Out of Darkness (11 page)

He shrugged and threw his arm along the back of the swing. “All my life I’ve strived for normal because I never had it growing up. I always wanted a porch swing growing up, so this was the first thing I did. I’ve never been out here with anyone else before.”

There was the opening she’d been looking for. “You mean never been out here on the swing with anybody else or had anybody else here in general.”

“Both, kind of” he clarified for her. “The guys don’t really come into my private sanctuary. Liam’s helped me with some of the remodeling, but nobody else cares to come here. You see how scared of the cup they are,” he grinned.

“I think you should be honest about the cup, at least with me,” she huffed.

He made the motion of zipping his lips and throwing away the key. “I’ll never tell.”

“Is it okay for us to be here for this long? I know you’ve been doing stuff for the club and I hate to take you away from that,” she changed the subject.

“I let Liam know I’d be off the grid for possibly a few days.”

“A few days, huh?” The smile that lit up her face caused every masculine part of his body to take notice.

“Well, you never know,” he tried to play it off. “I mean I didn’t think we’d spend two or three days here screwing like bunnies, but I thought maybe we could spend some time alone together,” he rushed to cover up.

“I’m just giving you a hard time,” she smacked him in the stomach. “I would love to spend some alone time with you.”

This was the part of their relationship that made him nervous. One look in her eyes and he wanted to spill his entire life story, but he’d never been the type to talk a lot about his past. With her though, he knew that it wasn’t fair to keep himself hidden away. For the two of them to work, there had to be honesty. He’d never had that in any kind of relationship before except in his club. It was scary.

“Do I make you nervous?” she asked after the long beat of silence had passed between them.

“You scare the fuck out of me,” he admitted on a laugh. She watched as he ran his hands through his hair.

“How?”

“You make me want to tell you everything and lay my soul bare. Especially after what you shared with me today, but I’m scared to do that. I don’t have a good track record with people at all, and I don’t want to send you running for the hills.”

His honesty touched her more than anything else could have and at the same time it broke her heart.

“You can tell me whatever you want to, Ty. It doesn’t have to be your life story and it doesn’t have to be anything you don’t want to share with me. Whatever you’re comfortable with.”

He wanted to laugh at her use of those words. They were the words he was constantly using for her. Maybe they had needed each other; maybe they’d been brought together by a force greater than themselves. For the first time, he believed that it wasn’t just a coincidence that he’d been driving by on the night of her attack, maybe it’d been the plan all along. Comfortably, she settled back against his lap, enjoying their quiet time together.

Liam sighed, he really needed Tyler. This protection run had turned FUBAR from the word go. William was breathing down his neck about these damn protection runs. It didn’t help that they had been voted on by the club as the first show of solidarity towards Liam. Showing that they were perhaps ready to move in a different direction with another man at the head of the table. If this didn’t go well, Liam knew he would never hear the end of it.

“I’m gonna tell you one more time Jagger, get this shit straight,” he yelled at the new brother who couldn’t seem to find his way out of a paper bag.

He’d been given the opportunity to drive point tonight on this run and he’d gotten them lost, even with a motherfucking GPS.

“It was right before we left, I swear to you,” he argued, hitting the GPS that kept giving them different directions, no matter how many times he set the destination on it.

Losing his patience, Liam grabbed it out of the other man’s hands. “Steele, fix this fuckin’ thing and get us the fuck out of here. Denise expected me an hour ago, and I’ll be damned if I’m sleepin’ on the couch because dimwit over here can’t work a piece of technology. Not to mention I’m gonna disappoint my son because he’s playing a damn football game right now,” Liam growled. The tension between him and his father – that they had kept between the two of them for the most part – made his words much rougher than he intended.

Steele walked over and grabbed the GPS, putting the destination in again and laughing when it showed them the correct route. “What the hell were you doin’, Jagger?”

“The same fuckin’ thing you just did.”

“Curse of the skull mug strikes again,” Steele advised him. “Told you not to touch that thing.”

