35. Quinn
35
QUINN
E mber’s face at the window of the bakery is a happy sight at the end of the day.
“If you’re here for food, we don’t have any of your favorites left,” I say as she steps inside.
“But I can do you a coffee and a scone.”
“Coffee would be great. While I could easily devour six of your scones, I’m not sure my nervous stomach could handle food right now. I’m here to see how you’re doing.”
I know exactly what she means.
We’re the ones left behind.
The ones who know our men well enough to know that what they’re about to go out and face is dangerous.
That men in this world sometimes go missing, and we’ll never know what happened to them for everyone else’s sake.
“If I said my emotions are complicated, would you know what I mean?”
Ember smiles sadly.
“I know exactly what you mean. You want them to be who they are. You’re proud of who they are. You don’t want them to be anything less than they are. But it’s hard to love them when it seems as though death is part of business as usual.”
I lean forward and grip the cool marble.
“Yeah. All that.”
Ember steps around the counter.
“We can wait it out together, if you like.”
“I would. I was thinking of keeping busy. Maybe starting to sort through the mess in the apartment upstairs, or heading to Smoke’s to bake.”
“You’re moving on?” Ember says with a pinch of amazement in her voice.
“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking,” I reply, busying myself making her coffee order.
“Close the shop. It’s like, two minutes until closing, anyway.”
I’ve needed time to process Melody’s arrival.
I’ve been made a fool of, and it hurts.
Every time I think about her, my chest tightens, and I feel like I can’t breathe.
And Melody has put me in an unthinkable situation, where I worried whether my friends would think I was cruel if I didn’t go through with getting tested.
These friendships are the most important ones in my life.
Which is why they will support you, whatever you decide.
Ember grins and turns the lock on the door.
“So, the thinking you’ve been doing? Is that the euphemism we’re using for doing Smoke every day and twice on Sundays?”
A chuckle escapes me, the first time I’ve laughed all day.
“Absolutely not.”
“Absolutely not a euphemism or absolutely not riding him every day? You know what they say, save a horse, ride a cowboy.”
I toss a napkin in her direction, and she bats it onto the counter.
“Stop it. And I think Atom qualifies as the cowboy in this scenario.”
“Meh. I think they’re all a little bit cowboy. But for what it’s worth, I’m really glad you found each other. You seem…happier.”
I take a deep breath.
“Despite the uncertainty washing around the town and the club, I am.”
“So, what have you been thinking about?”
“Take a seat, and I’ll keep cleaning up while I tell you.”
“Wait, I told Raven I’d let her know what we were doing. Let me call her and tell her to come over. We can help you sort things in the apartment. And there’s safety in numbers.”
Ember moves to one of the stools by the window, her back to the street, and makes her call while I finish up our drinks.
I place Ember’s coffee in front of her as she convinces Raven to join us.
“It’s fine if you bring Fen,” Ember says, but she looks to me like it’s a question.
“For sure,” I say. “We can order pizza. Fen can keep Bones happy. The two of them love each other anyway.”
It takes another ten minutes for the two of them to arrive, and Fen barely says a word before he runs up the stairs shouting Bones’s name.
“Oh my God, I’m so glad we’re doing this together,” Raven says.
“Wraith took an untold volume of weapons from his gun safe before he headed to the clubhouse.”
“Quinn was about to tell us all the thinking she’s been doing with Smoke recently,” Ember says as I make Raven’s usual coffee order.
I roll my eyes. “I was not.”
“You are cute together, though,” Raven says.
“I never thought I’d see the day Smoke settled down, though. He likes so much…never mind.”
Ember chuckles.
“You can say the word sex , Raven.”
She shakes her head.
“I know, but it’s hardly appropriate.”
Ember shrugs.
“From what I’ve observed, including why you and I were shunted from the bar at the clubhouse the other night, I feel like Quinn might be his match.”
“Shut up,” I say, but I can barely keep the grin from my face as I place her coffee in front of her.
Raven looks at Ember innocently for half a second before it dawns on her what Ember is saying.
“Oh my God…did you …in the clubhouse bar?”
“No comment,” I say.
Her mouth drops wide open.
“Oh my God. You totally did. Hey, no shame here. You know I tag scenes in romance books and leave them for Wraith to read so he can do them to me. And thank you for the coffee.”
She offers me her card to pay, and I refuse it.
“The coffee is on me. I love you girls, and I am more than happy to discuss anything in the romance books we read, but what I do with Smoke is?—”
“You’re shy?” Ember asks incredulously.
“After all the things I imagine Smoke is doing to you?”
I burst out laughing.
“I’d rather you didn’t imagine me and Smoke doing anything.”
Raven sips on her coffee.
“If this were a romance book, we’d be discussing size difference, and age gap, and a very distinctive meet cute.”
“Stop,” I say, but there’s no malice in my tone.
In fact, there’s something utterly comforting, joking with my friends during a time of stress.
“Oh, or the injured hero, hurt and comfort, and—yes! I got it. Forced proximity and unexpected roommate.”
“I hate you both,” I say playfully.
Ember shrugs. “You’ve always loved me.”
The use of the word love hits me.
It takes so many forms. True love, intense female friendships, our pets.
“Yeah, I love you both like sisters, which is why, what I want to tell you is, Melody’s alive.”
Ember immediately jumps off the stool again.
“Oh my God, Quinn. You should have led with that. That’s amazing.”
Raven reaches for my hand.
“Jesus. What happened to her? Is she okay? How are you?”
“It’s okay. You can both sit back down. You might need to. She was never taken. She left.”
