“Right,” I said just because he stopped talking but also because I couldn’t say more since he declared he didn’t like rich people and I was a rich person.

“No one has power over me,” he went on. “And no one ever will.”

I had nothing to say to that because I had no idea why he said it because I’d given him no reason to think I wanted that from him.

It was then he announced, “When I was fifteen, my mom and I were living on the streets.”

At this news, my body turned to stone in order to conserve all its energy to battle desperate, miserable, soul-demolishing thoughts of the magnificence Deke and the mom he clearly loved a great deal, homeless, and I again just stared at him.

“That was on me. I fucked us up. I did somethin’ seriously fuckin’ stupid that got her fired and blackballed so she couldn’t get another job. We didn’t have a lot because she got paid shit at the job she had. She got paid shit, she ate shit and her life was shit until it turned shittier when I pulled my shit and our lives that were actually just garbage turned to full-on shit.”

I kept staring at him but I did it feeling the wet hit my eyes.

“We got into a shelter, which was warmer than the streets, they had food so we weren’t hungry all the fuckin’ time, but the place still sucked. And she worked her ass off to get us out of there. She worked her ass off before we were in there and she kept doin’ it every day of her life until workin’ that hard killed her. Dead of a heart attack before she’d even reached sixty.”

I could not believe this.

Hell, I didn’t want to believe this.

But he was giving it to me, what Lauren had warned me I’d have to brace for, and she’d been right.

That said, it was no gift.

It was heartbreaking.

I felt a tear slide down my cheek.

Deke didn’t quit talking.

“That was her life. My life, I started workin’ at fifteen and I did everything I fuckin’ could to take care of my ma. But when I knew she was set, decent place to live, job that was steady, money in the bank for a rainy day, I had to go. I had to get out and go somewhere where I wasn’t covered with the shit of life and I could breathe easy. Between then and now, been a lot of places and there’s only one place that happens. That’s the road, Jussy. Only place I breathe easy.”

“I understand that,” I told him softly.

He nodded his head, his eyes on my wet cheeks but he didn’t touch me outside the hand he still had tucked behind my knee.

He kept distant and he kept speaking.

“I know. You’re my gypsy princess and you’re a true rock ‘n’ roll gypsy. But what you understand, what made you a part of the road is not what made me.”

“That’s not what I meant,” I said quickly.

“Tears in your eyes, Jussy, I get that you get me.”

“I hate that happened to you and your mom,” I whispered.

“Tears in your eyes, I get that too,” he whispered back. “But it happened, baby, and that never changes. The road, it’s in my blood not like you, born to it like you were. It’s who I was driven to be. And it’s that in a way it’ll never stop.”

“Deke, I don’t get—”

“Come April, Jussy, snow starts thawing, weather turns, I’m gone and there ain’t nothin’ that can hold that back.”

I slid away from him.

I had this reaction even though I knew this. He’d mentioned it during our night by the fire pit, how he’d take off, how he didn’t stay put for long.

I just didn’t know that it was something that might someday affect me.

I barely got an inch before his hand curled tight behind my knee and he jerked me right back.

“I go, Justice,” he started, his voice low like a warning, “this keeps like it is with us, I want you with me.”

I go, Justice…I want you with me.

More wet hit my eyes and didn’t linger.

It slid right down my cheeks.

Deke watched it then looked at me.

“Think that’s an answer, baby, but you gotta give it to me with words.”

“I’d go anywhere with you.”

It was then I felt Deke go solid as a rock.

“You make me happy,” I told him something he knew.

But maybe he didn’t know.

It was on the tip of my tongue to explain my poet’s soul, to share that “Chain Link” was for him, when his hand left my knee. He bent to put his beer on the floor then he twisted to me, his hand coming up. He caught me at the back of my neck and pulled me to him. His other hand lifted and cupped my cheek, thumb sliding through the wet as he stared into my eyes.

“So fuckin’ pretty, girl with all your hair, sittin’ in a corner of a biker bar with her notebook, writing poetry,” he murmured.

He was talking about way back in Wyoming.

His gaze shifted, watching his thumb move through my tears.

As for me, I was having trouble breathing.

His eyes came back to mine.

“You walked into Bubba’s, you were different. Whole new girl. You’d come into you. Smelled the money on you, Jussy. Knew I wanted to tap your ass but was goin’ nowhere near you because, I let you in, when I had to go, knew in my gut you wouldn’t go with me and it’d tear me up, leavin’ you behind, but it’d tear me up worse if I stayed.”

“You thought that at Bubba’s?” I asked breathlessly.