Unattainable (Undeniable, #3)(69)
“Can’t do it,” Ripper said, wincing when Deuce’s death glare turned on him. “Sorry, Prez. Harley’s gettin’ tubes put in her ears and if I ain’t there for the surgery, your daughter is gonna leave my ass.”
“My daughter,” Deuce bit out, “knows how it goes. She ain’t gonna say jack-f*ckin’-shit.”
Ripper snorted. “Maybe not to you, but me? Yeah, Prez, I’m gonna get an earful and that ain’t all she’ll do either.”
“You scared of your old lady, Ripper?” Mick said, laughing. “What’s she? A buck thirty soakin’ wet?”
It was Ripper’s turn to shoot a death glare. “Fuck you,” he shot back. “I ain’t scared of shit except havin’ nowhere to put my dick when it gets cold and sad and wants a motherf*ckin’ hug.”
The entire table cracked up, every brother except Cage, Deuce, and Ripper roared with laughter. Mick was even wiping tears from his eyes.
Deuce flashed Ripper a disgusted look and the guy grimaced. “Sorry, Prez,” Ripper muttered. “But you know how it go—”
“Don’t finish that f*ckin’ sentence,” Deuce growled, his nostrils flaring angrily. “And the rest of you *s,” he said, looking around the table. “Reel it the f*ck in before I put a bullet in each of you.”
Despite Cage being thoroughly disgusted by the mental image Ripper had just painted for him, he’d gotten stuck on what his father had said.
You’re headed out to Cali next week, right? I’m gonna need you to swing by Oakland.
Oakland. Twenty f*cking minutes from…
Tegen.
“I’ll take Oakland,” he said loudly, ignoring Cox as the f*cker turned to face him with a shit-eating grin on his face.
“You sure ’bout that?” Cox drawled. “Lot of hippies crawlin’ ’round close by.”
“You ain’t never ran Cali territory,” Deuce said. “Why the f*ck would I send you?”
“Because I’m not a f*ckin’ moron,” Cage spat. “I’ve ran East Coast, why the f*ck not west?”
The table went silent as father and son stared each other down, but Cage wasn’t going to back down this time. He wanted this run because he wanted to see Tegen, and he didn’t give a f*ck that every brother in this room knew exactly what his game was. So much for forgetting the bitch; he was contemplating tying her to the back of his bike and bringing her ass back home where he would promptly tie her to his bed until she agreed to stay.
“When we’re done here, you f*ckin’ talk to Ripper. You f*ckin’ breathe in every word that motherf*cker tells you and you best hope it sticks. Shit goes south in Oakland, it’s on you. You feel me?”
Cage gave his old man a brisk nod.
Two days later he was eating concrete, California bound.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Upon entering the hallway, Cage could hear music and laughter, smell the green, the booze…the sex.
Nostrils flaring, his fists clenched, he stopped walking and took a deep breath. If she were in there with…
Anxiety like he’d never felt before painfully cinched his stomach.
If she were in there with ZZ or with another guy, he’d kill him, then her, then everyone else in her f*cking apartment, and, depending on how he was feeling after that bloodbath, possibly everyone in San Francisco too.
Goddamn, he f*cking hated her. Hated how she went out of her way to make him feel like the biggest idiot to ever walk the planet, hated that she couldn’t care less if he looked her way or not, hated that HE wanted her so f*cking bad he could taste it and she wanted nothing, f*cking nothing at all, to do with him.
He’d told her he loved her. He’d opened up his entire f*cking world to her. And…
She’d f*cking snuck out on him, for Christ’s sake.
Yeah, so why the f*ck was he here? He was a glutton for punishment, that much he was painfully aware of. But he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Every time he closed his eyes, there she was…
At thirteen, with glasses and braces and the biggest, ugliest, frizziest hair he’d ever seen, following him around like a lovesick puppy.
At sixteen, when he taken her virginity and she’d told him she loved him and he’d been a nineteen-year-old * who’d told her, “It ain’t like that for me, baby.”
At seventeen and eighteen, when she’d refused to look at him, refused to acknowledge his existence.
At nineteen, after being away at college for a year, when she’d come home to Montana and he’d taken one look at her, her new look, her new attitude and wanted her. And she hadn’t wanted him.
And now, at twenty-four, she was everything he wanted in a woman. But she still hadn’t forgiven him, still didn’t want him.
All of it consistently churned within his thoughts, f*cking up even the simplest of tasks.
Gritting his teeth, he grabbed the doorknob, pushed open the door, and was greeted with a thick cloud of smoke. After several minutes of shoving half-naked, dancing, drugged-up bodies out of his way, he saw her.
Seated in the middle of an old, battered lime-green sofa was Tegen. Her long copper dreads were pulled back in a heavily beaded ponytail, her head was thrown back, displaying her numerous braided hemp necklaces, her pierced lips were parted, her hooded sweatshirt was unzipped, exposing her small breasts.