Surviving The Chaos Of Life (Demented Revengers MC: Quitman Chapter Book 4)

by Vera Quinn

  “I think it will be up to the lass, just like I said, but it would help in some of the complications that go along with having our blood running through her veins. Marriage is a better way.” Cooper says insistently.

  “You are insane. I’m not marrying anyone. She is going to be my ol’ lady and that’s all she will need. She will have my leather on her back and that will show people not to fuck with her. In our club and world, an ol’ lady is given more respect than a wife.” I hear Lachlan and Sean laugh.

  “Let’s wake Faith up and get on with this. I say she’s mine.” Con sounds convinced but I will not let myself be owned by anyone. He treated me like a child, and now he says I am his woman. I think not. I walk the rest of the way down the stairs and then up the short hall, Ewan is the first to see me and he walks over and takes my hand and brings me to a chair and I sit down. I turn to look at Rebel, Shine, and Con and none of the three look happy.

  “Where are Brody and Charity? I expected them this morning.” Shine starts to say something but Con interrupts him.

  “Charity is in the hospital from worrying about her runaway sister and Brody is there with her. Your sister was scared out of her head for you. What the hell were you thinking?” Con is staring me down with fire in his eyes. Yes, he’s pissed. I never meant to worry Charity. I stand up and put my hand on my hip and walk up to Con. I won’t let him intimidate me.

  “I was thinking that I needed to help find some answers so the people that were trying to help us would quit dying. I was thinking I wanted my sister and her unborn child safe. Charity and I both felt eyes on us and I knew someone was watching us and that we were still targets and I wanted to make sure this was all handled before an innocent child is brought into this world that would have a target on his or her back. That’s what families do, they take chances with their own lives to make sure others are taken care of. Have you never heard of a thing called love?” I am fuming by the time I am finished. “I will not be your old lady or whatever it’s called. I don’t accept. You ridiculed me for looking at you twice. You are a hot biker. I’m not blind. Are you not used to the attention? You seemed to be just fine with more than that from the women that hung out at the clubhouse. Now get over yourself. I have gotten over my attraction to you. I have more important things to worry about than some arrogant biker.” I am so going to hell for lying, but I will never give Con the satisfaction of letting him know I am still attracted to him or the thought of being called his makes my heart speed up.

  “Calm down sweetness, Con is just saying that you’re under his protection and that he’s responsible for you now. I can understand the concept, but we have always believed the woman in a relationship has a right to decline a courtship. I was telling him that marriage is a more acceptable arrangement for people in our bloodline.” Cooper looks at me and I can already see that the man cares about what happens to me. I just don’t know why, and I don’t understand why he talks with a proper tone. I also don’t understand why there are no women here. They may have sent them away for this meeting. I still feel no discomfort or uneasiness

  “I don’t take kind in you referring to my woman as sweetness. Hell, you just met her.” Con tells Cooper, but Shine reaches for Con’s arm to calm him down.

  “Would you gentlemen like some coffee so we can get down to business? I promised Faith some answers this morning and I am a man of my word. Sweetness are you hungry?” Cooper tells Shine, Con, and Rebel. Then he gives me his full smile. The three men never get a chance to answer the question about coffee, another of the men in the kitchen brings the pot of coffee over and three cups. “Faith, would you like something to eat or some juice or coffee? I brought you a sandwich up last night and you were sound asleep, so I left it in case you woke hungry in the middle of the night.?” I knew it was either Cooper or Sean that left the food for me. “Did you sleep well? I locked the door before I left you, so you would feel safe.”

  “Could I have some juice, please? I’m not picky, so any kind will work. I can get it if you tell me where it is.” I see the refrigerator, but I am not presumptuous enough to just get my own without permission. Ewan moves to the cabinet and gets a glass and goes to the refrigerator to get my juice. It’s only a minute before he has it in front of me. I smile at him and he smiles back. “Thank you, Ewan, it’s very thoughtful.” I look over to Cooper and he’s smiling, and I wink at him and that makes him laugh out loud.

