SURVIVING SAVANNAH: GODS OF CHAOS MC (BOOK 16), Honey Palomino [ebook offline reader .TXT] 📗

“I had a tofu and spinach bowl the other day in Portland with my friend Slade,” I said.

“Is that so? Well, maybe things are changing all over the place.”

“So, what else has changed?”

“Oh, you know. People died, kids were born. Marriages, divorces, cheating scandals. I could tell you stories for days.”

“I bet you could,” I laughed, grabbing a beer from her fridge and popping it open. I took a big long drink, the cold amber liquid coursing through me.

“Any Denny sightings?”

“No, the fucker,” she scoffed. Denny was Snake’s dad, and he had gone AWOL shortly after he was born.

“Fucker,” I agreed, shaking my head.

“I heard there’s been a couple of murders the last few years. Some creepy shit everyone is talking about?”

I tried to ask carefully, but again, she can see right through me.

“Why are you here?” she asked again, bluntly. Sera knew I’d joined up with the Gods. She knew what we did, in the vaguest of terms. I’d never really gone into detail about how we did what we did, as much as I told her what we did. I always figured the less she knew, the better.

“I’m investigating a case,” I admitted.

“What case? The murders?”

“Sort of,” I shrugged.

“How many questions do I have to ask you to get a straight answer? Spill it!” she insisted.

“Fine,” I laughed. She’d always had a relentless pursuit for the truth, coupled with extreme impatience. “An old friend of the club was investigating the murders of the two girls. She was here in town and was in an accident. Her sister thinks it was foul play. We’re here checking things out.”

“And if it was? Foul play?”

“I’m not sure,” I shrugged, again. “We’ll go where the information takes us.”

“Who is us? I thought you were alone.”

“I’m not alone, I’m with a few other people,” I said. “But remember, you don’t know a thing.”

“I see,” she said. “I knew you didn’t come just to visit.”

“Sis, as much as I love you and Snake, you know this isn’t my favorite place in the world.”

“It was at one time,” she said.

“Maybe,” I replied. “But that was a lifetime ago. I’m not the same person I was when I left.”

“No, you aren’t,” she agreed. “I guess none of us are the same as we were back then.”

“Do you miss it? Our youth? The good ol’ days?”

“Sure, don’t you?”

“I try not to,” I said.

“You never should have left,” she said. She’d said this to me countless times over the years.

“You know I had to,” I said. After her dog was killed, Sera grew up rather quickly. She understood how this town worked back then and she surely understood it now.

“I still think you should have stayed. It’s not like Rose was happy after you broke up. She got with Derek and she was miserable. I’m pretty sure she’s still miserable now that they’re broken up, too.”

I almost choked on my beer.

“What?” I managed to growl out.

“You didn’t know?”

“No,” I said, my eyes wide. “Rose and Derek broke up?”

“She asked him for a divorce. Honestly, when I first saw you, I thought that was why you came back.”

“No, I didn’t come back for Rose,” I said, my head spinning. I had just assumed she was still married, and I didn’t even glance at her ring finger when I’d seen her at the park. Why hadn’t she mentioned it?

“Well, now you know,” she said, winking. “Might be time to pay her a visit.”

“I just saw her.”

“What!”

“At the park, with Snake. We had a brief conversation, but she didn’t even mention Derek. I didn’t think to ask.”

“Interesting,” she said, laughing. “Maybe you two should hang out a little longer.”

“I’m not getting back together with Rose, Seraphina,” I said. “And don’t you meddle!”

“Me? Meddle?” she asked, her eyes wide with mock innocence.

“I’m not kidding!” I said.

She kept laughing and walked out of the kitchen, leaving me alone with my thoughts.

Did Rose being single change anything?

Of course not. Just like seeing her at the park hadn’t changed anything. We’d both gone on with our lives and whatever we had between us only existed decades ago, when we were just kids.

As I walked out to my bike and started it up again, I couldn’t shake the truth staring me right in the face.

It may have been a lifetime ago, but those feelings between us seemed to come roaring back to life as soon as she was in front of me again. The energy between us at the park was undeniable.

And as much as I tried to push them away as I wound through the streets of town, my heart’s memory hadn’t forgotten for a second. Now that I’d shone a light on that dark corner I’d pushed Rose’s memory into, everything was rushing right back to the surface like nothing had ever come between us.

Chapter 15

ROSE

Lately, most of my days seemed to come to a close while I sat on my porch with a glass of wine and tried to forget how lonely I was.

Today was no exception, except that the loneliness seemed to be even more intense after running into Blade.

I was lonely long before I broke up with Derek. I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d been properly kissed, or even really treated like a woman. If I’m being honest, the last time my heart raced from kissing a man was probably the last time I kissed Blade.

Derek never did much for me at all. He was like a conciliatory prize after losing the man I really wanted. I figured at the time, if I couldn’t have love, at least I could have a good life as Derek’s wife, I could have the stability I always dreamed of, a nice house in Savannah, a few kids to raise.

I’d be a proper Southern woman, just like I was raised to be.

Just like everyone expected me to be.

I knew it would be hard without truly loving the person I was making this life with, but