Broken & Burned (12 page)

“Can we help you?” Mandy asked politely.

I turned to see a slim girl our age standing at my desk. She wore black from head to toe and her short pixie cut platinum blonde hair was parted on the side and smoothed tight to her head. Her hands were planted on her hips and her bright blue eyes fixed on the motorcycle club patches on my bag.

“Yeah, you can tell me who’s Old Lady you are.” She said and her eyes flicked to mine. Her eyes were familiar but I just couldn’t place them.

“I’m no one’s Old Lady.” I said frowning and her light eyebrows shot into her hairline.

“What’re you doin’ with a bag with Sacred Heart patches all over it then?” she demanded.

“The Vice President, Dray, gave it to me.” I said and my eyebrows knit together. Mandy bit her lower lip and her eyebrows went up.

“Dray!?” the blonde girl asked surprised her cell phone appearing in her hand.

“Now I
know
you’re lyin’!” she exclaimed and her phone was ringing on speaker in her hand. We still had a half an hour before class but still, I was nonplussed. Not only had she interrupted the conversation with my BFF, she had called me a liar in her next breath. I was getting pissed.

“Yellow?” a male voice through the phone line.

“Hey Cuz, you’re not gonna believe this. There’s this bitch in my class with a backpack covered in Sacred Hearts patches and she’s trying to tell me
Dray
gave it to her.” She looked at me with cold blue eyes and it was right there at the edge of my mind.

“Mmmm Shells?” the male voice asked.

“Yeah?”

“You got me on speaker?”

“Yeah?”

“Girl there?” he asked.

“Oh I’m here.” I said and my voice was strained with the suppression of my temper.

“Irish!” The voice crowed, “That you!?” I closed my eyes.

“Yeah Reaver, it’s me.” I said and put my face in my palm.

“Hey Shells, it’s totally cool! Dray licked her, she’s his. I saw it with my own eyes!” he sounded entirely too happy about it and people in the classroom including my best friend were turning to look at me. My face flamed with embarrassment.

“No shit!?” The blonde pixie haired girl asked.

“Uhhh do I carry a knife every day of the week?” he asked.

“‘nuff said. Thanks Cuz!” the mysterious ‘Shells’ said and hung up on him. She dropped into the seat on my other side and beamed at me.

“Reaver’s your cousin?” I asked.

“Yep! Sorry, so Dray licked you and you’re his now? How does
that
work?” she asked all trace of hostility gone. I sighed.

“Yes Everett. Do tell.” Mandy crossed her arms.

“As I was saying,
before I was so rudely interrupted
,” I said pointedly looking at ‘Shells’

“Shelly.” She stuck out her hand. “I guess you could say my official title is Sacred Heart club whore, I’m no one’s Old Lady, but no one messes with me on account Reaver would flay them alive.” I shook her hand and settled on doing some damage control with Mandy before she throttled me from the suspense.

“So my car died and I’m stranded at the mechanic’s shop I pulled into and the mechanic, Dray,” I said for both their benefit, “Gives me a ride home where I walk into the living room to see said hooker riding him bareback on our couch.” Mandy scowled and Shelly looked at her nails.

“Did you punch him?” Shelly asked, making herself right at home in the middle of the conversation.

“No.” I said scowling at her, “So I’m standing there and we’re getting into a pretty good screaming match and here’s Dray with my graphing calculator in his hand standing in my doorway. My bag ripped when I got to his shop and it fell out on the ride to my apartment.” I told them.

“Did Dray punch him?” Shelly asked.

“No. Yes! But not until the next day… Hold on, let me get there.” Mandy put her hand over my own. She could tell I was starting to get aggravated. Shelly rolled her eyes like I was being a drama queen and I wanted to punch
her
.

“So what happened, where did you go?” Mandy asked me and I sighed.

“I threw some of my shit into a couple of bags and Dray said he’d take me where I wanted to go except I didn’t
have
anywhere to go. I’d just paid rent and bills and I had like a hundred and twenty bucks. Anyways, I freaked out he let me freak out then he took me home like some kind of stray cat.” I rested my head on my desk in abject humiliation.

“Meh, there are worse places to be than in Dray’s bed.” Shelly said like she would know with a shrug. I lifted my head and looked at her agape and blinked.

“Why didn’t you call me!?” Mandy asked aghast.

