Motorcycle Man

Epilogue Dreams Come True

I stood at the basin in our bathroom wearing my bra and panties, my eyes moving over my body.

Nothing there.

This was because, when I got out of the hospital, approximately half a second after Tack carried me into the house (even though I could walk, just not very fast) and he laid me in bed, he’d started researching. He found the best plastic surgeon in the country and since then I’d taken two trips out to Los Angeles to have procedures to erase the scars from the five stab wounds Grigori Lescheva’s henchman had given me.

“Got that day burned in my brain,” Tack had growled after he’d handed me the plane tickets and explained our destination. “Do not need to look at your beautiful body and have it burn deeper. But you definitely are not gonna live with the scars ‘a that shit in your head and on your body. No fuckin’ way.”

After his explanation, I decided, who was I to argue?

So I didn’t.

It was just over nine months since that day and all physical remnants of it were gone.

My man saw to that.

I shifted so my back was to the mirror and looked down. Above my hipster panties was Tack’s dragon. His tattoo artist was just that, an artist. The tattoo was the… freaking… coolest. All in black, its wings spanning the small of my back, the tips skimming my hips, spiky head turned to the side, the dragon’s body curled up as if to attack with its feet, its talons pointed to my behind.

It hurt like hell to get but Tack was right, it was worth it. I liked having his mark on me.

I liked how much he liked it more.

And boy did he like it.

These thoughts made me turn back around. I leaned into the counter and both my hands slid along my belly, my eyes dropping there and I caught sight of my rings.

The second day I woke up in the hospital, I did it with a huge-ass diamond ring on my left finger. It was a raised princess cut diamond, two carats with smaller round diamonds surrounding it, more diamonds set in the gold in the rise up to the bigger one.

The minute I saw it, regardless of the drugs pumping numbness through my system , I smiled.

Pure Tack.

The biker boss to end all biker bosses, his woman was unconscious when we officially became engaged. He did what he did and got what wanted however that had to come about.

I didn’t argue about that either. When Tack walked into my room five minutes later, I just lifted my hand (albeit weakly), wiggled my fingers and whispered, “I accept.”

Tack had just smiled back, came right to me, bent in and kissed me.

It kind of sucked that our engagement kiss was soft, gentle and brief seeing as I was highly drugged, had five stitched holes in my body, IVs and was recovering from an alarming loss of blood.

But none of that made that kiss any less sweet.

We didn’t have a huge-ass wedding and we didn’t delay in that either.

Lying in a hospital bed, my dream changed. After what I endured, what Tack endured trying to find me and the fact that my heart had stopped beating for one minute and forty-six seconds, my priorities changed.

Live life. Do not delay. Ever.

That didn’t mean our wedding didn’t kick ass.

It so did.

The minute I was up to it, Tack put me on the back of his bike and we lucked out that the weather was good the whole way as we rode over the Rockies and into the Napa Valley.

It was a long ride.

I loved every fucking minute of it.

Everyone met us there, Chaos, Mom and Dad, Aunt Bette and Uncle Marsh, Tabby and Rush, Hawk and Gwen, Brock and Tess, Mitch and Mara, Elvira and even Tack’s Mom.

I discovered that Tack’s Mom was not surprisingly beaten looking. But she was also friendly and loved her son if in an unusual distant, hesitant way I didn’t exactly get and I didn’t like all that much. But that distance meant she went right back to San Diego and kept distant. We rarely ever heard from her. Tack was used to this and it didn’t bother him so I decided not to let it bother me.

As for my Mom and Dad, they had met Tack when they came to Denver after my incident. While I was drugged up, Tack left Mom with me and took Dad for a cup of coffee. There he laid it out, all of it about Chaos, the Russians and how that made me a target. There he also laid it out about the fact we loved each other and he intended to spend the rest of his life with me and make a family.

This was also very Tack, up front and honest and apparently my father appreciated it.

I knew this when I was less whacked out and more lucid and I approached my father about his talk with Tack hoping to head him off the path to judgment.

I shouldn’t have worried (though I didn’t know that).

“Honey, God makes those decisions, I don’t,” Dad shocked the shit out of me by saying. “I just know it wasn’t him who stabbed you with a knife. I also know it was him who nearly got riddled with bullets to get you out. And I know he got you out alive. And last, I figure the path to redemption is thorny but I’m guessing that man will make it through mostly because he’s got a strong woman at his side. And I know that because I raised that woman.”

Seriously, it sucked I was laid up in a hospital bed because that meant I couldn’t give my Dad a big hug.

And, for your information, bawling while recovering from stab wounds hurts like a bitch.

