Page 2 of Diesel’s Desire

Mom’s out front working in the flower beds in her sun hat, and Dad’s on the porch with his sweet tea, watching her like she’s the only interesting thing in Graves County. I honk twice. Mom waves without looking up, and Dad raises his glass.

That’s what I wanted. I love my bungalow and my dog, Thunder. I’m proud of the badge. But I wanted somebody who’d still look at me the way Dad looks at Mom after four decades together.

Sometimes I think I could’ve had that with Evan if he’d stayed out of the club. As if we had everything else figured out at seventeen. I know better, but with the wedding invitation tucked in my glove box, it’s hard not to wonder.

I thought I’d found it in Texas. Three years with a man who seemed steady, who liked routine, who I let myself believe in. Then one night he sat across from me at dinner and asked how I’d feel about opening things up.

Like we were discussing a home renovation.

I left the next week. Packed what mattered and drove home with the radio too loud so I wouldn’t have to think.

Bet Evan would say I’m good at leaving.

I’d spent enough time around the club to know there were other things I couldn’t live with, either. I used to watch the women there—Ruth, sharp and sturdy; Carol with her four cups of coffee and her mouth like a razor; Savannah before the bomb took her, golden and adored, and somehow able to look past whatever crimes her husband committed on runs.

I never understood how they did it. How they wore that property patch with pride when I couldn’t bear the thought of putting one on.

I wanted a life where I didn’t have to look the other way. Becoming a cop ought to have settled that.

Thunder’s whining behind the door when I reach the porch, his claws scrabbling against the wood. I let myself in, and he barrels past my legs into the yard, running the fence line twice before stopping to bury his nose in a patch of grass. I didn’t know Rottweilers were supposed to be this dramatic about going outside.

Inside, I drop my keys in the bowl by the door and stop at the hallway mirror.

Tan uniform. Hair scraped back into a bun so tight my head aches. I reach up and loosen it, studying my reflection.

I look like a woman who ought to be able to spend a few hours in the same room as her ex. Seventeen years, a career, a life of my own. Surely I can manage a wedding.

I let my hand fall and try to remember if I own anything that doesn’t look like I could wear it to work.

Apparently, I’m going to need a dress.

2

DIESEL

Someone’s foot is in my ribs. Someone’s tit is in my face. I count three limbs pinning me to the couch cushions, none of them mine, and for one long, blissful second before my brain catches up, I don’t hate my life.

Then I try to move.

I peel a leg off my chest. Sherry’s, maybe. Hard to tell the blondes apart when they’re all naked, asleep, and smell like tequila and my cologne. I untangle myself one limb at a time, careful as a bomb tech. Somebody groans when I shift. Not me. I wait until I’m vertical, then make a noise like a dying animal that’s also extremely disappointed in itself.

I hold my head in both hands and stagger toward the bar, boots crunching over God knows what. Bottle caps. I step over a bra that isn’t mine and never will be.

I tap the bar top twice. My rings click against the wood, and the prospect slumped on the other side jackknifes upright like he’s been shot.

Wyatt blinks at me, hair everywhere, mouth hanging open.

“Hair of the dog,” I tell him. “And whatever’s in the first aid kit that isn’t a Band-Aid.”

He scrambles for the whiskey and a bottle of aspirin like his life depends on it. This morning, it might. I down two pills dry and chase them with a mouthful of Jack, then turn to survey the clubhouse in full daylight.

Empty bottles three deep along the bar. The pool table’s felt torn clean through at one corner. Somebody’s cut hanging off the jukebox like a flag of surrender. Bodies on the couches and sprawled across the floor. One poor bastard looks to be asleep standing up against the wall.

Didn’t know that was possible. Learn something every day.

Right. Lucy had the baby. Stray’s been walking around for two days like he invented fatherhood, and none of us had the heart to tell him several men in this club have felt exactly that stupid and proud. We celebrated. We celebrated hard.

“Too old for this shit,” I mutter.