XANDER (The Caine Brothers Book 2) (8 page)

“Oh, hell no. I’m damn sure there’s no way you’ll ever forget the sex, but there’s something beyond that and you know it. You’ll get your phone back after we’ve talked,” Xander said.

She glared daggers at him, but looking past the daggers he saw she agreed with him. There was something else.

“So what do you suggest?” she asked.

“Let’s go for a ride. Someplace away from the rally, so we can talk.”

She cocked her head and considered him for just a moment, but it didn’t take her long to decide. “Okay. But I need to tell Lily. Let me use my phone.”

“Nice try, Pixie. Just use the house phone.”

She headed to the phone on the wall near the registration desk, and Xander and the guys followed.

“I don’t trust her, Killer,” Dude said. “What if it’s an ambush?”

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“Word is Prez and Titan are looking for us,” Xander said. “You know anything about that?”

She cringed. “Maybe. Hang on.” She reached for the phone and dialed room 210. Xander stood at her shoulder, not even hiding the fact that he listened to every word she said. “Lily, I’ve got to go out for a while. Stay in the room and don’t go anywhere until I get back. I mean it. If you do anything stupid, I’ll be pissed.” Lily responded somehow, then Pixie said, “Don’t ask. It’s a mess. I’ll tell you when I get back. Love you.”

When she hung up, she turned and about ran into Xander.

“Okay, let’s go,” she said.

Xander faced Dude and Chico. “You guys stay out of trouble until I get back. Think you can manage that?”

Dude gave him a thumbs up and a stupid grin, which meant he’d probably go looking for Prez and Titan and take them both on alone. Chico just waved Xander off. He’d do his best to rein Dude in.

Xander grasped Pixie’s upper arm and guided her out the door to the parking lot. At his bike, he handed her his helmet and climbed on waiting for her to join him.

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“If I wear your helmet, what will you wear?”

“I’ll be fine.”

She stood there, not putting the helmet on, not moving at all.

“We could take my car,” she said.

“Why would we do that?”

“We can actually talk in a car. While it’s moving. The weather’s nice now, but it’s November. It could turn on us, and then we’d be stuck out in the weather wherever you’re taking me.”

There was some sense in her suggestion, but no self-respecting biker took a car when he had his bike. Besides, he planned to take them somewhere that the weather wouldn’t matter. “Do you even have your keys?”

Her shoulders slumped in defeat. “No. I don’t suppose you’ll let me go back inside to get them.”

“Nope. Get on.”

She jammed the helmet on her head, grumbling something disdainful as she did, then climbed on the bike behind him. When she leaned into his back and wrapped her arms around his waist, he closed his eyes for just a moment and swallowed hard. Damn, but it felt right to have her there.

He took off, heading for the Seawall, then turned south to put some miles between them and the rally. The sun sparkled on the water of the gulf to their left, and with the wind in his hair and a woman he actually liked behind him, he tried not to let the feeling of contentment that lurked just beneath the surface take over. Pixie was a Ravager, which could only lead to a disastrous conclusion.

There was plenty to say and explain, but for just a while he enjoyed the peace of the road.

Of course he drove a Harley, but unlike the bikers she grew up with, Xander’s bike was classy. Understated. Badass. A Softail Slim, it was flat black everything, rather than chromed and tricked to the hilt. She liked it.

They rode for miles heading for the south end of the island, and for every one of those miles Gracie played out a different scenario in her head for how things would turn out at the end of the ride. Try as hard as she could, though, they all ended the same way—with the two of them apart. The problem was, she didn’t want that. By the time he pulled off the main road into a frontage of beach houses, she’d determined she wasn’t ready to give up just yet, despite the enormous obstacles in the way.

He pulled into the driveway of a modest, raised beach house and killed the engine. Reluctant to release her hold on Xander since she had no idea if he’d ever let her touch him again after she told him who she was, she slid off the back of the bike. She removed the helmet, placing it on the seat for later use, and ran her hands through her hair to toss out the helmet hair.

