Always Was Mine

by Dawn Martens

  “No, please, don’t do that,” I beg.

  Lilly ignores me and gets off the couch. “It’s still early in the night, what do you say we go to the clubhouse?”

  “Can I jump in now? This girl chat is so great and all but I’m pretty sure I have a dick, and girl chat is not something I like to do,” Gavin says from beside me.

  “Oh my god, I’m so sorry,” Lilly says, for the first time actually staring at him. Her mouth drops open and I swear I see some drool.

  “Wipe your mouth, Lil,” I mutter.

  “You’re the hottie that drove the rescue van,” she blurts out.

  Gavin gives her his signature panty soaking smirk and winks.

  “Okay, um yeah, sorry but his hotness is on total overload. Back to what I was saying. Clubhouse,” she says turning back to me.

  I suck my lips in between my teeth, thinking. I know the Warriors aren’t the Untamed, but I’ve never been in the clubhouse before. That was always off limits to me.

  “Come on, it will be fine, trust me. We even have female members in the club, and no club whores. Those are long gone.”

  I nod. “Okay, we can go.”

  “Perfect! Mom isn’t there tonight; she’s watching all the kids with Mona, Hilary’s mom. But you will see her tomorrow,” she tells me.

  I haven’t seen Aunt Ann in years, it will be nice to catch up with her.

  “Go get dressed, I know you like the comfy look, but just a pair of jeans is fine. Get out of those sweat pants,” she tells me, shooing me into a guest room.

  Chapter 4

  Trevor

  I’m sitting at the bar, chugging back a beer when the most gorgeous fucking woman walks through the door, following behind Lilly.

  I take her in, she’s maybe an inch taller than Lilly, skinny, no real curves on her, long flowy red hair. But then I see her left hand, and I turn away. I don’t do married chicks.

  Out of the corner of my eye I see Lilly come to the bar with her friend and order drinks. “You need to lose the ring Tori,” I hear Lilly say.

  That name sends a painful feeling through my chest, thinking about the Tori I once had. “I know, in time I will. I’m still technically married you know, doesn’t feel right to take it off until it’s finalized,” Tori says, her voice all husky and shit. Damn.

  “Hey, Trevor!” Lilly says. Ever since the women learned my real name, they stopped calling me T-bags, it was mainly Eden’s doing, saying it was the worst nickname she’s ever heard.

  “Lilly,” I say with a chin lift.

  “How’s the pain tonight?” she asks sincerely.

  Last year during a really bad case, I was shot in the gut, leg and shoulder. Even after all this time, every so often I still get pain.

  “It’s good tonight.”

  She smiles. “This is my cousin Tori. Tori, this is Trevor,” she says, introducing us.

  Tori places her small hand in mine, and I almost don’t want to let it go. “Hi Trevor,” she speaks quietly.

  I grin at her, and she blushes. Fuck that’s hot. “Hi, Tori,” I say gruffly.

  She purses her lips together and gently pulls her hand out of mine. Lilly then moves her away, taking her to where the other girls are. I stare at her, really stare at her. I know her. Little Tori Jensen, the woman I had to leave behind, the woman I loved more than anything. Fuck. I should have put that shit together when I first met Lilly, considering they look a bit alike. She looks so different. Filled out in all the right places, older, tired looking.

  Reaper comes over and sits down beside me. Ever since he’s lost Hilary he’s changed. And for the better. He met and married his wife Moira. I’ve never seen this side of him, he’s just different. Happy even. Not the broody asshole he always was.

  “We gotta watch out for that chick Lilly brought,” he says.

  “Why?”

  “She’s Untamed Angels property. She’s here, hiding out, until the divorce goes through. She’s Hangman’s old lady. I don’t think he’s gonna let his property get away from him that easily. Fucker is twisted,” he says.

  I still. Fuckin’ hell. I knew he’d make her his. The pain I feel is worse than just the guessing game I played when I first faked my death. She moved onto him.

  “Don’t want her to know who I’m related to,” I tell Reaper.

  “You sayin…..?” he starts.

