Read Online Clear (Storm's Soldiers MC Book 3) by Paige Notaro - Free Book Online

started fanning.
    “Now that,” Darryl said, crouching next to him,“I wouldn’t mind learning to do.”
    “Na, I can’t share this. It’s an old family secret. Probably one of the few left to be proud off.”
    “Or..,” I said, “you can just look up this ‘secret’ online.”
    Darryl tapped at his phone. “No reception.”
    “Not now, dummy.”
    The fire started cracking the wood. The winds blew the smoke away from us, but the heat felt stuffy in the warm morning. Vaughn gutted the fish and started to roast it, but I looked around the low rolling hills and could almost imagine this place hot with canon smoke and filled with confederate flags and hundreds of other grimy campfires. This had been where the rebel army had broke Sherman’s march to the sea. Now it was just rolling greens. Crazy to think how swiftly the ugliness of the past might be wiped away.
    The two men talked behind me and seasoned the fish. The winds shifted and brought the salty, spicy aroma straight to my nose. I forced down the hunger gushing into my mouth and sat down by the flame.
    “Is that enough?” I asked. The fish had felt big in my hands, but they looked like guppies skewered up one after another on the stick.
    “Just getting y’all in that war mood,” Vaughn said. “This is a far sight better than what those soldiers had to eat, union or confederate.”
    “Yeah, and they didn’t have soap or toothbrushes either,” I said. “I’ll take a pass on walking in their footsteps.”
    “Gotta know the past to understand the future. Didn’t you tell me that?”
    Vaughn’s eyes danced with the flame between us. He’d taken me to the place his mom had died. My family had lived not too far away at one point. The gas station woman had come hobbling out at us, but the livid look on her face washed away after seeing me. She waggled her shoulders and headed on back in, but Vaughn chased after her and asked her something. She nodded and he came back slouched. Apparently his brother was coming around more than ever. This was the only bit of news he had about his family. The two men had cut him off as clean as a guillotine.
    “You two can have my cut,” Darryl said. “I’m not in a sushi mood.”
    “Not with that empty cabin,” Vaughn chuckled.
    Darryl flicked him off, but that set Vaughn laughing even harder. “Brother, you gotta stop serving em up easy.”
    Darryl’s lips fumbled with words. I threw an arm across my brother’s back. “You could have at least asked her to come.”
    “It’s way too soon,” he said. “We had one good date. I don’t want to blow it by giving her cabin fever.”
    “Wouldn’t be the one blowing anything,” Vaughn said.
    Both of us stared death at him now. Darryl was right. His first date with Tara had gone well, but she was a traditional sort of girl, especially with a guy like Darryl. I’d cashed in so many favors to pull that one off.
    “I’m glad she ain’t around to hear this nonsense,” Darryl said. “Can’t force open a girl like that.”
    I moved away from him, suddenly hot with the memory of just how easily Vaughn had forced me open. Well, different strokes for different folks.
    “Aubrey would be willing to go just about anywhere with you,” I offered.
    “I’ll keep it in mind in case I need a rebound.”
    “Just more fish for us,” Vaughn said. He took the stick off the spit, broke it in half and handed one part to me. I brushed back the burnt scales and peeled off rich, oily chunks of meat. I didn’t know what river fish this was, but we were just about at the ocean now, so it could have come upstream. The fire crackled and I savored each juicy bite. My appetite roared after the night before, but this was a good start.
    Darryl ate from a sleeve of crackers. I offered him some fish but he just shook his head.
    We tossed the remains near a compost heap, then washed up and refilled by the fountains.
    “Good to go?” Vaughn asked, shaking off the water he’d poured