Chapter 23
Cage
I sigh as I watch the officer brothers all pile into my girl's small apartment, everyone looking around the place that I’ve decided to call home. Blaze and Crusher scowling as they look at the photos of my girl and me, along with her family, who didn’t want her staying here last night.
Her mom cried when I told her she’ll be coming home with me after the bar. Her dad understood and pulled her mom back, whereas her sister threw the biggest fucking hissy fit out of nowhere.
“I nearly lost her without showing her I was sorry, she’s not going with you…”
Her scream inside the bar full of brothers still rattles my ears, but the fact that my girl just walked out without even looking at her was funny as fuck.
She thinks we’re stupid, that Drew is stupid. She spent years treating my girl like shit. She tried pushing her out of her own family, chucked her ex-boyfriend in her face with her mother’s blessing then suddenly is upset because she wants to apologize?
Yeah, nah, not falling for it, the whole time we were at the bar she was fucking drooling over the brothers and don’t get me started on the looks she kept giving me.
The bitch hasn’t seen the light, she’s hoping to entice me away from her sister after we all ‘fall’ for her nice girl act and she can fuck right off.
I shake my head and look towards the kitchen, watching my girl who has yet again stolen one of my shirts – the one I wore last night – making drinks for the assholes who demanded we do church before they got on the road.
Blade and his brothers rode out after the bar, all giving my girl a kiss on the head. That pissed off my brothers because she clearly has a bond with the Dark Angels.
Scar was pissed when he noticed I didn’t agree with coming home after they all but demanded it. While a few of the brothers were busy saying their goodbyes to Drew.
As if feeling my eyes on her, Drew looks my way, and I give her a half smile, causing her to smile widely at me. Just like that, everything settles deep inside me.
I’ve given her a whole fucking week of space, and I now see that was a big mistake.
She said she was scared, that she wasn’t ready to be a momma.
That she’s struggling to get her head around the fact she is pregnant before we had a few years together.
I knew she’d never terminate the pregnancy, but I also knew she needed time to come to terms with the fact that we are going to be parents.
Meanwhile, I needed to try and overcome my fear—a fear I still haven’t managed to conquer because I’ve come to realize I need my girl’s help to overcome it.
I needed to try and heal, so leaving her for a week was an idiotic move.
Especially when the fuckers managed to grab hold of her and according to my girl, they had no idea who I was.
Scar messaged last night, Scrawny blabbed like a little squealing pig. The idiots didn’t even know I was Carnage when they were following me. Neither did their boss like we all thought, they want all MC’s in the surrounding areas to fuck off.
My heart hammers as I watch my girl gently load up the drinks onto a tray, regret sitting heavy on my chest for giving her the space I thought she needed.
Fuck, it messes with my head, especially when I couldn't save…
“Are we all here?” my dad asks as he enters the living area and shuts the door before he scans the room and pales at my stuff everywhere.
Here we fucking go…
“All accounted for plus one,” Trick says as he nods to my girl, and Dad nods, not bothering to ask Drew to leave her own home for this meeting I didn’t even want.
I won’t have her out of my sight, not after yesterday. While she may only have a bruised cheek and a headache from the chloroform. According to Trick the baby is doing good, but I need my eyes on her at all times. She keeps me calm and I really don’t want to shoot my own father, do I?
“Thank you, sweetheart,” my dad murmurs as my girl hands him a cup of tea. I smile as she takes a tray around the brothers that are looking at her with awe.
My fucking girl.
"You’re all heart, ain’t ya, sweets?" Crusher asks with a soft smile.
Drew grins before admitting, "Sometimes…"
I chuckle as she carefully walks toward me, balancing the tray with my cup, which is the last one left.
"Thanks, baby," I whisper as I lean down, gently pressing my lips against hers before taking my drink and her smile broadens.
“Of course, I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,” she replies softly and I nod, then kiss her again, feeling so fucking grateful to have found her.
She walks to the kitchen just as Dad says, “Alright, church in session!” and every eye comes my way.
Fuck’s sake.
“You can all stop staring at me,” I say, glancing around the room, and Trick smirks.
“Sure, if you tell us you’ll let us pack for you and ride with us…” He says and I sigh and glance at my girl, busy whisking pancake batter.
Of course she’s making them breakfast.
“Not happening,” I state and every man in the room tenses. I huff, “I have built a life here, brothers. I have a steady job. I have my girl…”
"You have your own tattoo parlor back home, your own house! Pack your girl up and bring her with you!" Dad snaps, his face already turning red.
I shake my head at him and say, “Alright, Dad, say my girl drops everything—her family, who she eats with twice a week, her shows that she does to raise money for charity, her business where she has over sixty students—and we go home. What’s to say I won’t fall off the deep end again?
What’s to say returning to where I failed, where I hurt most, won’t drag me down that hole again? ”
“Because we wouldn’t let you...” Crash says softly, and I swallow hard before reminding them, “You couldn’t stop me last time. You had to knock me out and get my sister to plead.” I sigh, “I think it’s best I stay here, where I’m content and happy, where I’m not at risk in hurting my family.”
Dad scowls. “No!” I shake my head, but he ignores me and snaps, “You’re coming home.
I fucking mean it! You have a role even you know you could do, just look at yesterday.
