Highway Don't Care (Freebirds) (18 page)

  “You doin’ okay?”  I asked her.

  “Yeah.  I guess so.  I guess I’m just in
shock.  I’ll be less worried when we have a little more to go on.”

  My phone buzzed in my pocket, so I reached in and then
answered it, noting that it was Sam.

  “Ember’s gone.”  Sam said briskly.

  “Yeah.  Sorry she’s with me.”

  “Okay.”  Sam said and then hung up.

  “Sam seemed a little upset that you forgot to tell everyone
that you were leaving.”  I said to her.

  The inevitable argument was delayed by the arrival of our
food and drinks.  My food was placed down first, followed by my drink, the
ketchup, but I stopped her when she tried to place the napkin in my lap.

  “If you don’t put my food down and get out of here, I’ll
make sure you don’t work here anymore.”  Ember said through clinched
teeth.

  The server didn’t look too concerned, but still placed
Ember’s food and drink down.

  “Can I get you anything else, sir?”  The server asked.

  “No.”  Ember said tersely.

  “Okay, well here are a few extra napkins then.  Holler
if you need anything.”  She said while placing a napkin next to my plate.

  The napkin wasn’t clean, however.  It had the server’s
name and number, which I made sure to crumple up in a ball and toss to the
floor, all while Ember watched with her nostrils flaring.

  “It wasn’t my fault.”  I said to her while holding my
hands up in a placating gesture.

  Rolling her eyes, Ember went on to devour her food. 
Where she hid it all, I don’t know. 

  “Do you want anything else, ma’am.”  The server asked
on the way past our table while eyeing Ember’s empty plate with a look of
disgust.

  “The check.”  I said while staring at my own plate,
not giving the woman the benefit of making eye contact, but also unable to keep
the smile off my face at the hostile look reflected on Ember’s none too happy
face.

  “I’ll be back.”  Ember said to me.

  Nodding, I watched her walk to the bathroom.  She came
out a few minutes later, but made sure to stop by the checkout table and speak
with a manager.  Just like I knew she would.  Ember couldn’t help but
give her opinion on things, which is what I loved about her.  She wasn’t
afraid to speak her mind, and let other people know how she felt.  I
always knew where I stood with her.  She wasn’t the type of woman who gave
the silent treatment.  Nor was she the type who played games.  You
always knew where you stood.

  The server dropped the check off a few seconds later, but
didn’t stay because the manager called her to the front.  Taking that as
the cue to get out, I grabbed the check and paid at the front.  The server
and the manager disappeared through the kitchen door, but that didn’t mean we
couldn’t hear the reaming she was receiving from the manager.  She’s lucky
that was all Ember did.  Things could have been worse, like the time I saw
her pull a pregnant woman out of a bar by the hair.

  We rode in silence to Wildwood Subdivision where Sidney
lived.  Parking three houses down, we didn’t have long to wait when a
Lincoln Town Car pulled up and an older gentleman stepped out.  In his hand,
he had a file folder with the words Confidential written in bold black
letters.  My heart started beating wildly, and my palms started
sweating.  This was really going to happen, and it honestly scared the
fuck out of me to know that in a few weeks, I might have custody of my child,
and her life would be in my hands.

  The older man knocked on the door, and it wasn’t but
minutes later when the object of my disgust answered the door.  I guess
somewhere deep inside I had hopes that a Sidney wasn’t truly that evil. 
That I hadn’t spent years of my life with a woman who would keep something so
important from me.  That she would lie about something that would have
changed my life.

  Sidney look confused when she took the papers.  Once
the papers exchanged hands, the older man started walking to his car.  Sidney
opened the package, and we both watched as her eyes widened, and a look of fear
crossed over her features.  Then she started after the old man.

  “What in the hell is this?”  She shrieked.

  “I don’t know ma’am.  I only deliver the papers. 
I don’t know what’s in them.”  He said before getting in his car and
driving off. 

