Unbreakable: Unrequited Part Two (Fallen Aces MC Book 2) (17 page)

I let him help me down from the truck and up the steps into the large house. Flower boxes are dotted along the porch, a faded swing seat at the far end. Wind chimes sing gently as the light evening air tickles them. This house is a
home.
It’s a place filled with memories, with love, and quite clearly, understanding. The man I now know as his father gives me a friendly smile and curt nod as we pass by, and Hooch simply watches with eyes that hold a million unanswered questions.

I can’t blame him. I’d be wondering if this woman I’d just risked life and limb for was worth the effort, too.

“Where you want us, Mom?” King hollers through the belly of the house.

“Kitchen table,” drifts a voice from the far left. “Just trying to find my swabbing alcohol.”

Framed cross-stitches hang either side of the large arch that connects the sitting room with the dining room. I twist my head to look at one—a family tree—and suck a sharp breath in when I read the name of another child, Garret, and the date of birth and death, so near to each other
.
King’s never spoken of him, and if at all possible, I feel even more as though I’m intruding on the closeness of this family.

I’m bringing fear and death to the doorstep of people who’ve obviously experienced enough for one lifetime. How selfish can I be?

An attractive blonde woman with her hair pulled into a messy chignon rushes around the corner as King lowers me into a seat. I brace myself on the table and watch with interest as she embraces him tightly and whispers something in his ear, a small brown bottle clutched in her hand. Several other first aid items are already laid out on the table, and I fidget with a pair of tweezers, spinning them under my finger.

King holds what I assume to be his mother back at arm’s length, his hands on her shoulders, and smiles before he mouths
thank you
.

I’m the weed among the beautiful blooms. The love between mother and son is so heavy I feel as though if I were to step closer it would physically impede me.
I don’t belong.
The thought echoes in my head relentlessly, morphing into an anxiety-ridden mantra.

“Where’s the damage?” King’s mom asks. She pulls out a chair across the corner of the table from me and settles in, putting on a pair of reading glasses.

I place both hands on the table, palms up. “I did it when I pulled myself up on a window frame.”

His mom sucks in a sharp breath between her teeth and tips her head to one side with sympathy in her gaze. “Oh, honey.”

I sit in silence and watch as she picks up a damp washcloth and gently sweeps the remainder of the dried blood off my palms. King leaves the room, seemingly satisfied with the job his mom does, and returns out front. His mother shares the same green eyes as him, her expression soft and with a natural calm that I recognize in King also. They’re a lot alike.

“How far along are you?” she asks.

I start. My hand jerks in her grasp. “Uh, I think this is week seventeen.” I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the fact she so obviously knows, or what it says about how much King shares with her. What else does she know about me? What does she think of the circumstances that have brought me to be here, now, in her home?

“You’ll feel kicks soon,” she replies, her eyes alive. “Special time indeed.”

I can’t hide my smile. “I know. I’m looking forward to it.”

She sets the washcloth aside and picks up a cotton swab, unscrews the cap of the brown bottle, and with the swab over the top, tips it to apply some of what’s inside. “Looking at your hands and at the faded bruises on your arms that I know wouldn’t have come from my boy, I’m going to guess you had it rough. Am I right?”

I nod, unable to say a thing for fear of losing my slim hold on civility.

“Should we get you examined then?” Her gaze falls to my stomach. “Check everything is as it should be?”

“I haven’t bled,” I assure her.

“Don’t always do until it’s too late.”

Even so, if the damage is done, it’s done. I should take the offer, find a doctor to check me out, but a part of me wants to remain ignorant and believe that I’ve come out of this relatively unscathed.

“I know a lady,” she continues. “Play bingo with her on Sundays. She was the local midwife for a while.” She glances up when I don’t respond. “What’s the matter, honey?”

“I’m scared.”

“That something might be wrong?”

I nod and bite my lip as the alcohol on her swab stings the raw flesh. “I’m not the lucky type.”

“Only one way to know for sure.” She pats my hands dry with a clean towel and then sits back. “I’ll leave them uncovered, let the skin dry out. You’ll probably find they heal faster that way. As bad as it looks, you’ve just torn the top layers back; it’s not deep.”

