He leaned in close just as I did the same. While he was watching my mouth I reached over and squirted the lime right in his face before snatching a shot up, downing it, and then slamming one of the cokes back to chase it. I shivered as Rabbit spewed and sputtered about his eye being on fire while everyone around us laughed.
“Damn boy, you never learn.” Shameless chuckled as he grabbed up his beer, took a sip, and started to walk off. Unfortunately, he was still in blast radius, and Rabbit pointed the spray nozzle toward the older brother.
“Neither do you, old man!” Rabbit called out, and just as Shameless glanced back he got a face full of seltzer. I continued to giggle until the hose was turned on me too. It was fine though. I got the last laugh when Cherry’s gorgeous twin sister, Chastity, strolled up to the bar about twenty minutes later, having just gotten to the clubhouse, and saw Rabbit with one red and irritated eye.
“Oh my God, Rabbit, what happened? You don’t have pink eye do you?” The woman actually took a step back as if the man might have been carrying a deadly communicable disease instead of a possible pink eye infection.
“Poor Rabbit,” I lamented with my lip poked out in a mock pout. “He learned a lesson about sniffing random panties and falling asleep with the wrong pair, didn’t you, Captain Shit-Eye Willy?”
“Jesus,” Tango muttered as he moved from his chair to come get me.
Chastity had continued backing up even more.
Rabbit actually growled at me then as he pointed an accusatory finger my way. “Paybacks are a bitch, woman! You remember that.”
Chastity leaned in, then thought better of it and straightened back up. “Why? Did you have her panties? You know she belongs to Tango, right?” Rabbit growled some more, and said not so nice things about me under his breath.
I was still giggling as Tango picked me up and slung me over his shoulder again. God, did I love when my man went all caveman on me. I still managed to see the smirk on Rabbit’s face as he whispered something to Chastity. Well, he spoke low enough I couldn’t hear, but she could still hear him from the safe distance she was maintaining.
“Aw, honey, I can show you some videos online later about how to take care of all your princess parts so your panties aren’t infecting the men,” Chastity called out.
I huffed in indignation. “Don’t you do his dirty work for him!”
“You were the one doing the dirty work, remember, sweetheart?” Rabbit called out his question on a cackle. “Maybe Tango can show you how to trim up and keep clean so this never happens again. We need to protect the club members.”
“You bastard!” I yelled from my position still flopped over Tango’s shoulders as he moved up the steps bumping me higher into the air with each step as he went. “I’ll squirt you in both eyes next time, with a lemon! Mark my…ouch! Damn it! I was in the middle of something, T. My diabolical laugh was next and everything!” I pouted after Tango slapped the hell out of my ass to get me to shut the fuck up.
“I swear, you two are going to be the death of me,” he lamented as he put me down on our bed. We were still living together at the clubhouse for now. We were having a house built not far from the clubhouse on bordering property, and until it was done I didn’t mind living amongst the guys. Actually, I was beginning to wonder how in the hell I was going to adjust to a quiet house once we moved out. I was so used to the security here, and the noise of the men I had come to love and trust that I wasn’t sure how I would adjust to the quiet and lack of bodies willing to defend me if necessary.
Tango’s phone rang, bringing me out of my thoughts. “Yeah? She did? Well shit, man. I’m happy for you guys! Yeah, I’m sure we will. We’ve both been drinking tonight, though.” I continued to listen to the one-sided conversation as Tango devolved the conversation to grunts of acknowledgement and the occasional okay. When he hung up he glanced at me warily. I thought I knew what was coming.
“I know you don’t want anything to do with Amy, but we really should go congratulate Whiskey and Fox on their baby girl.”
“Of course, we can.” I leaned into Tango and smiled into his chest thinking about the little bundle the boys had been blessed with. “Tell me about her,” I stated before placing a kiss over his heart.
“She was seven pounds, three ounces, has little sprigs of bright red hair, and she came into this world screaming up a storm according to the guys. They named her Tori Ashlynn Waters.”
“Aw, are we going to see her tomorrow?”
“In the morning if you’re okay with that?”
“Of course, I am. I can’t wait to hold her!” I squealed the last sentence. I might have loathed Amy and her antics that didn’t stop with her banishment from the clubhouse, but I couldn’t wait to get my hands on that tiny little baby.
I didn’t miss the funny look Tango was giving me when I started gushing about snuggling up to her and smelling that baby smell, and hearing her coo, and how I wanted to rock her and sing to her. Okay, so I may have caught a little baby fever, but I totally had it under control.
“Soon as the house is ready, babe!”
“What?” I asked, clueless.
“You, me, and a baby of our own.”
“Oh!”
“Yeah, oh!” He moved over so that he was standing directly in front of me and placed his hands on my flat tummy then moved them out further into the space that was between us. I can’t wait to be standing like this and touching that belly that holds our baby. You’re already gorgeous, that’s just going to ramp you up beyond perfection.”
“Well, hell, if you wanted into my pants, all you had to do was say so, T. I’m ready and willing, but you can keep the compliments coming anyway. I like them.”
