A Dream of Summer (Bleeding Angels MC Book 3) (10 page)

The welcome bell has stopped ringing, but I still feel like I can hear it echoing in my ears. Jake has only taken a second or so longer to see me than it took for me to see him. I watch as his expression changes from the flash of what I think was happiness at first sight to a hardness that I never thought I would see directed at me.

“Excuse me,” I breathe as I get up from my seat and head towards the entrance where Jake is still standing completely still as if he’s been frozen in place.

He looks anywhere but at me as I walk towards him. In spite of that, I feel like I’m drinking in the sight of him. I take everything from the soles of his booted feet, up his perfectly fitting jeans to his tantalizingly fitted t-shirt that shows his muscular frame underneath to his stubbly chin and cheeks that just adds to the sexiness that oozes from him naturally.

“Hey.” I say the word quietly, almost under my breath, as I reach him. We’re still a couple of feet apart but the distance between us seems so much more than that.

As if realizing he can’t ignore that I’m in front of him anymore, he lifts his dark brown eyes from the floor and locks gazes with me. I can feel my stomach do back-flips like it always does when I’m this close to Jake. The only difference this time is that it doesn’t look like the feeling is mutual.

“Hi.” The word is curt, and he doesn’t make any move to step towards me. If anything, he looks like he’d like to turn around and head straight back out of the door that he came through.

We stand like this, staring at each other, at an impasse. Ideas of what Jake must be thinking of me whirl around my head.
Slut. Whore.
The words that he said to me in my dream rain down on me and I have to take a deep breath to push them away and remind myself that he didn’t really say them. But seeing the way he looks at me and the aloofness in his eyes I wonder if I was wrong.

“Did you get my message?” It’s the most pathetic thing I could have asked. It makes me sound like a moony school kid. Why out of all the times in my life am I now finding it so hard to say what it is that I mean?

“They took my phone as soon as I walked onto the compound.” Jake’s response is as bland and uninterested as his expression is.

When he doesn’t offer anything further, I figure that he’s here to give me a chance to explain and to tell him what I’ve been wishing I’d said days ago

“Jake, I’m so sorry.” I take another step towards him and he instantly takes a step back. I swallow back the sadness that I feel at knowing he wants to get away from me. I know I probably deserve whatever it is that he plans to throw at me. “I can explain everything. It’s not what you think. I would never hurt you.” I know how earnest I sound, but Jake remains unmoved.

“Did you go to Wheels to sleep with Ryan?” It’s the only question Jake has asked so far and it’s also the only one that’s impossible for me to answer without making everything worse.

“Jake, why are you being like this? I know you have reason to be mad, but if you’d just let me explain…” I bite my bottom lip when he holds his hand up to stop me from talking.

“Just a yes or no answer, Aimee. Did you or did you not go to Wheels to sleep with Ryan?” Jake looks me in the eye and I don’t see any of the tenderness or the love that I was so used to seeing. It’s like he’s a different person.

“It’s not that simple,” I protest, and then berate myself for being so defensive. I know that I’m not helping myself.

“Yes or no.” He’s raised his voice and the hardness seems to fill the almost-empty diner.

I cover my face with my hands because I know that my answer is going to make him hate me. But I promised myself that I wouldn’t lie; it was the time to tell the truth and he deserved that. I just wish that he’d given me the chance to defend myself, to explain. But maybe that’s not what I deserved. “Yes.” The word comes out in a whisper and as I take my hands away from my face I see Jake’s shoulders sag.

“That’s all I need to know, then.” Jake seems to be talking to himself rather than to me. He turns around, cutting me out of his field of vision completely as he heads towards the cash register. He’s right in front of me, but at the same time he’s never been so far away.

Something in his response makes me snap and I can‘t control my reaction. “No, Jake, that’s not all you need to know and if you would take your head out of your ass long enough to let me explain, then maybe you’d understand what I’m trying to tell you!” My voice is loud and out of the corner of my eye I can see George stick his head out from behind the kitchen and then duck back out.

I grab Jake’s arm, trying to get him to look at me, and he winces and pulls away from me. At first I think he’s just trying to get away from my touch, but it’s more than that and then it hits me.

“You’ve been tatted.” As I say the words I wonder how it was possible that I hadn’t noticed it before. His new ink peeks out slightly from under his t-shirt sleeve.

“I’m an Angel now.” Jake says the words in such a matter-of-fact way that it takes me a moment to realize what it is that I’ve just heard. “Well, not quite yet, there’s still one more thing I have to do.” He looks between me and the cash register. Suddenly it all makes sense.

“This is your initiation.” The words ring dully in my ears and I wonder how I could have been so stupid not to have realized what was going on before. “You’re not here to see me. You’re here because they sent you.”

Jake has the decency to look sheepish and, just for a second, I see a crack in this armor of indifference that he’s put on and the real Jake comes shining through. I see the good, strong, honorable man that had been my best friend for years and who had become the love of my life.

I look past Jake and down the steep stairs to the street. I think I already know who it is that I’m going to see before I even manage to focus my eyes on him. Ryan is leaning lazily against his bike as if this is the most boring night of his life, but his gaze is trained on both of us.

