Rooster pulled his bike into the parking lot of Roni's apartment building and cut it off. He sat there for what seemed like forever. Since talking to Cash, he had gone back and forth with whether he should tell Roni what was going on with Drew. He still hadn't been able to make a gut decision. For once, he wanted to be completely selfish, he wanted them to have a real shot at a forever. If he told her what he had found out, that could potentially put a stop to the relationship they had begun to build. He knew it was misguided, but he felt responsible for not only Drew but the other kids at the school. He had been an officer for the county; he was supposed to have kept them all safe, keep all the bad shit away. It was still hard, at times, for him to turn off what his former life had been. What if she blamed him for this too? It was something else in a long line of ways he'd failed her. What would he do if that happened? He wasn't sure he could stomach it again. For a few more days, he
Roni dug her fingers into his hair when she felt his big hands cup her ass and lift, bringing her legs around his waist. In the water, in this position, she was weightless. It pushed her further up the rock so that his mouth was even with her chest. It seemed like forever that he stared at her before he glanced up, gave her a grin, and dove headfirst into his mission of blowing her mind.There was one thing he hadn't been as a teenager, and that was smooth. He'd learned over the years what women liked and what they didn't. He hoped that Roni was similar to most women he'd encountered since their split. Using the flat of his tongue, he licked a path to where her nipples jutted at him, capturing one in his mouth, worrying the nub with his teeth. He felt the pull of her fingers against his scalp, and then he felt her press harder."Don't stop, Rooster," she moaned.Those words affected him like no others could. He hadn't heard them from her in years, and to know she was with him in
Rooster was beginning to get frustrated. He'd figured out without a whole lot of trouble which kids at the high school were the ones dealing the steroids, and he kind of had an idea as to who the kids were that were taking them. Drew and his best friend Dalton Morrison were knee-deep in this whole situation. He still hadn't found out a way to tell Liam, he was still skirting the truth with Roni, and he was pissed about the whole situation. He was selfish because half of the reason he wasn't confirming anything about Drew was because he didn't want Liam to shoot the messenger. His biggest fear was that Liam and Roni would say he was lying and be done with him, even if they both suspected that Drew had a problem. In his experience, when telling people things they didn't want to hear, it was easy as fuck to turn a blind eye and accuse the person bringing the truth to them. The hardest thing to do was to sit back and wait for it all to unfold, but that's what he kept telling himself that h
An hour later, Rooster had what he was looking for and Travis was asking questions that he knew he couldn't answer. That seemed to be his token job lately, having answers that he couldn't reveal."This is the high school football coach. What the fuck is going on?" Travis whispered as he held onto the papers he had printed for Rooster."I can't explain that right now, I need this information, so I need you to let go of the fucking paper," he whispered back.It was stupid, the two of them whisper shouting at each other in Steele's cave, but Rooster couldn't afford to let someone else hear them. What if Liam heard and then he had to confess that he'd kept all of this a secret? That he hadn't been completely on the up and up. It made his stomach hurt, but he didn't want to cause emotional pain to anyone until he knew exactly what he was dealing with. It didn't matter that he was waiting to get a bead on everything, to find out if what he thought was true was actually true. Liam wasn'
Roni sat on the couch in Doc Jones office, wringing her hands together. She wasn't sure how people were supposed to feel once they got here, but she was nervous as hell. Everyone that she'd spoken with told her how easy it was to talk to the older woman once they got going, but Roni was beginning to doubt that. They'd been here for almost fifteen minutes and neither one of them were any closer to spilling their guts than they had been when they first walked inside. Neither one of them had barely said a sentence, much less anything else."Roni, you're the one who called me," Doc Jones started when it was apparent the two of them weren't going to offer her any information. "Why did you feel the need to have me around when you speak to Rooster?"She shifted in her seat; this part was the hard part. It felt like the spotlight was on her and she was on display. Being on display was never something her personality had craved and it made her very uncomfortable. If it helped her move on wi
Rooster didn't know if this was a great idea, he was still reeling from what she had told him about their unborn child. That had been the last thing he'd thought she'd tell him when he'd agreed to come here. Of course, he'd had a feeling that whatever it was, it was going to be big. This was much bigger than anything he could have ever imagined."Go ahead," Doc Jones encouraged him. "You get yours out and then we'll work through it all together. It's better to just say it, and then we can take the ramifications one by one.""I quit the sheriff's department after some things happened that I didn't agree with. When I had to go to the camp, things changed and I became the do-gooder extraordinaire of the world because that's what I had to do. For years, I was a dick to Heaven Hill and I acted like I didn't even know who Roni was. There's no doubt in my mind why she didn't tell me about all this before now. I was trying to be someone I wasn't." He ran a hand through his hair. "That's ne
They sat in his truck, silence blanketing them for long minutes. They both fidgeted in their seats, neither one sure of what to say or how to put into words the feelings that coursed through their hearts. If either one of them were honest, they were probably in shock about the bombshells they'd both dropped. Roni finally spoke."I know the two of us have a lot to talk about. I know I handed you a blow in there, there's not been time for either of us to process the emotions we're both feeling, but right now, we have a bigger issue that needs our attention."He glanced at her, nodding his head. "Drew.""That's right." She blew out a deep breath and glanced out the window. "We've got to see what we can do to help get him out of this situation. Right now, he's not over the edge. He's on the brink, and we've got to make sure we pull him back before he does some incredibly stupid shit. I don't want him to ruin his life before he even gets it started."Rooster agreed with her. "So we
Rooster felt awkward walking up to a teenage boy's bedroom with Tyler following close behind. If this had been a year ago, he'd think that Drew was luring him in for a beat down. Bad analogy, he knew, but he had to do something to keep from thinking too heavily about the situation at hand. The three of them made their way inside. Rooster stood with his back to the door while Tyler had a seat next to Drew on the bed. The silence was deafening as they waited for him to tell them why he had called them in on this and not his parents."You're gonna need to give us something here," Tyler told him quietly. "What the fuck is going on?"Rooster tried to look at this subjectively. Back when all this had happened with him and Liam, they were almost a full two years older than the boy who sat before them. But he couldn't deny the fact that Drew had grown up on them. His face had thinned out the last couple of months, losing the baby fat that had made him look boyish. He'd had a growth spurt a