Beard Up(29)

She was watchful and observant like me, too.





Chapter 14


If you don't have anything nice to say, say it anyway. Sometimes motherfuckers need to hear the truth.

-Ghost's secret thoughts

Ghost

Day five of Mina and Sienna being in Mooresville

I watched her live in my house, and I knew that this would have to be taken care of quickly. I couldn't keep doing this. I couldn't watch her cry in my bed. Couldn't watch her walking around looking so lost and sad. Couldn't stay away from her another minute when all I wanted to do was wrap my arms around her and never, ever let her go.

"You know, one of these days, she's going to find you standing out here."

I grunted.

"You're creepy as fuck standing here, too," Sean offered his two cents.

I'd heard the two men arrive, of course.

I just hadn't acknowledged them because I didn't feel like talking. Obviously, they weren't taking my subtle hints. 

"I'm standing in my home, Sean."

"No," he disagreed. "You're standing in a RV. And ignoring everyone and everything so you can watch the woman that you won't claim as your woman."

I shot him the finger. "Fuck off."

"Someone's pulling up."

My head whipped around and I saw Loki, one of my old club brothers who also thought I was dead, pulling up with his wife, and children in tow.

Oh, and Taco, Mina's cat.

"You know, I'm not sure any of the club would ever talk about you to anyone but among themselves. It wouldn't kill you to tell them that you're alive."

"No," I agreed. "But knowing it might get them killed and that is not a risk I'm willing to take."

And that was that.





***


Day seven of Mina and Sienna being in Mooresville

I couldn't do this. I really, really couldn't do this.

"Shit," I grunted and walked up the driveway.

"Can I help?"

Mina jumped a foot and whirled like a startled cat, instantly on guard. Her eyes were wild, and her entirely too short hair spun spectacularly around her head as if she'd been in a commercial trying to sell a certain brand of shampoo that was for luxurious, sleek hair.

The cat that we'd bought together, the one that I knew didn't like me-although dislike was too mild a word for what this cat felt for me-hissed and growled, causing us both to turn our heads and stare at the evil shit.

"Wow," Mina said. "She never hisses and growls like that at anybody."

I saw her pause as the memories hit, and I barely resisted the urge to back away.

Oh, this was not good either.

"She used to hiss at my husband like that," Mina said, a slow smile curving over her lips. "When we got her, Taco used to love to lay on my husband's chest." She grinned at me, not asking why the hell I'd walked up her driveway when I didn't even live on the street. "Then, one day, the cat grew up enough and decided that she no longer liked my husband. He hadn't hurt her or bothered her in any way, she just decided one day that she hated him and that was that."

That was all true.

I'd kind of liked the cat. In fact, I had even thought that I had bonded with that cat, dammit!

Then, one day, she just up and decided that I was no longer an acceptable human being and showed her displeasure with me by hissing and spitting at me any time I came too close for her comfort.

Like right now, for instance. I was presently within a ten-foot radius of Mina, and the cat was protecting her owner like a dog would have done.

"And now she's doing that to you. How odd." She studied me for a long moment. "Why are you here?"

That was the thousand-dollar question. Why the hell was I here? I shouldn't be here. I damn sure shouldn't be in her driveway, talking to her.

The only good thing was that it was dark so she couldn't see the color of my eyes due to the shadows.

"I live down the street," I lied. In actuality, I lived in the camper that was right here on this same property that she was on. It was far enough away, though, that it seemed like it was the next property over, but it wasn't. "I saw you struggling with the grill and thought that I'd offer to help."

Her lips pursed.

"My husband used to have a problem with me manning the grill, too," she murmured. Those watchful eyes were still scrutinizing me. "I can do it, though."


      ///
       
         
       
        

I doubted that.

The reason I had a problem with her using the grill was because she didn't know what in the hell she was doing. And she proved that moments later by squirting about half the bottle of lighter fluid onto the grill and holding out a match.