by Drew Elyse
Ash turned on me, and I let her. Her hands came up to my chest and pushed me back. It was a decent push, but I didn’t budge.
“Stop it,” she snapped. “I’m not having any more kids. Not with you, not with anyone. Once this crap with Barton is over, she and I are out of here. She is none of your business and we aren’t going to be some happy little family. Just stop it!”
I held her to me and laid it out for her. “You aren’t going anywhere. Not now, not after we eliminate that fucker Barton, not ever.”
“You don’t own me.”
“Maybe not, but I own your heart. I know, because I gave you mine when I took it. You took off with it once and it hurt like hell, there’s no fucking way I’ll go through that again.”
Her lips hung open, and fuck if the need to kiss her didn’t take the edge off the frustration garnering within me.
“Lookie!” Emmy squealed. We both turned to watch her run our way. Her little arms extended the jar up toward us, showing the single firefly inside. “I got one!”
My heart nearly burst open when she came right to me, handing me the jar. She was so fuckin’ proud of herself. I almost didn’t have the heart to tell her you usually caught more than one at a time.
“Good work, princess. How about I help you find him a friend or two? You don’t want him to be all alone, do you?”
“No. That’s sad. He needs a friend.”
“Come on, let’s find some,” I said.
It was another half hour before we had Emmy back inside and in bed, a jar of fireflies on her dresser. I hung out while Ash read her a story, wishing I hadn’t missed all the times it had happened before. I didn’t want to miss it again.
When Emmy was asleep, Ash lingered. She didn’t want to leave the room with me because she knew what was coming. Well, she thought she did anyway.
“Come on, Firefly,” I whispered. “Let her rest.”
With a heavy sigh, she passed me and went out the door. I followed, pulling the door closed without a sound. Ash was nearly through her door already, trying to escape without me getting a chance to talk to her. I jogged her way and tagged her arm. Pressing her into the doorjamb, I ran a hand along the curve of her side.
“You’re a good mom, baby. It makes you even more fucking beautiful.”
Her breath caught.
“I know you used to worry about how you would be a good mom when neither of us had examples, but you’re doing an amazing job.” I leaned into her frozen body, right into her neck. “Fucking magnificent,” I told her there, then nipped at her earlobe. She jumped.
I straightened and took a second to look at her beautiful and overwhelmed face. She didn’t know what to do with what I’d said, but I knew what it meant to her. Mission accomplished.
Cupping her face, I tilted her head back to kiss her. She let me in. I wanted to take everything she offered with that move. I wanted to devour her mouth, take her into her room, and devour everything else. Instead, I stepped back.
“Sweet dreams, Firefly,” I said.
Then, I did the damn near impossible. Despite the protests of my rock hard dick, I walked away and left her to sleep on what I’d said. I had a cold shower and a long night ahead of me.
The next day was spent almost entirely back at Sailor’s Grave. I went in hours before my first appointment to start going over operations information with Carson. It wasn’t entirely unfamiliar territory. He’d taught me most of it when I was an apprentice in case I ever wanted to leave and open my own place. Carson wouldn’t have been upset about that. It was part of the gig. I just never felt like there was a reason to leave. I wasn’t relocating with the club being in Hoffman, so it was a moot point.
I also used that time to restart and scrap a few more sketches of the tattoo I was designing for myself. Every time I drew it, the design seemed flat, dull, lifeless. I didn’t want to put anything on my skin, or anyone else’s, that could be described that way. And I didn’t want to do that with this particular tattoo.
Most of my day was blocked out for a large piece I was doing for one of my long-standing clients. It was a design I was incredibly proud of, one I’d labored over hour after hour until I could say that. Carson said it was some of the best drawing he’d ever seen me do, a statement not made lightly. Some people get into tattooing because they want to put ink in skin specifically, I got into it because it was the form of art I’d chosen. Drawing was my strong suit.
I was setting up my station when the bell above the door went. I glanced that way to see Ethan coming in and waved him over.
“How’s it goin’?” I greeted, grabbing his hand and slapping his back.
“It’s good, man. Got the call from your club’s shop this morning that my bike will be done tomorrow,” he said as he sat and began removing his prosthetic leg.
Ethan was stationed in Afghanistan, Army. His unit was ambushed. Only three of them made it out. Ethan took a hunk of shrapnel to the right leg. By the time it was extracted, the wound was infected. They were forced to amputate below the knee.
He had a motorcycle before he enlisted and rode every chance he could when he was on leave. He’d managed to learn to ride again with his prosthetic, but he was struggling with the rear wheel break. His bike had a standard toe lever on the right side, but he wasn’t getting enough tactile input to feel solid operating it. I’d hooked him up with the club’s garage to modify the break system for him. We also started talking about club life—a life he seemed to be considering for himself.
After he leaned his prosthesis against the side of the chair, he pulled up the leg of his shorts to reveal the outline I’d already put down on his thigh. The tattoo was a tribute to his fallen brothers. When we’d sat down to discuss the design, he told me he wanted it on his right leg, so he would never forget what he’d lost physically was not so great as the sacrifice they had made.
That was why I’d given everything I had for this tattoo.
