Oh. Well. Now that sounded exactly like my mother. My mother who, memory problems or not, I absolutely did not want to discuss my sex life with. Hell to the no.

“You seem good,” I said, hoping to build a bridge over last night’s ocean full of confusion and regret, and head immediately for dry land. “No more nightmares?”

“Have it your way,” she said, sighing. “I’m going to shower then, I guess.”

As she began to turn, she paused. “You know, baby, I might be older than you, but I still know what pain is. I only wanted to help.”

I swallowed hard. Of course she knew what pain was. She’d had nothing but pain, and why would I want to contribute more to the ungodly amounts already weighing her down?

“Mom, I—”

The sharp chime of the doorbell cut me off.

Glancing to her right, my mother pursed her lips. “It’s too early for—”

“D! ANSWER THIS MOTHERFUCKING DOOR!”

At the sound of Jase’s voice, my mother turned an unhealthy shade of pale.

The doorbell chimed again, one, two, three times. This was followed by a demanding series of what sounded like someone trying to beat a door down with their fists.

I closed my eyes. Without fail, Jase loved making my visits home even more miserable.

“DOROTHY!”

“He sounds drunk again,” she whispered, staring down the hallway, her expression one of sheer terror. “Last time he showed up here drunk, he tried to kiss me.”

WHAT? Oh, hell no.

“Go in the back,” I said firmly, quickly crossing the kitchen, grabbing her car keys off the counter as I passed by her. “I’ll get rid of him.”

“Tegen!” she cried, grabbing my arm. “You know he gets violent when he drinks!”

“Fuck that,” I said, shaking her off. “He’s gonna get a foot to the dick if he tries anything.”

Shoving her car keys in the front pocket of my jeans, I grabbed the doorknob and waited for it. The second Jase started pounding again, I quickly flipped the lock and threw open the door. I ducked Jase’s fist and went barreling into his midsection. Caught off guard, he stumbled backward.

“Fuck!” he bellowed, grabbing for the railing before he went tumbling down the stairs.

“Lock this!” I shouted as I turned to pull the front door closed.

“D!” Jase yelled, having pulled himself back to standing and lunging for the door. I jumped in front of him and grabbed a handful of his shirt. “Stop!” I yelled. “Stop it right now!”

Jase blinked down at me through bloodshot brown eyes ringed in dark circles.

“Tegen?”

Duh.

“Yes, Jason,” I bit out. “Now, turn your drunk ass around and let’s get in the car.”

“What?” He blinked again, looking confused.

“The car!” I yelled, pointing to my mother’s four-door sedan in the driveway. “Get in the damn car! I’m taking you home!”

“I need to see D first,” he slurred, slapping at my arm, trying to pull free.

“Jason!” I screamed. “You will either get in the car or I will go inside, get a baseball bat, and use it to beat the shit out of your motherfucking Harley!”

“Tegen,” he said hoarsely, and his eyes began to fill. “Please, please let me see her.”

Shit.

It was one thing to see a grown man cry, but it was another thing to watch a six-foot-plus, two-hundred-and-thirty-pound man covered head to toe in leather break down in front of you.

Still holding his shirt, with my free hand I reached up and slapped him across the face.

“How many bikers am I going to have to slap this weekend?” I yelled. “Get your shit together! Do you really think she wants to see you like this? No! She doesn’t. You look like fucking shit, you smell like fucking shit, and you’re a babbling, crying mess! Nobody wants to see you like this! Now, get in the car before I call Deuce and he makes you sit in the corner for acting like a douchebag!”

Jase’s mouth flattened. “Don’t call him.”

“I will,” I said, releasing him with a small shove. “If you don’t walk your ass off this porch and get IN THE MOTHERFUCKING CAR!”

Jase lost his balance and his boot slid backward off the top step. Any other time, under any other circumstances, I would have found humor in watching Jase fall off a three-step porch and land on his ass. But this was just sad.

“I’m fine,” he said, struggling to get to his feet.

“Great,” I muttered, grabbing his arm. “I can rest easy tonight.”

Once I had him buckled into the passenger seat, I glanced back at the condo and found my mother standing at the window, staring at Jase, tears streaming down her cheeks.

What a fucking mess.

• • •

“Where the fuck is the Patrón?” Cage demanded from behind the bar.

Cox, who was seated opposite him, jerked his thumb over at Blue. “Wake the fuck up, you old drunk!” he yelled. “You’re sleepin’ on top of the Patrón!”

Blue cracked an eyelid and gave Cox a toothless grin. “Get outta my face, ya fuckin’ crazy little spic,” he slurred. “This baby’s mine.” Then the old bastard fell promptly back to sleep.

Cage remembered his father saying once, a long time ago, that Blue had been around seventy-five, but that he wasn’t really sure and could very well have been eighty-five or ninety-five, for all he knew. Which, if that were true, Blue could be well over a hundred now and looked it. Still drank like a damn fish, though.

“Fuck,” Cage muttered as he headed back around the bar and took a seat on the stool beside Cox. Pulling a pack of smokes out of his cut, he shook several out and offered one to Cox.

Accepting, the man nodded his thanks and lit it up.

“So, you gonna spill?” Cox asked after blowing out a ring of smoke.

Cage glanced at him. “Spill what?”

“Brother, you took off gunnin’ after the hippie bitch last night and ain’t never came back. I ain’t stupid, so fuckin’ spill. I ain’t gotten ass in almost two months. Gotta live vicariously through my brothers.”

Cage made a face. “You and Kami? Fuckin’ seriously, dude? Since when aren’t you two maulin’ each other like pit bulls in heat?”

“She wants another kid,” Cox muttered and Cage raised his eyebrows.

What was with all these old fuckers wanting more kids lately? Eva and Kami were nearing forty. But seeing as Eva was pregnant, it made sense that Kami would want to be pregnant too. Whatever those two did, they always did it together.

