Feeling nervous but surprisingly confident, I descended the stairs, happily inhaling the smells of my mouthwatering meal as I breezed past the kitchen and turned left to enter the living room.
Both Hawk and Christopher were utterly immersed in whatever video game they were playing, their eyes glued to the television screen while their fingers worked the controllers with swift and sure movements.
I stared at them for a moment, just drinking in the sight of father and son, knowing this was the last time for a long time that they would be able to just be together in this way. It made me incredibly sad to think that another of my children would grow up without their father.
Hawk and I had both tried our best to let Christopher know what was coming, without giving away the grittier aspect of things. Although the time would soon come when he would be visiting his father in jail, neither of us wanted to taint Christopher with the brutal details of his father’s past. And while Christopher had become upset hearing that his father would no longer be coming for visits, he didn’t truly understand, and both Hawk and I decided to leave well enough alone for the time being.
“Mom!” Christopher exclaimed, dropping his controller into his lap. His eyes widened into big green saucers as he took in my appearance. “You look so pretty!”
I smiled at my son, but my attentions were soon diverted to Hawk, who had also released his controller and was raking me over with his eyes.
He looked surprised, but even more he appeared . . . turned on.
Despite the heat of the room, his unspoken thoughts caused icy-hot shivers to race along my skin, leaving trails of gooseflesh in their wake. He was more than aware of my reaction to him, aware of his effect on me, and I watched with the utmost delight as those unfathomably dark eyes grew even more opaque, as the swell of his muscles grew strained, as his body tightened with need, the sight of which was holding my eyes and my body hostage, frozen like a deer in the spotlight of his hungry gaze.
It was a look I hadn’t seen since we’d both been in our twenties, a heavy look, one laden with hidden meaning and secret emotion, both of us despairing over different things and secretly using each other to soothe the desperate burning inside us.
But this time it was different.
This wasn’t a secret look.
This was all for me, for all the world to see.
All for him.
All for me. All for me.
I stared at him, my thoughts and body afire as he mouthed the words, You’re beautiful. And I could have sworn I felt his breath, cool against my overheated body, cascading over my skin, causing it to ripple and pebble with gooseflesh all over again.
“Dinner’s ready,” I whispered hoarsely, then lifted my hand to my throat, to the necklace that I never took off, surreptitiously hiding the large swallow of emotion that had welled up within me.
Christopher leaped off the couch and bounded past me while Hawk remained unmoving, his eyes still on me.
“I don’t wanna go,” he said softly, surprising me.
Those words, so full of raw emotion, caused a tidal wave of pain to come crashing over me, coursing through me at an alarming rate.
Its impact on my heart was devastating.
He looked so vulnerable, so unlike any way he’d ever looked before, that I couldn’t stop myself. I rushed forward, dropping onto the couch beside him and wrapping my arms around his neck.
“Let’s leave,” I whispered frantically against the soft cotton of his T-shirt. “Let’s just go, run away. We could move somewhere remote, where no one would ever find us. We could be a family.”
His body heaved as a heavy breath fled his chest, and in that breath I heard his answer. We wouldn’t be leaving, or running. We wouldn’t be together.
“D,” he said gently. “I’ve been hidin’ most of my life. I don’t wanna hide anymore.”
“I can’t lose you,” I whimpered. “Not after I just got you back.”
“Someday,” he whispered, sliding his arm behind my back and pulling me into a one-armed hug. “I’m going to finally take you for that ride. Just you and me, D. Me wearing my cut, you with all that red hair flying in the wind. Both of us finally out in the wide fuckin’ open. No more hidin’.”
And after hearing that, there was no way on earth I was going to make it through a three-course meal without crying.
I fell apart for what felt like the millionth time, ruining all my carefully applied makeup, smearing it all over Hawk’s T-shirt as I clutched him so tightly my knuckles began to throb.
“I want tonight to last forever,” I whispered brokenly.
Because it had to last forever, or at least for the next ten years.
• • •
The last three weeks had been full of surprises, the biggest of which Hawk had thought was him and Dorothy finally coming together.
He’d been so fucking wrong.
The biggest surprise was just . . . Dorothy.
With as much rational thought as he could manage while being slowly ridden by the beautiful woman on top of him, he stared up at her in wonder.
The dress’s halter top was pooled around her waist, leaving her breasts exposed. Her body was arched, hands clutching his knees, and her head was thrown back, making the tips of her long red hair brush the tops of his thighs. With closed eyes and parted lips, she ground back and forth over him in a maddening, painstakingly, yet magnificently slow pace.
She was not the same woman he’d fallen in love with. But he was pretty sure he loved who she’d become even more.
And he was insanely terrified that he was going to lose her again.
She’d promised him over and over again that she would wait. But he didn’t expect her to wait, to be alone for years. She’d already been alone for far too long, and he wanted her happy.
Even if that meant she’d be happy without him.
Of course, he’d never in a million fucking years voice his feelings to her or anyone else on earth. Because as much as he wanted her happy, he wanted her waiting at those gates when he was finally able to rejoin the world.
