“Talk to me.”
“I don’t know what to say, Christopher,” she confessed.
“How you feel.Whatyou feel. Why you not upset.”
“Says you,” she retorted. “I’m crushed.”
“You ain’t soundin’ crushed,” he snapped. “You sound so fuckin’ cold and distant.”
“You can’t pick and choose when I’m your moral compass. And I can’t steady you, act as your conscience, when you shut me out.”
He stiffened. “You can’t help me if you turnin’ intothem.”
“The club girls?” she said, knowing exactly what he meant. “Why should I be soft and sweet when nothing and no one around me is?”
“That never mattered to you before.”
“You never shut me out before.”
“I ain’t shuttin’ you out.”
“What did you and CJ talk about? How did you get Torie to come to the clubhouse? What risks did you take? She could’ve worn a wiretap.”
“You think I’m fuckin’ stupid?”
“I think you’re the most brilliant human I’ve ever met.”
“You really wanna fuckin’ hear about CJ in the club and all the shit that go with that? Youreallywanna know how I found out Torie wasn’t wired up?Tell me the fuckin’ truth. Shit fucked up enough between us.”
Meggie pondered those words. “I see,” she said coolly, sitting up and covering her bare breasts with the top sheet.
Christopher sat up, too. “What do you see?”
“You made Torie undress.” It was the only way he would’ve known for sure. “And CJ has had s-s-sex with one of the club girls.” Probably Nyx. It just made Meggie hate her more. “He’s so young. All the kids are.”
“Well, Reb too fuckin’ young for birth control, so shut the fuck up about CJ bein’ too fuckin’ young.”
“Then hehashad sex,” she spat. “And I never said Reb wasn’t young, jerk. I said we have to protect her so she doesn’t end up pregnant.”
“She’s your fuckin’ daughter. I could clamp a chastity belt on your pussy and come on it and you still endin’ up filled with my kid. Rebel probably the same fuckin’ way.”
Shoving the covers aside, Meggie stormed out of bed and beelined across the room to where her robe hung over one of the bistro chairs around the dining table.
She jerked it on. “I’m going to sleep in another room. Have a good night.”
Christopher hurried to the door and used his big body to block her.
“Move,” she ordered.
Instead of complying, he grabbed her arms and searched her face. “The kids growin’ up hard for me too, Megan. Maybe, I ain’t fair butRebelgrowin’ up harder. She my baby girl. She ain’t evensixteenyet. Kiera was seventeen when she started comin’ around, and I spent the next fuckin’ year protectin’ her and her pussy. How I’m supposed to turn a blind fuckin’ eye onmy baby girlfuckin’?”
The thought upset Meggie too, but reality was hard and cold. “It’s a double standard—”
“It ain’t. It’sme. Who the fuck I am. How I was fuckin’ taught. Life so fuckin’ hard.Thislife especially. It’s brutal on motherfuckers, but girls got it so much rougher. One fuckin’ misstep and you fair game to the brothers. Chicks either seen as a saint or a slut, and it’s hard to change that perception.”
“But guys are celebrated for their conquests,” she said sarcastically.
A pained expression crossed his face. He was such a beautiful man. “I was fifteen when I started fuckin’. Big Joe celebrated that. He taught me whatheknew.”
