Recklessly Rogue (Royals Gone Rogue #4)

28. Henry

Chapter 28

Henry

B right and early on Monday morning, I walk into Big Dick’s with a huge smile.

Then stop short and frown.

What the hell ?

Christopher is coming toward me.

“What are you?—”

But April steps up next to him. “Hey, Henry.”

I turn my frown from Christopher to her. “What’s going on?”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not.”

“It really is. We’re just talking about a plan,” she insists.

“I don’t like him being here.”

“I’m leaving,” Christopher says shortly.

“Good. Don’t come back,” I say firmly.

He looks at April.

“I’ll talk to him,” she assures him.

“You are not welcome here,” I tell Christopher.

He nods. “I know. I just stopped by because I want to work something out.”

“You are not going to harass April here. Or anywhere,” I add. “But this place is absolutely off limits.”

“So I’ve been told,” Christopher says. He glances over his shoulder.

I follow his gaze to the table in the middle of the room where our regulars are sitting. But today there are three newcomers with them.

I know those new guys. Those are three of the men from the coffee shop. The churchgoing, “live right” guys. The ones I invited here.

“I’ll think about what you said,” April tells Christopher.

“Fine.” He nods once, then pushes through the door and leaves.

“What are they doing here?” I ask April, inclining my head toward the table of older men drinking coffee and eating cinnamon rolls.

“They said you invited them here to watch game shows and talk about church.”

“I did not say they could talk about church.” I swear to God, if they brought Christopher here, heads are going to roll.

“All they did was ask Will if he remembers church camp. He said yes, Paul asked if he remembered the verse about just a few people gathering in God’s name. Will said yes and that he also knows the one about removing the plank from your own eye before worrying about the speck in someone else’s.” She shrugs. “I don’t really know those verses, but they were all nodding, then shook hands and all sat down together.”

That all sounds like some strange religious forgiveness ceremony.

I study the group. They seem happy. They’re talking, even chuckling. As I suspected, there are new stories to be told and new gossip to be shared.

Will, Charles, Ben, and Michael are smiling. Even Dan is there and isn’t scowling.

That’s good enough for me. “By the way, their cinnamon rolls are free.”

She smiles. “They told me that too. Anyway ,” April continues. “Christopher showed up this morning, asking if he can come out here to have lunch with Elliot a few times a week. He found out from the church guys that they’re going to be coming here, and he thought maybe I’d agree if they were here to supervise.” She points. “Randy—that’s the guy in the gray shirt next to Charles—is Christopher’s dad’s best friend. He said he would personally ensure that Christopher is on his best behavior. Or he said I could choose one of our guys to supervise. Randy also said if I didn’t want Chris here, he’d throw him out himself.”

I open my mouth to reply, but she’s not done.

“Randy said they’re not trying to convince me to take him back. They just want Chris to have some time with Elliot a couple of days a week. But they also want Chris to know that his behavior is unacceptable and because of that, he can only see us in public.”

I blow out a breath. “I don’t like that they’re using this opportunity out here to help Christopher get close to Elliot again.”

She nods. “I called Cecelia to see what she thought of it.”

“You did?” That surprises me. “Not Mandy?”

“Mandy’s sweet. Kind. Generous. Cecelia is tougher and no bullshit.” April smiles. “They’re all amazing, but in different ways.”

“What did Cecelia say?”

“That Chris can have lunch with Elliot, but she is going to come out and supervise.”

I smile. I like that solution.

“But generally, she thought it would be okay,” April goes on. “She said it would look good for me to be cooperating as much as I can when we go to court. And she likes the idea that all of these people are watching Christopher, and he knows it. And she was surprised, but happy, to know that the church guys were not just all on Christopher’s side. She likes knowing that these men she’s known all these years are who she hoped they were.”

I look over at the table. The men are all visiting, and there isn’t a Bible in sight. The game shows haven’t started yet, but these guys showed up anyway. Maybe they really do want to see if some of these relationships can be repaired.

That’s what I wanted.

I wanted my guys to see that they’re not outcasts.

“Okay. I just don’t want them to come in here and take over,” I say.

