Masked & Miserable: A Novella of the Sacred Hearts MC (Book 3.5)

by Downey, A. J.

  I blinked, stunned… “What are you saying?” I asked, my words hollow in my chest.

  “I’m saying,” he said gripping me by the shoulders and turning me towards Reaver who held a brand new Sacred Heart’s cut in his hands, “Welcome brother Disney.”

  Dragon gave me a little shove in Reaver’s direction, taking the Prospect’s cut off my shoulders when he did it. I stepped forward, shaking and turned around so Reaver could slide the new patch onto my shoulders.

  “Disney?” I asked incredulous.

  “On account of all them fucked up cartoons you got all over you,” Dragon said grinning. I looked over to Trigger who wore a shit eating grin and to Zander who looked as stunned as me.

  “Zander,” Dray said and Zander looked over to his mentor, our VP who was shaking out another, larger cut.

  “Not anymore,” Dragon said. “Revelator, on account of getting hit by you is one, a revelation, that is. You’ve proven in the last year that no matter how bad it gets, no matter how sideways shit goes that you’ve got any man in this club’s back. You’ve gone above and beyond and done what needs done to serve this club, protect this club and its people and we couldn’t ask for two better brothers than you and Disney.” Zander shuffled forward on his red Chuck Taylor’s. He shrugged out of his prospect’s cut and let Dray help him into his new colors and looked about as overcome by emotion as I felt.

  “Congratu-fucking-lations you two,” Dragon said then roared like his namesake, “Welcome home!” the room erupted in loud cheering and applause punctuated by earsplitting whistles of approval. Hugs were handed out like cigars at a baby shower and by the time it was over my ribs felt loose and my back bruised from all the sound poundings it’d taken.

  “Disney,” I said under my breath, finger tips smoothing across the ridge of embroidery of my new road name. I felt my face split into a smile. I liked it. I liked my new name a lot. I swallowed hard and sobered.

  “Uh oh, what’s that look for?” Reaver asked. I looked up at him, Zan- Revelator, Trigger, my Pres. and Vice Pres.

  “Is it okay… I mean, is it going to be weird if…” they all looked at me like they weren’t getting it, Ghost shouldered his way between Trig and Revelator with three beers in each hand, holding the bottle necks between his fingers.

  “Spit it out Disney,” Trig said amused.

  “Is it going to be weird for you guys if I bring my boyfriend around?” I rushed out, thinking of Aaron. The guys all exchanged looks, some of them had the grace to look embarrassed by their discomfort but it was Dray of all people who spoke up first…

  “Dis, man, I’m not going to pretend that it isn’t going to make me uncomfortable at first but that’s my malfunction, not yours. I’ll get used to it the more I see it,” he said and gave me a nod. I blinked.

  “Not sure how we’re going to handle it, I mean does he have any interest in prospecting? Is he going to be your Old Lady? We’re forging new ground here, the club has never had a gay member so we’re all on a learning curve with you boy,” Doc said.

  “Um, I don’t know either, Aaron and I have only been seeing each other for about a week, it uh, it was all real sudden and real new… I’m uh…” I blushed. I wasn’t used to being so open about all this.

  “Where’s he at?” Zander asked, eyes narrowed.

  “He plays the Cello for the Philharmonic Orchestra in the city,” I said.

  Ghost put the beers on the bar when Dragon started looking from one to the other of his chapter.

  “It’s a clear night. Why don’t we just go get ‘im and find out?” Dragon asked, I startled.

  “I... don’t know!” I said drawing out the ‘I’.

  “Ashamed of us Puddin’?” Revelator asked wrinkling his nose and smiling a toothy grin. I gave him a flat look.

  “Fuck you, let’s go, but you guys have to let me talk to him first!” I cried when they all started getting rowdy and cheering.

  Oh God… how was this going to go?

  Chapter 8

  Squick

  Disney…

  We rode out in formation, the guys from out of town staying back at the club house to hold down the fort until we got back. Reaver had called his wife and told her to get the girls together and their pretty little asses to the club house if they wanted to meet my boyfriend and had to hold the phone a foot from his ear as her and Ashton’s ear splitting squeals of delight had blasted through the earpiece.

