Brother In Arms: The Sacred Brotherhood Book III

by A. J. Downey

  “Scared the shit out of me, seeing you like that. I just wanted to kill him. Make sure he could never touch you like that again. I still should have broken his damn hands. Maybe Dragon and Dray did it for me.”

  “You mean that,” I said.

  “Damn right I do.”

  “I’m not used to this,” I said looking up at him, I couldn’t see him in the dark, the light through the blinds illuminating my face but leaving his shadowed.

  “I know. Things are a lot simpler where I come from. More basic. You touch a man’s property, his woman, his bike, you best be prepared to have your face smashed in.”

  “Is that what I am to you?”

  “What?”

  “Your woman, your property?”

  “Well, yeah, Bailey. At least I’d like you to be.” I swallowed hard and pushed away from him, getting out of my bed.

  “Get out,” I said and it nearly broke my heart to say it but it needed to be said.

  “Call someone else to come sit with me, I don’t care but get out.” I was shaking now and he sat up completely, clicking on the bedside lamp and leaning back against the headboard.

  “Talk to me,” he said, and I could tell by his tone I’d hurt him.

  I shook my head and said, “Just please, get dressed and leave.”

  “Not until you tell me why.”

  I sniffed and stared at the ceiling, willing the tears to remain where they were and not spill but no such luck. It was like the tap was loose or something and wouldn’t quite shut off.

  “Don’t you understand?” I demanded. “My whole life I’ve been told to shush. I’ve been shuffled off to the side in favor of the Berling golden boy. Told what I’m going to do, when I am going to do it; paraded in front of people to make my parents, my father, look good to his cronies and to impress clients or whatever. I’m not a show piece, damn it! I’m a woman, a person and no one’s fucking property!”

  He started laughing then, hanging his head and shaking it a little just like every patronizing male in my life ever had as a way to discount the girl, oh don’t mind her, must be that time of the month, sort of thing. I hated it, I hated it so much and all of that venom, the poison I’d been ingesting since I first drew a damn breath just boiled to the surface and I just completely blew a gasket.

  “Get out!” I screamed at him and stomped into the bathroom and slammed the door, locking it.

  He tapped on the other side of it a moment later while I paced over my travertine floor and seethed.

  “Bailey, open the door.”

  “I mean it, Rush, either you leave now or I’m calling the police.”

  Silence met that proclamation and he said, “Come out here and talk to me.”

  I ripped open the door and demanded, “And say what?”

  “What the hell’s gotten into you would be a good start,” his expression was stormy and he was getting angry too.

  “Men! Men’s what’s gotten into me. Men thinking they know what’s best for me, men thinking they can do whatever they want to me and blowing me off every time I have a problem with their shitty attitude or way of treating me like I’m nothing more than a cute little pet!” I went to slam the door in his face but it was stopped by his broad palm.

  “And I’m one of those men, huh?”

  “Yes! I’m not your fucking property. I might have been your girlfriend, but good luck with that now, biker boy!”

  That tipped him over the edge. He got right into my face, nose to nose and said, “You rich bitches are all the same. Judgmental little cunts in it to ride some bad boy cock for a few nights then can’t handle it when shit gets real even for a minute. Then what do you do when we clean up your fucking mess for you? Trash us like we ain’t shit. News flash for you, rich bitch. I’m a person, a man, and I’ve got feelings; I’m not fucking disposable, not that you’d know anything about that.” I recoiled from his low vehement tone and the horror of what I’d just done had only begun to sink in.

  My mind raced, repeating over, and over, and over again, you broke it. You broke this, you broke this; you broke this… even as my mouth betrayed me further by saying dully, “Just get out, leave.”

  He yanked on his clothes while I watched from the bathroom doorway and when he finished swinging on his leather vest he came to me with his gun in his hand.

  “You know how to shoot this?” he demanded.

  “No.”

