“Nah. That’s all you.” He leans in for another sniff. “Mmm. I would never get enough of eating you all up.”
“Why is that so hot?” Parker puffs out a breath of air.
“It’s the Grinder effect.” Mac chooses now to break the strange tension as she enters the kitchen with her hands full of more party decorations from the trunk of my car. “Aleko and Bear are still looking for Sledge, but they have a lead. Gryffin is having a nap upstairs with Mom. Athena, Paxton, and Vanessa have made a start on blowing up balloons in the bar room, andSabrina will be along with some of the Khunts in the next five minutes to get the food ready. So chop chop, mother truckers, we have a party to decorate.” If her hands weren’t full, I know she’d be clapping them to get us all moving.
“Yes, Mistress.” Grinder stands to attention and salutes.
“No, Grinder. Just no. Never say that to me again.” Mac glares at him and shakes her head. “If you’re lucky, my best friend might let you fuck him later. Now, out. Come on. Shoop shoop.”
“Baby, shoop shoop…”
“Baby, shoop shoop…”
Grinder and Parker burst into laughter after they both finish the song lyric Mac inadvertently began.
The glare my best friend gives Grinder to get his ass moving is one of her best. She’s become very mother hen to all of the brothers since Gryffin came along, and ensuring Sledge has a great birthday is her current top priority.
“Okay, okay. I’m coming…” With a dramatic flair only Grinder possesses, he pauses and takes his time looking me up and down. I feel it from the very tips of my toes to the top of my head. The electricity flying through the air makes my dick twitch, but my response is to lift my chin and give him a defiant, bored stare. Then he moves his gaze over Parker and, surprisingly, I don’t feel the same kind of jealousy as when he’s with the Khunts or club hangarounds. “Although I’d come a lot quicker with one of you two riding my dick. Like a pubescent teenager, in fact.” He wags his brows and grins, his icy eyes, only made blue because of his long, dark lashes, narrowing into half-moons.
Sometimes I wish that my morals weren’t quite so high. I wish I could be the fuck and chuck guy, but apparently I’ve outgrown that stage of my life.
“Is he like that with everyone?” Parker’s new question comes once the other three have left the room.
I don’t need to think about the answer to that. “Yeah, mostly.”The intensity feels like it’s ramped up by a thousand notches when it’s aimed at me, though.
“This Sledge dude, does he have a family? Partner? Kids? And why doesn’t anyone seem concerned that he’s missing?” Again with the topic switch. She’s fidgeting, too, always moving, her eyes darting around the room and taking it all in. With my basic medical skills and mental health training, I’d go as far as saying Parker has ADHD.
“Why the interest in Sledge if you haven’t met him?”
“I don’t know why, but I feel like you won’t blab and I’m bursting to tell someone.” Jumping down from the counter, she sidles up close and tiptoes, motioning for me to bend so she can whisper into my ear.
The words that follow make me glad I’m here to witness how this is going to go down.
Someone is in for a surprise.
Chapter Six
Parker
Wearing my nicest jeans and a plain black T-shirt, paired with my trusty black boots, I think I’m ready to meet my brother. I need to shake my shit out, though, because I’m feeling jittery. The whole of the last year has been leading up to this point.
Literally on her deathbed, my mum confessed what she told me was her worst sin. That I had a big brother, ten years older than me, but she sent him away to live with her brother in the US. Apparently she couldn’t handle having two kids from two different dads. I’m not surprised she waited until her dying day to confess because that is a lame-as-fuck excuse for sending your kid away. I resent her for keeping him from me for the first twenty-four years of my life. Twenty-five if I’m counting the last year I have spent digging for information on him.
I imagine what it would have been like to grow up with a big brother. Would he have sat with me when Mum and Dad argued night after night about her pill problem? Would he have taken some of the pressure away from me when it came to Dad’s lifestyle? Maybe I wouldn’t have seen my first dead body inour basement at the age of nine. Maybe it wouldn’t have been my fault. I had wanted to impress my dad, to show him how unafraid I was to pull the trigger, just like he taught me. He was so proud of me that day, but what would my big brother have thought?
I don’t have the answer to any of those questions, and I never will, but this has been my focus since the day I found out and I won’t feel complete until I meet him.
Okay, get your act together, Parker. You’re meeting your big brother today. You can do this.
My little pep talk to myself helps and I nod at myself in the mirror. I couldn’t find a hairdryer or straightener and I ran out of hair products about a week ago, so I scrunched my hair into space buns to keep it out of my face. Well, mostly. I have a few shorter layers around the sides that tickle my cheeks.
It was real nice of them to let me stay in this room for a few days, seeing as my ‘hotel room’ is actually non-existent. I just hope tonight doesn’t go sideways and end with me back on the street. With every penny I had saved now sunk into this trip—and medical expenses because even the back door docs cost the world—I’m relying on being accepted here.
A knock on the door reminds me I was supposed to be leaving the bedroom, not admiring myself in the mirror and getting stuck in my thoughts.
It’s difficult to hide my grin when I see Grinder standing on the other side of the door, holding out his elbow like a chivalrous gentleman.
“I am here to escort m’lady to the party. The birthday boy has been found, and I should really introduce you to the prez.” He’s wearing jeans that I can just tell hug his arse perfectly, and as per earlier, in the kitchen, he’s only wearing his leather cut on the top half. The tattoos across his chest and ribs are mesmerizing, dipping and folding with his muscles and…nope! Stop it, Parker.