Vodka On The Rocks (The Uncertain Saints Book 3) (24 page)

I’d been doing that a lot.

Seemed I’d left my brain with Casten when I left him in the hospital room.

“Yeah, I’m ready. Let’s go.”

The drive was short and sweet.

The event was taking place at the home of Lenore’s parents.

Lenore was married to Griffin, and her parents owned a house and some property that butted up against the Caddo River.

The men had been busy working hard over the last two weeks, digging deep square ditches to make up the volleyball court.

I looked around at the huge muddy pits and grinned.

The smile, however, dimmed, when I saw Casten talking to some woman near one of the pits.

She was wearing what looked to be a referee costume…
if
you could call it that.

Now it wasn’t much more than a shirt cinched at the waist to make it look like it was a dress.

She was perhaps fifteen feet or so away from me when I happened to glance down to see a volleyball at my feet.

Grinning, I picked up the ball and threw, making sure there was a high arch in it to cause the most mud splatter as possible.

It hit almost perfectly about two feet away from the two of them, splattering them both with mud.

The girl squealed and shied away.

Casten turned his glare on me.

I gave him a little finger wave, and he narrowed his eyes.

So I flipped him off instead.

His eyes started to twitch before he turned around, not sparing the woman another glance.

The woman stomped hard on her high heeled foot, turning her glare to me as she did.

I raised my brows at her as if in invitation.

One she didn’t accept.

“That was rude,” my sister observed.

“Kiss my ass,” I snapped at her.

She held her hands up as if in acquiescence.

“Let’s get stretched,” she ordered.

We took turns using each other for balance as we stretched first our legs, then our arms.

And when I pulled her into my arms and squeezed her head as hard as I could, I heard several chuckles from those around us.

“I can’t believe there are so many different motorcycle clubs here,” I said, finally releasing her and taking a look around.

“It’s pretty insane, I’ll give you that. I heard we have people here from Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Alabama,” she expounded.

Amazing.

This place looked amazing.

“Volleyball teams, are you ready?” an announcer called over a loudspeaker.

“Let’s do this,” Annie said, taking my hand.

I followed her to the side of the huge mud pit, saying a silent prayer that whatever I did today wouldn’t turn into a brutal war that it was likely to become.

We were playing the best out of three games against a team made up of police officers, firefighters, and nurses.

They were all women, so it wouldn’t be too incredibly unfair, at least on their part.

They were strong and in shape, but Annie and I had been playing volleyball since we were ten.

Their muscle and brawn didn’t stand a chance against our skills.

“Who else is on our team?” I asked as we walked closer to the mud pit.

“The rest of the Saint Girls,” she answered, then looked at me with sympathy at the mention that I wasn’t technically one of those girls. “Lenore, Alison, me, you.”

I looked over at the other team. “They have six people.”

Annie shrugged. “Apparently, nobody wanted to play against the other team. So it’s just us.”

Interesting.

I smiled widely when I saw that Peek was the referee.

“Really?” I asked him as we walked up to the side.

Peek grinned at me, not caring in the least.

He looked down at his body, which wasn’t covered in anything but a pair of board shorts.

“What’s wrong?” he teased.

I just shook my head.

The board shorts were intended to appear as though they were a bit ‘see through.’

The design on them was a faint image of a penis and an ass, which he modeled for me as he turned all the way around.

“
Bow-chicka-wow-wow
,” I sang.

He grinned.

He really did look good…for an older guy.

He had a six pack with strong, burly arms.

He reminded me more of a lumberjack, rather than a tattoo artist, but who was to say that a tattoo artist over fifty couldn’t be hot as hell?

My eyes drifted left when a movement caught my eye, and I narrowed my eyes as Casten sat down directly across from the other side of the court, directly in my line of sight so I’d see him no matter what I did.

Would he cheer for me?

“Alright, darlin’ girl. Let me help you in,” he offered those big burly arms to me.

I laughed and launched myself at him.

