A Second Chance at love The Rocker Girls Series (6 page)

South smiled. “They keep looking over
cuz they’re jealous. Besides, I don’t think I ‘ve ever seen this
pizza on the menu.”

She sighed. “You haven’t, it’s the
hospital personnel special.”

He took another piece and she smacked
his hand, but that didn’t stop him from taking it and biting into
it. “What?”

“
Nothing,” she
sighed.

“
So tell me about
yourself,” South said with a mouth full of her pizza.

“
What do you want to
know?”

“
Well, how long have you
and your band been together?”

“
I don’t know. I guess
about fifteen years.”

“
No way! When did you guys
start, when you were two?” he laughed.

“
Ha, ha. No, I guess around
fourteen. It was about the same time when the boys that lived in
the same house started to get serious about their band,” she told
him, not wanting to give much away.

“
You’re serious?” he asked,
to which she nodded, taking another bite.

“
So you’re
like…”

“
I’m twenty-nine, well, in
two months I’ll be thirty.”

“
No fucking way! I thought
you were maybe twenty-three…at best.”

“
And how ‘bout you, I’m
guessing twenty-four?”

“
No, twenty-six. Win’s the
oldest of us, he’s twenty-eight. Wow, twenty-nine, and you just
came out and told me, too. I thought women kept that shit a secret
from guys.”

She shrugged. “It’s my age, I don’t
really care if you know.”

“
So you girls have known
each other for a long time. When did you all meet?”

She sat back, letting her food digest
and thinking about his question. “Well, Tia and I met the girls
when I was ten and Tia was eight. So I could easily say most of my
life.”

“
You talk like you lived
together or something?”

“
Yeah, we did. There was a
community home that we all lived in. Me, Tia, Lynn, Mindy, and
Margie, we all grew up together and became a family. We haven’t
left each other’s sides since then.”

She picked up her beer and took a
drink. “So what about you guys? You all seem pretty tight
knit.”

He nodded, picked up the beer she’d
just put back on the table and took a drink, and she frowned. “You
owe me another beer too,” she mumbled, making him smile.

“
Well, I guess we’re a lot
like you. But we met in high school, and just kind of clicked.
Win’s like the brother I never wanted, though. My mom kind of
adopted him into our family.”

“
Well isn’t that sweet,”
she smirked.

He smiled but it faded. “You see Win’s
mom and my mom were best friends most of their lives. But my mom
moved away for college and met my dad. When they got divorced,
about two years later she got remarried, and her and my stepdad
decided to come back to her home.

“
When she did, she found
out that Win’s mom was being abused. She tried to get her to leave
but she said she loved him, and after every beating he’d come to
our house, picking her up and saying how sorry he was. Finally my
mom just let Win live with us, his mom never said anything about
it.”

She looked down at the table, thinking
of Win, and at such a young age witnessing all that violence…just
like Jimmy had been. Then all the drunken beatings that he’d given
her in the last two years came rushing to her mind.

Taking one more slice of pizza, she was
about to take a bite when the group of men all cheered, and called
out a name when someone walked in. She looked over to see Win
saying hi to his friends, and his friends laughing, pointing to the
table where she and South sat.

He looked over at her, smiling that
smooth smile she’d seen on many playboys before, and walked over to
them. “What are you doing bothering this beautiful woman, South?”
he asked as he sat down next to him.

“
Just getting to know our
neighbor better. Why don’t you go sit with the guys, we were having
a nice conversation before you came over.”

Win glanced at him and Addison could
see a scowl on his face. But he looked back to her and took a slice
of her pizza. “Hey! Between you and South my pizza will be
gone!”

He took a bite. “So what were you
talking about?”

“
Just how all the girls
met, how we met, and our families,” South said, but she could see
Win tense slightly.

“
So you told him all about
your family?” he asked Addison. “Cool, so what did I
miss?”

“
I didn’t tell him about my
family. I told him how I met all the girls,” she said, finishing
her last piece.

“
Well, tell me about your
family then.”

Addison looked away. Those deep blue
eyes could talk any woman out of her panties and if she didn’t
watch herself, she could be one of them. Win was definitely the
slick bad boy. With that auburn hair and a model’s gorgeous
looks…yeah, this man could easily pull her into his trap. She just
had to remember that she didn’t have time for herself, let alone
time to get involved with someone.

“
I don’t speak about my
family,” she said softly.

“
Why?” asked
Win.

Glancing down at her watch, she started
to get up from the table. “Look, I really need to be going. I’ve
got to be back at work by two tomorrow afternoon. It’s been good
talking to you guys. Have a good time with your friends.” She’d
started to walk away when Win came up beside her.

“
Hey, how you getting
home?”

“
I’m going to take the bus
tonight. Mindy and Lynn are still on at the hospital.”

“
Well, why don’t I give you
a ride to the apartment? It will be much safer for you than waiting
for a damn bus,” Win said, walking with her to the door.

She looked up at him. “I don’t know,”
she said, but man, it would be great not to take the bus and get
home forty-five minutes sooner. She looked over at South who had
his arms crossed, looking at them like he’d lost a bet or
something. “Are you sure you want to leave South? He looks pretty
ticked off.”

Win smiled. “He’s fine. Believe me.
He’s just slower on the uptake.”

“
What?”

“
Nothing you need to worry
about, angel. So how ‘bout that ride?”

“
I guess a ride would be
quicker. That is if you’re sure you don’t mind not hanging out with
your friends?” she asked, looking back at the table full of
men.