It was selfish. Hawk knew that.
But he’d always been selfish when it came to this woman. He might have let her be, but he’d never given her up or really truly ever left her side.
He’d always been right there, whether she wanted him there or not.
And now that she wanted him there, for good this time, to make something solid out of their choppy history . . .
He was going to be fucking selfish.
Even locked up, he was going to be selfish.
With one hand under the skirt of her dress, clutching her hip, he reached up with the other and cupped her breast, lifting and squeezing the soft flesh. In response she moaned loudly, her breathing grew more uneven, her movements sped up, becoming less rhythmic and jerkier than before.
“Faster,” he rasped.
She tried to do as he asked but she was beginning to waver, her body quaking as she reached the beginnings of an orgasm. Releasing her breast to grab her other hip, he gripped her tightly and despite the pain in his leg his movements were causing, thrust his hips upward, over and over again, as fast as he could manage until he too was finishing with her.
As he released inside her, staring up her beautiful body, he was struck with most profound sense of homecoming. Maybe he hadn’t realized it back then, when he’d first set his sights on her, how much this woman would come to mean to him, but he knew it now.
Breathing hard, blinking rapidly, Dorothy released his legs and straightened above him. Her hair, the way it fell forward covering her breasts; her eyes, the way they shone even in the dim light; her lips, plumped from her own biting, glossy from licking them; her body, the way it curved like a woman’s should, soft in all the right places—he took it all in, taking his time in order to capture it all, to memorize every inch of her.
Just like this.
This was how he wanted to remember her.
“Fucking hel
l, woman,” he said hoarsely, unable to stop the words, unable to keep himself from letting it out. “I fuckin’ love you.”
Her eyes caught his, her lips slowly curved into a smile that, sure as shit, was sexy as hell.
Yeah. This was how he wanted to remember her.
This was what would get him through.
Chapter Twenty-Two
For Jase, finding a house to rent hadn’t been difficult. Neither had filling it with the minimal furniture he had brought with him.
And after Deuce had called in a favor at the local auto body shop in town, obtaining employment had been a piece of fucking cake.
What hadn’t been easy was having to say good-bye to everyone. Even Hawk, despite his scowl, had shaken Jase’s hand. During the party, he’d come to find out that it was Hawk who was leaving, was turning himself over to the law in order to take down the Russians blackmailing Deuce and Preacher. Despite how he felt about Hawk and Dorothy being together, you couldn’t hate a man who would sacrifice his own life for the good of the club.
In a way, Jase felt like Hawk had everything Jase never had. The woman they both loved belonged to Hawk, the respect of everyone in the club belonged to Hawk, and whereas Jase had left the club behind, Hawk would never. Even in the face of his imprisonment.
He was a far better man than Jase would ever be, as well as being a better father than Jase would ever be.
Hawk deserved both Dorothy and the club.
And Jase deserved . . .
Well, he didn’t know what the fuck he deserved, but his father’s words had been playing on repeat over and over in his head. He only had one life to live, he only had this one life to make things right, and, Jesus Christ, he was going to do his damnedest to do just that.
His first week in town had been quiet, and other than watching his girls from afar, he’d left them alone. The twins lived together in a large apartment building not far from the college they were attending, but Maribelle lived alone in a studio apartment above an antiques store. Unlike the twins she was often alone, her only social interaction with the customers at a nearby café where she worked.
Several days in a row after work, Jase had stood across the street, hidden by his heavy winter wear, just watching her through the foggy glass windows of the café. While she might smile at the people she was waiting on, Jase knew it was fake and forced. Maribelle, when she was truly happy, showed her teeth when she smiled. These smiles looked almost painful, her lips pressed tightly together, her brow furrowed and pinched. And the dimple he knew to be on the left side of her cheek never once revealed itself.
Unlike the twins, who were happily behaving as most college students do and seeming to have a booming social life, Maribelle had shut down. No longer was she the ambitious girl she’d once been, peppy and spunky, and who’d graduated from college with honors. Ignoring her degree, she’d become a waitress, and had taken to hiding from the world instead of participating in it. He could only attribute her downward spiral to the many responsibilities she’d been laden with after her mother had gone to jail. Taking care of the twins, being the mother they no longer had, as well as keeping up with Chrissy’s legal matters, Maribelle had forgotten to take care of herself.
He could have gone straight to the twins. Without Maribelle around to influence them, he didn’t doubt he’d at least get them to hear what he had to say, but it was Maribelle who was suffering the most, and going behind her back to her sisters wouldn’t earn him any favors with her.
It was Maribelle’s love and respect he needed to win back first, and then the twins would follow.
And so, on his seventh day in town, he decided to finally show his face. Once he’d parked his truck across the street from where she worked, he tried desperately to clean the grease from his hands. After succeeding in wiping most of it onto his coveralls, he took a glimpse in the rearview mirror at himself. Gone was the good-looking, cocky son of a bitch he’d once been. He was looking his age lately, older and infinitely more tired. Most days he went without shaving, and he hadn’t gotten around to getting a haircut in quite a while.
