Chapter 13
"How'd you do, New Girl?"
Morgan stuck her wad of cash into her purse without looking at the woman in the red wig who she had learned was named Lindy. "Alright." She had made double what she had expected in tips. It was enough to confirm that this job was the right decision. The fact that she felt filthy after a night with drunk guys trying to put their hands on her was outweighed by the money. She reminded herself of that. Again.
"She did great," Emme said.
Morgan sighed in relief when she stepped out of her four inch heels. She wanted a shower, but changing back into leggings and her loose t-shirt was still an improvement.
"Are you coming out with us?" Emme asked.
Morgan lifted a brow at her in question.
Emme pulled her teased hair back into a ponytail, looking more relaxed in a sweatshirt and jeans even with her heavy makeup that mirrored Morgan's still in place. "Over to Spike's."
"The bartender," Lindy clarified when Morgan didn't respond.
"We go over there and blow off steam most nights. Some of the girls, the bouncer, Spike, whoever wants to go." Emme smiled encouragingly. "You should come."
Anything sounded better than heading back to Buck's. Or being alone with her thoughts. "Sounds good." She lifted her oversized purse, hands more relaxed on the handles than they had been when she had arrived for work. She typed the address into her phone and walked out to her car at the far edge of the lot with Emme.
Spike's apartment wasn't far from the club. It was farther into the abyss of the depressed neighborhood. It reminded her a little of Vin's apartment building, but without the hope of better days the families she had seen occupying the building at Vin's represented.
"Hey," the bartender said when he opened the door to Morgan.
She responded with a lift of her brow, moving past him into the apartment that boasted minimal furniture and a handful of strippers. The bouncer, sat back on the couch, listening to something Lindy said.
Morgan noticed it had the same worn furniture Vin's apartment had, but none of the bookshelves of audio books. She caught herself before she looked for anything else that would remind her of Vin. There was no reason for her to be thinking of him.
Determined to think of anything but Vin, she took the beer Spike handed her from the fridge and moved to hear what Lindy was saying that made the bouncer laugh.
#
Chris didn't want to run into Morgan. Not after what had happened. After what he let happen.
"What's your problem, Larabee?" Buck asked, grabbing a bottled water from the fridge and tossing it towards Chris. "You're like a bear with a sore paw."
Chris grunted in lieu of an answer. Telling Buck that Morgan had all but seduced him, and he had all but let her, wasn't something that was going to happen. He had known Morgan for years. He knew how reckless she was, how punitive she could be when she was pissed off. And he had pissed her off. She had struck out at him as hard as she could and it had worked. He felt lower than low.
Chris went back into the living room. "Ezra going to grace us with his presence?" he asked.
He wished he had insisted they have their debriefing with Ezra at the office. Or at his place. But it was Sunday and no one wanted to be in the office. And it wasn't fair to make Ezra drive the 45 minutes out of Denver to get to his place after being up all night.
"He'll be here, Cowboy," Vin said, looking at Chris.
Chris fought the urge to squirm. No way Vin knew what happened with Morgan. Being so on edge was getting him riled. And the thought of Morgan coming through the door at any time had him ready to snap.
There was a knock at the door and it opened, Ezra coming in, somehow looking like he hadn't been in a seedy strip club overnight.
"Hey, Ezra," Buck called, coming into the room with his phone out and a paper menu in hand. "I'm going to order brunch from Inez. Any requests?"
"I didn't realize she delivered," Ezra said, moving to the couch and settling in. He took a look at what JD had pulled up on his laptop screen.
"She does for me," Buck grinned. "That woman likes me. It's only a matter of time before she gives in to my charm."
"A lovely sentiment," Ezra muttered. Chris let out a soft huff in agreement with Ezra.
"Let's get started," Chris said. Maybe they could get this wrapped up before Morgan made an appearance. "What did you find out, Ezra? Who all's at the club?"
Ezra's face shifted almost imperceptibly before returning to neutral. "Not who you would expect."
Josiah reached for his notepad on the coffee table and grabbed his pen. "They aren't using it as a front for what they're moving?"
Ezra cleared his throat. "What I mean is, the manager is definitely managing more than the legitimate enterprise of peddling seduction."
"Um, Ezra," JD interrupted. "Can you just talk in English?"
"He manages the strip club, and the guns," Ezra clarified with a slight smile for the youngest team member. "But there are also regular appearances by all manner of other players."
Before he could tell them where his suspicions came from, the door opened and a disheveled Morgan stepped through the door. Her heavily lined eyes didn't hide her surprise. Just like the heavy makeup didn't hide the way her eyes narrowed at Chris when she saw him.
Buck made a show of looking at his watch. "Nine am," he said. "Longest waitressing shift I ever heard of."
Morgan shifted her eyes from Chris towards her brother. "I went out with my coworkers afterwards." She looked back at Chris and gave him a tight smile. "They're really nice. They don't pass judgment on people every chance they get."
