Page 14

Charlie

Goddamm it.

I should have let her go inside and eat whatever she could find. For some reason, the thought of her going to bed pissed at me set a cold and sour feeling in my stomach. I don’t even like this girl, yet here I am, holding the door of my truck open for her and helping her in like I’m taking her on a fucking date.

She steps up into the cab, though for a split second, the bottom of her ass is on display.

Fucking hell.

With my cock hardening in my jeans, I circle the truck and climb into the driver’s seat before a wave of her perfume hits me. It was a mistake to get her into my truck. It smells like her and it makes my mouth water.

“Where are we going?” she asks, lounging back with her foot up on the seat. Anyone else and I would have made them put their foot down, but Bailey, though . . . for some reason, I don’t care. It could be the raging hard on I’m trying to hide in my jeans, or the tanned leg that I can’t seem to take my eyes off of. Who knows?

“Put your seat belt on.”

I can practically feel her roll her eyes, but at least she obliges, for once.

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“You’ll see when we get there.”

“You’re so full of secrets, Charlie Coulter. Don’t you ever get tired of hiding everything?”

If she knew what was really on my mind when I caught Peter trying to get his grimy dick in her pants, she’d probably keel over.

I would have dragged her out of the square a lot fucking sooner had I known he was there. Motherfucker has a handsome face and I severely regret not breaking his nose when I caught him in my bed with Priscilla.

“Do you like seafood?”

“I’ve had lobster. Does that count?”

I chuckle darkly. Not at all.

Bailey eyes me, her brow furrowed in concern.

“Did you bring me out here to kill me?” she asks when I open her door.

I brought her south, down by the bayou, for some authentic Cajun food. There’s nothing like Mama Jean’s, though it’s a little hole in the wall to most people .

“If I wanted to kill you, I would have just thrown you in the water on the way over here.”

Her eyes widen and she leans away from me, causing me to laugh. Despite her wariness, she takes my hand and lets me help her down out of the truck. I drop it as soon as she’s on her feet and lead her into the building.

Mama Jean’s is inside an old warehouse, abandoned after Katrina. The men that own it now converted it and cleaned it up on the inside, leaving the outside close to how it was after the storm.

Inside is full of locals from the town just down the road. Being the only restaurant in the area, the place gets a lot of business, especially with Mama Jean’s being situated right on the water. They specialize in fresh shrimp, oysters, and their seafood boil.

“Charlie,” Bianca smiles when we walk in. “Haven’t seen you in a while.” Bianca’s eyes filter over Bailey, who smiles. Bianca and I had a tryst, back in the day, but I’ll be damned if I tell Bailey that. We’re here for the food, not Bianca.

Bianca’s beautiful, with shining black hair and tanned long legs, but she has a disorder that causes her to sleep with anyone she can. I’d been young and dumb at the time, around twenty-two.

As soon as we arrive at our table, Bailey excuses herself to go to the restroom. Bianca takes the opportunity to scrutinize me, looking me up and down with her chocolate-colored eyes. I watch Bailey walk to the bathroom, my eyes zeroing in on the sway of her hips.

Jesus Christ .

“You look good,” she comments, laying the menus on the table in front of me, taking extra care to flash her tits in my face while she does. “Who’s the girl?”

I debate on which lie I should tell her. I can’t tell her truth. Hell, I don’t even know the truth myself.

“That’s none of your concern.”

The last thing I need is Bianca hunting Bailey down and tormenting her. I’ve seen the way women can be and I don’t want that happening to her.

“Don’t be like that,” Bianca murmurs, her voice soft and her eyes sad. “Are ya’ll together?”

Bailey returns, her eyes trained on a toddler across the room who’s waving at her. Bailey waves back, beaming. I can’t take my eyes off her. Bianca notices, too.

“I know that look . . .” Bianca says quietly, looking back at Bailey. “Brice used to look at me that way.”

Brice is Bianca’s now-husband, and one of the biggest assholes I’ve ever met. He’s a drunk, and a violent one, at that. I can’t tell you how many times Bianca has called me to come pick her up when he was hitting her, throwing things at her. I’d stopped that since Mom died and I always have to remind myself that it’s not my job to save her.

“Sorry,” Bailey smiles, sliding into the booth opposite me.

“Two sweet teas and a triple.”

Bianca marks our order down on her clipboard and takes the menus from in front of us. Bailey sputters, watching after her as she leaves. She looks back at me, confused.

“I don’t even get to order?”

I shake my head .

“What if I don’t like the food?”

“You will.”

We stare at each other, neither of us willing to back down.

“Are you always this pushy?”

“Do you always talk this much?”

She rolls her eyes and flushes. “I get the feeling you like that I talk too much.”

I lean forward, crossing my fingers over one another on the table. Bianca delivers our drinks, but I don’t look up. Bailey thanks her and Bianca marches off without a word. Fucking women.

“Why would you get that feeling?”

Bailey crosses her arms over her chest. “It makes you talk more. Not so mute.”

“I don’t need to talk more.”

“I don’t know,” Bailey quips. “When I first met you, I thought you were a monk taking a vow of silence.”

I shake my head, leaning back in the booth.

