As I am getting her into the backseat of the car with Dawn, the motherfucker responsible pulls up and jumps out of his truck.
“Where do you think you are taking my wife?” he roars with rage.
I won’t kill him in front of my kids but I will make damn sure he gets the message. I jerk my blade out and hold it to his throat. “Sunshine is leaving now and you aren’t going to get in the way or say a fucking word, or I will shove this blade up your ass so far you’ll feel me every time you try to shit for the rest of your pathetic life. Ya feel me?”
He says a gurgled, “yes.”
Shoving him away from the car, I point my knife in his direction as I get behind the wheel. Dawn is wrapped around Sunshine crying and Jamie is speechless as we pull away.
“Do you want to go back to your Aunt’s house?” I ask Sunshine looking at her through the review mirror.
“No, I don’t want to bring my troubles to her door. Paul only married me because he wants her farm; she wanted to leave the deed to me.”
I drive through the next two towns at the urgency of Sunshine. Stopping off I secure us two rooms at a decent hotel.
I leave Dawn with her to assist her if she needs it while Jamie accompanies me to Wal-Mart to buy her a change of clothes, and to get Dawn some fucking pads and a change of clothes and panties. I grab a first aid kit while I am at it.
Sunshine is refusing to go the hospital. Her face is going to have a nasty scar if she relies on me for the stitches.
She winces as I apply Neosporin to her cut jaw. “You really need to go get that stitched.”
“No!” she shakes her head. “They will ask too many questions. You do it.”
“Woman, you don’t want to fuck your face up.”
“Just do it.” She downs a shot of Jack Daniels from the minibar.
“Fine, but when it looks like shit don’t blame me.” I start getting what I need to do a decent job. Dawn and Jamie are fast asleep exhausted from our exciting day.
Sunshine stops me before I start, taking my hand in hers. “Thank you. I mean it Romeo. If you hadn’t come…I don’t want to think about what more he would have done to me.”
“You don’t have to worry. I’ll protect you.” I tease and she laughs. “Better have one more drink before I start.” I warn her.
“You are a good man Romeo. How’s Baby? Tell me about her and Colt to take my mind off things.”
“I’d rather not talk about her, how about I tell you about the shit storm I’ve gotten myself into and then you can retract your opinion on my being a good man.”
“I doubt that,” she tells me being sincere.
I tell her everything about Laura and what I did. She gives me a look of pity once I am finished with my recollection of the past week.
“Where do you want to go from here Sunshine? Surely you aren’t going back to him.”
“No, I’ll never go back there. I don’t know, I thought I had everything figured out. Paul really pulled the wool over my eyes,” she tenses on his name.
“I can take you back home to Drag Creek,” I offer.
“I can’t go back there either. What about you what are your plans?”
I finish her stiches and come to a conclusion, I don’t want to go back either. “We could go somewhere and start over…you, me, Dawn and Jamie.”
Her face brightens and she raises a curious brow to me. “You’d do that…just walk away from everything?”
“There’s nothing there for me anymore. I need to make a real life for these kids.”
“And Miracle, you’d go back for her though?”
“She isn’t mine. Rebel and Lil Bit have her right now. They will look after her and give her a good life. I mean it Sunshine. Let’s just say fuck it and go somewhere where we can be whoever the fuck we want to be and never turn back.”
“You know we can’t run from our pasts but we can start fresh.” She looks over at my sleeping children. “Okay…” She nods. “Let’s do it. Where are we going?”
“Fuck if I know, get some sleep we can figure it out on the way.”
17
Rebel
Arriving at Romeo’s cabin, Lil Bit and Miracle walk out onto the porch to greet me. Her belly is swollen and her dark hair frames her face. She is wearing a form fitting sundress, her cleavage popping out. I smile taking in her bare feet. Barefoot and pregnant. I smile at the memory of a photo that hangs in my mother’s living room. She was pregnant with my brother, and standing with my old man in front of his bike, in front of this cabin.
“What have you girls been up to?” I squat down to pick Miracle up. Her blonde hair is almost white.
“We’ve been making cupcakes with Play-doh,” Lil Bit answers.
“Maybe I’ll come play too after I check on some things.” I wink at Miracle and she giggles.
“I think we’d like that a lot.” Lil Bit’s hand goes to her belly. “He just kicked. Do you want to feel?”
My hand goes to the warm swell of her stomach. I don’t feel anything at first, but then I fell a faint flutter.
“Amazing,” I mutter astonished at the connection I am feeling right now. “Wait did you say he?”
“I did. Had you not been an A-s-s-h-o-l-e,” she spells out in respect for Miracle’s tiny ears. “You would have gotten to see him. I have a video on my phone though if you’d like to meet your son.”
“I’d like that a lot,” I tell her knowing I need to be better to her. If this is my child, she deserves my respect.
My conversation with Baby has been eating at me since she walked out on me. I know the things she said were true; it doesn’t mean they were easy to hear.
“Lil Bit, I hope this doesn’t come off as bad as it sounds, but what’s your real name?” I don’t remember even having sex with her. I just remember waking up next to her naked in a room in the basement of the Midnight Sun tavern.
