AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“He touched her,” I say, offering the only explanation there is.
Avery stiffens from where she is still standing behind me, practically pressing herself up against my back, but no one even blinks at my response.
Instead, Sissy offers a tattooed hand to Wheeler and heaves him up. “Why do I have a feeling this has to do with you chasing your dick?”
Avery snorts, and I look down to see her sticking her head out from behind my back. “Because he was. Right to Karen Zucker.”
Sissy groans. “Not her. Anyone but her. Wheeler, you know if you hook up with her, Deacon is gonna send you out as a Nomad for a year. Don’t dip your wick there, man.”
“Well, if you’d date me,” Wheeler says, suddenly sounding more sober than he’d been before Sissy’s arrival. “I wouldn’t have to chase a fuckin’ ass like that.”
Sissy rolls her eyes, but puts her arm around Wheeler’s waist. “Come on, Wheels. I’ll sober you up and you can sleep on my couch.”
“The cab’s on the way,” Avery says as soon as they are gone. “Thanks for not arresting me.”
Even as she says the words, though, the patrol I’d called in swings into the parking lot.
“Fuck,” Chris says. I’d almost forgotten that he, Bria, and Casey are there since they are being so quiet. “Why’d you have to call the 5-0, Carter? Aren’t you off duty?”
“I saw an assault happen, in progress.” I shrug. “There’s nothing I can do about it.”
“No one’s pressing charges,” Avery quietly contradicts me. “And the cab is here.”
Casey chooses that moment to interrupt. “Why won’t you talk to me?” he loudly questions Bria. “I said I was sorry. I don’t know what else to do here, Bria.”
“Youleft,” she hisses at him and shoos him away like he is an animal. “I don’t have to waste my time with you.” Bria’s eyes flash, and I recognize the look for what it is.
Avery must have seen it at the same time because she immediately steps around me and gets between the two other people.
“I’m getting married, Casey. I think it’s time you gave me the divorce I’ve been asking you for the past ten years.”
“Over my dead body.” Casey doesn’t move, though. He doesn’t step forward threateningly. He doesn’t get angry. He doesn’t respond at all except for those words. “You’re not marrying anyone… but me.”
Bria isn’t the only one who tenses at his comment, though. Chris, who has kept relatively quiet through the whole thing, coughs and interrupts.
“You left, man. You don’t get to question who she’s with or what she does. Not anymore.”
Casey blinks, and a blank expression takes over his features. Gone is the mask of the husband whose wife just asked for a divorce. Gone is the man who has just lost his brother. Gone is everything except a carefully cultivated blank stare.
“When you’re sober,” he addresses Bria alone. “We’re going to sit down and talk about this.”
“Fat chance.” Bria gets in the waiting cab, followed by Chris and Liam, and rolls down the window. “Come on, Avery. You can sit on my lap.”
Avery blanches. “Can’t I sit up front?” The cab driver shakes his head, and Avery turns to her friend with a grim expression. “Sorry, Toots. I’m not getting in the car unless I have a seat belt to myself. And we’re not going to ride like that. I’ll call another cab.”
Bria turns to me, giving me a murderous expression. “You. Make sure she gets home safe, or I’m gonna show up to Sunday dinner at your mom’s house.”
Her threat wouldn’t mean anything to anyone else. However, Mom has been trying to get Bria to our house for Sunday dinner every single week for the past ten years since the day Casey broke her heart. Every week, Bria fails to show. If she starts coming now, there isn’t a doubt in my mind that Mom will beat the shit out of Casey for what he did. She doesn’t actually know the whole picture, and that is the only gift that Bria has given him.
“Done.”
They drive off a few seconds later, and I’m left with Casey and Avery.
“Hey, Linc.” Lincoln Hayes, one of the officers I work with, gets out of his cruiser after the others are gone and crosses his arms.
“What’s up, Avery? You up to no good?”
Avery flushes slightly in the dim lights around us, and then her face breaks into a huge smile.
