Текст книги "Retribution"
Автор книги: Sienna Valentine
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Текущая страница: 6 (всего у книги 13 страниц)
~ NINE ~
Will only saw Eva twice more that evening before he finally crashed on the uncomfortable living room sofa, and both times she passed by him without a glance, her lips pursed. She was angry, and Will knew she’d only be angrier if she realized how cute he thought she looked when she was mad. Once, he almost told her, but it was late, and he decided he’d rather not have the adrenaline rush of engaging with her. Instead, he just enjoyed the view as he lay on the couch with his hand behind his head.
Eva passed by to go to the kitchen in a short bathrobe that showed even more of her beautiful thighs than her dress had, and Will didn’t try to hide his interest. On the way back, she couldn’t resist giving him a glare. He looked her up and down and gave her a half smile as she huffed back to her bedroom and shut the door.
After both she and Charlie had retired he took a shower, letting himself air-dry in the bathroom as he thumbed through magazines. For a moment, before he put his clothes back on, he contemplated masturbating to the thought of Eva. Imagining her on his lap, as naked as he was, got him as hard as a rock, but knowing she was just down the hall made him only want the real thing. So instead, he dressed and returned to his makeshift bedroom, flopping down on the couch.
Right before he fell asleep, he had the thought that he was playing with fire, but his typical answer to that familiar feeling echoed in his head—I don’t care.
Only this time he wasn’t sure how true that answer really was.
The night passed fitfully and he woke up sore. He could hear Charlie in one of the bedrooms snoring louder than he’d ever heard anyone snore, and that was counting the old timers at the MC. He was almost impressed. Sounded like he was revving a Harley in there.
Will groaned and rubbed his neck with his hand. The light coming in from the windows was beautiful gold, but low and dim, that special glow that only happened in the earliest morning hours. Morning birds had already begun their songs and he took a moment to enjoy the rare tranquil moment in a life that had turned so recently into such chaos.
As he stood and stretched, he realized something was different about this morning—aside from, obviously, waking up in a strange home without being next to a hot piece of ass. It took him a few moments, but then it hit him: he wasn’t hung over. Between the adrenaline of the fight, the prep work with Charlie, and his tense dance with Eva, Will hadn’t even had time to think about needing a drink to dull the pain. It was an uncomfortable realization for reasons he couldn’t quite explain.
One-off day, I’m sure, he thought. Though if this plan doesn’t work, I’ll probably be dead, anyway. What does it matter?
He twisted around, cracking his back muscles as he walked through the living room and into the kitchen. Will came to a stop when he saw Eva already sitting at the kitchen table in her bathrobe, one hand around a big cup of steaming coffee, the other flattened over an open book on the table. She looked up when he came in the room. Her anger from the day before was nowhere to be found.
“Oh,” said Will. He shifted his hips a bit when he realized he hadn’t quite lost his morning wood yet, and the sight of her barely covered thighs was not helping. “I didn’t hear you get up.”
“I was trying not to wake you,” said Eva in a quiet, tired voice. She nodded toward the counter. “There’s still coffee, if you want some.”
Indeed he did. Will opened a few cabinets until he found an empty blue mug and served himself a cup of black java. The warmth sang down his throat. Eva had gone back to her book, her index finger running a slow pace as she devoured each line. He could see her eyes moving back and forth along the page, momentarily jealous of the familiar but long neglected feeling of being lost in another world. How long has it been since I’ve read a book? There was a time when that was his favorite hobby, passed down to him from his grandparents’ own love of reading.
Will grabbed his cup and joined her at the table. Eva had taken the head of the table so he took the seat at her right hand that gave him a great angled view of her legs when he leaned back. When he sat, she peeked her eyes up at him without lifting her head.
“What’re you reading?” he asked, resting his coffee in his lap.
“Coriolanus,” said Eva, again without looking up.
“Shakespeare?” said Will. He smiled to himself. “I haven’t read any Bard in a long time.”
