“I had a trauma,” I explained.
“A trauma?” She questioned again. Then she took in everything around us. “No bars,” she mentioned out loud, although I don’t think she realized it. “You can’t remember?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “You want to fill me in?” I asked the woman even though an inexplicable queasiness was eating at my insides.
“I’m your wife,” she stated. My eyes immediately drifted to her left hand in search of a ring. She noticed. “Don’t be silly, I’m pregnant. My fingers swell all the time. It makes it impossible to wear my rings right now.”
I knew I wasn’t wearing a ring and there had been no evidence of tan lines or anything else to indicate I had been wearing one in the time since I came into Durbin’s care. I just cocked my head and continued to study the woman. There was something familiar about her, but I was having a hard time focusing on that fact because my body was bubbling up inside with uneasiness. Something Durbin once said to me came back. “You might not remember things right now but trust your body’s responses to your surroundings. Even when you might not remember up here,” he told me as he tapped my head, “Your body still remembers and responds accordingly.” My body was telling me that I wasn’t comfortable with this woman. There was no denying that fact.
“You don’t believe me?” Her words came out as a whine as her bottom lip poked out in a pout that just seemed put-on. She then looked down and dug into a purse she had hanging on her arm. The damn thing matched her posh outfit a bit too well too. I continued to watch her as she pulled a cell phone out of the bag, but the entire time I took in her appearance, all I could think was that this woman did not feel like someone I would be at home with. Granted, I had a failing memory, but she didn’t feel right. Her clothes didn’t seem right. The things I tended to identify with were the things I saw my old physical therapist came in wearing. He always had on denim pants, leather boots and jacket, and he smelled like freedom. Okay, freedom didn’t really have a scent, I guess, but he smelled like fresh air, leather, and motor oil even after he changed his clothes to work out with me. I asked once why he wore that stuff and he told me he would rather be safe and avoid road rash if he ever laid his motorcycle down.
I understood that sentiment on a level that didn’t register the way it should. I snapped out of the thought once a phone was shoved in my face though. “See?” The woman questioned me snidely as she thrust the thing at me. “This is us.”
“Shit! I look half dead there,” I answered. It was true. She’d shown me a picture of her lying naked next to me in bed, but my eyes appeared to be closed or rolled back and I was incredibly thin. I tried to look closer because I thought I saw bruising on my body too, but she yanked the phone away.
“Whatever, you were sick for a while,” was her answer.
“I’ll say. I was a fucking junkie when I was brought here.”
She waved away my statement. “Pssh, you weren’t a junkie, baby. You just enjoyed having a good time,” she countered.
I narrowed my eyes on her once again and glanced between the phone in her hands and the rounded belly she was sporting. “That’s the kind of man you want to be the father of your baby?” I asked her, not understanding why a woman who was about to be a mother would blow off that type of behavior from the man she claimed was hers.
“Well, you’re all better now, aren’t you?”
“Which begs the question, where were you all this time, and how did you find me?”
“I knew who you were with, just not where.”
I cocked a brow up at her in question. “My brother has kept you here, away from me. He told me you were no good for me, or the baby,” she added, almost as an afterthought. “So, he wouldn’t allow me to know where you were until you were healthy enough.” She wouldn’t look at me as she explained, and the rolling in my gut suggested that she might be lying.
“We’re supposed to be married and you only have one picture of us?”
“Don’t be silly, of course there are more.”
“Show me,” I demanded when she didn’t seem inclined to do so.
“Fine!” She did something on her phone and continued to swipe her fingers across it. “See,” she offered again. This time when she showed me a picture it was of a much younger couple. It could definitely be the two of us, many years ago. “We’ve been together a long time. We met when you were still in the Army.”
“I was in the Army?” I asked, but the minute the word left my mouth, several flashes of memory hit all at once. None of them had the woman in question, but they definitely supported the idea that I had, indeed, been in the Army. I could have fucking shot myself in the foot for all the clues that had been around me all this time. I glanced down at the tattoo on my arm and traced the image there for the longest time. There were others all over my body, but this was the only one anywhere near that part of my arm. Why the hell hadn’t I bothered to look closer at the images I wore on my skin? It was a question that didn’t need an answer because I already knew why. Fear. The way I had been found and picked up and put back together made me fear the story that my ink would tell. As I traced a finger around the ink on my arm though, all I felt was warmth and a tingle of a memory that involved a letter, a sketch, and coming home.
“Are you even listening?” The woman shrieked at me as she smacked at the finger that was still tracing over the tattoo. “What the hell, Declan?”
“Zoned out for a minute,” I admitted.
