Chapter Three
Cash
“You sure about her?”
“Fuck you.”
“I have to ask, brother.” King sat next to me as I watched Rosie talking to Mellie.
“You sure about Grace?”
“Grace isn’t my old lady.” I looked at my president and one of the best men I knew.
“Because you’re a fucking pussy. Just claim her already.”
“I can’t,” he sighed.
“Why the fuck not?”
“She’s Steele’s daughter.”
Hold the goddamned fucking front door. I stared at King, my mouth open wide enough for God and everybody to just walk on in.
“What the fuck did you just say?”
“Don’t make me fucking repeat it,” King said, rubbing his hands over his face.
I didn’t have words. My brain couldn’t comprehend what he was saying. How the fuck did we not know Steele had a daughter?
“How? I mean... when?”
“She told me the first night I met her,” he confessed as he leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees.
“You’ve known for two fucking years and you didn’t say shit?”
King and his fucking secrets.
“You never told me you were adopted.”
I gaped at him. “The two things aren’t even remotely the same fucking thing, and you know it. Bob and Karen are my fucking parents, and they always will be.”
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t insinuating they weren’t. But it threw me for a fucking loop when I heard you say that this morning. And the shrinks? You never said anything.”
I shrugged. “What was the point? It doesn’t change anything.”
“Brother, you need to fucking talk to us.”
“Hey, Pot, how you fucking doing?”
“Yea, I know. It’s why I told you about Grace.”
“You need to tell the others.”
I sat up, watching Rose. She was rubbing her legs. It meant she was struggling. I watched and waited. I couldn’t rush over there.
Not yet.
Mellie was pissed I was sitting here. She said Rose was already becoming co-dependent. I didn’t fucking care. I wanted her dependent on me. I wanted her to give me every fucking fear, worry and disappointment she had so she didn’t have to feel them.
I could carry the fucking load for her and I would do so proudly.
“I’ll call the officers in tonight. The rest don’t need to know. Not yet.”
“What are you gonna do?” I asked, my attention still on Rose.
“What the fuck can I do?”
I turned then. He was such a fucking Boy Scout sometimes. “You fucking claim the woman you’re in love with.”
“It’s not that fucking easy.”
“Why the fuck not? He clearly doesn’t know who she is; either that or he really is the douchebag I think he is and knows his daughter is here and fucking ignored her when he visited. So fuck him.”
“Is that what you’ll say to Montana when he finds out we have two legacies in our club? And Reaper? When he finds out they’re Golden, he’ll come for them.”
I hadn’t fucking thought about that. But yeah, I would tell them to fuck off. Rose was mine. Mimic was ours. He was already patched in. I wasn’t worried about that.
“He’s no different from Morpheus.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“When Morpheus finds out about Amber and Pippen, he’ll come for them. Reaper will do the same for Kytten and Mimic.”
“And Montana?”
“Who knows what the fuck he’ll do? His ego will force him to come whether he wants to or not.”
“Hang on.” I jumped out of my chair when I saw Rose rushing toward me.
I met her halfway and put my arms around her. “What’s wrong, Rosie?”
“Did King call Val?” she asked, her eyes locked on my president.
I looked over my shoulder at King and motioned for him to come forward. When he approached, she asked, “Did you call Val?”
King looked at me, and I shook my head before he looked back at Rose.
“Did you call her?” she shouted.
“No, Cash asked me not to,” he answered. I felt her deflate in my arms. She was so worried about Val knowing what she had been doing to herself.
She threw herself at me and said, “Thank you. You can’t tell her.”
“Rosie, she has to be told at some point,” I whispered.
“Why?” She stepped back and looked up at me. “She doesn’t need to know.”
“Baby, settle down. No one is going to tell her until you are ready.”
“Kytten.” I looked up at Mellie. “Let’s finish talking, ok?”
Rose looked at King. “You promise you won’t call her?”
“I can’t promise that. But I can promise I will talk to you about it first.”
I wouldn’t let him call Valhalla. That was something she had to do on her own.
“Go on, baby. I’m not leaving.” I kissed her forehead and turned her around. I watched her and Mellie walk to their seats. She didn’t think she could do this, but she was stronger than she fucking knew. When she sat down, her eyes sought mine. I smiled and winked as King and I sat.
“I need to ask you again, brother. Are you sure?”
“You don’t know her the way I do.”
“It’s only been a few weeks.”
“How long before you knew Grace was it?” When he didn’t answer, I continued, “You think I don’t know about Brandy?”
“Why do you have to be a fucking dick?”
I threw my head back and laughed. “You’re the one who wanted to talk. You say you aren’t fucking Grace—”
“I’m not.” His jaw flexed with his confession.
“That means you haven’t fucked a woman in over two years. Tell me again how I couldn’t know shit after a few weeks.”
“Alright, brother.” He slapped me on the back and walked inside, leaving me to watch over Rose as I thought about the shit show that had become my life.
I didn’t care who showed up on our doorstep; no one was taking her away from me.