April nods. “Me either. But our people are very protective of this place. I don’t think that will happen. And I also heard that there are going to be fewer Live Right sessions in town this week.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. These guys aren’t having theirs at the coffee shop, and it sounds like they’ve talked to some other people and they’ve decided they’re sick of it too. I know of at least three that are taking a break this week.” April shrugs. “And Cecelia has been talking non-stop about the church and how they were part of turning that big grant down and saying that doesn’t sound very much like Jesus to her. She’s told her knitting club, her feral cat club, her wine club, and her origami club.”

“Cecelia’s in a lot of clubs,” I comment. She was the perfect choice to bring into my take-down-the-mega-church plan.

“She is.” April laughs. “People find her to be…a lot. But you can’t help but overhear her and, I don’t know, she plants seeds, you know?”

I definitely know.

“Those seem like small things, but it’s amazing how just one person can take a little action that starts a ripple that grows, isn’t it?” April asks.

Those words hit me harder than she intended, I’m sure.

It is amazing.

Over and over again, I’ve witnessed one person do seemingly small things that change the course of everything.

“Hey, I need to tell you something,” I say.

“Okay.”

“I’m moving to New Orleans. With Ruby.”

April’s face falls. “Oh. When?”

“Today. Tonight. Ruby is already there. I’m leaving this afternoon.”

April’s eyes fill with tears. “Oh.”

“I know you’re going to miss her,” I say quickly. “But she’s going to law school. She’s got a huge opportunity to do amazing things. She’s going to be so great at that.”

April nods. “For sure. That’s perfect for her.” She takes a shaky breath. “I’m just going to miss this place. And these people. Especially now that all of these things are coming together.”

Oh, shit. I handled that badly. “I’m not shutting Dick’s down,” I tell her. “In fact, I want you to manage it for me.”

April frowns. “Wait, what?”

“You know more about this place and these people than I do anyway,” I tell her. “I’m going to make you the manager. Full benefits, big raise.”

She wipes at her eyes. “Wh—what?”

“You’ll be in charge of the day-to-day. In fact, if you want to, we can arrange a situation where part of your benefits is a slow buy-in over time. Eventually you can be a co-owner with me. Or maybe even someday buy me out. Or, if you don’t want that and you’ve got your eyes set on something else, or somewhere else, that’s fine too.” I hand her the credit card I got in her name a few days ago. This was my plan even before I decided to move to New Orleans. It’s ridiculous for her to not run the place. “But until then, I want you to run Big Dick’s.”

April stares down at the credit card. “But…” She looks up at me. “Really?”

“Really. You can do whatever you want. I want to do some expansion and renovation at the back, for the kids, but I’ll show you all of that. If you don’t like it, we can do something else.”

Suddenly, she throws herself at me. I barely have enough time to react to spread my arms before she’s hugging me around the waist, her face buried in my chest. “Oh my God!” she exclaims against my shirt. “Oh my God! ”

I smile and pat her back.

After a few seconds, she pulls back. “Thank you, Henry. I promise I’ll do a good job.”

“I’m absolutely certain of that.”

“Everything okay over here?”

I look over to see Will, Ben, Dan, Michael, and Charles all watching us. They wear a combination of expressions from curious to protective.

That’s exactly how I want them to look about April.

April spins to face them with a huge grin. “Henry just made me the manager of the bar!”

All of their faces relax into smiles.

“Of course he did, honey,” Will says.

“Good for you, sweetheart,” Ben says.

“Good call,” Michael tells me.

“She’ll do a good job,” Dan says.

I nod. “I know she will. And you guys will be here to help, right?”

“Every day,” Charles says.

“Can I ask you to look out for Cian and Scarlett and Mariah too?” I ask them. “Ruby and I are going to be in New Orleans for a couple of years while she goes to law school.”

“Good for her,” Will exclaims. “That girl is so smart and sassy. She’ll be a great lawyer.”

I grin and feel a surge of pride. I couldn’t agree more. “She’ll miss all of you.”

Will waves that away. “She knows where to find us. She can come visit any time.”

“You tell her she’d better,” Ben adds.

“I will. And you’ll look out for Cian and Scarlett?”

“Of course,” Will says.

They all nod.

I chuckle. “Let me guess, you’re first cousins with their late stepdad, right?”

Will laughs. “Nah. We don’t have any family connection.”

The other men shake their heads.

