The Slow Burn Read online

  She had not, he just realized, made him laugh.

  With her looks, ass, legs and come on, she’d made him fight getting hard.

  That was why she was there.

  And now Tobe was beginning to realize where he’d gone wrong from his very first girlfriend, the one he’d asked to “go with me” at fourteen to the woman standing in front of him right now.

  She wasn’t finished.

  “The ones who look like you don’t go for some fat bitch who cooks good and worships the ground they walk on. The ones who look like you go for ones that look like him, gorgeous, and they still worship the ground he walks on.”

  “Yeah, I totally want my woman to worship the ground I walk on,” he shared.

  “See,” she retorted.

  “And she’ll do that because I’d die for her.”

  Kristy again shut her mouth and her eyes got big.

  “She has to have that fire for me too, babe,” he told her. “And yeah, she’ll probably be gorgeous because I’ll want that fire for her when I’m eating her pussy. But this,” he indicated the room with a tilt of his head, “this is just a pain in my ass.”

  Her voice was small when she shared, “I heard you tell your mom you’re moving to Nashville and it wouldn’t be good to meet a woman now and drag her there.”

  And it comes out.

  Why didn’t she lead with that?

  Why hit him with a load of shit when she was clearly more into him than he knew and wanted him to be into her?

  “I was just messing with her, though I wouldn’t mind heading to Nashville. That’s not the point. You’ve got no idea my relationship with Margot or my plans for the future, immediate or otherwise. But just to say, if I’m willing to die for a woman, Kristy, when I meet her, it goes without saying I’d be willing to stick. And if I feel I gotta bounce, I’ll be willing to put the effort into talking her into coming with me,” he explained, what he considered unnecessarily.

  “And obviously I’m not that girl.”

  Was she out of her mind?

  Toby didn’t field that one.

  She read his silence correctly.

  “Right. Great. Just sayin’, not in the mood to spend more time with you. So I’m gonna call a taxi,” she snapped.

  “Maybe that’s a good idea.”

  She strolled his way, going all out with the sway of her hips to the point he worried she’d take herself off balance.

  “Good luck finding your fantasy girl,” she bid acidly.

  “Thanks,” he muttered, getting out of her way.

  He let her pass him but followed her out.

  He didn’t lock his front door when she slammed it behind her.

  But he did look out his window to watch her dig her phone out of her bag and bend her head to it.

  And he kept watching as she stood out there until a taxi pulled up.

  He didn’t go for the door to walk out with her and pay for the damn taxi when she turned to him and flipped him off through the window, mouthing, Fuck you, dick.

  Toby sighed again.

  Yeah, he could pick them.

  He still continued to watch until she folded into the taxi and it took off.

  She’d get safe home.

  So Toby stopped watching and went to lock the door.

  He went back to his bedroom thinking that it was going to be just him and his fist for a good long while after that.

  After he got undressed and stretched out under the covers, Kristy was already barely a memory.

  All the ones who came before, who acted like bitches or nagged incessantly, or decided he was going to marry them before he even knew their middle names or how they took their coffee, were memories.

  Tobias Gamble was not going to be his father.

  He was not going to pick the wrong one and end up broken in a way no woman—or no child, not even his own blood—could fix.

  She was going to be just right.

  She was going to love the children they made more than anything in the world.

  She was going to worship the ground he walked on.

  And she was going to be so spectacular, he’d be willing to die for her without even a blink of an eye to think.

  So yeah, Kristy was a memory.

  And therefore, Toby had no problem getting back to sleep.

  Four Years Later . . .

  Toby pulled up to the house in his old red Chevy truck with the silver panels.

  The house was cute-as-fuck, totally the place where whoever the new woman his brother was seeing, after Shandra got done grinding him to ash, would live.

  But Toby didn’t have a mind to the house.

  Toby didn’t even have a mind to the fact this was the first time he’d seen his brother in months, since he hadn’t been back to Matlock in months.

  He didn’t have a mind to any of this seeing as there was clearly a drama playing out beside that cute-as-fuck house.

  A drama Johnny was involved in.

  Johnny and some strung-out-looking dude, some huge black dude, and two of the prettiest women Toby had ever seen in his life.

  Yeah, one of those women was Johnny’s new girl.

  And that figured.

  House cute as fuck.

  Women pretty as hell.

  Toby got out of his truck and saw Johnny give him a short shake of his head before Tobe began to make a slow approach.

  The strung-out dude was speaking.

  “You know I’ve been lookin’ for gigs,” the dude announced.

  “I’m not sure how you’ll find gigs camped out on the couch with a six pack or humping some chick in my bed,” the blonde woman (or one of the two) with all the hair, fantastic ass, long legs and clear attitude replied.

  Right.

  That probably wasn’t Johnny’s girl.

  Though she was the prettier one.

  Christ.

  Coming closer, Tobe saw she was gorgeous.

  “Addie, don’t lay this shit on me,” the dude returned. “You haven’t been giving it up for months.”

  “That’s because I’m tired, Perry,” she shot back. “I’m exhausted. I’m a single mother of a baby boy with a deadbeat dad who lives with me.”