I didn’t know if Mom and Dad came to Denver with open minds. I just knew they respected Tack’s honesty and they saw how Tack, Tabby, Rush and Chaos treated me so if their minds didn’t start out open, they ended up that way.

Tack and I got married in a vineyard.

I was wearing a simple but kickass ivory dress and not simple and more kickass ivory spiked heels. At my side was an immensely sad but faking it for me Lanie. Tack wore jeans and an unbelievably cool ivory shirt with subtle western-style stitching and not subtle totally kickass rocker-biker black embroidery across the upper chest and his shoulders at the back. Through the nuptials, Dog stood by his side. And when we were pronounced man and wife, a collective biker howl split the air that made me laugh and cry at the same time.

After I slid my wide gold band on his finger, he slid the thin, diamond-imbedded gold on mine, we partied hard and long and, as it raged on, rowdy. The owners of the vineyard luckily were game and joined in rather than taking the alternative of calling the cops.

Everyone left but Tack and I stayed a week for our honeymoon. Then we extended our honeymoon and rode the coastal road of California.

Only after we’d done that did we go home.

It wasn’t near enough time riding the roads with my man with the wind in my hair. But it still was time I savored.

Every second.

Both Lanie and I missed Elliott’s funeral because we were both still in the hospital. But she waited for me and my moral support and I took her to his grave when Tack and I got home from our honeymoon. I also held her while we stood at his grave and she sobbed in my arms. Not long after, she moved back to Connecticut to be close to her Mom, Dad and sister. I missed her every day but I understood her play.

Too much Elliott in Denver.

He was a fuck up, got himself dead and Lanie in the ICU. But even so, she loved him and still wasn’t over him.

She hadn’t dated since. Not once.

I was worried about her and planning a trip to go out and shake her shit up.

Life was too short and too precious to lay it down to grief.

My friend was beautiful, she was funny, she was loving and she needed to wake the fuck up.

She was breathing.

She needed to start living.

And she was going to do it even if I had to kick her ass.

Yes, I was a badass biker babe and if my friend didn’t sort her shit, she’d answer to me.

On this thought, the bathroom door opened and my eyes went to it in the mirror to see Tack walking in wearing nothing but faded jeans and my dogtags hanging around his neck.

Mm. Nice.

My eyes dropped to his chest to see my ink on his upper ribs, under Tabby, close to his heart. The dogtags rested right next to it.

He had my tattoo done before I got out of the hospital.

On the inside of his right forearm was another new tattoo. A set of scales, unbalanced. The top scale had the word “Red” inked in killer lettering sitting on it and dripping over the sides were rivers of blood. The bottom scale had the word “Black” and drifting up was a ghostly, hooded, skull-faced reaper with eerie blue eyes and a scythe in his skeletal hand. The support holding the scales was made of the words, “Never Forget”.

Every member of Chaos had this tattoo. The “Red” was me and a reminder that I got out alive, but barely. The “Black” represented their fallen brother (whose last name, incidentally, was Black) who went down when they’d first instigated plans to pull themselves off the path of evil to strike out toward redemption. The message of the tattoo was a reminder that if they weren’t smart, the scales could unbalance and it wasn’t worth the loss of what was at stake.

Brothers and blood.

Nothing more important in life.

Not one thing.

Even Arlo and High got that tattoo. One could say what happened that day was a wakeup call. No money or adrenalin rush was worth what happened to their brother or Tack and me.

So all was good in the Club.

No, actually, all was good with everything.

Absolutely everything.

And it was about to get better.

My eyes lifted from my ink on my old man to catch his as he made his way to me. He held my gaze as he fitted his front to my back, one of his hands gliding along my arm to rest on mine at my belly. His other hand came up and wrapped around my throat.

He did this often. In fact, all the time. I knew what it meant and as the weeks wore into months and he kept doing it, it troubled me so I’d gently approached him about it.

“Don’t question it,” he’d replied just as gently. “Just give it to me when I think I need it.”

What could I say? They were his demons and he had to create his methods of coping. And this was one.

So I agreed and let it go.

As for me, the first thing I saw after waking up in the hospital which was also the last thing I saw every night before going to bed and the first thing I saw in the morning was my coping mechanism.

It was a hellish six hours and I couldn’t say I didn’t have dark moments when those hours drifted into my brain and haunted me.

What I could say was, once I made my way to Tack, he let in the light.

I watched him tip his head and felt the tickle of his goatee whisper against the skin of my shoulder before I felt his lips touch there and I melted back into him.

He lifted his head and again caught my eyes in the mirror.

