Chapter Four
ZANDER GRABBED THE drawings he’d just picked up from a local architect and climbed out of his truck at Cape Renovations.
It had been three months since his accident, and he was glad to be back on his feet.
But everyone was constantly checking on him, treating him like he was made of glass, and he couldn’t take it anymore.
To make matters worse, his father was still giving him menial jobs instead of letting him work on the major renovation project Zeke and Tobias were tackling.
He eyed his father’s beloved black Trans Am, grinding his back teeth against the conflicting emotions gnawing at him.
He had many fond childhood memories of watching his father tinker with that car, and later, of helping him fix it up.
He had his old man to thank for his love of fast cars, but the accident had changed the way Zander looked at many things.
He’d much rather see his old man driving a car that had airbags, which made no sense coming from a biker who would never give up his motorcycle.
But he’d become acutely aware of how fragile life was, and when he thought about the people he loved, he wanted to protect them even more fiercely than before.
Protecting them meant changing his ways.
He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the accident.
If he hadn’t gone home with those women, he wouldn’t have overslept or been at the intersection at the moment that truck had barreled through it.
He’d been selfish, living life to the fullest, consequences be damned.
But that time it had nearly ruined all their lives.
Pushing those worries away, he headed inside to set his father straight.
It would not be an easy conversation. His father had always been one of his heroes.
Zander had severe dyslexia and ADHD, which they hadn’t known enough about to test for when he was young.
It had gone undiagnosed for years. From the time he was a little boy, written words were mixed up, letters danced across pages of books and menus, and his thoughts were too chaotic for him to be able to concentrate.
He’d thought those dancing letters were normal and that he was just too stupid to figure out how to read.
He’d never mentioned what he saw to anyone.
He knew he was different than his smarter, more patient siblings, and he hated it.
He’d learned to deflect attention from those differences by becoming the class clown in school, and a jokester outside of it, which admittedly carried over into his adult life.
He was labeled a troublemaker, and his father had tried to help him find something to capture his attention and keep him on the right side of trouble.
His father had given him his own set of tools and projects and had worked with him to complete them.
Even if they worked on them for only ten or twenty minutes at a time a few days a week, and they took months to complete, his old man never gave up trying.
The praise his parents had given him along the way had given the kid who didn’t want to be different a sense of pride for being able to do the things his father could do.
Over the years, his father taught him everything he knew about contracting, instilling confidence and giving him a trade that he excelled at. But he couldn’t take the bullshit jobs anymore.
He headed down the hall and saw his mother sitting behind her desk, smiling up at his father, who was sitting on the edge of her desk.
His father reached for her hand, bringing her up to her feet.
Her mahogany hair brushed her shoulders as he guided her between his legs, his arms circling her.
His parents had always been openly affectionate, and the way they looked at each other was something to be revered.
Zander wasn’t searching for that, but ever since his accident, when he saw his parents, or his siblings or cousins with their significant others, it tweaked something in his chest. He glanced away before it could settle in too deep and cleared his throat to let them know he was coming in.
“Hey, baby,” his mother said, stepping away from his father.
“Hi, Mom. Sorry to interrupt your make-out session.”
“Sure you are,” his father teased. “Thanks for picking those up.”
“No problem.” Zander handed him the drawings. “What time are we meeting at the Martels’ tomorrow?” The Martels owned the home they were renovating.
“I need you on another job tomorrow. Fascia repair and a few other things in Eastham. I’ll text you the info.”
“Seriously, Preach?” Zander asked incredulously.
His father’s eyes narrowed. “Yes, seriously.”
Zander glanced at his mother.
“Don’t look at me. Your father makes the schedules.” She arched a brow at Preacher, sending a silent message Zander couldn’t read, as she sat down behind her desk.
“Come on, Preach. You’ve been making up menial shit for me to do for two weeks, sending me to Hyannis to pick up drawings, organizing the workshop, painting.”
“I’m not making anything up,” he said sternly. “We got a call, and I need to handle it.”
“Then give it to Zeke or Tobias,” Zander challenged.
His father’s jaw ticked, but when he spoke, his tone was softer. “Zan, we nearly lost you. You had a brain bleed.”
