by Ashley, Ava
I try to distract myself from thoughts about Savannah and the enormous responsibility that I have to make sure that she gets the long, happy, cared-for life that she deserves, free of all this motorcycle club stress, but it backfires. As soon as I stop thinking about Savannah, my thoughts turn to a topic I have not thought about in a long time and I do not think about often. My mother.
I haven’t heard from her since just after her third arrest on prostitution charges, this time tied in with Schedule I drug possession charges. It said she had two hundred fucking grams of ecstasy, for suspected sale, but the ecstasy wasn’t even hers. She was holding it for a married john who liked rolling for his visits. Why there was so damn much of it, I have no clue. But that amount of ecstasy, paired with the whoring charges and her prior arrests, put her over the edge. She was in jail during my high school prom and the last I knew of her, from some digging when I got top level clearance and data access as an active Navy SEAL, was that she joined a cult somewhere out in the deserts of Arizona, where she lives as part of some New Age, self-proclaimed prophet’s harem and takes biannual ventures out into Las Vegas to preach straightedge principles at unsuspecting casino-goers.
She was fucked up long before I was even born. Hell, for all I know she was born fucked up. But I couldn’t help feeling that somehow I had failed her by not being able to provide for her. I blamed myself for not being able to pull her out of her self-destructive pattern and, as illogical as I now know that guilt to be, I still cannot help but feel, at least a bit, that I failed her.
I am not going to fail Savannah. Whatever the cost, I will keep her safe.
When I finally fall asleep, it’s an uneasy, light sleep, interrupted by every little noise and even the slightest breeze.
Chapter Twelve
Savannah
I wake up to the warmth of a ray of bright autumn sunlight falling across my face. I’m pressed up against Cooper’s back, the big spoon in our spooning this time, and the first thing that I see when I blink the sleep out of my eyes is Cooper’s shoulder blade piece, glorious on his muscled upper back.
From a distance, it would seem identical to the beautiful, swirling pattern of my mother’s tattoo, with the same magical swirls and bursts, the same starspots that haunt my memory. Come a little closer and you’ll notice that the swirls are not made of block lines and complete marks. Come even closer and you will see that the lines are actually words. The pattern is a poem, dancing over his skin.
She had looked for his coming as warriors come,
With the clash of arms and the bugle's call;
But he came instead with a stealthy tread,
Which she did not hear at all.
She had thought how his armor would blaze in the sun,
As he rode like a prince to claim his bride:
In the sweet dim light of the falling night
She found him at her side.
She had dreamed how the gaze of his strange, bold eye
Would wake her heart to a sudden glow:
She found in his face the familiar grace
Of a friend she used to know.
She had dreamed how his coming would stir her soul,
As the ocean is stirred by the wild storm's strife:
He brought her the balm of a heavenly calm,
And a peace which crowned her life.
It’s ‘Love’s Coming’ by Ella Wheeler Wilcox. I read it when I was back in the tenth grade, in English class, and for some reason it just stuck with me. It was disturbingly beautiful and I could really connect to it. I was doomed to a life without love, so the thought of finding a love so perfect, and only just nearly unattainable, was the most fascinating thing to me. I fell in love with the poem, as I thought I would never be able to fall in love with a man.
And then I met Cooper. And even though I would not, could not, put how I felt about him in those words yet, it just felt right to give him that poem. It just felt right to share that with him.
Now I know why. I was falling in love with him long before I would admit that to myself.
Cooper shifts, still mostly asleep. I snuggle into him, pressing my face against his back. Today could be the day that everything comes crumbling down around our ears. I trust Cooper to know what our best option is, but I also know that we are in an incredibly difficult situation. Even if something is our best option, that does not even come close to meaning that it is a good one.