  He clicked a little lever on the side and said to me, “Safety is off, it’s a point and click application, aim for center mass; that’s the chest. It’s not hard, I know your spoiled ass is used to having everything done for you, but I think you can handle it. Just do me a fuckin’ favor and don’t shoot me in the back, already hurts from your knife.”

  With that, he turned and walked away, ducking out the bedroom door. I heard his truck engine start up outside and the tires slide in the gravel as he romped on the gas and left. Just like I’d asked him, no… demanded, he do.

  I stared at the big black gun in my hand and knew fear. Not for what might happen to me, more for what wouldn’t now… I really loved him. I knew it by the breaking of my heart, but at the same time, I couldn’t blame anyone but myself.

  What have I done?

  I slid down the door frame to my bedroom floor and wept. What else could I do? You know the trouble with crying, though? It didn’t really fix anything. Sure, it made you feel a little better for the moment, but when you were done? Nothing was different. Nothing was changed.

  I got dressed and went to my kitchen. I had to pass the ruin of my front door, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. I looked around my house and shook my head. All of it was just stuff. I’d had the potential to really have something with Rush, something more real than anything I had ever had with anyone before and I’d just taken a keg of dynamite to it. White washed any future I might have had with the same prejudiced brush of my past.

  What is wrong with you? I asked myself, but I didn’t have an answer. I honestly didn’t have an answer at all. I made coffee and curled up in one of the chairs on my front porch. I set the gun next to the coffee cup and stared at it for a long, long, time wondering why he’d left it.

  It was around seven in the morning when Dray pulled up on his bike, the sun had risen, the birds were chirping, and my cousin looked pissed. He stormed up onto the porch and made a disgusted sound.

  “What the hell did you do, Bales?” he demanded, and I looked up at him with a tear streaked face.

  “I fucked up,” I said and he shook his head, gripping the back of his neck and swore.

  “No, shit. What did you say to him?”

  He dropped into a seat across from mine and I stared at him, “What does it matter? He left, I drove him away and he probably hates me.”

  Dray rolled his eyes and said, “Oh, for fuck’s sakes, talk. What did you say?”

  I told him everything and he bowed his head, nodding. “You’re right,” he said, “you fucked up. You didn’t let him get a single word in edgewise, did you?” I stared at him blankly and shook my head. “Didn’t think so, if you had, you’d know that to be considered property of one of us is just about the highest honorific a brother could give you.”

  “I don’t understand that!” I said. “How does that make sense to any normal person!?”

  “It’s not supposed to. Not for a citizen like you,” he shot back, and it wounded me. Dray had always been patient with me before, teasing, but now? Now, he was harsh and unforgiving and I wasn’t used to it, even if I did deserve it.

  “Listen,” he said finally, “I’m only going to explain this once…” and he did and I would be lying if I said it didn’t boggle my mind. I sat there and absorbed it all and finally came to the conclusion that there wasn’t really anything to understand about it. It wasn’t something, like he said, that fit into any neat little box constructed by the average person to explain it. It just was for them. As natural to them as the air they breathed.

  “How d
id you know to come here? That I would be alone?”

  “He left a fuckin’ voicemail. Shit, Bales, get your fuckin’ ass up and let’s go.”

  “To do what?”

  “So you can fuckin’ apologize.”

  I nodded. As much as I didn’t want to do it because, god, so many reasons… embarrassment being chief among them. I nodded and said, “Let me grab a pair of boots and tell my lead that I’ll be gone for a bit so that he can keep an eye on the house.”

  “Make it quick, I ain’t got all fuckin’ day. I’d like to get back to the club and my girl.” He picked up Rush’s gun and put the safety on, swearing. “You’re lucky you didn’t shoot your fuckin’ self.”

  I tipped my head and said, “I’m not completely stupid, Dray-Dray.”

  “No, just naïve as fuck.”

  I nodded, I couldn’t argue that when it came to his world. I went and did the aforementioned errands as quickly as I could. When I came back, Dray was already astride his bike which was running. He shoved his helmet at me and I put it on and got on the back of his motorcycle. It was a little weird riding with my cousin, not knowing where to hold on and such. I mean, he was my cousin… I don’t know. I guess I was just being dumb.