  “You are trouble, aren’t you?” Sean says with a smile on his face.

  “No more than any seventeen-year-old. I slept very well, and I felt safe. Once I had a shower I couldn’t hold my eyes open.” I see Rebel is getting impatient.

  “Now that everyone has had a nice little chat, do you think we could get down to the information. We have things to get back to.” Shine speaks up.

  “Quinn get the fireproof box with my important papers in it.” Cooper gives the order, and one of the young men in the room that I hadn’t met hurries up the hall. “Gentlemen, I understand you had some trouble out of the community. Damn, I hated that name. This is going to take a while to explain so this won’t be fast, and I also need answers. I have arranged for one of the local doctors to come and do a DNA test on Faith, Sean, and myself to clear up who is her father. Faith agreed last night. I also will need to have one done on Charity if she is willing.” I did agree to the test. I would like to know the answer myself.

  “Are you people a motorcycle club of some type? I see the cuts but no name, only lost ones. What the hell does that mean?” Sean laughs. Rebel, Shine, and Con all give Sean a go to hell look that says they don’t find anything funny. “What is your association with the Hell Keeperz MC?”

  “And the community?” Shine adds. Quinn walks back in the room with a huge safe looking metal box. I don’t see how Quinn can handle it by himself. He walks over and puts it down beside Cooper.

  “I only know of the Hell Keeperz MC from the community. One or two of their members stopped in our store and tried to intimidate one of my workers into giving them money and saying it was protection. The worker hit the silent alarm and we chased them out of town. They haven’t been back, but I expect they will one day and we will have a situation to take to counsel, but they won’t be taking any of our money. It’s law.” Cooper never raises his voice or acts like he’s mad at what the Hell Keeperz MC did. Cooper has opened the box and has set some papers on top of the table. He has two stacks wrapped together with a rubber band, and he slides them down the table to Shine. Shine picks them up and starts going through them. He hands some of them to Con, and some to Rebel to read. “Long story short is Sean, Darren, and I are half-brothers. We are from a small town in Ireland, or that’s where we were all born. For some reason our mam moved around a lot, but every time she was close to her time to give birth she went back to this small town.” Cooper looks up to be sure we are all listening. I already heard this part last night. “Our mam’s family is in the Irish mob. Mam didn’t like her family, and they didn’t like her much either, she was disowned. She was a bit of a scrubber and they thought she brought shame to a bunch of thieves and murderers.” Cooper sits back in his chair and takes a drink of his coffee and then continues. “Mam kept us a secret from her family or, so we were lead to believe. She saved the money that she made at the pub she worked at and some from the men she blackmailed and sent Darren to the United States with papers stating his name, but different parents. A man and a woman that mam trusted, and they became Darren’s family. A couple of years later Mam got a windfall of money from blackmailing a very rich married man. She was able to send both, Sean and I over here. Different parents, but we were cousins on the paperwork. I was too young to understand anything about the paperwork or why we were sent to live in the United States. I just knew Mam said we would be safe, and she would try to join us when she earned more money. She never made it over. She met her end by her own brothers gun a few months after we arrived in the United States. The people our Mam sent us to the states with
were good people. They cared for us as their own. We were able to visit with Darren from time to time, but Sean and I were lucky enough to live on the same block in a small town close to Dallas. Darren was the oldest, and he was very intelligent when it came to new electronic technology and communications. Then he met Alice. She was a different sort of woman than we were ever around, or Sean and I anyway.” I am into what Cooper is saying. “At first, we met her just a few times, but the difference that overcame Darren when he was around her was noticeable.” I always thought it was Pop who had the dominance over Ma. That’s how it always appeared to me anyway.

  “This is a nice stroll down memory lane, but can you get to where this involves Charity and Faith. We have places to be.” Con is always butting in. This may not be important to the bikers, but it is to me.

