My voice broke.
There was so much I needed to say, but my pride wouldn't allow it.
Then the door to the minivan opened and MacKenzie, April and Crunch’s little girl, came running out, wrapping herself around my leg. “Uncle Axe! Uncle Axe! Are you okay? Why did he hit you?” She started bawling, and I picked her up, patting her back.
“It’s okay, Mac,” I said. “He was just joking. You know Uncle Axe is too tough for anything to hurt him.”
“No?” she asked.
“Not at all,” I said, brushing my thumb against her cheek, wet with tears. “Do you know who this guy right here is? This is your Uncle Axe’s old man.”
My father glared at me, then turned to MacKenzie, his voice now soft. “I didn’t know you were watching, little lady. I certainly didn’t mean to scare you.”
MacKenzie’s mother, April, scooped her up in her arms, hushing her as she went to stand near Crunch. My father turned toward me, his voice low. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me there was a kid with you?”
“You didn’t give me a chance, Pop.”
“What the hell is going on? What kind of trouble are you in?”
“I need a chance to explain, but this isn’t the time. It’s not what you think.”
Well, it was probably almost exactly what he thought. I knew he thought I was in some kind of trouble connected to the MC, and he would be right.
“You better hope it’s not what I think. Because if it is -”
“It’s not.” I clenched my jaw. He’d help me. Even if my father disagreed with everything I had done, even if he hated the person I had become, he was still my father and he would help me.
“Well, come on in, then.” My father gestured to Crunch and his family, his voice falsely bright. I knew he would make nice with Crunch’s family here, especially with MacKenzie being with us. It had always killed him and my mom, the fact that they didn't have any grandkids. “I was just having a cup of coffee on the porch here with my new neighbor, June. Are you all hungry?”
“Yes!” the little girl shouted, running up the stairs. “And I have to pee!” April and Crunch closely trailed her, and my father followed behind.
“Hi, lady!” Mac waved as she passed June. “Is there a potty in here?”
"Hush, Mac," April whispered as she walked through the door.
June smiled at MacKenzie, and then looked up at me. “Cade.”
Cade.
I hadn't been called Cade in years.
"Hi, Junebug.” I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Sure, it was something like twenty years later, but it was just like being a teenager again.
“No one’s called me Junebug in forever,” she said. When she stepped forward, kissing me on the cheek, her lips smooth against my skin, I felt an immediate jolt. It was that familiar electricity between us that had always existed.
She pulled back and I grabbed her arms, the instinct to hold her taking over me. I didn't want to let her go. Gazing into her eyes was like taking a twenty-year journey back in time. For a split second, I saw it in her eyes - that look.
It was the same look she used to give me when we were teenagers.
That same way she had looked at me before her sister died.
I had the nearly irresistible urge to pull her into me and cover her mouth with mine. But then I felt her pull back, and the moment passed.
I let her go.
“You look different,” she said.
Different.
You look like shit would probably have been more accurate. Could she see the darkness that surrounded me now? Sometimes I felt like it oozed from my pores, seeped out, stinking up everything I got near.
“You haven’t changed a bit,” I said. No, that wasn’t true at all. Her face no longer held the same innocence it did back then, and I knew there was pain behind her eyes. But she wore that pain beautifully, etched into the lines on her face.
June laughed, the sound light, and I instantly ached to hear it more. “I hope that’s not true.” She was silent for a minute. Then, “You’re a biker now."
"Yeah." Why did I feel ashamed admitting that to her?
"Axe, huh?" She pointed at the name on my leather cut. "One percent."
I could feel my face get warm. I didn't want to explain why I was called Axe. Or what one percent meant. Not to her. She was too good for that shit.
I changed the subject. “I heard you’re in the Navy.”
“I was," she said, leaning back on the porch railing. "But I'm here now. I got out."
“You’re back in town?” I asked. “For good?”
I was suddenly interested in her answer. Why the hell did I care? This wasn't a fucking social visit, and neither of us were the same people we were when we were kids.
"Yeah," she said, tucking her hair behind her ear and biting on her lip. I couldn't stop looking at her mouth, at the nervous gesture, the thing she would do when she wanted me, back when we were sixteen and couldn't keep our hands off each other. I don't even think she ever knew she was doing it.
I wondered if she knew what she was doing to me now, if she knew I wanted to rip her clothes off and take her right here in the driveway.