“But do you like the sound of all of it?” There was a slight hesitation in his question, and I relieved it with a smile and my promise.
“I promise you, as soon as the house is ready, I’ll be ready too.”
~ Tango ~
The next day we went to the hospital to see the guys and their precious new daughter. They were in a special room reserved for mothers who had just given birth, but the mom was suspiciously absent from this one.
“Where’s Amy?” I asked the question right away, because if we were going to have any issues I wanted to know up front so I could get Liza out of there. She could see the baby another time when the guys took her home.
Whiskey hung his head, shaking it back and forth in disbelief. Fox was the one to speak up.
“She’s gone. Took off as soon as they’d release her this morning. The little one gets one more day in the hospital for observation and then she gets to come home with us.”
“Will Amy be heading there too, or did she decide to do it?”
“She did it, man.” That was from Whiskey. “I can’t believe she could look at this sweet little face and just walk away, but she did.”
“She signed, and everything?”
“Yeah, man, lawyer was here to tidy it up and everything.”
“Can I see her?” Liza asked Whiskey in almost a whisper.
“You can hold her,” he informed her as he stood from the chair he’d been occupying. “Wash your hands first, and no kissing on her face.”
Liza smiled at him then. “Aw, look at you already being the protective daddy. That’s adorable.” Liza washed up and then took the seat Whiskey had just vacated then she held her arms out waiting to take the baby from him. I watched in awe as my woman cradled the infant in her arms like it was the most natural thing in the world to do. Then she grabbed a tiny little baby bottle that Whiskey handed her and started feeding her.
“Looks like Tori might have a cousin sometime soon,” Fox teased. Fatherhood was already looking good on him. His grumpy demeanor had sloughed off as he helped Whiskey prepare for their impending child. We all saw it happen; like this light switched on behind his eyes and suddenly he knew what happiness was. Most people wouldn’t understand, because they already knew it wasn’t his biological child, but th
at didn’t matter to him. Tori was his daughter just as much as she was Whiskey’s.
“What?” I finally asked, because it had just dawned on me what my buddy had said.
“I saw the way you were just watching Liza with Tori. It won’t be long before she brings Tori’s cousin into the world.”
I chuckled lightly then. “You’re not wrong. I already told her as soon as the house is ready.”
Fox nodded.
“So she really signed away her rights?” I lowered my voice to ask the question, because I didn’t want to upset Whiskey any more than I already had.
He tipped his head toward the door, and reluctantly I followed. I stood at a point where I could see in the little window of the door. My eyes stayed glued to Liza as she took the bottle from the sleeping baby’s mouth, and then leaned her up on her shoulder, cradling the head, and started patting her back in order to burp her.
“She’s a natural,” Fox told me before I turned back to him.
“Yeah, it appears so.” I pulled him in for a quick hug and whispered, “Congratulations,” in his ear. He shook a little so I knew he had a lot of pent up emotion he was trying to stave off. “What happened, man?”
“When she ran off after she was banned temporarily from the clubhouse, we found her and convinced her to keep the baby for us. We offered to pay her a stipend, get her through the pregnancy, and had papers drawn up then for her to sign away her rights to us.”
“I remember.”
“Well, over the past couple months she’s been coming around more and more, because Whiskey kept requesting to see her. He couldn’t get enough of feeling Tori moving in her mom’s belly, you know?” The love that shown in Fox’s eyes wasn’t entirely for his daughter at that point. Even I couldn’t deny it any longer. Not that I had been clueless all along, but I was now certain that while the guys had harbored strong feelings for Amy at one point, they were also in love with one another in a different way.
“We thought she might have finally been coming around. The doc had said early on that he thought she was having a heightened, abnormal reaction to the hormones. I don’t know. We thought it was all leveling out and that we’d be able to work through everything. She flat out told Whiskey that she was only ever with us to get to you. Told him that we were both sick fucks, and that she wanted nothing to do with us or our demon spawn.”
“Jesus, fuck! Seriously?”
“Yeah, man,” Fox told me. “It was twisted. It’s like she’s a completely different person to the one we all met and took in. I can’t wrap my head around it.”
“That’s a lot to take in especially with having to worry about what she was doing while she was pregnant.” I sighed. “So, what are you going to do?” Fox was quiet for a few moments as he watched Whiskey hovering over Liza and the baby. He turned to me after a moment and laid it all out there for me. I don’t know if he was waiting for me to judge them, or what, but I could hear the trepidation in his voice. I smiled as he spoke, trying to reassure him that I loved both of my friends, and that I’d have their backs, no matter what.
“We’re going to carry on, and raise our daughter together. When the time is right, maybe we’ll find a woman of value who will take us for what we are already, a family.” I reached over and pulled him in for another quick side hug.
“You know I’m here for the three of you whenever you need me.” I tipped my chin over at the little window that gave us a sliver of a view into the room. “We better get back in there before my old lady steals your daughter.” Fox chuckled, but I could already see Liza growing attached in there. “Keep that in mind though. I meant what I said earlier. We’re both here for you guys whenever you need someone, okay?”
