10. Monroe

TEN

monroe

My week was going just great. Jerry and I had gotten into a fight on Saturday, which earned me a split lip. My shit box car wouldn't start. Again. Which meant Jade had to drop me at Max's house. And then there was Zepp...

I will kill him, Roe. The words rang around my head for what felt like the hundredth time as I sat in Max's huge kitchen. I'd screwed up. I never said I was dating Max, but I had let Zepp assume.

Well, assumption was the mother of all screw ups, because now Zepp wanted Max dead.

I could have just told him the truth, but the last thing I needed was Zepp thinking he could take Jerry because the simple fact was, he probably couldn't. High school kids were one thing. A dirty meth dealer was another entirely. Truthfully, I didn't want Jerry to hurt Zepp, and that was why I'd kept my mouth shut, inadvertently creating a different problem. At the root of it, I knew Zepp only gave a crap because Max was from Barrington.

"So, I just need to divide it again?" Max asked, snapping my attention across the marble breakfast bar. His brows pulled together as he stared at the textbook in front of him.

"Yeah." I moved around the counter and turned the page.

"Why does anyone need to know about algebra?"

"Who knows? But you need to for that A ." The little pep in my voice made me cringe. Max was paying me. I felt like I owed it to him to try to be nice, like a normal person.

"I just want to play football."

I envied the fact that his life was so easy, that he had room to have passion for something so trivial. After we had finished going over quadratic equations, I shoved my books into my ragged backpack. "Just keep practicing. You'll get it."

"Doubtful," he said on a snort. Max led me into the hotel-standard foyer, then opened the door. Light from inside cut across the manicured lawn. "Hey." He grabbed my wrist before I reached the first step, but quickly dropped it when I gave him a sharp look. "I know I already asked, but you really should come to my party this weekend."

I could not imagine anything worse than a Barrington party. "Uh, thanks. But I'm busy."

"I get it. Hunt wouldn't like it." A small smirk pulled at his lips. "Huh?"

"I'm not dating Zepp." I felt like I had to defend myself.

"Good. He's scum."

I didn't know what to say to that.

"Come on; it'll be fun." He swept a tendril of hair from my face, making me uncomfortable. "Bring a friend if you want."

I was annoyed at the mention of Zepp, and I wanted off Max's porch. "Maybe." I backed toward the step. "I'll let you know."

With a smug smile, he closed the door. I stared at my phone on my way down the stairs, typing out a text to Jade to let her know I was ready to be picked up. It was only when I reached the end of the long drive that I looked up, and my steps faltered. The lights on either side of the Harford's gates reflected off the shiny, black paint of a motorcycle. A figure separated from the shadows. He took a puff from his cigarette, the bright end glowing before he dropped it. Embers skittered over the pavement.

I froze. A list of questions flipped through my mind: How did he know I was here? How did he know where Max lived? Why was he here?

"I told you I was gonna kill him." A wild flicker of rage burned in his eyes when he started across the lawn.

I ran after him, placing myself in his path, then slamming both palms against his chest. Like that did any good.

"Get outta the way, Monroe."

"Zepp. Stop!"

For a split second, he stilled. But then his gaze shot over my shoulder to Max's house. He jabbed an angry finger in the air, mumbling, "you motherfucker." I turned. Max was at the window, his judgmental stare fixed on us.

That was enough.

Zepp took determined strides toward the front, like a total psycho. I guessed this was what everyone was so scared of, the side of him that had earned him his reputation.

I ran past him, taking the first two steps and blocking his path. "It's not him."

"Move," he grunted.

I grabbed his face and forced him to look at me.

His eyes were a churning pit of chaos, demons dancing around a fire within their black depths. "I swear to God, Monroe…"

"I'm not dating Max!"

He glanced back to the window, his face boiling red. "You think it's funny, you little bitch? I will take your guts and hang them over the freeway." He rounded me and pounded his fist over the wooden door.

"You really think Max Harford could hit me?"

The only guy who had ever managed to lay a hand on me more than once was Jerry because he was built like a linebacker, and he was a piece of work.

Zepp slowly faced me, veins bulging in his neck. "It's not whether he could, it's whether you would let him."

"Oh, fuck you, Zepp!" I descended the steps.

He could bang on Max's door the rest of the night for all I cared and get himself arrested.

"He's not my boyfriend. I just let you think that." I started down the sidewalk. "And he definitely hasn't hit me."

"So what? You're just fucking him?"

My jaw clenched, teeth grinding over each other. I could have just told Zepp the truth, but pride reared its ugly head. And that little thing inside me that refused to back down stamped its feet like an angry toddler. "What if I am?" I said, turning and walking backward. "Pissed off that it's him and not you?"

That got him. Good. Zepp stormed down the steps, nostrils flaring. He latched onto my jaw, and his hot, angry breaths rushed across my face. His temper should have scared me—that would have been rational. But for reasons I couldn't explain, I felt safe with Zepp, and I might have been the only person in this town who could say that.

"I don't give a shit about anything but who hits you."

Something twisted in my chest. "Then why ask if I'm screwing him?"

