‘You know how it goes, kiddo. How this club works.’
She threw her head back, letting out a quiet but frustrated sigh. ‘I am so tired of hearing that now. Yes, I know how this all works, it’s all I’ve ever known. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.’ Her eyes met Kel’s again. ‘Or agree with it.’
Kel left a couple of beats before he spoke. ‘So, what happens now?’
Lexi shrugged, her attention distracted by Coby’s voice booming out across the compound as he shouted over to Kip at the gate. ‘I really don’t know. My mum still doesn’t want it to get out that Coby was over in England, but I can’t see how that can be avoided.’ She turned back to face Kel. ‘Because of Ozzie. That’s when Ozzie was conceived. And the one thing I am not prepared to do anymore is lie about his father. I’ve gone along with it for far too long as it is, but I’m finished with the lies now, Kel. I’m done with all that shit.’
‘And you and Coby… you’re okay?’
‘Now that I know the truth?’ She shrugged again. ‘Having my suspicions confirmed doesn’t make it any easier to deal with, and there’s this huge part of me that feels almost… it feels wrong. Shane is dead, and I’m in love with the man who helped take his life.’ She looked over at Coby again. He was sitting up on one of the tables outside the clubhouse now, nursing a mug of something, talking to Luca. ‘I don’t really know what to feel, if I’m being honest. This place, it’s messing with my head. And there’s this tiny, tiny part of me that can’t help thinking maybe I should have stayed over there. In England. That I should never have come back here.’
Kel climbed off his bike and pulled her in for one of his big bear hugs. Lexi clung on to him, closing her eyes for a second or two, once more breathing in that familiar smell of engine oil and cigarette smoke. That strangely comforting smell. ‘You don’t belong over there, kiddo. You belong here, with us. We’re your family.’ He looked at her, stroking her hair from her eyes. ‘Listen to me, sweetheart. This club – it might seem like a real fucked-up place at times. But when all is said and done, we just want to make sure the people we love are safe. And if that means breaking rules and moral codes… we do it because we have to.’
She sighed, leaning back against Coby’s bike.
Kel looked at her. ‘You gonna be okay?’
She nodded. ‘I don’t know exactly what’s gonna happen now, but – I guess that’s up to Tay.’
Kel took her hand, giving it a quick squeeze. ‘Yeah. I guess it is.’
***
‘Do we all understand what I’ve just told you?’ Tay asked, his hand hovering over the gavel as silence fell around the table.
‘After this, we go totally legit? For real, this time?’ Luca asked, sitting back in his seat.
‘This job is gonna make us a lot of money,’ Tay replied.
‘That isn’t what he asked,’ Coby said.
Tay threw him a look, but Coby wasn’t intimidated. He never had been. His friend was losing it, taking risks that were way too big for them to handle should the shit hit the fan. And he wasn’t sure Tay had made that completely clear. It wasn’t fair to send anyone out there thinking this was going to be easy, no matter how much Tay tried to make out that it was.
‘And we’re all needed, are we?’ Kip asked, looking to his stepfather for some kind of reassurance.
‘We need a full crew,’ Tay replied, leaning forward. ‘Plus, I’m calling in some back-up from Hilton. Just as a precaution.’
Jesse let out a low whistle, clasping his hands together in front of him. ‘I dunno, Tay…’
‘Believe me, this really is the last time we do this. And if I didn’t think we could handle it…’
Coby let out a low but audible laugh, dripping with more than a hint of cynicism. Tay glared at him. ‘Something you wanna say there, Coby?’
‘You know how I feel about this, Tay.’
‘Our VP has his doubts,’ Tay said, twirling the gavel over and over between his fingers as he surveyed the rest of the table, fixing them all with a look that told them he was in control here. Him. Nobody else. ‘But I’m telling you all – as President of a club I love – doing this job, it could be really good for us. The financial gains, both personally and for the club as a whole, are too great to ignore…’
‘Can I have a word?’ Coby interrupted, pushing his chair back and standing up, looking down at Tay.
