Page 30 of Brash for It (Hellions Ride On #11)

I snort, roll out of bed, catch the sheet when she tries to steal it with her. “In a minute,” I say, and throw her my T-shirt from last night. She pulls it on and claims my boxers again and I find myself happy about it.

In the kitchen I make coffee while she sits on the counter because she likes the height and because her feet always find the rung my boot scuffed up. She watches me, quiet, not the way people watch when they’re waiting for a show, but the way people watch when the watching is the point.

“You’re staring,” I tell her over the pour.

“Damn right I am,” she admits without hesitation.

We eat eggs and toast standing up, like we don’t want to get too far from the doorway between bed and day.

She brings her mug to her mouth, winces at the strength, drowns it in milk, tries again.

“I have a late shift,” she says. “Trina’s got a morning bridal party from hell and then she’s taking off.

She asked if I can close. Didn’t know you’d be back. Now I’m sad I took the extra shift.”

“I’ll probably have a debrief sermon at some point in the afternoon.” I tell her honestly. “So I’ll be at the compound for a bit any way.”

She nods, the rhythm we’ve built clicking into place. Ordinary sounds good this morning. Ordinary feels like aftercare.

“Today or tomorrow,” I add, “I’m putting up that back camera at the spa. I don’t think he’ll try anything, but I’m not leaving gaps.”

“Today if you can,” she remarks making me wonder if she struggled with fear while I was away. “It’ll shut up the small voices faster.”

“Done.”

We clean what we dirtied. I turn to wipe the counter and she comes in close and puts both hands flat at my hips. The move’s not heat; it’s gravity. I bend to kiss the top of her head because I can’t not.

“What?” I ask into her hair.

“Last night,” she hesitates, not looking up, but then continues. “The warning and then the choice. Thank you for giving me both.”

“That’s the only way I know how to do it.” I tip her chin up. Her eyes are clear. Good. “No take-backs,” I add, a half-smile.

She laughs. “None.” Then, more sober: “Kellum, if the club needs you—if you get called again—just, like I know the club is everything. It’s your whole family and they have all been so nice to me.

Your mom and Jenni, Kylee, and Jami even have all checked in while you were gone.

I know this stuff matters. I just,” she’s rambling uncomfortably.

“Just if you could tell me goodbye. Don’t slip out without that please.

The quiet hurts worse than the road. I know this is new, but I need you to know I need that. ”

“Won’t slip again,” I commit. It’s an easy promise to keep now that I know what the silence costs. “I’ll wake you up so you can complain about the coffee before I ride out.”

She grins. “Deal.”

I grab my cut and she reaches without asking, fingers running over the stitching on the rocker, the worn patches. She doesn’t treat it like a costume or a threat. She treats it like part of the man. That matters.

“You ever think you’d want this?” she asks. “The house that smells like coffee, the wet towels you forgot to hang right,” She’s tiptoeing around her real question. I raise my eyebrow letting her know, I just need the actual question, direct. “Did you ever think you’ want the us?”

“No,” I tell her honestly. Then, “But yes, apparently I do. It’s all I thought about being away from you. It’s not any us I want. It’s you.”

She steps in and kisses me, slow and morning-sweet. It tastes like yes.

We split for showers—quick, boring, the kind where the steam is just steam.

I put on jeans that know my shape and a fresh tee; she throws her hair up in a knot that looks like chaos and somehow never falls apart and looks intentional.

Before we walk out, she pauses at the notebook on the table and writes in neat block letters:

Spa back camera (K)

DMV (tomorrow?)

Groceries: real bread, milk, coffee creamer

She adds a line at the bottom, smaller: — Tell Kellum again: I choose this.

She leaves it open on the table like a note to the future. I read it without pretending I didn’t. Something in my chest does a dangerous thing. I let it.

We make our way out to face the day and for once I am excited to come home tonight.

“Ride or SUV?” I present her options.

“Bike,” she replies, immediately. “It makes everything in my head clear up.”

“Helmet,” I order, and hand it over. She takes it, putting it on with practiced ease.

At the spa, I walk her in because I want to and because there’s a coil in me that still listens for trouble.

I leave Kristen at the desk with her tote in its place and a little jar of mints that she keeps refilling even though people take five at a time like they’re stealing coins or some shit.

She looks up as I step backward toward the door.

I tip my chin. She tips hers. It’s a small salute and it says a stupid amount more between us.

Back on the bike, the engine shakes the last of the sleep out of my forearms and I head toward the shop.

The road runs under me in friendly stripes.

I pass the bridge and think of steam and her skin.

I pass the turn to his neighborhood and don’t take it because we’re not living there.

I pass the PO box and grin like an idiot at metal doors because I know which one of them holds the life she’s building. A life I want to be part of.

At lunch I get a text.

Kristen: Bridal party is a lively crew. Trina says she’d rather rebuild an engine at the shop with you than talk about 3D bows on nails again. You?

I write back: Camaro tried to best me. Found the wire shorting out. I win.

She sends a wrench emoji and a heart. I don’t ask how to interpret it. I put my phone face-down and go back to work with a stupid calm I can’t blame on coffee, sleep, or the peace I find in fixing a car.

By four, I’ve got the camera boxed and in my saddlebag.

I swing by the spa and climb a ladder while Kristen stands below with her palm on my calf like a spotter.

I want to laugh because at five feet one inch maybe two in shoes, she’s not catching my six feet four inch frame. But it’s cute she cares.

We run the wire, check the angle on her phone, watch the door paint into the tiny screen. “There,” I say. She marks a check in the notebook with a flourish like she’s signing a declaration.

On the porch that night we eat a simple pork chop dinner. We talk about nothing for an hour and everything for five minutes and then nothing again. It feels like a tune I want to hear on repeat.

When we go to bed, she doesn’t hesitate. She climbs into my space like she owns it because truth be told she owns me. I reach out, hook my arm across her and feel the room click into its best version of itself as she falls into place.

“Mind, body, soul,” she says into the dark, like she’s checking the inventory. “That was the line.”

“Still is,” I answer.

“You got it,” she whispers. “We’re good.”

She’s asleep in minutes. I stay awake a little longer, listening for the noise that used to pace the floorboards of my head.

It doesn’t show. If it ever does again, I know what to do with it now: put it on a bike, ride it out until the only thing left is wind and a woman who pressed closer when I told her she should go.

It’s not complicated. It’s commitment the way I understand it.

I’ll be where I said I’d be.

I’ll tell you the truth.

I’ll show you the rest.

The map on the wall is still the same map. I’m just not looking at it alone anymore.

I close my eyes with her weight right where it belongs, and for the second time in as many nights, I fall asleep before the AC finishes its next breath.