Under Locke (71 page)

He'd left me and my family. Check. 

He'd left me at sixteen in the middle of radiation with a dead mother. Check.

And then he'd left me again to deal with his mess at twenty-four, obviously knowing what kind of people he was dealing with. Check.

It hit me right smack in the face. A hard smack that might have knocked a few teeth loose.

He sucked. Plain and simple.

He was no Sonny. He wasn't even a Will because I knew that if I told my brother people had been showing up to my job threatening my life, he
’d
do whatever he could to fix it. Literally, he woul
d ha
ve done anything. I just hadn't wanted to drag him into this mess.

Curt Taylor was no Luther even. Lu had gone as far as to let Dex and I borrow his car to come look for my dad. He'd helped me look for his crappy ass. And he barely knew me.

Curt Taylor was absolutely no Dex either. No Charlie. There was no fierce possessiveness or loyalty. Nothing. Besides both being males and members of the Widowmakers MC, that was it. There was no other trace of similarity between the man standing in front of me and the one who had walked out on me.

This was a man that had left people who needed him hanging a million and a half times. What in the friggin' hell did I have to be nervous about? If anything, he needed to be nervous about meeting me. There wasn't a single thing that I owed him. This wasn't about reconnecting with him or seeking the love and guidance he'd ripped from me when I was too young to unde
r
stand it.

He should
be
s
cared of me.

At least his organs
needed to be
. Because I swore to myself right then, sitting on the edge of the hotel bed, that I'd make sure he paid the damn Croatians back somehow.

The old bastard owed me that much.

~ * ~ *

“He’s a sneaky son of a bitch,” Sonny sighed on his end of the line.

Bracing my feet on the bottom rung of the stool, I glanced around the diner like my dad could be hiding in a booth. That friggin’ asswipe. “The guy at the front desk told me he checked out yesterday. Yesterday, Sonny. It was like he knew what happened or something.”

“Maybe he did, Ris. Wouldn’t hold it past the old bastard.”

“It’s bull crap.” I cast another glance around the diner, this time looking for Dex. He’d left for the bathroom a few minutes before but he hadn’t come back yet. “We’re going to try to go to a few different motels around the area and see if we can find him.”

Yeah, the chances were slim, and Dex and I had both acknowledged that my dad would have to be a complete moron to move hotels within a few miles distance but...I’d never said he wasn’t a total moron. I could hope for the best, it was all I had.

Sonny hummed in response, the tension awkward between us still. I almost hadn’t called him, but after the phone conversation I’d overheard the night before between him and my tattooed behemoth, I figured it was the best option. The truth was, it pained me that Sonny was still mad at me. Even after I’d told him all about the incident at Pins, he’d sounded angry but still so distant. It wasn’t the way I felt he would have responded if things had been fine between us.

And it was my fault, which was the hardest thing to swallow but probably the most important. Actions always have consequences, right?

I looked over my shoulder while I waited to hear if Sonny said anything else, to see Dex standing just outside the bathroom with a waitress crowding his space. Not our waitress, just a cute one that had smiled at us when we walked in. Whore.

Okay, that was rude.

“Keep me posted on whether you guys need me to drive down there or not, I should be getting to Austin in a day or two depending on how many times Trip wants to stop,” my brother said.

Still looking at Dex as he shook his head at whatever the waitress was saying to him, I swallowed back the weird feeling in my throat and focused on my conversation with Sonny. There was no way I wanted to spend minutes of my life worried about whether or not Dex was doing something suspicious behind my back. I mean, he was right there. He’d never given me a reason not to trust him.

I closed my eyes and tried to imagine the many, many times Sonny had eaten something he didn’t like all because I wouldn’t eat meat. Or the hundreds of times he’d worried about my health and well-being. Sonny mattered to me. And I needed to try and fix what was wrong with us. That mattered.

“Son, I love you. A lot. And I’m sorry I’ve been such a lying shit and I know that my promises probably don’t mean anything to you anymore but I swear I won’t lie to you again. At least not over anything so stupid. I mean, if you ask me if I finished the last PopTart, I might lie but that’s it. Nothing else important.”

And then I waited. And waited. And waited.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, he really was that pissed off at me. Holy crap. I’d finally done it.

“Kid,” he finally spoke after what felt like a year. “You pissed me the hell off but I love you anyway. Nothing will ever change that. Not even that dumb monkey you got playing bodyguard.”

“I like my dumb monkey.” Like hell was I going to bring up him being mad at me again. I was going to focus on something other than that.

Sonny sighed again, this long, suffering sigh. “That’s unfortunate.”

“He’s really nice to me,” I whispered into the phone, turning around in the stool to look for said dumb monkey. He was still standing by the bathrooms with the waitress talking to him. “I’d like to keep him, so I hope you aren’t planning on murdering him.”

“Kinda ruining my plans there, kid,” he said, and I wasn’t sure whether he was joking or not. More than likely, he wasn’t. “He didn’t exactly keep to the truce between the Club, of leaving family alone. He knows that’s not cool.”

“Eh.” I glanced around to see the tall, black-haired jerk making his way around the booths toward where he’d left me. “At least leave his face alone.” I paused before adding, “And his hands.”