  “I hate you so god damned much,” I said in a dry, deadpan tone of voice but I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. He sucked in his cheeks and gave me fish lips and made smooching sounds in my direction and I flipped him the fucking bird.

  Dragon came to me and handed me a Pillion pad for my back fender. I smiled and took it and pressed the lick and stick seat’s suction cups to my back fender and I really, really hoped that it would get used. Adrenaline coursed through my veins, thrumming with a low hum through every nerve ending. A mixture of excitement and anxiety played the insides of my ribs like a xylophone, my heart hammering a bass beat against the underside of my breast bone the closer we got to the city.

  The night was clear and the sky which was shot through with stars over the clubhouse was merely sprinkled with them the closer and closer we got to the lights of the city. It was almost an hour’s ride and it honored me that my brothers would take it with me. We pulled up to the taxi waiting area along the curb in front of the Orchestra house and waited. I checked the time and the timing couldn’t be more perfect. The performance had ended a half hour ago and the musicians were just coming out the side door. I blew into my icy hands to warm them, looked back at the guys who all sat astride their bikes and waited.

  “Well go get him!” Trigger barked and laughed. I shot a grin over my shoulder and walked towards the mouth of the alley where the performers were coming out a side door and watched for Aaron. My heart nearly stopped in my chest when he came out. He was between a girl who carried a slim case for a clarinet or a flute and a guy who carried a violin. Aaron’s cello was in a soft case that he wore like a back pack and he looked up sharply at the girl’s startled “Oh my!”

  His liquid dark eyes locked with mine and all the tension I’d felt on the way out here eased marginally. I held out my hands to either side and laughed a little incredulously. Aaron blinked behind his sexy as hell lenses and looked past me to the gleaming line of chrome and dusky black leather at the curb.

  “Andy?” he asked, “What’s going on?”

  “Well, uh, my brothers thought it might be a good idea if we came out and picked up my boyfriend so he could celebrate me patching in with me,” I said and pursed my lips. My heart was fucking hammering in my chest as I waited for Aaron to say something.

  “Oh… well um,” he smiled softly and his eyes glinted with mischief, “What’s your boyfriend’s name? I’ll tell him you’re here,” I stepped closer, slowly, and shrugged my shoulders nonchalantly.

  “You uh, really want to play this game huh?” I asked and put a smile on my face that would make Reaver proud. Aaron gasped and I smiled a little bigger and before he or his friends could react, shot out my hand, hooking it around the back of his neck and pulling his face to mine in a fierce kiss. Aaron smiled against my mouth and kissed me back and any fear or apprehension I had been feeling about coming here evaporated.

  The girl gasped and his male friend said “Damn!” like he was impressed and meanwhile my guys cheered and hollered from back at the bikes. Some clapping and an odd whistle or two split the city air and Aaron pulled back from the kiss.

  “Um, guys, I’m going to have to catch you later, my boyfriend’s come to give me a ride home. Drinks next week?” he asked.

  “Absolutely,” the girl said, smiling.

  “Thanks Anya,” Aaron said and nodded to the dude, “Mark.”

  “No problem man,” Mark said, smiling, “I’m happy for you.” He linked arms with Anya and they went up the alley and turned down the block.

  “Gl
ad I car pool with Anya,” he said, his breath frosting the air. I smiled.

  “Come and meet the guys? The girls are waiting for us back at the club house,” he nodded and we went toward the line of bikes hand in hand.

  “Hey!” Trigger called as we got near, “Disney’s told us nothin’ about you!” he said in the tone reserved for meeting someone and saying ‘oh so and so has told us so much about you!’ and then the bastard gave us a shit eating grin. Aaron tripped on a laugh and winked.

  “Well he’s told me enough about you to tell me you’re Trigger, and that you must be Reaver,” he said turning to my mentor, “and Zander, and Dragon and Dray.” He said turning to each of them in turn, “I’m assuming you’re Doc and that makes you Ghost, and you Data.” He said. Everybody smiled broadly as he recognized them from their descriptions.