His hand dropped to his side, then swept through his hair as he took a step back. There were seconds, minutes, eternities before he spoke. "Because a guy like that doesn't deserve your fucking time."

The tension fizzled between us like one of the fireworks that never quite exploded as he walked down the drive. My anger petered out, and on a sigh, I followed him to his bike.

"I'm offended you think I'd screw a private school quarterback. And just so you know, I've never let anyone hit me in my life," I said. I hated the way his expression morphed from rage to pity. "Don't you dare look at me like that." I jabbed a finger at him.

We stared at each other. The distant whine of cop sirens trickled through the night. The Harfords had probably called the police—I wouldn't blame them. Something foreign passed between us, making my chest tighten.

"And just so you know, Roe," he tossed the helmet to me, and I caught it against my stomach. "I won't let anyone hit you, either." There was no missing the threat in his voice.

His display should have pissed me off, but the sad fact was, no one had ever cared enough about me to get so angry. No one in my life had ever been willing to fight for me. And the look in Zepp's eyes when he thought Max was hurting me—he was willing to kill.

The motorcycle rumbled to life, and I slipped on the helmet, then straddled the back of his bike, wrapping my arms around his waist. I absorbed the warmth that I shouldn't have craved so suddenly, but Zepp gave a shit. And that complicated things.

He pulled up outside Wolf's place then cut the engine.

"Thanks," I said, getting off the bike and handing him the helmet. I headed toward my trailer.

"Want a beer?"

When I turned around, he was already on Wolf's deck, propping a rickety ladder against the side of the double-wide. I could have gone home and probably should have, but I couldn't deny the little pull I felt toward him at that moment. A beer couldn't hurt. Right? He scaled the rungs like a nimble cat, disappearing over the roof. With a groan, I climbed up after him.

There were two ratty, nylon deck chairs secured to the shingles, along with a wooden cubby that housed a mini-fridge. From up here, I could see most of the trailer park, and the lights of the passing cars and big rigs on the highway. To see it all like this was kind of depressing. This was all there was.

He took two beers from the fridge, tossing one to me before he folded his massive frame into one of the chairs. "If you're not sucking Harford's dick, what were you doing at his house?"

"I tutor him," I confessed, sinking down beside him.

"You?" He snorted. "Tutor?" He threw his head back against the lawn chair on a hard laugh.

Asshole. People made quick-fire judgments about me all the time. They saw me as white trash in a short skirt. No prospects. Certainly, no brains. I was used to it, hell, I encouraged it, so why did it bother me that he saw me the same way?

"Is that so hard to believe? You thought I was dating him!"

His gaze dragged over me, slow. The subtle rake of teeth over his lip drew my attention, triggering the hazy memory of this mouth on my neck Friday night. A flash of heat stung my cheeks.

"Tell anyone, and I'll kill you."

He snorted. "Okay."

The silence stretched between us, the distant hum of the highway permeated only by the buzz of cicadas. I had to wonder why he cared enough that he'd turn up at Max's house. He was so desperate for Max to be the bad guy.

"Why do you hate Max so much?"

He stared across the trailer park. In the distance, I could just make out the twinkling lights of Barrington. "Those assholes get every opportunity."

I shrugged. "That's just the way the world works."

"They think they're better, but meanwhile their moms are popping Vicodin, chasing it with champagne, and their daddies are jerking their dicks at the strip clubs." He chugged his beer. "They're no better than us."

His comment hit a little too close to home. How many times had I danced for those kinds of guys?

"Preaching to the choir," I mumbled, before tipping up my beer. Zepp was right, we had zero opportunities, and that made a hard life even harder.

Silence fell over us like a comfortable blanket for a few minutes. I took in the strong set of Zepp's jaw, his lips, a brow that seemed permanently crumpled with the weight of the world, and my heart tripped a little. There was a savagery to him that most feared, down to the way he looked. Zepp Hunt was an animal because he had to be. But I wasn't so sure he was as awful as everyone thought.

One of the neighbors started yelling, breaking me from my thoughts.

"How did you know where Max lives?"

He took a sip of beer. "Until you decide to tell me who hits you, I'm not telling you."

My temper prickled beneath my skin.

"I'm working for you for three months, Zepp. That's it. You don't get to dictate my life." I glared at him. "I can handle myself." I didn't need a white knight or a savior. This was not a fairytale. I was no damsel, and Zeppelin Hunt was certainly no prince.

He leaned over his lawn chair and grabbed the arm of mine, invading my space. The scent of beer danced on his breath, caressing my face. "For the next three months, I can dictate it," he said. "And I will."

Back and forth we went, and every time I thought he might just be okay, he made me hate him again. Carved from stone, Zepp was hard, implacable. An asshole most of the time, but he had fought for me when he thought Max was hurting me. And that meant something because no one had ever cared before. Under the weight of that sad realization, my temper snuffed out.

"Thank you," I said before I pushed to my feet and descended the ladder.

I still didn't like him, and he was still a dick, but perhaps he was less of a dick than I had thought.