She stepped from the car on shaky legs, pulled the hood of her parka up to ward off the cold, and shoved her hands deep into her pockets. She wrapped her fingers around the pamphlet. She didn’t even know why she’d brought it, but now it felt important, like it was her excuse for showing up unannounced.
As she walked up to the door, she glanced back at the car, but the headlights made it impossible to see inside. She turned and trained her eyes on the front door, willing herself to be strong for Hail’s sake. Hell, for her own sake, too. She climbed the front steps, unable to hear past the blood rushing through her ears. She lifted a trembling hand and knocked before she could lose her nerve.
The door opened—and Sarah’s face blanched. “Josie—” Music and voices billowed out from behind Sarah as Bones came to her side and swept an arm around her.
Sarah was so beautiful, and pregnant, and right there in front of her. Josie’s eyes filled with tears, and she prayed she wouldn’t pass out.
“Dude, stop staring,” Bullet’s gruff voice drew Josie’s attention to another man standing just to the left of Sarah, watching her. He was tall and broad chested with dirty-blond hair—features that could belong to anyone. Except they didn’t. Josie knew those Carolina-blue-gray eyes. She’d never forget the piercing stare that made her feel as though he could see all her thoughts, or the scar on the ridge of his cheekbone she’d traced with her fingers and kissed with her lips. In the space of a second, her past came tumbling back.
Moon?
The door closed, snapping her out of her shock and back to the present. Sarah and Bones were standing on the porch, staring at her expectantly. Maybe even hopefully.
Josie’s thoughts spun. She didn’t know what to do or say, so she took the pamphlet from her pocket and held it up, forcing her words to come. “Bones gave this to me with this address and said to come by anytime. I didn’t know you were having a party.”
“We’re not,” Sarah said quickly, worrying with her hands. An enormous diamond sparkled from her left ring finger. “Stay, please. Scott is right inside, and I know he’s dying to talk to you.”
Josie was numb. Scott was inside, and Sarah was truly happy. Engaged. But was that Moon? Her worlds were colliding, overwhelming her. She glanced back at the car and managed, “I can’t. My friend’s waiting with Hail in the car.”
“Invite them in,” Sarah said quickly. “I’d love to meet them.”
The hope in her voice and the plea in Bones’s eyes nearly had her agreeing, but there was a good chance that the only man besides Brian she’d ever slept with was right inside those doors, and there was no way she could deal with that on top of reconciling with her siblings after a decade.
“No,” Josie said quickly. “I’m not ready to…” Deal with all of this. “I just wanted to say that I read your story. I didn’t know your life was so hard. I’m sorry.” She hurried down the porch steps, stopping abruptly on the walkway, and slammed her eyes shut against tears. She shoved her hands into her pockets again and turned back. Not wanting to run away again but unable to do more, she said, “Merry Christmas. Maybe we can talk after the holidays?”
Tears streamed down Sarah’s cheeks as she said, “I’d like that.”
Good. Perfect. Josie wasn’t sure she’d actually said the words. She was shaking all over as she climbed into her car, taking one last glimpse at Sarah and her fiancé embracing. Hail giggled from the back seat, and she managed, “Still buckled up, bean?”
“He is. We’re good. You did good, too, Josie.” Tracey put her hand on Josie’s shoulder as she backed out of the driveway and said, “Want me to drive?”
Josie shook her head, unable to stop the flow of tears. Sarah hadn’t turned her away. She’d invited her in. She doesn’t hate me. And she was engaged!
Relief and happiness rushed through her, and she felt herself smiling. A puff of a laugh escaped, and hope swelled inside her.
“Look, Mama!” Hail exclaimed. “I can see the moon through the trees.”
Moon’s face appeared in Josie’s mind. Her nerves prickled and burned as she remembered with a heavy dose of guilt the one and only time she’d ever been attracted to someone other than Brian.
“The moon is really far away, even though it seems like you can reach out and touch it,” Tracey said.
