Caleb found me before I found him. He was waiting for me outside the bathroom, a glass of sparkling water in one hand and a bottle of beer in the other. I wondered if he’d been there in time to see Tiffani leave, but she wasn’t draped all over him like I’m sure she would have been if she’d seen him.
“Hey, you,” he said with that killer smile of his. He handed me the glass of water. “I figured you’d be here, you know, that dime-store bladder of yours.”
“It’s dime store because your baby is bouncing on it.” I smiled up at him as I took the glass from him. “Thank you.”
“Want to get some fresh air?”
After the mean girl attack I was ready for lots of fresh air.
“Please, it’s a bit chaotic out there at the moment,” I said.
“Sorry about that.” Again he smiled but it was softer. “When you’re a part of an MC, you’re a part of a huge family. Your business quickly becomes their business. You tell one person something, and before you know it, ten people know about it. You’ll get used to it.”
A strange sense of belonging unfurled in me.
“You think they’ll like me?”
“They already do.”
Caleb took my hand in his and we walked down to the river and sat down at the end of the pier. Twilight slowly darkened to night and moonlight danced on the water. It was a clear night, crickets sung in the shadows and above us the stars twinkled in brilliant starshine.
“So tomorrow I’m going to meet your grandmother,” I said.
“Are you ready?”
“I don’t know what to expect.”
He chuckled softly. “There aren’t any words I could use to prepare you, believe me.”
I’d heard talk about his feisty grandma. She was one of a kind, they said. She wasn’t here tonight because she’d broken her foot and was resting at home.
“How do you think she’ll react, you know, when she finds out about the baby?”
“She’ll be thrilled. Like my mom, family is everything to her.” His finger brushed mine. “And she’ll love you.”
The touch of his finger against mine sent a wave of longing through me.
I raised my face to the moonlight and inhaled a deep breath of fresh night air and it raced through my mind like a cool breeze, bringing with it a beautiful sense of calm.
When I glanced back at Caleb he was looking at me. Our eyes met and the moment became excruciatingly intimate. I licked my lips and his eyes darkened as he watched my tongue slide across them. His Adam’s apple bobbed and his lips parted. Emotion was all around us. Attraction. Longing. Need.
He swallowed deeply and the St. Christopher on the choker chain around his neck glinted in the bright moonlight.
“I like your St. Christopher,” I said, breaking the spell.
He reached up and touched it.
“My granddaddy gave it to me when I was young. It was his. He wore it in the war. He said it kept him safe through two tours of Vietnam.” He ran a finger over the tarnished silver. “It’s the most precious thing I own.”
“Even more than your Harley?”
He gave me a lopsided smile. “A Harley you can replace. This is irreplaceable. I never take it off and it’d kill me to lose it. It’s the last bit of him I have, you know.”
“You were close?”
He nodded. “Growing up, he was my best friend. When he died suddenly, it felt like my whole world fell away.”
“How old were you?”
“He died three days before my ninth birthday.”
Feeling his sorrow, I thought for a moment and then said, “It must’ve been nice growing up with grandparents.” With family.
“You’re a part of this now, too,” he said.
It was a kind thing to say and it warmed me because I knew he said it to give me the sense of belonging that I’d missed out on as a kid. Caleb was a lot of things, I was learning. Strong. Sexy. Fiercely protective of what was his. Generous. He was all that, but he was also incredibly thoughtful. Considerate.
We looked at one another. Across the water, the band was singing the old Poison hit “Unskinny Bop” and a bunch of drunk bikers and their old ladies sang along. Their loud, off-key voices dipped and waned on the breeze.
I didn’t tell Caleb about the girl in the bathroom. I didn’t want to ruin the night. Because aside from my mean girl encounter, the night had been perfect.
“What do you think, time to go home?” he asked, draining his beer bottle.
I was surprised. The party didn’t show any signs of dying down.
“You don’t want to stay here and hang out with your buddies? It sounds like they’re having a good time.”
He shook his head and his eyes were a beautiful blue in the dim light of the night. We looked at one another for a moment longer.