Eva snickered into the book.
“What?” said Will. “Is that you laughing at the idea of me reading Shakespeare?”
Eva finally looked up from the book. He expected to see that same fire in her eyes she’d had all night, but instead she actually looked confused. “Oh, no I… I really did think you were joking.”
“So, you really do think I’m just some dumb meathead who doesn’t read.” Will had been treated that way by friends, enemies, and strangers alike for most of his life—but this time, it actually stung. He kept his face still, because he didn’t want Eva to know that. Not that he could really blame her.
Eva shook her head. “I didn’t say that.” She paused. “Actually, by the way you picked up my book yesterday, I knew you had to be a reader of some kind.”
Will had forgotten about that. “Oh, yeah?”
“What kind of meathead would even notice I dropped a book, let alone care enough to pick it up?” said Eva. “That’s only something people who love books would care about.” When she finished, she smiled at him in a soft way that seemed different.
I guess she’s got me there. “I do love books. Or, I did… I haven’t read much in a while,” he said.
Eva tilted her head. “Why’s that?” Her pale skin looked so beautiful in the golden morning sunlight, even looking at her made it hard for Will to focus.
Will shook his head and looked down at his coffee. “Sometimes, I have trouble concentrating.”
Eva didn’t reply. When he looked up, he saw sadness on her face, but not pity. As if she was sad he couldn’t read anymore.
“I wasn’t really a big Shakespeare guy, anyway,” he added, feeling self-conscious. “When I was a kid, my grandfather would read to us while my grandmother baked in the evenings, and he always insisted on using this British accent when he read Shakespeare—a terrible one. We could never finish because we were laughing too hard. It basically ruined my ability to take him seriously.”
Eva laughed with him at the memory, and Will couldn’t believe how lovely she looked.
I haven’t thought about that in so long. And I just told it to this woman I barely know. What the hell is going on with me?
“Well, technically, Coriolanus is only part Shakespeare. It’s actually a very old Roman story that he retold,” said Eva.
“So we really have been doing remakes forever,” said Will as he sipped his coffee. He winked at Eva when she gave him the stink eye for his terrible joke.
“It’s a story meant to be remade. It’s so powerful,” she said, her voice taking on a wistful quality. “The great drama of the warrior and people; the balance of peace and war.”
“And whose side are you on?” asked Will.
“I think they both have their merits,” said Eva. “I understand why Coriolanus is upset with the plebeians. Being in war is a difficult thing, and it changes a person. It changes the way they see things. Sometimes they can’t see normal, peaceful life anymore, because it seems like an illusion.”
Will’s chest was tightening up as she spoke, because he felt like she was reaching right into his mind and yanking out his own thoughts; his own fears; the way he saw the world now.
“But Coriolanus didn’t react how he should have. Being excellent on the battlefield doesn’t always translate to being excellent in other areas. He got beaten by better politicians, and then he tried to come back with violence, compelled by thoughts of vengeance and retribution, and because that’s the only way he thought he could win. But violence isn’t always the best tool.”
Will looked at her, watching the depth in her eyes as her brain worked out her thoughtful answer. Her soft lips pursed closed as she waited for his response. For a moment, all he could think about was smashing his own lips against hers in a passionate kiss.
Instead, he gathered his thoughts and spoke. “It’s an ancient cautionary tale. I always enjoyed him, though—Coriolanus. I enjoy his fighting spirit.”
Eva gave him a smirk, but it wasn’t bitter like yesterday’s—this was more playful. “You, enjoying the warrior archetype? Color me shocked.”
“And I enjoy how he doesn’t let the shitty decisions of his superiors sway him from what he knows he has to do,” said Will. As the words came out of his mouth, he realized exactly why he liked Coriolanus, really. Doing a little hero worship of yourself, are we?
“He does have some of the best speeches,” said Eva.
Will nodded. “So did Volumnia. Such a supportive mother.”
