by Joy Blood
"Fuck off, man," I say, not giving a shit that I'm making it worse.
He holds his hands up in surrender. "Fine. I'll go. But I won’t stand for you treating her like shit ‘cause she wasn’t pining away for you in the corner until you got your shit figured out. She’s a woman. Women need shit, and you weren't giving it."
"She needed dick that bad? That what you’re saying?" His glare hits me hard, nearly singeing the hairs on my face.
"She wanted acknowledgment, man, just the simplest thing from you, and you refused it. Shit is on you, and you know it." With that, he’s out the door, slamming it hard enough to let me know he isn't happy with my actions.
"Fucking wannabe Dr. Phil asshole," I grumble, nearly throwing the bottle at the now closed before thinking better of it. Instead, I bring it back to my lips and take another long pull, dulling the pain the only way I know how: self-medicating.
I knew Ari had an ongoing thing with Premo, but their interactions had been few and far between. Every time we did something with the Siberian MC, I made myself scarce, not wanting to see them together. She wasn't his old lady or anything, not even his side piece. They would just fuck, as far as I knew. I was fine with it, didn't give a fuck what she did with the asshole, just as long as I didn't see it. Now, though…fuck, what if the kid is his? The prick will want to step up to take care of her, and where does that leave me? Not that I know what I expected to happen with her.
The first time I saw her, I knew I was in trouble. All perky with a smile plastered on her face. Those fat lips—lips I wanted to bite, suck, and shove my dick between. I knew she was going to be trouble, and I was right. So, I was an asshole—the crabby cripple who pretended she didn't exist. Then she went and got in a car accident and shattered every bone in her leg. With her being “BFF's” with Kimi, Jake’s wife, our VP, she ended up here at the club for the good part of a year. We had the equipment she needed for PT, so instead of being shuttled back and forth from Vin and Ellie's to the rehab center, she lived here, in the room we have reserved for visiting Presidents—the most common being Premo. He sure as hell didn't mind bunking with her.
She got better. She left. Came back from time to time. Now, after six fucking years, we settled into a somewhat toxic existence. I'm a dick, and she’s a bitch right back. Even with the constant tension between us, in my mind, she’s mine and always would be. But, in my mind, I can also ride my bike without pain and fuck her up against the wall without my back feeling like it’s on fire.
Joke’s on me.
Chapter Three
Ari
Looking down at the grainy black and white picture I got from the doctor this morning confirming what I had dreaded to hear, I drag in a heavy breath. So small but already such a huge thing.
I knew telling Rico I was pregnant was going to be hard, but I didn’t think he would blow up like he did. We aren’t a thing and never will be. I’m still shocked we even had sex. With him being such an asshole and all. The guy hasn't said a good word to me since I met him. At first it took a while to get him to even speak around me, but when I came to live here for a short while, he kind of had no choice. I was always around, and he couldn’t avoid me unless he left the clubhouse. He only did that when the Siberians came to visit. Just the thought of telling Premo has me sick to my stomach. We aren’t exclusive or anything—far from it. I know he has his woman, or probably women at his club and more than likely every town in between, but I didn’t care, and I still don’t. We have no strings—had no strings. Now, there is a string, one that’s going to be here in...six months. Oh, fuck my life. How did I get to be three months pregnant and not even know it? Being stupid, that’s how.
Apparently, I’m one of those girls who need birth control to get knocked up. My periods have never been regular and started to get heavy, so I decided oral contraceptive was the right choice for me. Bad idea number one. When I started taking them, my body started to ovulate, as it should. Add one broody man, an argument that led to him fucking me into his mattress, then throw in a little bomb threat at the clubhouse and the need to have the club’s friends and families relocated to the Siberian compound for lockdown. Plus, the fact that I had to leave on such short notice and didn’t pack my pills, then spent every night we were there in a certain President's bed, I wound up pregnant with a baby whose father is a coin toss at this point. How is that for an equation? Stupid.