  “I am getting to it. It’s all relevant if you want all the information.” Cooper responds but I can see that Con is saying the words, but Rebel and Shine feel the same way. “We didn’t have much contact with Darren once he was with Alice. It wasn’t like we had contact with Darren constantly before Alice, but it became less and less. Time passed, and then it was time for Sean to graduate high school, I graduated the year before, and they attended the ceremony and after that we were either receiving phone calls daily, or they came to visit every weekend. Sean and I started college the next semester. I could’ve started the year before, but I didn’t want to leave Sean behind. Our school was three hours away from where we lived, and we weren’t going to be separated. We only spent one year at the little college town and then we both signed up to go into the military and for the next twelve years we both did our service to our country and met some good people along the way. Most of those friends we made were all pipe hitters and our bonds became strong.” Cooper looks like his mind is far away, but he stops talking to catch his breath or get his thoughts straight. I am not sure which, so I ask the question.

  “What is a pipe hitter?” I ask and wait for his answer. Cooper and Sean look at each other and then back to me.

  “I’m sorry, sweetness, I should’ve realized such a young lass wouldn’t know what it meant. A pipe hitter is a military term that means someone willing to go to the extreme to get things done. Every soldier in our unit was just that, and it was a brotherhood to us. Most of the men from that unit live in this town. Every man that’s part of our brotherhood, and town serves at least four years in the military. We do our service with honor and then come back to our family and then we serve our town and families. Quinn and Ryan will be leaving for boot camp at the end of summer.” I take that in. I know Quinn is the one that went and got this big box, but I haven’t met Ryan yet. I guess Cooper sees my confusion. “Quinn is my youngest son. You met Ewan and Lachlan last night and they are both my sons.” Cooper points to the young man standing beside Quinn. “That is Sean’s youngest son, Ryan.” I look at him and he does resemble Quinn a little. Ryan blushes. Then Cooper points to another man standing by the counter. “That’s Connor, and the one standing by the back door is Riley. They could be your cousins or possibly brothers.” I wanted to ask about that, but I know Cooper needs to get on with story or I will be pulled out of here by three angry bikers.

  “Get on with it.” Rebel pushes Cooper to get to the point, but I can see Rebel, Shine, and Con are agitating Cooper. Sean is the one that speaks up.

  “Aren’t you the ones that need information? Just listen. We have thirty years of information and we don’t know what’s important to you or not. Isn’t it better to be thorough, besides we are still waiting on the doctor.” Sean is up out of his seat with one hand on his hip and his hand pointing at Shine as if that’s going to get the big biker’s attention. Good luck with that one. I do understand that we need to get back, so I can check on Charity.

  “I know this is a long story, but could we get a condensed version. I need to check on Charity.” I hope she and the baby are doing alright. I never meant to put extra worry on Charity. I should’ve known.

  “Now she thinks of her sister.” Con says in a hushed tone, but Cooper heard it.

  “You are an arrogant little prick, aren’t you? I don’t see what sweetness sees in you, but to each their own. I see the attraction in both your eyes, but you’re fighting it and sweetness accepts hers, no matter how many times she denies it.” Cooper says to Con, but then he looks at me. “You deserve much better, sweetness, and you are more than welcome to stay with us. You have a good soul and you are loyal, that is the marks of a good woman.”

  “I told you old man that I don’t like you calling my ol’ lady sweetness. Last warning.” Con, says in a menacing voice. What has happened to Con, while I was gone? Except for the first time, Con let me know he thought of me as a child, Con is a jokester. He’s always has a quick joke to say no matter the subject talked about. This Con sitting beside me is too serious. What could have happened?

  “Let’s fast forward a bit.” Sean says. “Whatever is left out it is their loss if they need it.” Cooper and Con are in a stare down.