Eva let out a cackle. “Supportive? She encouraged his aggression! She almost ruined him.”
Will shrugged. “At least she understood how he felt. My favorite line from that wasn’t one of the big characters, anyway.”
“Oh?” The eyebrow raised on Eva’s face was a challenge, Will could see. With a cocky half-smile, he heartily accepted.
“ ‘Let me have war, say I: it exceeds peace as far as day does night; it's spritely, waking, audible, and full of vent. Peace is a very apoplexy, lethargy; mulled, deaf, sleepy, insensible; a getter of more bastard children than war's a destroyer of men.’ ” He took a drink of coffee and watched with satisfaction as Eva’s smile widened with every word.
She was quiet for a good long moment after he finished, like she was drinking it in. “Of course that’s your favorite,” she said softly. She shook her head at him and laughed, then got up from her chair and went to refill her coffee. Her bare thighs walked right by Will within touching distance, and he felt his cock ache against his jeans when he smelled her body wash.
It only got worse when she came back and stood in front of him instead of sitting in her chair. Will had to practically rip his gaze away from the flesh of her legs just begging to be touched to look up at her face. The expression she wore said she probably didn’t even realize what she was doing, and somehow that made it sexier to Will.
“You think force is the only way get things done, then?” said Eva. She shifted on her legs, hiking her robe up just a little bit more.
Will bit his lip and adjusted in his seat to hide his growing erection. “Not all things,” he said. “Some things require a bit more… delicacy.” He made sure his eyes were on the skin at her thighs when he said it. When he trailed back up her body, Eva’s mouth was open, realization slowly dawning in her eyes.
“Oh…” It was less a word, and more a sound that escaped her mouth with a breath.
When she didn’t back away, Will couldn’t help himself. He looked up in her eyes, and then brought his left hand slowly up from his side and laid it on the skin of her thigh. When his skin met hers, it felt like a jolt of electricity running through his nerves. Her skin felt even softer than it looked.
Eva gasped, but it was a drawn-out, heavy thing that was just as much relief as it was surprise. When he looked up he saw her eyes closed against his touch, her mouth half-open, taking in deep breaths. He watched her mouth widen even more as his hand softly traced up along her skin, from her knee, all the way back up to the bottom of the bathrobe. He only hesitated there a moment before he pushed up even further, palming the skin of her upper thigh, and moving around to grasp her ass.
Eva moaned, her hips bucking under his touch. Will’s cock pushed against his jeans, already painfully erect. Just as he felt the soft skin of her ass under his fingers, the sound of a door shutting and shuffling footsteps interrupted from the hallway.
Will yanked his hand back, and Eva went pale and stepped back until she was practically against the kitchen wall. Charlie must have been too tired to notice how odd it looked when he came into the kitchen. “Morning,” he said, heading straight for the coffee pot with a yawn.
“Morning,” said Will. He looked up at Eva, saw the heat flush still on her pale cheeks, and he grinned at her wickedly. He saw her struggling, trying to decide if she wanted to return it or not, still fighting the clear attraction she had to him.
I know you want me, he thought. I know it for sure, now. I felt the way you moved under my hand.
Eva and Will’s moment ended unceremoniously as Charlie joined them at the kitchen table. Eva went back to her book, ignoring Will for as long as it took her to finish her second cup of joe, then she disappeared into her bedroom. When they were alone, Will admitted to Charlie that he had been right about Eva not wanting to stay in the house.
“She does not like to feel confined,” said Charlie with a shake of his head. “Blame it on her ex-husband. He pretty much kept her trapped like a rat.”
Will raised an eyebrow, a bit of anger bubbling in his gut. “Is that right?”
“Yeah, that guy was a piece of shit.”
“Well, maybe I can find something safe for her to do, then.”
“As long as it keeps her out of harm’s way,” Charlie agreed.