He climbed off the bike and dug in his pocket, coming out with her phone. He handed it to her, then headed for the stairs up to the house without saying a word or looking at her. Gracie’s heart fell somewhere into the deep dark pit of her stomach.

“Alexander, is that you?”

Both Gracie and Xander turned to the female voice. A huge smile lit Xander’s face as Gracie watched a little old lady—no more than five foot nothing—in a flowery blue housecoat and furry slippers cross the street.

“Mrs. Riley,” Xander said. He leaned down to kiss her wrinkled, powdery cheek. “How are you?”

“I’d be better if my favorite boys visited me more often.” Her fake pout belied the humorous glitter in her eyes. “How are your brothers?”

“Married, stupid, out of control, crazy, and dangerous. In that order.”

“Hunter got married and didn’t tell me?” The incredulous look of surprise told Gracie how unbelievable it was to combine the name Hunter and the word marriage in the same sentence.

“It happened suddenly. We were all as shocked as you are. Who’d have thought that bastard would find a woman willing to tolerate him long enough to get married?”

Mrs. Riley gave Xander’s arm a playful slap. “That’s not a nice thing to say about your brother. I think it’s lovely he found someone. Everyone should be so lucky.”

Gracie shifted uncomfortably. If not for the rivalry between their clubs, she would have dared to hope for such luck with Xander.

Mrs. Riley sighed a dreamy sigh. “I miss having men around.”

Despite her curly gray hair, weathered skin, and rounded form, hints of the attractive woman she’d been in her youth lurked behind her age. She’d probably attracted men like flies to honey.

“Trust me,” Xander said. “You don’t want my brothers around. Not all at once, anyway.”

“Pffft. I never met a man I couldn’t handle.”

“I don’t doubt that for a minute,” Xander said. He waggled his eyebrows at her playfully.

“So, who’s this beauty?” Mrs. Riley asked, waggling her eyebrows right back at him.

Xander turned to Gracie and gestured to her to introduce herself. Animosity rolled off him in waves. He had every right to be upset, but it occurred to her that she knew very little about him. He worked for the Huntsmen dispensing their vigilante justice. She’d seen what they did to Hank. Did he have a hand in that? Could he do that to her?

She had to trust her instincts, which said no. But still, she’d stay alert.

She offered her hand to shake, and the older woman took it, grasping it in both of hers.

“I’m Gracie. It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Riley. I hope someday you and I can sit down and share Xander stories.”

Mrs. Riley winked and squeezed her hand. “You can bet on it. It’s a date.”

“That’ll be a short date,” Xander said.

Mrs. Riley snorted. “You wish. I have plenty of stories. About all of you boys. I used to babysit them, you know. They’re a wild bunch, Gracie. The crazy Caine boys.”

Xander just grunted.

“Well, I’ll let you kids go,” Mrs. Riley said. “Don’t you be a stranger, Alexander. And tell those brothers of yours to come visit me.”

“I will. It’s good to see you again.”

Xander kissed her cheek one more time, and she beamed at him for just a moment before shuffling back across the street.

“She’s adorable,” Gracie said.

“She is.”

Xander took her wrist in a tight grip and without saying another word, led her up the stairs and unlocked the door to the beach house.

Inside, she wrenched her wrist from his grip and rounded on him, holding it close to her chest and rubbing it with her other hand.

“There’s no need for that. If you want to talk, that’s fine. If you want to yell at me, that’s fine, too. But I won’t put up with a man who needs to control, or who does it by hurting people.”

He jerked as if she’d struck him and his features settled into a hurt expression. “Sorry if I hurt you. I’m not a control freak, and I don’t hit women. Not all bikers are like that. Most of us work hard to discredit that asshole image bikers have.”

“Yeah, well, I grew up with the assholes.”

At the reference to the Ravagers, the hurt expression disappeared, as did the happy indulgence he’d displayed for Mrs. Riley. In its place a grim biker glared at her. So much for fighting the reputation.

