11. Riley

eleven

Riley

This side of Cam was unexpected and surprising in the best kind of way. Sitting there, stretched out in a booth at a diner off the interstate, he was more relaxed than I'd ever seen him. His grin came easy, and he made jokes.

But the love he showed for the older woman, Robbie, spoke to my heart.

There were layers to Cam Savage, and I couldn't help myself from poking at them and peeling them back little by little.

"Thank you," I said, before sipping my soda through the straw.

Cam stretched one arm across the back of the booth and grinned at me over the rim of his coffee cup. "For what?"

"Not judging the ramblings of a drunk woman the other night. For not telling anyone. For being kind. I don't know, for everything."

"You don't owe me any gratitude. You don't owe anyone here shit." After several swallows, he put the cup down.

"Just because you don't think you deserve it, doesn't make it… less ."

The way he watched me was like he was finding a place to put my words. He heard them, he understood them, but he wasn't quite sure what he was supposed to do with them.

I kind of felt that way anytime I talked to anyone.

"Being alone sucks." He spun the half-empty cup, his tone contemplative and a little sad. "Having no one to lean on, nowhere to belong, is the worst feeling in the world."

A part of my chest felt like it was being jerked through my skin. My breaths were suddenly painful. I looked out the window into the empty parking lot to keep from looking at him, so he couldn't see me flinch.

He was right, but I didn't need a reminder that in a week I'd be right back where I was. A little cushion for my landing but flying solo. The lone streetlight blinked every few seconds, threatening to go out. That's how it felt to be me. The bright spots were brief and constantly interrupted by the darkness.

"Is that why you joined the club?"

"Patched in." He was still studying me, like he was afraid he'd spook me. "You have to be invited. Archer—" he tilted his head toward Robbie "—dated Ro for a while, sponsored me."

I blinked once. He'd brought me here, not to show me a side of himself but to show me something about Archer only he could.

"She knew your mom, too."

The way he said that stopped me. He'd said only a few Desert Kings had known I existed. He was obviously one of them. I couldn't process Ro, or what she knew about my parents. Not yet.

"How long did you know about me?" I absently twirled the straw around the large cup.

"A while." He didn't sip the coffee. Instead, he spun the cup on the table, mirroring my motions with the straw, and watched me. It was like he was deciding what to tell me.

"I moved in with him when I was about sixteen. Shit with my mom got too deep, she OD'd, and I was too much for Ro to handle. I think he told me about you as a way to relate. We're close to the same age."

"But he didn't even know me."

Cam shrugged, then leaned across the table. "Even if he hadn't, darlin, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have wanted you riding around with me in the middle of the night."

There was a sexy rumble to his voice, but I snorted a laugh. "I'm so scared."

"Maybe you should be." It wasn't his words, but the way he narrowed his eyes, like a predator zeroing in on his dinner.

I shivered. "Archer keep you out of trouble?"

"Got him in way more than out." Robbie snorted a half laugh as she expertly passed plates from her arm to the table.

"I'm going to wash my hands." Cam slipped out of the booth.

Robbie busied herself at the table arranging a fresh bottle of syrup until he was out of earshot.

"He's never brought a woman to see me." Ro sighed. "I was excited for a minute until he told me who you were."

I flinched and my stomach tightened.

Reading my expression, she hurried on. "Oh no, nothing bad, honey. I'm sorry I phrased it like that. Archer's kid? Of course, he'd keep you close. Your daddy would want him to, that's all I meant."

"And you knew him well, my…dad?"

She sat in Cam's seat. "I did. Your mom too. I didn't get with him until after she'd left, but we were all close at one point."

I had so many questions, but I was lost. Anything I'd want to ask would take time to unpack and the answers even longer.

She stared toward where the restroom door swung shut. "Cam's got a good heart. Life hasn't been kind to him, but he keeps dusting himself off." She turned her gentle eyes toward me. "Life's been a dick to you too, huh?"

I laughed. "Yeah."

"I should have never introduced him to the Kings. But—the shit he got into wasn't going away. Not without help."

