Page 142 of Preacher Man

“Out.” He insisted, pulling on his jeans.

She didn’t feel shame, not even a little bit for her nudity. In fact, she gave Slider a wide grateful grin and a wave of her fingertips as he left winking at her.

Preacher followed him out, with his jeans unbuttoned, all his inked skin on show, it was a wonder she could breathe after experiencing all of that. She heard him say “Remember what I said if you tell a word of this, prospect? Good. You don’t glance at Ruby any differently, you dig? Thanks for doing this.”

And then Slider. “She’s a goddamn goddess. And that was the hottest shit I ever saw. Now can I fuck off, sir? I have to go bang my girl. I don’t even have a girl. I need to get a girl so I can bang her stupid ‘cause damn me, did I say that was the hottest shit I ever saw? I’m gonna dream about this shit.”

Ruby rolled over onto her belly, laughing.

She liked being a sexual goddess. It was … liberating. She’d never shared any of her fantasies with any of her exes before. Preacher was different. He not only didn’t judge her for them, he made them happen.

And god. She hadn’t felt free in such a long time, weighed down by circumstances and duty didn’t leave much time for sexual liberty.

She smiled at him when he came back inside, his trademark smirk all over his face.

“Well, well. Wasn’t that fun, beautiful.”

Beautiful. When he said it, she believed it. Her belly fluttered with everything she was feeling for him. He climbed back onto the bed, spooning behind her.

She was feeling too much, far too much, a wash of girlish excitement she hadn’t experienced in a long time, until him. The mood had her uncertain in her own skin. Was she meant to tell him how she felt? Just sex had become so complicated suddenly. After setting out her stringent rules, she’d fallen for him anyway. What was the protocol now? She allowed herself thirty minutes cuddling into him, listening to his husky tones as he told her just how much he’d enjoyed tonight and then Ruby made her excuses to leave not long after, saying she had an early start at work tomorrow. She didn’t. It was the first lie she told Preacher.

She should have stayed at the club with him. Because everything went to shit not long after she arrived home.

That’s just how her life went. She got a taste of good and then the inevitable blast of sourness.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

“I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. Grab onto me, beautiful.” – Preacher

Rita: 4:03 - I can’t do ths anymore, it’s 2 fukn hard. I’m tired. U can have him, he’ll be better off with u anyway. U can have him. U need to come and get the kid NOW! I’m no good for him. I fuk up. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for not being a good sister. Pls come 4 him.

The text woke her up. Ruby was one of those people who never switched their phone off, always worried the moment she did she’d miss an important call. She looked at the blurry screen until her tired eyes focused, her mouth parted, her heart pounding out of her chest. Holy shit, here we go again. She sighed. Was she for real? Hitting buttons, she tried to call Rita to ask what the fuck had happened, it dropped directly to voicemail. Goddammit. Four am in the morning, this was not happening. She needed coffee to deal with yet another of Rita’s melodramas. No doubt Dwayne was at the root of this fresh wave of drama, that asshole was always the reason Rita wanted to dump Sebastian on her, in a few hours’ time Rita would call and demand money and all would be conveniently forgotten that she’d basically given her child away without a second thought.

She could hate her sister some days.

Taking a pissed off breath, she climbed out of bed, no sleep would be had now, she wished Preacher was here, then shut that thought down, there was no reason to go crazy, just because she had the feelings for him, she could deal with her family circus herself.

First things first, she padded through to the kitchen, pulling open cabinets to grab a mug and the half can of coffee beans, got the old coffee maker to gurgling and she sent her sister a long-ass text reply, basically asking what the hell had happened and how could she help. Sebastian did not merit being in that environment, but she’d do all she could to help his mom if she could. What else could she do?

Ruby spent the next few hours trying to call her sister.

******

"Yo, Preach. You saw your girl?" Called out Grinder, his friend walked towards him as he shrugged out of his jacket, tossed it aside and began pulling on work overalls. The shop was full to bursting today with shit needing repairing. Preacher was already making a way through some damn lug nuts on his job.

Arching a brow, he didn't answer Grinder right away, assuming his buddy wanted to gossip, just got on with the bike under his hands before saying "Not today, why? You wanting some fresh ink?"

"I was just over at Otis' picking up some food, I heard him telling that kid who serves how she's had to take some emergency personal time."

This reared up Preacher's head, his eyes focused a million questions on the end of his tongue. He picked the easiest one. "What do you mean?"

"According to Otis, there was a death in the family."

Preacher's face fell into a confused frown, he abandoned the bike, leaving the tools right by it on the floor as he lifted off his knees. Who the fuck had died? Why hadn't she called him? His girl would be crushed, she wore her heart right there on her sleeve for anyone to stomp all over.

He needed to see her, talk to her, make sure she was okay. "Can you take over for me, G?"

"Yeah, sure, not like I don't have five other repairs to do ... "