Together We Lie

Chapter Twenty Three

Fifteen Years Old

“I want to join your gang when I turn eighteen,” I say to Mac, who has just come home wearing his new biker leathers - or cut, as he told me it’s called. He looks like such a badass.

He shrugs off the sleeveless jacket and hands it over for me to try on. I slip my arms through the holes of the vest, enjoying the warmth and smell that’s a mixture of him and new leather, even though it looks old and worn.

I go to his mirror and look at my reflection, turning to check myself out from the back and say with a laugh, “I think I’d look good as a biker chick.”

I hand back the jacket and he drops it beside him on the bed. “No girls allowed,” he says, unlacing his boots and sliding them off, leaving them where they land.

“That’s sexist and not very progressive,” I retort with a hand on my hip.

“Okay, sorry, there are girls in the gang. So maybe I should have said you’re not allowed.”

Alex crashes into Mac’s room, banging the door against the wall with his arms full of snacks and drinks for our movie marathon while we wait for Chris’s after-school club to finish. He tosses the contents on the bed and jumps onto the side he has claimed as his every time the three of us hang out at their house.

“Why not?” I snap, annoyed at being left out of something Mac was doing. We were already sort of a gang, so why couldn’t I join his official one?

“Because, sugar, you’re too sweet and too pure to join a rough MC club.” He pulls me into his arms, dragging us both to the top of the bed where he positions me in between my two favourite boys. He gives me a soft kiss on the side of my head and sighs. “You’ve already experienced way too much violence for someone your age. I don’t want that life for you.”

Alex nods his head, agreeing with his sibling. “Next year, when you’re old enough, you’re going to get emancipated and move in here with us where we can protect you.” His hand finds mine and gives it a reassuring squeeze.

“I can’t move out without Chris. I’ll need to stay there until I am at least eighteen so I can be her guardian. I’m not leaving her alone in that house, Alex. I can’t.” He pulls me in for a tight hug, rubbing my back soothingly. But the contact has me lying rigid against him.

“It’s fine, Stevie baby, you don’t need to do anything you don’t want to,” he whispers, letting me go and reaching for the strawberry laces he knows are my favourite. I give him a smile that feels foreign on my face.

Mac turns on the TV and we settle down to watch the first film of the afternoon, but Mac and Alex wrestle over the only bag of sour worms over the top of me. I barely notice as I think about the day when my life will finally be good.

Just three more years, I think to myself. Three more years.

Dreaming about my childhood had become a nightly occurrence, as was waking up more and more often to repressed memories. Sometimes they were awful, filled with pain and hurt, and would startle me to wake in a cold sweat with Alex by my side, and others would be pleasantly filled with joy and laughter of my sister and my boys playing in the sun.

Pulling down the sun visor, I glanced at my reflection in the little mirror on the inside as I waited for the traffic lights to turn green. My make-up was heavy in an attempt to cover the dark circles lining my eyes, but I still looked tired. I sighed and slammed the visor shut with a hard thump, pushing the car forward as the red hue from the light disappeared. I didn’t have time to dwell on my subconscious trying to fuck with my head. I had a date and more details to extract from Jake tonight.

When I arrived outside Jake’s apartment, he was standing on the sidewalk, eagerly awaiting my arrival. His eyes sparkled with an excitement that could rival a child’s on Christmas day when my sleek orange supercar pulled to a stop next to him, the bright LED headlights illuminating the road in front. I watched as the door slid up and his massive body folded into the passenger seat.

“Graphite and jet black with ember orange accent. Nice,” he remarked, running his fingers along the upgraded lining of the door. “And carbon fibre finish along the dash. You went all out, Stefany.”

I rolled my lips between my teeth, trying to hold off a laugh. Every time I was with this man, I seemed to get a glimpse of a new part of him. Someone who wasn’t the CEO philanthropist or the alpha asshole. I liked this one. The one who spoke a mile a minute about all the upgrades of my car and the sheer appreciation of her craftsmanship as his eyes flitted around in unadulterated delight.

He stopped running his hand across the centre console when his eyes raked over my bare legs. He continued his sweep up my body, over my tight black body con dress that was intricately detailed with a sequined gold wolf that hugged around my hip.

