Beautiful Outlaw by Emily Minton
Not in my Bed
Bowie
I take a drag from my cigarette as I watch people start to unload off the bus. One by one, they climb down, looking haggard. Just as the crowd starts to thin, I see a skinny red head step out and grab a suitcase from the ground. As she starts to walk away from the bus, I get a closer look and have to shake my head. No way. No fuckin’ way.
Her hair is pulled back in a tight knot at the base of her neck, not a strand out of a place. The black pants and purple turtle neck she’s wearing don’t even have a damn wrinkle on them, even though every other person looks like they’ve rolled around in their clothes for a week. Even from a distance, I can see that her face is caked in make-up, but not the kind the girls at the club wear. No, this shit isn’t meant to attract a man; it’s meant to hide the person underneath the paint. It’s her mask from the world.
With each step closer, I know I’m right. This uptight bitch is Laura, the same girl that used to make my dick hard as a rock. Now, the damn thing is shriveling up at the sight of her. Any dreams of having Laura in my bed quickly fade away. This woman won’t be going anywhere near my bed or my cock.
Wanting to get this over with quickly, so I can drop her ass off with Nina, I bring my fingers to my lips and blow. The sound causes everyone to stop in their tracks and look. My eyes meet hers, and she misses a step, causing her to nearly fall. Catching herself just in time, she straightens up and turns away. What the fuck?
“Laura,” I shout out, not wanting to chase her ass down.
She stops, standing statue still for just a moment, then slowly turns around and walks toward me. In a loud voice, making sure everyone around us can hear, she says, “I’m sorry, you must have mistaken me for someone else. My name is Shay.”
Looking down at her, my eyes narrow in on her pinched lips. “You’re not Laura?”
She shakes her head and whispers, “Not anymore.”
Blowing out a frustrated breath, I look into her eyes. “I don’t give a fuck what you want me to call you. I’m not chasing you across this place. If you want a ride, you better follow me.”
Not waiting for her to reply, I turn on my heels and head to my bike. I’m only a few feet away when a shaking hand reaches out and grabs my arm. “Are you Bowie?”
I may not want this woman in my bed, but she’s still Lock’s little sister and probably scared out of her damn mind. I stop, looking over my shoulder at her. She looks up at me, chewing nervously on her bottom lip. Something about the way her teeth look digging into the tender flesh has my cock taking notice. Maybe fuckin’ the ice queen would be possible after all. “Yeah, I am.”
She continues to stare at me for few seconds before finally releasing her lip. “What did the other soldiers call my brother?”
I crack a smile at her question, knowing her brother taught her well. “Lock. He’s the reconnaissance master. He could get a lock on the enemy from a mile away.”
She finally nods her head, looking away from my face. “My name is Shay now. Jeremy said it was very important that I let you know that right away.”
What the fuck is going on here? Hiding her away, changing her name, all this cloak and dagger shit makes me wonder what the fuck her dickhead of a husband did to her. “He also said he would tell me what the hell is happening, but he hasn’t told me shit yet.”
She looks around the parking lot, making sure no one is near. “Can we talk about it somewhere else?”
I’m about to tell her no, make her give me the information that I want, but then I notice the tears in her eyes. They’re not running down her cheeks; she’s not sobbing to get her way like most bitches. The tears are just pooling against her eyelashes, as if she is holding them there by pure force of will. I know that she’s holding on by a thread, and that thread is going to break at any moment. “Yeah, let’s get you out of here.”
Not wanting to watch her fall apart, I look away and continue the walk to my bike. I can hear the click-click of her heels as she follows close behind. As I slide on, I finally look back at her and see her standing only a few feet away. She is looking from the bike to her suitcase and back. “Uhmm…”
I stop her before she can even start. “There’s no room on the bike for that. You either leave it behind, or you stay here with it.”
Something flashes in her eyes; it’s not quite anger, but I can tell my words aren’t making her happy. When she steps forward, I assume it’s to chew my ass. Instead, she shakes her head and says, “There’s nothing in it. Jeremy gave it to me. He just wanted me to carry a suitcase, so I didn’t look out of place on the bus.”
I laugh at her words. “Darlin’, you couldn’t look more out of place if you tried.”
She looks puzzled as she asks, “What do you mean?”
I lift a hand, motioning toward her. “Those fancy-ass clothes, the hair, all of it; no way you look like you belonged on that bus.”
She looks down at herself, inspecting her body. She stays that way for a long minute before finally lifting her head to mine. Those tears that had been on the verge of falling are now trickling down her cheeks. “I tried. I wore my casual clothes, the ones I was only allowed to wear at home, and I didn’t fix my hair.”
I would laugh again if it wasn’t for those damn tears. I stare at her for a second, trying to decide what to say, as her words replay through my head. Then it hits me. What the fuck? “What do you mean, you’re only allowed to wear them at home?”
Her face goes pale, and her mouth forms a straight line. The tears instantly dry up as she raises a hand to wipe the few that had escaped away. The mask that I noticed when she first stepped off the bus is back with a vengeance. “I misspoke. I meant to say they are the clothes I normally wear at home.”
I want to call bullshit, tell her that I know she’s lying. Instead, I climb from my bike and grab the empty suitcase. As I walk toward the dumpster, my thoughts are on the woman waiting by my bike. There is something about her, something that pulls at me, even if she isn’t what I was expecting. Knowing whatever I’m feeling isn’t something that I want, I have only one option- Nina.