Craving Constellations (12 page)

I woke up to a rough hand rubbing back and forth across the tattoo covering my lower stomach. The white wall I was facing didn’t look familiar, but it only took a few seconds for me to realize where I was and who was lying behind me. I leaned up on one elbow, brushing my hair out of my face, and turned my head to look at the man behind me. Mornings had never been my best time of the day, and I blamed that on the sleepy smile I sent in his direction. His hair was a mess, and his eyes were adorably sleepy.

I had seen him asleep before, five years ago, but never when he had just woken up. After our night all those years ago, I had left while he was sleeping to get something to drink and brush my teeth, fully intending to climb back into bed with him. The boys and their toys never woke up early after a party, and I was glad to have some extra time with him before we acted like strangers. But when I was scrambling to grab my toothbrush out of the bag in the backseat of my Bug, my pop and some of the boys pulled into the forecourt, and the opportunity for a lazy morning had vanished.

“Hey, baby. Sleep good?” he asked me in a voice even scratchier than normal.

“Yeah,” I replied in a soft voice, drinking in his morning scruff and the affectionate look he was sending me. “Where’s Trix?” I asked as I finally noticed she wasn’t in bed with us.

“She woke up fuckin’ rarin’ to go, so I sent her to play in her room. You didn’t fall asleep for-fuckin’-ever last night, and you needed to rest.”

“What do you mean I didn’t fall asleep?” I asked as I felt my face start to burn. “How would you know? You passed out right after you got in bed.”

“Not gonna last long the way we live if you aren’t aware of your surroundings, babe. You were up ’til ’bout three. Your body didn’t relax ’til then.”

The morning fog I’d been enjoying lifted as I realized he’d known I was awake and stewing for hours. I was irritated that he’d been awake the whole time I thought I’d been alone with my thoughts. My eyebrows furrowed, and I glared over at him.

“I need to go check on the baby.”

I tried to slip out from under his arm, but he tightened his grip and pulled me into him. He rolled from his side to partially on top of me, and his knee slipped between mine, trapping me under him.

“She’s fine, Brenna. Why don’t you wipe that scowl off your face, and tell your man good morning?” he asked with an amused look in his eyes.

“I don’t have a man, and I need to go check on my girl.” I pushed at his shoulders, but it didn’t seem to faze him.

“Oh, you don’t got a man, huh?”

“No, I don’t. Get off me. I need coffee. Trix needs breakfast. Why don’t you head on home to your wife? She can tell you good morning,” I grumbled, still trying to wiggle out of his arms.

He started laughing, a rumble that started deep in his belly. It was annoying as hell. This wasn’t funny, and I wanted to get the hell away from him.

“Got no wife. That what you’re pissed about? Kendra?” he asked, still looking down at me like he thought this whole situation was hilarious.

“Yeah, Kendra. I doubt she’d be real happy if she saw you lying on top of me with your hands all over me. Now, get off!”

I shoved as hard as I could, and his shoulders rocked back. As soon as I tried to scramble away, he wrapped both arms around me and leaned his chest into mine. My arms were completely immobile, and he dropped his head, so our faces were less than an inch apart.

“You don’t need to worry about Kendra. I’ll worry about that. Hear me?”

I glared back at him, not willing to have this conversation.

“You hear me, Brenna? That’s none of your business.”

His arms gave me a little shake, so I nodded, still refusing to say anything.

“You say you got no man?” He waited a minute for an answer, but I didn’t say anything. “You just crawl in any man’s lap and bawl your eyes out? Huh? You just let any man crawl in bed with you and my daughter, curled up like a bunch of puppies?”

I gasped at what he was insinuating. “Of course not! She didn’t even sleep with Tony and me!” Then, I realized the trap I’d walked right into.

“You got any other man’s name tattooed on your belly?” he asked quietly.

“It’s not your name.” I clenched my jaw tightly.

“You have Draco tattooed on your belly,” he reminded me as if I didn’t know exactly what was written there.

“Yes.” I nodded. “That’s not your name.”

