Without Consequence

by Victoria L. James

  “Come on, darlin’, let’s go distract ourselves for a while and see if we can’t come up with an answer to all of this.”

  “Thanks, Jan.”

  She tucked my hair behind my ear and gave me a wink, her thumbs brushing under my eyes before she flashed them to show the mascara there. “You’re not alone, sugar. You’ll never be alone while I’m drawing breath, and don’t you forget it.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She smiled and pulled open the door. Rusty was just walking away and spun on his heel to start in on me, but one look at my face and he waved his arms in resignation and mumbled to himself before disappearing into the kitchen. The action brought a smile to my lips. Janette was right, the man complained like the devil, but he cared more than he would ever admit. If you asked him, he’d deny it, but that was all part of the old man’s charm.

  Work, I could manage. Work was familiar. As long as it wasn’t another surprise morning from the MC, I’d do just fine. But after the night they’d had, and from the stumble of Drew Tucker as he left my home, I doubted I’d see any of them before sunset.

  At least, I hoped I wouldn’t.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Drew

  I hadn’t sat at the head of the table during our meeting that morning for many reasons, most of which were purely selfish but could be masked as good club intentions. First of all, I was in no fit state to take control of a fucking go-kart, never mind a group of ten men who were all waiting on inspiration and leadership. My head was thick and the muscles in my body ached and begged for me to go back to bed. But, as promised, I’d been up at the ass-crack of dawn and I’d taken my seat with my pack to try and find my place again.

  Jedd didn’t bat an eyelid when I gestured for him to take his usual place. Neither did Kenny or Slater, but Harry’s glare was burning holes into the back of my head as ever. I was starting to think that little fat bastard had some kind of crush on my hairline, he spent that long looking at it.

  The others had all said their pieces to me, welcomed me back into the family with clear heads and promises of doing whatever they could to help make the transition from prison to society as easy as possible. This is what my family was good at. This was where I realized I’d missed them and that constant support.

  We’d gone through the more basic things to do with the businesses we ran, but I’d yet to hear any of them talk about the boxing clubs and, from the looks I kept catching from across the table, I knew it was only a matter of time before I had to ask what the hell was going on and why it was being avoided. A major reason for me going to prison was so they could turn that shit around without my influence and reputation overshadowing it. They’d promised me to make it good, clean and more importantly, profitable. Yet here we were, and not one word about it had been spoken.

  It was only when the table went silent and I felt all eyes fall to me as I sat beside Jedd that I let my eyes flicker around the room as I tried to read my fellow men. It was as though the quiet could only be broken by my voice. They knew it and I knew it, even though no one had spoken it. With my hands clasped out in front of me, I raised my balled up fists to my mouth and took a moment to just stare down at the table my elbows were resting on. A few of the guys shuffled in their seats, the leather of their cuts creaking as they did. It didn’t take a genius to figure out there was still a lot left to be said.

  “So the pawn business is good. The repo side of things is still moving along slowly…” I paused, sniffing up through one nostril before I let my eyes rise up to look at the man sitting directly opposite me. Owen Sinclair, the only one of us, besides me, with enough brains to run the accounts and make everything look above board, even when it wasn’t. “Is that it?”

  Jedd coughed on my right and I saw Kenny’s hand rise to scratch his head out of the corner of my eye.

  “That’s all there is as far as I’m concerned,” Owen answered roughly. He wasn’t much younger than Harry, and if I was honest, he’d always managed to piss me off whenever he’d opened his mouth. Owen carried a certain air of arrogance around with him that even I couldn’t match. Hard, covered in leather and intelligent were three very powerful things for a man to have in his favor. He knew it and he owned it. Fucker rarely ever smiled.

  My mouth turned down as I held his gaze and cocked my head. “You sure?”

  “Always am.”

  “Fair enough.” Turning my attention to the side, I glared at Jedd who was looking down at the table. “What about you?” I asked him, pushing my mouth further into my fists.

  “All covered.”

  “All?”

  “Those are the main things we’ve been focusing on in recent months, Drew,” he answered eventually, looking up at me nervously.

  I cast a quick glance back around all the other men at the table, narrowing my eyes on each one at some point so they knew I knew what was going on, even if I wasn’t about to say it. Dropping my hands back down, I rolled both shoulders and then stretched my neck from side to side before I cleared my throat and sighed. “Then I guess we’re done here for the day.”

  Slamming my hands down hard on the surface, some of them flinched at the sudden movement, almost as though they’d been waiting for me to kick off. Instead, my mouth curled into a small smile before I leaned back in my chair and crossed my ankles underneath the table. Jumpy bastards. I guess that’s what happened when you knew you were lying or hiding things from someone you were always meant to be clean with. You got nervous.

  “Actually,” Harry spoke up from the other end of the room. “We need to discuss what’s happening with that seat over there.” He lifted a finger, pointing it directly at Jedd as he raised both his brows.

  “What about it?” Jedd frowned, while my grin just grew fucking bigger.

  “Yeah, Harry. What about it?” I mimicked.

  “You know what I’m talking about, kid. Drop the cocky look and let’s deal with some real issues here. Now that you’re out, that chair belongs to you.”

