Page 31 of Holley Jolly Biker

I nodded cause I got that.

“Anyway, I later found out that he was there waiting to meet a girl he had met online. She was fourteen. I didn’t find that out until I was twenty, and the statute of limitations for that sort of thing had expired. He had waited to tell me when he wanted to cut me down another peg. Something he loved to do.”

I growled at that, then she said, “I’ll tell you how he did that. But not tonight. Anyway, we were together from that moment onward. I thought I had gotten lucky. A girl from the trailer park. Lands an older man, one who has a stable job. I never had to worry about not having heat. I never had to worry about running water or power. I never had to worry about where my next meal came from. Even though he had something bad to say about any type of calorie, I put in my body.”

I bit back the growl I wanted to unleash, and I bit back the urge to stand up and find something to pummel with my fists. Any man who criticized a woman about what she ate wasn’t a man at all if you wanted my opinion on the matter.

She took another pull from her beer, then said, “But a week before Halloween, he came home, looked at the dinner I had made, sneered, and told me to pack my shit along with Soraya and get the fuck out of his house.”

“Since my name wasn’t on anything, I didn’t have a leg to stand on.”

“I refused at first, questioning him because things didn’t add up. But he told me that the owner of the company he worked for thought it was a bad look for the company if his top chief executive had a little family.”

“When he moved to backhand me, I ran and grabbed what I could carry and got us out of there.”

“A long time ago, when I was Soraya’s age, I had an aunt. Before she passed away, she told me about this little town andthe magic it held. So, with the money I had from my job, we headed here.”

“Would it upset you if I got up and walked away for a bit?” I asked her.

She took in my features, then shook her head, “Of course not.”

I got up then, moved over to her, leaned down, and placed a soft kiss on the top of her head.

It took me half an hour to cool off.

And by the time I got back, I felt my brows raise.

“You didn’t finish eatin’?” I asked as I sat back down.

She shook her head, “No. Appreciate you not taking your anger out on me. Wanted to wait for you.”

I growled then, unable to hold it back, “That’s somethin’ you’ll never fear from me. Doubt there’s anythin’ you could ever do that would make me even remotely mad at you. And should I ever even raise my voice to you, I want you to tell me to shut the fuck up. Alright?”

She looked down at herself, then at me, and asked, “Seriously? You’re three times my size.”

I winked at her, “Baby, the harder the man feels, the easier it is to take him down. I ever cause you fear or pain, you have my consent to shoot me in the head.”

She froze, then she threw her head back and started laughing.

Needless to say, we talked about ourselves while we finished our cold meal.

One that neither of us seemed to mind.

I had her laughing about the yellow device I found in the dumpster as I walked her out to my truck.

“So, you're telling me that you were so hungry, and you thought it was a banana?” she was gasping while laughing so hard I knew it was hard for her to breathe.

I nodded as I opened her door for her, “Yes, ma’am. I thought it was weird that I was getting disgusted looks while I shoved it in my mouth and tried to bite it and suck it.”

At that moment, she lost her balance from laughing even harder.

***

Since it was still kind of early, I asked her if she wanted to take a walk along Main Street to see the lights.

She shocked me by tagging my hand and saying, “Since I’m not ready for this night to end, that sounds perfect.”

We were walking down Main Street moments later, her small hand in mine, when she looked up at me and asked, “Why’d you just do that?”