by Simone Elise
“Thanks, I hadn’t noticed,” I snapped.
“In here now,”
Right, the bikies.
Now to deal with them.
I rolled my eyes and pulled myself together as I walked back towards the dining room.
I noticed that Jax was sitting next to Adam, with his arms crossed, glaring at me. Why was he pissed off? He wasn’t the one about to get a grilling!
Cole went and sat next to Tyler. Troy had positioned himself at the head of the table, with authority.
I stood at the opposite end of the table with my arms crossed.
“You will no longer ride with any gang. You will no longer associate with any gang members. You will go to school, do your homework and, when you attend parties, they will be high school parties. Do you understand?” Troy demanded, his jaw clenched and his arms tightly crossed.
I keep my face blank, showing no emotion.
I was in no position to disagree, but it was against my nature to simply give in.
“Do you understand?” Cole venomously questioned.
“And that tattoo will be removed,” Tyler spoke up.
“And you will be handing over your gun,” Adam added.
A smirk spread across my face and I cocked my left eyebrow.
No way in hell was I handing my gun over, nor was I getting my tattoo removed.
”Don’t give us that look. You have no choice,” Troy informed me firmly.
As soon as that sentence left his mouth, my father opened the double doors leading in from the sitting room. He had a smile on his face, clearly happy to have all his kids in his house.
That was when the solution hit me.
If they wanted to ruin my life, I might as well throw them for a loop as well.
As if right on cue, I burst into tears.
And just like that, my dad rushed to my side.
And I fought hard to not let a smile cross my lips.
“Amber sweetie,” my father said, wrapping his arms around me.
I took the tears up to another level and wailed into his arms.
“What the devil has happened?” My father asked openly.
I quickly answered before my brothers or Jax had a chance to ruin my performance.
“They...” I broke off, adding a few more tears before I continued, “are going to leave again dad,” I whispered with fake heavy sadness.
I heard dad take in a deep breath and his body stiffen a little.
Now time to put the icing on the cake.
“They are abandoning me again,” I choked. “Leaving me with no support.”
They wanted to ruin my life and make sure I didn’t have one; well they could suffer with me. In fact, they could watch my life turn to shit first hand.
Thinking of coming here, ruining my life, and then leaving to watch from afar. Hah!
I snuck a small glance at their faces from under dad’s arm.
They looked stricken. Score!
Jax just sat there with a knowing smirk.
My dad let go of me and turned to face the boys. I didn’t have the willpower to control my laughter, so rather than facing them, I stood behind dad like a coward.
“You boys will NOT be leaving,” my father commanded the room.
Troy cleared his voice.
“We have commitments,” he pointed out.
“We can’t stay here and babysit,” Cole added with disgust.
“Family comes first!” My dad roared. “I expect each of you boys to have fully moved back into this house by the end of today. And no arguments or mention of prior commitments. Your commitment is to this family.”
Even the boys knew how strict dad was on family. He had let them leave, but he wasn’t going to let that happen again. Not if he thought I needed them.
Which I didn’t. I just wanted them to suffer.
A small smile played on my lips as I stared at the marble tiles.
But, as I noticed my father’s feet turn, I completely masked my face with sadness once again.
“Now Amber, you go upstairs and rest sweetie. I promise you they won’t be leaving,” he said slowly.
He then turned his attention back to my brothers.
As I walked towards the door, I cocked a look at my brothers.
Cole was glaring at me and I sent him a sweet smile, and I watched his hands curl into fists. Satisfied, I walked out the door and then skipped up the staircase.
Let’s see how long they’ll stick around and follow through on the threats. My guess was, they’d be gone, and for good, sooner than I could even imagine, far away from this house that they hated so much.
Chapter 8
My plan backfired. Badly. It had been weeks and my brothers were still here, making sure my life was nothing but miserable.
I attended school, I ate, and I slept.
What a hell of a life I was leading.
It was Saturday night and, just like the other weekends since their arrival, I was trapped in this hell hole called home. I hadn’t drunk anything stronger than a coffee since my brothers took up living here permanently.
Though they still spent a lot of time at the clubhouse, but when they were out, a prospect was left at the gate to guard the house. God forbid I go somewhere.
And, as for that pain in the ass, Jackson Johnston, I hadn’t really spoken to him since my brothers were back; he was glued to them anyway.
Which I didn’t completely understand.
I had come to the conclusion that he was either in the club, or in a brothering club. Or maybe just a tool my brothers liked. Though what was really interesting to me was that if he was indeed a member of one of these clubs, why didn’t he sport a cut? A son of Satan’s Son was never seen without his vest.
I was debating raiding dad’s whiskey, because that was the only liquor left in the house at this point. The boys had drunk everything else and, if it hadn’t already been consumed, it had been hidden; God forbid I got my hands on it!
I was getting up when the noise of squealing tires caught my attention.
I quickly jumped off my stool and walked towards the kitchen door, pushing the door open; the passageway was empty.
I heard the car coming to a halt outside the front of my house, followed by loud voices.
