Was I ready to become a mom if I truly did have a bun in the oven?
I couldn’t imagine it. I wasn’t the most maternal of people anyway, and I was young. Christ, I was barely twenty-three.
Placing a shaky hand on my belly, I wondered if there was a kid in there, if that kid could feel me, could sense my emotions, my stress, and my concern for the future.
I wouldn’t have been ready for a baby if I’d still been loaded.
But to be facing this without a penny to my name? Without the man I’d come to care for in a ridiculously short span of time at my side?
Fuck, was it any wonder I was terrified?
“I need to get a job,” I muttered.
“Huh?” Lily swerved the wheel so hard that the bikes had to swerve with her. Her shoulders hunched just like mine had when, in different stages, the bikers turned around to glower at her. Link drove up beside her and tapped on the window. She waved him off and carefully mouthed, “Sorry.”
His stare was hard until he fell back a pace, returning to the moving circle around us.
It was hard to imagine Lily with a biker. She was all class. We both were. And yet, somehow, we’d both fallen for bikers.
Rough and ready men that moms warned their daughters about.
Men who said daughters ignored their moms over, and who they tried to toy with until they got burned.
When they did, they were burned badly.
Just like me.
Only, Sin hadn’t meant to hurt me.
He couldn’t help that he’d been transferred. If anything, it was my fault. And Luke Lancaster’s. May he rot in hell.
“You can’t get a job.”
“Why can’t I?” I mumbled. “That’s what people do, isn’t it? Work when they have no means of supporting themselves?”
“You’re different. You don’t need to work. You have me.”
I released a shaky breath. “You have to stop saying that, Lily. Your generosity is too much. It isn’t fair for me to take from you and give nothing in return.”
“If things were different, wouldn’t you do the same for me?” she reasoned, and I knew I’d hurt her, even if that wasn’t my intention.
“You know I would,” I muttered softly, “and I know that, just like I am, you’d struggle with it.”
“Yeah, I’d struggle, but I’d expect nothing less. We’re sisters,” she stated staunchly. “Sisters have each other’s backs. Plus, what the hell are you going to do? You’re pregnant, you’ll be getting tired in the afternoons soon and—”
“Pregnant women work, Lily,” I said dryly, amused by her declaration. “They manage to get through morning sickness in the afternoon during a business meeting as well, all while keeping their homes clean and sometimes caring for more than one kid at the same time. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t be one of them.”
“Why would you take a job away from someone who needs it?” she countered, and I growled under my breath.
“That’s fighting dirty.”
“That’s the truth. You don’t need the money. You’re not a spendthrift, so I won’t even have to give you that big of an allowance—”
“Oh my God! That’s enough, Lily. I can’t handle this conversation right now. I’m not thirteen—”
“No, I know you’re not, but you’re potentially a mom, and you have to think of that kid. Anyway, I’ve already told you that the Sinners want your help. You can work for them as a favor to me. You’re living with me at the moment, and food isn’t an issue. If the father doesn’t want anything to do with you, then there’s no reason to worry. We can raise the baby together.”
My lips curved at that. “Like a commune baby?”
She snickered. “Yeah. I don’t see why not. The baby can grow up knowing what pedicures are while fixing bikes in their spare time with Link—”
My heart clutched at the thought. Damn, I was really nuts if I thought that sounded like an epic idea.
Raising a baby with Lily? Knowing that Link and his men would protect it, even if Sin wouldn’t?
Heaven.
Because I didn’t entirely trust heaven right now, uneasily, I argued, “I’m not trained.”
“Only because you quit school. We both know you could—”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t be jealous.”
“Of your 4.0 GPA without you even having to open a book?” She snorted. “Bet your damn ass I’m jealous. Anyway, they need you. Whether or not you’re officially trained, those women need you more than you will ever know, Tiff. Fuck, what they’ve been through?” She shuddered. “You’re the only help they’ll get too. It’s either you or nothing.”
