Chapter 26
?
— Lilac —
Indira showed up the next morning with coffee and croissants. “Girls’ day,” she announced, breezing into Betty’s kitchen like she owned the place. “Betty, you’re coming too. We’re leaving the boys with Handful—don’t look at me like that, he’s surprisingly good with kids—and we’re going to the spa.”
“The spa?” I blinked at her. “I can’t afford—”
“My treat. Consider it a welcome-to-the-family gift.” She set down the coffee and croissants, her expression softening. “You’ve been through hell, Lilac. You deserve a day of being pampered.”
Betty was already reaching for her purse. “I haven’t had a spa day in fifteen years. I’m not arguing.”
Two hours later, I was lying on a massage table, every muscle in my body slowly turning to jelly, while Indira talked from the table next to mine.
“Dutch and I separated for a while, you know.”
I turned my head to look at her. “You did?”
“Mm-hmm. He was an ass. Not violent or anything like what happened to you—just selfish. Entitled. Thought being president meant he could do whatever he wanted without consequences.” She sighed as the masseuse worked on a knot in her shoulder. “I walked away. Told him I deserved better.”
“What made you come back?”
“He changed.” Indira’s voice was simple, matter-of-fact.
“Not just his words—his actions. And I wasn’t even here to see most of it.
I didn’t just leave Dutch. I left Millfield, and moved to Nashville because my employer let me work remotely.
” She was quiet a moment. “Then my manager retired and I got a promotion. Except the promotion meant I had to be in the regional office. Which is here.” A small smile in her voice.
“I didn’t come back for Dutch. I came back for my job.
He just happened to be here, proving himself every day without an audience.
Which maybe says more than anything else. ” She paused. “Sound familiar?”
I didn’t answer, but my silence was answer enough.
“Colt isn’t Dutch,” Indira continued. “Their situations are different. But the principle is the same. A man can say whatever he wants. Words are cheap. What matters is what he does. Day after day, choice after choice.”
“He’s been…” I searched for the right word. “Consistent. He shows up when he says he will. He’s gentle with the boys. He respects my boundaries.”
“And how does that make you feel?”
I thought about it. “Confused,” I admitted. “Part of me is still scared of him. Not physically—I don’t believe he’d ever hurt me—but scared of what he represents. This whole life I don’t remember, this person I used to be.”
“That’s fair.”
“But another part of me…” I hesitated. “When he’s around, something in me relaxes. Like my body knows him even if my mind doesn’t. It’s unsettling.”
“Body memory.” Indira nodded. “Bea mentioned that at one of my sessions. Trauma can erase conscious memories, but the body holds onto things. The good and the bad.”
“Graham said we were happy. That Colt worshiped me.”
“From what I’ve seen, that hasn’t changed.” Indira turned onto her back, staring at the ceiling. “The question isn’t whether you can trust him, Lilac. The question is whether you want to.”
“What if I try and it goes wrong? What if he’s not who everyone says he is?”
“You have Betty, you have Graham, you have me and the whole damn club backing you up. If Colt ever reverted to who he was that first week, Dutch would handle it personally.” Her voice hardened.
“But I don’t think he will. I’ve known Colt for years.
That man at the grocery store? That wasn’t him.
That was a broken man lashing out because he’d lost everything and didn’t know how to cope. ”
I was quiet for a long moment, letting the massage work out the tension I’d been carrying for weeks.
“The boys called him Dad yesterday,” I said finally. “At school. Told their whole class.”
Indira smiled. “How did that make you feel?”
“Terrified.” I laughed softly. “And also… right.”
“Your boys are already halfway in love with their father. The only question is whether you’ll let yourself follow.”
I stared at the ceiling, Indira’s words echoing in my mind.
The only question is whether you’ll let yourself follow.
I didn’t have an answer yet.
?
After the spa, we stopped for lunch at a café downtown. Betty had gone home—“I need a nap after all that relaxation,” she’d said, which made us both laugh—so it was just me and Indira.
“Can I ask you something personal?” I said, picking at my salad.
“Shoot.”
“What’s it actually like? Being an old lady?”
Indira set down her fork, considering the question seriously.
“It’s not like the movies, if that’s what you’re asking.
There’s no constant drama or danger. Mostly it’s…
normal. Dutch runs his business, I run mine.
We have dinner together, argue about whose turn it is to do dishes, watch too much Netflix. ”
“But the club stuff—”
“Is part of it, yeah. There are runs, there are meetings, there are times when something serious goes down and I don’t know if he’s coming home.” Her eyes darkened briefly. “But that’s true of any relationship with a man who does a dangerous job. Lots of men have wives who worry.”
“And the other women? The club girls?”
“They exist. Some of the guys who aren’t in committed relationships, they have arrangements.
” Indira shrugged. “But old ladies are different. We’re not just girlfriends, we’re family.
The club protects us, respects us. Anyone who disrespects an old lady disrespects the whole MC.
” She leaned forward. “Has anyone been disrespectful to you?”
“No. Everyone’s been—” I thought about it. “Careful, I guess. Watching to see what Colt and I are going to do.”
“They’re waiting to see if you’ll stick.
If you’ll become one of us.” Indira reached across the table and squeezed my hand.
“For what it’s worth, I’m hoping you will.
Truth is, I already consider you one of us.
” She squeezed my hand once before letting go.
“We could use more women with backbones. And I could use a friend who isn’t terrified of Dutch. ”
I laughed despite myself. “He is kind of intimidating.”
