He nodded slowly. "Yeah, you could say that."
"Then what are you doing here? Are you here to punish me?"
His eyes moved lazily up and down my body, causing my core to clench with arousal and my panties to become wet.
"Maybe before I move on with someone else I want more of what I had last night."
Oh, God, so did I but not like this. He hated me, but I couldn't help but hope that they were just words said because I'd hurt him, that he didn't really mean them. I still loved Sax, so much, and I knew that there would never be anyone else for me.
My heart jumped as I remembered how he'd fucked me the night before. It had been different. More raw and primal than what I was used to with him. We'd always had an active, intense sexual relationship, but in the past he'd been more considerate of me. Last night he'd taken what he'd wanted, setting me on fire with his desperate kind of invasion of my body.
He stepped closer to me, but I had nowhere to go. Would I stop him? Was I strong enough to deny him? I found myself breathing hard in anticipation, both fearful and excited. "What if I don't want it?"
My question didn't stop Sax, and before I knew it he had me trapped against the counter with his arms on either side of me. We were so close that I could feel the heat rolling off his body, could breathe in the warm whiskey on his breath. When I couldn't stand it any longer I raised my eyes to his. My lips parted, and a tiny sound escaped me. His dark gaze dropped to my mouth, and I dragged my bottom lip between my teeth. His nostrils flared in response, and his expression flushed with hunger.
I waited for him to grab me and ravish me like he had the night before, but something seemed to be holding him back. I knew he was aroused. The air was thick with it. I watched emotion flicker in his eyes and saw the indecision there. He was fighting against what he wanted to do and what he needed to do.
"Can't make up my mind if I want to fuck you or strangle you."
Tears filled my eyes. "I'm sorry." I was sorry that I'd ruined us with my selfishness and deceit.
He moved the few inches separating us and unexpectedly rested his forehead against mine and closed his eyes. "Me, too, Babe." The words were whispered against my lips. "Sorry I wasn't enough for you. Sorry I didn't give you the baby you wanted." There was so much anguish in his voice that it tore me up inside. The tears were flowing now, my mouth trembling as I fought to hold back sobs. When he spoke again I could barely hear him. "Have a good life, Babe. I'll try to leave you alone."
With that he turned and left, and I crumbled. I was such a fool. How was I going to live without him? If I could have gone back to undo the damage that I’d done, I would have. Maybe Sax would have forgiven me in time. I hadn't really given him a chance. I'd just taken the coward's way out, left him a note, and taken off.
As my sobs echoed off the bathroom tiles, I was sure that they could be heard outside at the bar. Hopefully the celebration was enough to drown them out. I had to pull myself together and get back out there to Ava. We needed to go home. But really, was I in any condition to drive?
The second time the door opened Raven walked in. Our eyes instantly met, and it didn't take her long to see the devastation on my face. She rushed to me and took me into her arms.
"Oh, honey," she said into my hair with understanding. "I saw Sax follow you, and when he came back out I thought I should check up on you."
I couldn't hold back my sobs as a fresh onset of tears exploded from me.
"I knew you weren't over that man."
"I'll never be over him, Raven," I confessed, pulling back and angrily brushing my cheeks. "I love him! I hate myself for what I've done to us."
"Then why did you break up with him? We've all been asking ourselves that for months. At first we believed it was because of what happened when the three of us were kidnapped, but it's about Ava, isn't it?"
I just stared at the concern in her eyes. Everyone knew Sax's thoughts about having a baby. It was on the tip of my tongue to just tell Raven everything, to confess my sins, but once the words were out there was no going back, and I wasn't sure that I was ready for that. Maybe I shouldn't have come back after all.
"Honey, it's not too late to undo it," Raven continued when the silence between us grew. "People break up all the time and then get back together. Sometimes a break is good for a relationship."
I half-laughed, half-sobbed. "I did something unforgivable," I whispered. Our eyes held, and I could see that Raven was considering my words, unsure about what she should say. Maybe she was afraid of what I'd say. "No. I made my bed, and I'll lie in it." God, that made me sound like such a martyr.
"Do you want to talk about it?" There was caring and sincerity in her soft tone, and I loved her for it. I knew that I could trust any one of the girls to be there for me if I needed them.
I shook my head. "Someday, but not today, and not here." I forced a smile to set Raven at ease. "And before someone claims that I've abandoned Ava, I'd better get out there." I glanced back in the mirror to see how bad my face looked. I looked a wreck.
Like a woman who'd had her heart broken.
Chapter 8
Sax
I sat back, relaxed against my headboard, legs crossed at the ankles, I played a jazz favorite of mine by Kenny G on my sax. "Alone" seemed appropriate to the way I was feeling these days, in spite of the fact that I was once again surrounded by my brothers. In many ways I felt more alone now than I had the whole time that I'd been on the road.
I was fucking pathetic.
I wished that I'd never seen Holly again, because it was messing with my fucking head. I'd kept to the declaration I'd made to my brothers on the day I'd received my VP patch. I was handling club business fine, but the rest of the time I was fixated on my ex-old lady and what had gone wrong with us. I missed everything about her. Hell, I missed everything about us. We'd been good together.
I was faking it, and my brothers weren't stupid, they knew it. Sure, I hung on to the club girls while I was out in the bar, gave attention to some of the hang arounds on Friday and Saturday nights, but I never took one back to my room. When the girls didn't get an invite to my bed, they tried fucking hard to get me to fuck them anywhere else. It wasn't lost on me that my VP patch drew them in like flies on shit, but I knew that all they wanted was bragging rights. Under different circumstances, I'd have been all over that.
The trouble was that I had two organs, my heart and my dick, that were refusing to let Holly go.
Truth was, I'd loved Holly since the moment I’d walked into the diner she'd been working at and saw her cute ass waiting tables. When she'd glanced up and our eyes had met that first time, it had been like a fucking ray of sunshine shining down on me. Her genuine smile and the glow shining in her friendly eyes had captured me and refused to let go. I'd gone back again and again just to watch her, never approaching her because I hadn't wanted to drag her into the danger and chaos of my world.
When my brothers and I had been asked by Moody, a nomad friend of the club, to rescue a woman out of the brothel she was being held at, and I'd walked in and found out that woman was Holly, our fates had been sealed. I’d had to have her, and I'd taken her to our clubhouse for safe keeping until the situation with Moody and his old lady was over. It hadn't taken me long to claim her ass.