“You’re quiet this mornin’,” he said softly.

“I’m pregnant,” I replied and felt his body go still behind mine but his fingers at my throat flexed and his hand over mine at my belly pressed deep.

We held each other’s gazes in the mirror for long moments before he whispered, “Say again?”

“I’m pregnant, handsome.”

His hand again pressed against mine at my belly as I watched his eyes flare.

Then both of his hands moved so his thumbs could hook into the sides of my panties and he yanked them down.

A tremor ran through me at this maneuver and the area between my legs instantly got wet.

Then Tack put his fingers to my hips and turned me to him, his mouth slammed down on mine and I got wetter. His tongue thrust into my mouth as my arms slid around his shoulders, his fingers clenched into my hips, jerking me up and I got even wetter.

My ass landed on the basin and my legs wrapped around his hips.

One arm tight around my back, his other hand roamed as he kissed me and I kissed him back. His hand slid over my side, my ribs, up and in, he found my nipple, caught it between thumb and finger and rolled.

I gasped into his mouth, my hips shifting on the counter to gain better access to his.

His hand instantly left my nipple and went between us.

“Fuck, please, be ready,” he growled against my lips as his hand worked his jeans.

“I’m ready, honey,” I breathed against his.

He kissed me again then he was inside me. I gasped in his mouth and my legs tightened around his hips. He leaned in, I went back and he braced one hand against the basin, the other arm still wrapped around me and he pounded in deeper and, better still, harder.

“Yes,” I whispered.

His arm around me jerked me slightly out from the basin so he had better access and I moaned as fire shot through me because this meant he could go even deeper and drive in way, way harder. I knew because he did just that.

He fucked me and kissed me as my hands moved on him, all over him, every inch I could get, fast, feverish but when I was close, one hand sifted in his hair and clenched as my other arm went around his back and squeezed.

“I’m there,” I gasped.

“No shit,” he muttered, I vaguely felt his mouth smile against mine but I was paying a lot more attention to the fact that I was coming.

He lasted a long time, I held him tight and he built it again so I climaxed again before he finally groaned in my mouth.

Except during my recuperation and after the cosmetic procedures, this hadn’t changed. Tack was always hungry for me. I was always greedy for him.

No. It had changed. It kept getting better and better.

His lips were working my neck and my hands were sliding over his skin when I turned my head and asked, “So, I’m taking it that was Kane ‘Tack’ Allen’s way of communicating he’s happy he knocked me up.”

Tack’s head came up and his lips surrounded by is badass biker goatee were smiling.

“Yeah, babe. That’s my way of communicatin’ I’m glad I got you knocked up.”

“Good,” I said softly.

His smile faded as his hand came up to my neck, palm under my ear, fingers in my hair behind it, thumb moving out to sweep the apple of my cheek.

God, I loved it when he did that.

His eyes watched his thumb move then they came to mine and I held my breath at what I saw.

“I got there,” he whispered.

“Where, baby?” I whispered back.

“God wouldn’t ‘a given me you and all you could give me growin’ inside you if I was not redeemed.”

My heart tripped and my belly flipped as I breathed, “Handsome,” lifting a hand to curl around the side of his neck and moving my head so my forehead was resting against his.

His soft words brushed against my lips and it was the sweetest touch he’d ever given me when he said, “I love you, Red.”

“I love you too, Tack.”

We held each other close, connected and savored the moment before he lifted his head and announced, “We got a party to get to, darlin’.”

He was not wrong.

He touched his lips to mine, pulled out gently and, still gentle, slid me off the counter and onto my feet. He held me close until my legs felt firm under me. Then he dropped his head and kissed my throat.

I closed my eyes.

Second sweetest touch he’d given me. Definitely.

I opened my eyes when Tack stepped away and adjusted his jeans. I turned to the basin and twisted on the taps to clean up.

All was right in the world and I knew this when Tack wandered out of the bathroom bossing, “Hurry up, babe. Takin’ the time to fuck you means we’re runnin’ late.”

My eyes to the reflection in the mirror of the door he disappeared through, I rolled them.

Then I cleaned up.

Back in my panties, I reached to my moisturizer but stopped.

We had pale yellow tile in our bathroom rimmed with thin tiles of white. I’d dumped Tack’s old, mismatched towels and added new, thick emerald green ones. They were hanging on the towel rack.

My eyes moved.

My moisturizer and toner bottles were the deep hued color of moss. My toothbrush was bright pink, Tack’s was electric blue. There was a little bowl by the tap where I tossed my jewelry when I was washing my hands or preparing for bed. It was ceramic painted in glossy sunshine yellow and grass green. My eyes went to the mirror. My undies were cherry red lace.