My half-brother groaned. “Getting off the phone now.”

I was torn between laughing and being ridiculously embarrassed by the way I’d made the comment sound. “That wasn’t what I meant!”

“Don’t care, kid. The damage is done.”

Warm fingers drew a line from my bare shoulder down to my wrist before Dex sat down next to me, his chest a solid wall of muscle and heat on my side. I glanced at his face, seeing it calm and passive. So handsome. Yet, I still cringed when I thought about the mental picture Sonny was probably having. “Yeah, okay.”

“Call me later?” he asked.

I kept my eyes on Dex as his own gaze dragged its way from the low cut half of my shirt, and then up over my face. The corner of his mouth went up in a soft smile. “Sure will. Drive safe.” Then, I added for good measure, watching Charlie as I said, “Love you.”

Sonny must have mumbled the response to me but I missed it. The only thing I captured was the dial tone after he hung up. Because the man sitting next to me was watching me with those curious blue eyes.

As soon as I set the phone flat on the counter, I nudged my shoulder into his arm. “Just checking in with Son.”

That hot gaze ran over my face, my mouth, my cheeks, before making its way to stare straight into my eyes. “Got all y’alls shit straightened out?” he asked in a lower voice.

“Mmmhmm. I had to let him call you a dumb monkey to get his forgiveness but I doubt you care.”

Dex slid those long fingers over my wrist, circling the bones gently. “You happy he’s finally talkin’ to you again?” I nodded, earning a shrug. “Then I don’t give a fuck what he thinks, you know that.”

I did know that. Like I knew plenty of other crazy things. Like the fact that I’d offer up one of my dad’s body parts to ensure Dex’s safety. Leaning into him again, I pressed my mouth into his biceps. “Yeah, I know you don’t.”

“One stack of blueberry pancakes, and a double stack with a side of sausage,” our waitress appeared then, dropping each of our plates in front of us.

I thanked her and watched her disappear, looking around for the younger one I’d spotted talking to Dex just a few minutes before. But she wasn’t anywhere.

“I think I pissed her off,” Dex said abruptly, making me drag my eyes back to him.

He was busy cutting into the huge mound of pancakes in front of him, his tone casual.

“The waitress you were talking to?”

He lifted a single shoulder in a shrug. “She was annoyin’ the shit outta me. Don’t know why she’d think I’d care whether she likes my ink or not.”

My first thought was that the girl had run to the kitchen and spit in our food. Oh hell.

Dex cut into another thick triangle, eyeing me out of the corner of his eye. “Wouldn’t quit ramblin’ about how she wants to get tatted up, even after I told her my girl was waitin’ on me.”

It’d be the biggest lie in the universe if I said I didn’t get a thrill out of him calling me his girl. Was that a little barbaric? Maybe, but who cared? I didn’t.  “You can’t blame her, you’re pretty cute, Charlie. I’m sure plenty of women wouldn’t care that you’re with someone else.” As much as the thought bothered me, it was the truth.

An exasperated sigh made its way out of his pretty mouth. “Cute?” he said the word like he was torn between being disgusted and amused, ignoring my other comment.

All right, I could pretend too. “Excuse me, you’re a hot, virile, stud-muffin.”

He pinned me with a flat look that made me laugh.

“What? You are.” When his facial expression didn’t change for a long minute, I laughed again and poked him in the side. I wasn’t going to let my dad and his disappearance plummet my mood. He wouldn’t have that much power over me. And I definitely wasn’t going to take it out on the one person that was here trying to help me, no siree. “Fine, you’re just hot. Smoking hot. Not cute. Definitely not cute at all.”

Dex gave me that signature little smile before returning his attention to his plate. We took a few bites of our food before he finally spoke again. “You know there’s nothin’ and nobody you gotta worry about, Ritz.”

Here we go. I nodded but didn’t look at him. “I believe you.” I just didn’t want to carry around this fear that Dex would eventually get bored. He wasn’t my father, and every day I knew him better and better, that fact was cemented in place more firmly.

He plucked the fork from my hand before pulling it beneath the counter of the diner, setting it palm down right next to his groin. “Babe, you got me as much as I got you, and that shit’s not changin’, you understand? Not today, tomorrow, not ever.” He slid his hand over mine, cupping it firmly to the shape of his thigh. “Got it?”

“Dex,” I sighed.

“Ritz.”

“You can’t say stuff like that. You might get tired of me at some point.”

“No.” He shook his head. “I know exactly what I’m sayin’.  I know exactly what I mean. Yeah?”

He wasn’t really asking, I knew that. So I also knew it was pointless to argue with him, and at the same time, it was pointless to make excuses as to why he couldn’t care for me like that. I’d never know unless I let him. I squeezed his thigh and nodded. “Yeah, I got it.” For good measure, I smiled. “Cutie.”

“Ritz,” he groaned, but I could tell by the look in his eye he didn’t care.

“Just kidding.” Taking my hand off his leg, I cut a neat triangle out of my blueberry pancakes before muttering under my breath, “Not really.”

That got a snort out of him.

The younger waitress that had been harassing Dex before made an appearance right then at a table on the opposite side of the diner. So I took the opportunity to make Dex laugh again. I think I enjoyed the sound way too much. “Dex?”