“You live with your parents, love, what could you have done?” I asked her honestly. She looked hurt for a moment then sighed resigned. Her father was a preacher and I mean that in the strictest and worst sense of the word. Mandy was on ever loving lock down ninety-nine percent of the time. Sometimes I felt like if it weren’t for me she’d have
no
clue how the really real world worked. Just this vague half notion of how it was supposed to go through her father’s hard core Christian-colored glasses. 

She nodded and opened her mouth to speak but the professor called for attention at the front of the class. I drank my tepid coffee and tried like Hell to understand what he was saying. Mandy was holding her own but barely, then I looked over at Shelly who was rapt. She looked like this statistics crap was as easy as breathing and I think
that
is what tipped me toward wanting to hate her more than anything else so far.

The class ended in scraping chairs, rustling paper and the general chaos of every student trying to flee for their lives, or at least their sanity. I was no exception, unceremoniously shoving my papers, notebook and laptop into my bag.

“Well Sister, you’ve got at least one less thing to worry about now.” Shelly said shoving
her
notebook into
her
bag.

“What’s that?” I asked haggard.

“I’m going to teach you and Red how to get through this with a passing grade. Call us even for me being such a cunt when I got here. Sorry about that, by the way, just looking out for the club.” She smiled beatifically and it had Reaver all over it. Clearly they were related. I eyed her warily.

“Hey if I could teach Ashton how to do her own taxes after she became a millionaire overnight I can teach you how to do this. You’ve already won half the battle by even
being
in stats.” She stood up.

“A bunch of the Old Ladies are doing a ladies night out this Friday. You should come, we’ll set something up then. Gimme your phone.” She held out her hand and I blinked. I unlocked my phone and handed it to her. She added herself as a contact sent herself a text and handed it back.

“Call you with the details!” she sang out and breezed out of the room.

“Why do I feel like you were just hit by a tornado?” Mandy asked me. I sighed.

“You think she’s bad you should meet her cousin.” I said.

“What the hell kind of name is Reaver?” she asked and her eyes darted around to make sure she hadn’t been overheard. I suppressed a laugh. She was trying to be more normal and had started with swearing but old habits die hard. It was sobering really. Her reaction every time she did it kind of made me afraid of what her da’ had been up to behind closed doors. I’d seen him in action a few times, all puffed up with his righteous indignation. It wasn’t pretty. I couldn’t wait to get my friend out from under her parent’s roof.

“A dangerous one belonging to a man who really,
really
likes his knives.” I said.

“Oh my God! Evy! What are you
doing with these people!?
” Mandy demanded in a harsh whisper as we headed out of the classroom.

“Mandy, don’t judge!” I said in a warning tone. “Dray has been taking really good care of me, driving me everywhere, and he hasn’t asked for anything…” I told her everything as we stood outside my next class’ door. I had an hour between classes and she stood listening rapt the whole time as people filtered in past us.

“And you say he’s really hot?” she asked meekly. Good lord, my friend the virgin…

“Mandy, he’s the sin of lust personified.” I swooned and she laughed then sighed herself.

“Look, as your best friend I am telling you to be careful, to go slowly and to only do anything if it
feels
right. Don’t close yourself off to a possibility of something with Dray because of what that jerkwad Jerry did. At the same time, don’t rush into something because of it either.” She made a frustrated growl of disgust at the lost and confused look that I could feel on my face. “You know what?” she said.

“What?” I asked.

“Just don’t over complicate things. Do what feels right and only if it feels right.” she said and shrugged.

“Thanks Mandy.” I whispered and we hugged again.

“I’ll see you after class. I want to see this guy for myself.” She said and went off to the library. I laughed and sat through the next class.

Finally, at five forty-five I collected Mandy from the library. We pushed out the double glass doors of the college building’s entry way and stepped out under threatening skies.

“Will this rain never end?” she asked and I shrugged. I liked it. Dray’s Trans Am was idling at the curb. Mandy eyed it.

“That him?” she asked. The driver’s door opened and he popped over the roof. He folded his hands on the gleaming black metal and his dark gaze bore into me as I approached with Mandy at my side.

“I hear you met Shelly.” He said flatly, and his eyes were angry, but I could tell it wasn’t at me.