I grinned at myself in the mirror.

I lived in color, every day, and my life was vibrant.

I rubbed in moisturizer hoping our baby got his or her Dad’s sapphire blue eyes.

But I’d settle if they were my green.

Sitting on top of a picnic table outside the Compound in the warm, late June Colorado sun having a moment of alone time, I heard the clickety-clack of high-heeled shoes and my eyes turned to see Elvira bearing down on me.

And when they did, my lips curved into a smile.

Only Elvira would wear to a barbeque at a biker stronghold a tight, butter yellow, cleavage-baring, halter top dress with a pair of bronze sandals that were so fuck-me, even as a girl I would describe them as that.

She looked like she was about to step out to a trendy eatery not about to bite into a grilled brat.

With a grace borne of practice, she climbed up and sat her ass down beside me at the picnic table whereupon she announced, “Trouble’s a-brewin’.”

I felt my eyebrows draw together at this very strange yet totally Elvira opening. “Pardon?”

Her head tipped in the direction of something and my eyes moved there.

I saw Shy, now a full member of the Club, being Shy. That was to say he had on a pair of faded jeans that fit him all too well, a tight black t-shirt that also fit him all too well, his dark hair was a sexy mess, his mirrored shades were shoved on the top of his head and he was openly flirting with a young, attractive biker babe.

He was smiling at her and his smile was wicked.

She was also smiling at him and her smile was come hither.

Shy was clearly going to get him some. And from copious experience witnessing Shy in action my guess was, he was going to get that some and soon. Hell, just that week I’d seen him charm a woman who was buying wiper fluid in Ride into his bed in the Compound and he’d done it in ten point seven five minutes. I knew this because Hop and I had timed it.

Not a surprise and also not a rarity, not by a long shot. Thus I didn’t know what trouble was “a-brewin’” until I started to look away and my eyes caught on Tabby.

Oh boy.

She was standing about ten feet away. She was also looking at Shy and the way she was looking was like her entire world just came to an end.

This was not good.

Tabby had pulled her shit together. This didn’t mean she didn’t come home drunk once, as in drunk and puking all over the entryway. And this didn’t mean Tack didn’t lose his mind when she did and she didn’t get a lecture. But she was a teenager. That shit happened. Tack knew it and busted her chops but he didn’t go overboard.

Mostly, she was Tabby, sweet, cute, smart, charming. She and her Dad were tight. She and her brother were tight. And she and I were tight. She got good grades. She came home (mostly) by curfew. She dated boys of an appropriate age who only slightly scared the crap out of me seeing as they were all good-looking and players-in-training but were also totally into her. And it helped Tab’s Dad was a badass and he more than slightly scared the crap out of Tabby’s boyfriends.

But this wasn’t good. Not only because Tabby was seventeen and Shy, at twenty-two, was out of her league for at least another year but also because Shy was Shy. He was a dawg. He racked ‘em up and nailed them down so fast, if it could be recorded as a world record, it would.

And he was a brother. It was not as if Tack wasn’t aware of all this.

On this thought my eyes slid to my old man to see he was, indeed, aware of all this. All of it. I knew this because his face didn’t look happy and it didn’t look that way even though his eyes were covered by his own mirrored shades and those shades were pointed in the direction of Tabby and Shy. Tack had Mitch, Dog and Gwen’s father Bax standing close to him talking but I knew he wasn’t involved in the conversation.

His mind was on his girl. And his brother, the dawg.

Crap.

“’Cause ‘a Gwen then ‘cause ‘a you, I been to my fair share of these boys’ jamborees and it hasn’t escaped my notice that boy is fine,” Elvira stated at my side. “He’s rough, he’s young, he makes me feel like a cougar but that don’t mean that boy ain’t fine. So fine, a girl could convince herself she don’t mind he’s a player. ‘Love ‘em, leave ‘em’ could be tattooed across his chest and a girl could convince herself she don’t care just so she could see the weapon he’s packin’ in those faded jeans. May have been some time since you bitch-slapped your way to kicking that motherfucker’s ass, girlfriend, but I think your girl there has tastes that run toward heartbreak. And it looks like this is not lost your man and he’s not takin’ to it too good.”

Tack must have felt my eyes because his shades came to me. They locked with my eyes and then he slowly shook his head. We weren’t close but I still knew he blew out a sigh.

No, this was not lost on Tack.

“Makes matters worse,” Elvira kept talking and I tore my eyes from Tack’s shades and looked at her, “that boy won’t go down to no bitch slappin’, sister. He gets a whiff he’s got a go and she comes of age, you better arm yourself with more than pepper spray. I’m thinkin’… machete.”

