Chapter 22 Options
CASSIDY
The men of the club looked bone-tired by the time their meeting ended.
Still, Knuckles made his way over to me along side Grunt.
“One quick thing, while we were questioning Simone, she asked to speak with you. To apologize for shooting you because supposedly she didn’t mean to hit you.
I wouldn’t dignify her request at all, but I’m not telling you about it for her sake.
I wanted to give you the option to say your peace to her, if you needed to. ”
I shook my head. “I gave her enough of my time when she gave nothing in return. I’m certainly not going to change my mind after she shot me, and I haven’t forgotten that she used me in her lies for years.
That damage is still a problem in the way you react to things.
She can rot in hell with the knowledge that I refused to speak to her. ”
When neither Grunt or Knuckles moved to relay that message, I second guessed myself. “Do you think there is anything we can learn from me talking to her that you guys can put to use?” I asked.
“No, Cass,” Knuckles said.
“She just wants to fuck with your head some. Simone might claim she wants to see you to apologize, but that bitch doesn’t care who she hurts.
She wants to see you to know if she hurt you badly enough to feel good about it - whether she was aiming for you originally or not.
She probably also wants to put a little worm in your ear that would taint shit between you and Knuckles.
He might have given you the choice to go down there and talk to her, but I wouldn’t allow it because that bitch always has a fucking agenda. ”
I nodded and then turned to Knuckles. “Are you done here? Can you take me home? I want to sleep in my own bed.”
“Her security system is updated and we’ll put someone outside on the property in case all of our visitors didn’t leave when they were supposed to,” Grunt informed him.
They said something quietly to one another and then Knuckles came back over to me and helped me out to a truck instead of the motorcycle. “Your friends are getting their shit together. They want to go back to the ranch, too.”
“Are you okay with everything you learned?” I still didn’t know all of it but I had heard swaths of conversation.
Enough to know Simone had ties to both the mafia and the cartel and she was using her close position with the MC for years to feed information to one, the other, or maybe both.
It wasn’t all clear and I might never know since it was club business.
“It was a lot to digest, but Simone was already a part of my past until her name kept popping up every time I turned around. I’ll fill you in on everything she had to say, but it needs to wait until tomorrow.
For now, I want to take you home, get comfortable, and crawl into your bed behind you.
For a month, I’ve slept on that lumpy-ass hospital cot.
I want a bed, and I want you in my arms where I know you’re safe. ”
“I think that can be arranged,” I agreed because I wanted the same thing and I wasn’t going to fight it any longer.
It felt like if we continued to let our past keep us apart, then Simone won.
The cartel won. The mafia, too. Whoever is against us would win by us not being together and I wasn’t willing to give any of them the satisfaction.
As silly as the sentiment sounded, because I doubted any of those entities except Simone, gave a rat’s ass about me and whether I got close to Knuckles or not.
When we got to my house, the trip from Phoenix and everything that came after caught up to me.
I was beyond exhausted and realized what Dr. Roberts warned me about was true.
The hospital was like a bubble and while I got up and walked and exercised to try to heal quickly, there was a different pace set by life.
There were more things going on around me that I had to spend brain power to process.
I never realized how much energy all the outside stimuli from day-to-day took, but going from the hospital with minimal effort necessary on my part, and relative quiet to a long motorcycle ride, being surrounded by an entire MC, the reunion with my friends, and then all the shit with the cartel, Simone, and her dad being the Mafia Don for the Morelli Organization… I was done. It was too much.
“My bed.”
“You need to eat and get your meds,” Knuckles informed me.
“No, I need to drop into a coma for a couple days and then eat everything in the house.” He chuckled but pulled me into a hug. “No jokes about being in a coma for a while. I nearly lost my fucking mind waiting for you to wake up from surgery and then you would drift back out so fast.”
“Sorry, I guess on my end, it was just a big nap to avoid the pain. I didn’t think what it must have been like for you on the other end.
” I could see the worry and frustration in his eyes as he cataloged every single inch of my face.
“I’m really not hungry. Bigfoot’s mom fed me, but I’m pretty sure the food came from your grandma, so you know I’m filled to the brim. ”
“Figures she was lookin’ out for you. I told her I was bringing you home.”
“I haven’t spoken to them in weeks. Are they doing okay?”
“They’re just fine. They want to see you as soon as you’re up for visitors, so we’ll have to plan a family dinner.”
“Family dinner?” I questioned.
“Yeah. Dinner with you, me, my grandparents, all our best friends.”
“So, we’ll need to hire a caterer for this shindig?” I teased. He swatted my ass and shooed me up the stairs.
“Go get in bed. I’m going to grab something from the kitchen and I’ll be up in a minute.”