  Great.

  Just fucking fabulous.

  This strung-out dude was her dude.

  “I love my kid,” the Perry guy hurled back.

  “He’s a toy, like I was a toy before I wasn’t shiny and new anymore and life became a drag. But you didn’t give me away, you tossed me aside and looked for a new toy just like I know you’ll do with Brooklyn when he’s not fun anymore,” the gorgeous chick called Addie replied.

  Toby saw Johnny turn his head and watch his approach.

  Toby lifted his eyebrows toward his brother.

  Johnny gave him another short jerk of his head and again looked at Addie.

  “That’s not true, baby.” Perry was now trying to wheedle. “I love you. I love Brooklyn. You know that. It’s just been tough since the band broke up and—”

  “God, spare me,” Addie drawled bitingly. “You’re such a cliché and I’m such a moron for falling for it.”

  “We got it good, we just gotta get that back,” Perry said.

  “You had it good, because you had someone paying your bills and doing all the grunt work taking care of your son so he’s nice and clean and fed when you feel like playing with him. I didn’t have it good. And even after sharing this about seven million times, it didn’t sink in that you might wanna give your wife and son better. I know this because nothing changed. I also know this because I walked in on you fucking another woman.”

  What was happening sunk in.

  That beautiful woman had a baby with this asshole guy.

  They were married.

  And this fuckwad cheated on her.

  She’d seen him do it.

  Shit.

  “I’ll get in another band soon and then—” the asshole guy started.

  “Do not try to feed me that ag
ain, Perry. I believed it two years ago. Do you honestly think I’ll believe it now?”

  “So, right,” Perry bit out, not trying it on anymore. He was again pissed. “Now you get to make the decision we’re done then you clean out the apartment and the bank accounts and take off?”

  “You cheated on me and we were done so I moved, Perry. I took my stuff. I left yours. That stuff that’s mine includes what’s in the bank accounts since every penny in them I earned,” Addie explained.

  Toby could not believe this moron had cheated on her.

  Jesus.

  Was the man blind?

  “When I got back after you split, there was nothing in the place but my clothes,” the moron retorted.

  “Which is what you brought to our marriage and all you contributed to our marriage, so that’s all you’ll get out of it.”

  “It took me a week to get up here because I had to raise the cash for gas since you took it all and canceled our credit cards,” Perry complained.

  “My credit cards,” she fired back. “Your name was on them. I paid them.”

  Man, this woman had some serious sass.

  And she was laying his ass out.

  It would be really fucking righteous, if what was happening didn’t suck.

  Perry raised his hand quickly to his forehead, slamming his fingers against it and then sending his hand flying out, and Toby braced to lock things down because if this dude was stupid enough to cheat on his beautiful wife with all her righteous attitude, he’d be stupid enough to do something even more dickish to her surrounded by three men.

  The asshole made this irate move, stating, “Can you not see how totally fucked up it is, some bitch cleans out an apartment and takes a man’s kid then takes off without even a fuckin’ note?”

  Toby found himself swallowing a growl that the man had called her a bitch.

  “You were inside her,” Addie whispered.

  At that, precisely the way she said it, Toby’s focus locked on her, and like it had a mind of its own, his body moved nearer to hers.

  “Baby, can we please talk about this without an audience?” Perry begged.

  “She looked at me. You looked at me. You looked right in my eyes when you were connected to another woman,” Addie said, her voice dripping with hurt.

  “I tried to come after you.”

  “With your dick wet from another woman.”

  The moron went silent.

  Toby still didn’t look at him.

  His attention was riveted to her.

  How could she be even more beautiful showing her pain?

  “This is how this is going to go,” she said softly. “I’m moving up here. I got a job in the grocery store. I start on Monday. I’ve already contacted an attorney. She’s started divorce proceedings. You will pay child support. You will take financial responsibility for the child you very enjoyably had a hand in creating. We’ll see what part of his life you’ll play, but that will be up to me. But he’ll be up here with me and Izzy. And you’ll be down there with your broken promises and your ridiculous dreams.”

  “My dreams aren’t ridiculous,” Perry clipped out, clearly insulted by that, and not all the shit she’d been saying about him being a dick of a partner, a cheat, and shit at being a dad.

  The selfish ass.

  “You wanna be the lead singer of a rock ’n’ roll band and no, that’s not ridiculous. The ridiculous part is you think that’ll happen sitting on a couch, drinking beer,” Addie told him.

  “You’re not going to take my son from me,” he threatened.

  “Too late, I already did. But just saying, Perry, you never actually had him because you never actually claimed him.”

  “We’ll see how this goes,” he snarled.

  It was then Toby tensed when Addie got in his space.

  “I know how it’ll go so listen up,” she hissed. “I’ll work until I drop to fight for what’s right for my son. I’ll sell my body if I need to, to give him not only what he needs but even just a little bit of what he wants. And I’ll bleed my last drop before I let you fuck him up. You know me, Perry,” she stressed. “You know what makes me. You know every word I say is true. And you know you don’t have what it takes to fight that. I’ll do whatever it takes to beat you, to give my son what he deserves. I was taught how, day in and day out by my mother, so I know the way. And I’ll take it if you make me, and I’ll die knowing I gave my boy happy.”

