Page 49 of Indecent Lies

Texas had never experienced many opportunities to protect a woman, not one he cared for, or was attracted to. He would have always protected the brothers old ladies, that was a given, but he wasn’t attached to those women, not in this sense that it burned his chest.

“No, I… I decided to call my parents. They’re worse than mad at me, Tait. They said how I’ve ruined my family name and there’s no going back for me now, not until I fix my mistakes.”

Damn. The fucking crème de le crème of high society always fired the hardest bullets.

Say what you will about bikers being scary or hardcases, but they tell it like it is. No one spared a person’s feelings, but they were never duplicitous either.

“It’ll be okay, little girl. They’re not going to kick you out when you go home.”

“I’m not going home. Not ever. I left for a reason, Tait. Not just because of Ronnie. I was stifled. I couldn’t breathe, they wouldn’t let me live.”

Tears did fall then and he had no choice but to pull her into his chest, it was a need he didn’t ignore and didn’t dig into the reasons why he felt like he could only exhale properly when he was holding her.

She clung both arms tightly around his waist and found his chest with her face. “Parents are supposed to love you no matter what.” She cried. “Why can’t they just love me for me?”

“I don’t know, little girl, but it’s their issue, not yours.”

Poor baby. Those Astor’s were a piece of work.

“Mom just text and said she would send all my clothes and things express tomorrow.”

His tongue felt like an out of control rattlesnake not asking about the guy.

Where the fuck was the guy in all this?

She’d been with him nearly a week, she’d been at Axel’s compound another week before that, that was two fucking weeks and there was no sign of the guy she was marrying.

Either she’d gotten herself into a marriage of convenience or she really had planned to marry some sexless wonder who didn’t know how dicks worked.

Because having a woman like Poppy, all soft and good smelling and the way her tits fit against his chest. Any guy would be chasing her ass down to get her back.

He felt attraction swell between them as she lifted her tear stained face to look at him all pitiful and cute.

He was a man with many flaws and one of those glaring flaws came to the front like a soldier at war as he cupped her face and teased the tears back with his thumbs.

He always seemed to find himself wanting women who were already taken.

What the hell did that say about what kind of man he was?

“Can we just go home, Tait?” She whined, clutching his upper body. Her whimpers clinging just as equally deep and he couldn’t ignore them. “I just want to go home and be with you.”

Fuck.

Fuck.

He felt that.

He knew he shouldn’t.

He knew her words didn’t mean what his dick were interpreting them to mean.

But what he knew about himself was, Texas was great at compartmentalizing shit and ignoring what he didn’t like. He’d done it so often with the club and Malachai that it was easy to ignore she was not a woman he could grow attached to.

She might have run away from that guy, but they weren’t over.

She had another life, a better life than a washed up has-been biker could offer her.

And still his system flooded with endorphins, churning her pleading words around his brain, making each word stick to the inside of his head.