“Yeah, three months ago. The doctor cleared me to go back to work, and I’m going to lose my damn mind if you don’t give me some real work to do. Are you afraid I can’t do the job anymore?”
“Of course not,” his father said sharply. “I’m just trying to keep you safe. What if you’re up on a ladder or using a power tool and you get dizzy and fall or hurt yourself? I don’t want you landing back in the hospital.”
“I haven’t been dizzy in months. I’m recovered and clear-headed.
” Sometimes it took him a few extra seconds to remember the name of a tool or something else, but it wasn’t often, and he didn’t forget important things, like how to do his job.
But he wasn’t about to add that fuel to Preacher’s fire.
“This isn’t about me not being fit to work, is it?
” He gritted his teeth as Zeke and Tobias came into the office, eyeing them cautiously.
Zeke positioned himself closer to Zander than their father.
He and Zander were near mirror images of each other, but Zeke had shorter, darker hair and less ink.
Tobias, a former fighter with long light brown hair, dwarfed them both by a couple of inches and about thirty pounds of pure muscle, and stood at an equal distance between Zander and Preacher.
“Everything okay?” Zeke, always the mediator, asked.
“No,” Zander gritted out. “Preacher thinks I’m not ready to go back to real work.”
“You’re so damn stubborn,” Preacher seethed.
“I wonder where I learned that from,” Zander countered.
“Stop it.” Zeke lifted his chin in Preacher’s direction. “I’ve got Zan. I won’t let anything happen to him.”
“Jesus Christ,” Zander fumed. “Dude, I don’t need you watching out for me like a motherfucking hen.”
“I’m not being a mother hen,” Zeke insisted.
“You camped out at my place for three weeks after I got out of the hospital. That’s more than Mom was there. I’m not injured anymore. I can take care of myself.”
Zeke threw his shoulders back. “I never said you couldn’t.”
“You didn’t have to say it—”
“There are worse things in life than being too loved,” Tobias said evenly, his deep voice silencing them.
Zander gritted his teeth, Tobias’s point giving him pause.
Tobias had lost his mother when he was young, he’d had a falling-out with his father, and had accidentally killed his sister’s fiancé, which severed his relationship with her at the same time he’d gone to prison.
He and his family had since mended those broken fences, but he had a fucking point.
Before Zander could get a word out, his mother was on her feet, planting all five feet three inches of herself in the middle of them.
She looked right at him and said, “Tobias is right. There’s more than enough to be angry at in this world, and being cared for too much shouldn’t be on that list.” She turned to Preacher.
“But my sweet, stubborn husband, Zander is right, too. Yes, we almost lost him, and Lord knows that affected all of us.” Her attention shifted to Zeke as she said, “Deeply.”
Zeke glanced at Zander with an expression that made Zander’s chest constrict.
“But we didn’t lose him,” she said, her gaze softening as it moved over them.
“I want to wrap each and every one of you in Bubble Wrap every time y’all walk out the door.
That’s what love is, but there’s a fine line between protecting and suffocating.
Preacher, you will push our son away if you try to cage him in. Haven’t we suffered enough loss?”
All their expressions turned serious with the painful reminder.
They’d lost their cousin Ashley years ago, and not a day passed that Zander didn’t think about her.
More recently, their cousin Tank’s wife, Leah, had lost her brother, River.
They hadn’t known River, but through Leah, they’d come to know him, and since Tank and Leah were raising River’s two young daughters, they’d grieved with them, too.
All of which underscored the reason Zander wanted to change his ways.
His family had grieved enough. He didn’t need them worrying about him.
“You’re absolutely right, darlin’.” Preacher looked at Zander and said, “I need you on that job in Eastham, but after that, you’ll join the guys at the Martels’. But you have to promise me, if you feel off in any way, you’ll stop what you’re doing immediately and tell one of us.”
Zander gave a curt nod. “Understood.” Preacher turned his attention to Zeke, and Zander said, “Don’t even think about telling him to keep an eye on me.”
Preacher held his hands up in surrender. “I was just going to ask what he and Tobias needed.”