  Toby felt something he hadn’t felt in years slide into his stomach as he stared at her while she said these words.

  But even at its strongest in the past, it had never burned as deep as it did right then.

  “You’re gonna have to fight it,” Perry hurled at her.

  “Only because you’re intent on proving how big of an asshole you are and you’re gonna make me,” she returned.

  That asshole glared at his wife. He then glared at the other blonde, Johnny, and the African American guy before he turned and stutter-stepped when he saw Toby. He recovered quickly and started to stalk off.

  “Just to let you know,” Addie called after him. “My attorney already has three appointments to get sworn affidavits next week. And that bitch you were banging while my son was in the next room got served a subpoena, so she’s one of them.”

  She didn’t even know his name, but Toby wanted to bump fists with her for being so fucking badass.

  That or kiss her.

  At that juncture, the second option was seriously inappropriate.

  But that didn’t mean he didn’t want to do it.

  “Kiss my ass, Addie,” Perry yelled, not breaking stride.

  “The time you get that from me, baby, is long gone,” she returned in a loud drawl.

  Only then did Toby wrench his eyes from her so he could watch her hopefully soon-to-be-official ex slam into his car, make it roar and then reverse and peel out in a shower of gravel and a cloud of dust.

  Toby twisted back when the other blonde started carefully, “Addie—”

  But Addie turned and raced down the side of the house, disappearing at the back.

  The second woman raced after her.

  Toby felt his brother’s eyes and tore his away from the area where the women had disappeared, doing this fighting running after them, and put them to Johnny.

  “Welcome home, brother,” Johnny said.

  God.

  Johnny.

  Toby felt lips hitch.

  “I’m Johnny,” Johnny said to the black dude.

  Say what?

  They didn’t know each other?

  “Charlie,” the guy replied, lifting his hand Johnny’s way.

  Johnny shook it, let go and introduced, “This is my brother, Toby.”

  “Toby,” Charlie said, offering his hand to Toby.

  “Charlie,” Toby replied, taking it.

  When they were done shaking, all three men hesitated, then when Johnny started down the side of the house, Toby and Charlie trailed with Ranger, Johnny’s dog, walking with them.

  So rumor in town was true.

  Shandra, Johnny’s ex-bitch who destroyed him was back in Matlock, because there was Ranger. The dog he’d given her to look after her after she’d kicked his brother in the teeth (this being about a nanosecond (slight exaggeration) after their father died) and took off.

  But Ranger was here.

  With two blondes and a cute-as-fuck house with ugly drama playing out in the side yard.

  Jesus.

  So Johnny walks his ass into that kind of drama, setting himself right up to be the hero, which Tobe so totally knew Johnny would wait about an hour to do.

  And when Toby had tried to intervene with some chick whose brother had some medical bills she was trying to help pay, she decided he was her prince charming. She then rented some hall for their reception when he had no intention of buying her a ring. And when he tells her that last, even though he goes gentle, she loses her mind about losing her deposit and takes off in his truck.
/>   Johnny found the righteous blondes who’d go to the mat to take care of their kids.

  Toby found the nutcases.

  Good to know things didn’t change.

  They walked in the back door hearing Addie saying, “No, Iz. Just put the queso under the broiler and let’s get this party started.”

  But her eyes hit Toby’s brother when he entered then they went behind him after Johnny cleared the door, and Tobe and Charlie crowded with him into the small kitchen.

  She was holding an adorable baby tight to her and hovering in a corner of the kitchen like the two women in it had her caged in (the blonde, clearly Eliza, who everyone in town was talking about being the girl who mended Johnny Gamble’s broken heart) and an African American woman, who probably belonged to Charlie.

  Though, to Toby, they seemed to be giving her space.

  It was then Addie said, “Great. As if that drama being played out in front of Clubber McHotterson,” she indicated Charlie with a flick of a hand, “and Magnus McHotterson,” she indicated Johnny with a jerk of her head, “wasn’t bad enough, now we got Talon McHotterson here to enjoy the show.”

  All the drama with that dickhead outside and she was cracking jokes.

  Fuck.

  Fuck.

  Toby again couldn’t take his eyes off her.

  “Maybe we should go upstairs and talk, baby girl,” the black lady said softly.

  “About what?” Addie asked. “About how Johnny’s changed more of Brooklyn’s diapers after knowing him for a week than his father has after knowing him seven months?”

  Yeah.

  That was Johnny.

  And it just sunk in that her kid was called Brooklyn.

  Kickass name.

  “Doll, how about you let Johnny and Charlie look after Brooks and we girls get a bottle of wine and—?” Eliza tried.

  “I saw you two,” Addie said, her voice hoarse, and Toby, already alert to everything about her, went more so. “In the stable. I saw Johnny doing you against the wall.”

  Well, shit.

  That he did not have to hear.

  “Oh Lord,” the black woman mumbled.

  “Shit,” Charlie muttered.

  “Hell,” Toby murmured.