Sloe Ride (5 page)

“It’s good to see ye here, Rafe. But the bride’s right. Yer missed up at the house.”

“I figured you didn’t want to start counting the silverware again.” Teasing usually dulled the ache under his breastbone, but this time it did nothing to lessen the burn across his chest. “Honestly, didn’t know if I was…. It’s been rough. Lots of doors slamming in my face.”

“Don’t give me that shite, brat. I know where ye live,” Brigid shot back. “Don’t think I won’t be coming to dig you out of your rock like the stubborn barnacle that you are. I’ll be having shellfish for dinner this week, and ye’ll be served right up on that plate alongside of it.”

“Secured building, Brigid.” He smiled back, matching her tooth for tooth. “Doormen and everything. You won’t be able to get to me.”

She snorted and poked his chest. “I either see ye this Sunday, or I’ll be sending the cavalry out for ye. I’m going to find Kiki. Later with yer nonsense.”

Donal watched his wife trot off, then drew Rafe into a steely one-armed hug. Leaning over, the older Irish man whispered, “I’ve got a badge, ye silly git. There’s not anywhere ye can hide in this city that I can’t find ye. So ye get yer ass to the house this Sunday and make that woman happy, or ye’ll be seeing the kind of hell and holy fire I can bring down on ye with just a knock on yer door. Understand me, son?”

“Got it.” Rafe nodded curtly. “Sunday. Six.”

“Make it four thirty. It’ll give her time to coo over ye, and we’ll be having dinner on time, then.” Donal gave him a quick squeeze, then let Rafe go. “It’s good to see ye, boyo. We’ll be seeing more of ye now, understand?”

“Yeah, I got it.” Rafe sucked at the coffee drops he’d gotten on his hand when Donal nearly folded him in half, then muttered at Donal’s retreating back. He put the cup and treat down on a tiny speck of a table, then wrung his hand dry with a napkin. “
Sir
.”

“Ah, and you know how he hates that word. Might as well be telling my uncle to fuck off and die,” Sionn Murphy growled, pulling Rafe into a tight hug. “God, it is good to see you, Andrade.”

“Sionn.” Rafe returned the hug, and their embrace grew as painful as the burn in Rafe’s chest when he’d seen the Morgans. “Dude, can’t breathe. I just fucking saw you yesterday. You act like I’m dead.”

“Just glad you came. And good, now that the aunt’s done torn a piece of your sorry hide off your ass, I can introduce you to the guys without having to look over my shoulder for Boadicea.”

“Your aunt know you call her that?” Whoever or whatever Boadi-something was, Rafe was pretty sure it wasn’t flattering Brigid in any way she’d like. “Sounds… naughty.”

“Please. She’d preen and slap my arm,” Sionn shot back. “Come on. I want you to meet Damie finally.”

He pulled back, sneakers squeaking on the floor. “Dude, I don’t know. I’m not exactly welcome in a lot of places. They might—”

“D came back from the dead, and Miki had a murder victim tossed into his car,” Sionn reminded him gruffly. “If anyone can talk to you about living in a shit storm, it’s these guys. Besides, you’ve got a choice. Musicians or cops?”

“Musicians it is.” He followed Sionn over to where the remaining members of Sinner’s Gin stood talking with a tall blond he recognized as Frank’s kid. “Jesus, is that Forest?”

“One and the same,” his best friend muttered. “And put your eyes back into your head, or Connor’ll pull them out for you. You know Con. The word possessive was invented for him.”

“It’s just so… fucking weird. I should have been around more, I guess. And Con’s more than possessive, he’s insane.” Rafe could still feel the steely clamp of Connor’s fingers on the back of his neck when he’d been warned off a fourteen-year-old Quinn.

“Yeah, you should have been around more,” Sionn agreed. “But here you are, so let’s go, then.”

“Okay, for those who are about to something or other, we salute you.”

He’d met the Sinner’s guys before, and still it shocked him to discover how tall Miki St. John was. And how growly. He’d seen feral cats taking down a seagull that were more approachable than the Sinner’s singer, but his quirk of a smile when Rafe held his hand out was heartening. A few tidbits of hellos and yeah-I-remember-yous, and Rafe felt the pressure along his spine ease.

The conversation turned to the Sound, and Rafe grimaced at Forest. “Sorry about your dad, man. Frank was a good guy.”

“For a stoner.” Forest’s eyes softened at the mention of the irascible hippie who’d mostly raised him. “But yeah, he was a good dad. Miss the shit out of him. More than I thought I would, but Connor’s offered to share Donal and Brigid, so I kind of got them now too.”