The final design was a haunting image, one that shook me to look at. The focal point was the classic image of a battlefield cross. The helmet, gun, and boots were all going to be filled in with full saturation color and black. Around it, in a grayscale pattern of the American flag, were silhouettes of the men in his unit who were lost that day. Each silhouette I had drawn from pouring over photos Ethan brought in. I had spent hours and hours making sure each one was as exact and recognizable as possible.
“It’s healed up well,” I commented as I looked over the outline. “I was worried some of the cross might not be ready to take on again. From the looks of this, we might be able to lay in everything today, if you want to sit for it all. Then we’ll just have one touch-up appointment once it’s all healed.”
“I’m all for it if you’ve got the time,” he answered.
“I kept the books open so I would.”
I got to work. We talked intermittently, but I focused on the work in front of me. During one of the breaks I took to rest my hand and give Ethan a breather, I checked my phone. Stone had sent a picture. Emmy was smiling huge with a marker in her hand. In front of her was Stone’s arm covered in squiggly lines between his tattoos.
He’d written, “Looks like you’ve got some competition coming up.”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. Emmy looked so fuckin’ proud of her work.
“What’s up?” Ethan asked.
Like the fucking sap she was making me, I turned the picture of Emmy his way. “My little girl. Apparently, she’s gonna take after me.”
“She’s cute. Didn’t know you had a daughter.”
“I didn’t either.”
I spent a good chunk of the time I was working telling him the whole damn thing.
When I was done, he whistled. “You got a mess on your hands.”
“Probably.”
“She worth it?”
“Absolutely.”
“Glad for you then.”
By the time I got out of there in the evening, I was fucking sore. My back w
as tight, my shoulder ached, and I had to shake my hand out for a good ten minutes before I could get on my bike.
I’d had four more appointments after Ethan left, but his kicked my ass. It was so fucking worth it, though. The tat turned out better than I’d hoped. The visceral response Ethan had at seeing it completed told me all I’d needed to know about what he thought. Those moments, even though they killed, were what really made an impact. I’d do a hundred meaningless doodles on people if the trade off was even one piece that meant as much as Ethan’s did.
I was ready to crash when I got in, but I had something important to see to before I could.
Emmy was already in bed. I was a bit disappointed, but I’d expected as much. Still, I was sure she was going to be much easier to win over than her mother. I needed to focus in on the real fight.
Ash was in the kitchen, leaning over the sink while she washed dishes. For a moment, I just stood in the doorway and appreciated the view of her heart-shaped ass. She was wearing those tight, thin pants that were popular. Yoga pants? That sounded right. Whatever. Point was, they hugged her ass like a second skin, but I couldn’t see the line of her underwear, so I was imagining up all kinds of fucking wonderful explanations as to why that was.
I wanted to go up and grab a handful. If I were even somewhat closer to getting her to give up this whole we-aren’t-together thing, I would have.
Instead, I decided on a smarter move, even if it was a hell of a lot less fun.
I started with bringing my hands to her arm, just below her shoulder. She was wearing a tank top, so it was skin on skin. She jumped, her head flying around to look at me. I grinned at her.
“Hi, babe.”
I ran my hand down her arm, leaving it at her bent elbow to move to her waist. I brought my other hand up to settle opposite.
“What are you doing?”
“What does it look like?”
“I…I don’t know.”
I shrugged. “Why don’t you just focus on those dishes before you make even more of a mess?”
Her head snapped back around to see the bowl she had in her hands spilling water and bubbles all down the cabinets.
“Crap.”
She snatched a towel and started swiping up the water. She was frazzled, like I’d hoped to make her. If there was one thing to learn from my day of “pretending” with Ash, it was that she was fighting her own desires. That was a hard fight to win, I knew from experience. I didn’t need to convince her that we worked. I just had to overwhelm her enough to make her give up the fight.
While she straightened and got back to the sink full of dishes, I smoothed her hair away from her shoulder. I let my fingers run through the curls. Ash tried to ignore me, but it was fruitless. She loved having her hair played with. She used to drop hints or just all out ask me to do it for her. As I shifted the curls around, she shivered, unable to catch the movement.
“Sketch,” she warned, but there was a pleading edge to it. It was a plea for me to keep going.
Her defenses were crumbling already and that was all I was after. I stepped back, enjoying the way she turned to look as if she didn’t understand where I was going.
“I just wanted to ask if I could take Emmy on Saturday,” I stated.
“What?”
“Emmy. Saturday. I want to take her out for the day. I’ll be on her the whole time, and I’ll leave you my car and take Roadrunner’s truck so the car seat is there and secured properly,” I explained.
“Ugh…yeah. Sure.”
“Sweet. Thanks, babe.”
Because I had shit impulse control and couldn’t help myself, I leaned in closer and whispered, “By the way, those pants make your sweet ass look fantastic.”
Leaving her with that, I grabbed a container of leftover pizza from the fridge and took it up to my room to eat.
Day two, and I was already making progress. Ash could talk her big game all she wanted, there was no way I was going to lose.
