Ignite (The Disciples #4) - Cassandra Robbins Page 0,102
out of the cold shower, I don’t bother to dry off. I grab my toothbrush and hear laughter coming from the bedroom. When I step out, she’s got her long legs propped up on my wall while she talks on her phone.
“I know. I miss you too.” She sighs. “Bella, stop it. I can’t just pick up and go on tour with you and P!nk.” She laughs. “I’m happy here and I have a job.”
I walk back to the bathroom and spit out the toothpaste.
Fuck.
Bella. This is the girlfriend she used to room with. The one whose shit I’ve stashed in a storage unit. I grip both sides of the sink. Antoinette is not going anywhere. I need to protect her and if that takes fifty years, so be it.
Her happy squeals bring me back to the fact that she’s telling Bella the size of my cock and that she’s in love with me.
I stop and listen, leaning against the doorframe. “He’s the most brilliant man to walk this earth. Talented, a musician… I know, I know… but he was in a band called the Dicks with Rhys Granger.”
What am I doing? Spying on my girlfriend? I’m thirty-three years old. I’d call her my old lady, but that seems final. Also, I notice she hasn’t mentioned that I’m the VP of the Disciples.
When I walk out, she sits up wearing my Dicks T-shirt and smiles at me. I open my dresser drawer and grab a black T-shirt. As she walks into the other room, I pull on some black jeans.
“Bella, I have to go. I’ll call you soon.” She laughs again, sounding happy. “I’m not changing my mind. Be good, you.”
I grab my cut from the side of my chair and put it on. I’m a dick. She’s twenty. Who the fuck am I to stand in her way?
“Anything you want to tell me?” I say as I light a cigarette.
“That was my best friend, Bella. I’ve been meaning to call her, and since yesterday was my birthday, I knew she’d be worried.” She bites her bottom lip as if she’s unsure if that’ll upset me.
“She wants you to go on tour with P!nk?” I inhale and she looks at her feet then up at me.
“A dancer got pregnant, so there’s an opening. But I told her no.” Her violet eyes look at me as if this should please me. Unfortunately, all it does is make me feel like a selfish prick.
I nod then tell her the truth. “You should call her back and say yes. I don’t do relationships. It’s only a matter of time before the sex becomes old. You’re twenty, babe. At twenty, I was traveling the world, doing ex—”
“Stop it!” she says, her face turning pale. “Don’t do that. Don’t tell me what I should do.” Her nose goes in the air and again my heart hurts. Keeping her with me when she needs to shine is selfish. I’m an asshole. It’s only a matter of time before I do tire of her.
Thinking about playing house with someone is fucking stupid. The club is my family, not a woman.
“I’m being honest. This is an opportunity for you. You should take it.”
“Why are you doing this?” Tears well in those eyes that were alive with happiness minutes ago. She was excited talking to her friend about having fallen in love. Too bad she fell for me, a Disciple.
“Because it’s the right thing. I’m never gonna be monogamous, Antoinette.” She looks as though I slapped her, but it’s true. “It’s not who I am. Sooner or later, I’ll see some cunt that I want to fuck and I will.”
The tears swimming in her eyes spill, but she holds her head high, looking me straight in the eyes.
“Well, you haven’t yet,” she challenges.
She’s right. I haven’t. Not even been tempted. Why would I? I have my perfect woman right here, waiting for me.
“I love you.”
I shake my head. “You don’t even know what love is.” Picking up my Glock, I tuck it into the back of my jeans.
“No. That’s where you’re wrong. I do know what love is, and it wouldn’t matter if I was twenty or thirty-three.” She sneers the thirty-three. “I love you, and not even you can take that from me.”
I snort. “Give yourself time, baby. You’ll be amazed at how fast you can hate me.” Grabbing my keys, I leave her, not wanting any of this. It’s not what I do.