Puck’s Property by Monique Moreau
ChapterEight
Ava massaged her forehead. What the hell had she agreed to? Did it matter as long as she got Kingpin’s poison off the street corners and out of schools? Seven years later, she still missed her closest childhood friend. Ava had Kat, but she’d been so busy raising her little sister, going to school, and helping her mother that she hadn’t the time or energy to build another tight friendship like that. Another part of her was also scared. What if she did, and that person disappeared like Sasha and Puck had. There was no doubt she was a little lonely. Although she’d never regretted walking away from the old crowd, she missed their easy camaraderie.
Sinking back in her chair, she tapped on her keyboard to open up her computer screen as fantasies of getting Kingpin danced in her head. After three long years of following his trips in and out of jail, she was a step closer to getting him locked away for a substantial amount of time. Through the open door of her office, the speaker crackled and announced the jail library was closing in fifteen minutes. If she was lucky, he’d be off the streets forever. Her journey began during an internship when she was finishing up her graduate degree. She was shadowing a social worker at the Green Haven Correctional Facility, a maximum-security prison half an hour away. It was the closest Kingpin had come to serving real time for one of his many crimes.
Her thoughts drifted toward Puck and his touch. A hot shudder coursed through her traitorous body. Not only had she found herself in the arms of a man for the first time in two years, but it wasn’t just any man. It was Puck. His scent alone brought back memories of them lying on her mattress on the floor of the apartment she’d shared with Sasha. Pillows had lain, cast off on the floor like sun-bleached debris on a vacant beach. The hot summer breeze came in through her bedroom windows. The apartment was down the street from a fire station, and the sound of ambulances and fire trucks blared through the night. Their sweat-lined bodies intertwined together as they fucked for hours through the sweltering heat of the August nights.
At nineteen years old, he was already a stallion, and he hadn’t even been that experienced. She’d taught him how to go down on a woman. The way he’d spoken about licking her pussy advertised he had his fair share of women since then. Talking dirty was new. Before, it had been all moans and grunts between them, neither of them experienced enough to consider talk at all, much less explicit talk. Clearly, that had changed in the past eight years.
He may have aroused her, but she couldn’t afford to catch feelings for him. Never that. She huffed out a laugh at his indignation when she’d called him a flake. Undoubtedly, he was solid with the people he’d committed himself to. Once upon a time, she’d been one of those people and remembered well what it was like to be cosseted by a man like him. Protected. Coveted. He was an expert at making a woman feel wanted and desired. It was one of the things that had made it such cold, miserable hell when he turned her away.
Her mind meandered back to the day he’d ended their relationship. Her belly had dropped when he gave her the double-whammy that his mother was dead and that he was breaking up with her. She knew their relationship was a cause of stress between him and his mom. Till then, he’d never told her how bad it had gotten. Admittedly, she hadn’t been a great influence, but if he’d told her, she might’ve changed. She wouldn’t have called him out to so many parties at her apartment or the record shop where she’d worked.
If given half a chance, she would’ve done things differently because she was head over heels in love with him. His mother had died in a car accident right after arguing with Puck. He’d made his decision, halfway out of his mind with grief and guilt. Damn him. Thinking about it brought back the harsh agony of that day. Briefly, it’d been overshadowed by Sasha’s death. Then, they’d merged together into one ball of grief and lived as a consistent ache in her heart for years afterward.
That one decision was the flakiness she saw in him. She’d given in to his demand today but there wasn’t much coercion. Who was she kidding? She wanted him to touch her. But in no way did that mean she’d allow him to pry open her heart. Hard pass on that one.
※※※
Saturday, Ava picked up Kat from the dealership for their regular bubble-tea date. Her father was on the floor again, so she was forced to endure a strained chat with him. He even suggested she stop by during the week to have dinner with him and Kat. Was he having a midlife crisis or something? Recently, he seemed to be trying to breach the divide between them. Almost as if he were remorseful. Yup, definitely a midlife crisis, she mused as she nudged Kat out of the dealership door toward her little orange Nissan Versa.
“Is the Clementine still here?” Kat cracked like she did every single time Ava picked her up. As if making fun of her car for being little and orange was going to somehow push her to buy a bike for Kat to ride on. Yeah, not happening.
“Hardy-har-har,” Ava replied as she clicked her car open. “I’d like to see your first car. Oh wait, your father spoils you like the brat you are, so he’ll buy you a fantastic car, and I won’t be able to tease you about it. Oops, my bad.”
“He’d buy you a fantastic car if you’d only let him. You know he likes to show his love by buying stuff, but you rarely let him spoil you. Whatever. Even if I end up buying my own car, I can guarantee you what it won’t be. It won’t be orange.”
“It was on sale,” she defended as she slid into the front seat and quickly turned on the heat.