We could still be dead before we get the chance to sleep again. I knew my life would be hard. I knew I would not be happy as Nate’s wife. I knew that the world of the motorcycle clubs was very dangerous and that what had happened to my mother and sister could happen to anyone. But, even so, I never thought that I would be dead before my twentieth birthday. I was sheltered, even amongst all the danger, and I never thought that I would be dead before I would get the chance to be a mother myself. And now I may be. But, if I had a magical time machine that could transport me back to moments before I ran away, setting off this entire crazy chain of events, would I go back and change anything? Even if I were certain that I would die by sunset, would I go back and stay, just to save myself?
I ask myself these questions because I feel that I should, but I already know the answer. It is an unwavering no. I am a young woman with big dream, and I definitely do not at all want to die. Not now, not before I have accomplished everything that I want to. But having shared the time that I have had with Cooper, limited as it was, is worth so much more than a long, but empty, life without him would be. And, finally, I know that Cooper feels the same way.
Cooper moves again as he awakens, shifting onto his back and reaching out an arm to pull me onto his chest.
“Good morning, my love,” he says, opening his beautiful, blue eyes. Though I have seen it daily, with the exception of the last miserable days without him here in New York, his beauty still takes my breath away.
“Good morning, love,” I whisper, before giving in to his kiss. He wraps his arms around me, squeezing me tight for a moment before releasing. We lie there, together in a peaceful and intimate silence, for some more minutes. Then a sharp knock on the bedroom door interrupts our peace.
“Guys?” Nate calls. “Guys? Are you up? Should we get going? It’s already after eight. We should get to it.”
Cooper groans. I feel the same way. I would never again leave his arms if I didn’t have to.
“We have to go, babe,” Cooper says. “We need to get on the 10:35 flight to Chicago.”
“Do you think we’ll still be able to get three tickets?” I ask. “It’s New York to Chicago on a weekday morning. I bet it’s packed with business travelers.”
“Don’t worry, babe,” Cooper says. “There are some perks to being a former Navy SEAL. I have it all covered. Getting on that flight is the least of our hurdles today.”
I give him a kiss. He instinctively pulls me in, kissing me so hard I feel it in my fingertips.
“Still,” he says, reluctantly pulling away. “We do need to get out of here.”
“So are we going?” Nate calls through the door, obviously still waiting for a response.
“Yeah, give us ten,” Cooper calls back. “And stop listening at the door, perv.”
Nate laughs. It’s weird to hear him having an almost friendly exchange with Cooper, or at least one that isn’t overtly hostile, but I guess the three of us are a team now. For life or death.
Huh. Savannah Santos and Nate Moreno, together as a team against the mightiest motorcycle clubs in Chicago, the Santoses and the Morenos? It must be snowing in Texas.
Chapter Thirteen
Savannah
Sure enough, the three of us find ourselves aboard the 10:35a.m. flight to Chicago, sitting in our oversized United Airways seats like any other business travelers. With our near complete lack of luggage, unless you count my backpack, we fly through security. We aren’t wearing the business suits and pointy-toed shoes of consultants, but an unwitting bystander could assume that we�
�re well-traveled, efficient, and cultural internet people on a work trip. There is nothing that betrays that we are on a mission of life or death, other than my clammy palms and racing pulse.
Cooper did something on his phone on the cab ride over to LaGuardia Airport and somehow made three first-class tickets magically appear for us. We are offered hot towels and drinks before the aircraft is even done taxiing down the runway, but we all just take towels and water or juice. Today is definitely one of those days when it is most crucial that all of us have full control over our faculties.
When we land in Chicago, after a flight that feels simultaneously forever long and like it passes all too quickly, Cooper gets a rental car from the Hertz next to the airport and we hit the road.
“Are we going to Vlad’s house?” I ask. I assume Vlad is the friend that Cooper is talking about, because he is the only other person I have heard Cooper speak of in a way that suggests some deep personal connection and trust. And whoever Cooper is taking us to now must be someone whom he trusts with all of our lives.