Chris clenched his jaw to hold back a response. This wasn't the place for that discussion.
Morgan's eyes flicked over Nathan, Josiah, and paused at Ezra, landed on JD and she smiled. "Morning, JD. You want to come out with me next time? We can have a real wild time."
JD coughed, started choking, and Josiah gave him a thump on the back while Nathan moved a bottle of water closer to him. Chris wondered if the kid would survive another week of Morgan's teasing. He wondered if he would survive another attack from Morgan himself.
Then Morgan's eyes flicked over Vin. The hesitation was so brief, Chris wasn't sure anyone else would catch it, and then Morgan was heading up the stairs.
Buck let out a long sigh and looked over at Chris, his brunch menu forgotten, dangling from his fingers. "I don't know what to do with her, Chris. Just let this slide?" Then his eyes lit up. "Maybe you could talk to her. You've always been just like a brother to her. Maybe she'd open up to—"
Chris cut him off, guilt and betrayal knifing his gut. "Let's get to work." He turned his attention back to Ezra, needing to focus on work, on something he had some control over.
#
Vin could see how guarded Morgan was. More than before they had left for Vegas. Worse than that, she looked lost. The hollowness that was starting to move into her eyes is what drew him away from the others when they finally took a break and Buck called over to The Saloon for food.
He moved to the stairs and went upstairs quickly, knowing the others would figure he had gone outside for a breather, like he often did when he had been stuck in a meeting with pages of information to read for too long.
The door to JD's room was open and Vin caught sight of the electronics JD was so fond of collecting and modifying. His desk looked like NASA control. Morgan's door was cracked open. Vin knocked on the door jam.
She turned from where she was emptying one of the boxes she had kept with her, rather than storing at Chris'. She saw him and the ache in her eyes was so quickly covered he would have doubted himself if he wasn't starting to know what she kept hidden beneath the surface of her untouchable exterior. She looked back down at the dress she held, carefully folding it and adding it to the pile of clothes she was stacking in two laundry baskets.
"I thought you'd be sleepin' by now," Vin commented, leaning against the door frame.
"I can't," Morgan said without elaborating, continuing her task. She had washed her face and for a second Vin realized it was like seeing her without her armor. Her hair was pulled back, escaping a messy knot, and her oversized t-shirt slipped off one shoulder revealing a lacy strap underneath.
"Things go ok at the new job?" he asked, concerned.
"Fine," she said, unconvincingly.
He pushed off the frame and moved towards her. He saw how tightly she held her shoulders.
He sat on the unmade bed next to her stack of unfolded clothes. She kept working silently. He picked up a sequined shirt and folded it, adding it to the laundry basket.
They worked together in silence until the pile of clothes was all stored orderly in the laundry baskets. Morgan looked away from her project for the first time. She looked lost as she looked around the room, clearly finding nothing else to occupy her.
"Hey," Vin said softly. She was standing near enough that she brushed against his knee. He gently reached a hand out to her. He wasn't sure if he pulled her closer, or if she moved toward him. But then she was standing in front of him, his legs on either side of her, her hands in his. "You don't have to do this on your own." He wasn't entirely sure what it was she was doing on her own. But whatever it was, he would be with her. All she had to do was let him.
Morgan shook her head, her chin moving out stubbornly.
One side of Vin's mouth lifted in a resigned smile. "I'm here," he said.
"I know," Morgan finally spoke. Her eyes hardened. "That's the problem."
"That's a problem?" he asked, not following her.
Morgan clamped her lips shut and looked over his shoulder, fixing her eyes on a blank space on the wall. She started to pull her hands out of Vin's. Vin just barely tightened his grip, wanting to keep her close, to keep her from whatever put the blank look in her eyes.
"I'm a problem," she said. She spoke through clenched teeth, keeping her eyes fixed on anything but him. "I'm not doing this. Not to you, Vin. Not when you deserve—"
And then Vin was on his feet, his hands moving from hers to her hair, brushing it back from her face, his fingertips tracing the line of her cheekbones, her jaw, her skin softer than anything he had ever touched. He was so close to her. Her breath lightly tickled his lips.
From downstairs he could hear the rumbled of Josiah's laughter followed by a protest from JD. But it didn't register with him. Morgan filled all his senses. Her eyes and the gold flecks in them, the sound of her unsteady breaths, the feel of her skin under his fingers, the rose scent that uniquely hers…and then the taste of her when he gently brushed his lips against hers.
Morgan hesitated. Vin waited, not pushing. And then she kissed him back. Her lips finding his, pulling at him with her lips, her fingers. Everything about her pulled at him, needing him and Vin tried to give her everything.
