Tastes Like Candy (Lean Dogs Legacy Book 2) (13 page)

              Michelle glanced over, startled. “I’m sorry?”

              Jenny grinned. “One of those weird, jealous, defensive sisters who thinks no one’s good enough for my brother and makes women jump through hoops.”

              “I’m not the sort of girl who falls into bed with people’s brothers,” she said with a groan, and flopped her head back against the seat. “On my life, it wasn’t intentional.”

              Jenny laughed, the sound light and genuine. “I figured it wasn’t. Candy’s got a twenty-year leg-up on you when it comes to working for what he wants. He can talk his way into and out of almost anything, including panties.”

              “What an idiot I am.”

              “No. Loneliness gets to the best of us.”

              Michelle studied her profile, searching for scorn or judgment, but found none. “He was very sweet, actually,” she admitted. “And I’m a fool for sweet.”

              Jenny nodded. “He can be sweet, yeah.”

              “Do I sense a ‘but’?”

              “But I don’t think most women would agree with you.”

              A prickling of unease down the back of her neck. “You don’t?”

              “No.” Then, “Oh,” she said, changing the subject abruptly. “Do you like pancakes? I thought we’d go to Dina’s for breakfast…”

              What sort of game, Michelle wondered, was Jenny Snow playing?

~*~

Candy

He was having a flashback. High school, junior year, the cafeteria, right after he’d let Katie Harper down not-so-easy in front of her locker, and she’d burst into noisy, copious tears right there in the middle of the hallway. Katie Harper, an accomplished cock-tease at seventeen, had given every boy in their class the runaround for months. She broke hearts, but never the other way around. That afternoon, every pair of eyes had focused on him, some admiring, some awed, some uncomfortable.

              Twenty-some-odd years later, and it was happening again.

              Disgusted by the scrutiny, he laid down his fork, pushed his plate away, and challenged all of them with a look. “Go ahead. Fire away.”

              And of course, no one said anything. The twins and Duke and Pup dove back into their breakfasts with too much enthusiasm. Jinx cleared his throat in a surprisingly delicate way.

              Fox said, “Just don’t hurt her on purpose, yeah?”

              Candy sighed. “Yeah.”

              And the meal resumed.

              More or less alone with his grits and ham again, he returned to his distraction of the morning: Michelle.

              Not the ATF problem looming over their heads, not the garage they would build, not the trip he needed to make to the bank to take out a business loan, but Michelle. And a little English sunbeam of a girl shouldn’t have taken up that much space in his mind.

              When he’d left her that morning, it had been with the usual light step and pleasantly drained body of every sexual encounter. Not joyous, not truly satiated, but content for the moment. Until the next time. He knew it had been good for her and he was proud of that. Any old idiot could hump a girl; it was a point of pride to know the girl had climaxed.

              But in the shower, somewhere between the shampoo and the soap, a cold sinking feeling began in his gut, and spread everywhere. So that, by the time he sat down in front of Darla’s cooking, he was almost depressed.

              Because that English sunbeam? Not someone he’d met in a bar. But the only child of a well-respected, powerful club president. And a relatively innocent, displaced, heartbroken girl nineteen years younger than him.

              God, he was an asshole.

              Shame was a new sensation for him, and not one he was coping with, he knew. He was running on a hair trigger today, and he hoped, for their sakes, that his boys knew to tread carefully.

              His appointment at the bank was at ten-thirty, so he chugged his coffee and decided to worry about Michelle later.

              “Colin,” he said, getting to his feet. “You’re with me.”

              The big lumbering idiot hurried to comply, forking the last bite of ham into his mouth until his cheeks bulged. “Coming.”

              The ride helped to clear his head, the breeze warm and velvety against his face, the sun pouring down his back in a hot spill, gluing cut and t-shirt to his skin. His father had always said there was no problem too big to sort out on the back of a bike, and he’d been right. By the time they hit downtown and found parking spots on the curb, he’d decided he wasn’t going to let guilt eat at him. He would let Michelle steer, and fuck Phil anyway for trying to force her out of the life she wanted for herself.

              Downtown Amarillo was so different from the clubhouse, stuck in the middle of nowhere. Here there were tall concrete-faced buildings, traffic signals, well-dressed pedestrians on the way to and from office jobs. It was Texas, and the air of the cowboy pervaded all things, but it felt like a beehive of civilization after their desert hideaway.