  “Gypsy prolly would have been here but it’s cold and dude is getting older, so his joints don’t much like ridin’ in it. It’s nice to meet ‘cha.” Dragon said and held out a meaty hand to shake.

  “Hey!” Revelator called from down the line, “I’m freezing my balls off and I want a beer, can we get this show on the road!?” Aaron laughed and I took him over to my bike. Reaver held out a spare helmet to me on the way by and I gave him a grateful look. Aaron was in a Pea coat and had traded his fancy duds for jeans and Converse inside, before he’d come out. I nodded and went through what I needed him to do for me as a passenger. He listened and once I had my bike kicked to life got on behind me.

  “You should call her Devi!” Aaron called over my shoulder and I looked back at him and smiled. He was talking about a female character from the Johnny the Homicidal Maniac comic books. The only one to ever get away from Nny.

  “The one who got away!?” I called back over the roar of more bikes starting up.

  “The one who lived!” Aaron called back and I laughed.

  “Put your hands in my pockets if they get cold and hang on!” I yelled and fell into the place among the pack of motorcycles pulling out. This was easily the best night of my life. Hands down.

  Chapter 9

  Disney…

  It was quiet and dark and about a week after me becoming a fully patched member of the Sacred Hearts. I lay in Aaron’s bed, his head on my chest, listening to him breathe and felt contentment swallow me whole. Life was good. Really good. The club was doing well adjusting to having me and Aaron together and there were only a few looks of discomfort and only one of the out of town members had left stating he couldn’t handle watching two dudes hold hands. As soon as the door had shut behind him Dragon had turned to Data who wordlessly had gone for his media room.

  No one even seemed phased by the dude leaving and no one had spoken on it since. Aaron and I hadn’t changed a god damned thing about how affectionate we were with each other. If anything the more comfortable we grew with the guys and the more comfortable they grew with us the more Aaron and I sharing a kiss or a swat on the ass seemed to be commonplace, phasing no one in the slightest.

  Ashton and the rest of the women had immediately adopted Aaron as one of the Old Ladies. Some conversations had taken place and some ground rules had been established and I think once that had happened and some of the mystery had been taken out of things the more things seemed to dovetail with one another nicely.

  It had been agreed upon that Aaron was firmly in with the Old Ladies and was for all intents and purposes the girl of the relationship when it came to the club and club business. We decided we’d worry about the finer points when it came to how we interacted with other clubs later. While we could give a fuck about what the Suicide Kings thought, we weren’t entirely sure how to go about things when it came to getting together with other outfits. For the most part this was okay. My relationship status was breaking new ground for the club and we were kind of the pioneers on how this would work. Playing it by ear was just how it was going to be and we were all okay with that for now.

  “What are you thinking about?” Aaron asked quietly and I startled a bit, I thought he had been asleep.

  “Just about how we’re forging new ground as a club, but mostly about how amazing you’re being with putting up with all of this while we figure out how things work,” I told him. He shifted and turned onto his stomach, resting an arm across my chest, his chin on his arm. He peered at me through the deep gloom of the fall night and I smiled knowing damned well he couldn’t really see me for shit without his glasses. I reached out to the side table where they rested and plucked them off the tabletop and slid them onto his face for him. His lips curled into a little appreciative smile and not for the first time I was struck by just how damned beautiful he was.

  “Andy…” he started then let out a breath… searching for where to start. I raised my eyebrows, amused and smiled patiently waiting for him to continue. “I first saw you and I thought, ‘Wow, this guy isn’t afraid of what people think of him!’” He swallowed, “I didn’t realize how all the colors and images were a diversionary tactic, that you were making it so people wouldn’t look too closely.” I blinked. I’d never thought of it that way before but what he said made sense.

  “I never thought of it that way before,” I said honestly, speaking my thoughts.

  “When I saw you it was instant attraction and the more I get to know you, the more, I don’t know, content? No, the happier I am. We’re like two peas in a pod it feels like.” He smiled and I felt my lips curve as I watched his.

