Death Dwellers Motorcycle Club:: Fifteen Bad Boy Biker Books

by Kathryn C. Kelly

  She pressed her lips into a tight line, then faked a smile. “Um, no. I-I’m not invited.”

  “Uh-huh.” Swallowing more of his vodka and scooping rice and gravy into his mouth, Mortician processed her words, her tone small and devastated. “What that mean to you?”

  Her brows lifted. “That Christopher needs time to himself. He’s working through a lot and I have to give him space.”

  Commendable but wrong like a motherfucker. “The Bobs coming.”

  Wringing her hands together, she nodded and bowed her head. “I know,” she whispered.

  “While you giving your man space, them bitches going to move in.”

  “No,” she insisted, although Mort saw she really didn’t believe her own words. Fear and panic darkened her eyes. “He wouldn’t cheat on me.”

  Laying his knife and fork down with a clank, he rubbed his forehead. “He going through a lot.”

  “He loves me.”

  The conviction in her voice made him reach for his bottle of vodka. Fuck, Meggie wasn’t completely naïve. Maybe, Prez did love her like he swore. He swigged the alcohol, then held it out to her. “Take a sip.”

  “I have to see to the boys, then clean up the kitchen and the main room.”

  “Probates can do that.”

  “They can’t see to my son and nephew,” she insisted stubbornly.

  Not pressing the matter further, he drank from it again and set the bottle between them. “This shit good, girl. ‘Ppreciate you making it for me.”

  She relaxed a little. “No problem,” she mumbled and got to her feet. She started to move away but Mortician caught her elbow and tugged her back. She stiffened, a touch of panic entering her eyes.

  “Prez shoulda cut Val dick off, Meggie.”

  “Val was high. He wouldn’t have done that otherwise.”

  “Well, I’m not fucking high. You think I’d hurt you?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “That’s it right there. Your heart telling you why Val hurt you, but your head being logical and making fear kick in. Around me. Around him. I guess around most of us motherfuckers.”

  Tears rushed to her eyes and her nose reddened. Mort knew the light clicked on in her brain. Meggie was smart. She figured shit out. “What’s your point?” she whispered.

  He thumbed a tear away. Prez didn’t want any of them touching her, but Mort felt compelled to comfort her. They were friends and she was hurting. “You know my point. Your heart telling you Prez would never lay with another bitch. Your head not. For the first time since you met, you can’t break through to him and that’s scaring you.”

  Swiping her tears away, she nodded and bent her head, her shoulders shaking with her tears. Uneasy, Mort glanced toward the door. Prez never stayed out all night, so he could return at any time. Wiping damn tears away was different than taking her in his arms and hugging her, but, fuck.

  He pulled her against him and rubbed her back, wishing like fuck Bailey was here. He told her he intended to talk to Meggie and she insisted if she needed comfort with the subjects Mort brought up, then he had to offer it to her. So here he stood, like a stupid assfuck, hugging his Prez’s girl. He hated to see her so sad.

  “Meggie, I know your hurt go deep for your baby. I know you trying to hold it together. But Prez need you. He scared, Meggie. He almost lost you.”

  She pulled back and sniffled, tugging away from him to look for a paper towel to wipe her running nose. “This is about my daddy and Zoann. Not me. He’s so angry with Big Joe and—“

  Mortician folded his arms. “Your old man was a motherfucker. Straight up,” he said. It wasn’t anything she hadn’t heard before, but that needed to be put out on the floor. “But he loved the fuck out of Prez. That dirty shit he pulled with Chester? I understand why. What need to happen is Prez got to separate this shit. Put it in different little compartments in his brain.”

  “Compartmentalize?”

  “Yeah. That.” He finished his vodka treat off. “Tell me what you know about your man.”

  She bristled. “I beg your pardon?”

  Smiling at her indignation, he went to the refrigerator and pulled the green skittle vodka out. “What you think about Prez. And I don’t want to hear no I fucking love him…What’s your assessment of my president?”

  “I’m not a psychologist.”

  “Fuck, might as well be. Loretta went to school for that shit and bitch not doing Red one fucking amount of good.”