Rose spent the afternoon with Mimic. They were in the main room with the others while the officers held church.
“What’s up, Prez?” Jack asked.
I was sure they were all wondering why King called them in. He needed to come clean. With everything going on, we were all on edge, wondering when the next fucking shoe would drop.
“I have something I want to tell you. Something I’ve been keeping back. For various reasons,” King started.
He looked at me, and I lifted my chin.
You can do this, brother.
He took a deep breath, and I watched the men we chose to help us run this club. There wasn’t a man in this room who didn’t have his back. And mine.
When he continued to stay silent, I knew he was floundering.
“You all know I am claiming Rose. The vote is a formality. She’s mine.”
“As long as Mimic votes yes,” Blade pointed out.
“He’ll vote fucking yes. His sister might castrate him if he doesn’t.
Look, I know you all didn’t have the best first impression of Rose.
But I’ve been getting to know her over the last few weeks, and the shit she’s been through would break most people.
She didn’t fucking break. She’s working with Mellie, and I have no doubt Mellie can help her.
With that said, she is tied to three fucking clubs. ”
I looked at King. His furrowed brow told me he didn’t know where I was going with this. The point of the meeting was to tell them about Grace.
“I don’t plan on asking permission from any of them. I want my cut on her back before Reaper and Montana get wind of who Rose and Mimic are. I need to know you’ll have my back.”
The room was quiet for a minute, until Ghost asked me a question I wasn’t fucking prepared for.
“Would you walk away for her?”
I may not have expected him to ask me the same question he asked a few weeks ago, but my answer came just as fast as it did last time.
“In a fucking heartbeat.”
His wide eyes and lifted brows told me I had shocked the shit out of him. “I’ll back you up, brother,” Ghost said with a big fucking grin.
His disappointment when he asked me the question about Rachel ate at me.
But things were different then. I’d read Rachel’s letter and believed she’d made her decision based on the belief that I didn’t love her enough.
Haizley helped me to see the truth. I wouldn’t make the same fucking mistake again.
The others murmured their agreement, and I turned to King.
“Your turn, Prez.”
I didn’t expect him to rip the Band-Aid off quite so quickly.
“Grace is Steele’s daughter.”
The room was silent. So silent that a pin drop would have sounded like an atom bomb.
“That’s why you haven’t claimed her,” Gunner surmised.
King didn’t answer, but we all knew it was the truth.
“Fuck Steele,” Blade snapped. I threw him a smile and nodded. I knew he would stand behind King, no questions asked.
“It’s not that simple,” King argued. “Even if I wanted to, I can’t contact him. Grace won’t let me.”
“What the fuck do you mean, if you wanted to?” Jingles asked.
“I won’t shit on the rules. Not for her. Not for anyone.”
“You kind of already have. You haven’t called Reaper or Montana, or Valhalla for that matter,” Jack pointed out.
“Let me say it again. I won’t shit on the rules we live by so I can have a woman in my bed.”
“You’re such a self-righteous prick,” Blade clipped.
“Fuck you, Blade.”
“Okay, both of you, shut the hell up. We aren’t here to discuss the many ways our president should get his head out of his ass. You all needed to know who Grace was. She is the daughter of our president. Regardless of whether or not he is a selfish, arrogant asshole—”
“Cash,” King growled.
I raised my hands in surrender. “Grace is still a princess. We don’t know who, if anyone, knows this.”
“Does Steele know?” Colt asked.
“Grace said he knew her mother was pregnant. She has a picture of them together.”
“I fucking hope he doesn’t know it’s Grace,” Ghost growled.
“Why?”
“Because how many times has he been here and fucking ignored her?”
I looked at King and raised an eyebrow. That was exactly what I fucking said to him earlier. It was no secret to King that I hated Steele. I knew in my gut he sent Chasm to his death.
I just didn’t know why. But the motherfucker was shady as shit.
“That’s not the point. The point is, Grace is off-limits.”
“Does this mean no more late-night visits?” Gunner asked.
I knew why he said it. King gave Gunner shit for stalking Haizley before he claimed her. But we all knew King had snuck off to Grace’s many times over the last two years.
He swore he hadn’t fucked her. If he wasn’t lying, he was stronger than I fucking was. I fucked Rachel the night I met her. And Rose up on the mountain once she agreed to have dinner with Ryder and Ellie.
If only I hadn’t bent her over my bike. If I laid her on the ground and stripped her like I wanted to, I would have known what she was doing that much sooner.
“Grace is still a friend of the club.”
I snorted, and Jack clipped, “That’s a no.”
“Fuck all of you!”
The guys snickered at King’s outburst.
Then it got serious when he said, “I know you don’t agree with me. But I want this chapter to be based on honor. What Steele may or may not have done over the years isn’t what I want for this club.”
King was right. We all knew it. But it didn’t change the fact that he was denying himself an old lady because of the fucking rules that Steele himself didn’t follow.
“If we don’t uphold the laws we chose to live by, then what the fuck are we?”