Kristen Ashley - Own the Wind

“I do and you don’t, bitch, you’ll find your coked-up ass out in the goddamned breezeway.”

Uh-oh.

What did he mean?

My eyes narrowed on Natalie.

Oh crap.

Her eyes were bright. Too bright.

Crap!

“Fuck you!” she screeched.

Shy leaned slightly toward her, and he’d done that to me when he was angry, so I knew he was in the danger zone.

“Do not even think of comin’ into your girl’s house who, by the way, is my woman, high off your goddamned ass and spoutin’ your mouth, so stoked on blow, your brain is a fuckin’ whiteout,” he growled. “Calm your ass down.”

“Natalie,” I verbally pushed into the fray and then carefully asked, “Are you doing cocaine?”

Her eyes swung to me. “We’re not talkin’ about me. We’re talkin’ about you hookin’ up with Shy fuckin’ Cage when I warned you not to do that shit.”

Shy moved, my eyes went to him, and I asked, “Darlin’, please, let me handle this.”

His gaze cut to me, he took me in, rocked to a halt, gave me an unhappy look that I endured but fortunately cut his eyes back to Natalie and stood firm, crossing his arms on his chest.

I looked back at my friend. “Nat, are you doing blow?”

She ignored me and declared, “You said it wasn’t like that with you two when I fuckin’ knew it was and now he’s sayin’ you’re his woman, Tab, which means you didn’t listen to me. You listened to his bullshit lines and now you think you’re his woman when you’re just like any other woman he’s had, and there have been lots, Tabby, and you fuckin’ know it. You’re just pussy.”

“Tab, babe, she didn’t hear me,” Shy clipped his warning, but I didn’t move my eyes from Natalie.

“Natalie, maybe we can talk about what happened with me and Shy when Shy’s not around. Let’s talk about something important, and that’s the fact that I’m a nurse and I can see quite clearly you’re high.”

“How about we talk about the fact that not weeks ago I know he was bangin’ a bitch named Rosalie?” she returned.

More unhappy growling from Shy but I again ignored him. “I know. Now he’s with me.”

She threw up her hands as her eyebrows went up. “So he dumps that bitch and now you’re his woman?” She looked at Shy. “Congratulations, sport. Record time. One down, the other one set up, good to go. How long’s Tab gonna last?”

Considering more unhappy thunder was rolling off Shy, I knew he was about to lose it but I’d already lost it. I, however, did it a whole lot quieter which meant they both felt me. I knew it because the air in the room stilled and I felt both their eyes on me.

But I only had eyes for Natalie.

When I had her attention, I said only one word:

“Don’t.”

“Tab—”

I shook my head, she processed the look I knew I had on my face, and she shut her mouth.

I carried on talking.

“You put me in the middle of you and Jason. He did too but he’s dead now, so he can’t right that wrong. You’re alive and you’re doing it again. Don’t.”

I saw her jaw flex.

I kept going. “Jason and you rubbed each other the wrong way. This time, starting right out of the gate, you are makin’ it impossible for Shy to like you, much less eventually be able to forgive you for the stuff coming out of your mouth. You know him, who he is, what he is. You go head-to-head with a brother of Chaos MC, you won’t come away unscathed one way or another. Don’t do that either.”

I watched her swallow then kept right on talking.

“He means something to me, you already know that, but what he means to me has changed. The reason you don’t know how it’s changed is demonstrated precisely with how you charged in today and behaved.”

“Right,” she hissed.

I ignored that and kept going. “If you’ll calm down, we’ll plan a time when we can talk like adults about what went down with Shy and me. Once we do that, it’s up to you to decide if you feel me or if you feel I’m making a mistake.”

I gave that a moment to sink in and when Nat made no response I kept right on going.

“You also gotta be you, so be you and tell me then, rationally and without being a pain in the ass, why you feel that way. But I expect you to respect my decision, since I’ll warn you now you won’t change my mind. I’ll also expect you to suck it up and get along with my man instead of putting me in the middle. You pull that crap on me again, Nat, like last time, you know you’re gonna lose. And this is not because I don’t adore you. You’ve never had a man”—I powered through her flinch—“when you do, you’ll get it. If you have a partner who grows to mean the world to you, I’m sorry, girl, but he’ll win every time. The thing you gotta get is, a sister’s any sister at all, she stands by her sister’s side or takes her back no matter how she feels about her sister’s man or the shit that goes down between her sister and that man. You have got to learn that but learn it now. I’m not going through that bullshit again.”

I watched her pull in breath and her eyes slid away.

“Nat,” I called quietly, “look at me.”

Her eyes slid back to me.

“You have got to pull yourself together,” I whispered, her shoulders went straight and I lifted a hand. “Hear me out.”

She stared at me, her eyes slid to Shy then they came back to me, and she jerked up her chin.

I took her invitation but kept at it gently.

“You’re in free fall, Natalie, and you know it. You have been since high school. Right now, I’m telling you and I want you to listen to me, you need to reach out and catch hold of the hand I’m extending and let me help you pull yourself out.”

“I’m cool,” she returned, and I shook my head.

“You’re coked to the gills. That doesn’t indicate cool to me.”

“It’s recreational,” she spat.

“Recreational?” I asked. “Coked to the gills at ten in the morning?”

“I’ve got it under control,” she retorted.

“Jeez, Nat!” I threw up my hands, suddenly exasperated. “Listen to yourself! They all say that!”

“I live my life the way I wanna live my life and you live your life jumpin’ from man to man ’cause you can’t seem to live your life without clutchin’ on to some dick that makes you feel complete. Your dad ruined you, controlling your every move, so now you can’t exist without findin’ some guy who will do the same.”