It's like she wanted me to ask her so she could relieve her burden. But it wasn't my place, so I didn't. She changed it up. "Don't trust any of them, except Cam. For what your daddy did for him, he'd step in front of a train for you, girl. If you want to talk about your daddy or anything else, give me a call. Cam has my number."

I didn't quite know what to do with that. She stood and met him halfway back to the table for another hug. The sun was rising, and other customers trickled in.

Disappointment made the food in front of me less appealing. A part of me had hoped that his attention was something other than a misplaced sense of duty. Robbie had confirmed the truth.

With a sigh, I poured a swirling trickle of syrup onto my pancakes as Cam sat back down.

"These are the best." He took the syrup and dumped a heaping amount on his stack before digging in. He ate several bites before looking up. "Eat."

Making a face, I plucked a piece of bacon off my plate and took a bite. What should have been a salty, savory experience tasted hard and dry. "I am."

He shook his head. "You don't want me crawling over there and feeding you. We'd make a scene." A mischievous spark lit his eyes and his lips twisted into a devilish grin.

Was he flirting with me? I narrowed my gaze, stabbed a bite of pancake, and shoved too much in my mouth. Without another word, I ate dutifully and quietly for several minutes, each bite feeling like cement in my stomach.

Finally, he pushed his mostly empty plate to the center of the table, leaned forward on his elbows, and steepled his fingers under his chin. "What did I miss?"

I flicked one eyebrow up and chewed my last piece of bacon.

"Did Ro say something to upset you?" He leaned back like he was about to leave the table.

"No." I wiped my mouth and waved my napkin like a white flag between us. "So hard to believe I wouldn't be all excited at the prospect of you feeding me something?"

He frowned. "That's not what I mean." His words were measured and made me irrationally angry.

I knew I shouldn't be mad at him. He hadn't led me on. In fact, all he'd been was nice and an occasional flirt. Guys like Cam Savage expected women to melt at their feet. But it was easier to be mad at him than myself, for somehow imagining something between us.

"Why two?" I asked, cooly, changing the subject to something that I had the high ground on.

"Huh?" He was genuinely confused for several seconds. Then realization settled on his face, and he rubbed his lips together. "Okay, let's do this. But outside."

He pulled cash from his hip pocket, far more than necessary to cover the meal, and tossed the bills on the table.

I followed him out, letting my anger grow until the warmth spread out down my arms and I had to push up the sleeves of his hoodie. I gritted my teeth to keep from jerking it off and tossing it at him.

Cam stopped at his bike, leaned back on the seat, pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, and lit one. "This is where you're going to go all raging feminist on me, right?"

"I don't even know what that means. I just want to know why. Why two women not one? Is one not good enough? Didn't the one deserve better or are you naturally a pervert?"

I should have had this conversation before the ride, but…the idea of the ride had been almost all-consuming. And then there was Cam. He turned me into someone I wasn't.

"And now I've got at least one groupie that hates me for interrupting whatever you were doing. She probably wants to claw my eyes out, and I'm definitely not doing any of what she was doing—with you."

"One would have been just fine, darlin. You offering?" There was a challenge on his smug face that made me want to ball up my fists and scream.

Mostly because if he offered, I'd say yes. It wasn't Cam I was angry with, but myself. Angry, confused, scared and a host of other things.

"You only answered one question." I did, at least, make fists. I stopped just before I settled them on my hips like an irate teenager.

He took another drag, pinched the cigarette between his thumb and forefinger like a joint, thumped the ashes, and contemplated the glowing tip with a mocking smile. "Darlin, I've got a feeling telling you it was her idea is going to really piss you off."

"No more than treating them both like dirt on the bottom of your shoe." I tried not to growl at him. The urge to do so was so foreign to me, I shifted my weight from foot to foot and searched for something that felt like myself. "You told her to kick rocks."

His laugh rang out across the parking lot, drawing an older couple's attention as the husband held the car door open for his wife. They probably thought we were on drugs.

He probably was.

"You would rather I went back up?" He stood from the bike and blew out smoke before he tossed the cigarette out into the parking lot. "Shut that door and let one go down on me while I made out with the other one?"

