“Talking of bullets, you wanna tell me why the last time I heard from my brother he told me you’d put one in him?” That was a voice I wasn’t expecting to hear, and I didn’t know whether I was concerned or confused.
I didn’t wait for my subconscious to give me the answer; I pulled the door open and stepped inside. “Brother, why are you here?”
Both Shadow and Penny stopped, momentarily forgetting about each other, and then turned to face me. Besides the stand-off between the two of them, the only other thing out of place was an axe protruding from the wall two feet to the side of Shadow.
“You ever think about returning a fucking call?” He was pissed.
“Been busy.”
“Why are you here? Something wrong back in Cali?” I asked and Shadow stepped closer to me as Penny froze. He was acting like a caged lion and we both knew he’d barely got a grip on his temper. Penny might be okay with being around men but judging by how wary she was at the moment, she wasn’t altogether comfortable either. “Come here, baby,” I mumbled; the only hope of containing her was if she was within arm’s reach.
“Baby? What the fuck is going on here?” Shadow’s mood was close to brimming over the top. “Last I heard she’d put a chunk of lead in you. I expected to find you in a shallow grave.”
“You came out here because you were worried?” I asked incredulously.
“In case it’s passed you by, California is a long fucking way away, so an explanation as to what the fuck is going on here would be good.”
That bristled.
He’d barged over here uninvited, not to mention scaring the shit out of Penny and bringing out a side in her I wasn’t keen to see again.
“Baby, why is there an axe in the wall? You keep embedding weapons in the walls, we won’t need to knock the house down, it will fall down on its own.”
She didn’t move; she was still on guard duty, and Shadow answered for her. “Better than it being in my fucking skull.”
Wow.
She’d dealt with me and gone tooled up to deal with him.
Impressive.
“Shadow, waiting on an answer. Why are you here?”
“Thought you were dead.” He said it simply like that. In all the times I’d thought about he and Penny escaping Afghanistan together, I figured they’d shared stuff and he’d gotten to know her. It looked like I was wrong on that front. “See she hasn’t lost her touch. Watched her take you down.”
“Don’t worry, we’re gonna be talking about that later. Penny, could you put the kettle on?” I could tell she didn’t want to move, and although we’d had plenty of disagreements in the short time we’d been together, I wasn’t keen to have a rip-roarer in front of my brother.
“Have...” she began, and it was the first time she’d spoken since I stepped into the middle of what could have been eventful, axes and all. “Did they follow you?”
Shadow looked at her like she’d lost her marbles. “Are you shittin’ me? You’re dead, remember? And I didn’t travel here under my own papers. Anyway, I plan to be back in the country before I’m missed by anyone who thinks to check on me.”
Her body eased up just a fraction, but she didn’t move toward the kitchen. “Penny…kettle, love. Give me a minute with my brother.”
When she hesitated, Shadow kicked in. “He’s not in any danger, and I’m sure you’ve got more weapons somewhere.”
“I have. My gun. Remember that.”
When she left, he lowered his ass onto a chair. “She bust your balls like that all the time?”
I ignored his comment and skewered him with a look that said he’d better get a fucking shift on with whatever explanation he had for turning up announced and scaring the shit out of Penny.
“I got worried when you didn’t answer, and why are you still here? You were supposed to check she wasn’t losing her shit and then come home.” All my brothers thought my home was with them. They were just waiting for the penny to drop with me too.
“I got... delayed, not that I need to explain myself to you.”
Bullet bolted in through the open door raced around the living room, barked at Shadow and then headed into the kitchen. Penny being in there with all the treats was too good an opportunity for man’s best friend to miss. Hearing her say, “Hear you go, boy,” a minute or so later confirmed I was right.
Shadow leaned forward and whispered. “You’ve caught feelings for her.” He didn’t wait for me to confirm it. “Dammit!”
“None of your fucking business,” I growled back.
“You know the old saying ‘a person isn’t defined by their enemies, but his friends’? You need to listen to that.”
“Dead fucking people don’t have enemies and besides me, the only friends she has are old Vinnie down the road, Bullet and, yeah, you. Not a bad selection by all accounts.” Shadow didn’t like that I’d countered what he thought was a fairly reasonable argument.
I heard the kettle come to a bubbling crescendo so it wouldn’t be long before she was back in the room with us. “This isn’t safe.”
“I’m in no more danger than when I was hanging out with you back in Cali.”
“Have you forgotten your own troubles?”
“Don’t. Don’t throw that shit back in my face.” As I was about to rip into him, Penny walked into the room with a steaming mug of coffee and slammed it down in front of him with enough force to slosh a good third over the side of it and onto the table.
“I only shot him because you called and he wasn’t honest about it.”