“We are going to go see Vlad,” Cooper confirms. “But not at his house. He knows to expect us and he is meeting us elsewhere. We definitely can’t meet at his house, because Vlad is married. There is no way that I would put his wife at risk, not that he would ever even consider it. And we can’t meet at our apartment, because they probably have someone watching it, especially with Nate gone now, too.”
I nod. Cooper is always a few steps ahead of everyone else.
We drive for a bit in silence before Nate breaks the quiet.
“Hey, Savannah?” Nate says, clearing his throat.
“Yeah?” I turn around to face him. He has a strange look on his face, like he is trying to figure out how to say something uncomfortable.
“I’m...” He clears his throat. Whatever he is about to say, it isn’t something he says often. “I am sorry.”
“Sorry?” I ask. “For what? I know all of this mess, our engagement and all the related disasters, isn’t your fault. You were just a kid, too. It’s not like you wanted to marry me any more than I wanted to marry you. And I get why you followed us. What choice did you have? If you didn’t do everything you could to find me, you would have lost your family. You would have been dishonored, disgraced, and exiled. Nikki’s dad is in the Moreno motorcycle club, an old prison friend of your dad, and so she can’t be with anyone who isn’t approved by the motorcycle club. You would have to go out and try to build a life, starting with nothing, knowing that your son or daughter is somewhere out there without a dad. And that Nikki is alone, abandoned by you. I get it, you don’t have to apologize. I couldn’t do that to the person I love, either.”
Cooper reaches over with the hand that isn't on the steering wheel and takes my hand in his. He leans over a little, tilting his cheek to me but never taking his eyes off of the road, and I lean over and kiss him on the cheek.
“I love you,” I whisper in his ear, before I lean back.
“Not that,” Nate says. “Savannah, I am sorry for your loss. I never said it back then and I didn’t say it in the many years and countless opportunities that I have had since then, but I am sorry that you lost your mom and your sister. I lost my mom in the same battle, as you know, and I understand how much that hurt. I just never thought about how you must feel. I am sorry for your loss and I am sorry for being such a dick to you when you were already hurt. I just wanted to say that I’m sorry.”
I look back at him. After our long history of hating each other almost recreationally, I half expect an ironic smirk. But Nate looks sincere and I can smell bullshit a mile away. He isn’t just saying this to make Cooper less hostile to him, or to make me trust him more. He is saying this because he means it. When pushed, people really can change and, sometimes, they can change for the better. His apology is genuine.
Just like that, all the years of hatred fall away like nothing. Suddenly, I look at the man I detested for the great majority of life, the man I identified as the cause of everything that went wrong in my life, and just see a hurting young man who was just as lonely and scared as I was. Now we have both somehow, against all odds, found love. He has Nikki, and a little one on the way, and I have Cooper. And now we are going to have to work together to make sure that we can keep both of those relationships—and all of our lives.
“Nate,” I say. “I am sorry, too.”
Just like that, I make a new friend on what might be the last day of my life.
Chapter Fourteen
Cooper
We pull into the trailer park where I grew up and I hop out of the car, onto the dirt of my old haunts. I jog around the front of the car to open Savannah’s door for her. Damn, she just seems to get more beautiful every time that I look at her. I love her with every cell in my body and I am going to keep her safe. That’s not an ‘if.’ I am going to make this work. Someone so beautiful, so kind, so warm, and so good cannot die so young.
She gives me a small kiss before we walk over to where we’re meeting Vlad. I wrap my arm around her waist, holding her close as we walk over to the abandoned shed down by the edge of the park. When I was a kid, the shed was a hotspot in the trailer park. It was where the junkies would come to do their deals, away from the prying eyes of tattle-tale, busybody neighbors and the plainclothes police who would occasionally show up, search some trailers for narcotics, give some kids warnings for truancy or public underage drunkenness, and then swing by my mother’s well-worn bed to reward themselves for a job well done. These days, the shed stands empty and abandoned, no longer really a part of the trailer park as trees grew around it and cut it off from the rest of the land. It is the perfect place to meet Vlad.