  “Yeah, she was mine first anyway.” I chug back the rest of my beer and give him a look that says not to question it.

  “Good luck,” he says, smirking, patting me on my good shoulder as he gets up and leaves. Someone sits down beside me.

  “Thought you were dead,” a low voice says from behind me.

  I whip my head around and look over the couch. “Scraper? What the fuck are you doing here?”

  “Helping Tori for one. But I’m also joining this club,” he declares.

  “How’s Hangman feel about that?”

  “He doesn’t know,” he says. “Again, I thought you were dead?”

  I clench my jaw. “I lived.”

  “Hangman still thinks you're dead. It’s why he agreed to help out the Warriors years ago. Wanted to avenge you,” Scraper tells me.

  “Well, I survived that shit. Hid out for a while, once I heard this club was changing, I joined in. Never wanted Hangman and his fucked up head to know I was still alive. Better this way.” I scratch my head and look at him. “How’d you know it was me?” I ask him, because I’ve looked in the mirror, and I sure as shit look nothing like the guy I used to, not after all the surgeries I had done to change my face on top of all of the tattoos I have covering almost my entire body and parts of my head and face.

  He shrugs. “You didn’t cover up the scar on the back of your neck.” He points to the spot. Carson gave me that when I was seven by hitting me with a stick. “Nah, I just overheard your chat with Reaper, then I noticed the scar. The tats look good though. Finally, not such an ugly fuck.” He smirks.

  I punch him in the arm, shaking my head. I wonder if Tori will notice it. If someone really looked hard at the tattoo at the base of my throat, they’d see Tori’s name. So far not one person has ever noticed it.

  He grunts in agreement. “Are you gonna go to her?” he asks me. I know what he’s asking, he knows about Tori and me from before.

  “Yeah. But I ain’t telling her yet.”

  He nods. “She won’t hear it from me. But just so you know, if she had known you were alive, she never would have married your brother.” He walks away. This is my fault, if I had just gone to her afterwards, I could have taken her away, and we would have been together the whole time.

  I spot Tori standing off to the side, alone. Stupid Lilly left her alone in a room full of people she doesn’t know. I shake my head and move towards her.

  “Hey,” I say coming to stand by her.

  She looks up at me startled then blushes. “Um, hi,” she says shyly.

  “So, you’re new here.” I state.

  “Yeah, had some trouble, and my cousin Lilly is helping me.”

  I try not to show emotion at her response, since I don’t want to come off too crazy. “Sorry to hear that.” I grab her arm, moving her to one of the empty couches. “You think you’ll be here long?”

  She nods. “I’m hoping once everything is done, this will be my new home. You know. New start and all that.” Good, she’s staying.

  “What do you do for work?”

  “Right now, nothing, but I went to school to become a teacher, before I came out here, I actually taught the first grade.” I remember in high school she used to talk all the time about becoming a teacher, glad to see it was a dream she didn’t give up on when I ‘died’.

  We keep talking for a little while, and I start getting bored of the conversation. Not that she bores me, but because I want so badly to just kiss her. I lean in close. “I want you.” I kiss her just below her ear and she stiffens.

  “Um, that’s nice, but I don’t know you. And, I um, I ca
n’t,” she stutters out.

  “You’ll be mine, trust me on that,” I promise and move away from her, going to my room in the back.

  I’m giving her a week to come to terms with shit. Then I’m moving in. Taking back what’s mine.

  Tori

  Oh my. When Trevor walks away it’s all I can think. As soon as I walked in here tonight, I saw him, sitting at the bar. I always thought Carson was the hottest man I’ve ever met, my Trevor was stunning too but we were only teenagers, so he didn’t count as a man then, but I was wrong. Something about him though seems familiar. Have I met him before? I shake my head. No that can’t be it. I don’t think I’ve ever met a man that looked like him. Tattoos on the sides of his face, arms and hands covered, what I could see of his chest was covered too. Huge holes in his ears.

  When he said his name was Trevor, I thought back to the Trevor I once knew. We were best friends growing up, it’s how I met Carson. I remember when I had learned that he was murdered—the pain of losing my best friend in the whole world. That’s when Carson and I grew closer, that’s when we slowly fell in love.