He caught me easily and set me down in the warm mud, then repeated the process for Annie, his wife, and finally Lenore.

“It feels like I’ve got my legs in a pit of sloshy shit,” Annie curled her nose in disgust.

I wiggled my toes.

I concurred.

I let my eyes wander, purposefully staying away from where they really wanted to go.

The bleachers were filled with bikers.

Tons of them of all different shapes and sizes.

My eyes caught on one particular club with a badass looking girl that looked slightly creepy on their cuts.

The Dixie Wardens.

Yum.

Now
they
were hot.

They didn’t have anything on my biker, but they were close contenders.

They were also one of the only clubs that had women paired with every single one of their guys.

Movement from where I wasn’t trying to look made me look, and I narrowed my eyes.

The referee girl was back, handing Casten a beer.

“Let me see that ball,” I ordered.

Annie tossed it to me, but I let it drop into the mud before I picked it back up again, being sure to spin it around for extra mud coverage.

Then, I served the ball, and nailed the girl perfectly in the back, causing her to drop the beer before Casten could actually get his hand around it.

Casten sighed and scratched his head, finally looking at me with a look of bemusement on his face.

I glared.

He shook his head.

The whistle blew.

I turned back to Peek to see him staring at his wife.

“Y’all ready?” he asked her now muddy breasts.

We all nodded.

“Alright, Tasha. CeeCee. Coin toss,” he ordered.

I trudged up through the mud to stop directly in front of where CeeCee was standing.

She glared at me.

“What are you looking at?” she snapped.

My brows rose.

“What’s your problem?” I asked, startled.

She sneered. “Don’t act like you don’t know.”

I blinked. “But I
don’t
know.”

“Fine, then let me enlighten you,” she hissed. “You left my brother. Made him start having nightmares again.”

I laughed, good and loud.

It was the type of laugh that wasn’t a laugh so much as a painful explosion of air that released my body.

“Oh, I didn’t leave him,” I informed her none too gently. “
He
left
me
. He told me I was fun for a while, but my shit was too much for him. He was shot and Koda was hurt because of it. Said he needed time and space to think. And he still has my cat and ferret!”

Her mouth turned from a sneer into a shocked frown.

“What?”
s
he asked.

I nodded. “Seems like you should have a conversation with your big brother.”

She sighed.

“Give it to them first. They’re one down,” CeeCee pointed at Peek.

Peek nodded and shoved the quarter back into his shorts pocket before turning to me and winking.

I stepped back as I watched him heave his big body out of the mud and stand at the side of the pole that held the net aloft.

He raised his hands and threw them down as if we were starting a race. “Go!”

We sat there.

“What are you waiting for?” he asked.

I turned to look at my sister and the rest of my teammates. “This isn’t a race, big guy. This is volleyball. You’ll have to tell us to serve.”

He sighed.

“Bitches always have to be so complicated,” he muttered under his breath.

It was a pretty even game, when it was all said and done.

And by the time we were finished with the game, every one of us was covered head to toe in mud, as was everyone in the first two rows closest to the court.

When we switched sides and I had Casten at my back, I made sure to get extra dirty and wet, then shook my ass in front of him for emphasis.

“Alright, Annie. Take us home,” I tossed her the ball.

I managed another quick look at Casten, seeing his eyes focused on me and only me, and I smiled down at my muddy toes.

Annie took the ball and served it, which the other team fumbled and sent right back over the net.

“Got it,” Lenore said, popping the ball up perfectly in the air.

Annie set the ball just as perfectly to me, and I jumped, slammed the ball down on the other side of the court, and promptly came down on my foot wrong.

I dropped like a stone, going down to my ass and pulling my foot up out of the mud to look at it.

I grimaced when I saw a huge piece of glass sticking out of it.

“Ouch,” I whined, touching the tip of the glass with my index finger.

“What’s wrong?” Casten barked.

I ignored him in favor of trying not to cry.

