Hawk: (23 page)

Hawk wasn’t certain how the fighting had led to fucking, although he couldn’t deny the sense it made. Both made him hard and want to pound something. Tildy was straddling him. Her skirt was hiked up around her waist and her silky panties were rubbing against his aching erection that was threatening to burst through his cargo pants.

Her lips had abandoned his and were now skimming across his jaw and toward his neck. He reached up and grasped the clip holding her hair back. As it fell down around her shoulders, he breathed her in. “Gonna get us arrested,” he murmured to her, dropping the plastic clip. It clattered to the pavement.

Tildy either didn’t hear him or didn’t care. Her hands were already at the snap of his pants, yanking the fly open. With one hand Hawk popped the top button of her cream colored blouse.
He couldn’t quite get to her breasts, with her shirt and her bra in the way, and the fact that they were outside
in public
. He drew his tongue along the swell of her chest anyway. He figured it was worth it if they got popped by a patrolman.

Tildy’s small, smooth hands brought out his cock, and Hawk, without thinking, grabbed the material of her panties along the hip and pulled. The fabric ripped and Tildy froze.

“Shit,” he muttered. “Tildy, I’m sorry.”

Tildy shook her head angrily and grasped his shaft. “I don’t care,” she whispered fiercely. “I don’t care.” As she positioned herself and sank down on him, she clutched his arms for balance. “You’re not him.”

“Oh, God,” Hawk groaned as she took him inside her.

He’d never been inside a woman before without protection. As it turned out, blowjobs were simply no comparison. Tildy was all silk and heat as she mounted him. She was also dripping wet. She was always that way for him though.

He gripped her hips and helped her ride him, since she wasn’t tall enough to reach the pavement for leverage. She squeezed him tightly as she moved, riding his shaft like she was made to do nothing else.

After only a few moments, Hawk grabbed her shoulders and held her down on him, lost in the feel of her tight pussy. “Fuck, Angel,” he growled. “This isn’t going to last.” He already felt his balls tightening. Nothing could have prepared him for how it would feel to have her bare against him. “Cum, Angel. Cum right now.”

Tildy gasped with the effort of getting herself off before he did. Hawk reached between them and pinched her clit lightly. That set her off. She tightened around him like a vise as Hawk clenched his jaw to keep from crying out as he pumped his load up into her.

She fell against him and held him tightly. She could have been just waiting until she caught her breath, but Hawk didn’t want her to let go all the same. All too soon she put one foot down on the pavement as she slid off his lap. He was still trying to recover, as she straightened her skirt over her thighs. She was still breathing hard and her face was still flushed. She avoided looking at him, as she turned and headed back to her car.

Hawk realized he was still holding her torn panties in his hand. He looked around at the dumpsters that were overflowing with garbage bags. Leaving them in this place seemed obscene. He wasn’t at all certain how he felt about what had just happened. He was even less sure of what Tildy felt, but she wasn’t trash.

He stuffed them into his pocket and started the Harley’s engine. He followed her again, out of the alley and onto the adjoining one-way street, though he was less aggressive in his pursuit this time. Tildy had just parked her car in the bank’s parking lot as he drove past. He still hadn’t lost his instinct to watch over her. As he sat at the red light, he watched her disappear inside before heading back to the garage.

Hawk walked back toward the bay doors where the guys were waiting for him. He stifled an irritated noise. He wished they’d just forget about the whole thing, but his and Tildy’s soap opera spat in front of them sealed the deal on that. None of them had ever seen Hawk argue with a woman. None of them had ever seen a woman come to Burnout
just
to have it out with him. As he neared the building, he sent up a silent prayer that they would just ignore the whole damn thing. It was too much to hope for.

“Want to tell us what that was all about?” Shooter asked.

Hawk didn’t respond.

“How did you end up with Tildy’s ring?” Tex pressed. “And what the hell is going on with you lately?”

Hawk slammed his keys down on the workbench. “Nothing!” he snapped. “Nothing’s going on. I just- I screwed up. It won’t happen again.”

“What won’t happen again?” Easy asked cautiously, taking note of Hawk’s foul mood.

Hawk sighed. They were all looking at him. He wasn’t getting out of it, not after his and Tildy’s little display. “I slept with her,” he mumbled.

“Come again?” Tex replied.

Hawk grimaced. “I slept with her,” he repeated more loudly.

“When?” Shooter asked.

Hawk hesitated. He wasn’t about to say they’d just finished going at each other like alley cats--in an alley no less. He hedged. “The first time was the night I picked her up at Maria’s when she was trashed.”

“The
first
time?”
Easy asked incredulous.

“You mean you were
Tildy’s
first time,” Tex clarified, looking at Hawk with a sharp, disapproving glare.

Hawk felt indignant. “Well, she was just going to give it away! Give it to some asshole who would’ve hurt her!”