“No way Shy would go there,” I informed her and her eyebrows went up.

“Girl, you crazy? She’s gorgeous and he’s on a mission to have a bedpost that’s made up ‘a nothin’ but notches.”

“She’s also his brother’s daughter. He won’t go there,” I told her authoritatively because I knew, Shy might be a dawg but he was also smart, a good guy and loyal and he’d rather cut off his own arm than disrespect Tack like that.

“Then your problem is her, ‘cause a girl don’t look that forlorn unless she’s in deep,” Elvira returned. “That ain’t no crush. She likes him, straight up.”

She was not wrong about that.

My eyes drifted to Tabby who had, fortunately, been engaged in conversation with Meredith, Gwen’s Mom, Roberta, a friend of Mara’s, Tracy and Camille.

“Oowee!” Elvira suddenly screeched, I jumped, twisted and saw Gwen approaching, her tiny, new baby Asher bundled in her arms. Elvira had both her arms extended, fingers wriggling. “Give me that little, cuddly, baby commando.” Gwen arrived, transferred Asher to Elvira who immediately cuddled him close to her chest, dipped her face to his and cooed, “Who’s gonna grow up, kick ass and take names? Who’s gonna be my little badass?”

“Elvira, stop putting ideas in his head,” Gwen ordered and Elvira kept Asher snuggled close to her substantial cleavage but her head snapped up.

“Girl, he can’t even cogitate. Calm down.”

“He’s Hawk’s. He has superhero powers. They’re latent, you can’t sense them, but they’re there. Trust me. Stop giving him ideas. He’s not going to grow up to be a commando. He’s going to grow up to be anything but a commando.” She looked to me. “I don’t know what that is. I also don’t care. Hawk being Hawk, I’m pretty certain every bullet in his arsenal is stamped with a male chromosome that will not be denied. I’m screwed. I already envision decades of living through fights, blood, drunkenness, puke and pregnancy scares. I don’t need to be finding assault rifles under beds and sitting on ninja stars that have fallen into my couch.”

Elvira lifted a hand to the side of baby Asher’s head, covering the whole of it but her target was his ear and I knew this when she snapped, “Gwen, shut yo’ mouth. If he don’t grow up commando, how’s he gonna make his fortune, make men quake in their boots and nail down his own fine piece of ass?”

Gwen’s eyes on Elvira bugged out then they went to the heavens. “Someone, deliver me. Or better yet, deliver Elvira. Maybe to China.”

“I don’t mind China,” Elvira told Asher in a baby-talk voice. “They got good food there and they created Jet Li. Now that’s a boy who knows his shit, Asher, and he’s got a kickass name. His Momma couldn’t ‘a made up a better name for a badass. With a name like that, only one route that boy could go down in life, the route straight to badass.” Her head came up and her eyes locked on Gwen before she finished, “Kinda like the name Asher Delgado.”

“My next boy I’m naming Nigel,” Gwen shot back.

“Ha!” Elvira hooted. “Like Hawk would allow that.”

“They’re boys, I get to name them. We have a pact,” Gwen retorted.

“Yeah, you make sure I’m around when you tell Hawk you’re gonna name his kid Nigel. We’ll see about that pact,” Elvira returned.

Gwen looked at me. “Are there weapons in the Compound?”

“Uh…” I mumbled, thinking there undoubtedly were.

“Never mind. Bullets mean questions. Poison, now, poison can go undetected,” Gwen muttered and I grinned.

Elvira dipped her head to whisper to Asher, “Mommy’s silly.”

Tess joined our party at this juncture, sitting at my feet on the bench seat of the picnic table.

“Hey girls,” she greeted.

She got greetings back from Gwen and Elvira with Elvira waving Asher’s little baby hand at her for good measure.

“Thanks for bringing that cake. It was awesome,” I told her.

“No problem,” she murmured, smiling at me.

“Yeah, well, you would know,” Elvira muttered. “Others of us not fast enough or experienced enough with the brethren didn’t get our asses in there to get our piece before the bikers fell on that shit like vultures. You would think those scary biker dudes never had a slice of cake in their lives. By the time I got there, not a crumb left. Not even a swipe of frosting on the plate.” She looked at Tess. “Means you owe me, girl.”

“Honey, I own two bakeries. You can walk in any time and get your fix,” Tess replied.

“Freebie?” Elvira asked.

“You’re the one who always insists on paying,” Tess said by way of answer.