Josie swallowed hard. It’s not as far away as you might think…
JED STOOD BY the window long after Josie—Joanne, Jojo—drove away. Sarah and Scott had been trying to reconnect with their younger sister for months, and Jed hadn’t had a clue that they were searching for the girl he’d known briefly years ago. He’d seen her only through the door, and she’d had that hood on. Could he have been wrong?
He ran his hand over the tattoos on his left arm, remembering the moment he’d first seen Jojo across the field at a keg party. Girls were a dime a dozen at those parties, but Jojo had stopped him in his tracks. Not just because she was utterly gorgeous, with long strawberry-blond hair and keen brown eyes, but because she was a tough little thing. He’d seen her at a few field parties, but she usually kept to herself. Things were different that night. She’d shot him an interested and challenging look that had seared through him like lightning, blazing straight to his cock. From the very first words out of her mouth and the hours they’d spent talking, to the way she went fucking wild when they were having sex, their connection had not only sizzled, but it had bored deep inside him like nothing he’d ever experienced—even to this day.
Fuck, she’d gotten to him that night.
Jojo had called him on his shit, her gorgeous eyes drilling into him as she coaxed things out of him that he’d never told a soul. She’d listened intently, asking about him—not just his situation. He’d been young, only twenty-three, but as he revealed his demons, detailing his grief over losing his father and his anger toward his mother for drinking herself into oblivion, their connection had felt heaven-sent. He’d confessed his darkest secrets, his womanizing ways, and to stealing to keep food on the table for his sister.
Could it really be her after all this time? He’d felt so much for her, he’d almost convinced himself he’d conjured her out of hope, rather than having spent the best night of his life with a woman he’d never see again. She’d become his fantasy, the woman he measured all others against. He could still feel her softness beneath him, see her hair fanned out around her beautiful face as they lay in the grass making out beneath the stars. And afterward, when she’d said, So you’re really a wolf in sheep’s clothing, his response had come without thought. You tell me, Little Red. She’d shaken her head with that low, sexy laugh and said, Forget Little Red. I’m the big bad hunter who nailed the wolf with my first shot.
Bullet Whiskey nudged him and said, “Dude, you done spacing out?”
Bullet was the oldest of the Whiskey siblings, which also included Bones, Bear, and Dixie. At six five and about two hundred and forty pounds, he was also the biggest. Bullet had spent several years in the Special Forces, where he had nearly lost his life, and he had been running their family bar, Whiskey Bro’s, ever since. He was married now, to Finlay, a petite blonde who owned a catering business and worked part time at the bar.
Jed shook his head to try to clear his thoughts. “Yeah. What’s up?” Across the room he saw Bones talking with Sarah and Scott. “Are Sarah and Scott okay?”
“You kidding? They’re elated that their sister stopped by.” He lifted his bearded chin toward his father and said, “Biggs called a meeting. In the kitchen, Prospect.”
Biggs Whiskey was the president of the Dark Knights motorcycle club. The Whiskeys and the Dark Knights had saved Jed’s ass, giving him a job, a home, and a purpose, which was why he’d decided to try to join their ranks. Prospecting to become a member of the Dark Knights was a process that started as a hang around, which was like a honeymoon period, when guys who wanted to join the club and the current members decided if they liked and respected one another enough to move on to the next stage of conside
ration. Prospects were given grunt work, which could be anything from fetching an ashtray during a meeting to picking up a stranded member at three o’clock in the morning. That grunt work would likely continue for the next year, but Jed didn’t care how long it took or how many menial jobs he had to do. The club was all about brotherhood, watching out for the community and for their own, which extended well beyond birthrights and bloodlines, to the family of each and every member. He wanted to be part of that more than he wanted anything else in life.
Until now.
Now he wanted to see if the woman he’d fallen hard for so long ago was Josie Beckley. He knew Sarah and her siblings had grown up in a horribly abusive household, though she and Scott had never witnessed Josie being abused. But she was exposed just the same, and Sarah and Scott had both left home before Josie. They didn’t know if she’d suffered at the hands of their monstrous parents after they’d gone. He was still trying to put together Josie as his Jojo. Sarah had told everyone weeks ago that she’d seen Josie and that Josie—Jojo—had a son. He hoped to hell some asshole hadn’t harmed either of them. The thought of Jojo or her boy hurting made his blood boil.