“You wonder why? They couldn’t afford to offload these cars at full price. They had no choice but to put them on sale. Otherwise, they’d be stuck with that trash inventory, like, for-ev-er.”
Ava tightened her grip on the steering wheel. She loved her little sister, but teenagers could try the patience of a saint, and she was no saint. She counted to the number ten and then repeated patience, patience, patience to herself.
“So how was your week?” asked Kat.
“Good,” Ava squeaked out, a frown tunneling between her brows. How could the thought of Puck not pop into her head at that question?
“Why do you look like that? Ohmigod, is something wrong with Rita?” Kat called Ava’s mom by her first name.
Ava gave her sister a quizzical sidelong look. “No, what would make you say that?”
“You had a weird look on your face, and only one thing would get your face screwed up like that. Me or your mom. I’m fine, so it’s got to have something to do with her. Did she get any news from the doctor?”
Ava pulled to a full stop at a stop sign and put on her left-turn signal. Click-click-click. “She’s fine.” Her mother was breast cancer-free over a year now.
“Then, what is it?”
Silence. Bothering her lower lip, she mulled over whether she had the guts to bring up the subject of Puck with her teenaged younger sister as she took a slow turn onto a main road.
“You’re starting to worry me. What is it?”
Ugh. Teenage emotion. So dramatic. She should’ve lied, but now it was too late. Kat was onto her. It was easier to simply come out with the truth. “Damien. I saw Damien. In jail. He goes by Puck now. He’s a member of the Demon Squad,” she blurted out.
Kat turned large, saucer-wide eyes toward her and punched her lightly in the arm. “Shut. Up.”
“I kid you not,” Ava confirmed. Kat knew everything there was to know about the clubs in Poughkeepsie and the surrounding area. It was a tight community, even if her father’s MC would technically be considered weekend warriors by the likes of the Squad.
“The Demon Squad,” Kat said in a hushed, awed tone. “They’re a badass club, and those bikers are, like, sizzling hot. Every man I’ve laid eyes on from that club could be on a Harley calendar. One hot biker for each month. Seriously, it’s sick.”
“Tell me about it,” she muttered to herself.
“What?”
“Nothing,” she replied quickly.
“You saw him in Duchess County?”
“Yep,” she grumbled. “He’s an inmate.”
“Did you talk to him? What’s he like now? Hot? I was too young to really notice, although I remember he had kind eyes,” Kat gushed.
“Yes, I did speak to him briefly. He’s…attractive. I-I’m his social worker.”
“He’s a druggie?”
Ava shot her a warning look. “Kat, what did I tell you about people who are struggling with addiction?”
“Sorry,” she mumbled, only slightly chastened, but she rebounded immediately with a, “So is he?” Kat knew about her past. Not the details, but she knew Ava had struggled with drugs, got clean, and dedicated her life to helping others fight the same fight.
“No, he’s not. I’m going to have sessions with him for other reasons, related to my job, of course.”
Her sister’s perceptive eyes coasted over Ava’s face. Kat had grown up fast with a deadbeat mom who’d left her. Besides that, the girl was smart as a whip. “How did it feel? Being around him?”
Too good. “Not great,” she replied. Both are true.
Kat flopped her hands on her lap. “Wow. You haven’t seen him since I was what? Eight?”
“Seven.”
“Eight years, then. And he’s an incarcerated biker. What’s he in for?”
“I can’t tell you that,” she responded patiently.
“Is it bad?” she asked in a hushed tone.
“It isn’t a good thing, although there was one redeeming aspect about it. Bottom line is he broke the law and he will most likely do time. He doesn’t have a sympathetic judge. On the other hand, he has an incredible attorney. Her firm has a great reputation.” Based on Sage’s exaggerated concern, Ava bet that Puck had probably banged her. Asshole. Like her father, who at one time had banged anything that wasn’t nailed down.
Motioning her hands in a “tell me more” gesture, Kat asked, “Aannd…what was it like…to see him? Did you still feel something for him?” Kat had kissed a boy, or at least that’s what she’d divulged to Ava, and she was definitely curious about sex. They’d had the sex talk, the how-to-pleasure-yourself talk, the consent talk, the how-to-be-a-badass-bitch talk, and the sexual-assault talk. Ava had made sure to cover all the bases. She wasn’t letting her kid sister walk out into the world of sex without being as informed as possible. Ava also tried to answer Kat’s questions as honestly as possible. Of course, she hadn’t had sex in a couple of years, so she hadn’t had much to answer for in a while.
Ava cleared her throat as she pulled into the café where they always went for their bubble-tea dates. “Well…it was a shock at first. I was attracted to him,” she admitted slowly. “Even in his orange jumpsuit. He’s definitely grown into a man’s body. He was always tall, but he was almost slim back then. Now, he’s bigger and wider. Lots of muscles,” she swallowed around her suddenly parched throat, “everywhere.” She let out a huge gust of breath. There, that was honest.