  Even now, twelve years after Trevor’s death, I still miss him.

  I sit around taking everyone in when I hear a screech. “Tori! Oh my fucking god!” I look up and see Eden, big as a whale, waddling over to me.

  “Oh wow, look at you.” We both say at the same time. She looks ten times bigger than she did when she was pregnant with the twins.

  She gives me a very awkward side hug and steps back. “Beautiful as ever, Tori.” She smiles at me.

  I notice the scarring on her face isn’t as bad as it once was.

  “I know.” She groans. “I’m friggen ginormous.”

  “When are you due?”

  “Two more weeks,” she huffs out. “But, I go in this weekend for the C-section. And this time, I’m getting totally fixed, no reversible crap,” she tells me with a small laugh.

  “So, you and Jasper are good now, hey?”

  She lights right up and smiles huge. “Yes, it was hard for a while. Once he found out about the twins and all, ya know, but we’re amazing now. However, his super sperm, seriously. Ugh. I don’t know how he managed this one,” she says rubbing her belly.

  “How the hell are you gonna survive having six kids?” I ask her, my eyes bugging out.

  “Well thankfully the twins and Glenna are all older, so really, it’s just the younger two and this one, but still. So many babies.”

  I pat her shoulder. “You’ll do fine, and just think, I’m here. I’ll help out anyway you need, just like I helped with the twins when you needed,” I say, smiling at her.

  She moves and sits on the couch, so I follow and do the same. “So why did you never tell me that you were married to Hangman? I didn’t even know you were part of a club.” She looks somewhat hurt.

  “I’m sorry, it was just something I didn’t want to get out. You know firsthand about the nasty that is Carson. I didn’t want to dirty you in that way.”

  She settles a hand on my knee. “Babe, trust me, I probably could have gotten you out of there sooner if I had known.”

  I hear Gavin’s loud booming laugh and look up, seeing him with Vinny, Lilly’s husband.

  “Oh, holy shit. That’s the man that helped us,” Eden says in awe. “He’s still really damn hot.”

  I burst out laughing. “Don’t let Jasper hear you say that.”

  She nudges me. “Trust me, it’s fine. Look, don’t touch, and all that. But trust me, I wouldn’t mind licking that all over.”

  “What the fuck did you just say?” I hear an angry voice spit out from behind us.

  Eden chews on her bottom lip before looking over her shoulder. “Uh. Hi.”

  Jasper narrows his eyes at her before turning to me. “Hey, Tori.”

  “Hey, Jasper,” I reply quietly back. Jasper is scary looking, but not in the way Carson is, and of course his sexiness just oozes off him. And his beard, unlike Carson’s, is kept neat.

  “You doin’ okay?”

  I give him a small smile. “It is what it is. I’ll be fine though.”

  “Gonna go talk to your buddy over there. Think you can manage to keep my wife’s eyes off him? Or make that tongue?”

  I laugh. “Yeah, I can do that.”

  “He always takes my fun away. Gee,” Eden grumbles.

  CHAPTER FLASHBACK

  “Trevor!” I swear if he doesn’t stop spinning me around I’m gonna puke all over his stupid face.

  Laughing, he puts me down. “Missed you, baby.” I smile against his mouth. I hate that he has been doing runs and drop offs for his brother, but he doesn’t really get much of a choice.

  Trevor hates that club and everything it stands for., The only way to get his brother, the President of the Untamed Angels, off his back, is to do simple things like drop offs. I don’t even want to know what a drop off is. I’m not stupid, I’ve heard rumors around town about what the club is into. When Trevor first said he had to do it, I begged him to just not tell me anything about it. True to his word, he never has.

  “Date night?” Trevor asks.

  Sighing I shake my head no with a sad smile. “Sorry, mom needs me home tonight.”

  His mouth goes tight. “I hate that your father did this.”

  My father is a worthless piece of garbage. When he was around he was usually always drunk, mom finally had enough and went and filed for divorce. I knew dad wasn’t going to go away quietly, I was with Trevor when my father went to the house and beat the shit out of my mom. She got out of the hospital last week, but still can’t get around much because the jerk broke her leg, and our house isn’t exactly wheelchair accessible.

