Rule. Jay Crownover

my slacks.

      “It was bad today?” Ayden was from Kentucky and her Southern drawl rolled over me like a soothing balm.

      “He was with some skank again, he had a hickey the size of Alaska on his neck, my mortal enemy from high school hit on him at Starbucks, and it took Margot and Dale less than a minute to insult his clothes and hair and remind him he is not now nor will he ever be his dead twin brother. Luckily, this time they left out his job and disregard for manners, but he blew his top and stormed out. They’ve all decided it’s best we no longer come up on Sundays, making this the second family I’ve been a part of that can’t figure it out and just love and appreciate one another. To top it all off, Gabe has been blowing up my phone all day and I can’t think of anyone I want to talk to less. So yeah, it was really fucking bad today.”

      She brushed a hand over my hair and laughed softly. “Girl, the situations you find yourself in.”

      “Tell me about it.”

      “Did you give him the key to his place back?”

      I moaned a little and buried my head in the pillow. “No. I totally spaced out, but it’s not like I’m in any hurry to walk in on him and two girls at once again. Honestly I’ll be super glad to never have to see Rule’s pierced junk again.”

      She snickered a laugh at me and rolled over onto her back so that she was staring at the ceiling. Ayden’s hair was as black as mine was blond and cut in a funky short pixie style. She had big whiskey-colored eyes and a heart that was pure gold. Besides Remy, she was the best friend I’d ever had. I loved her for not making me have to lay it all out for her to sift through—she just got it. While she might not understand how I spent my time equally loathing and loving a person who viewed me as nothing more than a nuisance, she never condemned or criticized me for it.

      “That boy, he is a handful.”

      “I don’t know, maybe the space will be good for me. Maybe time away from the whole family will finally give me the breathing room to kill the way I’ve always felt about him. I can’t spend the rest of my life walking away from other people just because they aren’t Rule.”

      “Well, I can’t say I’m sorry to see Gabe go, but you do deserve someone who treats you amazing and loves you in all the right ways. You’ve earned it, because no one I’ve ever met in my whole life loves as freely and gives as much as you do. Seeing as those parents of yours might as well be carved out of ice, that’s just a damn miracle. You’re a good girl, Shaw, and at the very least you deserve a good guy.”

      I folded my hands together on the bed and laid my cheek down on them. My head was slowly starting to stop throbbing and all I wanted to do was take a nap and maybe work on processing everything that had happened today.

      Ayden was right; I did deserve a good guy. I knew what one looked like, knew what one acted like, in fact I had been best friends with the ultimate good guy. Remy embodied everything any sane girl would want in a boyfriend and yet I had never had those feelings for him, not once. I remembered clearly the first time he had taken me home with him. I was fourteen and having a really hard time fitting in with all the preppy, rich kids my first year of high school. I know now that image and brands mattered, but back then I just wanted to wear jeans and my hair in a ponytail. Remy had been sixteen and captain of the football team. He found me crying outside the girls’ locker room one day after a particularly nasty verbal beat-down from Amy and her crew. He didn’t make fun of me, didn’t ask questions or get all weird because I was a freshman and he was a junior. He just bundled me up and carted me home with him because I was sad and alone and he didn’t want me to be either of those things ever again. He told me he could tell by my eyes that I was a kind person, that I needed someone to look out for me, and from that minute on he decided he would be the person to do it. I remembered all the warm and fuzzy feelings that came with that moment, remembered the gratitude and overwhelming joy I felt at finally having someone see how worthy and deserving of unconditional love I was, but what I remembered most was everything inside me going upside down when Rule walked into the kitchen and tilted his chin at me and asked, “Who’s the chick?”

      My heart stopped beating, my lungs felt like they were going to collapse, my skin was suddenly too tight all over my body, and I couldn’t form a rational thought or a coherent sentence. Back then I chalked it up to a silly teenage crush; all the Archer boys were good-looking and had qualities that made them larger than life. Every girl I knew had had the prerequisite infatuation with a bad boy at one time or another. Of course, they normally grew out of it when they realized the bad boy was just an ass and they deserved to be treated better. But as time went on and things changed, my feelings never did even though it was clear they were never going to be returned. Rule only saw me as Remy’s little tagalong; a spoiled little rich girl, and then as we got older, as Remy’s girlfriend. That sucked because I had never been any of those things and as a result I sabotaged relationships, turned down guy after guy simply because I didn’t want a good guy—I wanted the one who was damaged and blind to the way I felt.

      I was a good girl. I was loyal and honest and I worked hard and invested a lot of time and energy in building a secure future for myself. I stayed out of trouble and went out of my way to try to be the polished and perfect daughter my parents wanted me to be, and the successful, driven woman the Archers had given me the confidence to be. What I never spent any time being was the person that I actually felt like I was. She was locked somewhere deep inside me, suffocating and still holding on to the hope that Rule would notice she was alive. It was exhausting, and in the vulnerable moments when I was brutally honest with myself, I had to admit I wasn’t sure how much longer I could keep it up.

      CHAPTER 3

       Rule

      It was a crazy busy week at the shop. I think mostly because we were right in the thick of tax refund time and people had extra money to spend. I was booked with back-to-back appointments all the way through Saturday and even went in on my day off to work on a guy’s sleeve I had started a few months ago. Nash was just as booked as I was. When Saturday night rolled around we were both ready to let loose and tie one on. Sunday morning went about the same as last week, only this time when I walked the girl to her car I didn’t have to worry about Shaw bursting in on a scene I didn’t want her to see. I called Rome to see when he was going to come to town, but apparently things at home weren’t any better after last week so he wasn’t ready to leave Mom on her own yet. I wanted to care, wanted to feel bad for her, but I just couldn’t muster it up.

      I was getting ready to crack open a beer and plop in front of the flat-screen to relax and watch the game, when Nash came out of his room pulling on a hoodie and a black ball cap over his shaved head. He was a few inches shorter than me, built a lot stockier, but in all actuality was a hell of a lot better looking. He kept his black hair shaved close to the scalp because he had twin tattoos on the sides of his head. His bright, bright eyes looked more purple than blue and always stood out starkly against his much darker complexion. He didn’t have as much metal in his face as I did, just a hoop through the center of his nose and both ears sporting obsidian gauges. For whatever reason, he kept his hands and neck free of ink, which always made me laugh because of the stuff permanently marked on his head. We were a matched set, so when we went out together it was usually a given we wouldn’t have to come home alone. Nash was a much nicer guy than I was; he just looked several degrees more badass.

      “Jet and Rowdy are at the Goal Line watching the game. They wanna hang out if you’re down.”

      Rowdy worked at the shop with us and Jet was the lead singer of a local metal band we liked—they rounded out the group that Nash and I traveled in. Going to the bar to watch the game sounded a lot more fun than brooding on the couch by myself, so I put my beer back in the fridge and shoved my feet into my black boots.

      Nash drove a fully restored ’73 Dodge Charger. It was a monster of black, chrome, and motor. I was pretty sure everyone in the apartment complex knew whenever we were coming or going because it was just that loud and thunderous, but it was a cool ride. I knew it meant a lot to him because