Jake’s pupils were dilated, and his nostrils flared as he wetted his lips. He grabbed the back of my neck and pulled me to him.

“So fucking sexy,” he growled into my lips as he pressed hard against me and kissed me like he was a drowning man in need of a life preserver. My blood rushed around my ears as I grabbed his deep purple shirt in my fist, pulling myself deeper into his kiss, that one more inch and I would have climbed over the centre console to be in his lap. I was unable to get enough of the man sitting beside me.

He pulled back, moving mere inches away from my tingling lips. “You’re pretty sexy too.”

I laughed, panting a little, and rested my forehead on his with my eyes shut, enjoying his closeness.

“We should go,” I whispered, not wanting to break the comfortable silence or the sizzling heat between us. And if the steamed-up windows were anything to go by, it was best we started driving or else we’d never leave the car now that I’d discovered it was a bit of a turn-on for Jake.

Jake’s restaurant choice was magnificent. I had been to a lot of fancy places in my time, especially when someone tried to flaunt their wealth, but unlike all those jobs, I actually wanted to be here with this man.

He had managed to get reservations to Cibo di Fantasia, the finest and toughest Italian to get a booking. So much so that their next available slot was somewhere around the nine-month mark.

The waiter placed a bowl of Pappardelle con Lobster in front of me and Pollo Balsamico for Jake and removed our napkins from the table in a flourish, placing them on our laps. I bristled as the stranger dropped the linin over my knee. The man gave me an odd look and a tight smile. Waiter etiquette was weird when paying a small fortune for a bowl of pasta and chicken.

I took a bite of my lobster and groaned as the buttery goodness filled my mouth. Holy shit, no wonder this place was always fully booked. I would sell my left boob to get into this place again for more of this heaven in a bowl.

I shovelled another forkful into my mouth, groaning again, and caught Jake studying me with lust-filled eyes. I brought my hand to cover my mouth and muffled, “What?”

“You keep making those incredible sounds with your mouth full, and I’m going to have to fill it with something other than pasta.”

I almost choked, trying to swallow the half-chewed pasta. Jake’s deep, husky chuckle vibrated through my body, making me squirm in my chair. He handed me a glass of ice water, and I drank it all in a few gulps.

My cheeks flushed as I held my cutlery in mid-air, watching him calmly cut into his chicken as if he didn’t just insinuate he wanted to choke me with his cock. What was it about this man?

I twirled my fork in the spaghetti, gathering some round the prongs before stabbing a small piece of white flesh from the lobster and holding it out.

“Maybe if you tried some, you’d understand why I was moaning?” My eyes widened as Jake leaned over and took the entire contents into his mouth rather than taking it off me like I assumed he would have. The noise he let out was just as carnal as the ones I had done.

Continuing to chew, he nodded in approval and gestured towards his meal. Once finished, he ran his tongue along his bottom lip and said, “I definitely choose poorly in comparison.”

The rest of dinner was relaxed and enjoyable, but the heavy cloud of having to bring up his dead brother was hanging over me and our plates had already been cleared.

“I hope you don’t mind, but your HR girls told me more about your brother. I’m so sorry. Were you close?” Nothing like ripping off the band-aid and getting to the point.

Jake’s shoulders tensed, and he let out a sigh. I bit my lip and waited for his reply, wondering if he would even choose to answer me. He picked up his wineglass and took a sip.

“We were,” he said, his eyes filling with a sadness I’d never seen before, even worse than when he told me about his mother. “My brother never touched the hard stuff, contrary to what the newspapers wrote, only weed on the odd occasion with his friends. I guess that’s why I took it the hardest, because if he had started on that stuff, I would have been there for him. I could have helped him. He was smart, he knew about the dangers, but sometimes you only need to take it the one time…” he trailed off, looking down at his hands which were resting on the table. I reached over, placed mine in one of his and laced our fingers together, giving them a gentle squeeze.

“I went to Vic and Alton and begged them to research something, anything, that we could start manufacturing that would create the same buzz without the life-altering consequences.”