“We just really like Scarlett. And Ruby,” Ben says.

“And Mariah,” Dan says.

“And Cian,” Michael adds.

Damn, I’m going to have to make their morning coffee free here too.

“Thank you. And I hope you all know that I’m only a phone call away if any of you ever need anything. I’ll do whatever I can. And I have a lot of resources.”

Will nods. “We appreciate that.”

“I thought you said Ruby was already in New Orleans,” April says.

“She is. We both were this weekend, but I came back to tie a few things up.”

“Uh…” April points to something over my shoulder.

I turn. And my heart skips.

“Ruby?” I start toward her immediately.

She’s standing just inside the door.

In flannel pajamas.

The set is light blue with little fat sheep all over them.

“You’re wearing flannel pajamas. In August. In a bar,” I say as I come to stand directly in front of her.

She nods. “It would have been fine if you’d been at the house in bed like I expected.” She lifts her arms out to her sides, then lets them drop. “But I have to tell you, these didn’t work worth a crap.”

She looks bloody adorable. From the top of her gorgeous head with her hair pulled back in a ponytail to the tips of her toes that are currently hidden by fuzzy light blue slippers.

“What didn’t?”

“I was sitting in that gorgeous apartment in a city I love, lonely and sad. So I ordered flannel pajamas. You said those would make me feel better. Comforted.” She takes a breath. “But you know what happened when they showed up and I put them on? All they did was make me realize that I screwed up.”

“You ordered the wrong ones?” I ask.

God, I love her so much. I know exactly what she’s telling me here, but I want to let her say it.

“No. I realized that you are my flannel pajamas, Henry.”

Okay, I didn’t expect her to say it like that. My throat tightens and my heart feels like it swells in my chest. “I am?”

She nods. “ You make me feel better. You comfort me. You make me a better person. You lift me up. When you were dropped off at school and could have used pajamas, it’s because you had lost what comforted you and you couldn’t get it back. When April and Elliot needed pajamas, it was because they had left the comfort of home and what was familiar, and couldn’t go back. But then you found “pajamas”,” she says, making air quotes with her fingers. “With Alfred, and then the O’Gradys, and then the Landrys. And you helped April and Elliot find “pajamas” by surrounding them with good, happy things, and the community here at Dick’s rallied around them.” She takes a deep breath and takes a tiny step forward. “The thing is…I don’t need to leave what comforts me. I don’t need pajamas to make me feel better. Because I have you. I just need to be with you.” She takes a breath and blows it out. “And I can be.”

She steps forward again until she’s directly in front of me and tips her head back to meet my gaze. “I can be with you, so why would I choose to not be?”

I lift a hand and cup her face. “Because of law school. Because you want to do more. Because you should do more.”

She shakes her head. “I want to be a lawyer so I can help people. I can get my law degree at Ohio State and help people. It’s ridiculous to think I need to be in New Orleans.”

“But—” I start.

She keeps going. “What am I trying to prove? That I can do it? Of course I can do it. I know that. You know that. Everyone who knows me knows I can do it. That I can be on my own? Sure, okay. What’s that prove? I’m so fucking lucky to have so many people to love and who love me. Why do I want to be on my own?” She reaches up and grasps my wrist. “I don’t want to be away from you. We can have it all…the jobs that matter to us and the people that matter to us and each other. I’m not going to give that up.”

“Okay, that’s it,” I say.

I bend, cup her ass with both hands and pick her up. She wraps her arms and legs around me and buries her face in my neck.

I turn with her in my arms and realize we have an audience.

“We need a minute,” I tell them.

I stride toward the small room behind the bar that’s used as an office. I kick the door shut behind us, and sink into the office chair, with her legs straddling my thighs. I grasp both her thighs, squeezing gently.

“Okay, let’s talk,” I tell her.

She hugs me again, then pulls back. She smiles at me and lifts a hand to my cheek. “There’s nothing more to talk about. I love you, Henry. I just want to be with you wherever you are.”

“I love you too. And I just want to be with you. I was on my way to the airport from here. I said goodbye to Cian, Scarlett, and Mariah last night. I was going to be with you tonight.” I squeeze her thighs. “For good.”

She stares at me. “Really? For…good?”

“Do you really think you can get rid of me now?”