  Sidney’s hand went to her hair as she pushed it out of her
eyes.  This used to be a sign that she was nervous at being caught lying
about something.  When I saw this sign, I always knew she was lying, and
seeing it today, I knew that that little girl was mine.  What I did wonder
is whether she had tried to pass the little girl off as the other man’s, or
whether the other man knew what she’d done.  I was very interested, and I
vowed that I wouldn’t stop until I knew exactly what she’d done and why.

  “Let’s go.”  I said.

  Ember nodded against my back, and then settled the helmet
back over her head and wrapped her hands around my waist. 

  Something deep in me had caught fire, and I knew things
would never be the same.  One thing I was certain of though. 

  Ember was going to be mine forever.

Ω

  I swallowed hard.  Saliva was pooling in my
mouth.  My palms were clammy, but I wouldn’t let him see my
weakness.  This really wasn’t going to be that bad, I just needed to suck
it up and get it done.  He wouldn’t have a problem.  He would be
happy for us.  Wouldn’t he?

  Deciding to grow a pair, I opened the door with a bang and
walked inside.  I’d asked Max to meet me at The Sport’s Page.  I
needed his acceptance to marry his sister, and when he said yes (note I said
when and not if) I would go directly to the jewelry store to buy her ring.

  Spotting Max with his back to the room in a back corner
booth, I weaved my way through the tables and sat down across from him. 
This was not my favorite position to be in, with many years of caution
ingrained in me to be prepared and aware of my surroundings.  I hated
having my back to a door, but since I was about to ask the man across from me
if I could marry his sister, I decided to leave it alone.

  “Thanks.”  I said to Max for being considerate enough
to order my beer.

  “Yeah.  Welcome.”  Max mumbled. 

  His eyes were on my face.  He was studying it,
learning all of my secrets. 

  During our military days, Max was the one who could make
anyone talk, and I do mean anyone.  He was one scary motherfucker. 
You did
not
want to be found guilty of something and not confess. 
He had ways of getting you to talk.  Where and how he learned them, I
don’t know, but he was good at what he did.

  I distinctly remember our first mission together.  We
were all new to the group.  The only ones who knew each other were James
and Max.  Even though we were all part of the army, we still didn’t trust
each other with our lives.  We didn’t have a reason to.

  Our first mission was to get some intel on a leader that
was collecting young soldiers, some as young as nine and ten, and introducing
them into a local rebel group that branched off Al Qaeda.  It was our
sixth day into the mission when everything went FUBAR.

  We’d been boxed in on all four sides, and they were just
waiting for us to try to get out.  That, or call for help.  Not that
we’d have known that if it weren’t for Max.  Dougie had caught a man
sneaking in.  At the time, we hadn’t known that anything was wrong. 
We were under a black out, no communication in or out.  We’d thought we
were in a safe house.  We hadn’t been. 

  When Dougie’d brought that little bastard into the room,
everyone was stunned speechless.  Yes, we did have a patrol, and that very
reason was why Dougie found him, but we were running off of a mission that was
supposedly handed down to us by the president himself.  We never thought
that our position would be leaked.  Maybe we were green around the gills,
but after that mission, we never relied on anything but each other.  We
still took missions, but we didn’t take them blindly.  We did our own
recon on top of what was given to us.

  Max was the only one who spoke the boy’s language, so he
was the logical choice to interrogate him.  What we didn’t know was just
how brutal an interrogator he was.  Not one single thing could have
prepared me for the force that was Max.  Listening to that interrogation
had given me chills, and not much scared me those days.  I was living on
borrowed time, and I went balls to the wall wherever and whatever I did. 

  That day changed things for me.  Max somehow has a
sixth sense about things , and at that moment, sitting across from him about to
ask for his sister’s hand in marriage, I was worried that he wouldn’t give me
permission.  Taking a deep breath, I opened my mouth and started in with
my speech.