“What?” Ember stops in her tracks.
I nod. “Yup. She chose to leave. Chose to let us believe she’d been taken. Chose to let us believe there was a struggle as some kind of weird-ass payback for what she deemed my parents’ control. All this time, all this worry, all this money my parents put into searching for her, Mom dying by suicide in an attempt to escape the feeling she’d let Melody down…”
I pick up the cloth and continue to clean, and as I disinfect the shelves that usually hold the cake pops and brownie squares, I tell Ember and Raven the whole story, from Melody’s arrival to departure.
And it’s strange to watch them both go through the range of emotions I did.
To have it dawn on them that I stayed here, like a freaking lighthouse, waiting for a ship that knew where land was but preferred to be out at sea.
I feel Ember’s sense of betrayal, because she was here and saw what happened to us all.
And I feel Raven’s anguish at the life we all lost.
When Ember’s arms finally wrap around me, she says, “You’ve done more than any sister should ever have to. I feel bad for your niece, but your sister has used up every cent of her ‘ask Quinn for favors’ money.”
“For years, I’ve thought about what I would do when she was found. I’d give her the bakery and then cut ties with this town. Go travel. See the world. Work my way from place to place. Catch up on all the years I’ve lost being the stalwart, good daughter.”
Raven squeezes my hand.
“And now?”
I look around the bakery, my eyes resting on the photograph of our family.
The one my father took.
“I’m starting to think that family is how we define it.” I look back at my friends.
“I mean, look at us. Ember, we’ve been friends since we were little. And there’s Kinsey, who’s helped me run the bakery for years. And the community I know from being here. And new friends, like you, Raven. Other shop owners, my regular customers, the club.”
They both hear the roar of motorcycles at the same time I do, and Raven smiles.
“And then there’s Smoke?”
I nod.
“And Smoke. They all feel like ties to this place. I need to decide if the way they tether me here is something I need more than what I was going to do.”
We step out onto Main Street, and Butcher slows the procession of bikes down with a raised fist.
The bikes halt, and it’s like one of those weird scenes from a movie montage where Smoke, Atom, Wraith, and Butcher all dismount.
Smoke walks towards me and surprises me by simply hugging me to him, bending to bury his head in my hair.
“I love you, Quinn. I really fucking love you.”
I wrap my arms tight around him.
“I really love you too. I won’t accept anything less than you coming back to me. And if something does happen, can you tell Butcher that he has to let me know? Because I can’t go through not knowing where you are for the rest of my life.”
I realize a tear has escaped, and as if sensing it, he lifts his head and brushes it away with his thumb.
“I’ll tell Atom. I won’t put you through that again. Changed my will this morning too. Everything of mine is yours, sugar.”
“I don’t want to talk about that.”
He smiles sadly.
“Important that we do. Don’t want that hanging over you too. I’ll look after you, alive or dead, sugar. One day, it will be ’til death do us part. But that’s not today.”
“What’s a girl supposed to say to that?”
He cups my cheeks.
“What would they say in your books?”
“It would be lots of internal dialogue about how much they’d waited for this moment. How anxiety-inducing it was to find a man you loved so much, and who was willing to risk his life to keep you safe. And how awe-inducing that you got to love such a brave man for the rest of your life.”
Smoke winks at me.
“That’s good enough, sugar. I’ll be back in time for some of your blueberry and lemon scones in the morning. Stay with the girls, yeah?”
I nod silently.
“It’ll be okay, sugar. I promise.”
He kisses me one last time and then goes to mount his bike.
He’s just behind Butcher on the front line, and I realize just how important to the club he is.
Ember comes to stand to my left, Raven to my right.
“God, they’re spectacular,” Ember says.
“I pity the people they’re going to face,” Raven says.
“I just want them to come back alive.” Which makes me think of my niece, Liberty Ann.
As we wave them off and the crescendo of bike engines quiets, I know what I have to do.
I explain to Ember and Raven that I need to call my sister.
“Go,” Raven says. “We’ll finish cleaning up for you.”
I step into the kitchen.
“Melody,” I say when she answers.
“It’s Quinn.”
There’s a television playing loudly in the background, but a door closes and the volume drops.
“Quinn. Hey. I wasn’t sure if I’d hear from you.”
I wish Bones were here with me.
His soft fur and tired yawns bring me more comfort than I can express.
“I’ve thought a lot about what you told me last week,” I say.
“I have to be honest; I don’t know that my relationship with you will ever recover.”
It feels good to admit.
It’s an absolution, of sorts.
That I don’t need to forgive the person who, in her own selfishness, hurt me so badly.
“I understand,” Melody says.
“I was young and stupid. I realized it the moment Liberty Ann was born. I believed whole-heartedly that I had done the right thing. That I’d drawn a line under a toxic childhood and set boundaries for my adult life. That I didn’t need to embrace the people who made my life so difficult. I figured that there was some payback in my actions and that you would all slowly move on. But once I held Liberty Ann in my arms. God, just looking at her. I knew… God, I knew deep in my heart that you don’t just forget. How could I ever forget…?”
Her words catch.
It’s hard to hold space for the two pieces of the conversation.
I don’t remember our childhood the same way she does.
But I can hear the pain.
“Why didn’t you come back then, to make some kind of amends?”
Melody sighs.
“Because I still didn’t think I owed Mom and Dad any. In the same way you can’t forgive me for what I did, I’m not sure I can forgive them for the way they tried to control me.”
There’s a long silence on the line as we both grapple with what to say next, but I finally put us both at ease.
“I’ll come and be tested.”