by Marie James
“I fucked up.”
He doesn’t explain or elaborate further, and I know he won’t.
Club business is never discussed. Women in the MC life are supposed to take everything at face value. The men’s word is law, and we aren’t to question any of it. Those that do don’t last very long around here.
“I need you,” I tell him instead, with a slow swivel of my hips against him.
Certain the move would shoot him into action, I’m incredibly disappointed when he just stays still, lying underneath me like my weight doesn’t even register.
“Tell me what’s wrong, so I can fix it,” I whisper in his ear.
“You need to leave.”
His words aren’t a suggestion, but an order, ones I know he’ll physically enforce if I don’t comply on my own.
With the threat of tears burning behind my eyes, I climb off of him and scramble back into my clothes.
“You touch me, then push me away, over and over,” I spit, finding my spine somewhere between tugging on my dress and slipping my feet into my sandals. “One of these days I’m not going to come crawling back.”
I let the empty threat hang in the air as I leave his room. We both know I’d turn around and walk right into his arms if he opened his door and demanded it of me. That thought keeps me standing in the hallway for a long moment before finally giving up and heading out the back to the house.
Silence greets me as I step through the back door. Zoe and Lynch must still be playing at the clubhouse because there aren’t any sounds coming from upstairs, and they don’t entertain people in our home.
“Thank fuck for that,” I mutter to myself as I climb the stairs to my own room.
Overcome with my own exhaustion from the day, I don’t even bother to undress as I fall into bed. I’m tired from staying up late at the bar last night and returning only to go to Briar. My nap earlier wasn’t nearly as long as I would’ve liked, but it’s the push and pull from the man I love that seeps into my bones and leaves me weary.
I knew this thing between us wouldn’t be easy, but the second I think I finally have him, he pushes me away again. How can we successfully fight everyone with an opinion about us when he’s fighting against us too?
It’s that thought and the realization that we may not make it that carries me into a fitful sleep.
Chapter 32
Briar
“Someone want to fucking explain what happened last night?”
I don’t bother looking up from the table to know that Lynch’s icy glare is on me.
“It was my fault.” My head snaps up in Pete’s direction. “I should’ve been here.”
“You’re not responsible for what happens when you take a fucking night off,” Lynch spits, and I feel his eyes on me again. “What was so goddamned important for you to not pay attention when one of the guys comes to you for direction?”
He doesn’t do well with excuses, but spilling the truth with the entire MC sitting around the table during church isn’t something I’m fucking brave enough to do, so I open my mouth and lie to my president for the millionth time since Molly came home from school.
“The ride back from Detroit fucking killed me. I took a pain pill and passed out. I wasn’t thinking when Chains texted about the gate.”
“I’m not concerned about the fucking gate. If you had taken care of that bastard like you told me you were going to, that girl getting hurt last night never would’ve happened.”
What the actual fuck is he talking about? He knew that night that I didn’t put that guy to ground. He’d punched me in the fucking face for reminding him that Molly wasn’t a little girl anymore.
“I wasn’t going to kill a guy that was lured to a room because Mol—” My jaw snaps shut when his eyes narrow further. “I dealt with the guy how I saw fit.”
“And look where it got us.” Lynch’s eyes stay on me a moment longer before roaming down the table to Chains. “Where is the guy?”
“Scattered on the farm.” Chains is referencing the ten acres of land the MC owns on the opposite side of town. Heavily wooded, the area is hard to traverse, so it’s less likely people will go wandering and find something they shouldn’t.
“How’s the girl?” Lynch asks, turning his attention to our road captain.
Hornet shrugs. “Couldn’t tell you. Ask your brother. He took her from me before I could even get her inside the clubhouse last night.”
Lynch, confused, looks around the table as if he’s just now realizing TJ isn’t with us. Before he can open his mouth, the church door swings open, and one pissed off enforcer barrels into the room.
“Sit,” Lynch snaps when TJ beelines in my direction.
My shoulders sag in relief when he actually listens and falls into his chair.
“Where is she?”
“Who?” TJ asks.
“You know who I’m talking about. Where’s the girl?”
“Not here,” he mutters.
“TJ, I swear to God if you don’t give me a straight fucking answer, I’ll string you up myself.”
TJ swallows, pulling his knife from his belt. I don’t know if he’s readying himself to use it on his older brother, or if it’s a means to calm himself.
I’m grateful to see the blade is clean, but inwardly wonder just how long it’s going to stay that way.
“TJ?” No one misses the warning in Lynch’s voice.
“She’s fine,” he finally answers. “I took her home.”
“Home?” Hornet questions. “She wasn’t even conscious when you took her from me. How do you know where she lives?”
TJ doesn’t respond right away, and I can see him working on an answer, some lie that will get everyone off his back.
“Her phone synced up to the Tahoe. Her GPS had her apartment flagged.” The lie is good enough for everyone else, but no one says a word until he’s done cutting a line across his palm. “I didn’t fucking hurt her.”
He flinches, and I don’t know if it’s from the pain he’s inflicted on himself, or if the thought of making her bleed is abhorrent to him.