“You zoned out?” Her voice had taken on the edge I’d only think to associate with a harpy. Maybe a banshee. They were the ones that shrieked until your ears bled, right? I shrugged my shoulders in response to my thought, but the woman just hissed out a long, exaggerated breath before smacking at my head. I ducked out of the way and she nearly stumbled over from the momentum. Suddenly, me having a head injury didn’t seem so far-fetched if this woman had really been in my life. Hell, if it weren’t her smacking me, I had probably attempted to do myself in. Fit with the fact that I’d been drugged out of my mind for an ungodly amount of time.
“That’s it! We’re going home. I’m taking you out of here. Obviously, these quacks don’t know what the hell they’re doing if you can’t even focus long enough to have a conversation.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“You have to. You’re my husband.”
“I don’t know that though, do I?”
She turned, but not quick enough to hide the flash of angry hatred burning in that evil gaze of hers. The jolt in my stomach hit a little harder after seeing that. If my gut-instinct, or whatever it was, could talk, the damn thing was shouting at me to get as far away from this bitch as possible.
“I’m supposed to have the baby in January,” the woman commented from over her shoulder. She didn’t turn back to face me as she awaited my response.
“January?” I puzzled out loud. “I thought it was supposed to be July?” The question rolled off of my tongue before I could pull it back or even understand why I’d asked something so stupid. Obviously, she couldn’t have been due in July.
“Oh, so you are just playing games then?” She questioned. “That bitch already had the little bastard. I doubt it’s yours though. But look,” she pulled her phone out again and showed me a calendar. It was toward the end of September. “The kid is already a couple months old now.”
A flash of the blonde from my dreams hit me so hard. It was like a weight slamming into my chest. Her brilliant smile lit up the small bathroom we were standing in as she flashed me a little stick with a blue plus sign in the window. “We’re having a baby again, finally!” The sheer joy in her eyes was something else. I wanted to take that feeling and wrap up in it like a warm, comfortable blanket, and never let go.
“This,” the woman in my presence finally shouted at me as she grabbed hold of my hands and thrust them on her belly, “is your baby! Forget about all the rest of it.”
I just shook my head back and forth as
I yanked my hands away. “If I’m having a baby with you and we’ve supposedly been together all those years, how did I have another woman pregnant?”
“You didn’t! She lied!”
“I must have slept with her if I believed it was mine, or if she had a hope in hell of convincing me it was.”
“No! No! No!” The woman screeched. “This is the only one for you!” Again, she snatched my hands up and attempted to move them to her belly, but I pulled them from her grasp.
“Is there a problem here?” One of the doctors finally stuck his head into the room to ask.
“No!” The woman in my room hissed.
“Yes!” I called out to him. “I don’t know this lady and she’s attempted to get physically abusive with me several times now.”
“W-what? I, no. That’s not right. I’m your wife!”
“Says here that his wife is Ever Brothers Donavan.” The doctor informed her as he read through, what I assumed was my chart, on the tablet he had in his hands.
“Ever?” I questioned quietly. The name tastes sweet on my tongue, like the truth mixed with something so tangible it was almost…”
“You bastard! You work for us!” The woman shouted.
“Now, now,” he smirked. “Calm down, Sasha! I don’t work for you at all. In fact, your brother gave pretty explicit instructions that you were to never disturb Mr. Donavon.” The man, who had been called had been busy typing something into his tablet before the woman – Sasha – knocked it out of his hand.
“You will regret this day!”
“Security will see you out now,” he countered without another thought as he moved past her and headed directly for me. “You mentioned she attempted to get physical with you?” He asked me, seeming to really care if I had taken any damage.
“Yeah, she tried to hit me in the head a few times and then she was yanking on my arms,” I explained.
“So that he could feel our baby growing,” the woman told him before the two burly security men stepped in and each grabbed one of her arms.
“Sir?” One of the guards questioned.
“Take her out of here,” the doctor ordered.
“You will die for this!” She screamed as she was bodily taken from the room and ushered down the hall. The whole way, until they either went through a door or stepped into an elevator, her screamed threats could be heard.
“We will redouble our efforts to make sure she doesn’t come back, but I do have to relay the information. I would suggest you be prepared to be moved.”
“Moved?” I questioned and the man nodded. “Afraid so. We have to keep that one at bay a little bit longer, then you can go home.”
“I don’t want to go with her!” I was very adamant about that.
“Sasha is not your home,” he assured me and made me wonder if the Ever person he had spoken of before was my home. It felt like the truth when I thought her name again.
Chapter 16
Letters from Lucy
Lucy
I only had one more letter left to read. Somehow, I’d managed to go through the hundreds that he had written to me over the years. There really had been one in there for every single day we’d ever been separated. I was saving the last one though, because I decided that there was something I needed to do too. Reading through all those letters brought me closer to CJ. It brought me to a place where I felt I knew him better, where my heart was a little more his. My family would receive the same thing from me before I left this world.
So, I sat and penned a letter to each of my children. Within them was also a little something for my grandchildren too. When I said I wrote to each of my children, I meant it, Toby was included in that. I’m not sure why my heart compelled me to write to him as well. It just didn’t seem right to leave him out, even if he could never read it himself.
