Free Unexpected Ride by Rebecca Avery Page B

first week of spring.  The excuse and then rationalizing her actions sounded good in theory but the deceit was killing her. 
    Jarrod Tompkins had been the most dishonest person she’d ever come into contact with and it felt like the more often she ran into him, the more his treachery was rubbing off on her and she didn’t like it one bit.  Could she even trust that by allowing him to meet Meredith this one time, he would then go away and not bother them anymore?
    “You ready to do this thing, hot stuff?” Chuck asked, entering the kitchen and startling her out of her thoughts.
    Ready as she was going to be to introduce her precious Meredith to the one man from Carla’s past that had been instrumental in getting her arrested.  Looking at Chuck and knowing the crimes of his past, which were bad… somehow didn’t compare to what she had done. 
    Much like her, Chuck was out running his past and that she could respect... it was part of what she liked about him.  She’d done the same with some help from her father and Doug.  She could only pray that by helping Chuck rise above his mistakes, his past wouldn’t crop back up in twenty five years to remind him that he was once young and naïve… the way her past was doing to her currently.
    “Sure, let’s go,” she smiled.
    “You ready to get your sexy on and ride on the back of my bike?  Meredith is going to meet us there and I thought you could drive her car back so she and I can take a ride out to the beach where she will promise to obey me… for life ,” he teased.
    She could only laugh at him.  His constant attempts to try and get her feisty daughter to do anything she didn’t want to was some form of game to him.  In his mind the winning play would be to get Meredith to include the traditional love, honor and obey promise in their wedding vows.  So far Meredith had only agreed to it if Chuck was the one who would be saying them.
    Carla, having only ever ridden on the back of his motorcycle once… at a very slow speed… had also become a challenge for Chuck.  Now he constantly referred to her as hot stuff, sexy mama, biker babe or some other derogatory term as a way to tease her and relentlessly tried to get her to take a ‘real’ ride on his motorcycle.  Well, if the third time was supposedly the charm… then why not a third big decision in the same week.
    “Sounds like fun,” she replied nonchalantly.  The ornery look on his face changed to one of complete disbelief which had her laughing hysterically.
    “Are you serious?” he asked, his grin returning. 
    Her heart felt lighter than it had since before she lost Doug so she simply nodded.  It felt good to finally get one over on the mischievous young man who would soon be her son-in-law.  He picked on her constantly and it was great to finally give him back a little dose of his own medicine.
    “Sweet… how about we hook you up with some ink too… maybe a piercing or two?” he laughed.
    “Very funny…” she replied with a smile. 
    “Remind me to thank Detective Sanders next time I see him… he is the man!   I thought Dickie corrupting Becca was awesome, but this … I bow to the man.  Damn… and Meredith is missing it,” he laughed, shaking his head in disbelief.  “Here I thought you were un-corruptible but boy was I wrong!  Greg has got you kissing him, riding on the back of motorcycles and sneaking around doing God knows what… what’s next?  Drinking? Gambling?”
    “I highly doubt that… now let’s go before I change my mind,” she said unable to stop laughing at his antics. “I cannot believe you saw us kissing… you were supposed to be in the basement!”
    “Don’t worry… your secret is safe with me unless Meredith specifically asks, ‘Did you happen to catch my mom planting a porn kiss on Detective Sanders?’ Now, if she asks me that, I cannot lie so I would tell her the truth, but aside from that I didn’t see a thing,” he laughed.  Then he