  “I’m comfortable with you too, you came at just the right time and changed everything for the better and I can’t tell you…” I was interrupted by my phone vibrating across the bedside table. We both looked at it and with a little sigh of impatience I picked it up. It was Revelator and there was no telling what he was calling for so with a gusty sigh I raised my eyebrows at Aaron. He smiled a little broader and told me to answer it so I did.

  “Hello?”

  “You near the shop?” Rev asked by way of greeting and he sounded fucking irritated. I knew the feeling.

  “I’m at Aaron’s, so yeah why?” I asked.

  “Fucking alarm, go check it out?” he asked. I felt my frown ease and glanced at Aaron who was already moving off of me.

  “Yeah,” I grunted. I couldn’t bitch, Zander had checked it out the last couple of times.

  “Thanks kid,” he hung up.

  “Wonder what crawled up his ass and died,” I mused aloud. Aaron shrugged. I pulled on my discarded leather pants and pulled on the black button down shirt, doing it up right quick. I’d taken Aaron on a ride after I’d gotten off work and we’d dressed for the road and for the chill but also to look nice enough if we’d decided to go out to dinner or stop at a club which yeah, hadn’t happened. We’d come straight back here for another rousing round of extremely hot sex.

  Aaron held out my jacket and cut and I shrugged into them and zipped up, pulling on my gloves. He held out my helmet and leaned in for a kiss like some dutiful housewife. We hadn’t even needed to speak. I marveled at him, not for the first time, and kissed him fiercely.

  “Hurry home, I’ve been sleeping better with you in my bed than without,” he said gently. I gave him a crooked grin.

  “Should only be twenty minutes, tops. I go, I clear the alarm, call the company and bitch and come back,” I kissed him one more time quickly and plucked the helmet from his long fingered hands. He closed the door quickly behind me against the pervasive autumn chill and I huffed out a breath, watching it plume in the damp night air.

  It’d been raining, the ground having that slick wet sheen from it, and the clouds still hung overhead but thankfully, the rain had stopped falling so I wouldn’t be getting soaked. Aaron and I had made it back to his place just as the first fat drops of rain had started to pelt us. We’d stashed my bike underneath the stairwell and I put my weight behind pulling her out now. I rolled her down the short cement walkway and out from under the apartment building’s eaves onto the glimmering blacktop of the back parking lot.

  It
was a short ride to the shop and I had a sinking feeling in my chest the moment I pulled up into the lot. The alarm was blaring loudly into the night, too loudly, because the front window to the shop had a gaping hole in it, the glass ragged and angry where a brick or something had been thrown through it. I stopped my bike and got off, pulling my cell from my pocket. I turned my back on the shop and plugged my opposite ear with my gloved finger while the call rang through to Zander.

  “Yeah?” he asked.

  “Hey boss, it’s something this time. The front window’s been busted out and…” I didn’t get to finish my sentence. The world erupted into a cacophony of light and I was thrown forward onto my face. The lip of my German style helmet connected with the gritty asphalt a fraction of a second before my cheek did. My hand spasmed around the phone in a crushing grip as I felt my face slide forward across the rough ground. I couldn’t hear, I couldn’t really see, my vision blurring and I had no fucking idea what had just happened.

  I lay there on my stomach, stunned, my face scraped raw on the ground, a burning sensation in the back of my right thigh. I blinked and tried to drag some air into my lungs, the breath knocked clean out of me. I think the rain had started to fall again. Big fat drops with some real substance pelted the back of my jacket and cut. The heel of my left hand burned from a raw scrape but my wrist, my wrist was a deep, sharp, grinding pain that made me gasp.

  My hearing came back in stages, my sight recovering much faster. I tried to push myself up but I was just so disoriented. Bits of paper and charred wood and things were pelting the ground around me. I blinked, confused as one of the burning pieces of paper landed inches from my nose. I blinked and focused on a playing card, the edges blackening and curling, flame licking along the image of the King of Hearts… The Suicide King. I groaned and shook my head and tried to drag myself to my feet again. I could hear sirens in the distance and the steady even thump of my heart.