Chapter 18 #2
When I pull up, Pig is on duty. He takes one look at me and blanches.
I ride past him to the warehouse. I climb off my bike, leave the helmet on the seat, and walk up to the saloon, where the heart of the clubhouse is.
I can hear the music as I approach, though it’s not anywhere near as loud as it can get on party nights.
I push open the doors and walk through, taking in the crowd.
Havoc, G, Amity, and Neveah are at their usual corner table.
Amity looks like she’s just come in from running, in her tiny shorts and sports bra, which has the guys trying real hard to look like they’re not looking.
Neveah is wearing a dinosaur onesie, complete with a hood that has teeth.
I fight back my smile, not even remotely surprised.
The woman is a nut. Probe, Crane, Circus, and Capone are playing cards, and judging from Crane’s face, he’s losing as per usual.
I see Mac and Toot over by the pool table, not playing much pool, though.
One of the club girls is bent over it, with Toot clearly more interested in her pocket than the ones on the table.
Powers, Dice, and Hoops are at the bar drinking, reminding me that it wasn’t that long ago they were behind it serving the drinks.
Ambros is noticeably absent, but his sister is back in the hospital again, so he’s been running himself ragged trying to spend as much time with her as possible.
I walk over to Havoc’s table and pull out a seat, plonking my ass down without waiting for an invite. Havoc takes one look at my face and signals for the prospect behind the bar to bring me a beer.
“You need to talk in private?”
I look to the girls, unsure of the best way to handle this.
“I think she should be able to share when she’s ready, so yeah. The only reason I’m coming to you is because it’s all tied up with club business.”
Amity gets to her feet first. “I need a shower anyway.”
G groans. “Need me to wash your back?”
She winks at him. “I can reach. As you know, I’m very bendy.”
“You’re killing me.”
“Stay. Your friend needs you.”
“No, he doesn’t. We’re not even really friends. Kruger who?”
I laugh, shaking my head at the asshole.
She rolls her eyes and plants a kiss on his cheek as Neveah gets up and moves around the table to hug me.
“What the fuck, woman?” Havoc growls at her.
“Oh, hush. Look at his face and tell me he doesn’t need a hug from a T-rex. I mean T-rexes probably needed hugs too. Then they wouldn’t have been so angry. But they have teeny tiny arms, so alas no hugs, which explains why they were like the serial killers of the Mesozoic era.”
We all just look at her.
“What?”
“I swear, I never know what’s going to come out of your mouth.” G chuckles.
“Havoc’s penis, usually,” she mutters, making Havoc’s eyes slip closed.
“Just call it a cock Cupcake.”
“A cock cupcake? See, this is why punctuation is important—” She squeals as he gets up, making her run off laughing with an amused Amity following behind her.
Havoc grins before looking back at me. I take the beer from the prospect and take a drink, trying to find the right words.
“I know why Delphi wasn’t here that night.”
“Snake said she was sick, but she hadn’t come around a lot before that.” G leans forward, his elbows on the table.
“And maybe she was sick. Maybe her marriage was in crisis, and she didn’t want to be near the asshole. I’m just not sure how you all jumped so quickly to her being in on what went down.” Havoc shakes his head.
I frown at him.
“Yeah, I know I did something similar with Lola. Though in my defense, she was living with him, and pregnant with him, and I was led to believe that was her choice. I heard no differently until much later. I should have dug deeper, pushed harder, because I knew her better than that. But my fucking pride was hurt, and I have to live with that. My point is, the signs weren’t there for Delphi, at least from what I’ve heard.
So how did we get fifty-seven from two plus two, and why was everyone gung-ho to go with it?
Not one of you took her back. Did people not like her or something? Because I’m still fucking confused.”
I lean back, not sure how to answer.
“Blade nearly died that night. It’s no small thing to almost lose your president, and at the hands of brothers we were supposed to trust with our lives.
If it weren’t for Sunshine…” G trails off, but we know the rest. The Raven Souls would be very different, with Bear and Snake at the helm.
Most of us would have jumped ship, and where would that have left us?
“We fed off Blade’s reaction. He wasn’t thinking clearly, for obvious reasons. But neither were the rest of us for following him blindly. Emotions were too damn high. We should have backed off and waited for clearer heads to prevail.” I’ve thought as much before, but by then the damage was done.
“Not telling me anything I didn’t already know. Truth is, I doubt it matters much why she wasn’t here that night. Hell, she could have been fucking her neighbor for all I care. It still wouldn’t have made her a traitor to the club.”
“Fuck. That’s it.” I slam the bottle down and grip my hair, the missing piece finally slipping into place.
“What’s it? What am I missing?” G looks between us both.
“He’s just had an epiphany.”
I rub my hand across my jaw, feeling the scruff there where I need a shave.
“What?”
“Everyone’s been waiting for a reason, an excuse as to why she wasn’t here, so we can justify our response or explain away our reaction.
But the truth is, there is nothing she can say that justifies what we did.
We cast her as the villain with zero proof, and we did it because Snake was dead and we couldn’t punish him.
Why not punish what he loved the most then?
It’s a sick kind of catharsis, right? We didn’t take it too far.
We didn’t put our hands on her, so no lines were crossed.
Surely she’d forgive us all in the end.”
I shake my head, fucking pissed all over again.
“She didn’t come because she was grieving.
She didn’t come all those weeks before because she was hiding the fact that she was pregnant.
She didn’t want us to keep looking at her with pity every time she lost one, so she waited.
Only this time, she went into labor. It was too early.
Her son, Samuel, was born sleeping. All she went home with that day was a handful of photos and a set of footprints the hospital made for her. ”
It’s gone quiet around me, but I’m so caught up in my own grief, I barely notice.
“I dumped her at the edge of town without even a jacket. After Blade told her that if she came back, he’d kill her.
She had no phone, no money, no car. She walked back, after sleeping rough, to find that her home was nothing but ash and those photos and footprints gone right along with everything else. ”
“Fuck!” I hear from behind me. But I focus on G, who looks like he’s going to puke.
“She had nothing left. That’s why she has those scars. She tried to kill herself so she could be with her son. We did that—this club. And then years later, she loses everything again because of us. Is it done now? Has she paid enough?”
“We didn’t know,” Probe says quietly.
I turn and see everyone watching me. The ones who were here that night look as rough as I feel.
“Blade did. Snake told him. It was why he missed church the last few times. He knew. He made that call, knowing everything she cared about had died, and then he left her to live with it.”