Undressing, I turn the shower on and stand under the cold spray until it warms up. One of the reasons I go with the flow in the club, is because of reasons like tonight. One minute threats of death are being thrown around and in the next, congratulations and celebrations are being given.
Soaping up and rinsing off, I step out and grab the nearest towel. The only good thing about everyone being at the club is I get fresh towels magically appearing in my room. Thanks, mom.
I fall into bed, not bothering to put anything on and sigh. What a fucking day. Laying in the darkness, I wonder what Harper is doing, what she’s thinking. Most of all, I wonder why I can’t get my head around her, it’s making me lose my damn mind.
The one thing I know for sure is I’m going to kill Ellis one day for what he’s done to her, and I’m going to hurt the two Crow’s who took her for him.
I had Leo’s back when he shot Roman so he could get to India, but I never truly understood the emotions that drove him to commit murder. Now I do.
A knock on the door, so soft I nearly miss it has me sitting up and I swing my hair off my face as the door opens and whoever knocked is creeping in.
I stay where I am, not murmuring a word and watch Harper close the door and climb into bed beside me, careful to leave a wide space between us.
I lay back down and roll onto my side to match her position. She smells like soap and sadness and I burn to hold her.
I settle for reaching out and holding her hand and she lets me.
“What’s it like having a dad?” she asks.
This one question is the saddest question I’ve ever been asked, and I don’t know how to answer her.
“I’ll be straight with you, I couldn’t live without my dad in my life…”
“Not all dads are good to their kids though.”
“No, they’re not, but you’re asking what Cas was like, aren’t you?”
“Am I that obvious?”
“Nah, it would be weird if you didn’t want to know.”
“You must’ve seen him around a lot growing up here?”
“I slept at his house as much as Leo slept at mine, and if it weren’t at home, we were here at the club. I’m not going to lie, Cas was a good dad, he always had time for Leo and Luca, and he was cool as fuck.”
It goes quiet and I give her time to process.
“What do you want from me, JJ? Be honest,” she comes out with next.
“I want you.”
“Tell me exactly what it is you want from me. I can’t keep going around in circles with you.”
She says nothing as she waits for me to speak, but, how can I tell her I want everything with her yet I don’t know how?
“Your silence says it all.” She doesn’t sound angry, just sad.
“You’ll never give me all of you, and I deserve so much more than what you throw at me. So tonight I’m going to sleep here where I feel safe, and in the morning I’ll leave and work my shift behind the bar and the next time Tal asks me out, I won’t turn him down because I’m too busy wondering if you’re going to hook up with me or one of the girls that hang around here. I’m done wondering what the hell goes through your head.”
My chest vibrates as a growl erupts from deep in my gut as I move closer to her and wind my arm around her.
She doesn’t push me away, but she doesn’t mould around me either.
“You have no right to growl at me like a caveman. Goodnight, Jason.”
Pushing my nose into her hair, I blurt out, “I’m fucking this up, but we both know you’re mine in a weird, messed up way. I don’t know how to be good for you, but I do know you’re the one I want to keep coming back to.”
“Now you don’t have to stress over it.”
Her fight is coming back, and I like it.
“I ain’t stressing shit, maybe the headache you’re giving me but listen good, Harper, this between us is our beginning, and I’m going to figure it out and we’re going to live happily ever fuckin’ after.”
“Go to sleep, and we’ll see what happens next,” she vows, and I could laugh.
I know what’s going to happen. Now the twins are full members, I can recruit them into going Crow hunting, they’ll be up for anything and now they’re patched in, they’ll think they’re invincible.
I wait for Harper to fall asleep before I close my eyes. Falling asleep next to her feels right, I’m ashamed it took this long, and I won’t be a dick and leave before she’s wakes up this time.
It’s no surprise she’s gone when I wake the next morning. It does leave me in a bad mood though. This would be the old Harper’s payback, to leave me to wake up alone, but the Harper that came back from Blue Waters has me worried because she keeps a lot more to herself.
I throw on the closest pair of jeans from the floor and shove my feet into clean socks and then my boots. It’s not late but it isn’t early. I hear brothers moving around as I head downstairs, and mom and Lily are cooking up all kinds of crap in the kitchen.
“Do you need anything?” Lily asks me, looking up from buttering bread at the table. Her eyes linger on my bare chest for too long and it makes me feel sick. She knows by now that something is going on between me and her daughter, yet she still checks me out like she doesn’t care if I see or not.
“Yeah, for you to look after your daughter,” I seethe, pouring myself a coffee.
I don’t need to be facing her to see her putting down the knife and leaving the room. I hear it.
Mom doesn’t say anything until she has closed the door and is jerking her chin to me then at the table.
“That was uncalled for.”
“Was it?” I grunt, sitting down.
“I wouldn’t say it if it wasn’t. What’s going on with you?”
“No offence, but I’m not talking relationship shit with my mom.”
Rolling her eyes, I drain my coffee and she smirks.
“So you’re in a relationship with her? When did you make it official?”
The glare I cast only makes her laugh. Giving up, I put my cup down and rub my arm over the last patch of skin that is unmarred by ink.