I reached up and rubbed the back of my neck. “I still don’t understand what they’re doing there—”
“It’s complicated.”
“You’re telling me.”
Far as I could figure out, two of the women weren’t ‘technically’ there. As in, the authorities weren’t aware of them. They knew about one woman, and she was the one who’d gone to the cops and was the reason Donavan Lancaster was flitting around Asia trying to evade arrest warrants and extradition orders. It was like something out of an action movie, where the man I’d known pretty much all my life was the villain.
Surreal didn’t cut it.
“They need you, Tiff. Working in a restaurant, in a store…you’re not going to be helping anyone. Sure, you’ll be earning an honest buck, but that money could be going to someone who actually needs it, and you won’t be helping three people who my family destroyed. Please, Tiff. Please? Do it for me?”
Her tone wasn’t wheedling. It was filled with an urgent need I couldn’t hide from, one there was no avoiding. I stared ahead, seeing a future open before me that I’d never anticipated. There were two reasons I’d stopped training as a therapist. One because of politics, and two, because I couldn’t do it.
Literally.
I got too involved.
It wasn’t…
Fuck, it just wasn’t healthy. I wasn’t healthy with it.
My education had been derailed, but I was too self-aware to fail to realize that being a therapist wasn’t good for me.
Yet, equally, she was right. Why wouldn’t I do something to help women who’d been hurt by the men in Lily’s family when it was within the realms of possibility? If anyone deserved for me to try, it was her. She gave and gave, and at the moment, all I was doing was taking.
And for that reason, I knew she deserved for me to be honest with her. “Lily?”
“Yes, sweetheart?”
“Sin’s the father.”
Her brow puckered. “Sin? The brother who was—”
“Shipped off so that Nyx wouldn’t behead him? Yeah.” My tone was a mixture of dry and tortured. “That sums it up.”
Her shoulders straightened. “Well, this changes things. I’ll speak to Rex.”
My lips twitched at the thought of little Lily shoving her nose in club business and bullying Rex, the Prez.
I’d taken in a lot when I was at the clubhouse parties. Watched dynamics, studied interpersonal relationships, learned things that the bikers probably wouldn’t have anticipated me picking up on…
There were secrets in that clubhouse, but then, weren’t they everywhere?
My life was riddled with them, Lily’s too.
The thought had my heart twisting as I stared down at the hand which I’d covered my belly with. “We’ll get through this, won’t we, Lily?”
“Of course we will.” She smiled at me, and her love for me shone through.
I reached out with my spare hand, slipped my fingers through hers, and whispered, “Thank you.”
She squeezed me back. “No thanks necessary.”
Sin
Scrubbing the back of my neck with a handkerchief where sweat had gathered, I stayed as still as I otherwise could in the tree where I was sitting.
It wasn’t the most ridiculous position I’d ever been in for the club, but this was on my o
wn time and dime.
I had a purpose.
I wanted to go home, and the fucker in the house opposite me was my means to an end.
Nyx had two weaknesses.
Giulia was one of them, and the other?
The bastard in front of me, who didn’t deserve to live.
I’d been here for three hours, just waiting on him to make a move. With none of the connections I was used to hitting up in NJ, I was having to track this bastard in a truly old-school way.
It was a pain in the ass, but it’d be worth it to get back to West Orange.
I deserved to be here. I’d left my post, had left Giulia in danger, and the only reason I wasn’t fertilizing the compound grounds was because I had proof.
Proof that my woman had been messed with. Of course, said woman didn’t know she was mine because I didn’t have time to claim her officially before I rode the fuck out of Jersey with Nyx baying for my blood.
The thought had my jaw popping to the side, and I carefully eased the cramp in my foot as I stretched it out.
The dick was supposed to have left an hour ago, but he was still here. I’d cloned his phone, so I knew his plans had him heading out tonight, but he hadn’t specified a time. If he left it any longer, he’d be leaving tomorrow instead of tonight, which would ease into my new duties at the clubhouse.