“We just pretending we don’t know what Draco means?” he asked incredulously.

“I told you. It’s not for you.” I was beginning to panic at the direction this conversation was going.

“Yeah, okay, Brenna. You wanna pretend like you and me aren’t what we are, that’s fine. I’m not gonna pretend. I’m not takin’ your bullshit either. Baby, I’ve been waitin’ five years for you. That shit’s never gone away. So, you can bitch and moan and make your own life miserable, or you can suck it the fuck up and get on the same page with me. I’m not goin’ anywhere.”

I opened my mouth to argue that he was wrong, but Trix slammed open the door and jumped up onto the bed.

“Hi, Mama! Whatcha doin’?” She looked back and forth between Dragon and me curiously.

I was trying to inconspicuously pull myself out of his arms, but he wasn’t letting go.

“Morning, baby girl. You hungry?” I asked her, trying to act like I wasn’t lying under a man she’d met just two weeks ago.

She’d never seen anything even remotely like this when we lived with Tony. She had known not to come into our bedroom.

“Yeah, can I have yogurt for breakfast? We have the good kind in the fridge. I checked!” She started squirming like she was in a hurry.

“Sure. You remember where the spoons are? Next to the fridge in the drawer,” I answered her as she climbed back off the bed. “Sit up at the table!” I called, but she had already run down the small hallway, leaving my bedroom door wide open.

“I think she just wanted to see what we were doin’ in here,” Dragon said with a smile.

“Get
off
me! What the hell is a matter with you? She’s four! She doesn’t need to see some strange man in my bed, lying on top of me.”

I finally slid away from him and crawled to the edge of the bed, climbing down and spinning around to send a glare his way. I expected him to laugh at me or be pissed. I figured with his hot and cold personality, it could really go either way at this point. What I didn’t expect was for him to stand up and pull on his jeans with a completely blank expression on his face. I stood there stupidly, trying to figure out where his head was at, as he pulled on his T-shirt, and I caught another glimpse of the tattoos covering his torso. They looked like little dots all over his skin. I couldn’t see them very well, but it looked like they covered his whole chest and stomach. When he finished dressing, he walked around the bed and stood, looking down at me. I was frozen to the spot by his complete lack of expression.

“I’m not a stranger. I’m her dad. She knows I’m her dad. Don’t know who fuckin’ told her. I’m just glad I didn’t have to explain it. She’ll get used to me bein’ in your space ’cause I’m gonna be there a lot. She’ll also get used to me in your bed ’cause that’s where I’ll be sleepin’. Moms and dads sleep together. It’s normal. You got any other concerns, you’re gonna have to bitch at me later. I got places to be.”

As soon as he stopped talking, he wrapped a big hand around the back of my neck and pulled my face up to his for a quick kiss, rubbing his tongue along my bottom lip and then biting my top lip softly. His expression never changed, and before I could say anything, he had walked out into the hallway. I followed slowly behind him and watched him smile at Trix, kiss the top of her head, and then head out the door.

It was like any other family in America—the kid ate breakfast, and the mom stood there in her pajamas while the daddy headed off to work.
Well, almost the same
, I thought to myself as I watched him slide his cut onto his shoulders and then listened to the roar of pipes seconds later.

Not long after Dragon left and I got dressed for the day, we heard gravel crunching as someone drove toward the house. I’d forgotten how quiet it was out here. We’d lived in a neighborhood and then at the clubhouse, which always had people coming and going. The silence was nice and provided the added benefit of always knowing when someone was driving up. It gave me a little peace of mind; no one would get here on foot as we were too far out in the boonies. Trix ran to the window, already bored with the cartoons she’d been watching.

“Auntie Vera!” she squealed and then ran for the door.

Well, this wouldn’t be pleasant. Vera had been giving me the cold shoulder since the night we had dinner at her place. I was surprised she was showing up here. Trix threw open the door, and I caught sight of Vera opening up the back door of her car and then popping the trunk.

“Brenna!” she shouted up to me. “Come help me grab these boxes!”

