Flame’s grin didn’t die as he stared down at me. “You look like a man who has second thoughts. You gonna pull a Julia Roberts on me?”
“A what now?” I queried, brow puckering.
“Julia Roberts. Runaway Bride.” He waved a hand. “Lucie made me watch it. That and Pretty Woman.” He winced. “Only made bearable by the fact she gave me a BJ during. Not that I’d share those pertinent facts with anyone else, mind you. But you’re family.”
“Probably all the more reason not to tell me, Flame,” I muttered, crinkling my nose.
“Well, regardless. You look edgy. Why?”
“I’m nervous.” I shrugged. “Don’t want to let her down.”
“Be yourself and you won’t.”
I cut him a look and started jangling my keys. “That sounds too simple.”
“No. It’s just how it is. You can’t live like this and not be true to yourself, Jamie. Ama is a good woman. She’s strong, and she’ll love you forever just like she has since you were first friends. That love ain’t gonna die if you decide you can’t live like she needs—”
Dammit to hell. Grunting, I turned on him and hissed, “What the fuck is this? Look, I wasn’t happy about it at first, sure. But it has nothing to do with sharing her. These past several weeks have shown me that. I’ve loved the time we’ve spent together, and Saint is my brother in more ways than just the MC. Ink, he was new to me, but he’s cool as fuck.
“My issue ain’t with sharing her. Not like I thought it might be when this first started, ya know? It’s with fucking up. Letting her down. I’m scared about that.”
Flame grabbed me by the shoulder. “Those are the kind of doubts I like to hear.”
“Why?” I grumbled. “I sound like a pussy.”
“You sound like a man who’s about to start a lifelong relationship with a woman he adores. We all get scared about fucking up, but to be honest, we fuck up anyway.” He shrugged. “Remember how I watched Pretty Woman? Well, Axe chose not to. That’s the joy of this life. It’s not all on you. All you’ll miss out on is a potential BJ for your pains… So, you feel like you’re gonna fuck up, send Saint or Ink in.”
“You mean tag-team her?”
Flame shrugged. “Yup. You love her, you want what’s right for her, but maybe you can’t give it to her… maybe Ink or Saint can. See, my MC brothers, I know they think less of me for living this way. I’m a man, I’m a biker, I should have my bitch under my thumb—”
“Any man who thinks he could have Lucie Steeler under his thumb is a moron.”
“Exactly. But, that’s neither here nor there. My point is, they think I’m weaker for it when I’m not. It makes me stronger. If I know I need to go and do shit, I know I’ve got three men at my back who will take care of the woman who owns my soul if I fuck up. I can’t even imagine the terror of having that sole responsibility.” He shuddered. “And, like I said, Jamie, we all fuck up. It’s in our DNA.
“You just got to embrace the fact that you will, and when you do, try not to do it too royally. Because we raised Ama right. She won’t let you fuck around on her, won’t let you get away with shit for too long—no matter how many guys you have to help you cover your shit up, it’s still all on you.
“And you have to face facts… do you want to live in a world without her? Do you want to be without Ama in your life?”
His words resonated with me so deeply that I wasn’t even sure how to say what I wanted to. I just stared at him, floundering, and he slapped me on the shoulder and smiled.
“Yeah, you’re doing the right thing. She’s yours, brother. Just like you’re hers. Sometimes, it’s as easy as that. Our life ain’t always simple, so when you find something pure like her? You grab onto it with both hands.”
“Why are you okay with this?” I rasped. “I’m surprised you don’t want to kill us.”
His gaze shot over to Saint, whom Ama was leaning against while they all shot the shit with Bridges. “Because some women ain’t made for normal. Some women just need more. Ama’s like her momma. For different reasons, sure, but she’s still that way.
“She’ll keep you on your toes. Don’t think life will be regular, because it won’t. Not just because of Saint and Ink, but because it will never follow an ordinary pattern.”