“
I wouldn’t have offered if
I didn’t want to,” he told her, opening the door and leading her
out.

***

The windows were rolled down in Win’s
big truck as they drove back to the apartment. She slipped off her
clunky but comfortable shoes, kicking her feet up on the dash and
enjoying the breeze, then let down her hair, scrubbing her hands
through it to get the rubber band headache out.

She pulled off her scrub top, leaving
on the tank top underneath, so she could cool off. “So you and
South work together. What do you do?”

“
We’re in
construction.”

“
That’s cool. What kind of
construction?”

“
Carpenter.”

“
Nice,” she told him,
hanging her hand out the window to feel the breeze.

“
Can I ask you
something?”

“
Depends on what you want
to ask.”

“
Fair enough. But, why
don’t you like to talk about your family?”

She looked out the window, and not at
the gorgeous man who asked the question. “It’s not a good story. In
fact it’s a really bad one. And not something I like to talk
about.”

“
Would it be a bad thing to
tell me?” he asked as they waited at a red light. She turned her
head to look him over when the light turned green.

“
Well, like I said, I don’t
talk about it. But, I guess I could tell you, but only if you
promise not to tell anyone else. There are things in a person’s
past that the whole world doesn’t need to know about.”

He nodded. “No, I get that. And I won’t
tell anyone. I promise.”

Leaning her head back against the seat
she pulled a cigarette out of her bag. “Do you mind?”

“
No, go ahead. You pretty
much have free rein in my book, angel.”

She put the light to the end and took a
deep drag before she started her story. “First, my mother was a
beautiful, but a very carefree woman. And my father was very
jealous of men looking at or being near my mother.”

She put the smoke up to her mouth,
taking another drag before she got into the bad stuff. “See, my
father smothered her. That’s all that I could ever think of,
because he was a handsome guy too, but I think she felt stuck,
maybe a little trapped. You see Tia is my half-sister, and nobody
even knew that, until the night Tia got hurt.

“
Tia has always been clumsy
and when she was little, she was accident prone. When she was eight
she fell off her bike and onto these bricks that outlined the
neighbor’s lawn; they kind of stood up diagonally, and she fell and
hit her head on the hard part and had to be rushed to the
hospital.

“
The doctor came out,
telling my father that she was fine, and they put some staples in
her head. But since her blood was so rare it would be a good idea
for him to have some blood set aside for her or him just in case of
an emergency. You see Tia is AB negative… My father and me, we’re A
positive.

“
My dad was so quiet on the
ride home from the hospital. But I was too young to understand what
was going on, or what the big deal was with the different blood
types. He dropped me off at our house and kept Tia in the car while
he went into the garage, where he kept his gun-safe…

“
My mother was a nurse, and
I guess she was supposed to be working that evening. But when he
got to the hospital, she wasn’t there. And to make a long story
short… He found my mother at his best friend’s house in bed. I
guess he dragged Tia with him into the house…after some kind of
argument, he shot my mother and his best friend. When that was
done, he took the gun and shot himself. All in front of an
eight-year-old little girl.”

They had pulled into the parking area
as she finished, and Win didn’t say anything at first. “Addison,
I’m so sorry,” he said softly with that look of horror people got
on their faces when they found out what happened to her
family.

She sighed. “Thank you. But it happened
a long time ago, and I’m fine,” she said, taking a deep breath.
“Anyway I have to be strong and take care of my little sister.
She’s the one who was traumatized.”

“
Is she okay
now?”

“
Well, yes, and no. She
didn’t talk for four years afterwards, and the state put her into
therapy. But she somehow managed to find her voice again. Now she
just doesn’t deal well with stressful situations.”

“
She works at the hospital,
right? Isn’t that stressful for her?” he asked as he turned in his
seat to look at her.

“
Yes, she works there, but
only as someone who works with admissions. That can be very
stressful also, but it’s a different kind of stress than working
with the public. She likes the feeling of control at her job, and
likes the solidarity it gives sometimes. She knows that everything
has a certain place for it to be, and she likes that.”

He was watching her, like she was some
tragic story from a movie, and she hated that. So she thought she’d
change the subject. “I saw that your sleeve was in classic Japanese
artwork. Do you mind if I take a look?”

Shrugging, he held out his arm to her.
“Sure.”

She took it in her hands, looking at
all the details. “You know this is really good,” she told him,
turning his arm to look at the inside. “The lines are really clean,
and straight. From what I see the colors look even and bright. He
gave you just the right coloring, making everything pop and it
doesn’t look muddled at all. How far up did you go?”

He lifted up the sleeve to his t-shirt,
revealing his shoulder completely covered. She noticed the details
even in the dim light of the parking area. She wanted to sit closer
to him to get a better look at the beautiful tattoo, and maybe help
take her mind off the damn story she’d just told him. “Do you mind
if I take a closer look?”

“
Knock yourself out,
angel.”

She scooched over to get a good look at
his shoulder. “I’ve got to say I’m really impressed. You went for
the traditional koi, and it’s one complete sleeve. It’s really
beautiful. You’ve got a lot of hours in this.”

“
Yeah, about twenty. How do
you know so much about tattooing?” he asked as she lifted up his
arm, looking at the work on the bicep and armpit.

“
I have a friend who
specializes in Japanese tattoos, and let me tell you he is the best
there is, but this is really good,” she told him, taking her finger
and running it on a colorful part of a fin underneath his arm. He
shivered before his hand went behind her neck, pulling her to him.
His lips came down on hers hungrily, as she let him deepen the
kiss.