She laughs leading me inside. “Wow we are really backwards huh? My name is Michelle but my friends call me Chelle or as you know Lil Bit.”
“Would you mind if I called you Chelle?”
“I think I’d like that Rebel.”
Miracle goes back to playing with her Play-doh and Chelle hands me her phone showing me the video of her ultrasound. She sits next to me with a warm smile on her face as she watches the video along with me, pointing out body parts and explaining what I am witnessing.
A tiny hand raises up and it is the most remarkable entity I have laid eyes on, ever. I feel like a bitch but I can’t stop the tears that fall.
Chelle lays her hand over mine. “Rebel, I know we hardly know each other, but our son deserves the world and parents who at least like each other. Do you think we could take some time and get to know one another as friends, I mean?”
We spend the day watching Miracle together, waiting for a call from Romeo that never comes. I have tried him a few times but his phone goes direct to voicemail.
We trade childhood stories of what our lives were like growing up. We have a lot more in common than I originally thought. She lost her father a few years ago, her mother was strong willed, and feisty, much like my own. Her mother died when she was just a girl of breast cancer but she has many memories of her.
I tell her about my brother, talking about him with her is oddly satisfying. I don’t feel as though I have to feel guilty or as though I am not allowed to miss him or hell even love him. I loved my brother—he was my best friend.
Chelle understands my relationship and feelings toward my brother all too well considering how she grew up with Shred and Lasher, whose names I learn are Brian and Ryan. I am not sure which is which though.
It turns out she is the one who gave Lasher the scar over his eye. They were playing darts and she nearly took out his eye.
“Remind me never to make you too angry. I am attached to my eye,” I joke and she smacks at my arm.
It is refreshing to spend time with someone who doesn’t analyze every move I make or question every
gesture I make.
“I like that we don’t know everything about each other,” she informs me, exaggerating everything. “Just think every day we will be learning something new and sharing in a new experience. Especially when our son arrives. To be honest Rebel, childbirth terrifies me.”
“I don’t want you to be scared. I know I have been a huge dickhead, but I hope to change that in time. I’m nervous too. I’m so afraid I will let this child down. I wasn’t that great of a husband, son or brother, but I will promise you right now I will make an effort to be better at being a father than anything else I have ever been.”
“I think you’ll be just fine Rebel. You don’t run from your mistakes that much I can tell about you. Besides, at least you are honest about being an asshole. Don’t worry though. You don’t scare me and I am not afraid to lay into you and put you in your place if you need to be.”
“I’ll keep that in mind. You have one hell of a left hook.” I chuckle.
My cell goes off with what I hope is a call from Romeo.
Stepping out onto the porch for privacy, I finally have him on the line.
“I need you to look after Miracle for me,” he says with an edge of regret in his tone.
“Sure man, how long?”
“Indefinitely, I won’t be coming back to Drag Creek.” The line goes quiet.
“What are you saying…of course you are coming back?” My voice and temper are rising. He can’t mean to just saddle me with Miracle.
“Just as I said. When I get settled somewhere more permanent I will send money for her care when I can. The still is yours. The property at the cabin belonged to your father anyway,” he says coolly.
“You can’t just leave man, the club depends on you, and I depend on you too!”
“Rebel you are a man now and the time has come to prove yourself. You can either lie down like a dog in defeat or you can put on your fucking cut and ride!” he shouts back into the phone at me. “Your old man might be gone and Grim might not ever come back so I am talking to you as a father would a son. Stop being a dumbfuck and man the fuck up. Don’t make the mistakes the rest of us made, learn from us and do me a favor watch over Baby she is going to need you.”
The call ends and I stand wondering what in the fuck just changed.
**
Two days have passed since I received that call from Romeo that changed everything yet again. Baby must have taken some time away for herself. Her car is gone and she hasn’t been around. Not that I can blame her, we had a lot of heavy words spoken between us the last time we talked.
I have been staying at the cabin with Chelle and Miracle. We agreed that it would be best to keep her where she is accustomed to and besides it’s easier to stay there so I can take care of the still.
I don’t have any answers as to what the future of the club is shaping up to be. We need to get out of this deal with The Dry Ridge Sinners, we have made back our losses. It’s time to cut ties and get the fuck out before they drag us under with them. The Undead Bastards haven’t made a move on us yet, but it is only a matter of time.
I hope the fact that I am having a child with Lil Bit will hold me in good favor when I call for a meeting to sever our ties as business partners. I can’t wait for Grim to come back and fix shit. Romeo was right I have to take charge and be a Goddamn man.
I place a call to Tread and ask him to stay put with the Sinners. See if he can find out something from one of their whores that can give me some advantage. Lil Bit said they never let her in on any of the real club business. She only picked up on brief conversations as they happened in the tavern.
She doesn’t appear to want to return to her life in West Virginia, but I won’t fool myself into believing that she doesn’t feel loyalty to her brothers, pregnant with my child or not. Only time will tell how life will pan out for her here.
I have to give her credit though; she has stepped up to the plate with taking care of Miracle, treating her as her own. I just hope that it isn’t for show for me. A few days isn’t enough time to truly get to know someone.