She smiles. “God, I hope not.” She suddenly flings her arms around my neck again. “Oh God, Henry! I love you!” She pulls back just as suddenly. “But I’m not going to make you leave Cian.”

“Well, we can stay here if you really want to but…”

She arches her brows. “But?”

“I think we’re going to be bored here.”

She laughs in surprise. “What?”

I nod, my grin growing. “We did too good of a job. They’re all fine. They’re taking care of each other. They don’t need us.”

She seems to think that over. “Oh. Well, that’s good. But we could stay here and just… relax?”

I snort. She grins.

We are not the type to relax. Not for longer than maybe a week on a gorgeous private beach somewhere.

“We could,” I say. “Or we could go to a new city and find some new people who need us.”

Her eyes get a little shiny, but she nods. “Yeah. We could do that.”

“I think we should do that.”

“That sounds really good.”

“Let’s go to our new apartment, Gem. Right now. I want to fuck you in every single one of those rooms tonight .”

I feel the little shiver that goes through her.

“Okay.”

“Come on. Let’s go get your stuff and leave. My bags are already in my car, and the plane is on standby.”

“My stuff?” she asks.

“Your suitcase.”

She spreads her arms. “I didn’t bring a suitcase.”

“What?” I laugh.

“I called Jonah and asked if he could get me here. He said yes, he could get me a charter, but I had to get to the airport right away. So I called Sammy and he came to get me. It was super early this morning. You know I’m not a morning person. I just got in the car and then got on the plane.”

I love that she knew she could call Jonah. I love that he made this happen. I love that Jonah didn’t tell me that she’d called him for help. Then again, it had to have been around three in the morning. “You went to the airport in your pajamas?” I asked.

“It’s a private plane,” she says with a shrug. “And I was coming straight to the house to see you.” She laughs. “I didn’t think I’d be in public.”

“This bar with those people out there isn’t really public.”

She smiles at that.

I run my hands over the soft flannel. “I like them.”

“They’re cute,” she agrees. “But they’re really hot. I mean temperature hot. I’m sweating.”

I laugh. This woman always makes me happy, lighter, better. “Let’s go.” I stretch to my feet and let her slide down my body. “I’ll help you out of those pajamas on the plane.”

“I don’t know if that will help me cool off.” She grins up at me. “I’m not wearing panties underneath them.”

“Let’s go say goodbye to your sister and niece,” I say, practically dragging her out of the office.

“I thought you already said goodbye to them.”

“I did. But don’t you need to?”

She shakes her head. “They don’t even know I’m here. I didn’t see them. They were still asleep when I snuck into the house to find you, and I snuck back out when I realized where you were.”

I stop and look at her. “You really want to just leave town? Not see Scarlett and Cian? Just leave them on their own?”

She grins. “Kind of? What about you?”

I think about it. Then nod. “Yeah. They’ll be fine.”

“I agree.”

We stand just looking at each other. Then we look out at the bar.

Everyone is sitting around the tables, drinking coffee. The game shows have started, and no one is paying us any attention.

April is laughing with the ladies at the end of the bar.

I do not want to have to say goodbye to Elliot. I plan to send him cool postcards from New Orleans, including some with jets and old planes from the World War II Museum. He’ll love that, and we can talk about them when I come back and visit him.

“We’ll see them all later,” Ruby finally says.

I smile. “Of course we will. They’re our family.”

“Exactly. And I know a guy with access to a private plane, so traveling back and forth is no big deal.”

“He sounds amazing.”

“He is. Best brother-in-law I’ve ever had.”

She giggles as I sweep her up into my arms with a growl and stride for the door. “Shhh,” I tell her. “They might notice us and need something.”

“We wouldn’t want that,” she whispers with a softer giggle.

And, for the first time in either of our lives, we actually do sneak off without telling anyone where we’re going or how to get ahold of us for the next several hours.

I even fuck her on the plane and in half the rooms of our new house before we turn our phones back on.

Which is a mistake that keeps me from fucking her in every room.

Still, we’re both happy when we snuggle on our new sofa and look out at the view of New Orleans from our new apartment windows, with the AC turned way up so Ruby can wear her new pajamas, and answer dozens of texts and emails to all the other people we love most in the world, together.