Page 20 of Between Brothers

She blinked and scoffed a laugh. I cocked my head to the side.

“What’s funny?”

“You! That whole idea. If anyone is out of anyone’s league it’s that you’re way out of mine.”

I blushed then and shook my head rapidly. No, that wasn’t how that worked. She laughed again and I looked at her. She was serious… she wasn’t just saying it to be nice. I wished I could find the man who shook her self-confidence. I’d make him pay for it. Of course, I wouldn’t say such a thing to her. I didn’t want to scare her. If anyone was going to do that, it was going to be Cell.

“I’m glad you asked me out, I mean, again, I mean that you were persistent,” she said softly blushing as she tripped over her words and I smiled.

“I’m glad you finally said yes.”

“Me, too.”

Awkward silence.

“So, um, where did you learn to fold the pretty things you do?” she asked.

“I uh, actually taught myself.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I taught myself out of a book, and when I learned all of those, one of the CO’s started printing off directions for me and bringing them in with him until I figured out those.”

“I’m sorry… I don’t know what a CO is.”

I swallowed hard. Crap, I didn’t know if she knew Cell and I had been sent up. I bit the bullet and came clean.

“CO means Correctional Officer… Uh, we moved here after we got out of prison.”

“Oh. I um, I think I knew that actually.”

She kind of shrank back, cringing into her seat but I didn’t think it was from fear but rather a bit of embarrassment by how she blushed.

“It was stupid. Cell and I took the fall for our entire chapter for running guns, we went up on several weapons charges. We had a good lawyer. He managed to get it down to one charge. Possession of an illegal weapon with intent to sell. Carried a ten year sentence but we were out after a nickel.” I shut my mouth, her eyes gone wide at the severity of our transgression.

“Oh… I…”

“We came down to this chapter because they’d cleaned up their act. We don’t do any of that shit anymore. I seriously never want to go back to that life. Completely understand if you’d rather not see us anymore.”

She sat very still and I watched the wheels in her head turning. Finally she said, “You swear to me you don’t do anything illegal now?”

“I swear it on my life, on Cell’s life and all the lives on the rest of my club. We’re out of that life. It was the craziest and stupidest thing I’ve ever done and I wish I could say I had a noble reason for doing it, but I was in it for the money.”

“There’s more important things to life than money,” she murmured.

“I figured that out the hard way; it’s my biggest regret.”

She pressed her lips together and nodded, “Thank you for being honest with me.”

I could tell she meant that, I could also tell that she wanted to ask me a question, but wasn’t sure.

“You can ask me anything,” I said and meant it.

She searched my face and asked, “Does Duracell feel the same way that you do about it?”

I didn’t want to lie, but I didn’t want to frighten her either so I took the easy way out on that one. “I don’t know, that’s something to ask Cell.”

She nodded finally and said, “Fair enough.”

God. Fuck. She’s going to bail on us…

The truth fucking hurt, alright. I was living proof right now.

The musicians returned and effectively cut off any more conversation for the time being. I turned to watch them for a moment and a light touch to the back of my hand made me jump.

I turned to look and Hayley held out a hand to me. I took it and she smiled and simply held my hand while we listened. I stopped staring at the duo playing, my eyes suddenly stuck fast to our joined hands.

Maybe I hadn’t completely fucked up after all.

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