“Brigid is kind of like Russia. She kind of gets you, not the other way around,” Miki muttered only low enough for them to hear. “With teeth. Big, scary, kissy-faced teeth.”

“Hey, best mom I’ve ever had.” Forest toasted the firebrand matriarch with his coffee cup. “’Course, I’ve only had her officially for about half an hour or so.”

“Yeah, you keep thinking that, Ackerman,” Damie scoffed. “She had your ass in her sights as soon as she found out you existed. Only reason I’m safe is ’cause I’m with Sionn. Default to nephew status rocks.”

They found a lot to talk about: shitty road tours, crappy hotels, and the types of music that made their hearts sing. No one tossed out Rafe’s fall from grace, but as the conversation drifted over to Damie’s need to go back into a studio, Rafe felt the walls closing in on them.

“So, you’re getting a band together?” It was a small toe poke into the water, but the ripple it created was huge. Rafe tried not to let the flare of excitement in his belly get further than an ember, but he almost felt his cock harden at the thought of hitting a stage to drive a beat down into an audience. “Like kicking around together or actually going on the road?”

“Haven’t gotten that far.” Forest shrugged. “But I’m not saying no to a couple of road things.”

“Still need a name,” Miki tossed back. “And a bassist. Gotta be someone I can stand, because I get sick of looking at Damie jumping around in front of me. Need someone sane with me during the damned hour-long guitar wanks he has.”

“Leads do like their wanks,” Rafe agreed softly, grinning back at Damien’s smirk. “So, you all are really going to make that leap?”

“Yeah, just don’t say shit to anyone about it.” Damien dropped his voice down. “Nothing’s engraved in stone—well, we’ve been kicking it around for a month, and I’ve still got to convince Sinjun that he wants to sleep on hotel mattresses again. Such a fucking princess.”

“I don’t give a shit where I sleep.” The singer made a face. “You’re the one with the five-million-thread-count sheets.”

Damie lightly pushed his best friend. “Hey, you go live in Arkham for a bit, and you tell me how you like scratchy sheets.”

The conversation with the three musicians felt…
normal
, as if he hadn’t fucked up his life so badly Satan didn’t want him around. He wasn’t used to it. Even in the milquetoast, sing-around-the-campfire lovefest of a rehab, he’d caught censure from the other so-called celebrities and spoiled children.

“Shit, burn down one hotel room,” Rafe muttered to himself. “No one got hurt, and I put it out.”

Yeah, it’d been more than the fire. The dead body in his hotel room had a lot to do with it. Mark, Rafe corrected. Not dead body. Guy had a name. He deserved to have a name after everything was all said and done. He hadn’t killed Mark. Not like a knife to the heart or a bullet to the brain kind of murder, but Rafe’d been the one to lure the man upstairs with a promise of a good time.

He just hadn’t planned for it to be Mark’s
last
good time.

Rehab hadn’t been easy. He’d fought it viciously at first. Then when the place began to lock down around him so tight he couldn’t move, Rafe went subversive. There’d been a lot of denial. Even as he sat in the middle of a group of addicts with everyone singing their tales of woe, Rafe refused to believe he was one of the fallen. He’d made a mistake. Everyone did. He’d just be more careful next time: do less, drink more water, pay more attention. What happened in Los Angeles was a fluke, and Mark’s death, while unfortunate, couldn’t be laid down at Rafe’s door.

Disgusted, he’d broken his sobriety pact in small transgressions, tiny bits of pot or X picked up from other patients. Then a blowup at group drove him over the wall, and he’d said fuck it. He was going to spend an evening as numbed up as he could, just to take the edge off of his brain. A few bribes here and there scored Rafe a large bottle of vodka and prescription weight-loss pills, and he’d been determined to pump it all into himself until he saw flying kittens.

That
got him a weekend in the hospital and an extra fourteen days tacked onto his sentence.

He’d woken up breathing in his own vomit, facedown on the cold, hard floor and choking. His lungs weren’t functioning, too wet from the fluids he’d aspirated, and Rafe found himself staring straight into Death’s face.

And he didn’t like what he’d seen.

The Sinners guys had been kind, but Rafe’d noticed the slight hesitation in Damien’s eyes before they shook hands. When even a guy who’d been
dead
knows about someone’s burned bridges, there wasn’t much else Rafe could say. He’d wasted his life. To be fair, wasted was an understatement. Decimated came closer, leaving destroyed a distant second. He’d gathered it up like he’d done to the artwork in the hotel room and set it on fire. Unlike the impromptu bonfire, he’d burned his life until there was nothing left of it but ashes and the stink of regret.

