Sweet Perdition (7 page)

She paused for a moment, clearly considering his question. “Last night gave me closure. It brought up old wounds and people whispering behind my back all night sure didn’t help either, but the whole thing is over. He’s married and it’s done.” She sighed. “It’s kind of a relief, really, like I can finally move on.”

He studied her a moment. She seemed fine, no trace of the lonely girl he’d met last night. He believed her. “Okay then. I’ll pick you up at seven. We’ll grab some dinner and maybe go on a ride or something.”

He’d rather spend the night screwing her seven ways from Sunday, but he bet a girl like her expected a proper date, with a meal and shit. Well, he could play along with if it kept her in his bed.

She agreed, gave him her address and phone number, and they both finished their food.
Damn.
He’d just planned a real date with a woman. Break out the maxi pads, he’d officially become a chick.

***

“Got a minute? I need to go over the prep for Duke’s homecoming party with you.”

He glanced up to see his mother, Eddie Rollins standing in the doorway of his office. “Shit,” he muttered, under his breath.

It had been an hour since Elizabeth had left and he’d been going over the bar’s sales figures for the month, or trying to. He hadn’t been exactly been productive today. Pinky had him distracted as hell. He couldn’t get her out of his head and worse, didn’t want to.

As for his mother’s presence, he knew an excuse when he heard one. The two of them had gone over the party specs a couple of days ago. Not that he really gave a shit about Duke or his beer bash. But as a brother, he had an obligation. Duke had gotten paroled after doing a nickel in Huntsville and the guys planned to throw him one hell of a shindig to celebrate.

They always did it up right when one of the Horsemen got out of the system. Lots of booze, they grilled up some dogs and burgers, and then they waded through a whole lot of hellions afterwards. Good thing too. Institutional food could be bland, toilet wine literally tasted like piss, and worse? No pussy.

As for planning a party? It should have been an old lady duty, but their ranks had gone way down in recent years. Mostly because most of the Horsemen were bachelors. So he’d sucked it up and volunteered to help plan the damn thing.

Eddie smoothed her blue sweater and sat down in the seat directly in front of his desk. In her late fifties, she was still a beauty with vivid green eyes and manicured nails. She had twin streaks of white flowing from her temples, framing the rest of her brown hair. With her stiletto heels and penchant for tight clothes, she had a serious MILF vibe and he’d caught more than one of his brothers checking out her ass.

Ryker had to knock some heads together to make it known that his mom was off limits. She didn’t really need the protection, though. Eddie had a layer of cold steel right beneath her motherly vibe. Like June Cleaver fused with Bonnie Parker of Bonnie and Clyde fame. Most people found it unsettling, but he kinda loved it.

He crossed his arms over his chest. “Come on. Out with it. I know why you are really here. Who told you about her?” He needed to know who to beat the shit out of. Gossip had a way of spreading around the bar at a breakneck pace. Perdition could be worse than a fucking sorority house.

She tossed her clipboard on the seat beside her, all pretense gone. “Now we are getting somewhere! So her name is Elizabeth. That’s good,” she said thoughtfully. “It isn’t Trixie or Candy or some other bullshit stripper name.”

He stared at her, waiting to hear about the guilty party.

She rolled her eyes. “Fine. If you must know, Shep told me. He thinks she isn’t old lady material. How many times have I told you? The Billy Jean rule applies. Don’t go around breaking young girls’ hearts. If you want to screw around? Find a hellion. But if you are really interested in dating this girl… that’s a whole different matter!”

Please, let her drop this line of questioning.

His mother had always been too interested in his love life. He might as well be fourteen again, sitting at the dinner table and suffering through dueling cases of acne and blue balls.

“I don’t date good girls, Mom. Especially, not pretty college-educated ones who want a steady relationship.” He only sport fucked chicks who didn’t want a commitment. “Butt out of my sex life.”

She rested her high heels on the edge of his desk. “Not a chance. I’m getting sick of the manwhore routine. You are thirty-five years old. You and your brother, Axel, need to grow the hell up. At your age? I had two kids.”

Oh, here we go again.

“Yeah, I’m in my thirties, mom, not my forties. Plenty young enough to worry about having a family later.” Although, honestly, he had no desire to have a wife or kids. He would never put people he loved through the hell that had been his own childhood.

“The time passes faster than you think. And what about me? I need some grandkids before I die. I want to go to the park and make macaroni and cheese again. I miss having babies around. And this time?” She grinned. “I get to do all the fun stuff and
you
get to change the shitty diapers.”

“Oh, I see, this is about you?”

“It is about both of us, kid,” she said seriously. “You need to settle down, have a real family. Haven’t you had enough of these skanky girls you screw and forget? You need a real woman in your life, someone who’s strong and smart, who loves you, takes care of you. A partner.”

She didn’t say it, but he knew what she meant. She wanted him to have someone in his life like her. His mother had to be strong. Stronger than any man he’d ever known. She’d been both a father and a mother to him when his dad went to prison.

“That isn’t me, at least not now. I don’t lead the kind of life you share with a good woman.”

“Don’t hand me excuses. You are a good man and you make decent money. You’d make a great husband, if you let yourself consider the possibility.” She grabbed his hand. Squeezed it. “You aren’t like your father and it doesn’t have to end badly, kid.”

He pulled away from her, closed the spreadsheets on his desktop. Not like he could focus on them right now anyway. He finally met her eyes. “There are no guarantees. You know that better than anyone.”

She stood up and rounded the desk to press a kiss to his forehead. “Sometimes, shit happens, kid, and you have to deal with it. Maybe it will be different for you. Maybe it won’t. But you can’t let the past screw up your future because you are afraid something might go wrong.”