  “I know I’m not good enough for her, and I know she
deserves the world.  I never believed in forever until I met her. 
These last few weeks have proved to me that I need her in my life.  She’s
the good in me, and pushes away the demons that never seemed to give me a
break.  I haven’t had a nightmare since she started sleeping over.  I
used to dream about my dad, I used to dream about Iraq, and Afghanistan. 
My mom and dad dying.  I swear to God my brain used that time to make me
remember since I never allowed myself to do it in waking hours.  I need
her.”  I said.

  Max just stared, and I started to feel the urge to squirm
in my seat.  I haven’t felt the urge to do that since my dad caught me
trying to sneak some Twinkies out of the kitchen in my pants.

 “My mom wanted her to have our grandmother’s ring when she
was proposed to by the man of her dreams.  I can get that for you on the
way home.  We have a safe deposit box at Kilgore Bank and Trust.”  He
said simply.

  A huge weight lifted from my shoulders that I hadn’t
realized was there.

  “Fuck.”  I said simply letting my head droop in
relief.

  I hand clasped my shoulder and I looked up and stared into
Max’s eyes.

  “You aren’t good enough.  Don’t disappoint me.” 
He said, upended his beer, and then took off.

  I sat there in the booth for another hour before making my
way back home.  Tonight was Ember’s turn to cook.  I grimaced and
prayed that she didn’t find another recipe off Pinterest.  They may look
good on the sight, but that didn’t mean she could reproduce the same thing in our
kitchen.

  Paying the tab that Max conveniently left me; I walked out
into the muggy afternoon.  The sun was behind some dark ugly clouds, and I
double-timed it to my bike.  I’d just pulled up in front of the house when
the skies opened up.  You weren’t truly a biker if you didn’t ride in the
rain.  I enjoyed riding in the rain, but today I had other plans.

    Rain poured down, and drenched me to the bone
within seconds.  Luckily, I had my phone stashed in its Life Proof case;
otherwise, it’d have been toast.  I pounded up to the porch and stopped
once I reached the door.  Reaching behind my head, I tugged the collar of
my shirt and yanked it over my head.  Next, I did my boots and
socks.  Right when I was about to start on my jeans a piercing whistle sounded
next door.

  I knew she was there, which was precisely the reason I
started stripping in the first place.  Looking up, I spotted Ember and
Cheyenne two houses down.

  “Don’t you dare, Ponch.”

  Rolling my eyes skyward, I counted down from ten.  I
hated when Max called me that, and here his little sister was doing the same
thing.  I’d beat the bastard, but it might be frowned upon to kick your
wife’s brother’s ass.  Turning my back to the women, I noticed Ember was
wearing my favorite yoga pants.  A niggling of want popped into my head,
and once it was there it amplified into full-blown need. 

  Crooking my finger at her, I waited for her to come to
me.  She shook her head, so I decided to play dirty.  Popping the
first button on my jeans, I saw her eyes widen.  She started to take a
step towards me but then stopped herself when she realized what’d she’d just
done.  She was calling my bluff.  Turning my back to her, I quickly
popped the other four buttons and started to lower my jeans just to the curve
of my ass.  Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Ember charging towards me
through the rain. 

  She hit our porch and promptly leapt onto my back. 
Her wet, hot, slick skin warmed my back, and I growled at the heat emanating
from her.  Taking her by the arm, I slung her around to where her front
was plastered to my front, and her legs were wrapped around my waist.

  Her warm lips traveled up the side of my neck and she
hummed.  “Now we both have to get nakie.”

  Twisting her around so our fronts were plastered together, I
placed soft kiss on her lips.  One tiny, soft touch.

  “Precisely.”  I whispered against her mouth, and then
kissed her for real.

  She moaned and started moving her hips against mine. 
I pinned her against the wall with my body, but then had to make a mad grab to
keep my pants from exposing anything to Cheyenne who I knew still stood there
watching us.  Looking to my left, I confirmed my suspicions when I saw her
and Sam leaning against the wall watching us with smiles on their faces.