Wild Wind: A Chaos Novella (Chaos #6.6)(22)

He started laughing too, through it saying, “That was what I was just thinking.”

“Okay, in brief. Red. Cream, no sugar. Cat’s Eye. Insecure. Tie Cinema Paradiso and Rear Window. I got the idea for my shop from one in Boston where I went to school at Boston College, I just had more space to work with and made it bigger. I opened two years ago. Yes, my dad thought I was crazy and worried like hell. He’s remarried. Has been for nearly seven years. I dig her. My brother detests her. Okay, now, you go.”

“Uh…” he said, smiling at the windshield.

“Favorite color, coffee,” she prompted.

“Red too. One sugar, no cream. Fight Club. And…”

“Book, TV.”

“The Stand for books. I don’t watch much TV. I’m a mechanic, both car and bike and work at the garage at Ride on custom builds. My mom’s remarried to the guy who helped raise us. He’s a Chaos brother too. There was shit around that and it took them a while to get it together. But now they’re together and I got a little brother who is the absolute best. His name is Wilder.”

“I don’t have any half siblings, though I have two step-sisters.”

“Right.”

“I dig them too. Elijah thinks they suck and treats them like that. This is the biggest part of how he’s an asshole, because he does that and doesn’t hesitate to hand that to our stepmom too.”

“Shit.”

“Unh-hunh.”

He reached out a hand.

She took it.

“We can get into that later, okay?” he said.

“Yeah.” Then, “You don’t watch much TV?”

“When the weather’s nice, I like to be on my bike. It was my dad’s. It’s the only thing of his I have that’s tangible, outside his blood. My stepdad is awesome, and my mom is happy, genuinely happy, for the first time since I can remember. So I dig being with them. As mentioned, my baby bro is the shit and he cracks me up. So I get time in with him too. Ditto my big brother. We’re tight, always have been. He’s my bottom-line ride or die. I have a lot of other brothers, and there is not a one of them who I don’t enjoy his company. So there’s that. I like to play pool. I like to get loose. I know my way around a dart board. If I get a wild hair, I follow it, even if it takes me to Montana. And if my ass is ever in front of a TV, it’s usually to completely unplug and I have no clue what I’m watchin’, and don’t remember it when I’m done.”

He paused.

Then he finished, “Though, I happened onto The Sopranos once and binged that motherfucker even if it took weeks. So I guess that would be my favorite, because it rocked.”

She didn’t say anything when he quit talking so he glanced her way to see her staring at him.

He looked back at the road and asked, “What?”

All of a sudden, she was in his space.

He could feel her nose brush his skin and her breath against his jaw and neck when she said, “That is the fucking coolest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Do I need to pull over?”

“Maybe.”

Her “maybe” was Jag’s “no maybe about it.”

He found his shot, a parking lot outside a Little Caesar’s.

He pulled into a spot and barely got the truck in park and turned his head before they were making out.

In the middle of it, she stopped kissing him long enough to ask, “Are we gonna be late?”

“Yes.”

“Do you care?”

“Fuck no.”

He watched her eyes smile.

Then they started making out again.

And yeah.

They were totally late.





Chapter Five



It Just Is



Jagger



An hour and a half later, Jagger didn’t know what to do.

He was leaning toward laughing his ass off.

Though, that was only because he couldn’t drag Archie’s ass out of there, take her to her pad, and make out with her with every intent of eventually making love to her.

And this was because she’d played him.

Major.

The thing was, she did not want to go to dinner that night at his brother’s because they were sorting their shit, getting to know each other, she was unconventional and self-possessed and wanted to know him and maybe was a little curious about his brother.

Uh.

Nope.

She wanted to go to dinner that night to fuck with Carolyn.

He’d noticed when he’d shared what Carolyn did to him that Archie had seemed a little pissed.

And right then, he was making certain to tuck that away because her “little pissed” hid “totally pissed way the fuck off.”

He didn’t know if she was angry on behalf of the sisterhood that a woman would do the dirty on a guy and make them all look bad.

Or if she was pissed that Carolyn did that to Jagger.

He was guessing it was part the first.

But mostly it was the last.

He should have known with the skirt, the blouse, the fuck-me green pumps and showing a lot of leg, toned arms, hints of cleavage and lush, chic, assured style and beauty.

Though apparently, he didn’t know her well enough.