“He’s a teddy bear. Don’t tell him I said that.” She grinned. “But seriously, Lilac, if you have questions, if you need someone to talk to, I’m here. This life isn’t for everyone, but for the right people, it’s… home.”
Home. “I don’t know what home is anymore,” I admitted. “For seven years, it’s been Betty’s house. Me and the boys, trying to survive.”
“Maybe it’s time to figure out what it could be,” Indira said gently. “Not just surviving. Actually living.”
?
When I got back to Betty’s, there was a motorcycle in the driveway.
Not Colt’s—he’d been driving his truck lately, in case he needed to take the boys somewhere, and it was right there in the driveway. I felt a spike of unease as I walked up the porch steps.
The front door opened before I could reach for the handle.
A man stood there—tall, lean, with sharp features and dark hair shot through with silver at the temples, longer than you’d expect on someone in a cut.
He looked younger than the gray suggested.
The kind of face that was always slightly watchful, like he was running calculations behind his eyes.
I recognized him from the school parking lot. One of Colt’s brothers.
“Mrs. Spencer.” He stepped back to let me in. “I’m Glitch. I was hoping I could talk to you for a minute.”
Spencer. Colt’s last name. Not mine—not for seven years. I didn’t correct him.
Betty appeared in the hallway, drying her hands on a dish towel. “It’s alright, dear. He’s been very polite. The boys are in the backyard with Colt.”
I looked at Glitch. He seemed nervous, which was strange for a man who was part of an MC.
“Okay,” I said slowly. “Talk.”
“Maybe we could sit?” He gestured toward the living room. “This might take a minute.”
We sat—me on the couch, him on the chair opposite. Betty hovered in the doorway for a moment before deciding to give us privacy, retreating to the kitchen.
“I owe you an apology,” Glitch said without preamble. “A real one. Not just ‘sorry we scared you’—an actual, take-responsibility apology.”
I waited.
“That first night, at the clubhouse, when Colt found out you were in town…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I offered to make your life hell. Ruin your credit, drain your bank accounts, mess with your records. I was ready to destroy you without even meeting you, just because Colt was hurting.”
My stomach clenched. I hadn’t known that. Hadn’t known how close they’d come to—
“I didn’t do it,” he added quickly. “But the fact that I offered… that’s on me. I was so focused on loyalty to my brother that I didn’t stop to think about whether he was right.”
“But you did stop. At the school.” I remembered that moment—the way his voice had cut through the rage, the way he’d looked at me and seen something the others hadn’t.
“Yeah.” He met my eyes. “I watched you, and I saw someone who was genuinely terrified. Not guilty, not manipulative—scared. And something clicked. I knew—I knew—that we were wrong about you.”
“Betty said you uncovered the truth.”
“I dug until I found it. The forged divorce papers, the pregnancy records, all of it.” His expression darkened. “What Death’s Head did to you—what they let Colt believe—it was evil. Pure evil. And I almost helped Colt continue their work.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No. But I could have.” He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “I’m good at what I do, Mrs. Spen—” He stopped. “Sorry. James. You go by James.”
“Lilac is fine,” I said. “But yes. James.”
He nodded slowly, and for a moment he didn’t say anything. “That’s actually something I wanted to talk to you about. You know your signature on the divorce papers was forged. Technically, there was no divorce.” He held my gaze. “You’re still Colt’s wife. Still legally a Spencer.”
The room was very quiet.
“I’ve been Lilac James for seven years,” I said.
“I know. But, I can scrub every trace of the fraudulent paperwork.” He paused.
“Or I leave it as is. Either way, it’s your call.
” He let that land, then went on. “I’m good at what I do.
Really good. I could have destroyed your life before anyone knew to stop me.
And I would have done it without hesitation, because I trusted my brother’s pain over my own judgment. ”
I was quiet for a moment, processing this. He was right—he could have ruined me. The Lilac of a few months ago, struggling to make ends meet, raising two boys alone, wouldn’t have survived that kind of attack.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“You deserve to know. And because—” He hesitated. “I want to start fresh. If you’re going to be part of this family, you should know who we are. The good and the bad. And I’m asking you to forgive me for the bad.”
I studied his face. He seemed sincere—genuinely remorseful in a way that surprised me. I’d expected the MC men to be hard, unapologetic. Not… this.
“You stopped Colt from hurting me,” I said finally. “At the school. You were the one who made him let go of my arm.”
“I couldn’t let it go further. Once I started doubting…”
“And you found the truth. You’re the reason he knows the boys are his.”
“I just followed the data. The truth was already there.”
I shook my head. “Don’t minimize it. You could have let it go. You could have decided Colt’s feelings mattered more than my innocence. But you didn’t.”
Glitch was quiet.
“I forgive you,” I said. “For offering to destroy me. For being part of the harassment. I forgive you because you stopped when it mattered. You told the truth when you found it, and you admitted everything to me.”
His shoulders sagged with relief. “Thank you. I—thank you.”
“But Glitch?” I waited until he met my eyes. “If you ever threaten my family again, I won’t be so understanding.”
A surprised laugh escaped him. “No, Lilac. I wouldn’t expect you to be.”
He stood to leave, then paused at the door. “For what it’s worth, Colt’s lucky to have you. We all are. The club, I mean. We could use more people who call us on our bullshit.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
He grinned and walked out to his bike.
I stood at the window, watching him go. These men weren’t what I’d expected. Not just intimidating bikers with leather and rage. They were complicated, capable of cruelty and kindness in equal measure.
Were the Death’s Head MC like this too?