“Be right there!”

I ran to my room and grabbed some flip-flops from behind the door in my room. I guessed I could start leaving some by the front door, but I’d gotten in the habit of putting everything away the minute I got home. Tony didn’t like clutter, and after he’d tripped on my high heels once after dinner, I never left shoes out again. But this was my house, and if I wanted to leave stuff all over, I could. But just the thought of it caused my heart rate to spike, so maybe I’d try tomorrow…or next week.

“What is all this stuff?” I asked as we brought in the last of the six boxes Vera had dragged over.

Boxes were spread out all over the living room, and I could already feel the start of a panic attack coming on. They needed to go somewhere, anywhere, but our little house had virtually no storage.

“Hey, what’s your deal? You okay?” Vera asked, looking at me like she couldn’t figure out what the problem was. By the look on her face, she could tell I was ready to freak out.

“Uh, what are all these boxes?” I looked around the room.

“It’s all your old stuff. When your pop sold his place, I went in and packed up your room. Clothes and shoes in some boxes and memento stuff in others. I didn’t bring the memento boxes. Didn’t think you’d have space for ’em. I packed all of your star books in with the clothes. Figured if you ever came back, you’d want to open those first.”

The quiver in her voice told me what she would never say. I’d hurt her when I took off. Now that I had Trix, I could finally understand how she must have felt.

I felt a knot forming in the back of my throat. “I’m sorry. I should’ve—”

She stopped me when she wrapped her arms around me and hugged me tightly, her voice muffled in the shoulder of my T-shirt. I could feel her breath stuttering against me like she was trying not to cry.

“That’s okay, baby. You’re here now.”

I breathed in her smell of vanilla perfume and cigarettes, and my panic instantly faded.

All of a sudden, she stepped away, tugged on the bottom of her Harley Davidson tank top, and went on like it’d never happened.

“So, I brought by all of the clothes boxes. I mostly got stuff for Trix when I made that trip into town. A woman’s gotta have some clothes. I doubt your ass will fit into any of your old jeans—”

“Ouch!”

“But all those skirts and T-shirts you had will probably still fit.” She looked up, smiling from where she was using her pocketknife to cut open boxes. “I’ll even make some sundresses for Trix if you want…out of your old band T-shirts. Remember when I did that for you when you were little? Couldn’t even fit into the smallest size they had, and you still insisted on getting any band T-shirt you could get your hands on.”

“You want some new dresses, Trix?” I asked my daughter who had climbed onto one of the largest boxes in the living room and was shaking her little hips. She looked like a miniature go-go dancer.

“Yeah!” she yelled as she jumped off the box onto the couch.

“Trix! Don’t jump on the couch!” In that split second, I was envisioning missing teeth and a trip to the emergency room.

“Trix, you’re gonna give your mama a heart attack.”

Trix giggled as Vera pulled her off the couch.

“Why don’t you go out front and play? Leave the door open.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but one look at Vera made me close it again. I didn’t know how she perfected the
Mom
look, but she’d been using it on me for as long as I could remember.

“Okay, here are the rules.” I stopped Trix as she headed out the door. “Stay away from Auntie Vera’s car. No climbing on anything. You can play in the grass, but stay off the driveway. And if a car comes, you get back inside right that minute. Do you understand?” I waited until she nodded and then let go of her arm. She ran outside, and I turned back to Vera. “Can you help me get these boxes unpacked?”

“Sure, you better grab a laundry basket.” She started rifling through the first box as I headed toward the hallway. “These clothes are gonna need to be washed. I made Slider store them in the compound, so who knows what they’ve come into contact with through the cardboard.”

I grabbed a basket out of Trix’s room and got down to work with Vera.

Vera was a lot like a mother to me, but she was also my best friend. While we sat there on the floor, it felt like I had never left. We laughed over gaudy rhinestone tops and talked about what had happened in the club since I’d left, and I told her about life with Tony. She was pissed for me, and halfway through my story, she got up and grabbed us a couple of beers out of the fridge.