As he followed Bullet into the kitchen, he tried to recall what he’d learned about Jojo all those years ago. He remembered feeling like they’d had a lot in common and that she’d been the first girl to ever completely understand what he’d gone through. But as he scrutinized his memories of their conversation, he realized she’d spoken in generalities: Life is good now. I know all about alcoholics. Some people shouldn’t be parents. While she’d been prying information from him, he’d been too entranced with her attention, her beauty, and her deep, caring personality to ask much about her.
Fuck. Did that make him a dick?
He would sure as hell make up for that. He was no longer a troubled twenty-three-year-old. At twenty-eight, he had his head on straight. He had two stable jobs, and he was saving money, sharing an apartment above the auto shop with his buddy Quincy, while house hunting for a place of his own. Luckily, he’d never been a big drinker or a drug user. His downfall had been taking care of his family by whatever means he could, which often put him on the wrong side of the law. But he’d been on the right side for a long time, and he was never going back to that awful life.
Members of the Dark Knights gathered in the kitchen while the rest of their friends and family remained in the living room. Jed drew his shoulders back at the sight of Biggs standing shoulder to shoulder with Bullet, weathered and tattooed arms crossed over his leather vest, his cane leaning against the counter. A stroke had left Biggs unable to ride his motorcycle, but he would always be a biker. It was in his blood, and he’d instilled the same loyalty to the biker lifestyle in his children. His children were tough as nails, and his sons were members of the Dark Knights.
“We have a lot to celebrate tonight,” Biggs said slowly, a lingering effect of the stroke. His thick, untamed graying mustache and beard hid the slight drooping of the left side of his face, and a cane helped him deal with the muscular deficits of his stroke. Even with his cane and slow, sometimes slurred speech, his rough, manly presence was intimidating as fuck, but he was a good man and had become like a father to Jed.
“And we have some new business to take care of,” Biggs continued. “We need to make sure Sarah and Scott’s sister is protected. They know nothing about the last decade of Josie’s life, and we have no idea if she’s running from someone or if she’s just down on her luck.”
“She’s safe at the shelter,” Bones added. As a physician, Bones was the cleanest cut of the Whiskeys, but he was every bit as lethal. “But we’d feel a hell of a lot better if she had someone watching out for her. She’s reached out, but she’s obviously not ready to accept help from Sarah and Scott, which means she probably won’t accept help from me, either.”
“I’ll do it,” Jed offered. Though he wasn’t certain if Josie was Jojo, he sure as hell wanted to find out. But until he knew for sure, he didn’t want to mention it. “I’ll get to know her, make sure she finds a good job, a place for her and her kid to live. I don’t have that much time between working at the auto shop and the bar, but I’ll make it happen.”
Bear patted him on the back and said, “Way to man up, Prospect. I can pull more hours at the shop if need be.”
“No, you won’t,” Biggs said. “You and Crystal are newlyweds, and you’ve got a baby on the way. Diesel’s back in town, and he needs a job. He can take nights at the bar. Tex Sharpe needs a few hours over the winter, so he can fill in at the auto shop if we need him. We’ll figure it out.” Diesel and Tex were both members of the Dark Knights, though Diesel was a nomad, which meant he held no particular allegiance to any club chapter or territory.
“Diesel? Christ, Pop. He’s scarier than Bullet,” Bear said.
Bullet slapped Bear upside his head. “We need guys who intimidate the riffraff. God knows you can’t do it.”
Bear scoffed. “Fuck off. Nobody messes with me.”
“Boys, what could you possibly be arguing about on Christmas?” their mother, Wren “Red” Whiskey, asked as she walked into the kitchen. Most people thought she got her nickname from her flame-red hair, a trait Dixie shared, but she didn’t. When Bear was just a boy, he’d overheard someone calling her Wren and thought they’d said Red. The name had stuck. Red was tough as steel, but she also had a softer, maternal side. A side that made Jed want to be around her, protect her, and soak up all the motherly love she was willing to give.
