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Basically, he has a really nice ass.
He has nice tree trunk legs and arms that are almost as thick as his thick-ass legs, and he’s covered in tattoos. At least, I’m assuming he is because I can see dark ink spilling like oil along his bronzed neck and the backs of his hands, which fly as he makes drinks at a steady pace.
My dad hated that Smoke—sometimes, in my own mind, I have to use his chosen name because the other is so ridiculous—had his hair cut into an uppercut hairstyle. He hates all the new trending shit that office people and people in suits now wear. He has forbidden uppercuts in the club. Smoke shaved his hair off when he started working for my dad, but it’s growing back now, as dark black as my own with the slightest amount of curl, just long enough for a good rake through.
Why the hell are my fingers itching? Why the hell are my nipples pebbling? And why the hell is my pussy perking? Did I really just think that? Pussy perking. God. Wow. This is a new low, even for sudden, uncontrollably bad thoughts.
“Shit! You’re ogling him too!” Cass giggles and pokes me in the ribs.
I snatch my eyes from the back bar and turn them on her. I’m thankful my dad and I both have darker complexions, and that usually hides my blush, but it doesn’t stop my face from feeling like it’s a thousand degrees of hot, shameful fire.
“That scar is something, huh?” Cass bumps me with her hip.
My eyes are drawn back to Smoke again, despite my better judgment. The scar in question is long and it runs from his forehead down across the bridge of his nose, pouring over his chin like a streak of errant lightning pulled from the heavens straight down to his face.
That scar is quite badass, and it confirms that he led a not-so-pretty life sometime in the past oh thirty-odd years. He has darker, broodier features, the strangest gray eyes, sharp cheekbones, and a hard jawline that somehow makes that scar handsome. His nose is aristocratic and surprisingly straight. The scar skims very lightly over it, but whatever happened, it doesn’t appear that it’s ever been broken. The skin around the corners of his eyes and mouth is surprisingly smooth like he doesn’t smile often or hasn’t laughed enough to leave permanent creases there. His lips are, by rights, too full to belong on someone with such a craggy, hard face. Every single one of his actions is smooth and automatic, but somehow I sense a wariness that underscores it all. Or an awareness. Or maybe I’m just reading way too much into things.
Because this man might be built like a god, like a warrior time-warped into the present from some hardcore past life of warriors, but he’s not mine to stare at the way I’m currently doing, with open fascination tinged heavily with awe.
What do you know? There go my nipples again, acting like beacons pointing me in the direction they want me to head.
Shit, fuck, shit. Of course, after growing up around rough-cut, leather-wearing guys who were all like second fathers or big brothers to me, I’d find someone who looked just like them attractive. Smoke is the kind of man who would fit into my world, and there’s a certain kind of—I don’t know—aura about that. No, appeal. I think that’s what I’m looking for. You know, if I was in the market for someone appealing. Which I’m not. I like being single. I also know my dad would absolutely turn into a furious mother bear, angry lion, club prez, and go all I’ll kill you for touching my daughter on anyone.
“No,” I growl out like a grizzly bear myself.
Cass, who fears me about as much as she fears a sword-waving toad—and, of course, toads don’t wave swords—rolls her eyes right in my face. “It is,” she protests, meaning the scar. She’d just pointed it out before I got all creepy and ogled Smoke again. “It’s super hot.”
“It’s not.” I wind my fingers through hers and squeeze. Hard. “You do know what my dad would do if he thought I was even half interested in someone at all connected with the club?”
“Your dad’s a catch twenty-two. For real. You can’t be interested in someone who he would normally approve of, and you can’t be interested in someone he wouldn’t.”
“That’s right. I think most fathers are like that.”
Cass sighs. “Nope. Only yours. My parents don’t care who I date.”
“I know that’s not true. If you showed up with someone like him for a first date, your dad would shit bricks.”
Cass’ parents are nice—the church-going, good people, Sunday dinner as a family without fail kind of nice. I’ve always known that they think I’m fine because Cass would never give me up as a friend, but they don’t exactly approve of my dad or the guys from the club. I’m always super well-behaved around them. I don’t wear thick, dark eyeliner, and I opt for canvas shoes instead of combat boots when I’m going over to their house or doing something with the family. I don’t curse, and I don’t talk about the club. I’m definitely not ashamed of who I am, and I’m not a chameleon trying to change skins. They love and accept me in their own way, but I never wanted to give them a reason, especially in high school, to give Cass a hard time about her choice of a best friend. Over time, being the nicer version of myself just became a habit. Also? I don’t talk about the club or my dad, as a rule. If someone asks me a question about that side of my life, I’m very good at smiling, dialing up the charm, and steering them quickly in another direction.