  It was both the longest and shortest ride of my life. I spent the entire thing trying to get my exhausted, stressed out mind to work. Trying to come up with an apology big enough to suit the situation.

  I’d never been to my uncle or cousin’s motorcycle club, and I craned my neck as we pulled up into the lot, trying to get a good look. Dray stopped and I got off, taking his helmet off as I looked over the low slung cinderblock building. He backed his motorcycle into the line of them out front and shut it off, leaning it onto its kickstand. He took the helmet from my hands and led the way to the door.

  He opened it for me and I went through, a girl straightening up from the front of the bar, giving me a flat, unfriendly look.

  “Who the fuck are you?” she asked, but her thick Irish accent made it come out more like “Who th’ feck are ye?”

  “Excuse me?” I asked.

  “Aye,” she said addressing Dray, “Club business, ye say? Who the fuck is she, Dray? Huh?”

  “Jesus, chill out, Em.”

  “Oh? Gettin’ up this early an’ leavin’ without so much as a kiss? Ye come ridin’ up at a half past eight in th’ mornin’ with this lassie on yer bike and I’m supposed t’ stay calm? Club business my arse!”

  Fire sparked out of her steely blue eyes and I just kept my mouth shut. I didn’t know what was worse, that she was accusing my cousin of sleeping with me or the fact she was doing it in front of an audience, a mostly grinning audience.

  Dray went to her and grabbed her by the upper arm, “It is club business, Em, now get over here,” he said and started dragging her towards the darkened back of the club.

  She raised her voice and dug in her heels and said, “Not until ye tell me who she is!” She turned her attention back to me and said, “Ay, ay! Who are ye? Can’t ye talk?”

  I blinked and remained silent, just watching the mess start to unfold, Dray hauled on her a little harder and said, “Em, Em, EM! Get over here, alright!?”

  “No! It’s not alright! Who the feck is she, Dray?”

  It blew up into a full scale quarrel at that point. I looked over and saw my Uncle Dragon, Ghost and a few other men and women sitting around scattered tables laughing and watching the show Dray, and his girl, Em, was putting on. They were shouting at each other and I watched him thrust her through an empty doorway into a room beyond.

  He followed her in and bellowed, “Jesus Christ, Em! What is your fuckin’ problem?”

  “Ye want to know what my problem is, I’ll tell you what my problem is!” she shouted, then raised her voice even louder and screamed, “I’m pregnant!” right before the door slammed shut on a ringing silence. My jaw dropped and several of the men were laughing beside me. I looked and my uncle Dragon was beaming.

  “Congratulations, grandpa!” a man crowed. He had bright, twinkling blue eyes and his hair was smoothed down to a point between his eyes, an almost Mohawk without actually being one. Dragon laughed for real then, a lot of them did, laughing almost until they cried. The first thing that was evident was that Rush was not among them. I pinched the bridge of my nose and let out a pent up breath… I so don’t get these people…

  “How you doin’, Bailey?” Ghost asked and I dropped my shaking hand, my nerves shot from the stress and gave him a weak smile.

  “Seen Rush?” I asked softly, dodging the question.

  “Out in his woodshop, sweetheart. Straight ahead, zag left at the media room and go down the hall next to it and out the back door. Big fuckin’ building on the left, last bay. You can’t miss it,” my uncle said, dark eyes roving over me. Silent disapproval radiating from them but I couldn’t say I hadn’t earned it.

  I pressed my lips together and nodded, my chest tight with fear and anxiety. I put my hands in my back pockets and followed my uncle’s directions. I heard the first man that’d spoken, congratulating Dragon on him impending grandparenthood ask, “He do that to her face?”

  “Nope, that’s been handled already.”

  “And you didn’t tag me in? Awww!”