Blowing out a frustrated breath, Jagger screamed. “No one told me not to touch it.”

“Let’s just get the hell out of here,” Liam said, not able to help the grin that came to his face. Jagger was never going to live this down.

“You hungry?” Tyler asked.

They had been sitting outside for hours. Nighttime had already come pitch black, and with it, much cooler temperatures. November in Kentucky could be a crap shoot. Sometimes it was very cool, sometimes they suffered through an Indian summer. This year, it was already turning cool.

“Yeah, but I’m so warm and comfortable with you right here. I don’t wanna get up,” she admitted.

Just then his stomach gave a loud growl. They both laughed and she sat up, bringing the blanket with her.

“I guess we better feed you.”

The two of them walked into the house, holding hands. He directed them into the kitchen and walked over to the refrigerator. “I don’t even know what I have here. Hopefully something halfway decent.”

She reached up into the cabinets, trying to find staples. Finally opening a door with food behind it, she spotted some cans of soup. “Do you have cheese and bread? We can have soup and grilled cheese.”

That was agreeable to both of them, and they worked alongside each other in a comfortable silence. When it was done, they had a seat at the kitchen table and began eating.

He moaned as he took a bite of the grilled cheese. “This is so good,” he praised her.

“Thanks, just like my mom used to make. I loved when I was little and it was almost winter and we’d have grilled cheese and chicken noodle or tomato soup. Those are some of my best memories.” That was the only time she ever really felt like she and her mother had something in common with one another. They would sit for hours over their soup, talking until her dad got home, and then the conversation would turn to what he expected her to do when she grew up.

Immediately she felt bad, he didn’t have those memories and she could see it in his eyes. Even if hers weren’t great, she still had them. He took another large bite and swallowed loudly. “Would it freak you out if I told you I want to make those memories with you?”

She set down her food and grasped his hand. “Not at all. I wanna make those memories with you too.”

Chapter Fifteen

“D
id I miss anything important?”

Liam looked up from where he sat on the garage floor, putting together some parts for a bike he was working on. “I’m so glad you’re back, man. Oh my God, it’s been crazy since you left.”

“I was only gone for a little bit,” Tyler laughed, pulling over a chair so that he could have a seat.

“The curse of your damn cup is alive and well. Jagger got us lost, the GPS wouldn’t work for him, he’s still nursing himself from that fall, and to top it all off he broke the starter on his bike,” he held up the parts in his hands.

“How did he do that?”

“Like I need to tell you. Everyone firmly believes it’s your curse.”

Tyler laughed so hard tears streamed down his face. “This is getting way out of hand. I never thought that cup would cause all this grief. This is great.”

“Is it cursed or not?” Liam asked, leveling a glare at the other man.

“Don’t try to scare me with that look. You know I don’t scare easily. It is whatever you think it is,” he said cryptically.

“You’re getting on my nerves about this fuckin’ curse,” Liam mumbled. “Fuck,” he screamed as his wrench flew off the part he was trying to fix.

Tyler laughed again. “You should watch that blood pressure, old man. It can sometimes get to ya.”

“You’re not gonna tell me the truth,” he yelled at Tyler’s retreating form.

“You already know the truth.”

“Cryptic bullshit is gonna be the death of me,” Liam mumbled as he took a deep breath and went back to work.

“Denise, you here?” Meredith yelled as she lightly knocked on the front door.

“Upstairs, come on up.”

That was unusual, Denise upstairs towards the bedroom this late in the day. Meredith checked her watch to make sure she was right on the time of day. Sure enough, it was a quarter after one.

“You okay?” she asked as she came into the bedroom.

Denise was on the ground in front of the toilet, lying on the cool tile floor. “Something I ate totally did not agree with me. I’ve been sick since this morning,” she moaned.

“What did you eat?” Meredith asked, having a seat on the floor and leaning against the front of the tub.

“We had a cookout at the clubhouse. I really think it could have been the shrimp. As long as I stay horizontal on the cool tile, I’m fine. Enough about me, how were the past couple of days for you?”