“This place reminds me of the fake crab shacks back home,” Bailey murmurs, staring around at the décor.

“Well, this one is real,” I say. I eye her, studying her. “Why did you come down here?”

Bailey pauses and much to my surprise, shrugs. “Andi needed my help planning the wedding.”

“Bullshit.”

“What?” she asks, shocked.

“What’s the real reason?”

She stares at me for a moment, long and hard. Finally, she concedes after taking a drink .

“My ex handcuffed me to the bed and left me because I wouldn’t get into heavy BDSM with him. He was also cheating with half of Los Angeles, so he gave me chlamydia, which I’ve recovered from. All clean.” She takes a deep breath and takes another drink. I notice her hand shake when she places the glass back down. “Does that answer your question?”

So, now the truth comes out.

And it’s worse than I thought.

I want to hunt the little prick down.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she grumbles, setting her glass down a little too hard.

“Like what?”

“Like you feel bad for me. I got enough of that in Malibu.”

I shake my head. “I don’t feel bad for you.” For some reason, I feel like punching someone. Probably partially because I was already on edge before I’d learned why Bailey ended her engagement. I almost regret asking because now, I’m thinking of committing a hundred felonies.

Bailey studies me. “Well, good.”

“How long were you chained to the bed?” I clench my hands under the table, because I’m growing more and more agitated by the second.

“About four hours. Luckily, my sister needed something from my closet and let herself in.”

Four hours. I can’t fucking begin to fathom how long he thought he would leave her there. I run my tongue across my teeth, a deep, unsettling ache unfurling in my ribs.

Luckily, Bailey’s too busy trying to hide the tremor in her hands that she doesn’t notice the stiffness in my voice. I take a drink, needing to swallow down the burning anger just to form a sentence. “And where is he now?”

She shrugs. “Probably with Marcus, somewhere. Mom and he didn’t think it was fair to fire Drew. In fact, they forced me into therapy because they think something is wrong with me.” She rolls her eyes, sipping her drink.

“Why would something be wrong with you?”

“Because I’m not willing to give him another chance. Mom believes money matters over everything else. I guess I’m just not that way.” She chuckles before I have time to say anything, sealing me with that dangerous blue stare. “You know, Mason broke Drew’s nose when he found out. I had to beg Mom to get him out of jail.”

Been there. Only, my time inside was because of Priscilla cheating. If it were my sister, I would be in prison.

If I saw Drew, I would do a lot more than break his nose. I know places out in the swamps where they’d never find him again.

I don’t have a chance to say anything, as Bianca brings out our food. She sets the dishes down in front of us and Bailey eyes the bowl of crawfish.

“What the fuck is that?” she asks, pointing to the bowl.

I chuckle, darkly, picking up a crawfish and holding it out to her. She jerks back and the color leaves her face.

“It’s not going to bite you.”

“Are you punishing me?” she asks, ducking from my hand into the side of the booth.

“Bailey, take the damn crawfish.”

“It has eyes,” she argues, looking away from it .

“You can’t say you live here until you’ve had this.”

I can tell she’s debating on hightailing it back to California. “I don’t live here,” she murmurs, shaking her head, though her eyes never leave the crawfish in my fingers.

“Watch.” I pull the head off and suck the juices, the delicate blend of salt, butter and meat melting in my mouth.

For a split second, I actually worry Bailey might pass out when her eyes flutter.

“What is wrong with you?” she groans after a moment, her nose pinched up in disgust.

“It’s good. Try it. I said you were annoying, earlier, not a pussy.”

She gasps, her eyes narrowing on me. She grabs one of the crawfish in defiance, playing into my statement just like I knew she would.

“Twist its head off.”

“That’s mean.”

“It’s dead.”

“Would you twist my head off if I was dead?”

I shake my head. I’d find out who did it and they would join you soon after. “You wouldn’t taste nearly as good.”

With a groan, she pulls the head off instantly dropping the whole thing back in the bowl.

“Don’t be shy. Suck the head,” I say, instantly regretting what I’d said.

Bailey’s eyes warm with the challenge. “Gonna take a lot more than that, Charlie.”

I give her a stern expression and hold the head out to her. She takes it, closing her eyes and sucking the juices back. She coughs when she’s done, dropping the head in the extra bowl with mine.

“That was really salty.”

“Now, you want to rip this part off here,” I say, demonstrating for her. “Then you can pull the meat out of the tail.”

She follows my movements, extracting the meat and eating it.

“It’s kind of sweet.”

“Kind of,” I agree, taking another. “You just have to get past the head. Everyone has a problem with that. Try again.”

She does, clenching her eyes shut to break the head off.

“Do you like it?” I ask, trying to read her expression.

She nods, though I can see that she’s hesitant to touch them.

“Just wait until I tell Andi you had me out here murdering already murdered animals.”

“Don’t. I’ll never hear the end of it.”

She laughs, picking at the tail of her next crawfish. “You know, back home, I never really got out much. It’s not really allowed with Drew and Marcus being heavily watched by the paparazzi. If anyone from back there saw me eating with my fingers right now, they would probably have a heart attack.”