  “Tomorrow though, I am yours all day,” I tell him.

  “Yeah, baby, I’ll pick you up around eleven and drop off my mom to stay with yours for the day, how’s that sound?”

  Sounds perfect.

  Trevor and I have been best friends since Kindergarten, and of course, as we got older, those friendship feelings turned into more. So much more. I could never imagine being with anyone other than him. He’s it for me.

  Chapter 5

  Trevor

  It took everything in me last night, not to go out and drag Tori back here with me. Tell her who I was, have her underneath me again. I’m woken up to the knock on my door and Angel pokes his head in.

  “You okay man?” he asks.

  “Yeah. Fine.”

  “I saw you talking to Tori.” He leans against the door frame. “You know her?”

  I consider lying, but he already knows about my shit with Hangman. “Yeah, used to be best friends, grew up together, we were each other’s first.”

  “She recognize you?’

  I shake my head.

  “You want her,” he states.

  “Always have. And here she is, running away from my fucking brother, the man she married. When it should have and would have been me. The only thing that hurt when I recovered, once I got better, was leaving her behind.”

  “Can’t dwell in the past man,” he says. “Are you gonna tell her?”

  I snort. “Not yet. Eventually yeah, but until I have her where I want her, I ain’t saying shit. I don’t want to push her away before I even get the chance to actually have her.”

  Angel rubs at his beard and nods. “Just tell her before that son of a bitch shows up here. Because she finds out some other way, you’ll lose your chance.”

  I run my hands down my face. “Yeah, don’t worry.”

  “Jasper!” I hear Eden scream.

  Angel’s face pales and he runs out, I follow quickly behind him. Out in the main area of the clubhouse, Eden is standing there, doubled over in pain, and standing in the middle of a puddle of water.

  “Fuck!” Angel snaps.

  “Yeah, what I said. Water broke, let's go. Now,” Eden grits out.

  I step back holding my hands up. “You uh, have fun with that. Later.” I bolt out of the room, and down to mine,
slamming the door shut.

  I don’t know why I took off like that. Well actually I do. When Eden was pregnant with Harley she went into labor early, and I was the one that delivered the kid. I never want to see that shit ever again for as long as I live.

  Unless it’s with Tori. Helping to bring my child into the world would be a blessing. Tori being here brings up feelings I don’t like having. I know the truth about me being alive is going to come out. Hangman is going to eventually show up here, I know he will.

  Will I be ready to face him after all these years? I couldn’t six years ago when he showed up, I hid out like a little bitch. But now? I’ll be ready, I have to be, because I’ll be damned if I let him get Tori away from me again.

  Tori

  I’m woken up by two little monsters jumping on my bed. I smile as I open my eyes.

  “Auntie Tori, Auntie Tori, wake up, wake up. Mom made bacon.” Even though I’m not their Aunt, I’m their cousin, they still insisted on calling me Auntie. I sort of love it. Especially since I don’t have any siblings, and being an aunt won’t ever actually happen for me.

  They both say bacon as if it’s dreamy. Which makes me laugh. “Well then, I best get on up so I don’t miss out on that bacon.”

  The girls squeal as I launch out of bed and chase them into the kitchen.

  Lilly is at the counter scooping food onto plates.

  “Morning, Lilly.”

  She half turns and smiles. “Morning. You sleep okay?” she asks.

  I nod. “Yeah, and these two beautiful little girls woke me up. I swear I could get used to that.” I smile.

  Lilly chuckles. “Yeah, they don’t like sleeping in much, but I wouldn’t trade it.”

  “I can’t believe how much they look alike. They really could be twins.”

  “For now, they even think they are,” she says quietly. “When the day comes that they are old enough to know differently, I think it might hurt them more than me.”

  I go to her, giving her a small hug. “It will be okay.”

  She lets out a shaky breath. “I know. Sometimes I start thinking about it and I get mad at Vinny all over again. But then I take a look at those girls, and the anger fades away.”