  “Very well, have it your way.” Cooper says to Sean and the look between the two of them is intense. “A few years after Sean and I left the military Darren once again contacted us for a meeting. We would never turn our brother down. In the time we had been apart from Darren he took a drastic change and not for the better. Neither he or Alice were the same. They were disgruntled with the way their work was going at the NSA. They both received jobs after Darren came clean and proved the way he had come to the United States. One of the first things that we were made to do when we became of age was to get our citizenship. That’s when we found out that not only did our mam sign over rights of all three of us to the parents we lived with, but she had also let them adopt us with the stipulation we kept our last names. One of each set of the parents was a citizen of the United States. I don’t know how, but the why is our mam knew the laws that pertained to children to get their citizenship. She made sure we became citizens, so we couldn’t be drug back to Ireland. When Darren had to get his security clearances he was made to come clean and they raked him through the coals getting answers and information. From what Darren said it was a lengthy process but the NSA wanted his intelligence working for them, so they approved the clearance.” Cooper stops to catch a breath and I look at Shine and he looks like he is taking this all in and his anger is gone. “Sean and I chose the military, but while we were in there Sean was in the army intelligence pertaining to communications and I was more into the tactical part of intelligence. Somehow Darren kept up with us when we were enlisted and our job skills and that’s why he reconnected with us.”

  “Weren’t you the least bit suspicious of Darren since he knew of your whereabouts, and the skills you were trained for?” Shine asks.

  “We had learned to be suspicious of anything doing with Darren, Alice and their friends. We trusted none of them.” Sean tells Shine.

  “When Darren contacted us, it was like he was suspicious of us. The questions he asked were pertaining to job skills we achieved and nothing personal. We were interested in a family reconnection, but he wasn’t. He was cold and calculating. Alice was quiet, but she never missed anything, and they were always together. We were never left alone with Darren. Sean you talk a while.” Cooper sits back, and Quinn brings the coffee pot over and refills everyone’s coffee.

  “Darren and Alice started visiting us every weekend. They lived in Maryland so, yes, we were suspicious. We knew they were working up to something big. When we got out of the military we located in the Dallas area, but our parents had moved to Florida to a retirement community. They signed the deeds to our homes that we grew up in over to us saying our mother had paid for the property, and that was her instructions. Our army buddies were getting out of the military a few at a time, and they started moving close to us, some on the same street as us and then others in the same town. Darren was always asking questions about our friends and what they did in the military. That’s also when Alice started to want f
amily time and for us to get to meet their friends. Neither of us was okay with that. We are not politically correct people. We don’t rub elbows with the rich. We are, who we are, soldiers wanting to find our niche in this world. We just wanted to be left alone and that isn’t what Alice had in mind. She began making advances to either Cooper or myself. At first, I thought she was trying to do it on the sly, but then she started doing it openly in front of Darren. This isn’t something either of us was comfortable with, but when you are a young man we were thinking with our dicks and not with our brains.” Sean seems like this is hard to say.

  “Sean it’s alright, please, speak freely. So much has happened to me in the last few months that I am not some innocent girl. I am six months away from being eighteen, but I feel way older and none of this is making me uncomfortable.” I try to ease Sean’s mind, so he can go on.

  “But she acts like she’s twelve most days.” Con comes backs with. Sean levels Con with a stare.

  “For someone that says he wants this woman to be his woman, you sure don’t know how to go about making it happen.” Ewan says with a snicker.

  “Enough Ewan. Let him dig his own grave alone,” Cooper says. “What Sean is trying not to tell you is that Darren and Alice had fallen into extracurricular activities in their marriage. The friends they had shared their women, but only of the husbands choosing, never the wife.”

  “That was the practice of the community since I could remember. The men could have multiple wives, or they could choose to share their wives with another man in the community. That’s why Charity chose not to become a wife, because once they were bound on paper the women never had another say when it came to their bodies or anything else. The man was the head of the family unit, making the rules in the community, and the leaders were the head of the men.” I try to explain it, the situation, so everyone understands how I was raised. Cooper and Sean are shaking their heads.