Page 5

He turns his broad back on me and wraps his arms around the club girls.

Dismissed.

Fucking ouch.

And then it hits me.

I never told him my name.

Fuck.

No?

“Hayden?” I call out, and he stops in his tracks but doesn’t turn around.

It’s him.

He looks so different—his body is bigger, wider, taller

He never used to have any tattoos or piercings, and his hair was never this short.

He’s a man now, no longer the sweet boy who played guitar for me through his window so I could fall asleep to something other than the sounds of my parents fighting.

But those eyes…

I knew I recognized them.

“Go home, Luella,” he replies, turning his head to show me his profile. I watch in horror as he then starts to make out with both women right in front of me.

Like I mean nothing to him.

Like our past means nothing.

And I guess that’s the truth.

We’re both living in different worlds now, as different people, but he still rejected me again.

Some things never change.

I blink away the sudden rush of tears in my eyes.

The Hayden I knew, my Hayden, doesn’t exist anymore. It has been thirteen years, so what did I expect? Hayden is gone, and now only Haze, the callous, tattooed, manwhore biker is left.

Bones was right. I guess one woman isn’t enough for him.

Then again, I never was.

LU

Here I am, but I never thought I’d be living in a biker clubhouse right next door to my childhood love.

After my business, Lu’s Sweet Treats, was torched by some enemy biker club, Haze picked me up and brought me back here for my safety. We mostly ignored each other in the car, just like we did the other times I’ve been around him, but the tension between us was thick. After he rejected me so easily, he wouldn’t let Blade, another MC brother and resident tech wizard, drive me home.

He insisted on it being him.

That pissed me off.

Apparently, free will isn’t something women connected to the club are given.