“I couldn’t stop thinking about you after our first appointment, Serena.” Grayson seems eager to return to our conversation.
“Was I the first woman you encountered after…getting out?”
He scowls at the question. “No. Plenty of females hang around the club.”
I barely hold back my eye roll at the word females.
“You showing up at the clubhouse seemed like a sign that it was time for me to close the door on my past and move forward with my future.”
Is he trying to say he sees me as his future? I take a deep breath. Admitting this could open a Pandora’s box of questions I won’t be comfortable answering. “I came to the clubhouse hoping to run into you.”
“How’d you know I’d be there?”
I reach over and push up his sleeve, tracing my finger over the Lost Kings tattoo on his arm.
His mouth curves up. “So you felt something too?”
“I did.” He’s either too polite to ask the natural follow-up question or he doesn’t want the answer. Unattached women don’t normally hang out at MC clubhouses unless they’re there to fuck the members. I would’ve had to have been to the clubhouse before or known someone to be invited. Recently paroled or not, he has to know that.
Yet, he doesn’t ask about my relationship to the club. Or how I found my way to one of their parties so easily.
Over dinner doesn’t seem like the right place to bring it up.
So, I don’t.
The future may be uncertain, but even I know that, eventually, the truth will take a big bite out of my ass.
Chapter Fifteen
Grinder
Damn, I never thought I’d like a woman telling me exactly what’s on her mind so much.
Serena doesn’t hold back. Challenges me to give her answers I haven’t even thought about. Confront some harsh truths.
And she felt this attraction from the beginning too.
By the end of our meal, I’m jonesing to get out of this joint. It’s loud and crowded. Lots of annoying people jammed into an unfamiliar space. Too many frou-frou items on the menu. Things with weird ingredients that don’t belong in bar food.
I’ve never felt more alien. Out of place. Old as fuck.
Serena doesn’t seem to notice that I stick out like a polar bear at a tea party. And I’m not about to draw attention to or complain about my unease. I’ll suck it up. Adjusting to life outside is its own special hell. Tonight is tolerable only because of her presence.
We split a slice of chocolate cake for dessert. Watching Serena lick the thick frosting off her fork lights a fire in me that takes considerable effort to control.
She pauses, sips her water, and lets out a delicate yawn, covering her mouth.
“You have an early day tomorrow?” I ask.
“I do.”
I’m one hell of an inconsiderate prick. Poor girl didn’t have time to go home, change, and do all the stuff women like doing before a date. And now I’m keeping her out late. “I sprung this on you last minute, didn’t I?” I can’t bring myself to apologize. Not when I’m enjoying her company so much.
“That’s okay.”
By the time we’re ready to leave, the place has quieted down. Serena eyes the check when the waitress drops it off.
“Don’t even think about it,” I warn her, snatching it up and pulling out my wallet. It’d be a cold day in hell before I let my woman pay for dinner.
“I don’t mind splitting—”
I growl at the suggestion. “What did I say?”
“Okay.”
Fuck, I probably offended her. She works, has her own money, I guess. Girls her age expect to pay their own way, don’t they?
Nah, I can’t do it.
Outside, she curls her fingers around mine. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
I’m not ready to say good night to her, and I find myself driving slower than normal on the way back to her car.
A few scattered vehicles remain in the lot. I pull into a spot next to her car and put the truck in park but leave it running. I pull out my phone. “Think I can get your number?” I jerk my chin toward her office. “So I don’t have to ambush you again?”
“Sure.” She pulls the phone out of my hand and in a blur of speedy little thumbs, she programs her number into my phone, and calls it so she has my number. Thank fuck. It would’ve probably taken me the next fifteen minutes to figure all that out.
I set the phone on the console and reach for her. My shoulder protests the movement and I hiss out a pained breath.
“Are you okay?” she asks softly.
“I’m fine. Just probably overdid it today.”
She unbuckles her seat belt with a soft click. “You can tell me the truth.”
“It’s no worse than it’s been.”
She reaches over and kneads her thumb against a tight spot I didn’t even realize I had. My body tenses from the pain but slowly relaxes as she continues, following a line of tension from my shoulder to the base of my skull.