After breakfast, Will waited patiently for the Murdocks to finish their morning routines. On his second extended intelligence-gathering mission ever for the MC, Will had learned the enormous benefit of keeping a compact travel toothbrush nearby, and he used the one he kept stashed in his saddle bags over the kitchen sink.
Eva met him first, coming out of the bedroom in a beautiful white dress that fell to her knees, sleeves halfway down her arms. He couldn’t remember the last time he met a woman who always looked so put together. She carried Coriolanus in her arms; the smile she gave Will when she saw him had a glint of mischief to it.
“Where is it you think you’re going?” he said.
“To help open the bar,” said Eva. In her eyes was a challenge, a dare for him to keep to his word from the night before and drag her back to the house for her insolence.
Oh, honey, you are definitely asking for more than that. “You can help open. But you’re coming back up here as soon as that neon sign gets turned on.”
“Yeah, we’ll see about that,” she said, brushing past him and out the front door. He followed her out the door and through the forest meadow, trailing her like he was hunting a deer, smiling as he watched her move through the wildflowers like she belonged there.
Opening the bar didn’t consist of much except getting the daily ledgers cleared and ready, turning over stools, and making sure the front door was unlocked. At least, that was all Eva did as Will sat at the bar and watched her scurry around. Charlie came in after a few minutes and began doing heavier work, something with the keg connections under the counter and in the back. After an hour or so, when he was finished, Charlie asked Will if he wouldn’t mind holding things down for a bit while he finished the oak branches he had been working on the day before.
“I don’t want Eva in here alone,” he told him quietly in the kitchen.
Will nodded in agreement and patted him on the back. “I got you. I’m going to try and get her back up to the house, anyway.”
Charlie took off out the back door and Will watched him go before turning to watch Eva. She was sitting at a messy old desk stuffed into an ill-fitting office space to the side of the door, rustling through paperwork in a focused way.
“All right,” he said to her, leaning in the door way. “Time to go.”
“See ya,” she said without pausing or looking up.
Will snorted, folding his arms. “I mean it’s time for you to go back up to the house, out of the way.”
“I’m not in your way now,” said Eva, giving him a face. “You’re in mine.”
Something in her tone gave Will a little shot of heat, and he decided to tempt her a little. He stepped into the cramped office space and put one hand on the corner of the desk. “I’m in your what?”
Eva stopped rummaging through the papers and froze. Her gaze ran up Will’s body, starting with the bulge that was more or less at her eye level and begging to be noticed. Will enjoyed the feeling of her staring at his body until her gaze stopped on his face. “My way,” she spat out, flustered. “You’re in my way.”
“I can think of better things I can be in,” he said, taking another step toward her chair.
Red heat flushed over Eva’s face, and Will saw her lick her lips. For a moment, he thought he had her, but she stood up from the chair. He didn’t move; she was nearly pressed up against his body.
“Like a muddy ditch, somewhere?” she offered. “Or how about anywhere but in my face?”
Will smiled down at her wickedly. His voice came out a whisper. “But I like the idea of being in your face.”
Eva’s lips pursed open in shock and arousal, her chest heaving with a thick breath. She stared at him for a few tense moments before she huffed, frustrated, and pushed past him out of the office.
Will chuckled to himself, enjoying the feeling of her hand on his chest as she passed, even if it wasn’t meant to be tender. He followed out toward the kitchen with his hands in his pockets, and a half-hard dick in his pants.
Before he could tease her again, the rumble of an engine came from outside before stopping abruptly. A few seconds later, the door to the bar swung open and a familiar face walked in.
Of all the gin joints in all of the towns in all of the world, Will thought bitterly from the back as he watched Jase walk into the bar. Jase removed his sunglasses and looked around, an ugly look on his face. Before Jase could spot him, Will ducked behind the wall to the back room. Next to him, Eva gave him a quizzical expression.
“Oh, God, is it…” she whispered as fear washed over her face.
