“How’s Sledge?” I ask as the doors open to the elevator on the first floor.
“His old lady betrayed us to Herrin and Sledge helped kill her to send a message. He’s hiding it well, but I’d say he’s extremely fucked up right about now,” he states with zero emotion.
Freaking Halo.
“Peachy,” I mutter.
After climbing on the bike and sliding in behind him, I quickly strap on my helmet. He’s quicker to get the bike started and rolling this time, instead of fumbling around like a novice.
He tenses when I tighten my arms around his waist, and I try to ignore the familiarity between us and the remembered comfort I have when I press against him. After all, I’m the one who helped Sledge teach him how to drive.
I don’t bother asking where we’re going, but we’re definitely not heading toward the club. I get a little worried when we pull up to a house that is loaded down with at least ten cats eating out of one massive bowl.
They scatter like roaches under a light when the thunder of the Harley gets too close to the porch, and they peer out at us from the safety of their hiding spots.
It looks like an eighty-year-old woman’s place with all the beds of flowers, floral prints on the outdoor furniture, and endless stream of wind chimes.
Little humming birds buzz around some of the feeders put out for them.
“Did you recover a long lost grandma or something?” I ask him.
He makes a snort of derision. “Or something,” I barely hear him mutter.
He pauses at the doorway when a stream of muffled music barely reaches our ears. It’s distinct enough that I know exactly what the song is.
“Does your grandma have a thing for Julie Andrews?” I ask in a wry tone as I look around at the cat enthusiast’s somewhat creepy décor. “She’s seeming like a little old lady cliché right now.”
The music cuts out, and silence permeates the air as Rush takes a seat.
“Trust me, we should just wait this out,” he tells me as he picks up a magazine and starts flipping through it.
Confused bigger than dammit, I take a seat next to him and find my own magazine from the stack laid out on the coffee table. It’s reminiscent of a couple who are waiting to get my cervix examined or something.
There are even two creepy anatomy posters of the male and female body across from us with detailed, handwritten labels for each part inside and outside of the body. Well, all the critical parts of the body, that is.
“Your grandma into anatomy as well?” I pry.
He snorts and coughs down a laugh. “Something like that.”
I hear a door fly open, and I look up, waiting for this curious old lady to show her eccentric, cliché self.
It takes a few minutes of groans and grunts, and what sounds like someone struggling with stairs…
“Should we help her?”
“Absolutely not,” he says with a curious shudder that I feel, because it shakes the cushion I’m on.
I turn and give him a wary look as he keeps his attention trained on the gun magazine he’s reading.
He cuts his eyes to me, and he gives a lazy dip of his gaze to my low-cut shirt. “You can take the girl out of the club, but can you take the club out of the girl?” he asks, eyes coming back up to mine.
“Are you asking me how much I’ve changed? I gotta tell you, I’ve spent a small fortune in therapy. All they really do is teach you to accept how fucked up you are after you’ve been formed to be a fucked-up person from birth,” I state idly, getting slightly creeped out from the cat clock whose eyes seem to follow me as I lean from one side to another. “Why all the cats?”
“Bad breakup,” he answers too quickly, eyes drifting down my neck. “What about you? Ever had cats?”
“I’ve only had one bad breakup, and the guy was a total flunky for my father,” I quip with a tight smile. “We were too young to know better back then. It wouldn’t have ever worked out, and I accepted that before I moved on.”
His eyes harden, that blue resembling ice as his expressions shut down.
“Maybe if the girl had given him all the information, he would have gone with her,” he says very coldly.
I shift in my seat, weirdly feeling like he thinks I’ve wronged him. Dick.
“The girl tried to give him the information. He was too stubborn and content to hear it,” I volley.
“Sounds like the girl only half-assed her attempt. At least in my opinion,” he says with a shrug before redirecting his attention to the magazine. “How’ve you been sleeping without your nightly orgasms for stress relief?” he adds like the bastard is amused by my denial.