Burn in Hail(7)

"You okay?"

I looked up to see Ariya frowning at me.

"Just fine," I said, sitting back. "You ready to order?"

Ariya lifted her lip. "They don't have anything here that I can eat. I'm  on a Vegan diet until I can lose this last five pounds I gained while I  was sick last month."

I grunted something under my breath. "Then why did you agree to come here if you weren't going to eat anything?"

Ariya smiled. "I've been trying to get you to go out with me since  you've been back. I'd have gone to the movies, or even Hail House if  you'd asked me."

I snorted. She wouldn't have gotten into Hail House. Not without my permission, anyway.

The boys at the door had a list that they'd never let in, and a lot of  the exes of the club members-IE the boys that worked at Hail Auto  Recovery and the club itself-were known DO NOT ALLOW IN. Meaning, they  knew who they were, and if one of us didn't give it the okay, then they  weren't allowed entrance.

It was easier to circumvent any possible fights before they happened, rather than to allow them in and hope for the best.

"Alrighty, then," I said, holding up my hand and flagging the waitress down.

She came over in seconds, her eyes wary of me.

Everyone knew who I was.

It was hard to miss the guy that was six foot five, and tattooed from the tips of his fingers, to the base of his neck.

If they hadn't seen me in person, they'd heard of me. And it only took  one look to realize that the stories of what I looked like weren't an  exaggeration.

"W-what can I get you?" she asked.

That's when I realized I knew the waitress. She was also a checker at  the grocery store, and the woman whose car I'd repossessed not even a  few hours before.

"I'll have two of what that girl a couple tables over is having," I  pointed in Hennessy's direction. "No drink, though, except for water."

The waitress turned, nodded her head, and then moved away without asking  if Ariya wanted anything, which I thought was secretly hilarious.

Ariya found it annoying.

See, that was the thing about Ariya … we were polar opposites.

Where I found joy in doing outside activities, she didn't want to do  anything if it didn't involve air conditioning. For example, fishing.  She hated to fish. Despised it, actually.

That was my favorite thing to do when I wasn't working.

She also hated getting dirty, where the majority of my life was spent  enjoying the finer things in life-such as taking a lifted truck through a  mud puddle just because I fucking could.

Then there was her idea of kids. She wanted three, and all of them were  to be put through private school, so they could get the best education  known to man. And she wouldn't settle for anything less.

I had no problem with three kids. I also had no problem sending them to  private school if that was what they needed. What I had a problem with  was paying for said private school.

I never had been, or would be, made of money.

I made money so I could spend it. I didn't have a healthy savings  account, and if I were being honest, I likely would have if I didn't  keep buying toys-such as a new motorcycle, or a new truck that I could  fix up just to sell in three weeks.

Then there was my baby, my Chevelle. I bought parts for her on a daily  basis, fine tuning, nit picking. Anything that I thought she needed, I'd  give to her.

And Ariya thought that was stupid.

Maybe it was. Maybe it wasn't. But it was my money, and my decision to  make. A woman would never dictate what I was and wasn't allowed to spend  my hard-earned money on.

Which was another reason why Ariya and I never got along.

Our views on life were completely different.

"That was rude," Ariya said. Then her voice changed. "Is that little Hennessy Hanes over there?"

I didn't have to look at the woman to know that Ariya had finally noticed her.

The two had never gotten along. Which was surprising since Ariya's father had been a youth pastor for Hennessy's father.

"Yes, it is," I muttered without moving.

"God, what is she wearing?"

Jeans and a t-shirt.

"What's wrong with what she's wearing?" I questioned.

"Her pants are too tight. I can see a roll of fat over the top. Muffin top, anyone?"

I knew the ‘roll of fat' she was speaking of, and it was more than a  pinch, and that was only because she was sitting down, as well as  leaning forward in her chair, as she spoke adamantly with her friend,  Krisney.         

     



 

"And God, hasn't anyone told her that if she's going to wear a white  tank, that she should make sure it's not completely see through?"