“What do you mean?”
He sighed. “Need it spelling out, do you?”
“Yeah,” I said roughly. “You’ve had more time to think about this shit.”
Flame grinned. “True. Women like Ama and her momma are supernovas. Wherever they touch, they cause a reaction. They’re not simple people. They’re chaos bound. They take a lot of looking after, but I think you three are man enough for the job.”
“I can only try, Flame,” I rasped, and he clapped me on the shoulder again.
“That’s all we can do.”
With that, he wandered over to the table where Bridges had finally moved. Ama hustled him over to the reception desk where he settled his tab, and I watched her, watched how she moved. The way she flicked her hair behind her ear, the smile she shot him, the nervous look in her eyes as he talked about how much he loved the tattoo.
As I stared at her, the porcelain skin, the gentle chin that rounded to a point after sloping down from high, heart-shaped cheekbones, I recognized one thing—that was my woman.
Fuck, the pride that roared through me beat what I felt when I’d climbed on my bike that first time.
She’d held me while I’d grieved the loss of a sister who was dead to me, while I mourned my father who I might lose for a few more years thanks to Kenzie, and that she hadn’t cast me aside for not being ‘man enough,’ that she’d loved me through it all?
It made me want to give her the world.
It made me want to change her life. I didn’t want her to need to sleep on the fucking floor any more like a dog. I didn’t want her to wake up with nightmares.
I wanted her to feel so fucking secure that nothing scared her. That she became a force to be reckoned with like her momma was.
Hell, at that moment, that became my life goal.
My true fucking reason for existing.
To make this woman be what she was born to be.
Our sinning saint.
When she strode over to me after Bridges walked out, practically skipping with her glee, her head was tilted to the side as she saw me watching her.
The instant she was close enough, I shoved my hands in the back pockets of her short shorts and hauled her over to me.
“You look gloomy,” she stated brightly.
“Nope. Just pensive.”
That had her narrowing her eyes. “Why?”
“Just thinking about your tats.”
She stiffened. “You still want me to have yours, don’t you?”
I smirked. “Without a doubt.” I leaned down and nipped her earlobe. “I want it there. Behind your ear.”
She squirmed in my arms. “That’s gonna hurt.”
“All the best things do, babe.”
“True.” She stared up at me. “If I get mine there, then you get yours there too.”
I grinned. “Deal.”
“I have something to show you.”
“You do? Something good?” I squeezed her ass cheeks to tell her I was joking.
“Hopefully.”
She pulled away then grabbed my arm and tugged me over to the reception desk. I heard the buzzing of the tattoo machine and saw that Saint had removed his shirt and was laying down on the seat, having Ama’s name and her flower inked above his heart. The amaryllis was dripping ruby-colored blood that puddled underneath her name.
When she shuffled some papers, then dropped her sketch of my tattoo there for me, I felt my heart stop.
My first reaction?
“It’s perfect.”
My momma was there, her face pristine with the dark bob that had framed her delicate features. Her large eyes stared up at me, and underneath her chin was the egg timer. Ticking away, the
sands of time disappearing too fast for her.
I gritted my teeth as the pain of loss, so recent after Kenzie’s betrayal, hit me hard.
Shaking my head, I whispered again, “It’s perfect.”
She was there, like I knew she always would be, at my side, clinging to me. She raised up on tiptoe again, and whispered back, “You’re perfect.”
I dropped a kiss on her nose. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Being you.”
❖
Saint
“What you been doing?”
I winced at my dad’s question, and when my stepmom, Dorie, arched a brow at me, I just shrugged.
“That isn’t an answer, Lawrence.”
Blowing out a breath, I murmured, “Been hanging at Ink’s place. Keeping Ama and her brothers safe.”
“I knew that. I was at the council meeting when that talk went down,” my dad argued, “but what I want to know is what you’ve been doing.”
My brow puckered. “What are you talking about?”
