11. Kara
11
KARA
I f it were even possible, the Slayers’ gates had somehow become even more imposing in the week I’d been away. Or maybe it was just the fact I was now approaching them in the passenger seat of Hayden’s truck.
“They’re going to lock me in the basement,” he mumbled. “This is such a bad idea.”
“They won’t,” I said, voice full of a confidence I didn’t really feel.
Unless I thought about how I trusted Hawk with my child and so trusting him with Hayden’s life was no different.
If he said Hayden would be safe here, then he would be. I had to believe that. I’d heard the sincerity in Hawk’s voice when he’d said he loved me. He wouldn’t hurt me by going back on his word.
It didn’t stop my palms from sweating when Hayden stopped the truck outside the gates and Ice appeared from the shadows, a shotgun held in one hand.
“Kara?” he called out.
I rolled down the window. “It’s me.”
He lowered the gun and came to my side of the truck, peering in. His face relaxed into a smile. “Hey. You don’t look dead anymore. You doing okay?”
“Much better, thank you.”
He grinned, but then his gaze slid past me to the bags in the backseat holding all of mine and Hayden’s clothes. Ice’s eyes darkened in Hayden’s direction. “You’re a brave man. There’s a whole club full of hate waiting for you down there, you know that, right?”
“I don’t want any trouble,” Hayden said quietly.
Ice shrugged and opened the gate for us. “Your funeral, brother.”
I glanced nervously at Hayden as he nodded once and then urged the truck through the gates.
They closed with a metal-against-metal clang that sent a shudder down my spine.
He reached over and took my hand, squeezing it. “Listen, if they give me shit, you don’t try to stand up for me, okay? If there’s a fight, don’t get in the middle. I’ve earned whatever is coming to me. You just let them go. I can take whatever they dish out. You hear me?”
I wanted to argue. Wanted to assure him none of that would happen.
Except we both knew we were walking into a lion’s den, and while the lions might like me, they all had the scent of Hayden’s blood on their minds.
I didn’t think I could agree not to help him if push came to shove though. So I didn’t make a promise I couldn’t keep.
Hayden parked the truck at the end of a row of bikes, and we both got out, him shouldering our bags, leaving me only the smallest of them all to carry.
I led him to the doors and pulled them open.
The entire club waited on the other side. All the guys. Their wives. Rebel and Bliss’s partners who weren’t part of the club.
Everyone fell silent, their gazes all on us.
It was Hawk who moved first, pushing his way from the back of the room with Hayley Jade in his arms.
My heart skipped a beat at seeing her sweet face, even though she quickly buried it in the side of Hawk’s neck.
I touched a hand gently to her back as Hawk leaned down to take the bag from my hands. He lowered his head, brushing his lips across my cheek. “Welcome home, Little Mouse.”
Despite myself, a thrill raced down my spine at hearing him use that nickname again. At having him so close his warm breath coasted over my neck, reminding me of the way his tongue felt every time he traced patterns there.
Despite how angry I was at him, my body still reacted in the same way it always had.
Hawk turned around and faced the room. “Quit gawking at them! I don’t give a shit how any of you feel about Chaos being here. This ain’t a fucking…” He shifted Hayley Jade in his arms. “I mean, a fudging democracy. If you don’t like the decisions War and I have made, feel free to show yourself out the door.”
Nobody moved.
Nobody looked very happy though.
Rebel and Bliss came to my side. Rebel picked up my hand and squeezed it, staring up at Hayden with unabashed interest. She cocked her head to one side. “Well, I’ll give it to you, Sis. You like the pretty ones, don’t you? All cleaned up and not reeking of mud, I can see the appeal.”
“We’re right here, Roach,” Vaughn called from the couch where he sat between Kian and Fang.
All three of them were staring at Hayden like if he dared to so much as glance at Rebel wrong they’d be on him in a heartbeat. Bliss’s guys were no better. Vincent or Scythe, I couldn’t tell which, stood to one side of the room, absentmindedly turning over a blade in his fingers. Nash and War nursed drinks at the bar, all of their gazes fixed on Hayden.
I wasn’t sure if this was going well, or very badly. But nobody had pulled a weapon, so that was a start.
With a bright smile, Bliss hugged me. “It’s going to be okay. Some of the guys changed rooms, and we moved all of your stuff up from the cabin. Hawk set up the room next to yours—”
War interrupted. “Hawk might want to tell Kara about that himself.”
Bliss clapped a hand over her mouth, her eyes going wide. “Oh, of course. I’m sorry. I got overexcited.”
Confused, I shook my head questioningly at her. “What’s going on?”
She smiled. “He’s really sorry for whatever it is he did. I’ll let him show you, but just know he’s been working nonstop since you agreed to come back.”
She moved away to War’s side, who seemed much happier to have her in arm’s reach.
Hayden cleared his throat and held his hand out to War. “I appreciate you having me here.”
War stared at his hand and then up at his face. “You haven’t earned that handshake yet. Offer it again in a few weeks when you’ve proved you aren’t a threat to anyone here, and I’ll gladly shake it. But right now, you’re a fox in my henhouse. For reasons I can’t possibly comprehend, Hawk went to bat for you, and that’s the only reason I’m allowing it. But it’s against my better judgment. So you want me to shake your hand, earn it.”
Hayden’s mouth twisted into a grim line, but he dropped his arm and nodded. “I will.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to defend him, but Hayden had asked me not to. So I bit my tongue, even though it killed me. This was War’s club, and he only had the best interests of the people who lived here in mind. That included me and my daughter. I could hardly begrudge him that.
War jerked his head down the corridor. “Your room is the fourth on the left. If you’re smart, you’ll stay in there until everyone has had some time to process this.”
Hayden nodded once and kissed the top of my head. “I’ll see you in the morning, okay?”