I gave Ariya a jaded look, then pointedly looked down at her top.

"I can see the top of your bra over your tank," I told her. "What's it matter if I can see her bra through her shirt?"

Ariya smiled, liking the fact that I'd noticed her bra, and bared her teeth in a predatory smile.

I would've found that enticing at one point in time. Now I wanted to  lick the guacamole that'd fallen off of Hennessy's chip onto the front  of her white shirt.

I started to chuckle under my breath when she growled, and then pulled  the shirt up to her mouth and licked the offending goo off.

The move exposed her belly, and her adorable little roll on the top of her pants had me wanting to bite that, too.

"Are you even listening to me?"

I turned to find Ariya staring at me, and then looking back over at where Hennessy now had her shirt back in place.

"You have the hots for her, don't you?"

I shrugged. There was no use in denying it.

I'd always had a thing for her, even if it'd been borderline creepy when we were younger.

"That's kind of sad, Tate," Ariya curled her lip at me. "You know who her father is. You know what she did."

I nearly rolled my eyes.

Ariya was speaking about when they were in high school, and Hennessy had  accidentally bumped into Ariya, causing her to spill hot wax from two  candles all over her hands, and lower stomach.

Why Ariya had the candles, I didn't know. But it'd been before a service  that I'd been forced to attend, so I'd been there when Ariya had cried  and screamed that Hennessy had done it on purpose, when in reality it'd  been an accident on both of their parts.

However, Hennessy's father had taken her into the back room, and then proceeded to beat the shit out of her with a belt.

Not one single person had intervened, and by the time I'd realized what  was going on, I'd only been in time to walk into the room to see tears  of pain rolling down Hennessy's face, and Hennessey's father  repositioning his belt back around his hips.

I'd hated him from that moment on.

The feeling had also been mutual.

She hadn't screamed.

What I knew then, as well as now, showed how strong she actually was.

I sat back as the server brought my food, and winked at her when she  didn't so much as stutter when she spoke with me about the kitchen staff  taking too long.

And as I tasted my first bite of the tacos, I realized why Hennessy had moaned each and every time she'd taken a bite.

It was fan-fucking-tastic.





Chapter 7


Get a fixer upper, they said. It'll be fun, they said. They were liars. Fixing an old house up fucking sucks.

-Tate's secret thoughts

Tate

"Remind me again why I said I'd take this place?" I asked Baylor.

Baylor looked over at me with amused eyes.

"Because it was free?"

I snorted and turned my eyes back to the dilapidated house.

"It's a piece of shit," I muttered.

"It is a piece of shit," Baylor agreed. "But it's your piece of shit."

He handed over the keys, and I took them, making my way up the front walk.

The porch groaned underneath my weight.

I winced and kept going, ignoring the way the wood creaked with each additional step I took.

I turned and surveyed the porch.

The house itself was built in the nineteen hundreds. It was a two-story  monster with over ten rooms. The house itself needed work … a lot of work.  There were places in it where I could see straight through the walls to  the outside. It was built on pier and beam, and I wondered if the beams  holding the house up were even whole.

With the way that the wood underneath my feet groaned with each step, I doubted it.

"May have been free," I sighed. "But it might not be worth it to fix up."

Baylor grunted something behind me. "Yeah, sure," he agreed. "But the  historical society will pay you to fix it up to their expectations. Not  to mention if you do get it fixed up, they'll buy it from you."

That'd been one of the reasons I'd agreed to take it. I needed somewhere  to live, this place was available seeing as it was left to me after an  uncle died three years ago, and I wasn't in a position to complain.

"That apartment building is supposed to be coming down next month, and  that house right there," Baylor pointed, "belongs to your best friend."

I looked in the direction he pointed.

The house itself was old, like mine, but it was cute and fixed up, where mine was in need of a complete and total overhaul.         

     



 

"You knew about this, didn't you?" I accused.