  “Kendall is much better.”

  He didn’t think so. Not if she was fucking interfering in his business with Bailey. “Just pretend you Dr. Meggie. Now give me an analysis of Prez.”

  “Get my Dr. Phil on?” she asked with a giggle.

  “Uh-huh,” he agreed, joining her with laughter of his own.

  She worried her bottom lip, then slowly nodded. “Okay. When I met him—Christopher—he was trying to pull the club back together after the d-d-death of my father.”

  Mortician winced. He’d struggle over that shit, too, considering her husband killed her father.

  “I think…I think he was looking for his footing, so he didn’t react the way he had while my father had been alive. The way he does now. He doesn’t have patience, so Rack and Snake would’ve been b-buried long before I arrived if he hadn’t been questioning his decisions.” She twisted her wedding set. “Especially killing Big Joe.”

  Impressed, Mortician opened his new vodka and tasted it, frowning. He didn’t like the green as much as he’d liked the orange. “Go on.”

  Cocking her head to the side, she thought for a moment. “He wrestled with his feelings for me and—”

  “But he couldn’t let you go. You became the center of his world.”

  “And he mine.”

  “Meggie—”

  “You don’t want me to finish?”

  Not really. She got Prez. She really did, but, sometimes when motherfuckers were too closely involved, they missed important shit. “What happened that day Spoon got you and Red?”

  He hated to bring it up. She’d began to relax, the hurt and sadness clearing from her features, as she discussed her husband. But this was the root of their current problems and it had to be addressed.

  She backed away. “Mortician, I—”

  “Meggie, girl, listen to me. That shit not leaving him anytime soon, especially while you so hurt over the baby and insisting you want another one. You say he can’t fix everything for you, but you not letting him forget this shit because you can’t get yourself together.”

  “Wh-what…h-how can I fix it?”

  “First, cry as much as you need to tonight. In the morning, get the fuck up and go shopping. Find a fucking outfit to just cover the good parts of you and bring your ass to that party tomorrow night.”

  “Val gave me that same advice when I first got here.”

  “Yeah, I heard.” She’d worn a halter and skirt that had Prez crazy with jealousy. “Time to return to the fucking basics, Meggie.”

  She didn’t respond.

  “He need a little bit of your crazy, girl. Sometime, I believe he love you more than he love anything else. Other time, I don’t think that type of love exist. You know what? That shit between you and him. Feel me? He my brother, my prez, and my friend, and you my girl. If he love you like he say—like you believe—he’s going to be there for you again. He will. He just have to see that strength in you that made him want you in the first place. He need you throwing shit and standing up to him and making him believe you a fighter, not a fragile bitch who can get taken away.”

  The more he spoke, the more Meggie’s face filled with determination. “I asked him to go away with me next weekend and he said no,” she admitted. “I didn’t know what to do or who to go to, Mortician.” She stood on her tiptoes to hug him and he bent to allow her to place her arms around his neck. She kissed his cheek. “Thank you.”

  He patted her hair. “Meggie, girl, you know Prez know you fallible, just lik
e all us motherfuckers—”

  “Yes,” she interrupted. “I do and I’m not worried about that. All I want is for Christopher to realize is he doesn’t have to do this alone. He has people who love him and want to protect him just like he insists on doing with everyone."

  “Why you want another baby so bad right now, anyway?”

  “I grew up an only child and I was so lonely.”

  “Guess what? Prez grew up with five sisters and most of them bitches not worth shit to him. He still fucking alone. Don’t dwell on what you don’t have. Be fucking happy with what you fucking got. Me, Prez, John Boy, Val, none of us can take away your feelings for Patrick. We can be fathers to ten children but we not ever knowing how it feel to have those babies inside of us, so I know you hurting. But you got Prez and you got Little Man.”

  “And they need me,” she added softly.

  “Fuck, we all do. No chick around here cook like you.” He winked at her, although he was only half-joking. “Okay, baby, look like I got my Dr. Phil on.”

  “You did. Maybe, you should take over counseling Kendall.”

