CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Ingram
Ky and Chris were having a secret conversation. And no, it wasn’t one of those sexy ones that they tried to keep hidden from my ears. This was something else. I could feel it the moment I stepped into the main area and heard their harsh whispers coming from the couch.
I didn’t know if I should have listened in or announced my presence.
I got that Ky had club stuff or whatever and I wasn’t supposed to know what went on. Honestly, most of the time I didn’t want to know about it. I was older. I was wiser. And I wasn’t oblivious to the fact that the club wasn’t exactly on the legal side of the line.
Did I care about that?
Well, that wasn’t such an easy answer.
I did because I worried about Ky. And Mouse. And all of the other guys. If things were dangerous… well, I didn’t want anything bad to ever happen to them. Chris would be heartbroken. And I would be too.
I decided it was best not to be a snoop, clearing my throat to let them know I was there. I didn’t even miss the way they both jumped, which told me that they definitely didn’t want me to know what they were talking about.
I wasn’t hurt by it.
What Iwashurt by, was Mouse and his lack of contact.
I was worried about him.
To the point that I cried alone in my bed at night again last night.
Four days I hadn’t heard from him.
Four days of wondering what was going on and if he was alright.
It was stupid and I knew that I cried, but I couldn’t help the fear that pulled at my heart when I was alone in the dark.
I was sure that if he was dead they would have told me. Or it would have been front and center for club talk and I would have heard about it by now. I had to pray that he was okay and that he was simply taking care of something. Still, it wasn’t like him not to return my text messages… all one thousand of them. Okay, maybe I hadn’t been that bad, but I’d been frantically sending him stuff hoping he would answer just one of them.
I saw that it was clingy and desperate. And as the hours ticked on, I started to feel more anger than worry fill my head.
“Hey, Ingram,” Chris said with warmth in his tone like always. “You okay?”
“Just a little hungry. I wanted to get some ice cream but I didn’t want to scare you,” I replied trying to brush off the fact that I knew something was up.
Keeping the Mouse thing quiet was something I wasn’t sure about. I couldn’t even tell you what the Mouse-thing was but I knew that Ky would lose his shit if he knew how far things had gone. Especially since it seemed like Mouse was avoiding me now.
I didn’t understand why though. Mouse was a good man. A kind man. And he loved Chry so much. He didn’t even hide that part. In fact, Mouse treated Chry as if he were his own son. Which, yes, caused a warmness to fill my heart when I thought about it.
And maybe I was starting to see that could have been the problem.
I still didn’t know how to navigate this life stuff. As much as I’d learned while I was gone, I learned nothing on how to handle matters of the heart. But I was smart enough to know that there was something there between us and that it was more than a hopeful, bright-eyed girl wishing for someone to look after her.
I didn’t need Mouse.
I wanted him.
When I was with him, I felt more alive than I had ever before. I felt this humming, almost buzzing, throughout my whole body. I felt safe and wanted to be a little bit dangerous at the same time.
Could I explain it?
No, but then again, I didn’t really want to.
When it came to Mouse, I could admit I was conflicted. My heart kept trying to tell me one thing while my head wanted to argue and try to explain it all away.