“All issues are to go through Chains from now until Briar gets his head out of his ass.”
“Prez—”
He silences me with a quick slash of his hand.
“I’m all ears if you want to explain what’s more important than helping your brothers when they need you.”
Strained silence fills the room. Even confessing my love for his sister, professing to care for her for the rest of her life wouldn’t be enough to keep him from ripping my throat out in front of everyone. With the sneer on TJ’s face, I imagine he’ll be right there beside him, lending a helping hand.
When I don’t spill my guts, he continues. “I want the clubhouse on lockdown until further notice. Our members, prospects, and the regular whores are the only ones allowed through the gate. I don’t know what the fallout is going to be, but we have one girl beat to fuck and probably heading to the police as soon as she’s able, and a guy someone is going to miss eventually. We can only pray he didn’t tell anyone where he was going last night.”
“And if the girl talks?” Hornet asks, the only one of us brave enough to voice the question even though we’re all thinking it.
No one is worth bringing the club down, and he wouldn’t blink an eye to silence her if it looked like she was going to bring trouble on us.
“She isn’t going to the fucking police,” TJ assures us with an edge to his voice that begs anyone to disagree.
“How can you be so sure?” Lynch asks.
“I’ll kill her myself if I think she’s even considering it.”
That shuts everyone up about the subject.
“I’ll hold you to that,” Lynch says before turning his attention to Boston. “How did it go in Baltimore?”
He shakes his head. “I don’t know that the guys over there are going to be able to move their eight kilos.”
“I was afraid of that.” Lynch’s eyes find mi
ne again. “We may have to shift some of the product to Detroit. Parker assured me he could move more.”
“Speaking of that overeager bastard,” Boston interrupts. “He’s been feeling us out. I can tell he wants to join us here. I don’t think he’s satisfied with the oversight he’s been allowed in Detroit.”
“He’d rather be at the clubhouse than running shit in Michigan?” Ronan speaks up for the first time since we convened.
“I can’t tell if he wants a challenge or a break. The kid is actually pretty hard to read,” Boston answers, looking at Lynch rather than Ronan.
Lynch leans forward, steepling his fingers against his lips as he thinks. “I need him there.”
“You said you would never hold someone back just because they were an asset where they were,” Smalls reminds him, shocking everyone at the table since the man hardly ever speaks. “The kid actually emailed a fucking resume.”
Uneasy chuckles fill the room. It’s funny that anyone would do such a thing, but the tension still lingers from what happened last night.
Lynch nods before looking back at Boston. “Offer him another five percent.”
I know better than to speak up even though he just gave Parker an additional ten percent of the Detroit cut two days ago.
“If he still wants to join us, tell him he has to find and train his replacement before we’ll even consider it. Anything else?”
Lynch looks around the table, excusing everyone when no one speaks up. I stick close, just like I’ve done since he took over the gavel, even though every molecule in my body is urging me to make my way out with the rest of the guys.
“Want to tell me what’s really going on?”
“Huh?” Playing dumb has never been my style, and as much as I want to tell him everything, I know it’ll only damage our friendship more. Only in a perfect world would declaring my love for Molly end in a bro-hug and a simple threat to treat her right.
Our world is nowhere near perfect. Most days we’re just lucky to be alive, and as Lynch glares at me from the head of the table, I wonder just how many more days I’ve got left.
“TJ tells me Molly quit her job.”
Here we fucking go.
“What’s going on with her and the vet?” he asks when I don’t respond to his non-question like he expects me to.
“I think that’s over.”
“Did he hurt her?”
My blood boils, jaw clenching several times before I answer. “No.”
“I think I’m going to get Zoe to help her find a boyfriend,” he says almost absently, and I’m grateful that he’s pulled his eyes from me to look down at his phone. “I need to get her away from the clubhouse. The last fucking thing I need right now is her ending up with some fucking biker. Ronan told me that the new prospect behind the bar has been chomping at the fucking bit to get to her.”
“I’ll take care of it,” I assure him as I stand so abruptly the chair scrapes on the concrete floor.
“You’ll leave him alone. We can’t go around killing every fucking guy whose dick thinks about taking her for a ride.”
My nails dig into the already scarred tabletop.
“I need her out of this fucking place. Maybe someplace overseas,” he says absently as he continues to look at something on his phone.
“Where we can’t protect her?” I seethe. “She’s safest here.”
Now his eyes lift to mine. “Really? You’re so fucking distracted with something, you can’t even be bothered to think when a simple request comes across your phone, but you want me to think she’s protected?”
My lip twitches with the need to tell him she’s more protected than anyone else at this clubhouse, especially when she’s with me.
“We couldn’t even protect that fucking girl last night.” He stands, pounding his fist on the fucking table so hard his phone jumps from the vibration. “A woman got hurt here! I won’t fucking allow it to happen to my sister!”
“Molly is safe,” I vow, not even bothering to pull my eyes from him. Shit will come to blows right here and right fucking now before he sends her away. “And she isn’t fucking going anywhere.”