“I got three damn kids already,” Cox continued, “and I ain’t wantin’ no more. So she cut me off. Says I ain’t gettin’ pussy until I agree to shoot her up. And my little dudes ain’t gettin’ near that hungry-ass pussy of hers, not until she stops actin’ crazy. So, motherfuckin’ spill.”

Rolling his eyes and shaking his head, Cage stubbed out his smoke on the counter ashtray. “I fucked her. The end.”

Cox gaped at him. “The fuckin’ end? Seriously, brother? No fuckin’ details?”

Cage glared at him. “What the fuck kinda details you lookin’ for? Dude, you’re old enough to be her fuckin’ dad, you’ve been knowin’ her since she was just a little kid, and you really want to be hearin’ about her pussy?”

Cox stared at him, unfazed.

“This is Tegen we’re talkin’ about,” Cage continued, starting to feel his temper rise. “Tegen? D’s little girl? Am I hittin’ a nerve yet, fucker?”

Cox lifted his shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. “I get what you’re sayin’, brother, but look at it from my point of view. True, I watched that crazy-haired, shit-talkin’ little fucker grow up, then she took off for college and when she showed back up, she looked nothin’ like she used to. So from where I’m standin’, that ain’t Tegen, not our Tegen, that’s a hot piece of ass.”

Cage’s already rising temper flared to life and his arm shot out. Gripping Cox’s shirt collar, he pulled them nose to nose. “My hot piece of ass,” he growled. “Which you do not fuckin’ talk about.”

Cage froze. What?

What the fuck?

Why the fuck…

Where in motherfucking-shit-fucking-hell-fucking bullshit had that come from?

Cox started laughing and Cage abruptly released him.

Forget that he’d called her “his,” he’d actually gotten upset to the point he’d just nearly knocked Cox out for talking about her like she was a club whore when in reality she’d treated him like the whore.

Suddenly, Cage was feeling things he wasn’t used to feeling. He was pissed, yeah. He felt kind of slighted too, and most definitely annoyed. But…

Disappointment. Yeah, when it came to women that was a new one.

Inadequacy. Fuck him. Had he been horrible? Had she not been as into him as he’d been to her?

And…jealousy.

Did she have someone else in Cali? Had she taken off because she’d felt guilty?

Suddenly he was hoping like hell she had someone back home. Because that meant it hadn’t been him that ran her off and…

FUCK.

No, no, he was getting pissed off again thinking about her going home to…who? Her boyfriend? He wracked his brain, trying to think if he’d heard Eva or Danny mention a boyfriend and, shit, he didn’t know, he didn’t pay attention to that shit.

The sound of Cox’s hysterical laughter brought him up short.

“Dude,” Cox choked out, clutching his stomach. “Ripper said once you were hard up for that little shit and I didn’t fuckin’ believe him, but holy Mary, Mother of God, you are! Straight up! You should see the look on your face!”

Cage was considering knocking him out when out of nowhere a hand slammed down on the counter between them and they both glanced up to find Deuce glaring down at them.

“That little shit you’re talkin’ about,” Deuce growled, “is at the fuckin’ gate.”

Both Cage and Cox glanced over at the security monitor and sure enough, there was Tegen’s angry face on the screen. It was obvious she was yelling but since the sound button wasn’t being pressed, nobody could hear what she was saying.

“Jase is with her,” Deuce continued, pointing. He sure was. Slumped face forward into the dashboard and all.

“I ain’t gettin’ him,” Cox said. “That motherfucker is heavy.”

“What fuckin’ good are you,” Deuce demanded. “You sit around, drink my fuckin’ booze, eat my fuckin’ food, you’re always talkin’ about Kami this and Kami that, and makin’ my fuckin’ head hurt.”

Cage didn’t hear the rest, he was already out the front door, headed for the gate.

The moment she saw him, Tegen jumped out of Dorothy’s car. “Get this motherfucker out of my mom’s car!” she screamed. “He’s already puked twice and I can’t be certain but he might have shit himself too!”

“Calm the fuck down!” he shouted back as he punched in the sequence of numbers that would open the gate.

“Calm the fuck down?” Tegen shrieked. Cage winced. Jesus fucking Christ, this bitch needed to be strangled.

“He shows up drunk, scaring the crap out of my mom and making her cry, and now he’s puked and possibly shit all over her car, and you want me to calm the fuck down?”

Nostrils flaring, Cage stormed through the open gate and right up into her face.

“Do you ever shut the fuck up?” he growled. “Ever?”

Tegen closed the remaining inch between them. “Only when I’m taking it up the ass,” she hissed.

He was so used to Tegen’s dirty mouth that he’d thought nothing she said could faze him, but he’d been wrong. That statement caught him so far off guard, he nearly fell over. It also made his cock twitch. And a little pissed off. And, why the fuck did she smell so good? Like soap and…breakfast. Damn. He was seriously hungry. For both food and pussy. Her pussy.

“You tryin’ to tell me somethin’?” he asked, pressing into her. As she started to back up, he palmed her back and pulled her flush against him, immediately grabbing hold of her ass and pressing his quickly growing erection into her stomach. The change in her was instantaneous; her eyes widened, her lips parted, and Cage found himself thinking back to last night, when he’d grabbed her in the foyer and then again outside. How every time he would physically touch her, she’d quiet the fuck down and soften, not just verbally but physically.

And suddenly a lot of shit made sense. The way she treated him, always screaming and yelling and spouting off her hard-ass bullshit, always keeping her distance, refusing to be in the same room as him, it could only mean one thing.

Teacup still loved him.

He smiled down at her, watching her drink him in, watching her pupils dilate, and feeling her body relax even further.

“Why are you smiling?” she whispered.