“Good. At least that shit is company,” I snapped and watched him wince.
He recovered and stated, “You gotta get rid of it. Let me in. Let me help you get rid of it.”
“Not a chance.”
His hand slid back into my hair, fisting gently, and I knew what that meant.
He was not going to let me move. He was not going to release my eyes.
I would understand why when he admitted, “Last night, you didn’t hear me.”
This came out of the blue, surprising me, so I asked, “What?”
“I know the story. Fuck, babe, everyone does.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You put yourself in front of him. Boy that drilled holes in you, that the cops found, thought he could lessen his sentence by sayin’ you weren’t the target. He didn’t go there to hurt you. Wasn’t gonna touch you. Certainly not pump rounds into you. Says, first, you threw yourself in front of Belova and then, second, Belova used you as a shield.”
At his words, I jerked violently in his arms.
This got me on my back with him on me, his hand still in my hair, his eyes still imprisoning mine.
“Not that that shit is ever f**kin’ gonna go down again, but luck turns sour. If it does, no way, babe. No way would you be my shield.”
“Get off me,” I hissed.
“No way would I let you put yourself in the path of a bullet for me.”
“Get off me!” I snapped.
“No way I’d let you put yourself in the path of anything for me.”
“Get… off!”
He didn’t get off.
He kept right on talking.
“That’s the point I’m tryin’ to make. If you don’t know shit, you don’t feel shit. You breathe easy if you take a chance on me. What I do, I do. What the Club does, it does. You’ll learn to trust me, the brothers, Tack. I don’t use you as a shield. I am the goddamn shield, and I’m not talkin’ about bullets because shit like that does not touch old ladies. Ever. I’m talkin’ about ass**les with monster trucks. I’m talkin’ about Club business, life, every second you live, every breath you take. You take a chance on me, your biggest worry is your 7Up fizzing over.”
“You can’t promise that,” I told him.
“Yes, I can,” he told me.
“You think Tack promised that to Tyra before they took her and stuck her until she almost bled to death?”
His face got soft and his voice was cautious but tender when he returned, “I think you don’t wanna go there since it wasn’t Tack who got Tyra stuck.”
It was my turn to clench my jaw and, unable to turn my head away, I closed my eyes tight.
He was right, it was Elliott who did that and, through Elliott, me.
“Lady, look at me,” Hop ordered gently.
I opened my eyes.
“Take a chance on me,” he whispered.
“No,” I whispered back.
“Take a chance on me,” he repeated.
“No,” I repeated too.
“Baby,” his lips dropped to mine but his eyes didn’t let mine go, “Christ, I’m beggin’ you, let me in. Let me help. Let me in so I can untie that shit you got wound up inside you.”
I held his eyes.
Then I pushed my head in the pillows. He got my message, lifted his lips from mine and I announced, “I stepped in front of those bullets.”
I felt his body jerk then still.
I wasn’t done.
“He let me,” I shared.
He closed his eyes and murmured, “Fuck me, Lanie.”
“Look at me, Hopper.”
He opened his eyes and God, God, they were so intense it was a wonder they didn’t burn two holes straight through me.
“I’m not taking a chance on you,” I declared. “I am not taking a chance on anybody.”
His eyes started burning a different way.
“He was alive, I’d f**kin’ kill him,” he clipped.
“Well then, it’s good he’s dead. Now get off me,” I returned.
“Seven years, Lanie, you’ve held that monster inside and, I’ll repeat, it’s eatin’ you alive.”
“I know that monster, Hop, I understand it,” I sort of lied. I knew it before. Since I propositioned Hop at a hog roast, it was acting unpredictably. “It’s the world outside I don’t understand,” I finished and that was the honest to goodness truth.
“Then come full into Chaos, Lanie. Our world is simple. You got nothin’ to understand but family.”
God! He had an answer for everything.
“Please listen to me. That’s not going to happen,” I stressed.
He went quiet.
So did I.
He ended the silence.
“I’ll wear you down,” he proclaimed.
“No, you won’t,” I denied.
“You won’t let me in, I’ll break in, sneak in, blast in,” he promised.
“You won’t get in,” I contradicted.
He shut up again and stared at me.
After long moments, I watched as suddenly, weirdly and, most of all, scarily, he saw something in me that made his face clear.
I didn’t think that was good.
I would find out I was right.
“Let you in on a secret, babe, and you think on this,” he told me.
I was not going to think on anything.
“Hop… get… off… me,” I snapped.
His body pressed into mine so he could lift his hands up and frame my face.
“I’m already in. Just gotta wait for you to realize it.”
This, unfortunately, was a scary statement because, more unfortunately, I suspected he was not wrong. Furthering my misfortune, he’d read that in my face, which meant he knew or was learning how to read me.
This was not good.
At all.
Hiding my discomfiture, I advised, “Don’t hold your breath.”
He dropped his head, touched his lips to mine then lifted, shifting to plant his forearms in the bed at my sides. “You want me to take you back to your car?”
“Not on your life,” I answered.
His mouth twitched.
Then he asked, “Want me to ask one of the boys to do it?”
“Absolutely not,” I answered.
His mouth curved.
“Wanna f**k real quick before you go?”
I didn’t “wanna f**k real quick”. I actually wanted to f**k real slow.
I didn’t tell him that.
I demanded, “Get off me.”
He rolled off me.