When I got home, I was a little panicked, but after talking to a couple girls at the club, I decided taking a plan B and continuing the pills was the way to go. Worked for them, so why not me? For a while, I was good. Spotted a little once a month even. Called it good and decided I was in the clear…until I caught the stomach flu from hell—a flu that turned out to be an invasion of a tiny human growing in my womb. Still blows my mind.
I’m going to be a mom.
The thought makes me shudder. My relationship with my own mom is terrible at best. I haven’t talked to her in six years. The last call, sitting in my dorm room hoping Kimi wouldn’t come back and see me with tears streaming down my face, I decided enough was enough, and I wasn’t going to let her control me anymore. She would no longer be a part of my life. By the next day, I had changed my number and cut her phone off—the phone I paid for. Soft knocking grabs my attention, and Grace's voice comes through the door before it opens. I look up from my spot on the floor. "Hey." Grace's smile greets me, then her brow arches. "Uh…what are you doing on the floor?"
I don’t say anything, just hand her the small picture. After I left Rico in the hall, I went to my old room, let myself slide down the wall, and didn’t get up, content with staying in this position for the rest of the night. It takes a second before realization hits. "Ari, holy crap."
"Yeah. Crap is right."
"Have you told Premo?" I let out a forced laugh and decide to get off the floor.
"Nope, but I told Rico." I walk past her to the attached bathroom for some toilet paper to blow my nose.
"Rico!" she shouts, her eyes wide.
"Geez, not so loud. My head is pounding." No doubt from all the crying.
"Sorry. But, uh…when were you and Rico a thing? I thought he—"
"Hated me? Yeah. So did I. Guess his dick didn’t that one time." I groan at the memory. I can’t even remember what we were arguing about when the small band we had been winding tight finally snapped. Then, in the morning, after the chaos of the bomb, it had been tied back into place, nice and tight—tight enough for me to forget all he had said to me in the throes of passion. They were just words said in the heat of the moment.
"So...you had sex...with Rico..." she says the words slowly, as if needing them to sink in before she can believe them.
"Yeah, then one whole day later, I was in Premo's bed." Her eyes widen. "Go ahead, judge me. I am."
"Oh no, there’s no judgement here. Don’t be judging yourself either. You’re only human. What did Rico say that night? Did he say he wanted to be with you, take you away, and marry you?" I let out the biggest laugh possible. The thought of Rico declaring marriage is something beyond humorous.
"Yeah, right." I try controlling my laughter, but it takes me a second. "Whew, that was funny. Thanks for the laugh. I needed that."
"Well, what happened?"
"We had sex, he said all kinds of things, went all biker alpha on me, then the bomb went off in the clubhouse." She winces. "Yeah, that night.” I offer a weak smile. “So, anyway, I never got a chance to talk to him, and the next day, before we were all shipped off to the Siberians’ compound, I walked into the bar area and saw Cira straddling him. Topless," I add, and Grace gasps, like it’s a big shocker. "So…I brushed off the night we had."
"You aren’t sure who the baby's father is,” she muses, hitting the nail right on the head. “That stinks."
"Yeah, tell me about it."
"How do you think Premo will take it?" Premo. He isn’t a complicated man. He was straight forward with me about what we had going on. I know how he
likes getting head, know the right way to grind my hips while on top to make him come, know all the designs of the tattoos on his chest and arms by heart, but I don’t know the meaning behind a single one of them. I don’t know a thing about his past, and I sure as hell don’t know how he feels about kids.
"Couldn’t tell you. I’m not sure when it will happen anyway. It’s not like I see him very much.” I rub my hands on my face, groaning. “I can’t do this anymore. I want to talk about something else. How is your burly man-cake doing?" She lets out a small laugh at my reference to Gin.
"He’s good. I left him pushing Tanya on the swing."
"Gosh. Gin with kids. He's so—"
"Big."
"Broody," I say with a chuckle. "How is the house coming along?"
"It's good, actually. The kids all have their own rooms now, so that’s a godsend. Gin won’t shut up about getting Tanya a pony." She rolls her eyes. "I don’t think the man has ever been on a horse."