“I think he wants to know if you’re boning me,” Ama interjected politely, her eyes wide and her face expressionless.
Before I could choke on my coffee, Wheels, my dad, was snorting into his. “Well, I wouldn’t have put it like that, Ama.”
“Wouldn’t you?” Dorie replied with a wicked grin at him.
“Nope. Not to my Prez’s girl, and…” He pulled a face. “I mean, I don’t even know what you’re going to be to me yet.”
My mouth worked uselessly for a few seconds as I tried to process just how messed up this conversation was. When Ama was about to speak, intending on saying only God knew what, I quickly inserted, “Dad, it’s a little soon to be talking about this stuff.”
He slouched back in his La-Z-Boy and shrugged as he settled his mug on his jean-clad knee. “Not according to Ink.”
“Why? What’d he say?” I grumbled.
“That he was wifing her.”
Ama’s eyes flashed. “That’s what he said?”
My dad nodded, his gaze flashing between her and me. “That’s it. Pretty much word for word. I wanna know how you feel about that, Lawrence.”
I winced, because the question didn’t only catch me on the raw, but I didn’t even know what I felt about that. “I guess I’m glad,” I said hesitantly.
“Glad that another brother is wifing your woman?” He cocked a brow at me, and I knew Dorie, God love her, nudged him with her foot even though I couldn’t see it from the sofa across the room.
Dorie and my dad may only have gotten together because my birth mom had dumped me on him when I was five, but that didn’t mean their relationship had all been about the convenience. I had three sisters to prove otherwise.
Three sisters who were somewhere in the house, giggling and shit—I could hear them from down here in the place my pop had bought to make a family home for us when I was young.
I could remember him back then. He’d been young and brash, pretty much like me now I guessed, but when my mom, the bitch, had dumped me in Rutherford on a father I’d never met before? He’d manned up and hadn’t hesitated to take me on.
Hadn’t mattered that he knew shit about kids, or that his life wasn’t exactly conducive to having a child tagging along for the ride. He’d taken me in and raised me well. Dorie had helped, in fact, she’d helped so much that one day, she’d moved in and had never moved out again.
That was when a baby sister had popped up.
When Dorie had demanded I call in because she hadn’t seen me in over a month, Ama had decided to come with. I knew the two got on well, which made things helpful, and I wasn’t averse to spending some one-on-one time with my family so that they understood where we were at.
I didn’t need Keys interjecting with his random key jangles, or Ink grunting as I discussed anything my parents had to ask.
It wasn’t like we’d been hiding shit, because we hadn’t. But still, this was what I defined as an awkward conversation. And yet, as I sat there, I watched Ama charm them both. Not that she worked hard to do that. She was just herself, just the woman I fucking loved.
Christ.
How had this happened?
Where had this all-encompassing love come from?
It felt like it was newly discovered, but it wasn’t. It had been there all along. Just waiting for me to man up, to grow some balls, and to take her for my own.
When the doorbell rang and my dad got to his feet, was I surprised at what we found there?
Not really.
When Ama’s folks came striding in with a keg of beer, and Ink and Keys showed up too? I knew we had us a party in the making.
We spilled outside, and suddenly burgers were on the grill, and steaks and fixin’s made an appearance too. Through it all, Ama stayed by my side. Laughing as she joined in, showing the strength that blossomed inside her whenever we were together.
The MC had some tough times ahead. Shit had worked out with the dirty spur-sporting cop, and we were currently supplying him with weapons. It went against the grain, but not being hit up every week on raids was even better.
Sometimes, you had to deal with the devil to get shit done, and in this case, the devil had a badge. That was MC life. You rolled with the punches and took your happiness where you could get it.
For me?
That happiness was by my side.
I recognized a good thing when I had it, and I wasn’t dumb fuck enough to let things drop.
Pressing a kiss to Ama’s hair, I murmured, “You okay?”
She beamed up at me. “Of course, I am.”