Hissing at the inconvenience, I watched as, slowly, the dick got himself ready to leave.
When he finally pissed off a half hour later, the cramp in my foot had turned it numb, and when he roared off into the distance, unaware that I was tracing him, I hopped down from the branch that had become my bench and winced when I almost dropped to the ground.
Ignoring the pins and needles which instantly bombarded my extremities, I hustled into the shadows and walked to the front door. Kneeling, I picked the lock, crawled into the house, and closed it up behind me the second I could.
I wasn’t here just for shits and giggles. I’d been watching him go into that damn safe every night for the past three weeks I’d been tracking him, and last night, I’d finally seen his combination.
I knew what was in there, but I needed the proof. Needed something to give to Nyx to make him forgive me. Ohio might be great for the chapter of the Sinners who lived here, but it wasn’t my place.
I was an East Coaster, born and bred, and being in the middle of the country was only making me antsy. I needed to go home, and I didn’t want to lose a fucking limb in the process.
With a grunt, I unlocked the safe and trained my flashlight on my phone into the dark cavern of the strong box.
Shuffling through the different files, I came across the material I’d been seeking, and once I had it confirmed, I switched off the flashlight, not needing to see another fucking picture, and connected the call to Rex—the first time I’d spoken with him in weeks, because I was well aware I needed to earn my place back home. He’d already gone above and beyond for me by not kicking my ass out of the MC, telling Nyx he’d sent me to Oklahoma and not Ohio to save me from his wrath. Last thing I wanted was to waste his time too.
“You already know the answer if you’re asking if you can come home,” was his greeting. “Nyx ain’t nowhere close to forgiving you.”
Pulling a face at that, I told him, “He will be. I found him a toy.”
Silence echoed in my ear, then he muttered, “Might not be enough, bro.”
“I know, but I had to try, didn’t I?” I rubbed my chin, hating how fucking good it felt to be talking to him. Shit, I missed my family. This fucking exile sucked. It was, I also realized, a testament to my feelings for Tiff that I’d go through this shit for her. My voice turned gruff as I muttered, “I’ll send you his name and details so Mav can confirm the kill order is just, and fair warning, if Nyx doesn’t take out the trash, I will.”
“That bad?”
I could almost imagine my Prez’s brows rising at my statement.
He knew I didn’t get my hands dirty unless someone deserved it.
“That bad,” I confirmed. It was sickening, but I was insensate to the images I’d just seen.
The first time I’d ever come across that shit, back when I was younger, I’d actually puked, and it was the only time the brothers wouldn’t rip me a new one for being a pussy.
Our business was more than just the usual. We dealt in blood, we dealt in protection, and no one would ever thank us for it, because no one knew we were behind the eradication of these sick fucks.
But, numbed as I was, my stomach still snarled uneasily with what I’d seen in the fucker’s folders. I’d make him pay for every single picture. And if Nyx got involved? There was nothing he wouldn’t do to reap vengeance on the fucker’s soul.
“I’ll tell him. Wait to move on his word.”
“I will.”
He disconnected the call without another word, and I replaced everything in the safe as I’d found it. With all the fucker’s documents restored to its original neatness, I locked it up, then retreated to the outside once the door was closed too.
I left the place like the specter I was and headed for my bike.
I’d seen the message waiting on me, and while I wanted to reply, I knew that would be beyond stupid.
I needed to get out of here, away from David Faudreaux’s house and subdivision. The second someone saw me, I’d be implicating myself in the investigation when he was eliminated.
For that reason, I retrieved the kickstand and put the bike into neutral before rolling my hog down the road.
It took me a while, and each goddamn step felt like it took twice as long, but by the time I was at the unsecured entrance to the housing estate, where the noise from the highway shielded the kickstart of my ignition, I rolled away and back to the Sinners’ compound.