I look at the clean, pink skin and sigh. “Thank you.”

“Any time, love.”

There’s a strange serenity in watching her pack the items away, an odd ease being in a house that’s doesn’t harbor a new threat around every corner. If this is what a “normal” family life is, I want in. I want that: the calm, the love, and the peace. I want it with King.

His mom crosses path with King as he walks inside again, making a beeline across the room to where I’m still seated. I rub the good skin around my wounds, and sigh.

“When do you leave?”

He stills, clearly affronted that I’d ask. “You understand, don’t you?”

“I know why you would, but I’m not sure I
understand
.” I lift my gaze to find his piercing eyes asking,
pleading.
“How long?”

“I don’t know.”

How long is a piece of string? It could take weeks before they find the opportune moment to strike against Carlos . . . assuming that’s what he’s doing. “You’ll make sure he’s unable to bother me again, right?”

The flinch is slight, but it’s there. “I’ll try.”

“You’re not telling me something. What’s really going on?”

A laden breath escapes his lips as he jerks a chair out from under the table and swings it around to straddle it, leaning his thick forearms on the back. “There’s a lot going on at our club at the moment, not all of it to do with Carlos. I can’t tell you what, and because of that I can’t explain why it’s important.” He hesitates and drops his forehead to his arms.

It pains me to see the battle inside of him, but what can I do? He made it damn clear to me that the rules are the rules. If he can’t say, then he can’t. But where does that leave me? I want to understand, I want to believe that there’s something greater than us at the moment, but I can’t. Not knowing makes the justification hollow. There’s no conviction to what he says when I haven’t got a clue what he values as more important than us.

“Tell me one thing,” I ask, inching closer to the edge of my seat. “Tonight, when you leave, where will you go?”

His head lifts. “Elena . . .”

“Will it be to deal with Carlos?” I shake my head, frustration ripe at the fact I have to spell this out to him. “I went through hell to get out of there, King, and if you go . . . if you leave here to do something other than finish what we’ve started . . .”

“Baby.” He lifts both hands to grip the sides of his head. “I will. I promise that it’s not over. I’ll fuckin’ kill the bastard for what he’s done to you.”

“But?”

“But I need to do it right. I need to go back to the club and settle the problems in-house before I can spend time away without it being noticed, without it being a problem.”

The chair scrapes across the floor as I launch to my feet and march toward the kitchen, then hesitate and storm back to stand before him. “Will I ever come first for you?”

“What do you mean? Of course you fuckin’ come first.” He reaches out to take my arm in his hand.

I jerk away. “I need you, King. I try to understand, I try to be patient, but fuck it all,
I
need you tonight. Give me that, please.”

He swallows, and his hand tugs at his beard. He’s agitated, unsettled. Good
. Show me you care, King. Make the right decision.
“I’ll stay.”

The relief is immediate; I could float away with the weight that’s been lifted. “Thank you.”

“I’ll leave tomorrow.” He smiles and then chuckles. “I’m sure I’d be fuck all use to those assholes anyway with you on my mind.” He turns on the seat to sit side on and pats his knee. “Come here.”

With a sigh, I round his seat and lower myself to his legs sideways. He places his large hands on one of my hips and a thigh and shunts me closer so our bodies are pressed tightly together. One arm snakes around my middle, the other firmly wrapped up my side to my shoulder. When he pulls me close like this, when I’m trapped in his embrace, how am I supposed to think straight?

“I missed you so fuckin’ much.” His words are muffled in my shoulder, his face buried against my arm. “I’m sorry if I’ve been distant.”

I relent and wrap a hand around his thick neck, toying with the ends of his hair. “I didn’t expect fireworks, King. You picked me up in a hell of a situation; we didn’t exactly have time to stop for a romantic dinner for two.”

He laughs, shaking his head against my side. “True that.”

“But I am confused,” I admit. “You are distracted by something else, and I guess . . .” How do I say it? How do I convey how I feel without him taking the worst of it and calling me crazy or possessive?

King pulls back, his eyes searching my own. “Tell me. I can’t make it right if I don’t know what’s wrong.”

