She shook her head.
“No,” she denied me. “I told you that we couldn’t do this.”
I gritted my teeth.
Under any other circumstances, I would’ve handled it better.
However, I’d lost three patients today, and my mind was no longer firing with all cylinders.
So instead of saying what I should’ve said and tamping down my anger, I unleashed it on her.
“It’ll only be a few people. Men I’d trust with my life,” I informed her, hoping that her refusal to come stemmed from her fear of people learning that we were together.
She was shaking her head violently. “It only takes one person to blab to the wrong person, and that’s the end.”
I clenched my fists, then leaned back and placed one foot on the peg of the bike.
“Guess that’s it then,” I murmured. “Just don’t expect me to wait around forever for you. I was going to say that nobody but my club and a few other people will be there. People who wouldn’t say a goddamned word about either one of us. But I guess I was wrong about you. If you can’t handle that, then I guess I can’t handle you. Because I trust them with my life.”
With that I left, knowing as soon as I accelerated out of the parking lot that I should’ve turned around and apologized.
She didn’t deserve to have my anger hurled at her.
She hadn’t done anything wrong. She was trying to protect her education and both of our careers.
I didn’t turn around, though.
I headed straight to the clubhouse, and the moment I got through the door, I got myself a beer.
Then I got another.
And suddenly nothing seemed as bad as it had only a moment before.
***
Tally
“Thank you, Hadley,” I murmured into my phone as I pulled into a parking spot beside a small SUV with beads hanging from the rearview mirror. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“You’ll tell me everything,” she ordered. “Or I swear I’ll throw you to the wolves.”
I grinned, knowing she was joking.
However, I could hear the hint of honesty in her tone. She was tired of me keeping secrets, and I couldn’t say I blamed her.
I’d changed since I’d met Tommy, and she didn’t understand why.
She wouldn’t understand until I told her.
And I wouldn’t be telling her. Because despite her assurance that she wouldn’t tell a soul, I knew the type of person that Hadley was. She couldn’t hold a secret to save her life, and I wasn’t telling her a secret that could ruin mine.
Motherfucker.
I shouldn’t be here.
I didn’t know why I was here…other than that look on Tommy’s face had been one that broke my heart into a million tiny pieces.
I wasn’t talking about the words he’d hurled at me before he left.
I knew he didn’t mean them.
I could tell as soon as he’d pulled in that something was bothering him. I should’ve known that I shouldn’t have pushed it.
Did I, though?
No.
Why?
Because that wasn’t me.
I pushed, even when I shouldn’t.
Which was why Tallulah had come early, in a freakin’ cop car.
“Can I help you?” a deep, scary voice broke into my inner dialogue.
I jumped and turned to find a man sitting on the front porch steps of the clubhouse.
An address in which I’d had to beg Hadley—who only knew the address because she’d been to a party there and had told me all about it—to give me, knowing for a fact that it would elicit questions on her part.
“Ummm,” I mumbled. “I’m looking for Tommy.”
“Tommy’s not here.”
I blinked, then frowned.
“He invited me here and then he’s not going to show up?” I asked.
It’d been a statement more than a question, but the man answered it anyway.
“When did he tell you to come?”
Just as I was about to reply, the sound of a Harley pulling up had me turning to survey the area behind me.
Tommy got off his bike, an open beer in one hand, and a six pack in the other, and stared at me with anger shining clearly through his eyes.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded.
“You invited me.”
Tommy walked away, dismissing me, but I followed him.
He didn’t hold the door for me. He didn’t introduce me to anyone.
And the icing on the cake was when a woman, who was clearly in need of some more material to attach to her hoochie-short skirt, threw herself at my man and wrapped her skanky arms around his neck.
“You came!” she cried, laying a smacking kiss on top of Tommy’s head.
I cleared my throat.
“Would you like to introduce us, Tommy?” I asked sweetly.
Tommy set the woman down on her feet and turned to me, leaving his arm around her shoulders.
“No.”
The woman slapped his chest.
She was beautiful. Long brown hair, light blue eyes. Tall with long legs as far as the eye could see that were topped with that teeny-tiny skirt that seriously tested the boundaries of obscene, yet she was able to pull off without looking like a hoe. Her shirt was a neon green that hurt my eyes to look directly, and I wanted to hate her. I really did. She was that beautiful.
“My name is Ellen Tomirkanivov.” She smiled brightly. “Tommy’s sister.”
Relief poured through me.
I sat stunned for all of two seconds, then offered my hand to her. “Tally. I’m Tommy’s girlfriend.”
Ellen looked at her brother, then a huge smile broke out over her face.
“Look at you, brother. Getting a girl under mom’s nose.”
Tommy’s eyes were absolutely glacial.
“How about you just get your little stinky nose out of my business?”
I nearly choked.
“Stinky nose?” I teased him. “That’s pretty harsh, don’t you think?”
He shot me a glare.
“I wasn’t talking to you,” he countered. “Now you may leave.”
“No can do,” I apologized. “I have a babysitter until the morning, and it’s spring break. I deserve a day to unwind.”
“What changed your mind?” he asked suspiciously.
I grinned.
“That little pouty lip you have going on right now,” I touched the pouty lip under question.
He ripped his face away from my fingers and glared.
“Go away.”
Ellen started to laugh uproariously. “Let’s go inside. I think you’ll like the ladies.”
“What ladies?” I asked as she pulled me in her wake.
“Well, I’m pretty new myself,” she told me. “I arrived only last month, much to my brother’s annoyance.”
“Why would he be annoyed that his sister is back from wherever she went?” I asked in confusion as she led me into the house.
The minute my feet crossed over the threshold, my feet came to a stuttered stop.
“Oh, wow,” I breathed. “This is really nice. I didn’t expect that from the outside.”
She grinned at me. “This is the entrance, as you can tell.” She pulled my hand and led me around, showing me everything in a blur of activity.
The ‘clubhouse’, as Ellen called it, was a hidden gem.
On the outside, it didn’t look like all that much.
On the inside, though, it was a beautiful palace.