Page 21 of I Was Born Ruined (Death by Daybreak MC 1)
“I need a fucking break,” I tell her. It sounds almost like I'm pleading, but I don't plead. Sorry. Just not in my DNA. “I feel like I'm living in a cage, Reba.” Yeah, a cage of muscles and lust and the sweet smell of tobacco.
“Come with me to the Christian Youth Retreat,” she says, and I raise my eyebrows. “Oh, don't give me that look, Gidget. You could use Jesus in your life right now—badly. And we both know it.”
“I don't know about Jesus,” I say as I glance over and see Crown swim to the edge of the pool, folding his tattooed arms on the bricks. His ink is bright and crazy, popping off his skin like a comic strip. I hear his whole body tells a story—at least that's what the club-whores say—but I've never actually seen him naked with the lights on. “But a weekend in the woods? Away from men in leather vests? That sounds like fucking heaven. I'll convert if it means I get to go.”
“Well, my daddy is still angry about us skippin' out on the sermon last week, but maybe if I tell him you've decided to drag your heathen butt over to the bright side, he'll let you come.” Reba leans back, watching as my eyes lock on Crown and stay there. “Heck, never mind: you're coming whether he likes it or not.”
“It's this weekend?” I ask, my voice quiet enough that there's no way Crown can hear me over the girls' splashing. A quick glance over my shoulder shows that Nellie is still there, smoking a new cigarette and watching my friends with a wistful look, like maybe they remind her of the daughters that won't be swimming in this pool ever again. The daughters whose laughter will never ring inside these walls.
Pain and anger wash over me in a tidal wave, a tsunami of emotion that I toss aside like trash. I have no need for it. What good will it do me, to think about Queenie and Posey? The only thing those memories make me do is hate. Hate my mom, my dad, the club, the guys. The world.
“It is. So, what's the plan? And you'd best come up with one because I swear on the name I shall not take, that if Grainger ends up at this retreat, I will skin you like a hog.”
I give Reba a look and try not to laugh. Her smile says she's only half serious.
“I can't have any of them there, Reba. A weekend in the woods is perfect. It's away from the boys and …” I pause because I can't make my lips say it. Grey Wolfe. Grey Wolfe. Grey Wolfe.
Murderers. Rapists. Thieves.
I want to puke.
But they won't find me there, not in the woods on some Christian youth camping trip.
No fucking way.
I so wish I'd been wrong about that.“Don't think I don't know you're planning something,” Crown says when I open the door to my bathroom and step out, cloaked in pajamas and wishing he wasn't standing just inches from me. How the fuck am I supposed to deal with that?
He flashes a sharp smile, mischievous and playful.
What a bunch of crap.
I move around him, and I swear, I can feel the molecules vibrating in the air between us.
“Why do you guys always say that shit? You act like I'm some sort of escape artist.”
“You are an escape artist,” Crown says, following me into the hallway and pausing outside my bedroom door. When I move to close him out, he blocks the swing of the wood with his shoulder. “You're a teenage girl. Don't your kind specialize in escape plans?”
“Maybe I wouldn't have to come up with an escape plan if you guys and Cat would just leave me the hell alone.”
Crown purses his lips as I step into the room and grab my iPhone off the nightstand. Maybe if I plug my earbuds in and turn my music up, I can drive him out of here. Crown is not a big fan of Eminem.
“Isn't it time for you to switch shifts with Beast?” I ask, giving him a look as I flop down on the edge of my bed and try not to think of … that. That. Fucking that. I just can't seem to stop fantasizing about that night.
I felt worshipped.
Powerful.
In charge.
Right now … I feel like a prisoner.
“Grey Wolfe isn't a joke,” Crown says, crossing his arms over his chest in what I call 'bad boy biker pose'. It's ridiculous; they all do it. Every single one of them. I feel like it's almost part of the uniform. “Gidget, you know this is for your own good.”
“Really?” I ask, patting my bed and trying to encourage Feminist to join me up on the mattress. The snotty little black and white husky takes his time, stretching and yawning and padding over—but not before pausing to growl and lift his lip in Crown's direction. “Good boy,” I say before I refocus back on Crown. “Because 'for your own good' is one of those patriarchal bullshit phrases that say I'm not independent enough, not smart enough to think for myself.”