  “Maybe, I will, if I ever fucking talk to her again.”

  “Give her a break,” Meggie chided. “She’s looking for her place here, too. It takes time. There’s a lot to get used to and a lot to learn.”

  “She was Spoon’s old lady. She should’ve fucking learned already. I can’t see how she made it at the Torps’ MC.”

  “She didn’t live there. I know she overstepped her bounds with Bailey and, believe me, she still hurts me and pisses me off, but we have Johnnie back, so we have to stick it all out for him. She’ll be just who he needs once she figures it all out.”

  Yeah, just like Meggie was just who Prez needed. That shit clicked into Mort’s brain as he listened to her defending a woman who she’d formally competed against. All in the name of her husband’s MC. “That shit you and Kendall do. Acting like besties. That shit on the real or what?”

  “What do you think?” she asked with a sniff. “All of you say I’m not that much of a good liar.”

  “True that,” he said with laughter. “So you down with what you need to do with Prez?”

  She nodded without hesitation, a gleam of real hope in her eyes.

  “Okay. I’m counting on you to bring that motherfucker back around.”

  Glancing away, a flush swept over her and Mortician swallowed more alcohol.

  “What up, Meggie?” he asked, suspecting who she wanted to discuss. Fair was fair. He’d gotten into her personal shit. She could get into his.

  “Bailey loves you and she isn’t Char.”

  It didn’t surprise him she knew about Char, although it just added to his decision that his prez really did love her and see her as his best friend. Fuck. He’d see her death as a double loss—his lover and his friend. She had to do this shit right.

  “Okay. I see I’ve gone too far, so I won’t say anything else.”

  “It’s not that. It’s just…Bailey keep me fucked up in the head. I don’t even know what to say hearing she loves me.” Again. She’d already told him herself.

  “They are going to figure out you’re still sleeping with her.”

  He guzzled from the bottle until his eyes watered. “How you figure that?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Her smelling like your cologne might be a dead giveaway. Or the way she looks at you when you’ve gotten her from the room she’s staying in.”

  He grinned. “How’s that?”

  “Like you just…” Her voice trailed off and she frowned, her skin turning pink. “Never mind.”

  “Like I just laid some good dick on her, maybe?”

  “Exactly,” she muttered, not meeting his gaze.

  “Bailey’s pregnant. She need to fuck.”

  Meggie’s blush deepened and she glared at him.

  “It’s true,” he said with an unapologetic shrug. “She told me that shit when I went to tell her I didn’t want a fucking divorce.”

  “Why don’t you move her to the club and tell everyone she’s here because she’s pregnant for you and you want the baby to have your name?”

  “Because I lose the fucking bet,” he growled. “After I lost Char, I was determined to never lose fuck-all again.”

  “You wouldn’t lose the bet, Mortician,” Meggie insisted. “By the time she delivered, your wager would be over. You’d win. As long as you make them believe you don’t love her. Just be honest with her. Let her know that you do love her. Then you’d win all around. Her and the bet.”

  He scowled at her. “That shit not going to work. Bailey would fucking hate me. She’d think money more important than telling every motherfucker I’m crazy about her.”

  “Are you?”

  “No!” he barked, too quick to be truth. “I like Bailey. When she got my phone number and started calling me, I talked to her everyday straight for two or three weeks for hours, so I know she righteous. She smart. Funny. She a fucking chatterbox and—” He huffed in frustration at the lift of Meggie’s brow, then sat his second empty bottle aside and stomped to the refrigerator. Jerking it open, he yanked out the yellow colored vodka. “I like her and I don’t know what bullshit she told you about Finley fucking Abbot but that baby in her belly belong to me.”

  “She’s very proud that she’s having your baby. She’d never reject you.”

  “I don’t give a fuck who reject me. Sharper the fucking master of rejection. Me. Digger. My mother. I bet he even fucking reject Char and the baby she stole from me.”

  “Does it matter if he does? Unless you still love her.”

  “Love her?” Before he answered, he guzzled his vodka, wishing she’d used bigger bottles. “I can’t stand that fucking bitch.”