Shadow shook his head. “Normal members of society don’t shoot people because they tell a little white lie.”
“Thanks for the reminder,” she spat back at him. “But neither of us are normal members of society, or have you forgotten that, too?”
Now it was Shadow’s turn to go quiet and when he looked at her, it was like I didn’t exist. The conversation that was about to take place, would be born out of their connection. One that I would never understand, because unlike Shadow, I wasn’t able to rescue my sister and save her from the torturous path she’d found herself on. “Does he even know your real name. How can this work?”
“I don’t want him to know the person I was.”
“That’s not healthy,” he sighed.
“You told me to start my life again. That’s what I did. I... have a life now, one I want to actually live.”
“Not that she needs to justify her life plan to you, I’m still here and you don’t get to grill my old lady over choices that have nothing to do with you.”
“Your old lady?”
I looked at Penny and liked that shine in her eyes. I hadn’t noticed it, but now I knew what was different about her. That shine had been burning brighter every day now. I did that. We did that as a couple. Still, I knew Shadow wouldn’t walk away without a decent understanding.
“Brother, I’m not coming home. Yeah, I’ll visit, but I’m staying here with Penny.” He looked truly shocked by my words. “I’m done with the past. Penny is done with the past. We’re healing together. Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and hoping the other person dies.”
“You were just supposed to check on her.” He shook his head like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“I did. All that time searching lead me back here, back to home and now it feels like one. You need to let it go. Trust that I’m happy, we’re happy, and we’re good here.”
All of a sudden, this felt like a goodbye, and in truth I wasn’t ready to let him or the Black Sentinels walk out of my life for good, but if I had to make a choice here and now, it would be her, every damn time. The brotherhood gave me some solace, comfort and a place to belong for a while when I needed it, but what I felt for her was the missing part of me, and to pass that by would be like never completing the puzzle.
We all sat in silence. I was watching Penny, and she was looking at me, the shine in her eyes now a full diamond sparkle because of what I’d said.
Shadow’s head flipped between the two of us like he was watching a tennis match.
“Flick’s not gonna like this,” he muttered, and I finally smiled.
“She’s gonna love knowing I’m settled, brother.”
“She’s gonna hate not getting the chance to meet the one who settled you.”
I didn’t answer. I knew he was right, but that was going to be his problem and not mine.
The three of us fell silent again.
“Sorry about the axe thing.” Penny just about got the words out without laughing.
“Totally worth it, just to see you sleeper-choke this big lug.” The two of them burst out laughing, and I knew that the time for drama was over.
Epilogue
Penny
One year Later
“Yes, he’s good. No, I haven’t shot him again.”
“I hadn’t asked,” came the reply down the phone. Shadow didn’t call often, but it had been a year since they’d seen each other, and nearly two since Fraser had seen the rest of the Black Sentinels. Fraser and Shadow spoke on the phone infrequently. Months would pass, and then the phone would ring. The phone hardly ever rang, so usually I let Fraser take the call and appease his old friend, who although he told us he was fine with it, I still got the impression he didn’t think we were a suitable match.
“He’s up a ladder. I’ll get him.”
“No, don’t do that. Don’t want you blaming me when he falls off the fucking roof or something.” Shadow always bitched at me, but it felt more familial recently, like the way he would treat a sister, which was probably why I indulged him. Fraser and I had zero blood family we could count on, so it felt important to keep some connections. “Just tell him, Flick’s fine. It’s a boy.”
My heart did the rollercoaster thing. Elated at the news, sad at the news, elated at the news, and then devastated that someone else got that news. My throat thickened. “Give her our love. That’s such great news. Are they both well?”
The phone went quiet for a moment. “Perfect. Tell him I’ll talk to him soon.” He ended the call just like that. I didn’t even get to ask what name they’d given him, but I knew why he did it. He was protecting his family; it was safer that way because I was still a massive risk hanging around the outskirts of his life. I was fairly sure he’d never fully trust me, and I could respect that. Fraser needed Shadow in his life, and I wouldn’t be the one to unsettle that.
“Come on, boys, let’s go tell him the news.”
Bullet leaped to his feet, followed by three other sets of claws that scratched to gain some traction on the wooden floor. Murray, Pringle and Bruce all seemed like wretched names for puppies as far as I was concerned, not least because one of them was a salted chip in a tube, but Fraser assured me they were clan names. I might not have any human babies, but these fur babies kept me busy enough.
“Hey!” I shouted to the air above me.
“Aye,” came back the reply.
“A boy.”
The hammering stopped. He’d been working on laying the roof tiles that connected the old part of the house and the new extension together. After some compromising, we’d decided not to knock down the second place, but to build a little annex between the two and join them. It was crazy but as soon as I saw it taking shape, it felt like it had been the right decision. “A boy, hey?”