‘We’re in the middle of a fucking vote here, Cobe.’
‘Five minutes.’
Tay sighed, pushing his own chair back. ‘Give it some thought, guys, okay? We won’t be long.’ He followed Coby out of the room, out into the clubhouse. ‘What the fuck are you doing?’
‘You haven’t told them the whole truth, Tay.’
‘Because they don’t need to know the frigging ins and outs, Coby.’
Coby couldn’t help but let out another loud and humourless laugh. ‘Oh, you reckon?’
‘I know.’
‘Why? Because you think if they knew the real reason you’re putting their lives at risk is because of some stupid mistake you made, they’d say no? Is that it?’
‘Jesus, Coby, come on. Be the VP I need right now, brother.’
‘I don’t want any part of this shit, Tay. Not really. Because I don’t think you’re being fair to those guys. You’re sitting there, spouting some crap about how this is gonna make us financially secure but you haven’t really given them the full story, have you?’
Tay leant against the wall, throwing back his head. ‘What do you want me to say, Coby? If I don’t do this… if I don’t help Emilio, you know what he’ll do.’
‘Jesus Christ,’ Coby sighed, pushing a hand through his hair. ‘Fuck!’
‘Giving them the full story, telling them the whole truth… I can do that. I can go back in there and tell them the real risks involved but if I do, and they vote against doing this, I am in so much shit, Cobe. Up to my fucking ears.’
Coby turned to face him, his expression determined. ‘You tell them, Tay. You tell them everything. You got that? Those guys in there, they do not deserve to go into this not knowing the real risks.’
‘Coby…’
‘They can handle those risks, Tay. We all can. But we can’t handle shit if we don’t all know the truth. So get back in there, and tell them. Because if you don’t, I will.’
***
Lexi watched from the other side of the clubhouse as Coby faced up to Tay. She couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it looked serious. And that did nothing but send a familiar wave of fear washing over her.
‘Any idea what that’s all about?’ she asked Angie as she joined her at the bar.
Angie looked over at Tay and Coby, frowning slightly as she watched their exchange. ‘No.’ She knew her husband and his VP were butting heads over something, and she knew Coby was planning to challenge Tay for the Presidency, at some point. She just didn’t know why. And she didn’t want to lay that one on Lexi just yet. Not on top of everything else she’d had to face up to today.
Lexi looked at her mum. ‘So, you’ve no idea what this vote is about tonight, then?’
Angie walked behind the bar, grabbing two glasses and filling them each with a double shot of whisky. ‘We’re old ladies, Lexi. We aren’t privy to their private meetings.’
Lexi sat up on a stool at the bar, taking a sip of whisky. ‘Have you asked Tay?’
‘Jesus, Lexi, how long have you been around this shit? I can ask as many questions as I like, darlin’. It doesn’t mean I’m gonna get any answers.’
‘I asked Coby about being over in England. And he told me everything. Eventually.’
‘Because that man has been blinded by hot sex and a pretty face.’
‘Thanks, Mum.’
Angie leant over the bar, her eyes locking with Lexi’s. ‘You are gonna have to remember how this works, sweetheart. And that means learning your place, if you’re really serious about being with Coby.’
Lexi narrowed her ey
es, downing the last of her whisky. ‘And what if I want to fight against all that, huh?’
Angie filled her empty glass with another double shot. ‘You won’t win.’
‘So, I end up like you, is that it? Because what you’re telling me is crap, Mum. Old ladies don’t have to be kept away from the truth – it’s up to them whether they want to know what really goes on or not.’
‘We’ll never know what really goes on, Lexi. You know that.’
‘It’s up to us what we choose to be a part of.’
‘You still believe that?’
‘It isn’t my fault Tay won’t include you… or is it just that you don’t want to know what really goes on?’
Angie looked at her daughter. ‘When you have kids that are born into this shit, Lexi, then no. No, I don’t want to know what really goes on. Because it scares the crap out of me. What they’re voting on in there, that could be putting my son – your brother’s – life at risk, so, yeah, I really would rather not know exactly what’s involved. And you’re a mom yourself now, honey. You have a son, too, and whether he likes it or not he’s been born into this life. That cycle is never gonna end.’