“Well, you got mini-hot guys to raise. I don’t want to be the one who keeps you from keepin’ them clothed. ‘Specially now, seein’ as they’re of the datin’ age.”

Tess closed her eyes in despair at this thought and I knew why. Joel was already dating and Tess was already living her version of the threat of fights, blood, drunkenness, puke and pregnancy scares.

Elvira’s eyes drifted to the congregation in the direction of Joel and Rex who were both standing with Hawk, my Uncle Marsh and Aunt Bette, the visit of the latter two being why we were throwing this barbeque. “Shee-it, they’re growin’ like weeds. I reckon both ‘a them are gonna be taller than their Daddy. And it’s stamped all over them they’re gonna be just as hot.”

“Tell me about it,” Tess murmured, her eyes also on her boys.

I watched Brock walk to that particular huddle and when he got there, he lifted both hands, wrapped them around the backs of both his boys’ necks and, I suspected, he gave them a squeeze before he dropped his hands. After this move, both boys shifted slightly closer to their Dad, not close-close, but the invisible bond had tightened.

Then I watched Brock’s eyes scan the crowd and find Tess. He gave her a sexy smile before he turned away and gave his full attention to the huddle.

Watching this, my belly warmed.

Tack was a good Dad, a good man and a great husband.

I had that, what Tess had. And my kid would have that, what Brock gave his boys.

And I liked that.

Then it penetrated that something was happening. Bikers were moving, a word was drifting through then all the males were shifting toward the open tarmac. I spied Mitch carrying one of those big, long baseball bags, Bud striding beside him, Leo, Camille’s husband, next to Bud, Derek, LaTanya’s boyfriend, next to Mitch.

Holy crap.

Were bikers going to play a game of baseball?

Mara came in from the opposite side to where I was looking, sat on the bench seat by Elvira’s fuck-me shoes as her girl Billie climbed up behind her, got on her knees on the table and peered over Elvira’s shoulder to coo at Asher. At the same Tess’s best friend Martha came to stand beside Gwen.

“Mitch and Bud have struck up a game of baseball,” Mara announced and she smiled up at Gwen, “Not a surprise.”

Holy crap!

I stared as the men congregated.

Bikers were going to play a game of baseball.

“Does Bud sleep with a mitt on his hand?” Tess asked Mara.

“Close enough,” Mara answered.

I watched Mitch turn his head from the huddle and look toward Mara. Then I watched as he gave her a sexy grin too.

Well, I supposed if commandos and police detectives could show at a biker barbeque then bikers could play baseball.

My eyes drifted from Mitch to Brock to Hawk to Tack.

In the beginning, the woman posse took me under their wing.

But now, we were all family. And this wasn’t because Elvira was rabidly friendly.

No, it was because Hawk, Brock and Mitch stormed that house at Tack’s side. This meant, to Tack, they were different kinds of brothers. Not of blood. Not of the cut. But that bond was unshakable all the same.

It was on the more than occasional basis that I was out shopping, having coffee, drinks or dinner with one, several or all of the girls.

It was only occasional but not unheard of that Hawk, Brock and/or Mitch was sitting in the Compound having a beer.

Tack had made his statement. There was no going back now.

Not that I would want to.

Aunt Bette, Meredith, Roberta, Tabby, LaTanya, Tracy and Camille joined our klatch as did Sheila, Mitzi and the other old ladies.

“I take it this is the cheering section,” Aunt Bette noted.

“Seems to be,” Martha murmured.

“Right, before we gotta figure out who we’re cheering for, how ‘bout we get the important stuff outta the way?” Elvira suggested, I looked to her to see her eyes on me and she asked, “When you due?”

My body locked.

“Pardon?”

“Girl,” she said softly, “you’re surrounded by your girls. Do not think that contentment in your eyes is lost on us. The sun is shining. The food is good. The vibe is happy. But that look on your face don’t say sun, food and good company. It also don’t say you got yourself some. It says something a whole lot bigger. Make that vibe happier. When you due?”

I felt eyes hitting me from all around, primarily Aunt Bette’s and Tabby’s.

But Elvira was wrong. I had gotten myself some. I didn’t share that primarily because of Aunt Bette and Tabby.

Not surprisingly, Aunt Bette and Uncle Marsh had outwardly accepted Tack, his kids and my biker babe lifestyle. Though, considering shortly after I entered that world I’d been kidnapped and, later, stabbed five times, I didn’t know what they thought of it.

Nor did I know what they’d think of this added evidence that I was happily mired deep in it.

Still, because Elvira was nosy but she also was right, my girls were around me and outside of Tack (and his badass brothers) there was no safer place to be, I answered, “January.”

