A Leap in the Dark (The Assassins of Youth MC Book 2)(10)

“Knock it off, Giovanni. I’m done with you. You didn’t even know I was f*cking gone and you still stayed out all night with those moronic friends of yours.”

“It’s not their fault, baby. It’s me. I’m weak. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me. Don’t leave me. Please, baby, please—”

“I’ve had it, Giovanni,” I shouted louder, as if he’d finally hear me. “I can’t deal with your immature f*cking ways anymore. I’m a f*cking RN with a boyfriend who can’t seem to come home at night. How do you think that makes me feel?”

“I don’t blame you for—”

“I don’t care what you think. It was just a rhetorical question.” I was bellowing so loudly standing out on the back kitchen deck, it was a good thing most of the homes in the neighborhood were empty. The closest occupied home was the Save Our Baby Brides safe house, four homes down Little Wing Street. “Why don’t you just take some time to think about your priorities, Giovanni? I’ve got business to attend to down here.” And I punched the END button on my phone so violently it’s a wonder I didn’t break it. I only barely stopped myself from throwing it over the railing, into the big backyard that had never been landscaped.

“Argh!” I shouted, hugging myself tightly. It was cool in early December, but the briskness was bracing. I didn’t want to be so wide the f*ck awake. “I need a f*cking drink.”

It wasn’t until I was actually in the kitchen that I realized I didn’t have any booze. I didn’t like beer, the only thing the Avalanche grocery run was allowed to sell. There was a state liquor store out on Route 15. I headed for my purse on the living room couch, but was stopped by Deloy Pingree. My new roommate.

“Nurse Warrior!” he cried, as though he hadn’t seen me in a year. “Dingo just brought me back from the dental assisting school in St. George. It was amazing!” Deloy described “amazing” with his hands spread wide. I had the feeling he was equally as amazed by Full House reruns, sales on canned chili, and balloons. But his enthusiasm was infectious.

“But I thought you wanted to be a dentist. I found out the only school is in Salt Lake.” It was true. The school in St. George I thought was for dentists was now only for dental assistants.

“But that’s insane, Nurse Warrior.”

“Call me Oaklyn.”

“Oaklyn. Who’s going to pay my way while I attend dentist school in Salt Lake?”

“Who’s going to pay your way while you attend dental assisting school in St. George?”

Deloy splayed his hand against his chest. “I am. Like you said, I’ve got a small nest egg saved up, thanks to Levon Rockwell.”

“Thanks to yourself.”

“And Gideon’s offered me this house for free. He owns it, but it’s an investment for him, while he spruces up this town. It’ll be worth way more in a few years once we get this town together.”

Now I really needed a drink. “What’s this ‘we’ business? Are you planning on becoming the town’s first dental assistant?” I’d developed a sense of ownership over Deloy Pingree during the past few days. I was a nurse. I knew that a woman’s fertility started to decline once she hit thirty. The cutoff age had been going down and down with each new study done. Soon they’d be telling us the cutoff age was really twenty-five. And with no halfway feasible man even remotely on the horizon, my biological clock was ticking. I wanted to mother the hell out of some boy, and Deloy Pingree was it.

When he looked crushed, I was crushed too. “Well, there isn’t a dentist in Avalanche, so far. But by ‘we’ I mean us. The motorcycle gang.”

“What?” I bawled. “Deloy, you told me you drive a Prius! You ride one up on Dingo’s Harley and suddenly you’re a member of the club?”

“Well, not hardly. But they’ve already taken me under their wing.”

“They have?”

Deloy looked proud. “After the school, we stopped in at a bar called The High Dive downtown and had a drink.”

“You did?” I was feeling angry and more than a little left out. Why wasn’t I invited to have a drink? My sister’s old man was actually the President of the Assassins of Youth. I should be invited. And I was dying for a drink.

“And you wouldn’t believe it, but this giant, hulking, red-haired man came in wearing a bloody butcher’s apron. He looked like he was a Marine or a member of the Special Ops. Dingo knew him and started playing darts with him. Well! Turns out it was the infamous Sledgehammer, he owns the grocery around the corner on Watchtower Street, and he said he’d give me a job checking groceries!”

My jaw hung open. Deloy had accomplished all this in a day and a half, and all I’d done was fume over some worthless Italian playboy. “I…” was all I could say.

“Isn’t that amazing? Sledgehammer said he’d work around my dental school hours—classes start right after Christmas—and I can have all the cut-rate meat and groceries I want! Meanwhile, Gideon’s taking me to the shooting range to teach me how to use a gun, and—”

“What? Wait a minute. What? Deloy, why do you need to use a gun?”

He looked taken aback. “Well—uh—because. Because that’s what guys do when they join a motorcycle gang.”