Undeniable (Undeniable, #1)(4)

Seven years passed before Deuce and I crossed paths again.

During those years, my father had been released from prison, and I had gained an older, pain-in-the-ass brother, Frankie.

Franklin Deluva, Senior was my dad’s road chief. He died in a head-on collision with a Mack truck a few years back, and his old lady died several years earlier from breast cancer. As was the case with most biker brats, Frankie didn’t have any other family willing to take him on. Since my father didn’t have a son, he took Frankie under his wing and began mapping out his future as a Demon. If Frankie stayed the course, my father made it clear he’d be taking the gavel from him one day. Which was fine, great even, but there was just one big problem.

Frankie was angry.

All the time.

So much so that all he did was get into fights—at school, at the club, on the sidewalk, in the grocery store. Frankie would fight with a brick wall if it pissed him off. You wouldn’t believe how many walls have pissed Frankie off.

His poor fifteen-year-old body was already covered in scars from street fights. Since he had come to live with us, he’d been hospitalized sixteen times for various broken bones, knife wounds, and numerous concussions.

Frankie also had serious abandonment issues.

When he first moved in with my father and me, he had violent nightmares. He would wake up terrified, covered in sweat, and screaming at the top of his lungs. The nightmares turned into night terrors, and Frankie began thrashing in his sleep, beating his head with his fists while screaming and crying uncontrollably. My father had to hold him down until he either calmed or regained full consciousness.

One night, when my father was out on a run, Frankie snuck into my room and slipped in bed with me. He slept soundly for the first time since he’d moved in with us, and he’d been in my bed ever since.

And life moved on.

Two weeks after my twelfth birthday, my father decided it was time for Frankie to tag along on an MC run. When he found out I wouldn’t be going, he threw a violent fit until my father caved. When it came to Frankie, my father was a total pushover.

On the back of Frankie’s bike, I left Manhattan headed for northern Illinois. Our first stop: a pumpkin farm. When your father and his cohorts were involved in illegal dealings and needed to meet privately, criminal gatherings at pumpkin farms were more frequent than one would think.

This sort of meeting usually lasted a couple of days; the adults stayed inside and the kids outside. There was always a lot of yelling, a lot of fighting, and a lot of drinking. And a lot of slutty women.

I started developing early and looked rather awkward, being as skinny and as tall as I was—all elbows and knees with a pair of C cups. Several boys, who had accompanied their fathers to the meet, had been following me around, snapping my bra strap, and calling me “stuffer”—which was how I found myself hiding in a tree, my headphones on, listening to the Rolling Stones, swinging my legs and bobbing my head while singing along.

I felt a tug on the toe of my Chucks, and I jerked my foot away.

“Go away, Frankie!” I yelled.

Frankie tugged my toe again, and I ripped off my headphones and glared down at him.

It wasn’t Frankie.

Except for his hair, which was now thick and sandy blond and hung down to his shoulders, he looked exactly the same. Still devastatingly beautiful.

He grinned his multi-dimpled grin.

“Heard you were around here somewhere, darlin’. You remember me?”

“Deuce,” I whispered, staring at him. “From Rikers.”

He burst out laughing. “I’m not actually from there. Home sweet home is in Montana. I was just visitin’ my old man, same as you. Remember?”

I nodded. “Reaper. I liked him.”

His smile slipped. “He’s gone now.”

I never knew what to say to people who had lost their loved ones. Nothing ever sounded right. But seeing the faraway look in Deuce’s icy blue eyes, I had to say something.

“He had a great smile,” I said softly. “Just like yours.”

His gaze shot to mine, and he smiled.

And I smiled.

“You know,” he said as he pulled a thin gold chain out of his dirty white T-shirt and lifted it over his head, “you should have this.”

He grabbed my hand and placed the chain in it.

“It was my old man’s,” he said. “Ain’t no one ever said nothin’ nice ’bout that bastard. Ever. Not even his own mother. Not until right now. Figure that makes it yours.”

I held the chain up and studied the small round medallion hanging on it. The Hell’s Horsemen’s insignia was on the front. The words Hell’s Horsemen encircled a hooded Grim Reaper straddling a Harley and holding a scythe.

On the back, it read Reaper.

“That day seven years ago was the first time I’d seen that * smile. It was also the last.”

I didn’t know what to say. So I didn’t say anything and just slipped the chain over my neck.

“Thanks,” I said and tucked the medallion under my Jimi Hendrix T-shirt. “I like it.”

Nodding, he looked off into the distance.

“Gonna take a walk through them pumpkins, darlin’. You wanna join?”

I hung my headphones around my neck, clipped my Walkman to my jeans pocket, and hopped down.

I didn’t give it much thought and just slipped my hand into his, like I would with my father or Frankie. He glanced down but didn’t pull away, and his thick, warm fingers curled around mine as we started walking.