“Tabby, I’m losin’ patience,” Shy warned in a low voice, as I suspected he would when she pulled Dad into it. Something, incidentally, I didn’t much like either.

“Nat, that isn’t true and you know it, but I’ll point out you’re turning the focus on me so we won’t focus on you.”

“It’s my life, under my control,” she fired back.

“I’m Chaos,” I reminded her. “We were at that party and you know that I know that those dudes were not good dudes. I had to climb out a freaking window, they flipped me so bad.”

“They’re fun to party with,” she returned.

“Booze, drugs, and stockpiles of firearms right out on display for all to see is not a good combination, and you don’t have to have a college degree to know that’s just the God’s-honest truth,” I shot back.

“Oh—” she leaned back, waving a hand out in front of her in a wide sweep—“now you’re better than me because you got your degree?”

I shook my head and looked to Shy, wanting to find a hint of calm so I could keep dealing with her. From all appearances, I was looking in the wrong direction. Shy looked happy to rip her head off.

No help there.

Crap.

I looked back at Natalie and pulled in a calming breath.

Then I said softly, “I’m with you, thick and thin. I’ve proved it. I’ll keep doing it. You’re a beautiful person, Natalie, you deserve better. But the person who has to believe that is you. No one can give it to you, especially if you won’t let them. Stop doing this to yourself, realize your beauty, quit treating your body like shit, hanging with people that could get you in trouble or worse, and find your better.”

“Maybe I should rub up with Chaos. Get myself invited to a threesome, like Shy here likes so much.” She flicked a hand out to him as my breath caught at the unwelcome, long-ago memory her words brought crashing back. “Maybe I’ll get lucky, perform like a prize pony, get noticed and get myself an old man for a spell. That work for you, Tabby?”

I powered through the painful memory and shot back, “Any of the brothers of Chaos wanted to take your shit on, Natalie, and you didn’t put it out that you’re no more than ass to tap when they got a hankering for empty pussy, then yes. That would work for me great, Natalie.”

She leaned in to hiss, “You’re unbelievable.”

I didn’t hiss, I whispered, “And you’re in denial.”

She glared at me and I took it.

Finally, she spoke. “You can take your thick and thin and fuck yourself with it, Tab. We’re done.”

My heart lurched but my mouth pleaded, “Don’t do that either, Natalie.”

“Too late, bitch, it’s done,” she declared, sent an acid look to Shy, turned on her foot, and stormed to the door. She stopped there, twisted my key off her ring but was smart enough to throw it at the couch and not me when Shy was standing two feet from me.

Then she slammed out.

I stared at the door for about a third of a second before Shy curled his arm around and pulled me close.

I deep-breathed into his chest.

“Babe, your best girl is a fuckin’ bitch.”

I closed my eyes.

Then I mumbled into his chest. “That didn’t go well.”

“Nope,” he agreed.

“That also doesn’t fire me up to tell Dad, Tyra, and the rest.”

“Nope,” he again agreed and my shoulders slumped. “Though, sayin’ that, sugar, none of them are cokeheads with a life complex, so at least we got that going for us.”

I chuckled but it didn’t hold a lot of humor.

Shy’s other arm closed around me tight so I wound mine around him.

“Fuck,” I whispered in his chest.

“She loves you, Tabby. She just doesn’t love herself. She’ll come back.”

God, I hoped he was right.

Then he muttered forebodingly and not helpfully, “Let’s just hope when she makes that call to mend fences, she isn’t in a situation where she’s fucked one way or the other and we gotta save her ass.”

“Maybe you should stop talking,” I suggested, still speaking into his skin.

Shy was silent a moment, his arms tight around me, then he murmured, “I’ll give you that, sugar.”

I sucked in a deep breath and let it go.

Then I tipped my head back, saw him tilt his chin down and caught his eyes.

“I need coffee.”

Shy’s hand slid up my back, my neck, into my hair. He tipped my head down, I felt his lips at the top of my hair, where he whispered, “Then I better get my girl some coffee.”

I liked it like that.

He kissed my hair, his arm gave me a squeeze, I returned the favor, and he let me go.

Then he got me coffee.

And, it must be said, I liked it like that too.

Goin’ Through the Motions

One and a half weeks later…

We were at FlatIron Mall when it happened.

And we were at FlatIron because it was far enough away, it was unlikely we’d run into anyone we knew. Not that bikers went shopping, but their babes did.

We were leaving because Shy had had enough of shopping. I knew this because after I tried on my third pair of high-heeled, kick-ass, sexy-as-all-heck boots, as much as he appreciated the show, he didn’t have a lot of patience with my indecision.

He demonstrated this by turning to the clerk and saying, “The first pair and this one, ring ’em up.” Then to me he said, “We’re done.”

I could really only afford one pair, but since Shy bought them (after a brief verbal tussle at the counter), I got two. Part of letting this go was that I bought Shy all three pairs of his new jeans and two of his four thermals, so I thought that trade-off worked. Anyway, I knew I was pushing my luck just with him agreeing to go shopping, therefore I didn’t push it further.

So just then, we were walking through the mall, Shy with his arm around my shoulders, me with my hand shoved in the back pocket of his jeans.

Things were still great, even after the Natalie debacle. She hadn’t called and she didn’t pick up any of my calls or return any of my messages, but when I expressed my concern to Shy, he just said, “Keep tellin’ you, sugar, she’ll come back to you. Just give her time to burn it out.”