I try the door of the little, rundown shed, but it won’t give. Vlad blocked it with something, as agreed. I feel bad for pulling Vlad into this, but he is a grown man with the freedom of choice to decide whether or not he will do it and he has military training of his own. He took the most roundabout way here and we are taking all the precautions to keep the motorcycle clubs from knowing that he is the other one in on the blackmail plan, so he should be fine. Still, he is a real friend for doing this.
I knock again, in the Morse code pattern we agreed on, and then it swings open from the inside. Vlad hurries us in, then closes the door and shoves an old iron gardening chest in front of it again.
“Hi,” Savannah says. “I don’t believe we have ever been formally introduced, but I am Savannah.” She reaches out to shake his hand, still perfectly polite. The girl can keep a tea party level of class even when she’s about to walk to her possible death. If that’s not SEAL spirit, I don’t know what is.
“It’s my pleasure,” Vlad says, drily. “And this is?”
“This is Nate,” I say.
“He is a friend,” Savannah adds. Right.
“It is interesting to meet you, Savannah, and you again after seeing you fight.” Vlad nods at Nate. “But I am going to need a word alone with Cooper.”
“Of course,” Savannah says, with a nod. I give her a quick kiss on her forehead, then follow Vlad back to the small, partially closed-off section at the back of the shed, where rakes and hoes and shovels were stored in its heyday.
As soon as we are behind the wooden partition separating the storage area from the rest of the shed, Vlad drops his cool, calm facade.
“What the fuck have you gotten yourself into, man?” Vlad hisses, grabbing me by the bicep. “If you’re trying to fuck up your MMA career completely, you’re sure on the fucking right track to doing that. At this point, you would have to do everything—and I mean every fucking little thing—more right than right in order to have any chance at a comeback. Do you realize how much this is costing you, how much this is costing us? And what is this thing that you are in now? You need to give me something? To send?”
“I love Savannah,” I say seriously, looking Vlad straight in the eyes. “I love fighting, but that love can’t touch the one I have for Savannah. And all the money and pr
estige in the world means absolutely nothing to me if I can’t be with my girl and I can’t keep her safe and happy and provided for.
Vlad looks at me. He really looks at me, in that deep, all-baring way that only Vlad can do, and sees that my love for Savannah is the real thing.
Finally, he shakes his head. “She is a beautiful girl, man,” he says. “And if she is to you what Bettina is to me, I one hundred percent understand how you could throw away everything you have worked for. I have seen you grow and heal in these years, man, and for you to be able to go full on and love someone with all your power, that’s growing up. That’s being a man. I am proud of you.”
“Thanks, man. That means a lot coming from you,” I say. It does. “But Savannah is in real trouble and she is my girl, so I am in it with her. Life or death trouble. And that is why I’m here. I need your help. I have no right to ask for anything more, considering how much you have already done for me, and I really don’t want to have to ask you to stick out your neck again for me. But you are the only person I can trust with something this important.”
Vlad rolls up his right sleeve and turns his arm over, showing me the half yin-yang symbol, a white waved half-circle with a black dot in the middle of the top. He takes my right arm, turning it over to show my matching tat, a black waved half circle with a white dot in the middle of the bottom. We got the tattoos after I helped Vlad through a really bad spot. He had been saving up for years to start his own MMA gym, but the investor he had his money with scammed him out of all of it. He moved all his clients’ savings, including Vlad’s, overseas to a Caribbean account and disappeared with it. Vlad could have gone to court to fight to get it back, but it would have taken years, at the very least, and by then he would have been out of his home. Instead, I spotted him the money to start the gym and cover his mortgage payments, so that he would be financially stable enough to marry Bettina, his then-girlfriend and now wife. Business at the gym really took off and he paid it back to me pretty quickly, but that first loan really turned his life around after the debacle with his investor and made his present financial solvency possible.