Coal (Regulators MC 3)

“I agreed to dinner. Let the rest die.”

Hammer laughs, though I don’t understand what he finds funny about any of this.

“Tomorrow night; six good for you?” she asks me calmly.

“Okay,” I give in. The woman is tough. She isn’t at all intimidated by me. It’s shocking and refreshing.

Hammer laughs from beside me. “Coal, you got yourself your first date! I’m proud of you, buddy.”

“Shut the fuck up, dickhead.” I shove Hammer lightly out of my space. Then I look back at Paisley. “Pixie, no more searching and digging up shit that’s got nothing to do with you.”

“Okay,” she finally agrees.

I can only be thankful, because who knows what Screech has made up in his mind about why someone is looking into me. With my job, she can’t find much of anything. I have no social media. To have social media would mean I would have to consider being social, and yeah, that’s not me.

“I’ll be at your place at six tomorrow to pick you up,” I inform her, thinking the sooner I get this over with, the sooner I can be disengaged from Pixie.

“No,” she corrects me. “I have to do this for you. Be at my place at six tomorrow, hungry. I’ll cook something special.”

Hammer claps his hands together and rubs them like he’s excited. “Oh, Coal, you’re in for a real treat.”

I don’t ask questions. I turn and walk away. I don’t even want to know what Hammer is thinking. I just want the woman to realize she bumped me, yes, but I’m okay, so she can get me off her mind. If it means she needs to cook me a meal, so be it. I lived off chow hall food and MREs in combat for years; I can choke down anything she puts in front of me.

~Paisley~

Oh, my heavens to Betsy, what just happened here?

I sit in front of the computer, staring at it like it’s the enemy. It is. I got caught because this thing has a trail.

Hammer’s comment nags at me. I never claimed to be normal. Society’s standards and judgments aren’t what defines me. Unfortunately, he is not the first person to tell me I’m strange and he won’t be the last, so I push back my emotions and focus on what is to come.

Okay, Paisley, I mentally pep talk myself. He agreed to dinner. What to make?

Italian! Everyone loves Italian.

To make the pasta, I will have to skip the gym tomorrow.

My phone rings. I look down to see Des calling.

“Hello,” I answer, leaving the library.

“I told you to leave it alone!”

“What alone?”

“Coal! Paisley, Hammer just called and told me they found you at the library, searching him.”

“I admit nothing.”

She sighs. “Girl, I love you and all your quirks, but you are gonna have more than bad energy if you keep this up.”

“I don’t have to keep anything up. Coal agreed to dinner tomorrow night. I’ll cook; he’ll eat. The cosmic center between us will go back in balance, and I can move on with my life and he with his.”

Before she can reply, I stop at my car, and it hits me.

“That no-good man!”

“What?” Des asks while I try to calm my temper.

“He doesn’t have my address! He doesn’t know where I live, so how the heck is he going to come to dinner?”

She laughs.

I don’t find one bit of this funny, yet Des is laughing at me.

“Honey, Coal is the kind of man who can know when you’re out of milk if he wants to. Finding your address isn’t hard since Hammer already gave it to him when I was on the phone.”

“Then why are you on the phone with me? I have a dinner to plan and prepare,” I say before hanging up on her.

~~~

The knock at my door has my pulse racing. He’s here. He really is coming for dinner so I can make things right.

I open the door to see him standing in front of me, bald head glistening in the evening sun and his beard trimmed. He’s in well-worn jeans, black boots, and a T-shirt that clings to his body like a second skin.

I feel my panties dampen in desire. He’s both scary and sexy rolled into one.

I have never had such an instant attraction as I do to Coal. He’s mysterious with a side of dangerous, but it’s all wrapped up in sexiness. Knowing he’s not married and doesn’t have a kid only makes me wonder what he would be like in bed.

I shake my head, shaking off the thoughts. This is to make our energies disentangle, not to complicate things further.

Stepping back so he can enter, I greet him, “Trevor, thank you for coming.”

His eyes widen for a brief second before he steels himself to seem unaffected by the use of his given name.

Saying his real name feels different, but not in a bad way. I have determined he won’t be Coal to me. This isn’t about his nickname. I want to know the man from the inside out. As dark and mysterious as he is and wants to be, I refuse to have any darkness around me. No negative energy here. He will learn. I will give him as much light as I can muster to outshine all that murkiness he carries around.