I am getting ready to call choir into order when Truth bursts through the door breathing hard.
“Where in the fuck have you been?” I give him a hard look. This motherfucker has been gone for weeks.
“I was chasing a lead on what I thought was Grim. It took me to California. I lost the trail there but I did run across your mother and Colt. Her credit card popped up and I saw the charges were made near where I had been staying. I went to check it out but she had already checked out of the hotel she was staying at.” He takes drink of the beer I just handed to him. He is sweating profusely and his face is ashen.
“She took Colt to Disney. What about it?”
“That’s the thing. I followed her to the airport just to make sure someone hadn’t stolen her identity or something.” Truth shrugs taking another much-needed drink. “There was these men. I had never seen them before. They were in suits. They grabbed Foxie and Colt. I tried to stop it. One of the men hit me on the back of the head and when I came to they were gone without a trace.”
“You are sure about all of it.”
“I wouldn’t have come back if I thought I could go after them on my own.”
An uneasy feeling washes over me. Taking out my phone, I try my mother and get a busy signal. I try Baby too. I don’t want to alarm her but she needs to know.
When I dial her number, it says the line has been disconnected. Shoving my phone at Truth I order him to find out what is wrong with their motherfucking phones.
A few minutes pass and I light up a joint trying to stay calm. The rest of my brothers are agitated as well. I feel helpless right now and I hate this feeling. If something has happened to them, I will kill everyone who gets in my way when I find the motherfuckers behind all this bullshit.
“Something is blocking the signal for your mom’s phone and Baby’s line is disconnected. I can’t even pull up her account with her cell phone carrier.” Truth reaches me back my phone.
A thought that hadn’t occurred to me yet hits me. What if the Undead Bastard have already striked.
We need a plan and we need it now. I bang my fist down on the table.
18
Rebel
I am sitting at the head of the table at choir trying to figure out what in the fuck is going on. Nothing makes a damn bit of sense. I went over to Grim’s place and all of Baby’s stuff is still there. She didn’t even take her purse. She would never go anywhere without it. Someone has grabbed her right under my damn nose.
A frantic knock bangs against the door. I have Truth let Chelle in. She has Miracle with her. Her face is stricken with fear and panic.
“Are you okay; did something happen with the baby?”
“I take it you haven’t seen the news?” her skin is covered in goose bumps and her eyes are soft.
“No, Truth turn on the news.”
We all sit in shock as the news anchor reports on a breaking story.
“Sources tell us that a kidnapping gone wrong all over a turf war involving two biker gangs has turned deadly. Police say that it all happened here at a local tavern known to many locals as a hub for illegal activity.”
The camera pans to Midnight Sun. The Dry Ridge Sinners are being lead out in cuffs. Tread is among them.
“We have it on authority that a child and his mother affiliated with a rival club were taken as ransom and things quickly turned deadly. Names have yet to be released until the victims’ families can be notified and the police can investigate the case further.
I sink down in my chair, she can’t mean Baby and Colt can she? Shred and Lasher wouldn’t have…fuck who am I kidding those sick fucks could and would, so would the Undead Bastards.
Chelle looks to me with Miracle resting on her hip. “I don’t know what to say Rebel.”
My head falls to her stomach as she rubs my head. The room remains quiet as we all try to come to terms with what has happened.
&n
bsp; Baby
Two days ago
One minute I was walking into my dad’s trailer and the next I am blindfolded, gagged, and bound at my wrists and ankles in the back of a van or something. I don’t feel as though I am in a tiny space. I struggle against the floor I am lying on as I roll around it. The vehicle comes to an abrupt stop.
The door slides open and I assume I am in a van. What if the man responsible for killing my sister has me now? Am I his next victim? What if I never see my son again? Will he know how much I love him?
“I’m going to remove your blindfold now and free your legs don’t do anything stupid,” a voice I have longed for speaks tenderly into my ear. I shiver as his breath touches my neck. It can’t be. I must be imagining it. Have I already died? Am I dreaming?
I stay perfectly still as he cuts the tape from my ankles. His fingers brush across my cheeks caressing me. The blindfold slowly slides down my face. I open my eyes and blink trying to get adjusted to the blinding light and focus on his face.
Tears stream down my face as his eyes meet mine. I am speechless. Even if he took the gag from my mouth I wouldn’t’ be able to speak words fail me. He kisses my tears away, while I long to touch him to make sure he is real.
“Can you be calm enough for me to remove this?” I nod my head yes so fast I pull a muscle in my neck.
He removes the tape from my wrists and next comes the gag. I don’t know if I want to kiss him or smack him.
“Do you have any idea what you have put me through?” I throw my arms around my husband and begin to sob saying incoherent I love yous.
“There isn’t much time to explain. I have two questions for you before we get on this plane. If you had it all to do over again would you have still said yes? And if given the chance to do it over with me away from here would you say yes?”
It is now that I realize that we are on a runway at an abandoned airfield. A small plane is behind Striker with a pilot waiting for us to board along with two armed men in black suits.
“What’s going on, I can’t believe I am standing here with you.”
“Just answer me Baby, yes or no? I will explain on the plane.”
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