“Yee ha!” Elvira hooted, Asher jumping in her arms then his rosy baby lips gave a baby smile as all the women surrounding me cheered, whooped and I got hug after hug.

Tabby’s included her body giving a slight jerk as her breath gave a slight hitch and my arms giving her a not-so-slight squeeze.

My girl was happy she was getting a baby brother or sister. Or, maybe, it was just that my girl was happy for her Dad and me. Or, maybe, both.

My last hug was from Aunt Bette. It lasted the longest and it was the tightest.

“Sometimes it happens in weird ways,” she whispered before she let me go, “but dreams come true.”

Boy, Aunt Bette paid attention to e-mails.

I felt the sting of tears in my eyes and she let me go, looking away quickly and I gave her that play.

Okay, so, I guess Aunt Bette inwardly accepted Tack, his kids and my biker babe lifestyle too.

Good to know.

My dampening eyes found my old man’s.

He was standing, one arm thrown around Rush’s shoulders, but his attention was all on me and he was grinning his sexy grin at me.

Yes, I thought, sitting in the sun, my girls around me, holding his gaze, taking in his smile and carrying his child, Aunt Bette was absolutely right.

Sometimes it happens in weird ways that included fights, blood, drunkenness, kidnappings and pregnancies.

But dreams came true.

“It was good form, your brothers not pulling knives or shooting anyone when Mitch, Brock and Hawk’s team beat your team in baseball,” I noted, lying cuddled naked in bed with a naked Tack in his room in the Compound.

It was late. The barbeque was over. Aunt Bette and Uncle Marsh were at their hotel. Tab and Rush were at home. And Tack and I decided to keep partying in private.

“Lawson didn’t tell me he had a secret weapon,” Tack mumbled. “Fuck, you see that kid hit?”

“Yep.”

“Jesus,” Tack muttered. “Got an arm on him too. He’s only eleven.”

“I noticed that too.”

“And Lucas’s boys weren’t far behind him. Older, fuckin’ powerhouses.”

“Yep.”

“We didn’t stand a chance.”

“Nope.”

Tack fell silent.

I did too.

Then I broke it with, “Rush make his decision?”

Rush had graduated high school and Rush told his father he was thinking of joining Chaos. I was surprised this wasn’t a given but, for some reason, it wasn’t.

“Not yet.”

“What’s holding him back?”

“I don’t know, maybe our shit gettin’ a woman he cares about stabbed five times?”

My head popped up from his shoulder and I looked through the dark at his shadowed face.

“Me?”

“Only some shit you can shield your kids from, darlin’, my kids ain’t dumb and their mother had a big mouth that also was loud, both of those making it harder to shield them at all. They heard me and Naomi fightin’. They heard what it was about. Hard as I tried, bitch wouldn’t shut up. This only led to what happened to you. And, babe, you know Pipe went down.”

Only weeks after my drama, Naomi’s old man had gotten into his car, started it and got blown to smithereens. Lescheva might have been out but the Russians kept good books. They knew who owed them a debt and those kinds of debts got paid.

Elliott paid it.

Pipe Dahl paid it too.

Naomi didn’t waste time moving onto her next victim. She shacked up three months later with a biker in Boulder.

Rush saw her occasionally.

Tabby, never.

As for me, even though I never saw her, Boulder wasn’t far enough away. But it was something.

“Rush isn’t all fired up about Chaos,” Tack finished.

“But you’re not on that path anymore,” I pointed out.

“Darlin’, you got stabbed five times and his stepdad got dead.”

“Pipe dying had nothing to do with Chaos.”

“Not sure Rush sees it that way.”

“He couldn’t do better than the Club,” I announced heatedly and the air in the room went still but I ignored it and kept talking, “What’s he going to do? He loves cars. He’s great with them. You got him that bike for Christmas and every good day with clear roads we’ve had since then, he’s been on it. He knows everything about cars and bikes. And –”

“He couldn’t do better than the Club?” Tack cut me off to ask.

“Well, yeah. Brothers and blood. What’s more important than a lifetime of loyalty to both?”

“Jesus,” Tack murmured.

“What?” I asked.

“Jesus,” Tack repeated.

“What?” I repeated too and his hand came up and cupped my jaw.

“Your what is that those layers keep strippin’ off, baby. And sometimes, when they do, what’s uncovered shines out so bright, it takes the wind out of me.”

His words took the wind out of me.

Tack went on, “This mornin’, you gave me one of the most precious gifts a woman can give her man. And now, you just gave me another one.”

What did I do?

“I…” I faltered then asked, “How did I do that?”

