Sweet Dreams by Kristen Ashley
“No shit,” he replied.
I smiled at him and kept whispering. “I think you like me.”
“I like how you cook, probably like it better, now you got better tools to do the job.”
My smile got bigger. “You like more than how I cook.”
His arms gave me a squeeze and he whispered, “Yeah.”
I moved my arms from around his back, wound them around his neck and got up on my toes to touch my mouth to his. Then my lips went to his ear.
“Do you love me?”
His lips at my ear, he answered, “Oh yeah.”
I smiled and stuffed my face in my neck.
“Sick!” Jonas shouted. “Jeez, can we have cake or what?”
“I’ll go fire up the grill,” I heard Pop say as I shifted back and Tate’s arms around me became only one as he tucked me into his side and turned us to face our audience. “Stell, sweetheart, bring out the chops,” Pop finished.
“You got it, Kyle,” Stella replied, heading to the fridge.
“Chops first, Bub, then cake,” Tate told Jonas.
“Tyler and me are giving you a week of boot camps, free of charge!” Wendy called.
“Great,” I muttered, uncertain if a week’s worth of physical torture was a good birthday present but I still muttered this smiling at them.
Sunny came forward, holding out a card while saying, “Free coffee for your birthday month.”
“Oh Sunny, I couldn’t,” I told her, taking the card.
“All November, Petal,” Shambles walked up and slid an arm around Sunny’s chest from behind, his grin pinned to me, “on the house.”
“Thanks,” I whispered.
Krystal came forward with a package wrapped in birthday wrap but no ribbon or bow.
She handed it to me and stated, “It’s a Harley tee and it’s sweet. They only had that one left in our size. You don’t like it, give it back, I want it.”
I didn’t think Krystal was the same size as me and I figured she bought her own size so I’d have to give the t-shirt back. I laughed softly and shook my head while she avoided my eyes, turned and also avoided Bubba on her way back into the kitchen.
Tate let me go and drifted away as others came forward with cards and gifts. A huge bouquet of flowers from Holly. A smokin’ hot biker babe belt that Stoney had noticed me checking out at his store. A gift certificate for a mani and pedi from Dominic. A white ribbed tank with a black, silver, gray and orange design of skulls, hearts and flowers around the words “Carnal, Colorado, Harley Heaven” from Amber and Jonelle. Two gift certificates for the home store, one from Ned and Betty, one from Pop, Stella and Wood. A bottle of very good vodka from Steg, Wings and Nadine. A neck choker I would never have considered buying for myself (but it was hot and I couldn’t wait to wear it) made out of a thin strip of black leather with silver rivets on it from Bubba.
And a can of mace with a mumbled, “Can’t be too careful,” from Twyla.
Once I’d opened all my gifts; read my cards and set them on their sides on the counter that separated the kitchen from the living room; everyone had a beer; and Stella, Krys, Wendy and Amber had put out bowls of chips, macaroni and potato salad and fluffy dinner rolls, Tate returned to me.
And he did it carrying a martini, with olive, in a fantastic, long-stemmed, elegant martini glass.
When I took the martini all the while my eyes never leaving his, he murmured, “Wanda says happy birthday.”
Tate had braved Wanda and Deluxe Home Store for me.
I felt tears sting my eyes.
“Tate,” I breathed.
His hand slid along my waist as he muttered, “Shit, babe, are you gonna cry again?”
“No,” I lied as a tear ran down my cheek.
Tate watched it fall then his free hand lifted and he used his thumb to swipe it away. He left his hand cupping my cheek when he was done and I’d gotten control of myself.
Then I whispered, “Thank you, baby.”
His face got soft, tender and his head dropped so he could run his nose along mine.
He moved an inch away, his eyes locked on mine and he whispered back, “You’re welcome, Ace.”
My parents were good at giving birthdays. My Mom was a birthday freak and she made every one more special than the last.
But I stood in my new-ish kitchen, looking into Tatum Jackson’s brown, tawny-flecked eyes and I loved my Mom and all the hard work she’d put into giving me great birthdays… but Tate had given me the best.