“I wonder if I’ll
ever
be your first priority.” I close my eyes, certain he’ll simply sigh and push me off to walk away.

His arms clinch tighter. “I wish I could explain it all, tell you everything. Fuck, it would make life so much easier, but you’re goin’ to have to trust me, baby. Trust me when I tell you that what I’m doin’, this stuff I’m heading off to deal with, it comes back to us in a roundabout kind of way. I sort this out, it makes our life easier too.”

I nod. His lips twitch in a sad smile as I lift a hand and stroke the side of his face. He’s so torn, so upset that he can’t lay it all out for me. In a way it deepens my love for him, my appreciation for what he
has
done. If he didn’t care, he wouldn’t give my concerns any stock, but he does. He worries about what I worry about, and for that, I love him.

“I think we’ve talked about enough depressing topics for one night, don’t you?” I say.

He smiles, and pushes his chin up to ask for a kiss. As if I’d ever say no.

I lean down and meet him half way, pressing my lips to his lightly. “I love everything about you, even the frustrating bits.”

“Those are my favorite,” he says with a smile. “Because if I never made you mad, I wouldn’t have a reason to win you over again.”

“Really?” I chuckle. “And how exactly would you win me over?”

His fingers trace my cheekbone and then across the arch of my brow. “By proving everything I do is for you.”

I look away, warmed by his words but also saddened by his sacrifice. He could have been happier without me, without my troubles. He could have lived a different life. “I hope that one day I can show you that it was all worth it.”

He coaxes my chin up. The pad of his thumb skims across my bottom lip. “Each day I get with you, each hour, every minute we’re together—they’re what makes it worth it.”

Maybe so, but there has to be more. I understand what he says, I do, but I wish I could do more—I wish I could give him more than a complex shell of a woman.

He wants to protect me from the evil in my life, but in truth, I wish
I
could be the one to save him from all of this. I wish that grand gesture could be mine to give him, because damn it all if he isn’t worth every second of pain, every moment of doubt, and every inch of regret that I had.

King

Arms crossed behind my head, I lie back and watch Elena as she fusses in the bathroom across the hall. Only her reflection in the mirror is visible as she brushes her teeth and runs a wet cloth over her face. My breath hitches when she stops and stares at herself, something akin to distress in her eyes. She lifts a hand to press her fingers lightly to her cheek, tilting her chin to move one side of her face closer to the mirror.

A frustrated sigh drifts across the open space, and she drops her face, bracing both hands on the counter so her shoulders are hunched. Her lips move as though she talks to herself, but I can’t hear what she’s saying. The light goes out, and she crosses over to where I rest, a fake-as-fuck smile plastered on her face.

“Don’t lie to me,” I say.

She hesitates beside the bed, hand hesitant over the bedside lamp, and frowns. “What do you mean?”

“I could see you from here. You’re not happy.”

She turns and drops her ass to the mattress. “I’m tired, King.”

“Understandably.”

“Not tired after a long day.” She shakes her head. “I’m mentally tired; I’m done. I can’t do this day in and day out.” Elena twists to face me, placing a hand beside her to lean her weight on that arm. “How long until this is truly behind us, huh?”

I shrug. Wish I knew. World would be a lot simpler if I had that kind of foresight. Maybe then I wouldn’t have left her at that motel in the vain hope I could get the club’s backing.

She doesn’t say any more until she’s stripped her dress and underwear to climb in beside me naked. I lift both eyebrows as she tugs the sheet up over herself. “What? I don’t have any nightwear.”

It’s going to be a long night.
“So I see.” I turn to face her and reach out to place a hand over her stomach. She traps it under her own and skims the curves and hollows of her mid-section with our combined touch.

“Have you ever thought what you’d name your kids? What this wee one might be called?”

I laugh and press a kiss to her shoulder. “That’s a girly thing to do, Elena.”

She chuckles. “I guess it is.”

“Have you?”

“Not yet. Been pre-occupied.” I catch the whisper of a smile.

The gravity of our situation comes down on me like a ton of bricks. “Are you sure he never knew?”

“Ninety percent.” Her hand stills, keeping mine captive over her bellybutton. “What are you going to do to him?” she whispers.