  Turning my head slowly, I looked back at Jedd and gave him a ‘would you look at that’ face – one that was filled with amusement and my very own version of arrogance. Seemed the hangover was turning me into more of an asshole than even I thought I was capable of being. “Dissension in the ranks, Chief. What’s all that about?”

  Jedd’s eyes narrowed on me, like he couldn’t quite work out who the hell sat beside him. The old version of Drew Tucker, or a new, more screwed up, post-prison version that he wasn’t going to be able to handle quite as easily as he once did. “You want your chair back? It’s yours,” he answered abruptly.

  “I’m not saying you should just hand that shit over, but we have a system here. An order. That order got messed up when you went inside but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t respect it now. It’s what your father would have wanted. It’s what Pete would have wanted, too. Just becau–”

  Harry didn’t get time to finish what he was saying before my head snapped in his direction and my jaw tensed in a flash. The look I threw his way was enough to make him stop right there and once again, the room was crackling with a heavy tension as everyone sat up slowly in their seats.

  “He can keep the chair. I don’t want it,” I ground out. My voice was so quiet and so low, I was surprised anyone heard it at all. Swallowing down harshly, I raised both brows and let my eyes pop wide open as I stared at Harry. “I don’t want the chair. I don’t want anything. Not until I’ve earned it again and not until enough time has passed. You got that?”

  “Leave it, Rogers,” Jedd whispered across the table while Owen shuffled some more in his seat opposite me.

  “But…” Harry started, stopping himself as he lifted a hand over his mouth, dragging it down on both corners with his finger and his thumb.

  “No buts,” I said quietly. “I’ve made up my mind.”

  “And what about us?” Kenny asked from across the way. I didn’t look at him as I answered, and my eyes didn’t even shift to find Slater’s l
ike they once would have done before I spent time inside.

  “I don’t… want… the chair.”

  That awful silence fell upon us all once again as I held Harry’s gaze and practically burned two giant holes into the side of his ugly face. I could see what he was thinking. He was thinking I was an idiot and a fool. He’d wanted me back because he wanted things to return to how they once were: me leading the boys on a never-ending trip to nowhere, with him riding right alongside me. Only he couldn’t see just how much things had changed around here now. Nothing was the same, especially not me. The problem I was having was not knowing where to start explaining any of that to a single one of them. How could I speak up and let them all know that I had to figure myself out again before I could figure out what I could do for the rest of them? How could I speak up about Pete and let them all know just how much he haunted me on a night and how much I felt like I’d let him down already?

  How could I say that I wasn’t sure what I stood for anymore?

  My body began to practically shake from the way I’d tensed every muscle inside it. It felt like it was going to explode and shatter into a million pieces if someone didn’t say something that made even an ounce of fucking sense to me soon. A few of them cleared their throats again, and one even decided that was the right time to light up a smoke. So when Slater finally spoke and his voice flowed through my brain enough to blow clear some of the red fog that had set in, I was more than a little bit grateful.

  “What do you want, Drew? Just tell us all and we’ll do whatever we can,” he said in a way that made me believe everything he was saying. He was a good man – a good friend. I knew he’d walk to the other side of the world for me if he had to do it to make me happy again.

  As my eyes tore themselves away from Harry and I blinked enough to stop them burning so much, I let my head turn slowly to the side and looked up the table at Slater, blowing all the air out of my nose. “What do I want?” I repeated quietly.

  “Yeah.” He nodded once, not looking away from me as his eyes searched mine for answers.

  “I want to eat.”

  The whole table turned to look at me, every chair shifting and scraping along the floor as they did.

  “I want to eat,” I repeated, closing my eyes at the thought of real food and the opportunity to spend some time out in the open air, wandering around the town. “I want real shitty food – not the kind of prison food I’d have to spend forty minutes chewing to be able to swallow. I want fries. Burgers. Any old crap that I can throw a half a bottle of sauce on top of and wash down with a beer.”

  Kenny huffed out a laugh from across the table. I knew it was Kenny ‘cause he had a laugh that made him sound like he was being electrocuted.

  “I want to get outside. I want to look at daylight without seeing bars in my view… and most importantly,” I stopped to open my eyes, rolling my head lazily to one side and making sure Jedd got the full force of both my glare and my words. “I want to ride my mother fucking wheels. Right now. The chair? You can sit on that shit all year long. Just give me the seat that really matters. Let me back on my bike.”

  Jedd's own lips rose to a half smile as he began to nod slowly in my direction. “I'll give you your wheels. We'll give you the ride out and the food, and as an extra added bonus, we'll give you this.” Pulling a manila folder out from under a stack of shit he had in front of him, he slid it along the wooden surface until it was within my reach, never once taking his eyes away from mine.

  “What is it?” I asked as my fingertips reached for the edge.

  “That info you asked for.”

  “Info?” I scowled.

  “On the kid and his sister.” His smile grew bigger as he pushed himself up in his seat and moved to lean over the table towards me. “Seems we might be able to kill two birds with one stone today.”