              They had to walk a ways up the sidewalk to get to the bank, and Colin caught up with him, drew alongside him. That was when Candy realized why he’d chosen to bring Colin. For starters, because Jinx was a better hand at running the salvage biz. But also because in this new strange situation, Colin was the one with the most similar experience – hooking up with club royalty.

              “Jen took her out shopping,” Colin said without prompting. “They’re having a girl’s day or something.”

              “Hmm.”

              “In case you were wondering where she is.”

              “I wasn’t.”

              Colin chuckled. “Uh-huh. I figured.”

              They walked a few more paces and then Colin cleared his throat, sounding suddenly awkward and self-conscious. “Speaking of Jen…”

              “If you’re digging for relationship advice, I’m fresh out.”

              “No, not that.” Colin shoved his hands in his pockets, face tweaked with nerves. “Okay, I’m gonna say this because we’re brothers, and because I think you ought to know it. But for the love of God, you can’t tell Jenny I told you.”

              “How old are you again? Twelve?”

              “Dude. Jenny wants you to be with Michelle. She’s trying to, I dunno, nudge you two together or something.”

              Candy ground to a halt, grits and ham turning to lead in his stomach. “What?” He turned to Colin, brows raised. “Are you shitting me?”

              Colin’s dark face was apologetic. “That stunt with the bathroom? All her idea.”

              “Holy shit.”

              “You tried to do the same thing with her.”

              “Because someone wanted her dead!” He felt betrayed, and by his closest relative, no less.

              “She thinks it’s time you got an old lady.” Colin grimaced and rubbed the back of his neck. “Man, she’s gonna geld me for this.”

              “My sister’s evil,” Candy said, not interested in the fate of Colin’s balls. “I mean really, honest to God evil.”

              “But you like Michelle,” Colin reasoned. “Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Was the sex alright?”

              “It was fantastic.” Then he scowled. “Not that it’s your damn business.”

              Colin held up a placating hand. “All I’m saying is, maybe settling down wouldn’t be so bad.”

              “Who the hell are you to tell me that?”

              “The guy looking at that vein in your head and wondering if you’re about to stroke out.”

              Candy opened his mouth to respond, and then closed it slowly. His heart was thumping, his pulse thrumming in his ears. Over Colin’s shoulder, he glimpsed his reflection in a plate glass window, and even at a distance could make out the lines around his eyes and mouth. He wasn’t young anymore. And he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt light and peaceful.

              Not that some little English girl was the cure for that.

              Not that it was his sister’s business anyway.

              “Damn it, Jen,” he muttered, charging up the sidewalk.

              Colin followed, saying, “You won’t tell her I said anything, right?”

Eleven

Michelle

“They look great on you,” Jenny said, smiling down at Michelle’s feet. “They’re almost the exact same color as your eyes.”

              Michelle cocked her left foot, flexed up on its toes, and surveyed the intricate white stitching of the pale blue boots Jenny had urged her to try.

              “I’m sure they’re terribly expensive.”

              “Three-fifty,” Jenny said, glancing at the Old Gringo box they’d come out of.

              “Three-
hundred
and fifty?” Michelle asked with a gulp.

              “They’ll last a lifetime, though.”

              “But I already have boots.”

              “But not cowboy boots. If you’re going to live in Texas, you have to have cowboy boots.”

              But Michelle wasn’t convinced. About the boots, or the living in Texas part.

              They were in a massive western wear store the size of a warehouse, floored in industrial carpet, packed with jeans, shirts, belts, boots, hats, and everything you could ever need to ride and care for a horse. It smelled heavenly, of leather and saddle soap, and the staff kept asking, “Can I help y’all find anything?” So far, they were only browsing.

              They’d begun the day with breakfast at a diner with checkered tile floors, vinyl booths, and a bustling counter. The menus were laminated and featured pictures of the offerings. Michelle had pancakes with chocolate chips, and a side of bacon. “Chocolate to celebrate,” Jenny had urged, though what she was celebrating, Michelle had no idea.

              From Dina’s Diner they’d gone to a department store, dreadfully flashy and diversified in its offerings. Jenny bought a new pair of baby shoes for Jack, because he was fast outgrowing the ones he had. And Michelle had splurged on a tube of MAC lipstick. Brave Red. Though it now felt frivolous and silly. Then on to the western wear spot, and the blue boots.

              Jenny was good company, in that she wasn’t flighty, overly girlish, or prone to fits of exaggeration. She was practical, and if not naturally warm, then at least kind. But they were still mostly strangers, and Michelle had never been one for girlfriends.

              She contemplated the boots one last time. They were beautiful, but far too expensive, and not her style anyway. It was too difficult to justify the purchase.

