Page 67 of Volt
I shake my head and angrily scrub away the tears that are racing down my cheeks. I sniff loudly and silently chastise myself for feeling so weak. For getting so attached to him so quickly after warning myself against that very thing.
“Maybe it’s better that it happened now,” Bree says. “I mean, before you let yourself get any deeper with him. Better to rip the bandage off now.”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
I’m sitting on my couch with my knees drawn up to my chest and my arms wrapped around my legs. My chin is resting on my knee as I stare into nothing. I’m still sitting here in my work uniform. I just didn’t have the energy to shower and change after my shift. Or maybe I just didn’t care enough to be bothered with it.
“Shot,” Bree said quietly. “Jesus. They’re into some rough stuff.”
“Go ahead. Say it,” I tell her. “Tell me you told me so.”
“Babe, I’m not going to gloat like that. That’s childish,” she states. “But I did tell you so.”
I crack a grin despite my bleak mood. “You’re such an asshole.”
“Sometimes,” she chirps. “But you love me anyway.”
“That I do.”
“Anyway, I gotta get back down to the bar. I’m really sorry that happened, babe,” she says. “But you’re young and hot. You know that old saying, when one door closes, another one with a thousand hot men behind it opens.”
“Yeah, not sure I heard that one before.”
“I’m paraphrasing,” she calls over her shoulder as she heads for the door. “I’ll check in on you later. Hang in there, Fallon. Everything is going to be okay.”
When she closes it behind her, leaving me alone again, I feel an overwhelming, suffocating sense of despair washing over me. I stand up and pace my apartment, not sure what to do with myself. As I walk though, I feel my anger and heartache building up inside of me. It’s bubbling up deep within and setting the blood in my veins on fire. I feel so stupid for feeling this way. For letting myself feel so strongly for somebody I haven’t known for very long in the first place. I mean, how could I have let myself fall so far down that rabbit hole in such a short period of time?
I stop at my studio door and look at the painting that’s still sitting on the easel—the one that’s bright and colorful. The one Bree thought looked like it was filled with hope. I grit my teeth as I stare at it, my anger cresting and then crashing down over me. I storm into my studio and grab the box cutter. Screaming at the top of my lungs, I slash and hack at the canvas, cutting it to pieces. Shredding the bright colors and destroying the sense of hope it embodied. I curse myself for feeling optimistic. I curse myself for falling in love with him.
I fall to my knees and drop the box cutter. It hits the floor with a clatter, and I bury my face in my hands and sob wildly. I cry until I finally run out of tears and then just sit there, still covering my face as I try to get ahold of myself again. I just feel like such a damn fool right now. How could I have ever thought things could work with somebody who lived in such a different world than me? How could I have felt such an intense connection for him? How could I have been so utterly stupid?
“Are you all right?”
His voice sends a white-hot bolt of adrenaline coursing straight through me. I jump to my feet and wheel around to face him, my eyes narrowed and my jaw clenched tight. Blake is standing just inside the doorway of my studio, his expression one of concern. We stare at each other for a long moment as my heart thunders in my chest.
“What are you doing here?” I hiss.
“I-I wanted to see you. No, I needed to see you.”
“I told you to leave me alone.”
“Yeah, I’ve never been great with rules.”
I bite back the scathing reply that’s sitting on the tip of my tongue and glare at him instead. I know my anger at him is irrational. Would I be mad at anybody else for simply being who they are? Blake is a biker. It’s just who he is and what he does. It’s not like he misled me about who he was. So why am I so irrationally angry at him? The only answer that comes to me is that I’m not. I’m angry at myself for taking the chance on him knowing full well I shouldn’t have. I’m angry at myself for being so fucking reckless with my own heart.
He pointed to the tatters of the canvas behind me. “Your painting—”
“What do you want, Blake?”
“You.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
He frowned, but I saw a steely determination in his eyes that told me he was not going to let this go so easily. He rubbed his strong jawline, the stubble making a scratchy sound as he looked at me. He sighed.
“Fallon, the things going on with the club right now... It’s an anomaly. Ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the time, nothing much is going on. Certainly nothing dangerous. Not like this,” he says. “But this guy was coming after us. He and his brother picked this fight with us. And as much as I’d like to walk away from it, I can’t.”
“So, you admit that you’re always going to pick your club over somebody who might care about you then?”