“I claimed you into my world and then you gave me you. But, Red, me claimin’ you and you existing in my world is one thing. You accepting it is another.”

Oh, that’s what I did.

My body relaxed into his and his hand slid from my jaw into my hair as I pointed out, “I took my place in it a long time ago, honey.”

“You love me, you love my kids, you feel deep for my brothers but until now, I didn’t know you also loved the life.” His hand in my hair pulled me close so he could touch my mouth to his before he let me back an inch and finished, “And that’s a gift, baby. One that means the world to me. Thank you.”

Ohmigod!

I was thinking I just heard Tack say, “thank you”.

“Did you just say ‘thank you’?” I asked in order to confirm.

“Spoke English, babe.”

“You just said ‘thank you’.”

A pause before he muttered, “Now she’s bustin’ my balls.”

“I am not!” I snapped.

“Now she’s servin’ up attitude.”

Well, I was doing that.

“Give me a break, handsome, I’ve been with you just shy of a year and in that time I’ve been kidnapped, I kicked ass twice, I was stabbed, got married and you got me pregnant. Through all that, you’ve not once said ‘thank you’ to me. Even when I got that mammoth parts order right without having to ask you a single question. Let me savor the moment.”

“Yeah, I was savoring that moment too and that moment was tender until you got feisty.”

“Uh… you pledged your troth to me, Tack. It’s not like you don’t know I get feisty.”

“I pledged my troth,” Tack repeated.

“Yeah.”

“You just said I pledged my troth.”

“Yes, that’s what I just said.”

“What’s a troth?”

“I don’t know, I just know you pledged it.”

I heard and saw Tack shake his head on his pillow then he stated, “Babe, advice. A man expresses his gratitude, you do not throw attitude. You kiss him and, maybe, suck his dick to show your appreciation.”

Okay, now we were back to the Tack I knew.

“I think I’ve already cemented my biker bitch status, Tack, this very conversation being evidence of that. Lessons are no longer necessary.”

“Right, then, how about you get busy suckin’ my dick ‘cause I want you to?”

That went through me like a hot knife through butter and my legs shifted.

“Always greedy,” he muttered.

“Like you don’t like it,” I muttered back.

“Hard to talk, you got a mouth full of my cock,” Tack remarked.

That went through me too.

“Quit turning me on when I’m feeling feisty,” I snapped.

“Red, best time to turn you on is when you’re feeling feisty.”

This was true.

“Babe,” he prompted when I made no move then, “Tyra,” he prompted again when I still made no move.

“Oh, all right. I’ll get busy.”

“Obliged,” he muttered, a smile in his voice but his hand didn’t leave my hair to let me get down to business. It pulled me close so my mouth was touching his. “Think about this, darlin’, before you go down on me and brace, baby, ‘cause I’m about to get sweet and you need to process it fast so you can move on to suckin’ me off, not fast.”

As requested, I braced but I also held my breath.

Tack didn’t delay in trumping the best sweet he’d ever given me. Something he did often. Something his words proved I’d never get used to.

“I thank you for helpin’ me make that baby inside you. I thank you for takin’ your place in my world and likin’ it. I thank you for bein’ a good stepmom to my kids and givin’ Tab what she needed and never had. And I thank you most of all for bein’ you, givin’ as good as you get in all the ways you can, makin’ sure my life is never boring and makin’ sure I go to bed content and wake up happy to face the coming day.”

My throat closed because my heart swelled so big it took up my entire chest but I didn’t get a chance to start crying because Tack kissed me. I did give a little sob into his mouth before I got over it and decided to concentrate on kissing him back.

After that, I got down to business.

Tack

Tyra was out, her body heavy against his when Tack gently rolled her to her back.

He rolled into her and, as he’d done countless times since that day, his hand moved over her skin.

The scars were gone but their memory remained. He knew each location where the knife plunged into her flesh and he ran his fingers across the skin he’d paid a fucking mint to make smooth again.

And, as always, he ended the journey of his hand at her throat.

Resting lightly there so as not to wake her, he let her pulse beat into his fingers and he did it until it washed the memories away.

But this night and the ones to follow for the next seven months, the path of his hand didn’t end there as it usually did.

It moved down to her belly.

And into the darkness, to his sleeping woman, he whispered, “You don’t know this, baby, but some men have dream women too.”

Since she was asleep, for once, Tyra Allen had no reply.

Palm flat against his woman’s warm, soft skin, Kane Allen settled into his wife in the bed in the room where they started and he fell asleep.

Seven months later, Rider Allen was born.

And the first thing Tack did was wrap two fingers around his throat.