              “No,” she said, sighing. “I don’t guess so.”

              Jenny hummed a note of disappointment, but said, “Alright.”

              She’d just pulled them off when a saleslady, a redheaded girl in tight Wrangler jeans, rodeo shirt, and rhinestone-studded belt, appeared. “Don’t you just love these? And look, they even match your eyes. They’re perfect,” she said in her Texas drawl.

              “That’s what I said,” Jenny said. “About her eyes.”

              The girl reached for the box. “You just want me to take these up front for you while y’all keep shopping?”

              “Oh no, thank you. But I’m not getting them.”

              “You’re not?” the girl gasped, overly dramatic.

              “No, not today.” It made her feel a little guilty to watch the woman’s excitement dim. “Maybe some other time,” she tacked on.

              The girl shook her head. “You’ve got more willpower than me.” She neatly boxed the boots back up and slid them onto their shelf beneath the display pair.

              When she was done, had told them to ask for Nancy if they needed anything, and whisked away on her sharp-heeled boots, Jenny said, “Do you want to call it a day?”

              She hoped she hadn’t looked as miserable as that, not when Jenny had been kind enough to take her shopping. “Isn’t there anything else you want to look at?”

              “Nah. I spend too much money in here as it is.”

              The building was air conditioned, and after the chill inside, it felt nice to step out onto the sun-drenched sidewalk. Michelle tipped her face up to the cloudless sky, eyes shut, sun warm against her skin. “I think I’ve seen more of the sun in just a few days here than I have in the last year at home.”

              Jenny chuckled. “Does it really rain all the time over there?”

              “No. We have lots of beautiful days. But I’m not outside as much. And with the buildings and the crush of people…” She shrugged.

              “I get it,” Jenny said. “It’s big sky country out here.” She paused. “But there’s no place like home, is there?”

              “No.”

              Michelle tilted her head forward. When she opened her eyes, white circles filled her vision, the leftover impression of the sun, slow to fade.

              “Look,” Jenny said, voice suddenly brighter. “There’s the boys.”

              Michelle blinked away the last of the spots, looking in the direction Jenny pointed. “Boys” obviously meant Lean Dogs, but she didn’t know which ones.

              Until she spotted them across the street, heading down the sidewalk toward their bikes, and then her stomach flipped over. Candy and Colin, leaving the bank.

              She hadn’t known how she would react when she saw him next, and was a little ashamed to realize that she was going to have a distinctly female reaction. Clammy palms, accelerated heart rate, fluttering stomach, sudden urge to check her reflection. With an inner snarl, she tamped all of it down hard.

              But the next part wasn’t so easily controlled. The slow flush of heat beneath her skin. The memory of his hands on her. The low-level craving.

              She didn’t feel like coming face-to-face with him right now, mostly because she didn’t know what she’d do if he was familiar and affectionate with her.

              But that didn’t matter, because Jenny called to Colin, and then both men crossed the street to join them.

              Michelle tried not to stare.

              Tried.

              Forced her gaze away at the last minute.

              “Hi, baby,” Colin greeted his old lady, and they kissed. “Hey, Michelle.”

              “Hi.” She glanced toward him, and halfway there her gaze collided with Candy’s. She saw last night reflected in his blue eyes, the shared memories evident in his sly smile, and she was struck by the impulse to greet him properly: up on her tiptoes, hands splayed on his chest, stretching to kiss him, right there on the street.

              She checked the urge, swallowing a sudden lump in her throat, and repeated, “Hi.”

              Why did he have to look so impossibly delicious when he grinned? “Hey. Where’s all the bags?”

              “Bags?”

              “My sister doesn’t go into that place without coming out looking like a pack mule.”

              “Michelle’s smarter than me,” Jenny said. “And she resisted the Power of the Boot.”

              Without looking at his sister, eyes still trained on Michelle, he said, “Tough kid, then.”

              It felt like a real compliment; not the words, but the weight he put behind them, and the way he was looking at her.

              This was dangerous. She didn’t know how to openly give and receive romantic affection from a man.

              But Jenny saved her by saying, “How’d it go at the bank?”

              Candy finally glanced away from her, and for Michelle, it was like the rest of the world came back into focus. The street, the buildings, the cars, the people around them – all had faded to dull shapes and colors while she’d been staring at Candyman.

              Oh damn it. She hadn’t had a crush like this in forever. So not helpful.

              “How about we grab lunch and I’ll tell you?” Candy suggested.