Once I was done, they were put aside and my letter to CJ flowed from my fingertips onto the page with ease, because I knew my heart and the parts I wanted to share with him.
CJ,
You have been many things to me over the years. You were once my sweet and sexy biker boy who first made me understand what it felt like to be a woman. To be wanted, cherished, and not seen just as a trophy someone might win, but as their partner. Then you grew into the man who loved me so hard, so fiercely that I was duped into believing you would do something to jeopardize that. I know it doesn’t sound possible, but your love was so complete and unwavering that, to my youth and uncertainty, it read as impossible. Then you were my lover, my children’s father, and my champion always. I’ve been disappointed a few times over the years, you never failed me. We failed one another from time to time, but after reading your letters, I think I realize what we’ve been fighting against for most of our relationship. We were fighting against ourselves more than each other.
The whole time, you had your dad and his mistakes, riding your back. Then you had what happened to you all those years ago. The self-doubt and self-loathing you carried away from that experience rode you hard too, babe. It ate at your heart and pushed you to do things out of character for you.
I had my parents’ mistakes, the secret of my birth, feeling unwanted, and never in control of anything. Those things made me see the world in a different light for a while too. What happened to us over the years, being betrayed by someone I spent my life building a friendship with, made me lose faith in people. It made me lose faith in you too, but more importantly, I lost faith in myself and it allowed for doubt and fear to rule where truth and understanding should have won.
You see, we both made mistakes. Both of us were to blame for every single failing in our union, but we were also meant to take credit for all of our triumphs too, my love. That’s something I rarely saw you do in your letters. We didn’t always get things right, but when we messed up, we always, ALWAYS put them back together again in the end. Toby’s death lies in the hands of evil people who did horrible things. No matter if we had taken different paths, I believe it was still something that could have happened. The more important thing was that while he was here with us on this Earth, you were an amazing father. You loved him from the moment you saw him and that love has never wavered. You doted on and adored our daughter and in turn she became the beautiful, accomplished woman she is today. She’s a brilliant mother, and that is down to the fact that we didn’t leave her with all the baggage that our parents left us with. She is everything we succeeded at in life. Anna is our greatest hit, because she’s the one we affected the least.
I know, at this juncture, you’re thinking ‘but what about Ever?’. Well, she came to us amid a certain amount of turmoil. She brought with her, even though she didn’t know it or mean to, a whole lot of horrible memories. With Ever, we both had to learn to see past our own mistakes and failings. While you were doing that, you made some more. But I wouldn’t be with you today had you not fixed it, had you not learned and moved on. We aren’t perfect, never were, and no one out there is. Ever has forgiven you. In her heart of hearts, you were forgiven the moment she put that tattoo on you and explained its meaning. I forgave you. Our other children, I know they did too. Now, babe, it’s time to forgive yourself. It’s time to let go of all of those things that hold you back from enjoying the rest of your life.
I’m not always going to be around, and I know you think that you will leave this mortal world first, but just in case that’s not true, there are some things I need you to remember as you move on.
First, it’s okay to be happy again. I will be really disappointed if I think you pushed happiness out of your life just because I wasn’t around any longer.
Second, you can’t be happy and live your life without accepting everything about yourself, forgiving the wrongs, and making sure that you never repeat them. Love our children and grandchildren with all of you, not just the pieces you think are untainted, because there is nothing wrong with you. You aren’t dirty. Your soul isn’t broken. Your heart isn’t black. Live your life and love our family. Do it
with everything you have inside of you, because you’ll be doing it for the both of us until we meet again.
Finally, you need to believe the words you kept repeating throughout all of your letters. Our story isn’t over. We are more than what we’ve been allotted on this Earth. We are eternal. Even if there’s another after me, we will still be together again in another place, where jealousy and heartache don’t exist. We’ll have our joy, love, and understanding on the other side for the rest of ever. So, live your life, be well, love until your heart hurts and then a little bit more. And when I see you again, I’ll be able to feel all that I missed through you.
Don’t ever doubt us, because you, my love, you are my forever. You are my soulmate, CJ, and not even death can break that bond.
With all my heart, Always and Forever,
Your Lucy
Chapter 17
The Nameless
Ever
The familiar rumble of a motorcycle caused me to look up from where my son was nursing at my breast. Tiger Lily had taken the girls on a shopping trip because they were a little jealous of the new baby and all the presents he received since we got home from the hospital. They understood up to a point, but they were still young too.
Thankfully, my boy was just about done with his meal so I wouldn’t have to worry about covering up. I almost felt like I was smothering my child every time I had to do it, but honestly, my breasts were large enough before they filled out with pregnancy and filled up with milk. There was no way I was going to plop one out in front of a bunch of bikers when they came around to see the newest member of the club. Those assholes, family or not, were a bunch of pervs with boob jokes for days.
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