table.

It was torture to have to think every second that he might be looking at her, sizing her up. Or to momentarily glance up from behind her wineglass, hoping not to meet his gaze, only to find a pair of intense amber-gold eyes dart away with a look of concern, and maybe something else, something she was as desperate to hide as she was.

He'd been reserved, almost standoffish with her when they'd encountered each other in the kitchen. She'd at last built up the resolve to slip downstairs, tempted by the warmth, voices, and the delicious Italian-restaurant smell seeping up through the vents.

She’d spotted him leaning against the counter, drinking a bottle of Anchor Steam and chatting casually with Regan. The dark-haired girl gazed up at him, not even trying to hide her adoration, which, though intense, Ruby now knew was more or less innocuous. And, although it exhilarated but did not surprise her, he looked good. He'd looked like he'd showered and gotten a little rest since she'd last seen him. He'd taken off his leather jacket and added a black hoodie over a blue V-neck t-shirt that still showed off his collarbone, which she tried not to stare at as she cleared her throat. In fact, his jacket was hanging on the railing leading upstairs. For a second, she stood there staring at it.

"Excuse me," she said, pausing in the doorway into the dining room. He'd looked up at her, momentarily surprised, though she could see him trying to remain casual. She coldly slipped by him, avoiding his gaze. He seemed confused, but also resigned to not pushing an interaction with her. He seemed to realize that, for whatever reason, she needed her distance.

She made her way into the dining room, where she was immediately handed a glass of wine by Holly. She stared out at the Curtis' backyard, which, not to her surprise, contained a pole shed with the door hanging halfway open, stuffed to the gills with hulks of old motorcycle chassis and rusted-out parts.

"It's an eyesore, I know," said Holly from behind her. "But Colt claims that he needs every single thing that's in there and believe me, if I try to throw even a single sparkplug away, he'll know. Besides, when he’s not with the club, it keeps him busy, calm, and out of my hair, so I guess I can't complain too much," she laughed. "What was that old book called? Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance?"

"I prefer yoga myself," murmured Ruby.

"Hey, it worked for Kyle. Colt taught him everything he knew out there about fixing bikes. Joe, too, eventually," said Holly, turning around as if to call attention to the young blond man whose presence seemed to radiate throughout the room.

Joe was with Morgan now, who had already plopped down at the dining table, barely hiding the fact that she was tapping away at the iPhone that rested in her lap, the kind of this-is-stupid look on her face that only a teenager could pull off. But Joe glanced over her shoulder and cracked some joke that even made the moody teen laugh out loud.

Ruby gritted her teeth; tried to look away. He deserved an Oscar, even if she didn't. She'd been foolish to think she could ignore him; as foolish as the family whose home she was in, who thought they could trust him. After all, how could Holly, and even Colt, have known what Joe was up to when he rode out every night with Kyle?

For all they knew, he could have been collaborating with the very people who had killed Kyle, or even...She touched the pocket of the cardigan Regan had loaned her. Her face burned suddenly. One evil thought led to another. Sure, Regan had assured her that there had never been anything between her and Joe, but how could she believe that? She, like Joe, had been raised in an environment where dishonesty was a way of life.

You didn't grow up with outlaw M.C. members for a family and not absorb that mentality. It was just impossible. That was why Ruby had kept the Jockeys at arm's length for so long. And even if it meant she'd been naive, now that she knew the truth, she was glad she had.

"Ruby, are you okay?" Joe asked suddenly from behind her. She froze, hands clenched at her sides, trying to push down the simultaneous electric charges she felt--of being grateful of the mere fact that he was near her, and excoriating herself for falling for his charms--again. She turned her back, pretended not hear him. Trying to reply, trying to choke out an answer and pretend nothing was wrong. Trying to meet his eyes without wanting to crumple.

"The lasagna's almost ready," said Holly to Joe. Thank God for her, Ruby thought.

"It smells delicious," he replied a little absently.

Ruby was haunted by another sudden realization. He knew. He knew she had found the ruby. No; how could he? She put it right back in his pocket after the rest stop, and he hadn’t touched his jacket since he’d hung it on the railing.

Or maybe she was all wrong, and he had no idea about the necklace. But he knew something was wrong. He’d have to be oblivious not to. She was glad of that at least. The sooner he realized he couldn't lead her around by the nose anymore, the better off they'd all be.