He felt her fingers at the back of his head, pulling him in closer to the kiss, deepening the contact until her mouth was open. His hands moved to her hips, their curve a perfect fit for his hands, but he didn't dare pull her against him. He didn't want to do anything that would make her feel pressured, or like she was being grabbed at. He wanted what was between them to be just about them, untainted by anything that would trigger a memory of how she was manhandled in Vegas.
"Vin." His name came out on a breath and Vin responded by nipping at her lower lip. Morgan let out a soft hum, her fingers curling into his hair.
Downstairs Buck let out a yell, followed by Chris' curse, and laughter from all of them. Morgan froze for an instant, her lips still caught by him.
And then she was pulling a way, shaking her head. "This…No." Her hands were curled into white knuckled fists instead of curled in his hair. The distance she created when she stepped back spanned more than the three feet she put between them.
Vin started to say something, anything, to reassure her, to keep her from doing this, but she cut him off, her voice harsh.
"This is wrong. So wrong." She took another step back, her flushed cheeks and swollen lips at odds with the unbreakable hardness of her jaw, the impenetrable barrier covering any emotion in her eyes.
"It ain't," Vin said. "The way I feel about ya, Morgan—"
"Stop it," she snapped. "You know I'm just going to hurt you."
Vin shook his head, not sure where this was coming from. He scrambled for words to counter what she was saying, but she was faster.
"You really don't back down from a fight, do you?"
Vin couldn't figure out why she thought that, who would have told her that. "I don't give up on the people I care about."
"Well stop," she bit out. "Stop caring." She shook her head, looking at him like she couldn't understand him. When he took a step toward her, she glared at him, jerking back to stay out of reach. Then she pressed her lips together so tightly they turned white and tore her gaze away from him, making it to the door before he could stop her. Vin followed after her, hearing her steps hurrying down the stairs before he got to the top of the staircase, hurrying down the steps after her. She slammed the front door on her way out, and Vin yanked it open and went out after her.
#
"Don't you dare do anything to ruin my chances with Inez!" Buck yelled out good-naturedly.
Chris let out a comment, followed by a curse that told of what he thought of Buck's chances with Inez and Nathan's chuckle was joined by the laughter of the other men.
Buck clutched a hand to his chest, feigning deep hurt at the mockery, but couldn't keep his grin at bay.
These men, his family, gave him what he needed. A break from the drama Morgan brought with her. A chance to laugh and shake off the worry for her, however brief that lasted.
He was going to get his wallet so he had the money ready for Inez when she came, knowing she couldn't be away from her bar and grill long during the Sunday brunch hour she was working so hard to get going. He heard the front door slam loud enough to rattle the big bay window in the living room. He jolted at the sound and saw Vin tear towards the door, out the door, and it slammed behind him.
"What was that?" Buck asked. He looked around the room, seeing everyone except Vin. Which meant it was Morgan who had stormed out. With Vin running after her. He looked over at Chris and Chris' eyes were fixed on the floor. His lips were held together tightly and Buck knew he was counting to ten in his head. Not that Larabee ever made it past three. Buck wasn't waiting around to count to three. He went out the front door after his sister and his teammate.
Outside, Morgan was on the front lawn and Vin was asking her to talk to him. Buck pulled up alongside Vin just as Morgan whirled around and told Vin to get lost. She looked like she was including Buck in that order.
"What's goin' on?" Buck asked. And then he looked closer at the look on Vin's face. Turning back to Morgan, his voice edged up a notch. "What's goin' on with you and Vin?"
Morgan threw her hands in the air. "Oh my—NOTHING. Nothing is going on."
Vin didn't look shook up, but he didn't agree with Morgan, either.
Chris joined them on the lawn, his face drawn into something unreadable. Morgan glared at him and Buck felt like he was coming into play halfway through the second act. It wasn't a good feeling.
"I'm not with Vin," Morgan reiterated, flinging the words toward Chris. Chris didn't respond.
"You could be," Vin said quietly. Buck whipped his head around to look at Vin. Before he could even think of what he should say to that, Morgan spoke again.
"There's someone else."
Buck didn't miss the flash of pain that crossed Vin's face, or the anger that was brewing on Chris'. An unfamiliar expression pulled at Morgan's lips. Buck had never seen it from Morgan before and it took him a second to recognize it. Guilt.
"No there ain't," Vin said. "You don't have to do this—"
"I'll bring him by the office this week," Morgan declared, bravado squaring her shoulders. She flashed a look at Chris and the anger on her face matched his. "I'm not with Vin. I'm not with anyone you care about."
"Morgan," Chris started, her name somewhere between a warning and a sigh.
But Morgan had dug in her heels and Buck knew the conversation was over. She looked at the three of them. "I'm going to get to sleep." She looked at Buck. "I'm steering clear of your friends." A quick look at Chris. "All of them."
The three of them stood in silence while Morgan strode back into the house.
Buck finally spoke. "What the hell is going on?"
#