His eyes narrow with my challenge, but I make it out of the room and out the front door of the clubhouse without getting shot in the back. As I climb on my bike, I wonder if I’ll even be welcome if I return.
Chapter 33
Molly
Just like the first five times today, I ignore the knock on my bedroom door.
This time, whoever it is, doesn’t just walk away, and I turn to glare when my door is pushed open.
“Leave me alone,” I grumble when Zoe sticks her head in the crack.
“You’ve been up here alone all damn day. Care to tell me what’s eating you?”
Without being invited, she steps inside my room before closing the door behind her and joins me on my bed.
“What happened last night?”
“You know I don’t know.”
“You didn’t ask Lynch?”
“He told me it was club business, and wouldn’t say more, but whatever it is, it’s big. He was pissed. Like really pissed.” She sighs and leans back against my pillows. “Then he was really weird this morning when he got back from church. He told me I needed to find you a guy or—”
She stops, mouth clamped shut.
“Or what?” She doesn’t answer. “Tell me.”
“He mentioned sending you away. He said there was too much shit going down, and you weren’t safe here.”
“Not safe?” I huff indignantly. “He’s the only one I need to worry about.”
“Lynch wouldn’t hurt you.”
“He’d hurt Briar.” I glare at her, challenging her to deny it. “Hurting him would hurt me.”
“I’ve told you time and time again to talk to him about what’s going on between you two.”
What’s going on between us? Hell, I don’t even know if there is an us after the way he dismissed me last night.
“I want to,” I confess. “But I’ve texted him a hundred times today, and he won’t text me back. Whatever happened last night made him pull away. I think he’s made his choice, and he’s chosen the club. Not me.”
“If that’s the case,” she clasps my hand in hers, “then you deserve someone better.”
I can’t help the laugh that escapes my throat. She doesn’t have a damn clue. She’s so caught up in my brother, deciding to forget what happened to her down in the damn basement not too long ago, that she’s choosing to ignore what really happens around here when someone in the MC feels betrayed.
This is club life, not fairy tales and happy endings. In this life, the girl doesn’t always get the guy. More times than not the guy ends up dead, and the girl is just expected to go on like he never existed.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing,” I mutter. “There’s nothing fucking funny.”
I pull my hand from hers, hating anyone’s touch that isn’t Briar’s.
“Don’t be this way to me.”
I hate the pain in her voice, but at the end of the day, none of this is about her.
“I just want to be alone.”
“I think being alone is the last thing you need.”
I’m close to snapping, and she doesn’t even realize it. I wonder if wrapping my hands around her throat or meeting her face with my fist will make her realize that not everyone gets the guy. She’s the lucky one right now, but her luck could change. Any business meeting could leave her alone. One angry person in my brother’s life could put an abrupt end to every dream, fantasy, and plan she’s made with him.
The only difference in Lynch and Briar is that no one in the club would turn on my brother, but Briar’s back is against the wall and no matter the decision, to talk or stay quiet, still ends the same way.
“We should go to the clubhouse, gather the girls, and have ourselves a spa day.”
It only takes a second for me to crush the hope in her voice.
“I don’t want a fucking spa day.” I don’t bother to hide the anger in my voice. “I don’t want you in my fucking room. I asked you to leave.”
Her face falls when I turn in her direction.
“Do I need to make that happen?”
“Molly—”
“Now,” I hiss.
I’m so upset with everything else going on, I don’t even have the energy to feel bad when I hear her sniffle as she crosses my room. The door snaps closed with her own frustration.
“Oh hey,” I hear on the other side. “Nothing’s wrong. I’m fine.”
“You’re not,” Lynch insists, and my doorknob turns. “I won’t have her treating you this way.”
I stand from my bed, ready to tell him everything. I fear the worst as it is. Briar hasn’t texted back, and I know his silence, as well as his rejection last night, has everything to do with him. I’m not one to hurt myself, but I’m not above threatening it if Lynch refuses to listen to reason.
“Leave her alone. She’s hungover from last night. She’s just in a crappy mood. After some sleep, she’ll be okay.”
“Zoe?”
“I’m tired, baby. Take me to bed.”
My door remains closed, and I feel like a coward for falling back onto my mattress rather than throwing my door open and making him listen to me.
The night drags on, and another dozen text messages go unanswered. I give in to my worried exhaustion and turn out my bedside lamp. It’s been hours since Zoe met Lynch in the hall, and I can’t even hear the muffled music from the clubhouse. They must’ve shut things down early tonight.
I’m right on the cusp of unconsciousness when my door opens. It closes, darkness wrapping around me once again before I can see who has come inside, but familiar heavy breaths and the earthy scent of the man I love engulf me as he climbs in my bed.
He stops me when I move to turn over.
“Where have you been all day?”
“Out.”
“You didn’t answer my texts. I’ve been so worried.”
“I don’t want to talk right now,” he whispers against my neck. “Just let me hold you.”
His breaths calm, transforming into a soothing, rhythmic cadence, but sleep still eludes me.