There’s no mistaking the leery smile that he shoots at me when our eyes meet.  I had never really known what it was like to hate someone so much until Ryan had done what he had to me. I had always believed that it was wrong to kill another human being, no matter what the circumstances. But my experience with Ryan had changed my point of view. He was the only person I could imagine wanting to do serious bodily harm to. Even Scar, who gunned down my father in broad daylight—I don’t think I could bring myself to actually end his life. Ryan is the only person that I can imagine doing that to and I have to admit, the idea does give me a small amount of comfort.

“Jake, talk to me. Please. It’s me, Jake, it’s Aimee.” My voice is a plea and I know that it’s reflected in my eyes as I look at him. That small chink in his armor that I had found widens and I get another look at that the real Jake, my Jake.

“I look at you, and I feel like I know you. But the person that I knew wouldn’t have done the things to me that you have.” Jake has positioned himself with his back to the door so that Ryan can only see my face and not his.

“If you’d let me explain then you’d see that the only things I’ve done to you have been to protect you. Can you get that through your thick head?” I make sure to keep my features as unreadable as possible—not for Jake, but for Ryan. I know that he’s watching me as closely, if not more, than Jake.

“My thick head?” A small, rueful smile manages to escape Jake’s amazingly kissable lips.
He’s back
, I think to myself. But just as soon as he reappears he’s buried again.

“How long do we have?” I ask, flicking my eyes towards Ryan.

“Not long. I’m supposed to come in here, take everything you have out of the register, and get out.” Jake says the words as if he’s just talking about the weather, but I can see how hard he’s taking what he’s being forced to do.

“And are you going to do it?” I know the response that I want to hear, but I also know how unlikely it is.

“I don’t have a choice.” Jake’s reply comes through gritted teeth and his eyes flash with something close to anger.

“You always have a choice.” The words are out of my mouth before I realize the hypocrisy in them and I know I’m about to pay for them.

“Is that why you slept with Ryan behind my back? Because you had a choice? You’re telling me that’s what you chose to do?” The bitterness in Jake’s voice hits me like a freight train. “Now get me the money that I came here for so that I can leave.”

“Jake, don’t do this. You’re not like them.” I bite my lower lip, preventing it from trembling as I watch the man that I love do something I hoped that I’d never see.

“I’m not like them, but it turns out I’m not like you either.” Jake’s jaw is set hard in an expression that I know all too well.

“Fine, is this what you want?” I elbow past him to get to the cash register and take out the small handfuls of dollars that we’ve made in the past twenty-four hours. It’s a pitiful amount, really, and nothing close to what we would have made in what I know Big George would call “the good old days.” I hold up the money, which can’t amount to more than a couple of hundred dollars. “What if I won’t give it to you? Will you take it from me?” The challenge in my eyes can’t be mistaken, but my hand is shaking as I hold the dollars between us.

“I would never hurt you, Aimee. I’m not Ryan.” And the way he spits the name out makes me hope that all is not lost between the two of us.

“I know you’re not; you’re nothing like him.” Our eyes meet and I try to transmit all the love that I feel for him in that look. “Please, come to the shop tonight. Give me a chance to explain, to tell you what happened. Jake, you know me better than anyone else—do you really think that whatever happened between Ryan and me is as simple as the Angels are making it out to be?”

I can see that my words are getting through to Jake but there’s still a ways to go. “I’m going to give you this money, without causing a scene or making it any harder for you than I know it already is. But in return you have to come tonight—you have to hear me out. I love you, Jake. Isn’t what we had worth giving me a chance to explain myself?” My fist with the dollars clenched in it is shaking and I know that if Jake doesn’t respond to this last-ditch attempt of mine, then it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that I’ll completely lose it.

So many emotions pass over Jake’s face in the space of a few seconds. He seems to be wrestling with his own wants and desires. All I can do is pray that I haven’t misjudged how much I’ve hurt him or how much of the trust he had in me is still left.

“Even if I wanted to, it’s not like the Angels are going to let one of their new Patches just waltz out of the compound,” Jake points out. But the mere fact that he’s entertaining the option of coming to see me tonight gives me hope.

“The Jake I know wouldn’t let that stop him.” We lock eyes and I feel that familiar electricity pass between us. Whatever the Angels have tried to do to us, I know that we’re still a part of each other. I never feel more alive than when I’m with Jake and I so desperately want to believe that he feels the same way.

We’re both caught off-guard when the bell over the diner door dings insistently behind Jake. I look past him and feel my breath start to quicken as Ryan walks through. Jake and I have both been so caught in up in our own world and the intensity of our reunion that we’d forgotten about Ryan, the dark presence watching us from outside.

“Everything alright, Summers?” He takes a look around the diner and I feel myself stiffen up as his eyes drift over the Feds who are still sitting in their booth, in plain sight of the entrance. But Ryan doesn’t seem to think they’re worth his notice and I have to try hard not to let out a sigh of relief.

“Everything’s fine.” Jake’s voice is hard and he manages to make himself sound bored, like it’s a big effort for him to give Ryan the time of day.

“Just thought I’d check in and see what was taking so long.” Ryan trains his attention on me and that slick grin that I’ve seen so many times makes my skin crawl. “Is Winters here giving you any problems?” 

“No problems.” Jake looks straight into my eyes and the cold stare makes a shiver run down my spine. “Not unless you call begging a problem.” He barks a laugh and it sounds forced to me, although Ryan buys it completely.