“I didn’t take you for a lover of lawyers,” I point out, breaking the head off a crawfish with a little too much roughness.

She shakes her head, wiping her hands and taking a drink.

“I’m not, anymore. Back then, I just wanted stability and someone like that could give it to me.” I think back to the story she told me about her mom and dad, suddenly cold.

“And what do you want now?”

Her brow furrows and she stares at me. I watch the delicate heat rise up her neck and into her cheeks and wonder if anyone has ever asked her that.

“I don’t know. Happiness? Isn’t that what we all want.”

“What would make you happy, though?”

From the way she sputters, unable to come up with an answer, I can see she doesn’t know. Not that I’m any better. Does anyone know what makes them happy despite what’s on the surface?

“You sound like my therapist,” she grumbles, finally ripping the head off a crawfish with more gusto than before.

“You know you don’t have to follow all their rules, right? It’s a remotely free country. You can do whatever you want.”

She seems to mull that over, but some of the color drains from her face, like the idea of abstaining from going to shitty dinner parties and not marrying a man who chains you to the bed hadn’t crossed her mind.

“I don’t know why I’m telling you this,” she murmurs, her eyes on the crawfish in her hands, “but I really thought I was just boring when Drew and I split up.”

“Boring?” Somehow boring and Bailey don’t go together in my mind.

“I don’t know. I wasn’t ready to try what he wanted me to. I just,” she takes a breath and shrugs, “thought something was wrong with me.”

I can’t believe I’m talking about BDSM with my sister’s best friend, but here we are.

“BDSM is something I’ve stayed away from, but I know it’s not for everyone. If you aren’t comfortable, you shouldn’t have to try it. ”

“But isn’t that how you push your boundaries?”

I nod. “Pushing boundaries with someone who will take care of you is different than being forced into something prematurely. If you didn’t trust him, he could have hurt you.”

She wrinkles her nose, taking a slow, deep breath. “Sorry for burying you with my problems.”

I grit my teeth. “I would rather us talk about it than you do something stupid with someone you don’t know.”

I don’t realize what I’ve implied until Bailey eyes me precariously. Fuck, I keep sticking my foot in my mouth.

A sudden awkwardness hangs between us while we finish the food, like each of us is afraid to say anything else because we’re actually getting along for once.

“I figured out what you owe me,” Bailey chimes suddenly, her eyes on the room past me. I look behind me and see people moving together on the small dance floor to the live band.

“Hell no,” I shake my head.

“It will be fun!” she argues, sitting up straight. “It will be fun.”

“I don’t dance,” I murmur, taking a drink from my tea.

“Well, you do now.” Bailey stands, holding her hand out to me. “You owe me.”

I shake my head, again, but it’s no fucking use.

“Do you want to dance, ma’am?” a kid asks, probably only eighteen, or so. His buddies are at a booth a couple rows down, snickering.

Bailey cocks her head at me, nodding to the boy.

“She’s dancing with me,” I grumble, standing from the booth. The kid tips his ball cap before taking off to his friends.

“See,” Bailey gloats. “I can get dates just as easily. ”

Yeah, and if he would have touched you, he would have been a dead man.

I let her lead me into the mix of people as some sappy-ass country song comes on. The band’s singer isn’t too bad, but this song makes me think of some lovesick asshole, strumming away on his guitar after his woman leaves him.

I’ll admit, I’ve never slow danced. I didn’t go to prom. I didn’t go to homecoming dances. It just wasn’t for me. I let Bailey place my hand on her hip, exercising all my self-control not to feel the warmth of her skin through the denim of her shorts. She places her other hand on my shoulder and waits for me to move.

“I told you, I don’t dance,” I murmur, low enough that only she and I can hear.

Her gaze softens just a hair and she smiles, something about it hitting me square in the fucking chest.

“Just step back and forth to the music. Do whatever feels right and I’ll follow.”

What the fuck feels right anymore? I’m slow dancing with Bailey fucking Carpenter in a crab shack down on the bayou.

I start to move and Bailey follows along, her body moving under my hands like we’re fucking. Slow dancing — as it turns out — is like sex. Bailey sways with me, letting me lead even though I don’t have a clue what I’m fucking doing. I can’t lie to myself and say that holding her like this doesn’t make my pulse throb and my dick rock-hard in my jeans. Her scent’s everywhere, goading me and tempting me to break all my rules.

Her soft blue eyes peer up into mine and the overwhelming need to kiss her drives me insane. I pull her closer, barely moving us, now. She licks her lips and I can feel her heart beating against her ribs.

“Charlie,” she whispers, her voice so quiet, I can barely hear it. Her eyes flick from my eyes to my lips and back. “I think this was a mistake.”

Mistake?

“I told you I don’t dance,” I repeat back, holding her palm close to my chest.

“I’m ready to go now.”

The song ends and she pulls away from me, practically sprinting back to the table to grab her things.

Dazed and confused, I follow her, throwing a couple twenties on the table and hurrying out the door.

“Bailey,” I snap. Her back’s to me as she hurries to the truck.

“I’m tired,” she mumbles as I unlock the truck and open the door for her. She won’t look at me.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” I grit, walking around the back of the truck.