He walked away, taking a room halfway down the hallway. It left two doors between his and Hawk’s. Probably a good thing to have some space between them.
The rest of the room went back to their conversations and pool games now the entertainment was over. I found Hawk watching me, still holding my daughter. She had her head lying on his shoulder.
“She’s tired,” he confirmed when I approached them.
I nodded.
“You want to help me put her to bed?”
I stared up at him. “You do that?”
He shrugged. “Me or Queenie. Rebel if she’s here. She’s missed you though.”
My heart ached at the lie. Hayley Jade wouldn’t even look at me. She was more comfortable with anyone else. But I wouldn’t let that always be the case. I’d healed. And Hayley Jade needed to know I was still here. That I’d struggled to find myself, to work out how to help her, but I wasn’t ever going to give up or love her any less. “I missed you too, Hayley Jade,” I said quietly. “I’d love to tuck you into bed, if that’s okay?”
She raised her sleepy head and stared at me with those eyes that haunted my dreams.
My heart nearly broke in two when she nodded.
Hawk ruffled her hair gently. “That’s my girl.”
I could have melted into a puddle with all the feelings those three words sent through me. If seeing her in his arms wasn’t enough to defrost the ice that had formed around my heart with Hawk’s lies, those words would have done it.
He went to the door next to his, hand resting on the knob. “This isn’t finished, but I’ve been working on it for a while. The cabin only had one bedroom, and even if she slept down there with you, I wanted her to have a room of her own up here…”
He’d picked the room closest to his.
My heart squeezed painfully as he opened the door to reveal pale-pink walls and a white iron-frame bed covered with a pretty quilt. There was a small wardrobe filled with Hayley-Jade-sized clothes, and a shelf full of books and toys. A couple of Barbie dolls lay abandoned on a thick rug that covered the scuffed-up floorboards beneath, evidence she’d already been playing in here earlier in the day. All the rooms here had their own bathrooms, and Hayley Jade’s had a fluffy pink bathmat with matching towels hanging from the rails.
Hawk knelt beside the bed to lower my tired child to her pillow. He tucked her blankets around her. Her dark eyes watched him intently.
“Time for bed, Hay Jay.” He leaned over and switched on a nightlight sitting on the bedside table.
Hayley Jade shook her head stubbornly.
He stared at her for a second, something silently passing between them. Then he sighed, as if he’d understood whatever it was she’d been saying with her eyes. “Seriously? Again?”
I frowned, not sure what he meant by that, but a wide smile split her angel face, and she nodded.
He glanced over at me and then squinted at the little girl. “Your mama is going to laugh at me if I do that.”
Hayley Jade turned her eyes to me.
I stepped forward, perching on the edge of her bed and put my hand over my heart. “I promise. Whatever it is. I will not laugh.”
I meant it. Whatever was going on here was clearly important to her, and if it was important to Hayley Jade, then it was important to me too.
Hawk groaned. “Fine. Fine. But you two tell anyone else…”
I gave Hayley Jade a wink and drew my fingers across my lips, miming the closing of a zipper.
She giggled.
Hawk started singing beneath his breath.
I glanced over at him, surprised, and he just shook his head, continuing on with the song I didn’t recognize. It wasn’t one of the church songs I’d been taught as a kid, and I had a very limited knowledge of popular music from my time on the outside, but it wasn’t a song I recognized from then either.
But I didn’t need to know the words to enjoy the deep, husky sound of Hawk’s voice.
He was singing to my daughter, and clearly not for the first time. Her small body relaxed into the soft mattress, and her dark lashes fluttered closed while Hawk sang the strange song about shimmering lights and Heaven or Hell.
I listened to every word, and when he finished, Hayley Jade was out, her breathing soft and regular, sung to sleep by a biker who everyone thought was heartless.
But I knew better. I knew his heart. The true essence of who he was. Even if he didn’t show it to anyone else, he’d shown me. And he’d shown my girl.
He rocked back on his heels and stood, jerking his head toward the door. We both tiptoed out, and he closed it behind me with a soft snick.
“What was that song?” I asked him. “A lullaby?” I knew what that was, but I was unfamiliar with them. If my parents had sung to me or my sisters as babies, I didn’t remember.
He cleared his throat and rubbed a hand across the back of his neck awkwardly. “Uh. Not exactly. I don’t know any of those. It was ‘Hotel California’ by The Eagles.”
That didn’t mean anything to me, but Aloha overheard and snorted on his laughter.
Hawk shot him a look that promised death by a thousand tiny cuts if he didn’t shut up, but Aloha ignored him and started up his own warbled version of the song.
Hawk just steered me to the door between Hayley Jade’s and Hayden’s. “This is yours.”
I gasped when he opened the door to reveal a clean, simple space. The bedding from the cabin had been brought up and covered the large bed. My clothes hung in the closet, and the en suite had some sort of sweet-smelling reed diffuser sitting on the bathroom counter, next to a fluffy towel and my toiletries.
“This was Gunner’s room…” I stared at Hawk wide-eyed. “I can’t just take it from him.”
Hawk leaned against the doorway. “He’s not here much anymore anyway. He was happy to give it up for you.”
I was sure that wasn’t true and Hawk had probably used his rank to get his way. But I couldn’t deny that here with Hayley Jade was where I needed to be. I’d spent weeks hiding in that cabin. Hiding from her. It wasn’t big enough for all of us.
All of us.
Me. Hayley Jade. Hayden.
And Hawk.
Something warmed inside me at the thought of the four of us. It was ridiculous, when Hayden and Hawk were ready to kill each other at the drop of a hat, and I hadn’t forgiven Hawk for what he’d done.
But he was making it really hard to hold a grudge.
He pushed off the wall and nodded at me. “Sleep tight, Little Mouse. You’re home. Where you belong.”