Shooter crossed his arms in front of his broad chest. “Why do I get the feeling that’s exactly what
did
happen?”

“I didn’t hurt her!” Hawk insisted.

“Oh, really?” Shooter asked. “And that’s why she’s showing up to the garage spitting nails and ready to get into a slap fight with you? Because you were such a gentleman?”

“Jesus, Hawk,” Tex groaned. “Did you just walk out on her afterward? Did you just bang her in the truck and dump her ass at her front door?”

“No!” Hawk shouted. “Not that it’s any of your damn business, but
she
left
me
, okay? Not the other way around.”

“After you did what?” Tex asked icily.

Hawk paused. “Nothing,” he muttered.

“Nothing,” Tex repeated in a way that clearly indicated nothing meant something.

“She didn’t like it,” he admitted.

Tex looked at Shooter, then back to Hawk. He frowned. “Yeah, okay. Understandable. You’re not a small guy and she’s definitely a small girl. No way around that for the first time.”

“How drunk was she?” Shooter demanded.

Hawk bristled at that. “Not drunk
at all
!” he spat. “She’d slept it off and woke up later. Fuck you, if you think that I would do some shit like that!”

“I don’t,” Shooter replied. “I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on here.”

Hawk was close to either walking out or taking on all three of them. “She-” Fuck. He hated feeling like he was on trial, especially to his brothers who had such high standards. Hawk usually lived up to them, but when he failed, it always seemed to sting just that much more to know he was disappointing more than just himself. “She asked me how it would be the next time.”

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” Tex growled.

Hawk just shook his head. He was honest--always. He never lied to women or led them on. With him you always, always knew what you were getting. If you didn’t accept it, if you tried to ask for more, well, asking about the next time was the most sure fire way to make sure there would never
be
a next time.

“I didn’t know what to say,” he confessed. “So I didn’t say anything at all.”

“Hawk,” Shooter ground out. “Tildy is not some bar floozy that you picked up for a night of fun.”

“You think I don’t know that?!” Hawk snapped. “You think I don’t know I made a huge mistake?”

“The first time,” Easy chimed in. “You said the first time. So you made this huge mistake and you just went ahead and made it
again?
”

“She showed up at my house yesterday!”

“And you tripped? Both of you? And landed in bed together?” Tex asked dryly.

“I can’t say no to her,” Hawk snapped. “And stop acting like you can’t relate, Cowboy. When you tried to tell
Abby
no, she broke into your
house,
and you
still
fucked her eight ways from Sunday!”

“I wanted Abby,” Tex drawled.

“Well, I want Tildy.”

A heavy silence hung between them. “That why she’s wearing another man’s ring?”

Hawk glared at him. “It’s just sex.”

“Huh,” Tex replied with a shrug. “Wouldn’t have thought Tildy’d be into ‘
just sex.
’ ”

Hawk stalked past him and slammed the break room door, separating himself from the three pairs of judgmental eyes. He threw open the fridge and snatched out a bottle of water. As he drank, Tildy’s torn panties were practically burning a hole in the pocket of his pants. Slut. He was making her a slut. Other girls were built for ‘just sex’. Nothing wrong with that. But not Tildy. Not her. She’d waited for a time when it felt right, until she’d given up waiting and settled for him.

He closed his eyes and remembered her arms around him, less than an hour ago. He’d told himself she was just calming down not holding onto him for dear life.

Shooter was right; she did give it away to some asshole.

Tildy parked her Mercedes in the restaurant lot and had a full-on panic attack. Her hair was wild, her lipstick was smudged, and, not that she could forget, she was missing her panties. Her fingers fumbled at the buttons of her blouse, as she tried to make herself presentable, but finally gave up. She was a mess, and she was late--Just ten minutes--but still. Tildy was never late, and God forbid Julia, Tate’s mother, mentioned this fact to Tildy’s own mother.

She lurched out of the car; her stomach coming along for the ride. She took a deep breath to avoid vomiting. She hadn’t meant to let things get so out of control. In the mirror, she was unrecognizable; hell, her
life
was unrecognizable. She was cheating, having public sex, and having even more public arguments. Tate at least kept his indiscretions with Skylar (and God knew who else) restricted to dark kitchen pantries.

She shuffled across the parking lot and affixed her winning smile as she opened the front door and greeted the hostess.
I can do this
, Tildy told herself. Her whole life was a masquerade; surely this could just be another one. As she approached the table, Tate and his father, John, rose to greet her. Tate gave Julia the perfunctory kiss on the cheek and proceeded to sit down between her future mother-in-law and her fiancée.

“Sorry I’m late,” she told them sheepishly. “I got hung up at the bank.”

Julia smiled, unconcerned. “Oh, that’s alright dear.”