I grinned. “Thought you’d still be feeling grossed out.”
Now that she’d managed to pull apart a tattoo machine and put it back together again, Ink had decided she was good to work on oranges. But today, after getting thirty oranges under her belt, he’d brought out the big guns.
A side of pork.
She’d done a good job as well. I’d taken a picture and was threatening to have it framed, even though she’d been white as a sheet throughout the whole procedure.
Amazing how far she’d come in six weeks. Not that she’d be ready for human flesh for a long time, but still, it was nice to see her own her talent, and do more at the parlor than just play receptionist and autoclave technician. It felt like a step forward, and that was what I wanted for her—to keep the past buried and to walk along a route that led to the future.
She pulled a face at me. “It stank.”
“It didn’t.”
“It fucking did,” she grumbled. “My nose was inches away from it.”
“You sprayed it with perfume,” I reminded her. Had almost choked us all out too.
Ama laughed. “You know it stank then or I wouldn’t have wasted perfume on it.”
“True. You’re just squeamish.”
Her nose wrinkled but she didn’t hide from it. “You okay?” she asked, throwing the question back at me.
I nodded as I stared at our families mingling in the backyard of the house that had been mine since I was a boy.
“Funny how shit turns out, isn’t it?”
She nodded. “Yeah, it is. Especially in such a short space of time.”
“He’s doing better,” I murmured, tipping my chin at Keys. I reached up and tugged at her earlobe, where his claim was inked behind the sensitive flesh. “You helped him. Not sure he’d have handled everything so well if you—”
“Pfft. He’d have been okay.”
“Don’t diminish your importance in his life, babe. He lost his sister and learned his dad had lost parole rights…” My jaw clenched at his father’s stupidity.
She patted my chest, then spun around so she was leaning into me. I pressed my lips to her temple and whispered, “Wish I was inside you.”
A soft laugh escaped her. “You’re the one who wanted to visit your folks today.”
“Dorie was moaning,” I grumbled.
“Can’t blame her. You�
�re her only son, babes.”
I bit my lip at her easy acceptance of something that was true, yet wasn’t. I eyed the woman who’d helped raise me, and saw her and Lucie were hooting about only God knew what. Then I cut a look at Ink and Keys who were bitching about something with Axe and Flame, and then Wolfe and Dagger were hanging with my daddy. My sisters had come out and were jumping in the blow-up pool, and overhead, the stars had made an appearance, disguising the grass that really needed mowing, and the bike parts that took up a large chunk of the lawn because Wheels had been working on restoring in it during his spare time for the past two years.
This was life, this was home, and this was family.
It was only now when I realized how much that had opened up, and I was glad, so fucking glad, especially for Ink and Keys who didn’t have much of a family anymore.
“We gave them this, didn’t we?” I asked quietly.
She hummed. “They’re never gonna be alone again.”
“You little fixer,” I teased.
“Hardly,” she scoffed. “Can’t fix someone else when you’re broken.”
“You ain’t broken, babe. You’re just a little wonky.”
Laughter snorted out from her, and she began choking on the sip of Coke she’d just taken. I slapped her on the back, scowling down at her amusement. We caught a few glances from our families, but they turned away when they saw she was just coughing her guts up.
“What’s so funny?”
She giggled when she stopped choking. “Nothing. Nothing.”
I pshawed. “Doesn’t sound like it to me.”
“I’ll take being wonky over broken is all,” she replied, winking up at me. “In fact, I think I might get that inked on me.”
“You an addict now?” I teased.
“Hell yeah. Three pieces and counting.”
I grinned, then nuzzled my cheek into hers. “You gonna get a tramp stamp?”
“You want me to get one?”
“I’d like my eyes on it while I fuck you in the ass.”
When she shivered, I grinned.
“That can be arranged.”
“Glad to hear it.”
❖
Ink
Six months later
All Sinner No Saint Page 47