“I was just explaining everything to Nell. I can pull around near the kitchen to offload everything and then get the hell out of here. She can call when you’re done, and I’ll see if I can get my brother to come out and retrieve all my dishes and equipment so that I don’t have to come back.”
Cassie didn’t have a fucking brother. What the hell was she playing at?
“That’s silly,” Nell told her but Grunt nodded. The fucker must have thought it was a good idea. “You worked hard on all of this, and you were telling me that you wanted to see the unveiling,” Nell continued to put her foot down about Cassidy sticking around.
“I didn’t realize that it would take place here, though,” Cassidy explained. Grunt and I knew why she would be uncomfortable on the club’s property, but Nell didn’t and Baffle wasn’t so locked into my bullshit that he had put two-and-two together yet.
“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of bikers,” he called out to her teasingly.
“Not at all. It’s just…” Her voice trailed away as I stepped further around the building and our eyes met on one of her scans. I stopped in my tracks again and Bigfoot and Grease flanked me and glanced around to see what the problem was. I tried to break the ice in the dumbest way possible.
“It’s almost time. I can’t wait to see what sweet, sweet Nell cooked up for us.” I projected my voice, so they’d all be sure to hear me as I slapped my hands together and rubbed them like a greedy little kid on Christmas who was about to dive into all the presents under the tree. Cassidy’s alarmed face made me stop dead. My smile dropped as I watched her shake her head back and forth as if she could will me away.
Baffle mumbled something to the others but I couldn’t hear what he had to say. I didn’t miss a word of what Grunt spouted, though. “Why don’t you hop back in your truck, Cass?” He moved so that his body was between me and the woman I wanted. Dumb move for a best friend to make. “I’ll go help you unload, so you can get out of here faster.”
“What the fuck, Grunt?” I yelled as my feet finally engaged again and I started to jog over to them before Cassidy decided the catering job she’d obviously taken with Nell was not worth whatever she had been paid. I couldn’t get to her before she pulled off, but the passenger side of the truck would do. I hopped up and tugged the door open just as it started to move. Cassidy hit the break.
“No! Nope, Nope, Nope,” she repeated while her head shook on an endless swivel. “Get your ass out of my truck, James!”
“Can’t do that, sweetheart.”
“I am not now, nor have I ever been your sweetheart.” She threw those words at me as her foot hit the gas again and I lost my balance and fell into the dash. Damn her. She did that on purpose.
“What if I told you that you had it all wrong, just like I did for all these years?”
“I’d say you’re making shit up to save face.”
“You’re wrong,” I shot back. How in the hell was I supposed to convince Cassidy that she was the one I wanted all along when there was so much history between us that suggested otherwise? I couldn’t. She would never fucking believe me. Worse, she might hate me more if she knew I had a thing for her and still ignored her back in the day when we were in school. I didn’t think she would understand the logic I was playing with at the time because adult me didn’t understand what the fuck I’d been thinking back then either.
“You can help me unload this stuff on one condition,” Cassidy called out to me as she hopped down from the driver’s side of the box truck.
“What’s that?”
“No talking. We have nothing to say to one another and anything you could possibly have to yell at me is probably based on another lie cooked up by Simone. I always knew she was manipulative, but apparently, she was far worse or you were far dumber than I thought.”
That hurt. “Dumber” meant that she thought I was unintelligent to begin with. I might not have been the sharpest tool in the shed, but I was at least in the top half of our graduating class. Then again, I fucked around with her best friend and got her pregnant when I was pining for Cassidy and knew I wasn’t good enough for her yet. Maybe I was a complete fucking idiot after all.
I didn’t say a word as I got out of the truck and followed her around to the back. I would help her get everything set up, but she was wrong if she thought we weren’t going to have a chat while we did so.
“Be careful and don’t drop anything. I calculated the food based on the number of people Nell gave me and my crew are not around today to help make more if something happens.”
So, she had a crew. “Who all is in this crew of yours?”
She turned narrowed eyes on me and sneered as she pulled out a rolling tray and snapped everything into place. The efficient way she handled the thing left me impressed. The way her breasts jiggled as she moved sent my blood rushing straight to my dick. We needed to talk, but my body wanted what I had long since denied it. Youthful stupidity and Simone were no longer a hinderance.
I grabbed hold of Cassidy’s shoulders and pinned her to the wall near the door that led to the clubhouse’s kitchen. “We are going to talk but after I prove something to you.” I didn’t give her a chance to come back with an angry retort as I slammed my lips down on hers and traced the seam of her mouth with my tongue. The move surprised her enough that she gasped which allowed me into her mouth.
Fucking heaven.
I held her face clasped in both hands as I drank her essence down through that kiss. I could have come in my pants right then and there. This was what I had missed out on for all those years just because I was too stupid to go after who I really wanted back then.
As I pulled away, I whispered against her lips not realizing I said it out loud. “You should have been mine all this time.”
I did not see the slap coming but I felt the burning sting where it landed on my cheek just the same. Cassidy looked equal parts shocked and angry, but I didn’t see on her face the same awe that kiss left me feeling. Maybe she had gotten over her crush on me long ago, so much so that there was no hope to rekindle it.
Fuck.
I turned and stomped through the door to the kitchen and heard the ramp to the back of the truck as it was released and pulled out. She had moved right on to business as usual. I bypassed every other place in the clubhouse and anyone who tried to talk to me until I could lock myself inside the security room.