Something in the crowd shifted, and the world went still, leaving Rafe with only the beat of his heart in his ears and the sudden awareness that Quinn Morgan had walked into the coffee shop. Even through a sea of cops and musicians, Rafe knew Connor’s younger brother had come through the door.

But then, he’d always had a thing for the Morgans’ changeling.

Then, much like his mother’d done an hour before, Quinn Morgan slipped out of thin air and appeared a few feet away, looking right at him.

And it was all Rafe could do not to whisper
fucking hell
at the sight of Connor’s baby brother all grown up and sexy.

Quinn was definitely a Morgan, a leaner version of the standard-issue, carved-from-granite Morgan, but still as molten sensual as a shot of whiskey in hot drinking chocolate on a cold night. More poet than justiciar, the third Morgan boy carried himself looser than the others, sliding gracefully though the crowd instead of shouldering past anyone standing in his way. He was tall, a little bit taller since the last time Rafe’d seen him, or maybe just taller because there was no shoving Quinn back into the little-boy box Rafe’d placed him in years ago. There was no denying it anymore. Quinn Morgan had definitely hit manhood and made it his bitch.

His black hair was longer than his brothers’, evidence of his life outside of law enforcement. It fell down to nearly his shoulders, tousled carelessly away from his handsome face. The deep green of Quinn’s gaze was still a sharp flash of lush forests, but Rafe knew he’d see little specks of gold dappling Quinn’s irises when he got close. His mouth was full, kissable, and Rafe swallowed, remembering the taste of Quinn’s lips the
one
time he’d risked life and limb to sample a bit of forbidden fruit.

A single birthday kiss—one given to an innocent eighteen-year-old boy who celebrated adulthood and master degrees all in one fell swoop.

It had been like sucking on lightning, burning away Rafe’s reluctance in agreeing to give Quinn the one thing he’d asked for—a single birthday kiss in the shadowy darkness of his parents’ backyard before Rafe went back to live out his life as a rock star.

His heart seized up when Quinn gave him a short nod and began to head straight for him.
Fucking hell, now what are you going to do, Andrade?

Rafe excused himself from the conversation, giving Damien a quick, distracted grin when the guitarist said they’d hook up soon. He didn’t have time to think about promises and music. Not when Quinn was closing in on him.

“Excuse me,” Quinn murmured to a short woman with pigtails sticking out from either side of her head. His Irish accent was a softer roll than his father’s, more than a hint of green and peat hidden in its silky depths. Quinn got in close, their shoulders brushing as he jockeyed for space. “Hey. Just the guy I’m looking for.”

“Yeah?” He played it cool. If there was one thing Rafe knew, it was how to be cool in the face of a firing squad, and Quinn Morgan was definitely a loaded gun waiting to go off—and usually at the wrong moment. “Whatcha need?”

“I needed to ask you a question.” Quinn blinked, his lashes sweeping shadows down over his cheeks. “I kind of need to lose my virginity. And I was wondering if you could help me out.”

If the earth could have opened up beneath his feet and swallowed him whole, Rafe would have been okay with that. Or even if a dragon imprisoned in the depths of the Bay somehow broke loose and rampaged through San Francisco, looking for a single bite of Portuguese meat to satiate its appetite, Rafe would have volunteered—willingly—and asked his draconian executioner if there were any particular condiments he preferred Rafe baste himself in.

“Wait.” The still functioning bit of Rafe’s brain seized on the
one
piece of information he didn’t need to have in his life. He reached for something to hold on to, snagging an old familiar teasing from their younger days, and Rafe snapped back. “You’re joking, right? This is a joke. Hard to tell with you sometimes, Q.”

If there was anything Rafe’d learned in the short time he’d spent sober, it was that the universe had a really fucked-up sense of humor. In the scheme of things, he could have been saying something much more inflammatory just as the conversation din in the coffeehouse dropped, and his voice carried across the now relatively silent floor.

“Seriously, Q? A virgin?”

He’d been onstage in front of amps powerful enough to blow his hair back, and when a night was done, there was a silence throbbing in his eardrums that he could only call deafening. It was a whisper compared to the echoing stillness around him, and Rafe realized he’d caught the attention of every Morgan, Finnegan, and Murphy in the shop.