Ohio wasn’t for me. Sure, it was great and all that, but it just wasn’t my place. My home was in the Northeast.
Everything was just that little bit different. The smell, the way the people were. They were actually nicer, but I wasn’t used to it, and I missed home.
I missed her.
I didn’t think I’d be that pussy who’d get sentimental about his girl, but I kind of felt like a soldier who was on a deployment. I’d been there back in the day, and I could honestly say that I missed Tiffany more than I’d ever missed my bitch of an ex.
The only consolation was that here, sand wasn’t getting in every crease of my body—how the fuck it got in my asscrack with all the gear I’d had to wear back then, I’d never know—I wasn’t being shot at, and I didn’t have to kill anyone.
Not technically, at any rate.
Shit was starting to go down with the Famiglia, that much I knew, even if the council in Ohio kept things to themselves. I’d lost any ranking I’d earned with my exile here, but while even the average brother was kept out of the loop, we’d all learned that the Hell’s Rebels down in Texas had declared unofficial war on them, as had the Five Points, and since we were tied to them, that meant we technically were as well.
The Italians were sleazy fucks, trading in flesh and bone, selling women like they were property, and now the Russians were at war with them too? Nowhere was going to be safe for very long.
The prospect of Tiffany being in danger didn’t sit well with me, but there was fuck all I could do about it.
Fuck. All.
That killed me, but it made me haul my ass. I could have drowned myself in easy pussy the second I made it down here. Nyx held long grudges. He was the meanest motherfucker I’d ever met in my life, capable of things that would make a Spanish Inquisitor look soft-core, and I’d known, the second I heard that Giulia had been attacked, my life was on the line.
I felt like a pussy for leaving with my tail between my legs, but the truth was, I knew my brothers. And I got it. If I’d set a guard on Tiffany and they left their post when she was attacked? I’d want blood too.
But instead of feeling hopeless, instead of accepting my fate, I was working toward getting my ass back
home.
It was either that or bring Tiffany down here.
And I really couldn’t see her in Ohio.
New Jersey was a bit of a come down for her, even though she never said anything. I mean, I could just tell she didn’t like West Orange, and though it was my home, I got it. I’d been born and bred in Manhattan, Five Points’ territory, so I knew what the sparkle of the city that never slept felt like.
But also, it was no home. Not for me anyway. Still, Tiff and Podunk, Ohio? Nope.
It was an option, but it was one I’d prefer not to take.
I had a gut feeling she was pregnant.
Why?
Because life sucked sometimes, and kids always had a habit of popping up when the timing was never ideal. You picked that up really fast when you lived in an MC for as long as I had.
And what could be worse than my being in another fucking part of the States, forced to stay here at risk of Nyx giving me a Colombian necktie, while a half dozen of the nation’s criminal underworld were at war?
What a perfect time to bring a new life into the world, huh?
Of course, that was just my gut talking, and my gut had been known to be wrong. But the pill and then the drugs? She’d puked all over herself, several times until there was nothing left in her, and she ate like a bird anyway. If that morning after pill stuck, then it was a miracle.
As I rolled past a cornfield—I’d never seen so much fucking corn in my fucking life—I pulled into the clubhouse.
A party was raging, and I’d skipped it to go monitor Faudreaux. To be honest, I wasn’t in the mood.
Back home, I was the life and soul of the party, along with Link, but here? I was a miserable bastard, and I felt sorry for the fuckers who called me brother and had to deal with my sorry ass.
It didn’t help that I was cutting back on the booze, and that was mostly because I’d known I was drinking too much. Socializing, being friendly, and enjoying a party didn’t come natural to me. I needed the lubrication to fully enjoy those kinds of things, so without a bottle of tequila lining my stomach, I wasn’t going to appreciate shit. If anything, at the moment, I was maudlin as hell, and I had the feeling alcohol would only make that worse.
Forgotten & Found: A Dark & Dirty Sinners' MC Boxset Page 61