Page 26 of Steele

She’d always been there for me. For all the best…and all the worst days of my life. After a couple minutes of her chatting about her night at Roosters, there was a lag in the conversation. The silence filled with thoughts of Brett. She was going to be shook when I confessed to spending the night and getting railed by a hot, bad boy biker. “You know that little girl, Lili, in my class?”

She nodded. I’d told her how much Lili reminded me of Matti.

“Yesterday morning, her father came in to talk to me. He’s getting divorced. I’m pretty sure I misjudged the situation. I’ve always liked Lili’s mom. I know I misjudged him. At least, I think I did.”

“Does this have to do with your car breaking down? The long story?”

I nodded. “He saw me on the side of the road and gave me a ride home.”

She turned on her blinker, checked traffic, and made a right into the parking lot of the restaurant. “That was nice of him.”

“On his motorcycle.”

Her gaze snapped at me. “Really?”

“I don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t thinking.” I cast a side glance at her. “Because he’s so freaking good-looking, but he’s a walking red flag. Tattoos and muscles. I could drown in his eyes, and his smile… Like you know he’s naughty but he’s also nice. Well, not nice. He is nice, but nice is the wrong word. He’s kind, but he’s part of a motorcycle gang.”

Her brows pinched and her lips pulled into a smirk. “What aren’t you telling me? You don’t find men attractive. You hate men. I can’t say as I blame you.”

Not after what Jeff had done. “I don’t hate Brett,” I said as we walked into the restaurant.

“Brett? I like it. Hot, dangerous and rescues damsels in distress. Much better than the assholes at Roosters who want to fuck me in the bathroom on my break.”

“I don’t really even know Brett, but my guess is that he’d fuck a woman in a bar bathroom, too.”

The host sat us at a table on the patio.

“There’s more,” I said once we were alone again at our table. “It was raining when we got back to my place. I asked him to come in and wait out the storm.”

“Shut up.” She opened her menu. “So?”

“So, he did. I made us dinner, and when the power went out, he built a fire and fucked me on the floor in front of it.” I perused my menu, but her silence had me lifting my gaze to hers.

We stared at each other. I wasn’t sure if it was a grimace or a smile twisting her lips. “I don’t know what to say first. What were you thinking? I mean, I’m proud of you.”

“For hooking up with my student’s parent who isn’t yet divorced?”

She waved off my response and glanced at her menu. “Both temporary obstacles. No, I’m proud of you for getting on the back of a motorcycle and fucking a hot stranger—”

“Not a total stranger. He’s Lili’s dad—”

“Shut up.” She stared at me. “I’m making a point, and you need to hear it. Jeff didn’t deserve you. He never did. You were always trying to be good enough for him and his fucked-up family. He was punching way above his weight, and he knew it. Money doesn’t define a person except when it reveals a defect in a person’s moral compass. The fact that you’re being sued by his baby momma is proof enough that he was a piece of shit.”

“And his parents. They want the house.”

“Right.” She picked up her menu. “They all suck. So go fuck a ten on two wheels and shut up about the rest. Well, don’t shut up because I want details.”

“Oh, god.” I disappeared behind my menu.

“You know what I mean,” she said. “You have nothing to feel guilty over. You’re single, and you’re twenty-four years old. You can get down and dirty with a rebel on a Harley.”

“I’m dead,” I said and couldn’t help smiling. “How did you know it was a Harley?”

“Biker gang. Although don’t call it a gang when you’re with…what was his name again?”

“Brett. He goes by Steele.”

“Steele. Even his name sounds hot. Does he have a friend? Wait, what club is he from?”