Tildy willed her hands to stop shaking, as she picked up the menu. Talk quickly devolved into work and the upcoming engagement party. Tildy talked mostly with Julia, as Tate’s eyes seemed to have glazed over at the mention of the party.

“My mother decided to book the Custer hotel’s ballroom,” Tildy told Julia.

Julia started to frown.

Tildy was suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to defend the choice, and Abby. Abby had worked damn hard to renovate the old hotel and Tildy had come to think of her as a friend. “It’s beautiful,” she assured Julia. “The new owner, Abby Raines, is working so hard to restore the building. It’ll be amazing when she’s finished.”

“Well, we hope so,” Julia replied and smiled at Tate. “We want it to be perfect, don’t we, Tate?”

Tate was texting on his phone and not paying them any attention. Julia seemed to be more than slightly perturbed at her son’s rudeness. “Tate,” she said in a clipped tone. Tate looked up from his phone. Tildy wondered if Julia gave Tate some ‘corrections’ of her own in private.

“I said we want the engagement party and the reception to be perfect,” Julia repeated for her son’s benefit.

Tate grinned at his mother and slid his phone into the pocket of his khakis. “Absolutely.”

As Julia leaned toward her husband and discussed whom they should invite to the engagement party Friday night, Tate leaned toward Tildy. He didn’t say anything, but his hand landed on her knee and started up her thigh. He grinned at her.

Tildy’s heart fluttered. The last thing she needed was for Tate to find out she was missing her panties, or make any other unfortunate discoveries for that matter. She jerked suddenly, shaking the table. She had another surge of panic, but thankfully, Julia and John didn’t seem to notice.

“Something wrong?” Tate whispered in her ear.

Tildy shook her head forcefully and crossed her legs. She reached for a glass of water and drank deeply as Tate gave her a curious look. She blushed furiously and looked away. Tate’s interest, however, didn’t wane. In fact, Tildy’s overreaction to his advances seemed to only pique his interest. He tried repeatedly to get his hand between her legs, as their main course was brought out. He seemed to be even more amused that his parents sat only a few feet away.

When the check came, Tildy practically bolted up out of the chair. When Julia gave her a puzzled look, Tildy just smiled. “Work,” she said with a shrug. Julia, herself, did not work but could appreciate the concept as both her husband and son had to get back to their office as well.

As the four of them headed toward the door, Tate gripped her elbow good-naturedly. Tildy winced, because he’d grabbed the injured one. At first he merely look confused, then realization dawned on him. He simply dropped her elbow and took her hand. “Don’t run off so fast. I don’t get to see much of you,” he crooned to her, a bit more loudly than he should have, but Tildy had the idea that he was trying to cover for his mistake.

Julia gave them a knowing smile, clearly not getting Tate’s little joke about not getting to see much of Tildy. John was already at his own car and simply gave them all a half-salute while Tate followed Tildy to her car.

“I have to go,” she told him, walking as fast as she could.

“Got somewhere to be?” Tate teased, not letting go of her hand.

“Work, I said.”

Tate didn’t reply. He watched his mother pull out of the restaurant parking lot behind his father, smiling as he watched his parents leave. Then he pressed her up against her car and put his hand on her bare thigh. Tildy tried to push it away, but he shook his head. “No one can see,” he told her. He lifted the hem of her skirt.

“Tate, stop,” she demanded.

He grinned at her. “Your hair’s down,” he said quietly. “Top button’s open.” His hand slid up the inside of her thigh. “Matilda’s got secrets,” he whispered.

She grabbed his wrist, but she wasn’t strong enough to pry his hand off her. She glanced around nervously at the people across the lot, passing by on the sidewalk.

“Uh oh,” Tate said, moving his leg between hers, so she couldn’t close them. “No panties. Is my little virgin bride a little less...virginal...than I thought?”

“Stop!” she hissed, but Tate grazed the cleft between her legs. His fingers dipped into her and he pulled them back out. He brought his hand out from underneath her skirt and rubbed his fingers together. Tildy’s cheeks stung. She couldn’t deny any of it.

“Who is he, Matilda?” Tate asked politely--too politely--like they were discussing the weather or what they’d had for lunch, like he didn’t even really care. Tildy realized it was because he didn’t.

She shook her head, ignoring the tears stinging her eyes. “Just a friend,” she whispered.

He chuckled. “Cute. Didn’t know you
had
friends.”

Now Tildy’s cheeks stung for an entirely different reason. She reached up and shoved Tate. He stumbled back, just a few steps. “I do,” she insisted, but to her own ears she sounded whiny.

Tate, far from being angry at being denied, merely laughed. This enraged Tildy even more than his social leper comment. He wasn’t even angry that she was sleeping with someone else. Did he know it wasn’t serious? That Hawk wasn’t a threat, because he didn’t actually want to take her away? She turned toward her car, tears stinging her eyes. Tate knew. Skylar knew. Everyone, it seemed, was in on the joke.