He turned his head away from her. “I’m a realist.”

“You mean a pessimist.” She walked around the desk, stopped in the doorway for a moment. “But if you do get something real going with this girl, make sure you actually take her on a date. Not one of your bend her over behind the bar deals. Do it up right with some wine and candles.”

Hmm. Good idea
. Not that he would encourage her by saying so. “Goodbye, Mom,” he prompted.

“And I reserve the right to vet her.”

No way.
“I can vet my own women, mom.”

“Try and stop me.” With those words, she strolled out.

Not worth arguing about.

They would screw for a while and move on. She might be in his bed, but he had no plans to let her in his life. Besides, she’d run screaming from him, if she knew half the shit he’d done.

Ryker had to keep his distance from her, for both of their sakes.

Chapter Four

The day dragged on for what felt like years.

Elizabeth had been determined to keep busy. She paid bills, did some laundry, loaded the dishwasher, checked her email.

She’d even taken her sedan to the car wash and gotten an oil check, for pity’s sake. Unfortunately, the old bucket of bolts had a slow but persistent oil leak she needed to fix and it routinely left puddles in the driveway. But until she could afford repairs, she’d keep filling it with oil and hope for the best.

Yes, she’d done lots of little time-filling chores, but she hadn’t been able to concentrate on any of them and she normally loved crossing items off her to do list. Today, she felt on edge, eager to be in Ryker’s company again.

Damn, the man was like a drug.

She wanted to bask in the memory of last night and daydream about her date tonight like some lovesick high school girl. Pick out her clothes, fantasize about seeing him again. She hadn’t been able to concentrate on anything else.

Double damn.

Every time she allowed her thoughts to drift, she found herself back in Ryker’s bed, his heated mouth between her legs. Two years of sexual deprivation had apparently taken its toll on her libido. But she should at least try to use her fearsome intellect and not only respond to the needs of her lady parts.

And when she did use her brain, she had a few questions.

She couldn’t help but wonder about the Horsemen. She knew Ryker was a member, but did his gang actually break the law? Some bikers did, some didn’t. She’d seen news reports where outlaws got into scary stuff like illegal gambling, prostitution, gun running, sex trafficking, and God only knows what else. Could she handle it? Did she even want to?

She worried about unpaid parking tickets and whether a tax deduction she’d taken really counted. She didn’t want to be some biker babe on the run from the law.

She also needed to clarify her situation with him. What exactly were they doing? According to Shepherd, he didn’t do relationships so were they sex buddies? Not her usual beat, but the attraction between them drew her in. God knows she definitely wanted to explore it. But screwing around with him with no set boundaries could lead to heartache and she’d had enough of toxic relationship crap from Carl. So, she made up her mind to ask him about it tonight.

Even though what she really wanted to skip the conversation and spend time in his bed, having orgasm after orgasm.

The day crawled by at a pace that would make a snail seem speedy, but finally at seven o’clock, she had gotten herself dressed and ready. She settled on a black skirt which came down just below the knee, black kitten heels, a red tunic sweater with a V neckline and a black patent leather belt around her waist.

While wanting to appear attractive, she didn’t want to dress like one of those girls at the bar. So, she’d gone for sexy. Not skanky. And just to be prepared, she’d added a red demi cup bra and matching bikini panties.

Her phone rang and she grabbed it off the coffee table, answering it before she checked the caller ID. “Hello?”

“Well, hello to you, too. I thought you might not pick up the phone.”

She froze for a minute. Carl. “What do you want?” she said finally. If she had been paying attention, she wouldn’t have answered. She didn’t intend to make that mistake a second time.

“To talk to you,” he said playfully. “That’s why I’ve been sending you all those text messages you never answered because you’ve been avoiding me. So tell me, how have you been?”

She wanted to avoid him right now, but couldn’t bring herself to actually hang up on him, not wanting to appear childish. You’d think he could find other things to do on his honeymoon. Like his new wife, for instance, she thought snarkily.

“I’m good.” She sat down on the couch and checked her newly polished nails for mistakes. No chips or cracks.
Perfection.

He sighed gustily into the phone. “That’s all I get? Good? I didn’t get a chance to spend much time with you the other day. I want to see you.”

What?
“Yeah, it was your wedding day and you married my best friend. No doubt you were busy.”

She decided to multitask, so this call wouldn’t be an entire waste of her time. She flipped on the porch light to help Ryker find the place and then she gathered up her keys, a tube of lipstick, and a few other essentials from the coffee table. She threw them in her small, vintage silver purse. She loved carrying it on dates, but hadn’t used it in a while. It went with nearly any outfit.

“Yesterday must have been really rough for you, babe,” he murmured into the phone. “Maybe we could do lunch or something this week?”

“What are you talking about? The wedding was fun,” she lied. “But I can’t do lunch,” she said briskly. “I have a really busy week and this isn’t really a good time either. I am about to head out.”

A long pause on the other end of the phone.

Finally, he said, “Out where?”

She rubbed the bridge of her nose and mentally counted down from ten. “Since you haven’t been my boyfriend in a really long time, I don’t think how I spend my time is any of your business.”

The silence stretched on once more, uncomfortably.

He cleared his throat. “What if I wanted to make it my business again? You looked gorgeous the other night, babe.” He used his slow, bedroom voice, the one which used to melt her. Now, it made her feel like taking a shower and scrubbing her skin until it turned red.

“Remember the time,” Carl asked, voice growing husky, “we stayed at Excalibur in Vegas? And we—”

Oh. Eww.
Like she wanted to talk about their former sexcapades.