Page 35 of Ridin’ Dirty

That was my name.

Wells.

Wells.

It was too much to fully comprehend all at once.

As I grazed the underside of the wedding band with my thumb, I replayed the memory of our last kiss. It felt so real. So honest. For a second, my tongue tangled with his, I forgot it was all just for show. Except—I had his ring. We were married. He was my husband.

This wasn’t pretend.

What it was, was out of this world.

I felt delirious.

I was so tired it hurt.

And yet I couldn’t stop staring at it.

My wedding ring.

It wasn’t until he killed the engine of his truck that I looked up. I gazed out the windshield with a furrowed brow when I realized he hadn’t brought me back to the compound. We were parked in a driveway beside a house. Pistol stepped out of the driver’s seat without delay, and I watched as he opened the back passenger side door of his truck to let Reaper jump down. Given the way she trotted straight for the yard, like she’d done it a thousand times, I understood Pistol brought me to his home.

“Wait…”

My word got swallowed up by the sound of him shutting me inside the cab. When he started for the back door of the house, I grabbed my bag of clothes and hurried after him.

“Wait,” I called, the sound of my heels on the asphalt my insistent echo.

He did not wait.

He did, however, leave the door open for me.

So much for carrying me over the threshold, I thought sarcastically.

Reaper hurried in after me before I shut us all inside.

“Pistol—”

It was all I could get out before he tossed his keys on the kitchen counter and announced, “Your shit will be here tomorrow. Boys’ll handle the move.”

My mouth fell open as I registered what he was implying.

He didn’t notice.

Extracting my ID from his pocket, he tossed that onto the counter, too. It slid toward my purse, which I barely acknowledged, hung up on what he was saying.

“Guest room’s at the front of the house. I’m gonna get some shut eye.”

“What? Wait. Stop!” I cried, feeling unapologetically out of sorts.

For what felt like the first time since we stepped foot out of that courtroom, he turned and looked at me. His green eyes were red rimmed, his eyelids heavy with the same exhaustion I swear I felt down to my bones.

“What do you mean, my shit will be here tomorrow? You expect me to live here?”

“Babe—where you been all mornin’?” he asked, as if he thought I was missing a screw.

I coughed out an exacerbated sigh, dropping my bag of clothes at my feet in order to free my hands to grab hold of my hips. I leaned toward him and declared, “I have a life! I have a job. I need to go home.”