I held a hand up and flinched. "Stop."

"I answered your question; you answer mine."

I swallowed the spiny ball of misplaced jealousy and closed my eyes. "No." My voice wavered far more than I wanted it to.

When I opened them, he was right there. I had a brief second to register the heat of his breath against my face before he kissed me.

His lips on mine were like having all the air sucked out of a room. There was a tickle in my stomach, and I couldn't get enough.

He tasted of tobacco and menthol, of coffee and something sexier, darker. His tongue was wicked as it pushed past my lips and plundered. His facial hair was short enough to tickle, brushing across my lips as he sucked my tongue into his mouth, raked his teeth over it.

I gripped the sides of his vest, the well-worn leather softer than I expected. His calloused, long-fingered hand slipped across my jaw and against my neck, before cupping the back of my head to gently guide me.

The movement tilted my chin up, gave him more access, and all at once I was scalding hot but trembling like it was freezing. I pressed my body to his, practically climbing him, and rubbed my tongue against his, losing myself in the pure pleasure of the kiss.

He left me dizzy when he pulled away, dropping his hand so that he absently brushed both my arms.

"That better, princess?" he asked, his voice airy and breathless in a way that stoked a fire at my core.

No, it wasn't better. Absolutely nothing made sense. Two weeks ago, I was sleeping in my car, fending off greasy truckers, and wondering if I'd be able to eat the next day. Now I stood, shaking, having just had my mind blown by possibly the sexiest man I'd ever seen.

Who the hell was I?

"I hate you." I dropped my forehead to his shoulder and, still holding his vest, made a fist and nudged him gently in the side.

He oofed and hugged me to him. "No, you don't."

I didn't, but I wanted to. What little I knew about him, the good outweighed the bad. Every new thing made him more attractive. I wasn't angry that he'd brought two girls home the night before. He was right there, too; I'd wished it was me.

He let me go and grabbed the helmet. "We need to go. I'm beat."

I stopped thinking about myself and really looked at him. His eyes were bloodshot and while his lips were still swollen from our kiss, there were dark circles forming under his eyes and lines around his mouth.

"Can you ride back?"

He dropped a kiss on my forehead before putting the helmet on. "Awe, isn't she cute?"

I snatched the straps from him and hooked them myself. "Sunrise first kisses are supposed to be more romantic."

He threw a long leg over the bike and cranked it before shouting at me. "It was hot, though."

Yeah, it totally was .

The evening news had called for a warmup from the unseasonably cool desert weather. And even on the bike, with the wind whipping around me, I felt the temperature rise on the way home. Could have been Cam, too. Pressing against him after that kiss definitely hadn't cooled me off.

This time the ride felt more precarious as Cam wove in and out of morning traffic. It wasn't the fast roar of the engine, empty highway ride that exploded through me like a bolt of lightning. I didn't flinch, but I was keenly aware of how close every car or truck got.

Worse, the rush of air from passing eighteen wheelers felt like it might push us off the road.

Cam didn't seem to notice.

I didn't relax until he took the exit into town and slowed. There was less traffic here. What trickled out did so in the opposite lane—morning commuters heading to Vegas for work or to gamble, you never could tell in this desert.

By the time we turned onto Archer's street, I was comfortable enough to rest my hands on my knees. Until Cam shot up the angled driveway, jarring me in my seat enough that I grabbed his waist again and clung tight.

He grinned at me in the side mirror, making it obvious he'd done it on purpose.

Under the carport, with the roar of the motor reverberating all around us, I hopped off the bike. Touching him was a reminder of the kiss, which warmed me in places I'd never considered. My physical reaction to Cam Savage was shiny, new, and bothersome.

I pulled the hoodie over my head and handed it to him as he shut down the engine. Was it the heavy garment that made me sweat or my proximity to him?

Putting distance between us was the best plan. I needed to shower before Dylan came over, anyway.

Cam grabbed my hand before I could take a full step away from him.

"Riley, come here." His voice was cool, firm, and crashed into me like a bucket of cold water.

Something was wrong.