              Yes, food would be a good idea, now that she was weak-kneed. Food…and maybe a stiff whiskey.

~*~

Candy

The Armadillo was his stomping ground. Close to home, big and loud and crowded enough to make him almost anonymous, but boasting a staff of tan, leggy waitresses who remembered his name, his drink of choice, and the occasional stony expression that meant he wasn’t up for company when he left. He turned to club groupies less and less, preferring nameless encounters with waitresses he knew would never turn up at his doorstep. The more fleeting and meaningless the sex, the better. Lately, anyway.

              But for some reason, seeing Michelle alongside his sister in front of the western depot didn’t make him want to run for cover. His face hadn’t locked down into that typical don’t-bother-me scowl he normally sent toward women he’d already sampled. Instead, to his great surprise, he’d smiled at her. How pretty and feminine she’d looked, comfortable and unpretentious with her old scuffed boots and gray sweater that looked like it had been washed hundreds of times.

              Even mad as hell at Jenny, even anxious to get her alone and let her know just how mad, he couldn’t find it in him to be unhappy with Michelle. No, quite the opposite, in fact. So he decided he would take her to his other favorite spot in Amarillo: Odell’s.

              “Really?” Jenny protested, hugging Jack tight to her chest. “At lunch? With a baby?”

              “You can get the best tables at lunch,” Candy reasoned, and sent her a warning look. “And there’s no smoking anymore, so chill about your baby.”

              She gave him a face so like their mother, he almost forgot he was pissed at her and laughed. Almost.

              “What is it?” Colin asked, staring up at the face of the building with obvious interest.

              “It’s about to be your favorite place in the world,” Candy said. He put an arm around Michelle’s shoulders out of some latent surge of gallantry, and opened the door, steered her inside.

              His father had been the first one to bring him here. When he was twenty-one, already patched, but finally of legal bar-going age, Jack had pronounced it “time to see Odell’s.” Candy still remembered that first visit, the wonder it had sparked in him.

              From the outside, the boxy brick building inspired neither awe, nor even interest. But passing through the heavy front door was like entering another reality. Guests stepped directly onto an upper gallery floored in ancient scraped hardwood that ran the perimeter of the entire building. This was studded with comfy leather booths, high bar tables, doors to bathrooms and coat rooms and private rooms. Down a wide flight of stairs lay the main attraction, the wide floor full of pool tables, round dining tables, and several seating areas grouped around TVs where horse and greyhound races played. At the far end, the bar was a glittering, dazzling spectacle of glass, and chrome, and dark-stained wood. Behind this, through a set of double doors, was the boxing ring.

              It smelled of expensive cigar smoke, leather, furniture polish, and an assortment of colognes. It was nothing like the Armadillo, and therefore captivating to a teenage Derek Snow.

              How long had it been since he’d come to watch a match? Years. Too long. And his heart bumped with excited expectation as they entered. He…

              Wait.

              The wrongness hit him all at once, like a shove. Everything was still in place: the gallery, the dim lamps, the pool tables, TVs, the bar. No doubt the double doors and the ring beyond.

              But the cigar smoke was a lingering sour note in the already-musty air, undercut by damp, mold, and dust. The floorboards creaked in a suspect way. Even from the top of the stairs, he could see the smudges along the walls, the rips in the felt of the pool tables, the warped baseboards and dingy lamp shades. Nothing at the bar glittered or dazzled.

              Odell’s was a dump.

              “Damn,” Jenny said. “When were you in here last?”

              “Before New York…” Had it been that long? Years. At least eight. Damn was right. “It didn’t use to be this way,” he said, feeling helpless. “It was so nice. It was too nice for me, but Dad brought me anyway…”

              “It’s kinda got that New Orleans gambling hell vibe,” Colin said, voice low, like he didn’t want to disturb the atmosphere of disuse and grime.

              “That’s exactly what it was like. Like a riverboat or something.”

              “Two steps too fancy to be a saloon,” Jenny agreed. “And now…”

              Candy didn’t want to be here. In fact, he wished he had never come in, and that the pleasant illusion of a prosperous club remained in his mind.

              But the hostess had spotted them. Slumped against her podium, with bottle blonde hair that said sixteen and a face that said sixty, she wore not the sharply-tailored skirt and waistcoat of years past, but a shapeless black dress with a wide white collar. Her eyelids drooped, and her makeup had been applied with a heavy hand. With a cough like a death rattle, she gathered up menus in unsteady hands and came toward them. In a voice ravaged by years of smoking: “Here for lunch?”