” He glances at my girl, then meets my gaze, determination in his eyes and I narrow my eyes in return in warning not to drag her into this.
“I miss my son. I lost him when I lost Angie, and enough is enough.” He turns to call, “Drew, come here for a moment, sweetheart,” and I growl, making Dad wince.
He’s out of line, and he knows it and him dragging her into this is out of fucking line, and I’m going to fucking kill him.
Drew furrows her brows but instead of looking at Dad, she looks at me and I tick my jaw and fist my hands. Sensing my anger, she rushes over and ignores my dad.
I lift my arm and she burrows into my side as I wrap it around her waist and gently cup her small bump, allowing her and our baby to keep my anger at bay, a baby I am petrified of fucking up.
"Are you okay?" she asks quietly and despite feeling all eyes on us, I shake my head as I lean in, press my lips against hers. I inhale deeply but my body tenses when Dad oversteps and opens his mouth yet again.
“Drew, would you leave all this behind for my son?” Dad asks, voice firm and Bones mutters, “Fuck’s sake, Chains wants his ass kicked.”
“I’m not answering that,” my girl replies, grabbing my shirt to stop me from pouncing on my father, who scowls. Undeterred, she says, “I love your son, and I know him inside and out and –”
Dad cuts her off, “And what, I don’t?”
I growl at his disrespect towards her, trying to step forward, but Drew, being Drew, tightens her hold.
She doesn’t back down. She shakes her head and says, "No, you don’t.
" Awe fills the room as my girl meets my father’s gaze and tells him, “You’re not thinking like a president who wants his prodigy to take over but understands the pain he’s still currently in and needs more time.
You’re like a father who misses his son and wants him home and is trying to use everything against him to bring him back.
” Dad’s eyes soften as he looks at her and she says, “It doesn’t matter what you say, threaten, or even offer—like Scrawny on a pedestal.
Nothing will convince him to leave town. ”
The brothers took the fucker back home and placed him in the bunker where we like to torture fuckers before killing them.
Several times last night, Dad tried mentioning he was my kill, while the other two went back with Blade.
While I would love nothing more than to kill him for taking my girl and backhanding her, I can’t go home.
I’m not ready and I know Scar will ensure he suffers.
“Except you,” Dad says softly, and Drew nods.
She agrees, "Except me," but adds, "I would do anything for Bellamy if he asked. Not because you’re putting me on the spot to convince him to do something he isn’t ready for. Pissing him off further to the point I’m the only person in this room stopping him from attacking you,” Dad eyes where Drew has hold of me and he winces before she continues, “My job, my family—I’d leave it all for him, only for him, not for you.
I understand you want your son to return, but after what he went through—the guilt, his choices—he isn't ready to face any of that.
" She gives Dad a soft look and asks, "Do you know he hasn’t even gone to her gravesite? "
I hold my girl tighter as the brothers stare in shock and Dad's eyes well up.
“You see, if I force him to move home, he’ll resent me. I won’t have that because your son is my entire world. Plus, the ass knocked me up with his super sperm, so I really can’t have him resent me,” she says, and the brothers snort as I smirk, proud of my so-called super spunk.
Drew sighs as Dad roughly runs a hand through his hair, clearly not happy that she isn’t on his side, she’s on mine.
"I won’t choose for him. I won’t pressure him into doing anything he doesn’t want to do because only he knows what he wants. Right now, he wants to stay here, and you need to respect that. If not as his leader, then as his father—see the pain your son is still carrying," my girl says softly.
"Did I mention that I like you?" Dad chokes.
I smile as Drew chuckles, "Once or twice..."
Fuck me, this girl always has my back. She calmed me and knew exactly what to say to Dad.
“With all due respect, brother,” Trick says, and I tense again as he reminds me, “you saved her, you saved your baby, so why aren’t you strong enough to return? Why can’t you come home?”
I clear my throat to try not to snap my friend’s head off and as we lock eyes, I remind him, “I was in the house, upstairs in my room, staring at the DNA results, while my sister was being drowned. I was closer, and I didn’t save her.
I didn’t see the evil that Toya was in terminating a pregnancy when she was so far gone.
I—fuck—I can’t get over the guilt. I don’t know if I’ll ever want to come home… ”
Trick looks away as Drew sighs, "Stop pushing him to go home. Give him space to decide for himself. If you don't, he'll leave for good,” she eyes the brothers, “And if you don’t give him that space, well, I know how to break a man's special member and I’m not afraid to hurt anyone of you!"
The brothers look at my girl with horror, and I bite back a chuckle as she kisses my cheek and says, “I’m going to cook the pancakes for everyone and let you discuss whatever you’re going to do to Scrawny.”
I nod to her. Trick and Dad quickly move aside, covering themselves, and I grin.
“Did she just threaten us without batting an eyelash?” Crusher asks, his voice full of awe and shock and I chuckle in response.
“Yes, yes she did,” I confirm with a big grin and Blaze mutters, “Lucky fucker.”
I don’t disagree because I am one lucky fucker.
Whether I stay here, return home, or fuck, go out on the road again, I know without a doubt my girl will be by my side the whole time and that everything will be alright as long as I have her.
As Blaze said, I’m one lucky fucker.