I really wanted to be. Especially since I knew both my guys had lost their V-cards to sweetbutts. Clubwhore was the title of a woman who lived at the clubhouse for free, and who paid for her living costs on her back.
Still, I’d drawn him, laying out, the sun on his face as it was then and now, and the one-eyed snake glaring at me hungrily.
My mouth grew wet at the thought, as well as other parts of my body.
“That’s why I never take my jeans off,” Saint rumbled, before yawning. “You can never be caught off guard that way. You know what she’s like, Keys, obsessed with drawing us. No excuse in being caught off guard. It’s every man for himself where Ama’s concerned.”
I knew Keys wanted to whine, so I grinned at him, and murmured, “Don’t worry, Jamie, I won’t look down there again if you don’t want me to.”
His eyes narrowed. “Don’t call me Jamie.”
“Oops, slip of the tongue.”
He grunted, and I smirked down at my sketchpad as I drew him, furious features and all.
He was just as beautiful as Saint, even if he was—in his own words—a mutt. He had blue eyes, olive skin, and hair that was neither brown nor blond but somewhere in between. His mom was Mexican, and she’d been Rodeo’s old lady before she’d died.
That was why Rodeo was in jail.
He’d gone mad when he’d lost Luisa. Beat up the doctor who’d misdiagnosed her and was serving time for aggravated assault.
I bit my tongue at the memory, and even though I’d just been teasing him, I reached over and pressed my hand to his cheek. He was my age, but he looked older. His beard was grown out, and the stubble rasped against my hand as I flexed my fingers over the golden silk of his skin that spoke of his momma’s Mexican heritage.
“Sorry, Keys,” I whispered, and would have laughed if I hadn’t just been thinking about that horrible time when he’d lost both his mom and dad in one fell swoop.
Instead of looking relieved at my apology, he squinted at me. “Huh?”
We teased each other. A lot. So I understood why he didn’t trust me.
But because I was being sincere, I sighed and, bending over, pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I’m sorry for teasing.”
He didn’t rear back, didn’t freeze or melt at my innocent and chaste kiss, but his suspicion lessened and he fell back onto both elbows, which he was using to prop himself up as he stared at me.
“You sure about this?”
I shrugged, aware that the conversation had returned to what they’d dragged me out here for. I always thought better when I was drawing.
“It’s a big deal, Ama,” Saint rasped, his eyes dark now as he lowered his arm and tilted his head to look at me.
“I know it is.”
“A free pass to the Rhode Island School of Design isn’t something to turn your nose up at.”
I cocked a brow at him. “Think I don’t know that already?”
“Turning it down is a big deal.”
It was.
It was epic, especially since it was everything I’d ever wanted but, and it was a huge but, I couldn’t go further than Jonsson, the next town over, without having a panic attack.
Rhode Island?
Ha.
As if.
“You know why I can’t go,” I muttered, my gaze on the sketchpad once more.
He sighed. “You need to spread your wings, Ama.”
“Why?” I countered, tilting my head to the side. “Most people in town think I’m plenty spread enough.”
He grunted. “Fuck those people.”
Keys spat, “Yeah. Fuck ‘em.”
My lips twitched, but I didn’t say anything. Trouble with being raised in an MC? People seemed to think I was a slut or something. They didn’t realize that I’d been carefully raised. That a nun had probably seen more action than me.
Sure, I knew about the stuff that went down. Had even seen a few bits and pieces over the years. But nothing major. Nothing that I’d wanted to see, and if I did, my dads somehow knew about it and swooped in to make sure I remained ‘pure’ and ‘untainted’ from the MC life.
I knew for a fact my momma hadn’t been raised that way, and I was a bit envious about that. For all the good it did me. Momma was the exact justification my dads would use—she wasn’t exactly normal. I mean, I loved her, and so did they. Hell, they’d kill for her and probably had, but she was nuttier than a bag of pecans.