I darted down the passage and ran up the stairs, sprinting into my bedroom. I went straight for my top door and grabbed my gun.
Better to be safe than sorry.
Especially after the drive-by shootings I had seen; I didn’t want to take any chances. Not to mention the ones I did. I always had a flare for leaving the targets terrified.
Walking down the stairs cautiously, I noticed the front door was still swinging open from being pushed too hard, and a black van, evidently parked in a hurry, and was at the front step, with the sliding door wide open.
I slowly rounded the corner at the bottom of the stair case, gun raised.
“FOR FUCK SAKE!” a deep loud voice screamed from the kitchen.
I lowered my gun.
That voice wasn’t a threat.
I pushed the swinging doors open and walked into the kitchen.
Cole was slumped on a stool, leaning over the kitchen bench, with a pained expression on his face. Tyler was a holding a bloody t-shirt to Cole’s shoulder and Jax was sitting on an opposite stool drinking from a vodka bottle. Where had he got that from? I noticed his other hand was holding his side.
The side kitchen door swung open and Troy and Adam walked in; Troy was holding a First Aid kit and Adam had multiple bottles of spirits. Again, where was all this liquor coming from?
As Adam handed Cole a bottle, Tyler removed the bloody t-shirt and blood began to run down Cole’s arm; his t-shirt clinging to the wound as more and more blood leaked.
Troy grabbed a bandage from the First Aid kit and stuffed it into the leaking wound.
Cole let out a deep scream of pain and sent a flying kick into Troy’s knee.
Troy then let out a string of swear words.<
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“For fuck sake, Cole. It’s going to be a lot more painful when I remove the damn bullet!” Troy roared.
My mind raced, putting all the pieces together.
“Well, you could’ve waited until I fucking had a stiff drink!” He roared in response.
Troy grunted in response.
“Adam, Tyler, hold him,” Troy ordered.
Troy pulled out a pair of tweezers, a pair that looked like ones I used to pluck my eyebrows with, and removed the bandage.
Cole took a long swig from the bottle and slammed it down onto the table.
The boys gripped Cole firmly as Troy began to dig into Cole’s wound with the tweezers.
Cole’s fists curled and his face screwed up in clear pain.
“Stop,” I ordered from the doorway.
All the heads whipped in my direction.
Troy frowned before he spoke.
“Go to bed, Amber.”
“Before you spew,” Cole added, his eyes screwed shut.
I threw a glance in Jax’s direction, but his eyes wouldn’t meet mine.
Cole let out another grunt in pain as Troy got to work on his wound again.
I rolled my eyes. They were so stubborn!
I took a few steps towards Troy and ripped the tweezers out of his hand.
Troy’s eyes hardened.
“For fuck sake, what are you doing?” Cole screamed.
“GO to bed Amber. NOW,” Troy ordered.
“I am not a child,” I snapped, reaching for the wound. “And you clearly don’t know what you are doing!” I have more experience with this than you do,” Troy argued back.
“And this is not your business,” Cole snapped in his defense.
“Just go to bed Amber,” Adam said softly, eyes pleading.
“And let Troy rip into Cole’s shoulder? NO,” I argued.
“I don’t have time for this,” Troy snarled and grabbed my wrist firmly, ripping the tweezers from my fingers. “Leave,” he yelled, and brought his attention back to Cole’s bleeding shoulder.
I pushed Troy away hard, although he only fell back a step, and planted myself between him and Cole.
“I’ve removed enough bullets from men’s flesh to know what you’re doing will only leave scarring and cause more pain. Now, let me take over,” I informed them firmly.
Troy had a disbelieving expression.
I could tell not many people stood up to him, or defied him.
I ripped the tweezers from his hand and threw them across the room.
“Now, one of you two,” I pointed to Adam and Tyler, “Go upstairs and, under my bed, there is a sliver case. Grab it and bring it down here,” I ordered as I opened a drawer and grabbed a pair of scissors.
The room fell silent as Adam walked out the swinging door.
“You better know what you’re doing,” Cole muttered angrily.
I slowly cut his t-shirt from his body, peeling the pieces away; his wounded shoulder was a little more difficult, but I managed to get it all.
By the time Adam had returned, Cole was bare-chested and all pieces from the t-shirt had been removed.
Adam sat the case on the table and I opened it, grabbing a syringe and a bottle of anesthetic.
I grabbed a pair of gloves and put them on, before taking a needle out of its plastic.
“What are you doing?” Cole asked hesitantly.
“Trust me,” I replied softly.
I then inserted the clear needle into the anesthetic bottle.
I wiped an area clean just above the wound and inserted the needle; I did this four more times around the wound.
I then opened a bottle of salt water and began to clean the wound.
Then I ripped open a new pair of long medical tweezers from a plastic pack.
I slowly moved the tweezers into the wound.
“Feel that?” I asked Cole.
He shook his head.
I nodded mine and continued.
It wasn’t easy removing a bullet.
One, because the bullet doesn’t stay in a solid form; it explodes, leaving pieces everywhere.
It took me a while to get the job done; the room was in complete silence.