“Yep and you’re meeting Mandy. Mandy, this is Dray. Dray this is my best friend Mandy.” I said. He lifted his chin in acknowledgment and looked Mandy over once before his eyes settled onto me again. The heat in his gaze caused me to shiver.

“Nice to meet you Dray.” Mandy smiled and waved politely. “Ev, good luck.” My friend said low and dubiously for my ears alone and she hugged me.

“You need anything you call me!” she ordered. I smiled at her unease. She was like a kitten, my girl, and sometimes when we were outside her daddy’s sphere of influence, I felt like an overprotective mama cat. This attempt at role reversal amused me.

“Thanks Mandy. I’ll see you later.” I promised. She left and I got into the car.

“You pissed?” He asked me once the doors shut.

“I’m hungry. I’m tired. I’m confused and I’m horny.” I answered truthfully.

“Okay.” He said, voice light and eyebrows raised and he drove us to a nearby Mexican restaurant. When we were settled into a booth he leveled worried dark eyes on me and I leveled him with a calm gaze of my own. I was too tired to be angry.

“So what happened?” he asked. I told him about the bag and Shelly’s less than stellar introduction.

“She uh, she said there were worse places to be than your bed, so does that mean..?” he looked at me and his expression became shuttered, guarded…

“I told you I did casual sex.” His hands rested on the table and I reached out and covered one with mine.

“Not judging,” I said, and I wasn’t, Dray
had
told me he did casual sex and he had already said that wasn’t what he wanted from me. I took him at his word until he gave me cause not to.
If
he ever gave me cause not to. I would not let Jerry ruin my ability to trust. I just wouldn’t.  Dray searched my face carefully and whatever he saw there caused him to nod carefully.

“You really aren’t so what’s your concern?” he asked.

“My concern is if she’s that proprietary over a few patches on a bag then um, does she have any of the same ideas about you?” He blinked and his mouth turned down in an expression that said that wasn’t at all what he’d expected from me.

“No. Shelly is complicated. She’s a club whore but sort of at an elevated status. Somewhere between a club whore and an Old Lady.” He could see I wasn’t exactly following and sighed.

“Look, I didn’t want to talk about club politics or hierarchies tonight. I wanted to talk to you about whatever it is we’re doing. We’ve obviously got some kind of insane attraction going on but you just got out of a real bad situation and I don’t want a quick fuck or a short fling. You deserve better than that and for whatever reason I want to be that for you, what you deserve.” He found the spaces between my fingers with his and I looked down at our interlocked hands.

Our plates were set in front of us but still I stared for what felt like long minutes at our interlocked fingers.

“Everett?” he asked and his dusky voice sounded worried.

“I don’t want to overthink this.” I said suddenly. “Dray I’m attracted to you,
intensely
attracted to you and this thing with Jerry, I don’t know… I just don’t know but I think Mandy said it best. I should just do what feels right and only
if
it feels right. Everything else is just over complicating things.” His gaze was intense but guarded at the same time and I looked him over. He nodded slowly.

“Eat your dinner Em.” He sad gently and we ate in relative silence that wasn’t completely comfortable at least not for me.

Finally I asked, “What’s an ‘Old Lady’ to you guys, because quite frankly it sounds rude as Hell.” He choked on his sip of water and l blinked. He coughed and laughed at the same time and I felt my lips curve in amusement.

“An Old Lady is sacred, Babe. Take Ashton for instance, she’s Trigger’s Old Lady, that means if anyone and I do mean
anyone
that messes with her has to answer to Trig.” I swallowed thoughtfully as he went on. “It’s the nature of an MC that to mess with one of us, you’re gettin’ all of us so… yeah. Being an Old Lady is a big deal. It’s an honorific we bestow only on women who are of value to us.” I arched a brow at his phrasing of the last.

“You make us sound like property, like cattle or something.” I said and he grinned.

“Yeah it does, but the MC is a brotherhood and the traditions MC’s follow are an age old thing that can be full of all sorts of misogynistic douche-baggy goodness.” He gave me that boyish panty dropping grin of his and I laughed. “Seriously though, to be a patch holder’s girlfriend is one thing, but to be a patch holder’s Old Lady, property patch and all… Like I said, that’s sacred and a real big deal to us. We take it more seriously than a wedding ring.” He looked solemn all of a sudden and I really felt my eyebrows go up.