Craving Trix (The Aces' Sons 1)

I smiled at their interaction. He always did stuff like that. She did, too. Oh, you forgot to grab some corn on the cob? You can have mine. I didn’t really want it, anyway. You forgot your napkin? Don’t get up, I have one.

“Yeah, I’m kind of worried I haven’t found a job, though,” I replied, stiffening as Cam came and dropped down beside me.

“Thought you got offered one in Portland?”

“She’s not taking it,” Cam butt in, making my hands clench on the flimsy paper plate I was holding.

“That right?” Pop asked me.

“I didn’t really want to move so far north,” I answered, not meeting his eyes.

Pop made a sound in his throat, but I wasn’t sure if it was acceptance or irritation.

“I’ll find something down here,” I said with false cheer. “I just need to get my resume out.”

“You ask Slider?”

“For what? The club?”

“Knows a lot of people in Eugene,” he reminded me.

I nodded. Asking Slider was a good idea. He knew everyone, though I wasn’t sure how. I also wasn’t sure if I wanted to work with someone who had ties to the club—that was asking for a fucking audit every year.

We went quiet as we ate, and a little while later, we all surrounded the table where Gram was sitting to sing happy birthday.

It was a good day. I loved spending time with my family, I always had. I played horseshoes with Will, who was acting like a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders since the last time I’d seen him, helped the little girls do their hair up princess style, helped Farrah clean up the mess in the backyard and brought beer after beer to Slider and my gramps.

It was so normal after the past few days, such a relief.

Cam kept his distance for the most part, barely talking to me. I knew my parents were watching us closely, wondering what the hell was going on, but they never said anything.

It wasn’t until a couple hours later, when everyone was winding down and I was getting ready to leave, that Cam cornered me.

“Let’s make an announcement,” he said gruffly, coming up behind me as I picked up some empty soda cans off the edge of the porch.

“No,” I replied sharply. I couldn’t handle that today. I was barely hanging on, and I didn’t know how I could even function if I had to discuss the baby with anyone. My hands had begun to shake when I spoke to Vera, so there was no way I’d be able to speak to my parents about it.

“Not askin’ you, Trix,” Cam snapped back.

“Fuck off,” I said tonelessly, stepping away from him before stomping up the porch stairs.

“Trix, you don’t stop walking away from me, I’m gonna paddle your ass!”

I spun to look at him in disbelief, and for just a second, his eyes looked pained. Then his entire face hardened.

“Fuck off, Cam!” I yelled back, carrying the empties into the house.

I heard him come in behind me, but I didn’t turn around as I rinsed the cans and dumped them into the recycling container.

“What, you still lookin’ for a way out?” he asked meanly, coming to a stop just feet from me. “Thinkin’ if you don’t tell anyone, you could still get that abortion you wanted?”

“I told you I wasn’t going to do it,” I hissed, turning to face him. “Can’t you just let me wrap my fucking head around it before we have to tell people?”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want to say anything yet.”

“Yeah, you made that really fuckin’ clear.”

“Is this how it’s going to be? You take shots at me, and what, I just have to sit back and take it? You’ve never once looked at this from my point of view!”

“Yeah, that’s gonna happen,” he replied nastily. “Let me try and understand why you’d want to get rid of my kid.”

My jaw clenched and I wrapped my arms around my waist. He’d never see it. The man who had always known everything about me couldn’t see past his own shit to notice that I was crumbling. There wasn’t anything I could do. He wasn’t going to forgive me.

“I’m gonna go home,” I finally said, my eyes watering. “I’ll see you there later… or not.”

I turned and grabbed the bowl I’d brought with me and moved toward the front of the house, Cam’s silence beating at me like a sledgehammer.

He went to the back door and stepped outside as I was grabbing the sweatshirt I’d worn this morning and walking toward the front.

When I got to the screen door, I stopped.

Everything stopped.

The sound of metal on metal met my ears and then a solid thunk. Then again. Then again.

I’d heard that before.

“Someone’s here! Whose car is that?”

“I’m going to drop you out the window.”

“You start running toward the clubhouse.”