She grabbed his arm. “Reid…”
He shrugged her off as well. “I need to leave.”
Deacon stepped forward. “Yeah, you sure the fuck do.”
Rusty spun to face her brother. “Mind your own damn business, Deke.”
Her brother ignored her. “I don’t want you seeing my sister anymore. Just stay the hell away from her,” he said, jaw tight.
“Deacon!” She stepped in front of him and tried to talk to Reid. “Ignore him. Come on. Let’s go to my place and talk.”
Deke tried to shove her behind him again. “He’s got an anger problem. Shit, if I hadn’t been here…”
Alex sneered down at Brian, who was watching the drama unfold. “He more than deserved what he got.”
Deacon stared at his fiancée. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Rusty ignored them as Alex started telling her brother the whole nasty story. Instead she focused on Reid, and the stricken look on his face. “Reid, please.”
He shook his head. “I have to go.” Then he strode from the workshop and out the door. She ran after him, but he was already in his car, firing up the engine by the time she got to him.
He backed up without looking at her—even when she called his name—and drove off without a backward glance.
Chapter Eighteen
“How many times do I have to repeat this shit, Dominic?” Reid shook his head. “Get the hell out of my sight.” The kid stared up at him like he wanted to batter him with the wrench in his hand, then decided against it and skulked off.
“What’s crawled up your ass?” Law said, coming to stand beside him.
“He doesn’t fuckin’ listen. Either he starts or he finds another job.”
His friend stared at him in disbelief. “You’d do that to him? After everything he’s been through?”
“Not my problem.”
Law narrowed his eyes, knew he was full of it. Yeah he was pissed, and yeah, he was taking his bad mood out on the boy, but he could never do that to him, despite his threats.
“I’ll be hitting the road again in a couple weeks. Can I trust you on your own? Or am I gonna come back and find you’ve fired the whole fuckin’ lot of them cause someone got your panties in a wad?”
Law was a member of the Rogue Saint’s MC—had been since they were young—but because he worked for Reid, overseeing his different stores around the country, he’d chosen the life of a nomad. A brother with no set charter. It worked well for both of them. Especially since Law was the only person that called Reid out when he was acting like a dick.
He could do without that on a regular basis. “You know me better than that.”
“Yeah? These guys owe you a hell of a lot, all of them. They respect you, work their asses off for you because of what you’ve done for each and every one of them. Don’t mess that up because you’ve had a fight with your woman. That’s not cool, bro.”
He clenched his fists and felt the pull against the tender skin there. A wave of nausea hit him in the gut. “I didn’t fight with Rusty.”
“What’s the problem, then? You’ve been an asshole for the last two days.”
Reid didn’t look at him, couldn’t. “I fucked up.”
“Yeah?” His friend’s expression went from pissed to concerned in a flash. Jesus, he hated that. Hated that as much as he’d tried to convince himself otherwise, convince himself that he wasn’t that guy, that angry, damaged person he saw in the mirror every morning, that it was all bullshit, because Law knew different. It was written all over the other man’s face. They’d seen each other at their worst, knew what the other was capable of. Had seen the ugly that lay beneath.
“I beat a guy. A guy from Rusty’s past, because he’d hurt her, because he was touching her.” He shoved his hands in his hair. “She saw the whole thing. Watched me lose my shit, watched me turn into a goddamn monster.”
“Jesus.” His friend walked around, hard stare locking with Reid’s. “The cops involved?”
He shrugged. He had no idea, but if the cops had been called he guessed he would have had a visit by now. “Don’t know.”
“What’re you gonna do?”
“What I should have done when I first laid eyes on her.” Law frowned, about to say more, but Reid shook his head, and thankfully his friend knew better than to push.
Turning his back on the guy, he headed to his office. The conversation was closed, he did not want to be talked around, couldn’t afford to be. His mind was made up.
He’d lost it, completely. If Rusty’s brother hadn’t been there to drag him off the guy, Reid would have killed him. If he was honest, he still wanted to. He wanted to hurt that son of a bitch for what he’d done, for touching her, for daring to speak to her.
But that wasn’t what freaked him the most. What really got to him was the look on Rusty’s face. He couldn’t get it out of his head. The shock, the confusion—the horror.
His father was right. He was nothing but a chip off the old block. He’d always known it. That motherfucker had infected him, had poisoned him long ago, and there was nothing he could do about it. Nothing but keep his distance, go back to the way it was before Rusty exploded into his life. Before she threw light into the darkness that was his world, shining bright, completely rocking his narrow existence.
Avoiding her calls the last couple days hadn’t been easy. Whenever her name flashed up on the screen he’d had to fight himself every damn time not to pick it up, to beg her to understand, to make her believe that hadn’t been him, that he wasn’t that monster.
But that would be a lie. He was that monster. He’d proven it.
Rusty meant something to him. He cared for her in a way he had never cared for anyone else, to the point he couldn’t stomach the thought of being with another woman. He couldn’t imagine ever hurting her that way and truly believed, deep down, he never could. But then how could he risk it? How could he risk her? What if one day she pissed him off, and he lost it with her? What if he did hurt her?
How could he live with that?
He glanced at the clock. It was after five, and he wasn’t getting anything done. Screw this. Grabbing his keys, he left for home. Law would lock up. He needed to get out of there, let off steam, clear his head.
Twenty minutes later he was pulling into his driveway.
And almost turned around and went the other way when he saw who was waiting for him.
He sucked in a sharp breath when he saw Rusty parked there—the woman he hadn’t been able to get out of his head, not since the minute he’d laid eyes on her. She was leaning against her pickup, arms crossed, so damn beautiful, it hurt to look at her. Her long hair was down, straight around her shoulders. She’d showered before she’d come. He could tell because she wasn’t wearing her usual work boots, shorts, and tank. No, instead she had on a green sundress. It was short, showed off her long legs. Her arms were bare, exposing all the colorful ink decorating her smooth skin.
How in the hell was he going to get through this?
Taking a deep breath, he shut off his car, shoved the door open, and stepped out. It was now or never, and the latter wasn’t an option. It didn’t matter how tempting a lifetime with Rusty sounded. He couldn’t have her. “What are you doing here?”
She jerked back, the movement small, but he hadn’t missed it. She straightened her shoulders. “Why haven’t you been answering my calls?”
He shrugged. “I’ve been busy.”
This time her reaction wasn’t small, she flinched like he’d struck her, then wrapped her arms around herself. “You don’t need to worry about Brian. He’s not going to press charges or anything. Once Deke found out the whole story, he took care of it.” She frowned. “I think he threatened to destroy his career if he didn’t forget the whole thing. You have nothing to worry about.”