“No, no,” said Will. “It’s something else.”
“Are we in danger?”
You two aren’t; I’m not so sure about me. “No. But listen, I need you to do exactly as I say.” Will grabbed Eva by both shoulders and looked straight down into her eyes. The feel of the warm skin of her arms beneath his hands made his heart race. Her pupils dilated when he touched her. “Go out and serve him. I need you to act like we don’t know each other. Don’t say a word about what’s happening or why I’m here. Got it?”
“Why don’t you just go out the back? You can wait in the house until he leaves.”
“He had to have seen my bike, he knows I’m here. We just have to go with it.”
Eva nodded, and then licked her lips. “Okay, sure.”
“Go on out, I have to fake like I’m coming from the restroom,” said Will. He waited until Eva had Jase’s attention at the bar before he came walking out from behind the wall, thumbing absently at the fly on his jeans. He did a decent job coming to a surprised stop when he looked at Jase, as if he was seeing him there at the bar for the first time.
Jase straightened in his stool, his expression grim. He spread out his arms and shifted a bit. Will knew the man well enough to know by his body language, Jase was daring him to run.
A shameful sting pierced his chest; it was like seeing just how far he had fallen in Jase’s eyes. He didn’t have to fake the anger rising under his skin as he took a stool next to his MC brother, although Jase would never guess the source was more from shame than fury.
Eva put a full stein in front of Jase and wiped the glass with a rag before she turned to Will. “Did you need another drink?”
Pushing against all his instincts to look at her face as long as he could, Will only flicked his eyes up at her a moment as he ordered a beer and a shot of whiskey. Eva nodded and bent to pull glasses up from under the counter.
“So this is where you’ve been hiding out,” said Jase. He took a big gulp of beer.
Will took the shot that Eva put in front of him. “I’m not hiding.”
“Not answering your phone, not being where anyone but me can find you… what else would you call it?”
“How did you find me?” said Will.
Jase rolled his eyes and shook his head. “I know you, man. I’m not blind to what’s been going on with you.”
Will took a deep drink of his beer and looked up at Eva. She sat near the other end of the bar, trying to busy herself with organizing. Jase probably didn’t notice how she was trying to listen without being obvious, but Will did. He waited until she looked up and caught his eye, and gave her a very slight nod toward the back room.
Eva froze for a few seconds, as if considering whether to follow his unspoken command. But when she finally moved to follow his direction, she did it with such nervous speed that she knocked her leg hard into a stack of boxed beer sitting on the floor. A jolting sound of glass rattling against glass made both he and Jase look over curiously.
Eva went red with embarrassment and gave them a small smile. She kept her eyes down as she moved past and disappeared into the back room.
Will took a quick, clean side glance at Jase. He frowned at Eva as his eyes followed her out, but nothing on his face said he was suspicious.
Jase cleared his throat. “So, are you just going to spiral downward until someone kills you, or you kill yourself?”
“Fuck you,” said Will. He could feel the blackness rising from the back of his mind and realized he had actually been feeling better the past little while—until this moment. “I don’t need your self-righteous bullshit, Jase.”
From the moment Will spotted him, he could see the anger boiling under the surface of Jase’s skin, and it took no time at all for that kettle to start steaming. “Self-righteous? What part of me driving around the pass, searching for my asshole of a best friend who can’t answer his fucking phone… What part of that is for me?” said Jase. “I should be home with Maggie, getting my brains fucked out. Instead, I try to help out, and I get this shit.”
“No one asked you to come looking for me,” said Will, turning to him with a sour expression. He could feel a tension rising between them, the opposite of the tension he felt with Eva—this was the rage he was used to, all the earlier shame had dissipated against it. “Don’t nail yourself up on the cross and expect me to start wailing for you.”
“I can’t believe what I’m hearing,” said Jase. “What the fuck has happened to you, Will? I’ve known you half my life, and you’ve never fucking talked to me like this. You’ve never bailed on a community event; hell you’ve never bailed on anything the MC has asked of you. Now it’s like you’re begging us to take your cut.”