‘And what if I want it to end?’
Angie locked eyes with her daughter again. ‘It won’t ever end, darlin’. And that’s one thing I can promise you.’
***
‘All those in favour, say aye,’ Tay said, pulling the gavel further towards him, wrapping his fingers tight around the wooden handle.
‘This really is the last time?’ Kip asked, pushing his cap back on his head, his eyes fixed firmly on his stepfather.
‘It’s the last time,’ Tay replied, his voice steady and controlled. ‘And I’m sorry, okay? For putting you all at risk because of my mess, but…’
‘Hey, we’re all with you, brother,’ Jesse cut in. ‘Aren’t we?’ He looked around the table, at every single man sitting there, all of them nodding. Apart from Coby. ‘We’re all with you.’
Tay leant forward, picking up the gavel. ‘Thank you, Jesse. That means a lot.’
‘We all stand by each other,’ Kip said. ‘No matter what. That’s what this club’s all about, am I right?’
Coby looked down, breathing in deeply, watching as his hand balled into a fist on the table.
‘Okay, guys, let’s take this vote,’ Jesse rallied. ‘It’s an aye from me.’
As everyone took their turn, all of them standing firmly behind their President, Coby didn’t miss the way the expression on Tay’s face changed the second it was his turn to vote.
‘Come on, VP. You’re the last one to do this. It all depends on you.’
‘What you did was thoughtless.’ Coby’s voice was quiet, but harsh in tone.
‘Hey, Cobe, come on, man,’ Kip said. ‘We all make mistakes.’
Jesse glared across the table at Coby. ‘Yeah. We do.’
Coby narrowed his eyes as he looked over at Kip and Jesse. ‘This isn’t about me, or Lexi, or what we did. This is about the fact our President is putting all of us in danger for something he did. He stood alone, when he should have…’
‘He did it for the good of the club,’ Kip cut in. ‘And we need to remember that.’
‘And we need to remember just who we’re dealing with here.’ Coby leant forward, looking at each and every one of them in turn. ‘These people are dangerous, unpredictable…’
‘And what are we?’ Blake pointed out. ‘Fucking pussies?’
‘Jesus Christ, Blake, no. But we’re not invincible either. And we are about to put our lives on the line here. Do you understand that?’
‘When we joined this club, we all vowed we’d stand by each other, through anything. We swore that we would be prepared to die for the Brotherhood…’
‘That is so fucking extreme, Blake.’
‘Are you losing focus here, Coby?’ Tay asked.
‘Am I losing focus?’ Coby couldn’t help another short, monotone laugh from escaping. ‘Jesus…’
‘Yes, or no,’ Tay carried on, once more twisting the gavel between his fingers as he waited for Coby’s reply.
Coby fixed his friend with a cold, determined stare. ‘I’m in… but understand that I’m doing this for the club, for every one of these guys sitting around this table. I’m not doing it for you.’
Tay lifted the gavel, bringing it down on to the table in front of him. ‘I’ll make the necessary arrangements. Go on, get out of here.’
As everyone else scraped back their chairs and started to leave the room, Coby stayed put, clasping his hands together in front of him as he continued to stare at Tay. ‘You sure you know what you’re doing here, brother?’
‘I’m sure.’
Coby could only hope that he meant that.
Twenty
‘Is something wrong?’ Coby asked, joining Lexi at a table outside the clubhouse.
She looked up as he sat beside her. ‘No. Everything’s fine.’
‘Because I feel like you’re backing away from me here.’
‘I’m not backing away from anything, Coby.’
He reached out and took her hand, holding it tight because, all of a sudden, he needed to feel that small stab of safety just holding someone’s hand could provide. A tiny, almost insignificant action that he was beginning to crave more and more. ‘I know that what happened, with Shane…’
‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ She pulled her hand free of his and the disappointment he felt at that shocked him.