And it wasn’t over yet.
* * * * *
I returned to the house after waving good-bye to Bubba, Wendy, Tyler and Amber, the last of the lot to go.
Jonas had left earlier with Pop, he was spending the night with him, I suspected because Tate had another birthday treat for me, one I was seriously looking forward to because I’d had more than one martini and I was seriously drunk.
I slid the sliding glass door shut and cooed nonsensically at Buster who was weaving around my ankles as I weaved my way toward Tate who was standing at the debris-filled, brand new, shit hot kitchen counter, something in his hand, his neck bent to look at it.
I sidled up to him and then plastered myself against his side.
His neck twisted to look down at me and I whispered what I hoped was a suggestive, “everyone’s gone now, we can have wild, crazy, biker on biker babe sex”, “Hey.”
“Who’s Matt Derriford?”
I blinked drunkenly.
“What?”
He lifted my phone pointed at me and I saw my call history, Mom and Dad and Carrie were on it but at the top was Matt’s name.
“Um…” I muttered, trying to think fast, however I was inebriated so thinking fast was an impossibility.
“College boyfriend?” Tate surmised.
“Um…” I muttered again, trying to read his face, however I was inebriated so reading his face was an impossibility considering it was carefully blank.
Tate looked back down at my phone. “When’d you talk to him?”
“Um…” I repeated, “At the bar, after my shift.”
Tate looked back at me. “Tryin’ to hide it, Ace?”
I bit my lip as my mind screamed, Yes! considering he didn’t seem too happy. Hiding it was a moral imperative and I decided next year to do a heck of a lot better with that.
I didn’t answer and Tate put my phone on the counter and turned into my arms. His hands came up and settled where my neck met my shoulders.
“You drunk?” he asked.
“Yes,” I thought it safe to answer.
“How drunk?” he asked.
“Very drunk?” I answered with a question even though it should have been said firmly as I was, indeed, very drunk.
“Too drunk to hold on, I take you for a ride?”
My belly fluttered at the thought of being on the back of his bike but my eyes slid to the new microwave over the new stove then back to him.
“Tate, it’s nearly one in the morning.”
“Too drunk to hold on, Ace,” Tate repeated.
“I’m never too drunk to hold on,” I replied.
“Get your jacket,” he ordered.
I stared at him and I couldn’t decide if he was pissed or if he was something else. Since he loved me and he loved me lots and he’d proved that over and over again, most recently with a bunch of expensive, brand-spanking new stuff in the kitchen, I figured I was safe even if he was pissed about my call to Matt.
I got my jacket and he led me out to the garage, threw a leg over his bike, backed it out and then I got on behind him.
Then we rode. It was cold, the wind whipped my face and hair and bit through my jeans.
And I didn’t care.
Because I had Tate’s back tight to my front, my arms wrapped around his belly and my cheek to his shoulder. I was drunk on martinis he’d made me and I’d drunk them in delicate glasses he’d bought me. And my mind was free, clear and free and I was, for the first time in my li
It was late and it was cold but Tate and I rode for a long time. Finally, he stopped at a ridge, Carnal spread out before us, its lights blinking in the utter darkness of the hills and mountains surrounding it, covered in a blanket of midnight blue that was the sky.
Tate thrust down the stand, turned off the bike and I hopped off the back, Tate coming off after me. I walked to the edge of the ridge and stopped. Tate moved in behind me and circled me with his arms, one at my chest, one at my ribs.
“Next year, babe, you call him when I’m there,” he said in my ear.
My mind had been filled with nothing during the ride. Tate’s mind had been filled with Matt.
“Okay,” I whispered. “But, Tate, it isn’t a big deal,” I assured him, even though this year it was, I didn’t share that. “We’ve been doing it for –”
His arms gave me a squeeze and I shut up. “You do it when I’m there.”
“You have nothing to worry about,” I told him.
“I know,” he replied.
