Grit: A Spartan Riders Novel - Chapter #5 - Free To Read

Grocery shopping with parents, particularly her mother, was sheer torture. It was akin to a root canal. Actually, that would have been preferable to spending the last hour and a half in a place she’d normally be in and out of in a quarter the time.

Despite being a woman and the general consensus dictating that women were born shoppers, Gabby, in fact, hated it. Every last minute, which was why she did the bulk of her shopping online. It eliminated the hassle and freed up a ton of time.

This moment just solidified her distaste for it even more.

“Mom, please, just pick one.”

“Don’t rush me, Gabriella,” her mother said in her eternally calm voice. “Your father is very particular about his toothpaste.”

Gabby glanced at the shelving, noting the dozens upon dozens of boxes in all varying shapes, sizes, and designs, and groaned. They were going to die in this aisle. She could already feel the gray hairs sprouting.

“Didn’t you bring a list?”

Tapping her snow white, poodle perm hair with one arthritic finger, her mother replied, “The only list I need is right here.”

Which was why they’d circled the store from front to back three times already. There had to be a way to speed this snail race along. Stepping away from the cart, Gabby went to her mother’s side. “What are we looking for?”

“I can’t remember the name, but I’ll know it when I see it.”

Which would happen around the end of never. “Describe it to me.”

After a bit of complaining, she finally managed to drag out a few key details and plucked a package of Aquafresh from the shelf, dropping it in the cart. “Is that it? Are we ready to head out?”

Casting her eyes to the ceiling, her mother scraped her brain for the “only list she needed” before telling her, “Ice cream. I promised your father I’d make peach cobbler for dessert tonight.”

Okay, well, she couldn’t really complain about that. Her mother made a mean cobbler and what was cobbler without a little—or a lot—of ice cream.

Ten minutes later, Gabby blew her warm breath into her hands in a vain attempt to ward off frostbite from handling too many cartons of frozen milk product that weren’t the “right” one. She was ready to tear her hair out, strand by strand, when she heard a familiar voice call her name.

“Miss Gabby!”

Turning on her heel, Gabby spotted Ash charging toward her, his head of dark hair just barely peeking over the cart’s handlebar as he maneuvered it with practiced ease. Her gaze traveled just beyond his shoulders to Blake, who followed along, his expression blank.

When Gabby met his frosty stare, something inside her shivered as if there were more lurking behind it than simple animosity. Which was ridiculous, considering the only interaction they’d had to date was chock-full of the stuff.

For the second time that week, she couldn’t ignore the fuzzy feeling in her belly, nor could she pretend that she didn’t find him somewhat intriguing, if not a lot handsome. There was just something about Blake Mahone that sparked something in her, which was troublesome, considering the man was the epitome of irresponsible and had bad news written all over every inch of his solid form. What was he, six-two? Six-three? Removed from his bike, wearing a pair of snug-fitting, well-worn jeans in place of his leathers, and a basic white cotton t-shirt, he was somehow even more forbidding than the picture he presented roaring down the road on his bike.

Either way, he warranted a second look.

Or a third.

The man was positively mouth-watering.

“…wanna come?”

Ash’s voice came at her as if from a distance, followed up by a tug of her shirt sleeve, drawing her attention down to the little boy who now stood directly in front of her, looking up through hopeful gray eyes.

Crouching down to his level, Gabby summoned a shaky smile. “What was that, sweetie? Come where?”

Blake’s cocky chuckle, though held under his breath, shot through her like a plague of bullets through flimsy tissue paper, renewing her irritation. She kept her attention focused on Ash, blatantly ignoring his father as if he weren’t even there.

“The party,” Ash said. “Everyone’s gonna be there, and Daddy said I can bring a friend. So will you come?”

Gabby blinked, her mouth gaping open. She was at a loss for words. “Well…I…uh.” She glanced up at Blake, unsure how to respond to such a sweet but entirely unexpected offer. But her unspoken plea was met with a wall of silence. “What kind of party is it?”

“A barbeque. So are you comin’?”

A barbeque. The mental picture Gabby got when she thought of a typical barbeque was one made up of close friends and family. And when she pictured one that involved the likes of Blake Mahone, she thought of leather, burly, uncouth men with rap sheets a mile long, and women with fake boobs and flexible legs. It wasn’t a place she imagined herself being comfortable at. Not by a long shot.

“That’s very nice of you to invite me, Ash, but I think your dad meant for you to invite one of your friends,” she said, attempting to let him down gently.

Ash’s expression dropped, the corners of his mouth turning down. “But you are my friend.”

Gabby’s heart clenched, and she was fairly certain it might have cracked just a bit. Her gaze cut to Blake, unsure how to handle the situation.

