She was also still working part-time at the mall. She made dick but no matter how often he told her she should do it, she wouldn’t give up the job.

She also wouldn’t give up on him, the Club, their life.

She was all in with everything. She never missed a class. She studied between classes. She was never late for work. She studied when she got home. They went to movies. They went to bars. They went to parties. They went to concerts. They went to rallies. She cooked for him. She cleaned the house for him. And she studied more whenever she had the chance.

Business. That was her major.

“Don’t know what I’m gonna do with it,” she’d told him on a grin. “Just know I’m gonna kick ass whatever it is I do.”

He believed that. She didn’t do anything in half measures. She sucked life dry, setting her teeth in deep, straight to the bone and pulling out the marrow.

But this shit had to end. She was about to finish her first year of college and she wasn’t going to take a break. She was going to take two classes during the summer and go full-time at the store in the mall until her sophomore year started.

Which meant more of this. All-nighters where he went to bed alone, woke up alone, saw her faking it and drained dry but giving him a grin and the cute when he knew she was about ready to pass out.

He watched her pull off her clothes, dropping them to the floor as she wandered to their bed, and he decided it was time for this shit to stop.

She got in and Logan got in with her. Pulling her into his arms, he tangled himself up in her as she returned the favor and snuggled deep.

“Babe, you gotta quit that job,” he told the top of her head.

“Need the money,” she muttered sleepily.

“You don’t,” he replied. “I can cover us.”

And he could. Chaos business, the garage and shop called Ride, and the other shit they did, he could totally cover her and him. He could even do more. Get them nicer furniture, new shit that looked good. After a year or two put money down on a house. Take her on vacation to get her away from her work. Take her to Paris and kiss her under the Eiffel Tower.

He could give them better than what they had.

He could give his girl everything.

He could do that.

Absolutely.

“Can’t do that,” she mumbled, sounding very close to sleep.

“Millie,” he gave her a squeeze, “you’re gonna burn out, you keep this shit up.”

“Only two more years,” she replied. “Most... two and a half.”

“Babe—” he started but didn’t go on when she suddenly tipped her head back.

“No, Logan,” she whispered, her voice still sounding tired but it was also strong. “I do my bit.”

“You’ll do your bit when you got your degree and you get a fancy-ass job that makes us a lotta cake,” he returned.

“I do my bit now. I do my bit every day,” she shot back stubbornly.

He dragged her up his body so they were eye to eye in the dark. “You know it’s no hardship, me takin’ care of you. You also know that’s my job, one I get off on, so stop bein’ so stubborn and let me do it.”

“If I can do my part, I will, and I can, Low,” she retorted.

“Millie, this is the third night in a row you crashed at the dining room table,” he reminded her. “When it’s finals, it’s worse, but it’s bad all the time and that shit’s not good for you.”

“I have to.”

Logan went silent at the fierce tone in her voice.

“I have to, Logan.” She slid a hand up his chest to curve it around the side of his neck. “I know you can take care of me. I love how you take care of me. But I have to do this. For you. For us. To prove something to myself. My parents. You. I have to. And if you wanna take care of me, that’s how you can take care of me. By letting me do it.”

“I know what you need, baby,” he whispered back. “And you gotta know I don’t need that. I’m in. I know you’re in. We’re both in. All in. There’s times I gotta have your back. There’ll be times you’ll hafta have mine. Let me have your back now, Millie. It’ll mean a lot you got the time to do what you gotta do and I can go to bed beside you.”

She was silent a minute and he thought he had her, then she shook her head against the pillow.

“Please understand,” she said softly. “I just need to do my part. I need you to know I’m going to. No, that I’m able to. Life’s gonna throw a lot at us, Snook’ums. I need you to know I’m ready to do my bit when it does.”

She needed that. He knew it. He heard it. Fuck, he even felt it.

And he knew why she needed to give it to him. They were young. They were starting early. They were both all in. And they both wanted the same out of life. To be together, to build a family, to build a life. Neither wanted to delay.

So she needed to prove she could stick it, through thick and thin.

He didn’t like it but if his girl needed it, he was going to give it.

So he gave in.

“Okay, Millie.”

She snuggled even closer, pushing in to kiss his throat. Then she took her hand from his neck, trailed it down his chest so she could wrap her arm around him.

“Thanks, Low,” she murmured. It was again sleepy but there was feeling behind it.

Yeah, she needed it.

So he settled in, his girl cuddled close, and he gave it.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Going Through the Motions

Millie

MY ALARM WENT.

I opened my eyes, looked at the time, sleepily went through the magnitude of things I had to do to get ready to face the day, decided on one I could not do in order to buy more sleep, and I hit snooze.

I settled back in, closing my eyes, exhausted.

Because of all that was going on with Logan, I hadn’t found sleep easy the night before and I didn’t sleep great when I found it.

And it was getting on my busy season. I had a wedding coming up in two weeks and the bride was still changing her mind about practically everything. I also had a fiftieth anniversary party that should go off like clockwork, but it was happening that coming weekend, so I had to dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s.

But it wasn’t just the holiday season coming making things crazy. I was also reconnoitering clients’ homes and offices to create design schemes I would present, then I’d need to make sure I had everything to put my designs into action. Sometimes this took months. And it was taking those months, starting about two weeks ago.

I usually worked nine- to ten-hour days and nearly always put in time during the weekends. But it was getting to my six-day-a-week, ten- to twelve-hour-a-day season.

And to do that and be able to do it well I needed sleep, something I wouldn’t get if Logan remained in my life.

I should never have let this game with him go on.

It wasn’t just stupid.

It was unhealthy.

When he’d showed at my house Monday night, I should have done everything in my power to get him gone. Then I should have gone to Ride, talked to that Tyra woman, told her to stay out of my business and also told her to tell Tack to keep Logan out of it. And to do that, I should have threatened to call the cops.

Chaos did not like cops.

There were a variety of reasons why, including the fact that they grew and sold weed back in the day (and maybe still did).

I knew there was more to it than that but Logan had never shared any of it. And I knew whatever that more was was becoming a bigger part of Club business.

I knew this because, in the time I spent with Logan, Chaos’s antipathy toward police had grown to paranoia.

I also knew it because Logan would often need to go off and do “Club business,” business he did not share when he got back to me, business that could happen at any hour of the day and night, and the longer we were together, the more often that happened.