  “Don’t you worry about it, your turn’s a comin’,” Dragon said and he didn’t sound happy about it. The other guy, on the other hand, was all too pleased. I heard him give an excited, “Yay!” and the rest of their conversation was lost to me as I made my way deeper into the clubhouse, dread ticking fingers down my spine. They were so casual about violence and I found that so frightening.

  Still, I was distracted by the man’s first question. I wondered what they were talking about when it came to my face, and I realized I had no idea, that I hadn’t looked in a mirror yet. I went to the back door and there on my left was a small bathroom. I ducked into it and looked into the cracked mirror above the sink.

  A bruise stained my face, the color of old coffee, on my chin by my mouth. I bowed my head and shook my head. It hadn’t been Rush, he hadn’t laid a hand on me despite how pissed off he’d been before he’d left. Before you kicked his ass out, I corrected myself.

  Rush hadn’t hit anybody first, I thought to myself. Ken had… Rush had just come in and finished what Ken had started. I shook my head and scrubbed my face with my hands, tiredness making everything a small irritation.

  I went back out into the dimly lit hall, switching out the light to the bathroom and squared my shoulders at the back door. I took a deep breath in through my nose and let it out through my mouth and opened the portal into the too bright summer sun. Rush had been right, he had cleaned up the mess made last night regardless of if it’d been my mess or not, and I couldn’t even give him the benefit of hearing him out. I’d been too busy clutching my damn pearls. Ugh…

  It took me a minute to let my eyes adjust, not that I needed them. I could hear the sound of tools off to my left and ahead of me; I probably could have found him by sound alone. I followed the asphalt track around to that side and up a gentle incline until I was even with the shop. The first and second bay doors were firmly shut but the third was flung wide open to the air. I could hear what sounded like a hammer and chisel at work and I could almost picture him bent over whatever piece he was working on.

  I wanted to see that, for real, not just in my imagination, but I was afraid. More afraid of rounding that corner and having him reject me before I could even say I was sorry. He had every right to… I hadn’t listened to him. I hadn’t even given him the chance to say a thing. It’d serve me right if he told me to fuck right off.

  Tears collected on my lashes before I could even round the corner and I didn’t bother to try and dash them away. All it ever accomplished was making them worse, the oils from my skin liked to get into my eyes and started burning which just made them water even more. It wasn’t worth the trouble, so I just stepped around the corner and there he was, just like magic, leaning over a slab of w
ood, a mallet in one hand and a chisel in the other. He leaned up and lowered the tools to his sides, staring at me through a pair of clear safety glasses.

  “Hi,” I murmured and his gaze flicked over me from head to toe.

  “Hey.” One word, cautious, suspicious, my heart broke a little more.

  Tears welled up hot and fierce and my voice broke when I said, “I’m so sorry.”

  Tools clattered to the piece of wood he was working on and he came around it making a beeline for me. He pulled me tight against his chest and kissed the top of my head.

  “I’m sorry, too,” he said roughly and my tears turned to ones of relief.

  “I didn’t understand, I still don’t, but I want to... Dray showed up this morning and explained some things but this is all my fault. I should have let you talk. I should have just listened.”

  “Shh,” he soothed, and held me close. “I hate it when you hurt,” he said with a sigh and I laughed a little brokenly.

  “I hate that I hurt you.”

  “Water under the bridge, baby. I’m a big boy, I can take it. What’s killin’ me is the shit I said to you. I lost my temper, called you names, and that shit just wasn’t right.”

  “I don’t understand something,” I said and I could hear the slight smile in his voice when he said, “What’s that?”

  “Why’d you leave me your gun?”

  He chuckled faintly and said, “I love you, babe, and loving someone means tellin’ ‘em to go to Hell and worrying the whole time they’re travelin’ on if they’re gonna get there safely.”

  I laughed then, I couldn’t help it. It was one of the most ridiculous things I’d ever heard that made perfect sense. I’d been awake all night doing the same thing, worrying on if he made it back here safely. Wondering if it could be fixed, wondering if he hated me…

  “It’s the same reason I been out here since I got back, building you a new front door.”