“I don’t know how to be with her,” I admit, and she turns serious.
“Jason, I’m your mother and I love you something fierce, but I didn’t raise you to be this dense.”
Gee, thanks mom.
“I’m terrified I’m not good enough for her.”
“You might not be, but what you have to figure out is if she’s worth it. As long as you want to be better for her, and think of how your actions concern her, then you’re doing right.”
“I’m still terrified.”
“So is everyone who falls in love.”
Love?
Fucking Christ on a cracker.
The door swings open and dad strolls in, heading straight for the bacon and realises me and mom are in the room.
“What’s up with Lily now?” he asks.
“Hormones,” I mutter, and he doesn’t utter a word more.
“Babe, our boy is in love,” Mom beams and I close my eyes. “And he needed his momma’s advice.”
“Well, my advice is to steer clear if it’s Harper McCarthy you’re talking about. No offence, she’s hard work and not exactly to be believed, I reckon.”
“She’s not hard work, and I reckon you don’t know shit about her.”
“I know she hasn’t been anything but trouble for Slade and this club since she rocked into town and that mother of hers has more secrets that are still to be thrown in our faces. You mark my words, those two are trouble, son.”
“Didn’t Cas tell you the same thing about me all those years ago,” Mom throws in his face. “In fact, I know he did because I heard him. Don’t you talk about who’s acceptable and who isn’t, or I’ll have to remind you what I find acceptable and what I don’t.”
Okay, there is clearly a double-edged meaning and I don’t have any business listening to my parents talking like this.
?
??Huh,” Dad grunts. “I still can’t get between a momma and her boy.”
Mom’s smile is wicked beautiful, and I finish my coffee.
“I know you Jason, you don’t care about the girl, you’re pissed because Lana is struggling.”
I can always count on mom to defend me. I reckon I could do anything and she would justify it on my behalf.
“Lily pulled a dick move, that’s for sure, but I’m telling you, don’t be surprised when something else comes out and our boy is stuck in the middle cause he’s all in love with the girl. Anyway, you might not like my advice on her, but you’ll take it when it comes to club business.”
Jerking my chin, I let him know I’m listening, it’ll be better than him going on about Harper.
“Don’t ever put yourself in a position like you did at the tattoo parlour yesterday. I never want to bury your ass.”
“It got us valuable information though, didn’t it?”
“You wouldn’t have had to go there if your girl had told us the truth in the first place,” he digs at me.
“Still, I’m sure you would’ve done much worse for mom.”
I know he did. He’s killed for the woman who gave birth to me and there is no argument from him about it.
“All I’m saying is her secrets aren’t all laid bare yet, mark my words.”
He leaves before mom or I can argue with him and the door closes behind him.
“No one knows what they’re doing when it comes to their first relationship. Go with your instincts, just be fucking thoughtful of her, and you’ll be fine.”
I hope she’s right, mothers usually are.
“Everyone, in the bar, now.”
Mom takes my mug as I stand and walk into the bar and find Cas waiting on everyone impatiently. I hang back by the pool table and watch as a slow smile creeps along his face.
“I’ve just got word that Lim and his friend are held up in a motel. Let’s go get them, brothers.”
I’ll talk to Harper when I get back. My blood is rushing at the thought of being able to bring her a level of solace grabbing the two guys who took her.
I run up to my room, throw on a top and my cut, and grab my keys. I’m going to fuck up this Lim and his friend. They are going to regret ever laying eyes on her. In fact I might even scoop out their eyeballs in front of each other. Fuck, I have so many different ideas I let the violence run wild in my mind.
Nearly everyone is ready to go when I jog back downstairs, and I move through the brothers to stand by Leo and Zach.
“How’s Harper?” Leo asks.
“I haven’t seen her.”
“Oh, so she wasn’t creeping out of your room at dawn?”
For fuck sake, did everyone see her leave? Maybe she should start wearing flashing signs of when she’s coming and going.
“It wasn’t like that.”
But it will be. When I return with two of her captors and after they’ve been dealt with, we’re going to talk and we’re not going to go around in circles and when I lay down tonight, she will be beside me and all this shit will be sorted out.
Harper
* * *
Past
I’m on the verge of showing him how it feels to be humiliated, but the only thing stopping me is I know for a fact he wouldn’t care. If I were to have an orgy with half the brothers, he probably wouldn’t even notice.
“Can I get you another, beautiful?” The guy behind the bar asks and I slide my empty glass across to him.
“Sure, you can leave the bottle too.”
I’m making myself comfortable for the night and I’m going to need all the drink I can get. One thing I’ve learned throughout my life is if one path doesn’t take you where you want to go, a bottle of liquor will take you everywhere.
When I’m at the bottom of a bottle, I’m anywhere I want to be. One time, I was so drunk I thought I was on the moon, in a drunken reality, I was stumbling around the park. The beauty of alcohol is it’s your best friend while brutally ruining you at the same time, just like JJ.
It keeps you warm while it roams around your body and then once it has its claws in you, it can’t wait to make you feel like shit and hate yourself, just like JJ.
