Fire Inside:A Chaos Novel(13)

I’d picked Hop because I was attracted to him. I’d picked Hop because he was hot. I also picked Hop because I figured he wouldn’t say no and he’d also say yes to no strings, no complications, and no entanglements. All the boys were good ole boys, few rules and the ones they had were unwritten and pertained mostly to how they treated their bikes and how they treated their brothers. Anything else went. No. From what I could tell, everything else went.

It was not lost on me, however, that there were men amongst Chaos who fell hard and fast and not only didn’t mind the fall but also got off on staying down. Tack, Ty-Ty’s husband, was one of them. Dog, also a Chaos brother, was another. Brick got lost in every woman he was with. He just didn’t pick good ones so eventually they took off, but they did it with him not wanting to let go even when they did not nice stuff like stealing his money or making a pass at one of his brothers.

So when I decided I was going to approach one of them to get what I needed, what I’d let go on for so long, I was beginning to crave, I needed one who would break the seal and then move on without complications.

I picked poorly because I picked so damned well.

I sighed and banged my head lightly against the shutter.

What I needed.

What I craved.

Gah!

I opened my eyes, slid open the shutters, and stared out to the empty courtyard.

“You are seriously stupid, Lanie Heron,” I told the window.

I did this because I knew what I craved.

A taste.

Just a taste.

A small, sweet, short taste, even if it was pretend, even if it was milk and I had to imagine it was a thick, rich, vanilla shake, a little sip of what Ty-Ty had with Tack.

I didn’t have that with Elliott. I loved him, no doubt about it. I was ready to spend the rest of my life with him. I missed him even though he was totally whacked. I’d even made the decision to stay with him knowing he was totally whacked.

I loved him so much I’d taken bullets for him.

But I’d never seen anything like what Tyra had with Tack. I’d never seen a woman get that from a man. I’d never seen the naturalness, the ease of what she gave back. I’d never seen a man and woman able to be just who they were and yet make it so plain to each other and anyone watching they appreciated what they had more than anything.

Anything.

I wanted a taste of that.

“Boy, you got it, Lanie, you big, stupid, crazy, idiot.” I kept beating myself up just as my phone rang.

My head twisted around to look at it and my eyes narrowed even as my heart skipped.

I knew who it was because this happened all the time.

Nearly midnight my time, wee hours of the morning hers.

“Shoot, shoot, damn,” I mumbled as I wandered to the phone knowing I shouldn’t pick it up. My sister Elissa always told me I shouldn’t pick it up. She didn’t pick it up. She’d learned years ago and stopped doing it, so now she’d stopped calling my sis and called me instead.

Exclusively.

Because I stupidly picked up.

I got to the bed, saw the display on my phone told me I was right and still—stupid, stupid, stupidly—I picked up.

“Hey Mom,” I answered.

“Lanie, baby, howeryoudoin?”

I switched on the light, turned, sat on the side of the bed, lifted my feet up to the padded footboard, knees closed, and dropped my forehead to my knees because I could hear it.

She was gone.

Sloshed.

Well past three sheets—she was five sheets to the wind and sailing.

I was “darling” when she was sober. When she had it together to keep up appearances. When she expended all her energy to be the Connecticut banker’s wife and buried the Tennessee farmer’s daughter. Even if that Tennessee farmer had enough acreage to build three malls and had been the richest man in the richest family in town, she was still a farmer’s daughter and that didn’t do, according to her, in Connecticut.

“Good, Mom. It’s late. What’s up?” I answered.

“Oh, nuthin’. Just wan’ed to talk to my lil’ girl.”

“You’re talking to her, Mom, but it’s nearly midnight here. I’m really tired and I should get some sleep. It’s even later there so you should get some sleep, too.”

“Doan need sleep but you need some fun, Lanie. What you doin’ home? You shud be owd on the town, paintin’ it pink or, bedder, on a date,” Mom told me, a bit of what I thought was the cute, countrified twang she’d worked for decades to get rid of coming out in her voice.

This was a constant refrain even when she wasn’t drunk out of her mind. Heck, she’d started in on me about five days after I left the hospital, after everything happened with Elliott and the Russian Mob.