The mind is a funny thing. For instance, mine was pondering how groundskeepers managed to keep all the grass so even. Not just the length, but the color and the thickness were all completely even. It was really nice, until I started thinking about it too much, then it started to seem unnatural.
Of course, this was a not-so-brilliant defense mechanism. It was much easier to focus on the grass than it was to face the objects sticking up from it.
It was Saturday. As promised, I’d let Sketch take Emmy for the day. He had her at the tattoo parlor where he worked—which gave me the answer as to whether he’d ended up pursuing tattooing after all. I hadn’t told Emmy until the day before and that had been a smart move. From the moment it was mentioned, she spoke of nothing else. It was all Sketch. How nice he was, how much fun they were going to have, how she couldn’t wait.
It shouldn't have irritated me, but it did. It totally did.
Why? It could pretty much be summed up in how that morning went.
I had Emmy in the kitchen eating her breakfast. It was the first time she wasn’t dropping Sketch’s name every five seconds since she’d woken up, and that was only because there was food going in. The reprieve wasn’t going to last.
We got as far as me taking her bowl to the sink before it started again.
“When is Sketch gonna be up? I’m so excited. What do you think we gonna do, Momma?”
“I don’t know what you are going to do,” I’d said to correct her.
“I can’t wait! I hope he’s up soon.”
“I’m sure he will be, baby.”
“He’s the bestest. Right, Momma?”
“Yeah, honey. He’s the best.”
Then, I’d nearly swallowed my tongue when I’d heard, “Am I?”
“Sketch!” she’d cheered.
“How’s my favorite girl? Excited?”
“Yes!”
I didn’t want to, but I had to smile. Nothing got to me like Emmy’s happiness. I’d move heaven and earth—or force myself to deal with being near Sketch—to make her smile that way.
There was no avoiding it, so I made myself look his way. Sketch’s eyes were on me, and they looked satisfied. Whether I was saying it to placate my daughter or not, he was taking that statement as a boon. That smirk was on his face every time he looked at me as he grabbed a quick cup of coffee and some toast. It was the last thing he gave me as the two of them left.
I was still seeing it in my head.
Well, I had been anyway, until I started focusing on the grass.
I’d only walked the path I was on twice before—once escorted by a bevy of bikers, Gabe’s hand holding mine the whole time, the other around dawn on the day I left Hoffman. Still, I knew my way. It was burned into my memory to the point that I could never forget.
Gauge was my guard for the day while Cami and Levi were with Tank. I hated having to call Stone to see who could come with me, but this was something I needed to do while Emmy was taken care of. Gauge insisted it wasn’t a bother, but I was sure he’d say that even if it were. I’d felt even worse when I asked if I could have some space. He’d understood, agreeing to stay back, but saying he would be just a few yards away. It was too risky for him to be farther than that.
He’d stopped a few steps ago, leaving me to walk the remaining distance alone. The closer I got, the less the grass was able to distract me. I started studying it closely, looking at the individual blades, trying to find a stray weed or under-grown patch. At least, I did until I saw a leaf on the ground.
It drew my eyes up, looking at but not really seeing the tree just a few feet ahead. Beside it, just far enough away to keep it safe from the roots, was the headstone.
The Disciples had paid good money to get that plot, one removed from the more crowded areas of the cemetery, and with the beautiful tree next to it. They had done it, in part, I believe, for me, so I would have something nice to see when I visited.
I forced my lead feet to carry me the remaining distance. Making it, I sat—more like slu
mped—down in front of the granite slab. Across, it was engraved: Joel “Indian” Thomas. Devoted Father, Beloved Friend. Ride On, Brother. October 7th, 1967 - July 16th, 2011.
They’d even engraved the Disciples’ patch into the stone. He would have liked that.
I couldn’t stop the tears. I didn’t try.
“Hi, Daddy.”
With shaking hands, I placed the flowers and sealed picture down in front of the headstone.
“I’m not sure how you’d feel about the flowers. I got the manliest ones I could find. I don’t know if any flowers are really manly, but I tried,” I spoke out my erratic thoughts. I’d found dahlias in a very dark purple, almost black. If a flower could work for my dad, that would be it.
“I’m sorry I haven’t visited. I’ve thought about you every day. I wish you were still here.”
I tried to breathe through the pain, but it didn’t seem to help.
“I brought a picture of your granddaughter. Emmaline. Little Emmy. She’s so beautiful, Dad. God, I wish you could have known her. I wish you could be here to watch her grow up with me. You would love her so much, and she’d adore you. She’s turning four soon. She looks just like me, but she’s so different. She’s so outgoing and talkative. She loves to dress up like a princess and sing and dance. She loves to be the center of attention. You wouldn’t believe how she is with the brothers. She’s got them all wrapped around her little finger. Even Daz is suddenly the awesome uncle.
“I wish you were here for her. I wish you were here for me. I don’t know what to do and you always knew. You always had the advice I needed. You would have stopped me from taking off after we lost you. But you aren’t here. You weren’t there then. It’s just me, talking to a stone, wishing you hadn’t left me, just like it was four years ago.
“Why were you so committed to the fight with Barton? Why did you take that risk when you knew I needed you? I don’t understand it. Why would you ever risk leaving me?”