Sadly, he was beginning to look the part of a man who’d lost everything.
The bells on the door jingled as he pushed it open, and everyone in the small café turned to look at him, even Maribelle. Standing beside a small round table with two seated customers, she was wearing a small black apron, her hair pulled back in a ponytail, and she had a pen and pad of paper in her hand. In the process of scribbling something down when she’d heard the bells, she glanced up and then back down, instantly dismissing him.
As she went back to writing on her pad, Jase’s heart started to pound in his chest. He was entertaining the thought of turning around, his tail tucked between his legs, when her head snapped back up. Her eyes looked him over, from head to toe and back up again, before growing wide with surprise.
Grabbing the bill of his ball cap, Jase pulled it from his head, ran a hand through his messy hair, and gave his daughter a small smile.
Looking bewildered, Maribelle glanced back down at her customers, said a few words that Jase couldn’t make out, and began making her way toward him. He watched as she walked, her steps unsure and small, and remembered instead the little girl who used to come barreling down the driveway when he’d come home from a reserves weekend or a long run with the club.
Stopping in front of him, she tucked her pen into the base of her ponytail and shoved her notepad into the front of her apron.
“What are you doing here?” she asked quietly. “And why are you wearing that?” She gestured to his coveralls.
“Been workin’ at Pop’s a few blocks thataway,” he said, jerking his thumb over his shoulder. “Doin’ custom work and shit.”
Maribelle’s caramel-colored eyes grew even wider. “Why?” she whispered. “I mean, what? Do you live here now?”
Clutching his hat in front of him, Jase twisted the mesh material, beginning to feel uneasy. He could almost envision the very loud, very public scene she would make if the knowledge that he’d moved to her town rubbed her the wrong way. And he didn’t want to get her fired because of him. If that happened, it would just be one more thing he would have to try to make right, and the list was already too long as it was.
So he changed tactics.
“Left the club,” he said, keeping his voice low and hoping she’d take the hint and do the same. “Moved here to try and make shit right.”
“You left the club,” she repeated dumbly, staring blankly up at him. “You left the club you’ve been a part of your entire life, that you’ve always chosen above everything else, even your own family?”
Jase’s knuckles cracked as the grip on his hat tightened. Yeah, he was a crappy dad. And he deserved every single piece of shit she was going to fling his way.
“Yeah,” he said hoarsely, “but I ain’t been there my whole life, there was something I did before the club, somethin’ I was, that was a fuck of a lot more important than a club. Took me a while to figure it out, Belle, but I was a father first and I wanna be your father again.”
Uncomfortable silence filled the small space between them, during which Jase could practically feel the rejection that was sure to come, when suddenly Maribelle’s gaze dropped to the floor, her lips twisting and flattening. He knew that look. That was the look his little girl made when she was trying not to cry.
“Belle,” he said softly. “I didn’t come here to upset you. Just wanted you to know how much I love you and your sisters. Just wanted a chance to be a family again.”
“You just expect me to forgive you?” she whispered, still blinking. A drop fell from her lowered eyelashes and onto the floor near her sneakers. “Just because you quit the club and moved to my town, I’m just supposed to forget? Just like that?”
“No,” he said, wishing he could pull her into a hug, wishing that things were simple again, that his girls were still little and all their hurts easily fixed with just a little bit of love.
> “I’m not expectin’ anything,” he said. “Was just maybe hopin’ for the chance to try . . .”
When she didn’t respond, Jase took her silence as his cue to leave. Putting his cap back on, he pulled the bill down low and cleared his throat.
“I’ll leave you alone now,” he whispered. “You ever want to talk, I’m living on Forest Street. Got that little white house on the corner.”
He turned to go, feeling sick and suffocated by the disappointment quickly filling him, when he felt a light touch on his bicep.
“Wait,” Maribelle said.
Turning back around, he found her eyes on him, filled with unshed tears. “I have a break coming up,” she said, swallowing hard.
Jase couldn’t believe it, that she was actually letting him in, and despite himself, he smiled at her. A real, goddamn, genuine fucking smile.
“Great,” he said, his voice cracking. “’Cause your old man would love to buy you a cup of joe.”
Despite her tears, Maribelle snorted. “You sound like Grandpa.”
As his daughter walked off, Jase finished stomping off the snow from his boots before heading to the back of the café to find a quiet place to sit. While he waited for Maribelle to join him, he couldn’t help but think that sounding like his old man, or even being like his old man, something he’d never thought of as a compliment before, was just about the very best thing he’d ever heard.
A cup of coffee appeared in front of him as Maribelle took the seat opposite him. Placing her hands in her lap, she glanced up at him.
“So,” she said softly. “What should we talk about?”
Reaching for his coffee, wrapping his had around the warm mug and feeling the same sort of warmth beginning to spread within him, Jase shrugged.
“Everything,” he said. “I want to know everything.”
The road to redemption might be damn hard, but in the end—if you reached the end—his father was right. It was worth it.