“You can’t be serious.” I shake my head, actually feeling a lot better now that I’ve had my weird, cathartic release. “My father was a straight-laced, stick-up-his-ass accountant. He wasn’t a biker. He drove a Fiat.” He just stares, so I repeat the last part for emphasis. “A Fiat.”
He snorts derisively, a ghost of a smile appearing on his lips. “Never said he was a biker. And he did indeed drive that small little car everywhere. But he was our accountant for a while.”
My skin prickles as a weird chill settles in my bones. My brow furrows in confusion, and I desperately try to grab ahold of any memory that might give me an answer as to if Drex is lying or not.
But why would he lie?
“No,” I say softly, shaking my head absently while still mulling over dusty memories.
“Any idea how he kept his family a secret? That one is baffling me. We checked him out thoroughly before taking him on, and he lived in a one-bedroom apartment downtown. No family. No history of family in his file. Nothing.”
The memory of my dad and mother separating briefly after the accident that took my sister’s life floods back to me. Even after he came back home, he often stayed somewhere else, growing more distant.
My dad was a tech genius, so faking a background check would be child’s play if he wanted to keep us hidden. But… No. Not possible. Can’t be true.
“It’s true,” Drex says, worrying me that I said that aloud. “He cooked our books and handled the shady shit I won’t explain, so he wasn’t as straight-laced as you thought.”
My veins run cold, and a new brand of betrayal singes me. How could we not have known?
“My dad… was he bullied into working for you?”
He gives me a look that borders on insulted, but it fades quickly. “No. We don’t force people to work for us. That just invites trouble. Someone in a situation like that would turn to the feds the first chance they got. Your dad came to us. But I had no clue Benny knew him.”
I sit back to gather my thoughts, but I give up on processing my feelings.
“Benny has known me for most of my life. Well, he knew me at a glance. I never really talked to him. I rarely saw him, but the few occasions I did, he never let on like he knew my dad outside of my relationship with Ben.”
Drex picks at a piece of his food as his eyes drop.
“What kind of relationship was that?” The hard edge to his tone is subtle, but I still notice it.
Is he jealous right now?
When his jaw tics, proving he’s growing impatient with my hesitation to answer, I bite back a grin. He’s freaking jealous. Of Ben.
Ben would die to have this ego stroke right now.
“It was… a good one?” I say, but it sounds like a question. When his knuckles turn white from the grip he has on his fork, I decide to put him out of his misery.
“Ben was my best friend. At one time, I thought I loved him. And I did. Just not the way I thought I did. Or wanted to. We were more curious than anything when… well, when we were together. We lasted for two years before we decided we were better as friends than a couple. That was almost a year ago.”
He looks up at me, still seeming pissed. I can’t help but poke the bear a bit.
“I can’t believe you’re jealous right now.”
Surprise flickers across his face for a fleeting second, but then it’s replaced with that cocky look he wears so well. He loses interest in strangling the fork, letting it clank to the plate, then grabs my legs and jerks me, forcing me to fall on my back as he shifts to be in between my thighs.
He stays sitting up, slowly running his hands down my bare legs, teasing the edges of my shorts with his fingers.
“Jealous?” he asks, but I’m too busy panting for air to answer him.
How he makes the world vanish and distract me from all my problems, I don’t know.
He smirks as he pulls my hand up to his lips, and I’m fairly sure I moan in response when he sucks a finger into his mouth. I know that no intelligible sound emerges when his other hand starts messing with my button.
“I’m not jealous of Ben,” he says seriously, shifting so that his body is more aligned with mine.
In one swift move, he’s lifting me onto his lap, grabbing a handful of jean-clad ass roughly, forcing me tight against him.
“Okay,” I say breathlessly.
He grins while standing, keeping me straddling his waist, but then he lowers my feet to the ground with an abruptness that immediately has me feeling bereft. I start to ask him why he’s stopping, but he turns me around, pushing me toward the window of the living room until I’m forced to put my hands up reflexively to stop myself from crashing into it.