"Probably not. How are Jason and Brook?" Gin's kids. Their mom decided taking care of a teenage girl and near teenage boy was too hard for her, so after taking off eight years prior and refusing to let Gin see them, she showed back up and dropped them on his doorstep without a backward glance.
"I don’t know. Jason and I get along good enough, but Brook is still having a hard time with everything. She just seems so mad at the world." She shrugs. I can relate. Thirteen was a crap age…well, for me anyway. Though, I think that had a lot to do with my mother.
"Maybe ask Buggs to put her to work at the store. Might help a little," I offer. Maybe some sort of paycheck to look forward to might make the girl a little more focused on something other than being a hormonal teenager.
"Yeah. I'll ask him. Thanks,” she says with a genuine smile.
"Mama!" a voice calls out before little feet pound down the hallway toward the room. Tanya bursts through the door, hooking herself around her mom's leg.
"Hey, Tay."
"Gin pushed me on the swing. I went so high!" her high-pitched voice squeals.
"That’s great."
"Figured you'd be in here." Gin's deep timber sounds out as he walks into the room. He slips his hand onto Grace's back, then slides it around to her waist before settling onto her hip. "You girls going to join the party?" Crap, I completely forgot about the party going on outside.
"Yeah," I say, giving Gin a slight smile. "Is…uh…is Rico down there?" I ask.
"Nah, babe, he ain’t. Still in his room." That’s all the information I need before following after them as Gin loops his fingers through Grace's and tugs her toward the door.
Chapter Four
Rico
The pounding in my head doesn’t let up, not even after smoking a bowl, making my computer screens hard to look at. I keep them dim as I slay some dragons in an attempt to give my mind the streak of white-out it needs. Yesterday shouldn’t have gone down the way it did. If I'm honest, the last six years shouldn’t have gone the way they did either. "Nothing but a dick since day one," I say to the empty room. The chatter from the other players on the screen continues, but I ignore it, throwing out spells to take down the enemy.
I need to get my ass out of this room and away from my cloud of smoke to go talk to Ari, but I’m putting it off. She hasn’t stayed at the clubhouse since the bomb went off nearly four months ago. Avoiding me as best she can, I guess. Kimi let it slip that she’s been staying at Vin and Ellie's, but I would have found out either way. Vin wouldn’t lie to me if I asked. The two of us go back farther than we’d like to remember.
Shutting down my screens, I take in a deep breath and start toward the door, hopefully to come back with one more occupant.
When I get outside, I find Gin headed for his bike. "Nice to see you're still alive. Sage said you were hitting it pretty hard last night."
"Might still be alive, but fuck if I don’t feel like I’m dying a slow death." I shield my eyes from the sun. I need some fucking sunglasses.
"I’m headed home. That little cockblocker of Grace's is spending the night at Vin and Ellie's." He chuckles. "Love that little girl, but damn, I can’t get my dick inside my woman for five minutes without the kid knocking on our damn door," he says, a smile barely showing from under his full beard. "You good?"
"Yep. Just heading to Vin and Ellie's to talk to Ari," I say, rolling toward my truck.
"Take it easy on her. She'll come a runnin' if ya give her some space. Just don’t be a dick." He laughs, as if me not being a dick is comical. I give him the finger and get myself to the back of my truck so I can load my damn chair up. The six-hundred-dollar lift sticks out like a sore thumb on my 2015 blacked out Chevy, but it’s slicker than shit to get my chair loaded up. The platform comes down with the press of a button, right to the ground so I can roll my chair on. Standing, I pull down the tailgate, then press another button to lift the chair enough for me to roll it in. Fuck my life. It’s times like these when I find myself considering the surgery I promised myself I would never do. Each time I talk to the doctor, I get more reassurances things will go smooth, and he can correct the damage done, or rather neglected, to my back. At the request of said doctor, I’ve been trying to get back into shape to make things easier come recovery time. If I decide to go through with it, that is. Now, with Ari being knocked up, I think I’ve made up my mind.