Bear and Bullet mumbled, “Sorry, Mom.”
“Mm-hm,” she said. “Since you’re talking about club business and I’ve got all of you in one room without the distractions of your beautiful ladies and babies, I wanted to say my piece. I’ve been talking to Sarah and Dixie, and now that we’ve got two more babies in our family, and two on the way, I think it’s time we hire another waitress for the bar. I’d like to spend more time spoiling my husband and grandchildren and less time babysitting men at the bar.”
Bones, Bear, and Bullet all chuckled.
“You ought to give parenting lessons, Red,” Jed said. “I’d have given anything for a mother like you.”
She walked up to him, put her hand on his cheek with the kindest, most genuinely maternal expression he’d ever seen, and said, “You’ve got me now, darlin’. You’re just as much a part of our family as Truman, Gemma, Quincy, their babies, and the rest of our surrogate children.”
Bear had befriended Truman Gritt and his younger brother, Quincy, when they were teenagers. Their mother had been a drug addict, and Bear had taken Truman under his wing and taught him how to work on cars. Unfortunately, Truman had gone to prison for a crime Quincy had committed when Quincy was only fourteen—only to be set free and find his mother dead from an overdose, Quincy in the throes of addiction, and two baby siblings he hadn’t known existed living in a crack house. Now Quincy was clean, and Truman and his wife, Gemma, were raising their younger siblings, Kennedy and Lincoln, as their own.
“Thanks, Red. That means the world to me.”
“Why don’t we see about Josie working at the bar?” Biggs suggested.
“That won’t fly,” Red said. “I suggested it to Sarah, but she said Josie has just dipped her toes into the idea of reconnecting. She’s afraid Josie will get scared off, or feel pushed if we try to bring her into our world too quickly, and then she might run. But Sarah’s friend Tracey needs a job.”
“I don’t know. Tracey’s super sweet, and a tiny gal to boot,” Bones said. “I’m not sure she can handle that rough of a crowd.”
“If Fin can handle that crowd, I’m sure that little sweetheart can, because no one is sweeter than my wife,” Bullet said.
“Sarah’s sure Tracey can handle it,” Red reassured them. “Nobody bothers Izzy with Jed and Bullet around.” Isabel Ryder was a waitress at Whiskey Bro’s.
Bear grabbed a beer from the fridge and said, “A man would have to have a death wish to bother the girls or start shit
with Desmond “Diesel” Black around. Where’s he been anyway?”
“I don’t ask and he don’t tell,” Biggs said.
Bear motioned toward the entrance to the kitchen and cleared his throat, drawing everyone’s attention to adorable four-year-old Kennedy in her fluffy red-and-green princess dress, holding Sarah’s three-year-old son Bradley’s hand.
“Papa Biggs?” Kennedy asked. “Can you please be done now?”
There was a collective, stifled chuckle as Biggs grabbed his cane and limped over to the children who had the gumption to do what no adult other than Red ever would—interrupt one of Biggs’s meetings.
Kennedy and Bradley’s chins tipped up as Biggs stared down at them with serious dark eyes and said, “What’s going on? Someone out there bothering you?”
They both shook their heads.
Kennedy played with a ribbon on her dress and said, “Aunt Dixie said the only way you’d let Uncle Beah come play with us is if I could distract you. Can I?”
Everyone laughed, even Biggs.
“Yes, darlin’. I think you can.” He set that dark stare on Dixie, who blew him a kiss.
“Come on, guys.” Bear scooped up one kid under each arm against his sides, carrying them into the living room like squealing, giggling footballs.
Biggs put a hand on Jed’s shoulder and said, “You sure you’ve got this, son?”
“Absolutely, Biggs. I won’t fail you.”
If Josie was his Jojo, and he had a gut feeling she was, he wasn’t about to let the girl he’d never forgotten slip away again. He’d been warned away from her once, and the asshole who had done it better hope he wasn’t the reason she was at a shelter, or he’d have Jed to deal with.
Mad About Moon Page 2