Turning over on my hands and knees, I crawled to the opposite side of the court, or would’ve tried to, had huge, strong arms not wrapped around my middle and pulled me up like I weighed nothing more than a feather.

“You’re getting dirty,” I moaned, turning my face slightly away from him.

He grunted in response, walking with me to the tent that was set up nearest the house.

I whimpered when he placed me down on the table, and started to cry when he promptly left.

He didn’t go far, though, stopping at a tree just outside of the tent’s opening and watching while a paramedic I didn’t know was here came up to me at the table.

“Hi, I’m Tai. Show me where it hurts,” the sexy man drawled.

I licked my lips and glanced at Casten, whose eyes had flared when my tongue met my lip.

Oh, this would be fun.

I smiled inside, completely and utterly giddy at the turn of events.

“You’re going to piss him off,” Mig said dryly.

I turned to find my brother-in-law directly behind me, staring at me like I’d grown a second head.

“Who said I can’t hang out with other friends while I’m here?” I asked teasingly.

Mig just shook his head, and I turned back to my new friend.

“So, you’re a paramedic?” I asked, fluttering my eyelashes at him.

Not because I was actually trying to flirt, but because I had mud covering about ninety percent of my body. It even clung to my eyelashes, making them feel incredibly heavy.

“Yep,” the man in front of me agreed.

“Where do you work?” I asked.

“Kilgore. It’s about forty-five minutes from here,” he said.

“I didn’t realize that they hired a paramedic for this,” I explained.

He nodded, bringing up a bottle of water to his lips and taking a deep gulp.

He was a gorgeous man, but I had a thing for the brooding man that hadn’t let me out of his sight all day. But also refused to actually come any closer.

“It was sort of last minute. I think one of the women thought we should have a paramedic here in case of injuries,” he said. “I was just the only one she knew, so here I am.”

“Hmmm,” I said, turning to stare at the crowd while he fixed up my foot.

Casten was still in his earlier spot, but now he was surrounded by a few bikers from other clubs.

He was talking to the men, but he also kept his eye on nearly everything I did, taking notice of each and every move I made.

“Will it need stitches?” I wondered.

“No. It’s a puncture and it looks like you just got it about a half inch or so into the sole of your heel. They don’t usually sew punctures closed. It looks worse than it really is,” Tai explained. “You might want to make sure your tetanus is up to date, though.”

“Hmmm,” I replied, watching as he finished the last of the bandages.

“Now, tell me where you want me to carry you,” he said.

Fun, indeed.

Especially when I saw the look of rage that overtook Casten’s eyes.

I pointed at a bar stool that was set up in the backyard of Lenore’s parents’ place, and he took me right up to the very last seat and set me down.

“Don’t walk on that until the wound has the chance to start healing a little first, okay?” he asked.

I nodded. “Yep.”

“Alright, then I’ll see you around.”

And with that, I was left alone once again.

This time I didn’t see Casten anywhere.

He must really be pissed and that made me all the more nervous.

With a heavy heart, I went home, limping the entire way to my car.

I was completely defeated but tomorrow was a new day.

Classy as balls.

-T-shirt

Casten

I walked slowly up the path to the cabin where Tasha was still staying and stared at her.

She was beautiful.

Her long, wavy brown hair was flowing all around her, moving every which way because of the wind.

She was no longer covered in dirt and mud, and I had to shrug off a smidgen of disappointment.

Her eyes were directed up, and she didn’t move, even though I knew she knew I was here.

“Whatcha doin?” I asked softly.

She didn’t turn to look at me.

“I’m looking at the super moon and lunar eclipse,” she whispered.

I blinked, looking up to see what she was looking at.

I only saw clouds.

“I don’t see it,” I said.

She sighed.

“I don’t either. I’ve been waiting to see this for weeks. Bought a telescope,” she pointed to a massive telescope she had sitting next to her chair. “But I can’t see a damn thing. It sucks. This is supposed to happen once every three hundred years. I’ll never get the chance to see it again, and I’m disappointed.”