I pull myself into the truck and grip the steering wheel with my heavily tattooed hands. Most of my tattoos cover the scars brought on by the Chicago doctors when they tried to piece me back together like fucking Frankenstein. My hands hold scars upon scars underneath the ink. It took me a while before I found someone who would cover them. Each artist I went to said no, that there was too much scarring and the ink would just eventually fade from the use of my hands. I didn’t care. I’d get them touched up once a year if need be. A kid in Chicago who was just starting out with his own shop covered my hands and inked the ones on my back too, A winding pattern of machinery trying to piece my snarled flesh back together.
The small home that was once a bed and breakfast comes into view, as do the kids playing outside the farther I drive down the gravel road. Three kids: Anthony, Dawn, and Tanya, with Ellie watching over them. Tanya chases Anthony around, and I chuckle. Kid is going to have to get used to that; he got his mama's good looks. Ellie is a beautiful woman, curvy with short brown hair and one of those little noses that slope upward. I sure as fuck wouldn’t let on about that in front of Vin, though. Possessive bastard.
I park and go about getting my chair out of the truck before heading to the house. When I first came to live at the clubhouse, everyone snapped to and helped me out with everything. I shut that shit down right away. No fucking way was I going to let them treat me like an invalid. "Rico. Good to see you," Ellie says, getting up from her cushioned chair on the front porch to greet me.
"You too, Ells."
"I’m not sure she’ll see you." Right to the point. I remember when Ellie was a meek little thing. That was when she had no memory of who she was, but as it came back, the badass in her started to shine through.
"Yeah, might not. But I ain’t gonna give her a choice. Sorry." I stand from my chair, bypassing her to pull myself up her stairs and into her house, ignoring the pull in my lower back. The throbbing in my head from the hangover has slightly subsided, but it’s there—enough to pull my attention away from the constant ache.
"Not even going to knock, asshole," Vin grumbles from the kitchen as I barge through the door.
"Nope. Where is she?"
"Am I going to need to beat your ass like I did Jake?" he questions, raising his cup of coffee to his mouth.
"Shouldn’t."
"Better not. Wheelchair or not, I will. She’s my daughter as much as Kimi and Dawn are. Won’t think twice about laying you out." His scarred lip raises in a smirk.
"I respect that, V." I remember when Jake met Vin's fist after he made the mistake of being an asshole to Kimi and yelled at her in front of the club.<
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"All right. Up the stairs, third door on the left. Have fun with the steps." He chuckles and walks out the door to join his wife. Prick. I do my best taking each step, gripping hard on the railing for support, until I reach the top and come to a long hallway. Good fucking thing I brought my tin of joints. I’m going to need one at the end of this journey. When I find the door Vin mentioned, I open it without knocking and step in.
The room is dark, each window blacked out. Feeling along the wall, I find the light switch and flick it on. The artificial light starts out dim as it bathes the room, the brightness growing as the bulb heats. I find her lying on the bed, curled up under the covers, hugging her knees as she sleeps. In need of some relief, I go for the chair parked in front of a table along the wall, sit down, and pull out that joint I’m in desperate need of.
Chapter Five
Ari
The bright, red-tinted light shining through my blanket is the first thing I see when I open my eyes. When I pull my blanket away, the second thing I see is Rico sitting in my room, smoking a joint. Oh my god, Ellie is going to kill him. Not before I do for waking me up, though. "What the hell, Puerto Rico?" I grumble and bring the blanket farther over my head to cover myself.
"Why are you sleeping? It’s ten in the morning," he says, annoying me further.
"I just got off work three hours ago. I’m a little tired," I mumble. Oh, sweet sleep. Why am I being punished? "What do you want?" I snap.
"I came to tell you what I want." What he wants. I can’t even right now.
"Rico." Uncovering myself, I look right at him. "It might come as a shock to you, but what you want really doesn’t mean shit to me." He has the audacity to smirk.
"You might not, but I’m going to tell you anyway." A long, frustrated groan starts deep in my chest before I fling my arms upward to cover myself once again.