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“Don’t fuck around with Shila, not if you aren’t willin’ to stick around. Jolie will not only have your balls, but mine as well. The girl works her ass off for the Inn, and it’s hard to find people like her,” Rage states, sitting beside me on his motorcycle, waitin’ on Jolie to get this show on the road. The rest of the club went back to Texas. That wasn’t in the cards for me. The entire time I’ve been here, Shila hasn’t murmured two words to me, and fuck me sideways, neither have I. That shit has got to change, and soon.
“Thinkin’ you and Jolie don’t know Shila as well as you think you do.” I take my cigarette pack out of my vest, go for the Zippo I’ve carried around for almost eight years, and light my cigarette.
“You’re shittin’ me? Already?” It’s a goin’ joke that I’ll never settle down. All the brothers that have always say I’ll find the one who will stop me in my tracks.
“Nope.” I don’t say nothin’ else. That conversation is for Shila and me.
“You tellin’ me it finally hit you like the rest of us?” Rage is grasping for straws.
“Not that either. You and Jolie good to go alone? I’ve got shit to do.” I inhale the nicotine, needing the way it burns my lungs with every deep breath.
“Yeah, sure. Remember what I told you. Don’t fuck this up.” I slide off my matte black Harley Street Glide.
“Can’t fuck up something that’s already fucked up.” Jolie comes barreling out, like normal. That woman is constantly goin’ ninety miles an hour. How Rage keeps up with her, I have no idea. Just glad he’s fuckin’ happy. Before he found Jolie, that man had so much anger bottled up inside, we never knew when or if he’d blow.
“I thought you were coming with us?” Jolie asks. I shake my head no. She shrugs her shoulders. Even though I want so badly to confront Shila and figure out where her head is at, that’s not how to play things out with her. It’s time for me to be my name. I’ll be lurking in the Shadows, watching and waiting for the right time to make my move.
2
SHILA
I took three times longer than I should have before making my way up to Bennett’s room. The moment his door opened with a turn of my key, I was assaulted by memories—the same spice of his cologne tickled my senses along with the smell of Marlboro Reds. It would turn most people off, but it reminded me so much of the boy in my past it took everything I had not to lie down in the bed that’s rumpled from sleep and soak it all up. I never thought in a million years the only man I ever loved would walk back into my life. All of the emptiness I’ve been feeling through the years is suddenly overwhelming. The tough girl who has her shit together seems to evaporate before my eyes as tears attempt to fall and an all-consuming sadness is clawing at the edges of my anxiety.
“God,” I breathe out. I count to sixty, twice, before I get myself together and go through the motions of making his bed before picking up the trash lying on the dresser—discarded cigarette boxes that show me I wasn’t wrong on the brand he still smokes, among a few other things that lie discarded, so I put them back in place. The duffle bag he keeps on the chair in the corner makes me want to go through it, but even I’m not that much of a fool.
A piece of me wonders if he even remembers me, if when he left our small town, he forgot who I was. Not that I could blame him. The hell he must have gone through when the Sheriff showed up at my parents’ house, telling him he either left willingly or in the back of his cop car. It was devastating, the look that told me he’d take me with him. I knew it would be suicide for both of us if I did. So, I watched as he put his hands in his pockets, nodded at me, then turned on his heel, leaving in the beat-up old Chevrolet truck he worked so hard for during the summer to buy. It wasn’t a whole lot to look at, but it was his, and I was proud of him for achieving his goal. Not even his foster parents could take that from him.
I finish cleaning his room. It doesn’t take any time at all before I head into the bathroom, sucking back the emotions that are attempting to claw their way out. I replace his dirty towels with fresh ones, wipe down the counter, clean the toilet before I tackle the floors. I don’t know how Jolie enjoys doing the cleaning like she does. Sometimes I think she’s mental. Though I suppose some would say the same thing about me becoming a massage therapist. It’s not for everyone, and from what some people say, it can be damn tiring on your body. Newsflash—that’s already happened to my body, many times over.
