Ride Steady(169)

I looked around my lovely kitchen, which I’d yet to really take in.

It was at least three times the size of the kitchen at my old apartment, and in that moment I realized it wasn’t a lot smaller than the kitchen I had in the house I’d lived in with Aaron.

A house his parents bought us for our wedding. A house I hadn’t even viewed before it was given to me as a big surprise present with all the fanfare his father made of it as we stood on the dance floor at our reception with him and his wife making the grand announcement. And after we returned from Massachusetts, I was moved into it.

I wandered out of the kitchen, into the dining room/living room and gazed around.

My furniture fit here. The furniture I’d picked that was attractive and welcoming and comfortable, it fit in this house.

Perfectly.

Like I’d bought it for right here.

This was my place.

This was me.

I moved to the big picture window by the dining room table and looked out.

Big lawn. Room for kids to play. Same in the back with a nice deck. A place to grill out. A place to relax.

Quiet neighborhood.

I waited and watched and I did this for a while.

Only two cars drove down the street. They didn’t race down it. They didn’t have blaring music. They drove sedately through a safe, quiet, family neighborhood.

“This is my place. This is me,” I whispered.

I was where I needed to be for my son.

But also for me.

I had the man I needed to have who loved my son.

But also he was falling in love with me.

Aaron was going to pull out all the stops.

And he was going to ruin everything.

I heard the back door open just as I focused on a sign in the yard at a house across the street.

“Carrie, water’s boiling,” Joker called.

“Can you turn it off?” I called back, my eyes glued to that sign.

Seconds passed.

“Hey,” I heard.

“Hey,” I replied, eyes to that sign.

I felt him get close. I felt his hand light on the small of my back. I felt his heat. I felt his strength.

“Hey,” he said softly, one syllable, one word repeated, but the change in tone said everything.

“The house across the street is for rent,” I told him, staring at that sign.

“Yeah?” he asked gently.

“We should talk to Mrs. Heely. See if she wants to move. Get her out of that place,” I told him.

“Carrie.”

“Yes?”

“Look at me, Butterfly.”

I tore my gaze from the sign and looked up at him.

He also looked at me.

“Fuck, baby, what happened?”

“Aaron is investigating me.”

His jaw clenched.

“He knows you belong to Chaos,” I told him.

“I’m not hidin’ that, nor would I ever hide that,” he told me.

“I know,” I whispered.

He stared at me. He did this for a while, his hand on my back, light, not claiming like he usually touched me.

Just there.

Suddenly he announced, “Fought the underground fight circuit.”

I blinked.

Then I asked, “What?”

“Illegal fights, illegal betting. Did it for years. Never got caught. Made a shit ton of money. All cash. Didn’t pay taxes on it and won’t if I don’t have to.”

I stared.

Joker kept talking.

“Didn’t live a quiet life, but never did anything really stupid and never got caught doin’ the semi-stupid stuff I did do. In other words, I don’t have a rap sheet, Carissa.”

“I… okay,” I replied.

“I’ve done drugs,” he went on, and my head jerked. “Smoked pot. Snorted coke. Nothin’ else. Don’t mind the mellow of a joint but didn’t like the high of blow. But as a fighter, neither did good things for me, so I stopped doin’ that shit a long time ago.”

I was faintly shaking my head as I repeated, “Okay.”

“Chaos has been a clean club for over a decade,” he kept going. “Not a single member has been taken in for anything more than misdemeanors. Drunk and disorderly, that kinda shit. There are boys who got sheets, but nothin’ serious. Not for a long f*ckin’ time.”

With that, it started dawning on me, and what was dawning on me also started warming me.