They all pulled up chairs as Holly as placed the lasagna on the table on top of a wicker trivet. Joe was right; it did smell divine, and it had certainly felt like years since she'd had a proper, sit-down meal. She should be hungry, but the last thing she could concentrate on was filling her stomach. In fact, she'd have a hard time eating at all knowing that Joe was sitting across from her. He had enough finesse not to stare openly, but she knew he'd be paying attention to everything she did. He had the talent for seeing without looking.

"I hope you had a good rest," Holly said to Ruby. "You look lovely, by the way. That color brings out your eyes. Doesn't it, Joe?"

Joe raised his head from where he'd been talking to Colt, flipping his wheat-colored forelock of hair off his face. Ruby was immediately self-conscious. She remembered Regan's line:
He likes leather pants.
Being around the Curtises seemed to bring out something new in him. It was true that even here, Joe never really let his guard down; never risked shedding his armor.

But still, he was laughing easier and smiling more. It was as if he had reverted to a slightly younger, freer version of the intense, determined young man she had gotten to know. He'd taken that mask off with her, too, briefly. Like when he’d first tried to coax her onto the motorcycle,  after they'd gotten out of the situation with Sean, and later, when he was teaching her how to aim the gun.

Never before had Ruby noticed the kind of profound loneliness that seemed to be inherent in him, even in the middle of a crowded room. He would pause in the middle of some story and look down into his glass, or play with his fork, or run his fingers along the edge of the tablecloth. Ruby could tell his mind was someplace far away, someplace none of them could follow. It made Ruby ache, because she knew she wanted to. She wanted to be close enough to know where he went. To be that privileged one, as Kyle had been, and to be let into that place.

A warm shiver formed deep inside her as she thought, once again, of how he had kissed her on Desiree's sofa bed. Of the way his hand had curled slowly but confidently around her waist, looking like he wanted to let her in but didn't quite know how.

It was as if there were two magnets set on either side of the room, simultaneously pushing Ruby towards him, and reminding her that she needed to pull away. As earnest as Joe seemed, he was capable, perhaps more than anyone else, of taking the trust she had carefully offered him and maiming it beyond repair. Of leading her so far into the abyss that she could never crawl out. And worst of all, she knew she was doomed to be trapped there, in that no man's land between the poles, for as long as she stayed in Joe's orbit.

At the moment, though, his expression was serious, as if he were determined that she know he meant every word. And although his gaze definitely rested admiringly for a split-second on the leather caressing her lower half, he lingered longer on her face.

"She looks beautiful."

Ruby was startled, having lost her composure. Regan had been right when she’d said that Joe had a certain way of looking at her. His gaze wasn't like the gaze of anyone else. It was lingering, searching, but respectful. It was like he was aiming his eyes far past the surface, past her body and what she was wearing, to within. Like he was interested in all of her, body and soul.

It should have made her feel violated, but it didn't, and that made it worse. It was like he knew how she wanted to be looked at, and that wasn’t fair. He had no right. Especially not now, when she knew what a lie it all was. He raised the corner of his lip to smile at her, the finger of his other hand running around the mouth of his beer bottle, a nervous gesture that didn't seem conscious. She tore herself away and pressed her lips to the edge of her glass.

"I'm so jealous," piped up Regan, who had snagged the chair next to Ruby. "Ruby looks better in my clothes than I do. She actually fills them out. On me, they just hang there like curtains. I'll take some more of that pinot, Holly."

Her stepmother gave her a faux-dirty look, but she did poor a thimbleful of wine into Regan's glass. "Drink it slow. I'll be watching."

Yes, he’d called her beautiful, but after having tried to engage her earlier, it seemed Joe had given up the task. And now this no-hassle attitude, in Ruby's churning mind, felt like neglect, and it angered her. The conversation that night, to Ruby's consternation, was all about Kyle and Joe, about their antics as teenagers and later, as the youngest members of the Steel Jockeys.

It became clear to Ruby that though he held affection for Colt and his family, it was Kyle whom he had loved like a brother, and no other relationship in his life had yet replaced that bond. Ruby tried to laugh along, but she felt herself sink lower and lower into her seat.

"Remember how Joe and Kyle had a surprise birthday party for Colt at a strip club in Oakland?" spoke up Holly.

Was that before or after he stabbed him in the back?
Ruby wondered.

“How could I forget?” Colt chortled, and Holly turned to Ruby to explain.

"They told me to show up at this address in the city that I didn't recognize of course. I'd never heard of it in my life and I figured it was some banquet hall. So I show up with Colt's seventy-eight year old mother, whom I’d just picked up from the rest home."