  I pulled the file in front of me, flipping the cover open to see the face of the woman who dared to take on Drew Tucker last night staring back at me. What I couldn't figure out, as I looked down on her picture, was whether or not the smile on my lips was from amusement alone, or from the fact that I was looking into her wide eyes again and feeling the need to get a little pay back of my own.

  As my head snapped up to Jedd's, I smirked and closed the file in front of me, desperate to keep the info inside to myself. Suddenly, I really wanted to get out of there as fast as I could.

  “Where the hell are my keys?”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Ayda

  “Order up, Ayda.”

  “Ayda, can you pour me three coffees?”

  “Ayda, the guy on four changed up his eggs to scrambled, hun.”

  On no sleep whatsoever, all of the voices aimed at me were beginning to grate on my nerves and my sanity. Tangled with the constant contemplation of my altercation with Drew Tucker, I was about ready to throw my hands up and walk out of the damn place. This was normally what I thrived on – the constant rush, with no time to think, just to do. I could multitask without much thought on most days, but not that morning.

  “Okay, got it,” I mumbled, grabbing the ticket from the wheel and scribbling on it. My hand threw it back up as my other grabbed for three cups, but the scalding hot pot met my palm instead.

  “Jesus, Ayda,” Sam said, grabbing my wrist and towing me to the sink, where she ran cold water over my palm and clucked her tongue at me. “Where the hell is your head at today?”

  My eyes met Janette’s before I dropped them to watch our hands, the clear stream easing the tingle a little. Lifting one shoulder and huffing out a breath, I kept my excuse as close to the truth as possible. “Tate snuck out last night. I didn’t do much sleeping.”

  “Damn teenagers. With the noise those bikers were making last night, what the hell was he thinking?”

  “Good question,” I responded quietly, nodding to her that I could do it. “Thanks, Sam.”

  “It’s okay, sweetie. I’m dreading Cameron being a teenager. Makes me crazy to think about it.”

  “He’s five.” Janette laughed, grabbing my order and winking at me as she disappeared through the doors. I was in the middle of fixing the coffees when she returned and whispered to Sam before taking the pot from my good hand and towing me back into the office.

  “What the–”

  “Time to take a break.”

  “Jan, we’re in the middle of the rush.”

  “Yes ma’am, we sure are, and those hung-over bikers of yours seem to have quite an appetite on them.”

  Just like that, all of my fight was gone and I let her tow me straight back into the office. Backing up slowly, my ass planted on the desk chair, the creak disappearing into the muted sound of the diner just beyond the thin walls. As tempting as it was, I couldn’t sit in that office the whole time they were there. I had to face the music, and in all likelihood, the ridicule eventually. Sooner was better than later.

  “I can’t hide forever, Jan.”

  “No, but I can give you fifteen minutes to compose yourself and clean that burn up a little, sugar.” I watched as she moved around the office, pulling out the first aid kit, before tugging my hand under a lamp and examining it. “Nothing serious, but I’m going to wrap it to keep it clean.”

  I nodded, but I would have had the same reaction to anything she’d have said as the numbness of stark terror ran through my body. I was under no misapprehension as to who was out there. Had it been random members of the MC, Janette wouldn’t have reacted the way she was doing.

  Drew Tucker was sitting in the diner and I was going to have to grow a set and march out into the seating area with the same strength and arrogance that I had confronted him with the night before. Scared or not, at least I would have my pride. I wasn’t going to grovel at this man’s feet – no matter how much he expected me to.

  “Jan.”

  “Yes, sugar?”

  “I’m not hiding from him. I can’t live in fear of these men.”

  “That’s brave and all, but-”
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  I stood up, her eyes widening as she followed my actions. By the time I pulled the door out of my way, she was on my heels and mumbling under her breath. Aside from my parents’ funeral, it was one of the single hardest things I’d ever had to do. Ignoring Rusty’s grumbling about half his staff disappearing, I grabbed the tray with one of my table’s orders on it and headed to the swing door, bumping it out of my way with my ass before stepping into the chaos of the morning rush.

  I could feel every eye of the leather-wearing Hounds on me as I moved around the room. The intensity of the stares made my stomach boil with nausea, but I kept my head up and my back straight before nodding at Sam and heading to their joined tables to take their orders.

  I had nowhere else to go.

  “Morning, y’all. Coffees are on the way. Have you decided what you want to eat yet?”

  I looked around the table, forcing myself to meet the gaze of every man there. They were intimidating as hell, each one scrutinizing me as I stood, shuffling with discomfort from one leg to the other. Not one of them said a thing to me.

  “If you haven’t decided, I’ll go get the coffee and be right back with you.”

  Drew’s eyes were the last set I met, the greenish blue filled with sardonic humor as I stepped away from the table. He was enjoying every second of my discomfort. He was also utterly infuriating. I gripped onto that frustration with both hands and shrugged. It was better than fear, even if I couldn’t predict what would come out of my mouth next.

  I walked backwards away from the table, watching his arm stretch over the back of the occupied seat next to him, his other hand pinching the hair under his bottom lip. One last look and he cast his eyes down at the menu, releasing me from his hold.

  Turning around, I felt my heart in my throat. This was going to be a really long day.

  “I’ll have the waffle platter.”

  “Roughneck special for me.”