Will finished his beer in a few chugs, wiping the spill from his scruff. “Yeah, well, maybe it’s fucking time.”
Jase fell silent. When Will looked over, he saw a hooded darkness over Jase’s eyes, and pain on his face. “You don’t mean that.”
“Don’t fucking tell me what I mean,” said Will. Some tiny voice was screaming out from deep in Will’s mind that Jase was trying to help him, begging him to take the hand being offered. Will smothered it with a wash of anger. “The club has made your life better. It fucking ruined mine.”
Jase shook his head and stared down into what was left of his beer. “Dude, I can’t even imagine the pain you’re feeling about what happened. I get that. But how is this the MC’s fault? You got your retribution—”
“Did I?” said Will, startled by the loudness of his own voice. “You know what real retribution would be? Taking down every single one of the fuckers who had anything to do with that fire, and then severing ties forever with that piece of shit cartel. Instead, Henry asks me to smile and shake their hands as they drive through my fucking town every day.”
“Will…”
“No, shut the fuck up, Jase,” said Will. “You wanted to know what my problem was, so now you’re going to hear it.”
Surprisingly, Jase remained silent, but his expression darkened.
Will leaned down close to Jase’s face. “You didn’t feel the heat of that fire on my skin as it burned everything I’ve ever loved down,” Will whispered bitterly. “You didn’t feel the emptiness that was supposed to be relief when I blew away the men who set that fire. And you didn’t feel the betrayal when the other family in my life asked me to put down my sword and swallow my pain.”
Will thought he saw Jase’s eyes growing wet, but the look on his face was pure anger. Somehow, though, it wasn’t at Will.
“I’ve given the club everything I had, and in the end it meant nothing.” Will could barely believe the venom in his own voice. He turned away from Jase and stared at the bottles lining the bar wall, trying to quiet the adrenaline rushing through his veins.
“It didn’t mean nothing,” said Jase. “And it’s shitty of you to blame all of this on Henry. We all tried to do what we thought was best for everyone—for the town.”
“We were all fucking wrong.”
“You voted for diplomacy too, Will, plenty of times,” said Jase. “You backed Henry’s decision every step of the way, or do you not remember that?”
Will felt a new darkness erupt from his gut. He turned to Jase with fire in his eyes. “Are you about to deliver the most ill-advised I told you so in history?”
“What am I, a fucking fortune-teller? I don’t know what would have worked. I’m only saying it’s bullshit for you to play this solo martyr act when the club followed the plan you yourself propped up all along. Blame the club, fine—but you were a part of it too, Will. You can’t just make us villains in your personal story.”
“Oh, don’t you fucking worry, Jase, I have plenty of blame for the club and myself,” said Will. “We can all burn together.”
Jase stood up from his stool in an angry huff. “You know what? Fuck this. I’m so goddamn tired of trying to pull you up out of the gutter and getting stabbed for my effort.” He pulled a handful of crimped dollar bills from his pocket and threw them carelessly on the bar. “You are on thin ice with Henry. You need to figure out what the fuck you want to do—man up and do something useful with your pain, or sit here and drink yourself to death on top of your grandmother’s funeral pyre. It’s your call.”
“Get the fuck out of here,” Will growled.
Jase didn’t say another word to him, only grumbled underneath his breath and pulled his sunglasses from his cut. He stalked out of the bar, and Will heard the reckless revving of Jase’s bike as he pulled onto the highway.
Will stared down at his bruised and cut hands sitting on the bar, surprised to see them trembling with adrenaline. He thought he felt a panic rising in his throat.
Taking a long and steadying breath, he looked up to see Eva, standing and staring at him, half-out from behind the back room wall. The look on her face told him that his conversation with Jase wasn’t quite as private as he would have preferred. But exactly how much did she overhear?