“Did you touch him?”
“What? No!” Okay, that last question put a screeching halt to honesty. No way was she admitting to touching Puck in a government correctional facility while on the job.
“What if he was out? Would you have done something? Do you want to do something?”
“What’s with the twenty questions?” Ava griped as she turned off the engine, grabbed her purse, and got out of the Clementine.
Kat followed her out, buttoning her coat and clutching her cell phone to her chest as a cold gust of wind flapped at her coat tails. Shutting the car door, she said over the hood, “They’re legitimate questions.”
Ava clicked her fob to lock the car doors and waited on the curb for Kat to reach her. As they walked to the café, Kat admitted, “I remember him. He was funny. Used to play with me. Pay attention to me.”
Yanking the door to the café open, she gestured for her sister to enter and answered bitterly, “Yeah, but then he broke up with me out of the blue, Kat. Out of the blue. You may have been too young to remember that part.” She remembered one time, when she was babysitting Kat at her mother’s house. Puck had stopped by, and she came out of the kitchen with snacks to find him down on the floor, helping Kat construct her newest Lego Friends building set.
They got to the counter and ordered their bubble tea. Oreo for Kat, Black Milk Tea for Ava. She paid, and they slid over to the end of the counter to wait for their drinks.
“In a way, you should thank him for dumping you.”
Ava gave her an unamused look. “Is that so?”
“Yeah, because it started you on the path you’re now on. I know other things happened. Bad things. But you wouldn’t be where you are today without them, and the changes began with him dumping you.”
“‘Dumping,’ hmm…nice choice of word there. You’re right, but I also don’t think you should reward someone for screwing you over.”
They grabbed their bubble tea and took seats at a table by the window. After taking a long suck from the wide straw, Kat continued, “I think it’s because of dad. You haven’t forgiven him, and he’s the first one who ever screwed you over. Even if you wanted Puck, you wouldn’t open yourself to him, because you haven’t gotten over what dad did. Doesn’t help that he piled more crap on top of your abandonment issue.”
“Look who’s so smart, huh? Abandonment issue, she says now. Who’s to say he even wants to be with me?”
“Really, Ava? You’re a catch, and I’m not saying that because you’re my sister. You know I don’t roll like that. Besides the fact that you’re a great person, you’re, like, hawt. You have the figure of a model, without being too skinny. You still have boobs, and you have a beautiful face.”
“Ha! You clearly don’t remember how I dress at work,” she scoffed.
“Please, that’s bullsh—” She trailed off at Ava’s hard glance. Kat’s eyes turned soft as she asked, “Don’t you want a boyfriend?”
“Of course I do. I just want to make sure it’s the right person. I want what I had with Puck. That connection. The intimacy. But with the security of knowing I won’t get hurt. That my heart will be safe.” For that to happen, it would need to be with anyone but Puck. The irony was not lost on her.
“To do that, you have to take a risk.”
“Easier said than done.” Ava placed her hand over Kat’s. Her younger sister looked a lot like her father, with bright intelligent eyes, although she had her mother’s heart-shaped face and blond hair. Ava had long stopped resenting her little sister and the fact that her existence was the final nail in the coffin of her parents’ marriage. Once she’d turned her back on her misguided anger and embraced the little girl who’d always looked at her with adoration, Ava’s heart filled with love for her sister. She’d never told Kat, but taking care of her had helped Ava pull out of a deep depression after Sasha’s death. “The beauty about you is that your spirit hasn’t been crushed or even dimmed. Not one bit. Even with what happened with your mom, you’re still you. A bright, shining light of laughter and sassiness.”
“Part of that is your fault,” she teased.
“Thanks, sweetie. I try my best.” Looking out the window, she confessed, “You know, in my heart of hearts, I believed Puck was my person. That he saw me and would love me forever.” She pressed her lips together. “Turns out I was wrong. I’ve been wrong twice, and I’m not sure I could survive another disappointment. If I go for a guy, it should be someone who’s the opposite of Puck. There’s a CO at my job who’s nice. Someone like him might do. But Puck,” she shook her head as she chewed on the tapioca bubbles, “that’s a no-go.”
Kat took a long sip and chewed thoughtfully. “That’s what you need to do. Get out there. At least hook up with someone.”
She shoved Kat’s shoulder. “Oh, you know a lot about hooking up, do you?”
“I know it’s something you do when you want to have sex, and I think sex might help. Break the curse you’ve been under since Rita got sick.”
It’s true that after her mom’s diagnosis, Ava had dedicated herself to her family and her job, leaving little time for fun and play. “Okay, Ms. Know-it-All, and on that note, this discussion is officially closed. Now, tell me about your week.”
Enough about her private life. She loved sharing with Kat, but there was still a difference in maturity between them. Kat needed a mother figure, not a friend. While their relationship might transform over time, Ava was supposed to be there for Kat, not the other way around.