  “There’s a very thin line between love and hate.”

  “Not in this fucking case. I’m on one side of the line. I hate that ho’. Jump to the other side of the fucking line and I still hate her. How the fuck we started talking about Charlemagne anyway? This about fucking Bailey and my daughter. Not Char and my son.”

  “You’re blaming Bailey for what Char did to you,” she said evenly. She grabbed his shoulders and shook him. “That isn’t right and you know it. Bailey understands you more than you think. She wouldn’t be too happy about having to take a backseat to your juvenile bet, but she’d understand your need to save face.”

  He gave her a dirty look. “You can be such a pain in the fucking ass.”

  “I know,” she agreed with a sad smile. “Christopher used to say that all the time.”

  “Ahh, Meggie girl. S’okay. He going to say that shit again. Just like you was being a pain in my fucking ass just now? That’s what the fuck he need from you. But with that little bit of crazy in it, too.” His advice deftly steered their conversation away from Bailey. Everybody asked if he still loved Char. Did he fucking have to kill her to make them believe how much he despised her? “You have to be a hot bitch along with it,” he continued. He held up his fist. “This going down tomorrow. Deal?”

  She raised hers and bumped it against his, not pressing him on Bailey. “Deal.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Val frowned at the plate Zoann placed in front of him. It overflowed with rabbit food and had a gnome-sized piece of fish. “What the fuck is this? I don’t eat fucking rabbit food and that fish only big enough to fill up one of my balls.”

  “What’s rabbit food?” she asked, not the least bit ashamed at how flushed her body remained or the fact that she wore only his T-shirt. He never thought he’d enjoy seeing a woman in his clothes, but fuck, it turned him on.

  “Vegetables. That’s what the fuck rabbit food is. Don’t Bugs fucking Bunny eat carrots?”

  Laughing, Zoann rolled her eyes. “Dummy,” she teased. “It’s good for you.”

  “So’s fucking meat and potatoes. What the fuck happened to the bear soup?”

  “It was bear stew and I’m working with what I had. A bunch of—” she made air quotat
ions—“rabbit food and two pieces of fish to last for two days’ worth of meals.”

  “Fucking assholes! I told them we need bear meat, potatoes, a fish, and other shit. Didn’t mention fucking vegetables.”

  She stood on tiptoe to reach a glass and Val held his breath, waiting for the shirt to ride higher up so he’d glimpse her hairy pussy. Didn’t happen. She pulled two glasses down, then went to the ice bucket and yanked out the bottle. The ice had began to melt, so it clunked against the metal.

  “Apple cider?”

  “Not hard cider, either,” he answered. He sighed at the question in her eyes. “You supposed to toast your marriage, right? You can’t have alcohol, so I asked Outlaw. He suggested that shit. He said it’s apple cider, so we could pretend it got alcohol in it. You know? Have it be hard cider in our head.”

  She didn’t respond, although her soft smile went straight to his head. She sat in her seat and allowed him to open the cider and pour it out. He slid her glass to her and then raised his, drawing his brows together at her expectant look.

  “To us.” His simple words sounded ridiculous but her reaction made him puff out his chest and add, “Our future.”

  Her tender look deepened. “To us and out future,” she echoed. She took a dainty sip, then set her glass aside and dug into the food she’d prepared.

  Grumbling curses, he stabbed the fish and popped it into his mouth, all the more pissed off when the delicious flavor exploded in his mouth. “Fucking delicious! Think you can cook this shit the same way again?”

  “I believe so,” she said, chewing her vegetables. The movement of her mouth convinced Val to taste the rabbit food for himself. “Do you want me to cook more right now?”

  He paused, mid-chomp. “You’re eating, babe. After our fuck fest, you need to recoup your strength.”

  She shoved more food into her mouth, blushing. It reminded Val she didn’t like dirty talk too much.

  “Sorry, babe.”

  Halving her teensy piece of fish with her fork, she frowned. “For what?”

  “My dirty talking. I know you don’t like…what the fuck is this?” he asked as she placed an elf-sized piece of fish on his plate.