From the mirrors behind the optics, I have a clear view of JJ sloped over the couch by the pool table as a barely dressed woman drapes herself over him. He doesn’t push her away, he doesn’t look even remotely guilty because I’m here, and he knows I want him. He carries on as normal, drinking and chasing skirt, hurting me. It’s my fault, I know it is, I expect too much, I always do. He’s never once told me he wants more than sex, if anything, he goes out of his way to tell me how much he doesn’t want a relationship, how he only wants sex.
Sinking another shot, my eyes are trained on him. His arm snakes around her and his hand guides her mouth to his. My heart has been broken so many times over this man yet he’s the one who puts it back together when he shows up at my house and puts those lips on mine.
“I’m done for the night, you want to get out of here?”
I tear my eyes away from JJ’s reflection and focus on Tal. He’s a good-looking guy if you’re into the tall, dark and handsome look. I prefer JJ with his light, messy hair, his bright golden eyes and his ink that seeps into his soul.
“I’m good here, thanks. Grab yourself a glass and join me.”
He doesn’t hesitate and grabs a full bottle of vodka too. Sliding onto the stool to my left, I turn to face him. No one sits on the stool to my right, it’s some sort of tribute to some old guy who was killed years ago.
“You know, we’d be able to talk a lot easier up in my room, we can even take the drink with us.”
“I invited you to drink with me, not talk so don’t jump to any conclusions.”
Then again, giving him another once over, he is showing me attention, not that it’s a reason to jump him, but what the hell, I do have all this pent-up frustrations and time to kill.
“If you call a cab, we can go back to mine instead.”
My mother is most likely out with one of Willow’s Peak’s middle-aged bachelors, the house will be empty, and I won’t be the one who does the walk of shame the next morning and I won’t care when he leaves.
“That I can do, let me find a number,” he says eagerly.
He’s fast on his toes and I collect the half empty bottle of tequila and the bottle of vodka for good measure. Stumbling off the stool, the tequila bottle slips from under my arm and hits the floor. In slow motion, I watch it land and bounce a few times. It doesn’t smash and I’m fucking grateful not to have the mess to clean up.
I bend down to pick it up and another hand beats me to it. Lifting my head, I know who my eyes will land on.
“For a moment, it looked like you were going to leave with the prospect.”
I’m fucking speechless.
“For a moment, I forgot it’s none of your fucking business,” I hiss back at him.
“You’re always my business, Miss McCarthy.”
“Leave me alone, Jason.”
Of all the errant thoughts I battle with every single day, he is the most confusing.
His actions cause me to hate him, but then with a few words and his panty melting smile, the hatred ebbs away and the need for him returns, along with the sparks of hope that this time will be different.
He places his hand at my elbow and helps me back up to my feet. If I wasn’t looking through liquor glasses, and I wasn’t tangling myself in his web, I’d notice how he keeps enough distance from me as to not catch attention but keeps close enough to keep me happy.
I feel Tal come up behind me, he stops close enough his shirt brushes against the exposed skin on my back, and JJ’s face darkens.
“It’s all good, prospect. I’ll look after her from here.”
“Don’t sweat it, JJ. I said I’ll take her home, I’ve got her.”
Oh god.
“I ain’t sweating anything, Harper’s staying at the club tonight. She doesn
’t need escorting home. Back off, or should I make it known that you’re not following orders?”
I don’t get the prospects, they put themselves through hell sometimes, being spoken to like they’re nothing, all so they can wear a scrap of cloth. I know the second he backs down, a cool shudder runs through me. I daren’t look back at him, he was never the one I truly wanted, he was always going to be a filler for JJ.
Still, I keep my gaze solely on the guy who drives me crazy. Something cold hits my palm and then his warm hand pushes mine closed, wrapping around what I’m guessing is a key.
“You go up first and I’ll join you in a few,” he says, keeping his voice low.
We haven’t been together here at the club before, in his room. My heart is pounding so hard it’s making me dizzy. I don’t look back as I slip away unnoticed heading for the stairs, by the time I make it to the top, I’ve slipped out of my heels and I’m quick on my toes, unlocking his door. I berate myself for being this excited, but I shut that part of myself up. Being this is happening in his room, I might even wake up to him in the morning. I’ve been waiting a while to spend an entire night with him, tonight could be different.
PRESENT
Hope is a dangerous thing to possess. It’s such a downer when the hope runs out. Inhaling, I bask in the shade the big tree is offering and keep my eyes open on the clear view I have of the garages. Guys have been working on them for days, fixing the roof and getting rid of the burnt wood from the attack last month. The brothers are gearing up for something and after Cas told me to keep the bar closed, I slipped outside and managed to avoid my mom staring out into space.
I thought I’d feel better this morning after offloading to JJ last night, but I feel no different. He still has his grip on me and I wish I could disappear. There’s always been a part of me that has resented my mom for needing a man, but I’m turning out to be exactly like her. I need JJ to want me, to need me, I need him to put his biker ass claim on me and tell the whole fucking world I’m his. What is so wrong with me that he won’t?
I hear the baby before I see India walking over with her to the bench I’m sitting on under the biggest tree closest to the main house.