“So why –?”
“Don’t want you hidin’ anything from me.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
He was done with this topic, I knew that when he muttered, “Simple request, Ace.”
I was beginning to realize that, although some of the ways of a badass, biker, bounty hunting, alpha male would become clear to me, others would forever remain a mystery.
My hands came up and my fingers curled around his forearm at my chest. “Okay, Captain. Next year, I’ll talk to Matt when you’re there.”
His arm at my chest tightened and he kept muttering when he said, “Seal the deal.”
I blinked at the vista.
“What?”
His arm around my ribs stole away, then his hand came back, prying my left one from his forearm at my chest, I felt something cold at my ring finger and Tate slid its coldness to rest at the base.
“Seal the deal,” he repeated, his hand curling mine back on his arm and his lips went to my neck to give me a kiss.
That neck was bent and I was staring at a diamond glittering dimly in the night.
I simply stared at it, mind blank, stomach hollow, heart stopped as Tate kept talking.
“Seal the deal,” he said yet again. “You talk to him next year, another ring’s gonna be sittin’ at the base of that one.”
I felt my throat get tight.
Tate went on. “We’ll get married in April, anniversary we met.”
I swallowed and couldn’t tear my eyes from the ring.
Tate continued. “You want a big thing, we can do that, but, babe, I’d prefer it small.”
I stood statue-still, fingers frozen clutching his arm, eyes still locked on the ring.
Tate carried on. “Same people there as tonight, ‘cept your family too.”
I finally pulled my eyes from the ring and looked at the lights of Carnal but I still didn’t speak.
This went on for awhile and Tate’s arms, now both wrapped around me again, gave me a tight squeeze.
“Laurie?” he called.
“You spent thousands of dollars on me for my birthday,” I said, my voice rough, abrasive, sounding weird.
His arms squeezed me tight again but they stayed tight this time.
“Yeah, babe, and I get why you didn’t want to make a big thing about it but that shit’s whacked. That isn’t a lesson to Jonas. The lesson he needs to learn is life goes on and we’re lucky enough to be livin’ it so we should do it, as much as we can, while we got the chance.”
It was like he didn’t speak.
“You spent thousands of dollars on me for my birthday,” I reiterated.
He sighed then replied, “Overhead’s reduced, Ace, shit’s not tight. It ain’t even comfortable. We’re good, more than good.”
“Martinis and top of the line appliances,” I whispered.
I felt Tate’s body shift into hardness when he muttered, “Somethin’ like that.”
I stared at Carnal and Tate’s arms remained around me, his body solid behind me.
“Lauren,” he called again but I didn’t answer, I stared at Carnal, a Nowheresville town that looked magical after midnight. “Shit, baby, give me something,” Tate growled in my ear.
“Brad never remembered my birthday,” I told him.
Tate made a move as if to shift me, turn me toward him but my fingers curled deeper into his arm and he stilled.
“When he asked me to marry him, the first thing I felt was fear,” I went on.
“Ace –”
“Fear because I wanted him and I knew, eventually, I’d make it so he didn’t want me.”
“Lauren –”
“And I did,” I continued.
“Christ almighty, Laurie, I thought we were passed –”
“Not once, not once in all the years I was with him did I feel happy.”
Tate was silent.
“Not even a little,” I said.
Tate remained silent and so did I and we both stayed this way for a long time.
Finally, Tate asked, “You happy now, baby?”
“Yes,” I answered instantly and felt his face in my neck. “A small wedding,” I whispered. “Maybe Ned and Betty will let us have a pool party after.”
His head lifted and his voice was a thick growl when he said, “Sounds good.”
“You fucked up, Captain,” I told him and his arms got even tighter.
“Come again?”
“I’m not drunk anymore. You could have had Drunk Lauren Sex.”
I felt his body moving behind me and I knew it was with laughter.
“I was in the mood to attack,” I informed him. “You could definitely have had it dirty. You could have had anything you wanted.”
“I don’t get that now?” he asked, his voice still thick and now rumbly but with humor.