“Yeah, I hear you, T.” He clapped me on the back. “Come on, I can see Whiskey fidgeting. He wants our daughter back. Better go save him from himself and get you guys on your way so you can make a cousin for Tori sooner than later. What’s the point in waiting? If you knock her up now the house will be ready before the baby gets here,” he offered with a wink before heading back into the room.
I stood there a moment longer contemplating what he’d just said. There was a time when I was ready to write off my friends and any advice they might give me. I was coming to realize though that people make mistakes, they grow, and sometimes, they have the best ideas. Damn if I wasn’t about to put those ideas into action. I hoped Liza would forgive me, because my friend’s idea was only half the problem. I’d been dying to see Liza grow round with our baby, and to experience the feel of our son or daughter growing inside of her, kicking, and coming into this world screaming their head off. I could picture it as if it were reality already.
Book Previews
Dancing With Danger
Aces High MC – Dakotas Series #1
Available Now!
What do you do when your husband, an ex-NFL running back, is trying to have you murdered?
You get kidnapped, run, dance in questionable strip clubs, and stay under the radar while trying to survive.
That is exactly the path that I took, only in the end, it lead me to a motorcycle club in the Dakotas and to a family I never knew I had. I don’t know if they can keep me safe or sane, especially after meeting their VP - Rage. I do know it’s time to stop running, and to start living again.
*Meant for adult readers, strong language, violence, and sexual situations.
Over 70K word, full length, stand-alone novel with an HEA.
The Other Princess
Aces High MC – Charleston Book 1
Available Now!
I was eight years old when I found out I had a father. It was the same day I held my dead mother in my arms while praying her life wasn't really over.
I was dropped into the middle of a new family not long after that. My dad, his wife, and their two kids to be exact. My new brother was ten years old and my sister was five. It doesn't take a genius to figure out I wasn’t supposed to be there.
My family ended up bigger than that though. My dad was a member of the Aces High Motorcycle Club. From the very beginning I was ostracized because of who my mother had been. The daughters of club members were generally known as MC Princesses. My little sister was one. My title was a bit different, and proved that my mom's sins would always be held against me. I was The Other Princess.
My family, both by blood and MC ties, did wrong by me so I walked away from them. That was until he came home from the Army.
He tried to fix everything.
He tried to win an unattainable heart that had shut down years earlier.
I would know since it was my heart he was after.
He didn't realize it would take a miracle.
Secretly, I hoped I could still believe in miracles.
*Meant for adult readers, strong language, violence, and sexual situations.
Over 80K word, full length, stand-alone novel with an HEA.
Redemption Weather
Aces High MC – Cedar Falls Series #1
Available Now!
When I married Walker Smithson it was the happiest day of my life. My family was there, we had a bright future ahead of us, and the world was ours for the taking.
Then the storms started coming.
First, there was the one that took my family.
Then, there was the one that took my husband.
Moving to a new town, new state, and a new life was never on my agenda until I couldn’t take the ghosts, both living and dead, that haunted my every waking moment in the town I’d been born to, grown up and always thought I’d die in after living out my happily ever after.
I’d been wrong about my life before.
Wrong took me to Cedar Falls, West Virginia and left me on the doorstep of the same motorcycle club that had failed me before.
It took me to a place where my future was waiting for me.
If only the past would let go of us so that we could be happy.
If only tragedy and storms would stop following in
my wake.
If only the weather would turn, so my happy could commence. If, for once, wrong could prove to be absolutely right.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR DONATION!
This is a special thank you to my readers for purchasing this (and any other Aces High MC books), because part of your purchase goes to charity! As many of you know, my youngest daughter is a Type 1 Diabetic. She was diagnosed in Dec. 2012, after nearly dying from being DKA (diabetic ketoacidosis).
DKA is what happens when your body can’t use the sugar in the body properly and ends up making acids with it instead. Those acids build up and will eventually kill the person if left untreated. We have struggled and fought every day since to make sure she has a normal life despite all the blood sugar checks and things she has to attach to her body (or all the shots she has to take) in order to survive. We’ve managed all this time to never have her get sick enough to require hospitalization or even a trip to the ER (for diabetic related issues). I credit JDRF and Palmetto Children’s Hospital in Columbia, SC (where she was diagnosed) for that. They gave us a diabetic bible to live by. We received a small backpack full of information that we still have, and use, to this day. It keeps us on track, and has given my daughter a better chance of not having complications later on in life from Diabetes.
So, with that in mind, I am donating 10% of all royalties from every single one of my Aces High MC World books to JDRF on the anniversary of the first Aces High book to be published (Dancing With Danger – released March 2018). So, thank you for your purchase, because a little bit of what you spent on this book will go towards helping another child, like my daughter, to live successfully with Diabetes until a cure is found! You will see a very special newsletter go out in both March and April concerning the amounts donated, so be sure to sign up for that on the Moonlit Dreams Publications website. www.moonlitdreams.org
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot: Aces High MC (Aces High MC - Dakotas Book 2) Page 17