Stepping forward, Blake took his son by the shoulder and drew him back until he was once again standing at the head of the cart. “Miss Morgan is right, buddy. I meant one of your friends from school.”

“But she is from school,” he bemoaned, which was a total dichotomy to her initial, old soul impression of him.

“Someone more your age,” Blake clarified.

“But you always say age is just a number, and I like her. And besides, I don’t have any friends.”

Shoot. Gabby rose to her feet, feeling ten shades of crappy for letting the boy down, but she was already dancing the line when it came to Ash, and the less involved she was in his personal life, the better it would be for everyone involved.

Looking over her shoulder, she caught her mother’s assessing gaze just before she turned back to the carton of Breyer’s in her hand that she was pretending to read.

The look reminded her that he was the kind of man she’d been raised to stay far away from. The kind she’d promised herself she’d steer clear of.

“You can make friends at the party,” Blake assured him.

“But they’re all babies.”

“Jonah’s not a baby. You can hang out with him.”

“No, I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because Jonah’s got a girlfriend now and he says I’m a baby. I don’t even wear diapers anymore.”

Gabby observed their exchange with interest while simultaneously wondering what the chances were that she could quietly back away unnoticed. Would that be rude? It’d probably hurt Ash’s feelings if he turned around to find her gone, especially since revealing that she was his only friend. Man, talk about tugging at the heartstrings.

With his hands on his hips, his expression drawn, Blake wore the look of defeat as he stared down at his son. For a moment, in the absence of his hard mask, Gabby saw the look of a man who wasn’t so much impervious as he was weary. Tired. She got to wondering what his story was. Whether he was the man he presented—a tough, rugged, devil-may-care biker—or someone else entirely.

With a heavy sigh, Blake’s head tipped back and he gazed up at the ceiling muttering something that sounded like, “I’m going to regret this.” With a stony expression he directed his clipped words to Gabby. “Miss Morgan, would you like to come to the barbeque tomorrow?”

He couldn’t look any more pained than if he was suffering a heart attack. Gabby almost laughed out loud but just managed to hold it back. She wouldn’t want to be in his shoes, so she was choosing to be polite. “Oh, no, Mr. Mahone. I wouldn’t want to intrude.”

The relief that washed over him was short-lived. All it took was one round-eyed, innocent look from Ash, and Blake was done for. Which was actually quite surprising. And endearing. Gabby hadn’t pegged him for the sensitive type, but he certainly melted for his son, which was actually pretty attractive. She gave him a once-over, cataloging every detail of his honed form with fresh eyes.

Running a heavy hand over his face, the corners of Blake’s eyes pinched, and his full lips thinned as if he’d tasted something sour. “I insist,” he told Gabby through clenched teeth. “It’ll give Ash here a chance to show you some of his best work, and,” he tacked on, his tone holding a bitter edge, “maybe it’ll show you that I’m not the piece of trash biker you take me as.”

Gabby’s eyes widened, her nostrils flaring as she sucked in air. “I didn’t—I mean I don’t—I never said—”

Blake’s gaze flicked toward her mother standing just beyond her shoulder, and then back to her. “Didn’t need to be said to be understood. Look, come to the barbeque, have a plate. Maybe it’ll change your perspective. Maybe it won’t.” He shrugged as if it made no difference to him one way or the other.

Giving her no time to object, he rattled off the address—a place she was, thankfully, familiar with, because he didn’t seem inclined to write it down—and time. Without another word, Blake ushered Ash away, and Gabby was left contemplating what her next move would be.

“Well, he seemed…”

“Nice?” Gabby offered, thinking that Blake Mahone, even in an intense state of irritation, had actually seemed more civil than she’d known him to be during their previous encounters.

“I was going to say rough, but he didn’t kill us so…”

“I highly doubt he’s a killer, Mom.” Doubts crept in as soon as the words left her mouth.

“You aren’t thinking of taking him up on his offer, are you?”

Gabby stared down the aisle in the direction Blake and Ash had gone. Was she considering it? Maybe a cookout wouldn’t be so bad. It was just food and talking. Blake hinted that she had the wrong idea about him. What if she did? A part of her wanted to see for herself if he was right. The other part of her was mildly aware that she was making up excuses to go.

“You are considering it, aren’t you?”

“I don’t know.” Gabby felt a margin of shame wash over her when she looked back at her mother, expecting a verbal tongue lashing for going against what her parents had taught her.

Instead, her mother just shrugged. “Whatever you decide, just don’t mention it to your father.” The she dropped a pint of store brand ice cream into the cart. “Ready when you are.”