The “something” James grabbed from the kitchen was a drink for me to take my pills with. Bless the man, he was looking out for me better than I was myself. I would have gone to bed without taking them and woken up hating myself, especially after that trip.
Eventually, we fell asleep with me carefully draped half on top of him. I never thought it would be comfortable to sleep on a man like that, but his warmth, those arms wrapped around me, and the solid thump of his heartbeat put me to sleep almost instantly.
I woke before James and managed to disentangle myself without waking him.
There was a tray of food and a coffee that looked like it had gone cold a while ago.
It was weird that there was only one drink on the tray, though.
I made my way downstairs and ran into Collette in the kitchen brewing fresh coffee.
“Did you bring the tray up?” I asked.
Her cheeks grew rosy as she shook her head. “That was Greg.”
“Greg? What was he doing here?”
“When Finch mentioned to him that you came home yesterday, he headed up to see you. We didn’t realize that Knuckles stayed in your room with you or we wouldn’t have let him up there.
When he saw you two snuggled together on the bed, he left the tray and took off without saying anything. I think you broke his heart.”
“Well, I have news for him, it would have broken after that kiss we shared on our date anyway.”
“What? No! He’s a terrible kisser?” Collette asked. Considering she had also once had a thing for him, the news of our zero chemistry kiss was probably horrifying to her.
“No chemistry. No heat at all. It was just meh.”
I heard someone snicker and turned to see James there with amusement written all over his smug face. “Funny, because that’s exactly what I thought when he kissed you.”
“Could have fooled me when you went all caveman and decided you needed to put your brand on me.”
“Maybe when you’re fully healed up,” he told me as he winked and then spun to get the first cup of coffee from the pot Collette brewed.
“Wait, what?” I asked and the only answer I got was Collette’s laughter.
“Good luck with that one,” she managed to choke out. “He’s going to have you wifed up, inked with his property patch, and wearing one of those ol’ lady cuts before you can take your next breath.”
“I like these ideas of yours,” James told her.
“I think I’m going to need the rest of that pot. Can you slide it over?”
“Dr. Roberts said easy on the caffeine, remember?”
“Yeah, well, I haven’t had good coffee in over a month, so I’m at least going to enjoy a cup and I’ll deal with the consequences if there are any.”
“We need to make an appointment with the local doc and have you checked out in the next day or so, sooner if you feel off. I know that ride took more out of you than you wanted to admit.”
“You know,” Collette interrupted before I could wave James off the idea of another doctor visit so soon. “I was worried when you were the one there with her, but I see you now, Knuckles.”
He tipped his chin up to her and she returned the gesture with a smile before she went back to her cup to inhale the coffee she’d made.
“I feel like everyone is speaking in a code I don’t understand this morning.”
“Whatever is in your past doesn’t matter anymore. He’s been by your side this whole time. He has my blessing,” Collette informed me before she left me alone with James in the kitchen.
“Okay, Knuckles, maybe we should have a conversation now,” I suggested as I took a seat at the old Amish kitchen table and chairs set that my parents acquired on a trip early in their marriage.
“You don’t call me Knuckles unless you’re asking another club member to get me on a phone or to find me at the clubhouse.
I’m James to you. Only you. Well, my grandparents, too.
They refuse to call me anything but my given name.
Unless it’s my grandpa. He calls me Moron sometimes, but I’m pretty sure it’s said with love. ”
I put my coffee down and laughed because I could hear Tim Davis in my head doing just that.
“I’m yours - all yours - if you’ll have me and I fucking want nothing more than to make you mine, Cass. I meant what I said in the hospital. I already know what it’s like to lose you and I don’t ever want to live in a world you aren’t a part of again.”
Damn. How in the hell was I supposed to argue with that?
“Okay,” I agreed.
“Okay? That’s all I get? I’m over here, pouring my heart out to you and all I get is, ‘Okay.’” His teasing tone did something amazing to lift my spirits and boost my energy, so I threw the dish towel at him and a minute later he had come over, picked me up, and deposited me back into his lap as he sat in my seat.
“I have to go check in with the club in a bit, but I want to make sure you’re covered here before I go.
” He glanced around conspiratorially. “Fucking Greg Daniels is probably lying in wait somewhere to give you another mediocre kiss and we can’t have that. ”
“Shut your mouth. Greg is a great guy, he just wasn’t right for me.”
“Agree to disagree on that point.” James leaned forward and nipped my bottom lip before he kissed me stupid.
Yeah, there was no comparison. Just the light, playful touch when he nipped at me before going in for a real kiss left me feeling breathless and floaty in the best way possible.
It was nothing like the empty feel of Greg’s kiss at that restaurant.
If there were signs from the universe about who I was supposed to end up with, I’d say that one was pretty damn solid.