I forgot about the others in the room, so I was surprised when Tyler spoke up.
“You’ve done this before,” Tyler stated.
I gave him a quick glance as I continued to now sew Cole’s wound closed.
“Yeah.” I replied.
“I didn’t feel a thing,” Cole said in disbelief.
I lightly wiped an alcohol wipe over the now-sealed wound.
“Told you to trust me,” I advised and shot him a small smile. I couldn’t remember the last time I had smiled at any of my brothers, but, right now, I was finding myself giving Cole a smile, but a small one.
“Thanks,” he mumbled.
I placed a bandage on the wound and taped it in place. I then finally wrapped a large white bandage over the wound and around his chest and back, repeating this process until the bandage roll ran out.
“Done,” I said and let out a low sigh.
This brought back so many memories of Blake.
I handed Cole a bottle of prescription painkillers.
“These will help with the pain. I will clean the wound in two days.” Again, that small smile was on my face. I turned my attention to closing my case back up. “It was deep, so don’t do any heavy lifting and try to rest or you will rip the stitches.”
“Thanks,” he repeated, getting to his feet; Cole was doing something he never did! Smiling, at me, surprisingly.
“So, can we say that the other guy looks worse?” I asked, trying to lighten the tension.
A small smirk appeared on his lips.
“He will sis,” he smiled, and then sent me a wink. My eyes darted over his tattoos.
“Who was it anyway?” I asked. “Wait. Don’t worry about that. Club Business, right? I actually knew a lot about bikers, and I knew they weren’t about to tell me who did that to Cole, but if I really wanted to know who had shot Cole, all I would need to do was to make a phone call.
I was actually just as well connected as they were, and my contacts always did give me information, because, well, they knew what happened when they didn’t tell me.
Tyler let out a deep chuckle. “You are so full of surprises little one.” I sent him a wink and turned my attention to Jax. I noticed how he was clenching his fist on his side.
“I’m heading to bed. We can deal with this in the morning,” Troy stated. I didn’t pull my eyes away from Jax; I noticed how he nodded his head slightly in response to Troy.
Within a few minutes, all my brothers had left, leaving Jax and me alone.
“What happened to your side?” I answered quietly.
His head whipped up at the sound of my voice, and his haunting gray eyes met mine.
Clearly, he was surprised I was still here, had he thought I’d left?
“Flesh wound,” he mumbled.
I nodded my head slowly, stood up from my chair, and went to stand next to him.
“May I?” I asked as my hands lingered near the bottom of his jumper.
He didn’t respond and I took a step back.
Perhaps I had been too bold. Hell, it wasn’t like Jax and I were friends.
But then Jax removed his vest and pulled off his jumper and t-shirt, flinching as the fabric touched his injury.
As he sat there on the stool, bare-chested, I wanted to run my fingers over his amazingly toned body.
As my eyes landed on his injury, my jaw tightened.
It wasn’t just a flesh wound.
It was a gaping knife cut, one that ran right down his side.
“Some flesh wound,” I muttered sarcastically.
How could he have just sat there this whole time?
“Had worse,” he responded.
I stood awkwardly next to him.
My legs brushed against his jeans, and I was suddenly very aware of my short shorts
and tank top.
I cleared my throat and took a step back, reaching for my case.
“Well, it looks like I get to demonstrate my stitching skills again,” I said, clearly with a fake smile because there was no situation that could occur, where I would be giving Jackson a real smile.
Now, all I needed was to manage to keep my fingers steady enough to sew his flesh back together.
***
“Can I ask you a question?” Jax asked, as I wiped an alcohol wipe over his fresh stitches.
“Sure,” I responded.
Jax and I had remained in silence the complete time I worked on him.
I wasn’t sure if he didn’t speak because he just didn’t want to speak to me, or because he didn’t want to distract me.
“Why are you so good at this?” he asked seriously.
I frowned. “When your boyfriend is a known criminal, he doesn’t go to the hospital when he gets shot.”
“So you used to bandage Blake up?”
“Pretty much.” A dim smile appeared on my lips for a second, remembering the first time I did it. “Practice makes perfect.” I added, because I had got better over time.
“So I have him to thank for my perfect stitches then?”
“No, you have me to thank.”
“Can I ask you something else?” It sounded like he really wanted to know the answer to this question.
I arched my eyebrow, and nodded my head.
“In the HellBound, were you a target shooter?”
I wiped my face off any expression. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”
I watched as a full smile appeared on his face, and he arched his eyebrow.
“It’s a skill to lie straight to someone’s face,” he said, calling me out on my lie.
I gave Jackson something I would never ordinarily give him - a real smile - and stood up from my stool, placing my case on my hip as I turned to leave.
“So, you were then?” He got up.
“Again, I don’t know what you are talking about.” I could act dumb when I wanted to.
A soft chuckle left his lips as he followed me out of the kitchen.
“How many have you taken out?” he asked from behind me.
I grunted in response.
“Who said I have taken even one out?” I threw over my shoulder.
“The way you handle that gun tells me you know how to use it,” he muttered. “But then again, it could all be a show.”