“Yeah.” There was nothing more to say.
A minute later, I heard him crossing the roof before he swung a leg over the top of the ladder and came down. “You okay?”
God, he knew me so well. He knew this news might affect me and wanted to heal any hurt it brought. “Happy for your brother.” I kissed him as soon as he was in reaching range, and he did a quick once over of my face just to check I wasn’t hiding anything.
He glanced at my feet. “You’re like the pied piper of puppy dogs.”
I turned to look at the floor and all four of the dogs were investigating the immediate area around me. They never let me get too far from their sight.
“Fancy a beer?” When I turned to walk away from him, the dogs followed, but he pulled me back causing the dogs to roll around in reverse mode, which was more than a little amusing.
“Been thinking. Want to be part of my clan?”
He’d asked me numerous times and I’d always said no. I didn’t want anything religious; it was a big no-no for me. I might have been getting better about accepting all the things from my past, but religion was still a trigger for me.
“Been looking into it. We can have a humanist wedding. No religion involved. We do it when we want, where we want and how we want. You, me, the dogs and a celebrant. No church speak.”
It sounded too good to be true.
“Say yes, Penny. Do I have to lure you with a big honeymoon offer?”
“No, we can’t take any more trips until the roof is watertight. We already pushed our luck with the last one.”
I thought about it while he stood in a lumberjack shirt, his toolbelt around the waist of his denim jeans and work gloves sticking out the back pocket. “You sure you’d be happy, even though it could just be the two of us for the rest of our days?”
“You forgetting about the mutts currently hanging off your heels?”
“You, me and the dogs then.”
“Baby, it’s more than I could have ever expected to have. Every day with you is a blessing, you might not have your faith, and I respect that, but I still have a tiny bit of it, and that bit brought me to you and put me on this path.”
Fraser slotted the hammer in the front of his tool belt and popped open a popper on a pocket at the front. Out of it, he pulled a simple silver band, with a heart engraved into it. “Been tinkering with this for some time. Might not be diamonds, but, baby, you’ve got enough sparkle of your own.”
“You made this?”
It was intricate, smooth, yet brushed silver and utterly perfect.
“We don’t need ostentatious; we just need us. You want shine and sparkle, I’ll get you diamonds, but it’d mean everything to me if you’d take this one. It has special meaning.”
“What meaning?” I itched to touch it as he played with it in his fingers.
“It’s the bullet. Our bullet. I found it under the sink and repurposed it. I figured that something that has been skin deep inside me, should go full circle and be next to your skin, too.”
Fraser McPhee placed the handcrafted ring that was once the bullet I shot into him onto my finger, and I smiled. It was perfect; we were perfect. Because despite all our imperfections we’d created something unique and flawless just for us.
And neither of us had had flawless ever.
Until now.
Acknowledgments
Scotland became my home for a brief period when I was assigned a job there during the Summer of 2019.
Steve – Our friendship holds a dear place in my heart. I miss the madness and inappropriate humor we shared every day. Your research help with research made writing this book a pleasure. I might be south of the wall, but you’ll never be rid of me!
Tracey – When you joined our team it felt like the icing on the cake… or Mrs Tilley’s macaroon.
I was sad to leave both of you.
This book is for us.
The Powells – I’ve been creative with some of the places we visited, but just know, I thought of the good times we’ve shared, as I wrote this story. For Crabbing, beach walks, Pitlochry and the Captain’s Table.
About the Author
Victoria Johns is a writer who enjoys sharing a happily ever after and believes that it’s every good girl’s dream to experience a steamy one. Growing up in North West England in a large family surrounded by love and support she found her Prince Charming many years ago and enjoys living the life they’ve made with their son.
She’s always had a creative imagination and decided that some of the stories bubbling in her head need to be given life and shared. This pen name gives them the freedom to be loved by others.
When she’s not writing, she’s sewing, cycling or chomping on crisps in front of the TV.
CONTACT ME VIA…
Follow my Website on: www.victoriajohnsbooks.com
Facebook: @victoriajohnsauthor
Twitter: @victoriajohns75
Instagram: @iamvictoriajohns
Amazon: author.victoriajohnsbooks
Other books by Victoria Johns
The Soul Sisters Series
Fostering Love
Forgiving Love
Fated Love
Finding Love
Foundation Love – A novella
The Soul Mates Series
Survivor
Deserved
Alive
Forbidden
Heartstone – A Short Story
Part of the Titanic Tales Charity Anthology
The Black Sentinels MC Series
Angel
Gigi
Malia
Flick
Collaboration Novel with Nikki Ashton
I wanna get laid by Kade
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