‘I really need you right now, Lexi.’ His voice was quiet, his tone serious.
She looked at him, right into his eyes. ‘I needed you back in Newcastle when you walked out on me less than twenty-four hours after fucking me. I needed you when I found out I was pregnant. I needed you when our son was being born, when my waters broke two weeks early in the middle of the fucking clubhouse and the only people around were bikers with no fucking clue what to do with a pregnant woman in labour. I needed you when I felt as though I was being ripped apart with pain and the only thing I wanted… the only thing I wanted was you.’
‘Jesus, Lexi… I’m so sorry, baby. I am so, so sorry.’
‘I have the most beautiful little boy, Coby – we have the most beautiful little boy, and I wouldn’t change that for the world. But the lies and the crap and the fear that will constantly surround him… what we did… what we’ve done… I’d change all of that. If I could. In a heartbeat.’
He reached for her hand again, and she let him take it. ‘It’s who we are, Lexi.’
‘And don’t you find that sad?’
He searched her beautiful face, her huge blue eyes wide and questioning, asking him for something he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to give her. ‘This is who I am, kid.’
‘It isn’t who you have to be,’ she whispered, squeezing his hand.
He looked down at his fingers stroking hers, his thumb running lightly over her knuckles in an almost absent-minded action. ‘It’s who I want to be.’
She didn’t say anything for a few seconds, and the only comfort he could gain from that was the fact she was still holding his hand.
‘I love you, Lexi. I love you with every fibre of my being…’
‘But not as much as you love this club, huh?’
He looked up, his eyes staring straight into hers. ‘I love you. So much. I’ve loved you for a lot longer than I’ve dared let myself believe.’
‘But I’ll never come first, is that it?’
‘Baby, you’re a part of this, too. This place is in your blood…’
‘Not out of choice, Coby. You chose to be a part of it, I was born into it, it’s all I’ve ever known. But what if I want more than that? What if I want a better life for Ozzie?’
‘You want out?’
She let go of his hand again, pushing it through her hair. ‘I didn’t say that.’
‘Then what are you saying? Because you’re confusing the fuck out of me right now.’
She turned to glare at
him. ‘I’m just getting my head around a lot of serious shit right now. Okay? They say actions have consequences, and I’m just beginning to realize how fucking true that is. Yet you – you don’t seem bothered by that.’
He held up his hands in surrender, climbing off the bench, reaching into his pocket for a cigarette. ‘Go sort your head out, Lexi. Then tell me just what the hell it is you’re looking for, all right?’
He started to head off across the compound, over to his bike, taking a long drag on his cigarette as he walked.
‘Something going on there?’ Tay asked, looking up from checking the tyres on his bike as Coby approached.
‘Now she knows about Shane, things are changing, Tay.’
Tay stood up, wiping his hands on a rag he’d pulled out of his pocket. ‘She knows about Shane? Shit! Who the fuck told her?’
Coby frowned as he looked at Tay. ‘Hasn’t Angie…? Jesus, do you two ever actually talk to each other?’
‘Fuck!’ Tay sighed, leaning back against his bike. ‘Lexi spoke to her mum? About Shane?’
Coby shrugged. ‘Apparently so.’
‘Am I fucking invisible around here or what? Did you tell her?’
Coby threw his cigarette down on to the ground, stubbing it out with the heel of his boot. ‘She asked. I told her. That shit was never gonna stay a secret forever.’
Tay narrowed his eyes. ‘You reckon? Because that’s how I was intending it to stay. Shane, he was popular around here. People loved him. Explaining to them what he was planning, and how we had to deal with that, you know how nervous that’s gonna make people feel?’
‘For the good of the club, huh?’
‘Jesus Christ, Coby, are we still on this?’
‘Hey, forgive me if I’m a little concerned that clearing up your mess might mean I never actually get to meet my son.’
‘It won’t come to that.’
‘You can guarantee that, can you?’
‘Emilio is getting a couple of his guys to tag along, as extra back-up.’
Revolution (The Lone Riders MC Series Book #1) Page 18