Light from the windows facing the beach flooded the large living space beyond the foyer. Gracie wanted to explore. Despite being timeless and elegant, the decor looked like it hadn’t been updated since the ‘80s.

One look at Xander nixed exploration.

“I don’t suppose the fridge is stocked?” she asked.

“So your name is Gracie?”

The entry to the kitchen was just left of the foyer, so she wandered in, hoping to prolong the inevitable. She couldn’t stand the thought of him looking at her with disgust, betrayal, loathing, rejection once she told him exactly who she was. He’d never want to see her again.

Opening the fridge, she bent and stuck her head in. She found a six-pack of beer and grabbed one, not even caring how long ago it had expired. She popped the cap and guzzled half the bottle.

“This is a nice little place,” she said, making unimportant small talk. More prolonging.

He leaned in the doorway, his arms crossed. “It belonged to my mom. She left it to me and my brothers when she died.”

“Oh. I’m sorry. My mom’s dead too.”

Somehow the conversation had veered into dead mothers. God. Could it get any more awkward? Hours ago they’d been sliding around in each other’s naked arms, and now they could barely string two stiff, tense words together.

He didn’t say a word, just let the silence spiral out until she couldn’t stand it anymore.

“Okay, fine. My name is Gracie Buckner. My father is Prez Buckner. My brother is Titan Buckner. My sister is Lily Buckner. I refuse to refer to her by her married name because that fucker doesn’t deserve that much respect.”

A tiny smile played at the corner of Xander’s mouth.

She took another swig from the bottle, then pointed it at him. “But don’t you dare judge me by my family.”

An eyebrow went up, silently asking why.

“I may have been raised in the Ravagers, but I’m
not
one. I left years ago to go to college. I’m a photographer.”

“I hate to point out the flaw in your reasoning, but you’re at a bike rally and I met you at a biker bar. That suggests you haven’t really put the Ravagers behind.”

She roamed into the living room and stopped at the windows looking out over the gulf. The water sparkled in the sunlight. A kid threw a stick into the water for his dog to chase. She spoke while watching them playing in the surf.

“I live and work in Dallas, but when Lily called and asked me to come home, I did. When I saw her I lost it. I mean, I knew Hank was an asshole, and I knew he’d hit her in the past. Lily and I have gone round and round about it before. But I haven’t been home for a while. I guess he escalated things. This is the worst I’ve seen her.”

She glanced at Xander, whose face had gone stony at the mention of Hank hitting Lily. Gracie went back to watching the beach.

“So, I figured something needed to be done,” she continued. “Calling the cops would be pointless. If they did anything it would take forever to see results, and Prez would find a way around the justice system. I have no idea how he does it, but I’m pretty sure he’s bought some of them off, or they owe him favors, or something. Anyway, I’d heard the Huntsmen did some sort of vigilante thing, so I contacted y’all anonymously.”

“So when I met you in the bar?”

She faced him again. “I wanted to confirm you’d done something about it. But we got a little distracted, and I never had a chance to ask.”

An amused look flit across the angles and planes of his face, then disappeared. She had the urge to touch him; run her fingers through his blond hair and over the darker blond of his stubbled jaw. But she kept her hands to herself, instead stuffing one in her pocket and gripping the beer bottle with the other.

“He got a small sample of what he deserved,” Xander said.

“I saw.”

His brows came together. “When?”

“I was offered a job in Florida, so I went to the club house to say goodbye to Prez. Hank was there.”

“Florida?” He sounded incredulous. “You’re going to Florida?”

She gave a noncommittal shrug. He seemed pretty put out that she’d leave, which on the one hand made her happy, and on the other hand concerned her that she cared. She reminded herself she’d known him only two days, despite the fact that it felt like a lifetime. They fit together like puzzle pieces, or peanut butter and jelly, or biscuits and gravy. She generally considered herself too skeptical to believe in nonsense like love at first sight. Maybe
like
at first sight. Or undeniable attraction at first sight. Possibly unusual, magnetic bond that required more exploration at first sight. But love? No way.