“Oh yeah, you still get it,” I started to turn, his arms loosened, I faced him and mine went around his neck as I pressed deep into him. “But it’s my birthday and I’m not drunk anymore so now you have to do all the work.”
His mouth came to mine and he muttered, “I’m up for that.”
I pressed my lips to his, opened my mouth and slid my tongue inside. Tate’s head slanted and his hand sifted into my hair, tilting mine the other way as he took the kiss far deeper and made it much, much better.
When his lips broke from mine, he whispered, “Happy birthday, baby.”
To which, I whispered back, “Love you, Tate.”
His neck bent, his lips brushed mine and then slid to my ear, where he kept whispering, “Love you too, babe.”
I melted completely into my old man thinking how could I ever have not wanted him to call me babe?
Chapter Twenty-Seven
December
The garage door was going up, Tate was turning the key in the ignition and I was strapping in when I remembered to ask Jonas, “Did you get the gift for your teacher?”
“Where was that again?” Jonas asked from the backseat.
I twisted to look at him. “On the kitchen island.”
His eyes hit mine and he muttered, “Whoops.”
“Go get it, Bub,” Tate said from behind the wheel.
I twisted to forward as I heard Jonas unbuckle his seatbelt, open his door and jump from the SUV. As he ran across the front of the truck, I remembered something else, unbuckled my own seat belt, leaned clean across Tate, hit his electric window opener and shouted as the window rolled down, “Did you get your Secret Santa gift?” right before Jonas hit the door to the mudroom.
“It’s in my backpack,” he yelled back.
“And the cookies for your class party?” I bellowed.
Jonas was inside and his disembodied voice could be heard hollering back, “Backpack!”
I closed the window and sat back. I’d buckled my seatbelt again when I felt eyes on me and I looked at T
“What?” I asked.
“Christ almighty, Ace, you’re like the Christmas Beast.”
My eyes narrowed, Tate watched them and his lips twitched so they narrowed further.
The Christmas Beast, easy for him to say.
He didn’t buy Christmas cards, write and festively design a witty Christmas letter (with pictures, which I sent to all my old friends in Phoenix because any picture with Tate in it, and I included loads of them, would make them all green-eyed with jealousy), print out dozens of letters, sign the cards, address them and send them.
He didn’t buy presents for everyone we knew, wrap them and deliver them, packing up the ones to send to Indiana because, with baggage restrictions, we couldn’t carry them with us. This meant I had to memorize the post office’s schedule and rush around so I was sure the packages were away on time.
He didn’t bake twelve dozen Christmas cookies to sell at the Junior Football League’s table at the Christmas Fair in Carnal in an effort to help the Moms raise a bunch of money because the boys needed new jerseys and equipment for the next season. He also didn’t man that booth for five hours in the Colorado Mountain cold.
He didn’t organize, put together party trays, coordinate the staff Secret Santa gift exchange and throw the Christmas party at Bubba’s for staff and regulars and whoever was around including a big bowl of spiked eggnog and another big bowl of spiked, spiced Christmas punch on the bar with the trays covered in cheeses, cold cuts, veggies, varied Christmas treats and bowls of chips in the office for the staff (as well as Jim-Billy, Nadine, Steg, Wings, Stoney and select other regulars) to munch on through shift. He also didn’t decorate Bubba’s. Me, Wendy, Jim-Billy, Amber and Krys did.
Further, he didn’t have many Christmas decorations at his house but even so, he didn’t run around Carnal, Chantelle, Gnaw Bone and the mall finding decorations, lights, Christmas cookie jars (for the personal cookies I made us), Christmas dishtowels and bathroom hand towels (because even bathrooms needed Christmas cheer). Okay, so he set up the tree and he and Jonas did a really good job on the outside lights and they both helped decorate the tree, but the rest of the house was all me. We were going to Indiana for Christmas, leaving the next day, but that didn’t mean we didn’t need a little bit of Christmas at home on the lead up to it.