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"Alexandra, I know the pain you’re carrying, because it’s a weight in my chest, too. But if we rush this — if you rush this — we risk everything. We risk not knowing. Not finding the full truth. Do you really want to come this far just to lose out on the truth?"
Her body is rigid under my hands, but I can sense something in her wanting to break. She just needs another push.
"I won't let your brother's memory down," I say, softer now. My thumbs brush against the tops of her arms. "I promise you that much. Please, let Ghost do his work."
For an eternal moment, there is only us and the tension that stretches between our locked gazes. Then, at last, she lets out a shaky breath and nods sharply, once.
"Okay. But... when he's done — when there are answers — I will be there in the room to hear them."
"You will. I promise you.”
Slowly, her stance softens, and she leans her forehead against my shoulder. “I’m trusting you, Dixon. You know how much this means to me, all the years I’ve hurt for this. I’m trusting you.”
“I won’t let you down.”
After a moment and a nod, she smiles and kisses me. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” I say. Suddenly, aware of just how much we both have been through in the last couple of days, I feel a rush of exhaustion roll through me. It must be evident on my face, because she gives me a tired smile as well, and nods. “You want to get back to my place?”
“Not right away. There’s something I want to do first.”
I feel myself tense, hoping she doesn’t want to return to talking about Erik Marquez. “What’s that?”
“I want to forget about all this for the rest of the night. I need to rest. Like, really rest. So how about you and me get some takeout and beers, and we see how far we can sink into your couch… Like, an actual Netflix and chill, but with only a ninety-nine percent chance of sex. Because, let’s be honest, you look good right now, even though my eyelids feel like they have lead weights on them. How’s that sound?”
“That sounds like just the answer I’m looking for.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Alexandra
Cheap Chinese food sits in little cardboard boxes on the coffee table in front of us, alongside a six-pack’s worth of empty beer bottles. Dixon’s couch tries to suck me into its cushions like quicksand and make me fall asleep. But I can’t sleep, as exhausted as I am, because any second now, Ghost could contact us and I could have the answers to the questions that have weighed me down for the last three years. Every so often, I nod off, and the man beside me, my unlikely rock through this tumultuous storm, nudges me — on my orders — to stay awake. Every time I snap back to alertness, my mind goes to the question that sits between us unaddressed, while both of us do our best to ignore it, even though I feel its frightful potential.
In each moment I catch him staring off into space, and in every time I catch myself drifting, a simple, scary refrain echoes in my head: things are going to change soon.
My life is on the cusp of something monumental, and I have no idea what it could be. Maybe I learn that someone else is responsible for my brother’s death, or it could be…. it could be terrible. I hope for the best, but there’s a part of me that fears the worst. I can spend so much time thinking about what it would be like to move on — to end a night of work at the bar, to come home to Dixon, or go to the clubhouse and spend time with him and the guys and the ol’ ladies, to think about simple, lovely things like where we want to ride, or what to have for dinner, without worrying about who he really is — but there’s a scary, dark refrain in my head casting doubt on who I can trust and just what I’ll find.
What if Erik doesn’t give me the answers I’m looking for?
Or what if the answer he gives me is something I don’t want?
A fearful part of me wonders what I’ll do if it all leads back to Dixon. If the life I’ve constructed around me is built on nothing more than lies and my brother’s grave.
I don’t want to think about it.
I have to do something else.
So, when Dixon sets down his chopsticks, I set down my beer and leap on him with the fervent desperation to lose myself in him for what might be the last time.
“Holy fuck,” he whispers as I crawl into his lap and press my lips to his, grinding my ass into his groin, crushing my lips to his.
“Shut up,” I whisper, half to him, half to the doubtful voices in my head. “Shut up, and fuck me.”
There's an urgency in the way his hands move over my body, as if he's trying to chase away the darkness surrounding us with every touch. His fingers trace a line of fire down my spine and I shiver. Dixon says nothing. He doesn't have to; everything we need to say to each other is spoken through our eyes and the desperation behind each burning kiss.
This is an escape.
This is survival. In the heat of our passion, the world outside fades away, and all that matters is the two of us. We grab at each other, desperate to feel something other than the fear and uncertainty that consumes.
