13. Kara
13
KARA
I woke the next morning in my bed, pleasant throbbing between my thighs and slick panties.
Like I’d promised Hawk, I hadn’t showered. I’d slept with his cum inside me, the thought keeping me awake until the early hours.
I’d made him another promise.
To let Hayden know Hawk had taken me. That I’d let him mark me, claim me.
That I’d forgiven him enough to welcome him inside my body.
I didn’t like to break promises, but I didn’t think it was one I could keep, even though my body yearned to hear him praise me. The thought was just too mortifying. Hayden and I had barely even kissed. I couldn’t just walk into his room and ask him to put his hand inside my panties so Hawk had bragging rights.
Even if the thought did leave me breathless.
No, Hawk didn’t get that satisfaction. Not yet. He’d ninety-five percent earned my forgiveness, but I wasn’t quite willing to give him full control again.
So I got up and showered, put on fresh clothes, and then sat on the end of the bed, wondering what I was going to do with the rest of my life.
The answers came quickly.
Live here.
Get Hayley Jade into school.
Volunteer at the hospital until I had enough knowledge to apply for a paid position there.
Keep Hawk and Hayden from killing each other.
All but the last one seemed fairly doable.
I slipped into the hallway. The clubhouse was mostly quiet, only Ice and Queenie sitting at the bar, though this morning they both had mugs of coffee in their hands instead of beer bottles.
Queenie raised a hand at me. “Morning, Miss Thang. How you doing after your little sexcapade last night?”
I widened my eyes at her.
Queenie burst into laughter. “Yeah, sugar. You’re real lucky that girly of yours sleeps so solidly. The rest of us, however…” She took a sip of her coffee, her smile no less evident in the mischief in her eyes. “Gotta say though, until you screamed his name, I thought it was Chaos you were in there with. Pretty sure you weren’t going to forgive Hawk that easily.”
I faltered, moving over to the bar and taking the mug of coffee Ice poured for me because it was the polite thing to do, even though I didn’t really like it. “Do you think I forgave him too quickly?”
Queenie shook her head, the absence of her large hoop earrings jarring, though I didn’t blame her for taking those off when she slept. “No, sugar. What’s the point in holding on to hate? That ain’t going to get you anything good. You forgave him, and look what it got you? A whole lotta orgasms.”
Ice just shook his head and stared at the bar top, his cheeks pink.
Queenie ignored his embarrassment and nudged me. “What’s your plan for today?”
“I want to enroll Hayley Jade at school.”
She choked on her coffee, coughing as she put it down. “No shit? Well, good for you. And for her. That girl needs to get out of this clubhouse for a few hours a day.” She glanced at Hawk’s bedroom door. “You talk to him about it though? He’s gotten pretty protective over that girl, and I don’t blame him. She’s real easy to love.” The tender expression on her face told me she adored Hayley Jade just as much as Hawk did.
My heart filled with love for these people. They’d barely known me when I’d arrived on their doorstep, and yet they’d taken me in and cared for me and my child when I couldn’t. I owed it to them to consider their feelings on Hayley Jade’s next steps.
“I’ll talk to him,” I promised her.
Hawk’s door opened at the same time, and we all looked over at him.
But his gaze was only for me. The corner of his mouth flicked up, and his gaze grew hot, like he was remembering what we’d done in the dark just hours ago. My pussy clenched in on itself, missing the fullness of his dick.
Hayden’s door opened mid throb.
The need there only intensified when he walked out in black jeans, a black button-down shirt, and with his shoulder-length hair messily tied back off his face with a leather band at the nape of his neck.
I felt like a deer caught in headlights. Like all of them knew how much I was turned on just from being in the same room as them.
Hawk glanced at Hayden, and his smile for me grew. “You do what I asked, Little Mouse?”
Heat flushed my face as all eyes turned back to me.
Queenie chuckled at the clear triangle of sexual tension that had sprung up between me and the two guys. “Oooh, what did he say? Do tell.”
I shook my head quickly, my face on fire with embarrassment.
Hayden watched me quietly while Hawk strode to the bar, leaning on the countertop and waiting for Ice to pour him a coffee. He grinned over the top of it at Queenie, making sure his voice was plenty loud enough for Hayden to hear. “Filled her up with cum and sent her to dickhead over there.” He jerked his head in Hayden’s direction. “Just so he’d know who her pussy belongs to.”
“Hawk!” I hissed, glaring at him. “Stop it! I was never going to do that.”
He laughed into his mug. “Sure you weren’t.”
Hayden wandered over, and when Ice ignored him, not offering coffee like he had to me and Hawk, Hayden just reached over the counter and poured himself one. He took a taste, then screwing up his face at the flavor, crossed the space to stand in front of Hawk, the two of them eye to eye.
Nerves sprang to life in my belly, and I cringed, waiting for one of them to throw a punch.
Hawk sipped his drink like Hayden all up in his space was no big deal. He refused to move back though, not conceding an inch.
Slowly, Hayden lifted his mug and poured what was left of the sludgy coffee into Hawk’s mug.
Hawk let him, but the smile slowly fell from his face as Hayden leaned in and said loud enough for us all to hear, “If you’d wanted me to taste your cum, Hawk, you could have just asked me to blow you. No need for me to lick it from her pussy.” Then he winked at me. “Though for the record, if you’d come to me this morning, even dripping with his cum, I still would have.”
Queenie and Ice hooted with laughter, Queenie slapping her knee, her eyes watering at the horrified expression on Hawk’s face. Ice got himself under control quicker, turning away to busy himself with dishes that needed washing, but his shoulders shook with silent laughter.
I just wanted the earth to swallow me whole.
Or maybe transport me via secret underground tunnel back to Hayden’s room so he could make good on that promise, because just like last night when Hawk had suggested letting Hayden feel how wet I was, the idea turned me hot.
Hayden put the mug down on the countertop and pointed at the coffee machine. “I know I’m a guest around here, but your coffee is shit. I’ll bring a new machine home with me tonight.”
Hawk frowned. “The coffee is fine. And buying crap we don’t need isn’t your place—”
Queenie waved him off. “Stop, child. I’ve seen the man’s name on that fancy new restaurant in Providence. If he wants to be stealing coffee machines from work so we don’t have to drink unidentifiable swill, then let him. He’s right. The coffee is horrific.” She glanced at Ice. “No offense, sugar. You pour a nice whisky, but that’s about the extent of your culinary skills.”
Hawk looked ready to argue again, but Hayden ignored him.
“I can cook too. I’ll probably be working a lot of nights after we open but I can make extras, and someone can come down and pick it up.”
Hawk started to protest again, deciding for the entire club that Hayden’s services weren’t welcome here.
Hayden just stared at him. “War said I need to earn his respect. I intend to do that.” He shook his head. “Maybe even yours too. She clearly likes you, so there must be something good about you.”
Hawk paused, clearly as surprised at Hayden’s words as I was. Then he shrugged. “Aloha is allergic to mushrooms. Gunner can’t eat fried shit, his cholesterol is already sky-high.”
Hayden nodded. “Okay. Fine. I can work out meals around that.”
Hawk crossed his arms and leaned against a wall. “And I don’t like pickles.”
Hayden raised an eyebrow. “Because they’re dick shaped?”
Hawk scowled and jerked his head toward the door. “Don’t you have to go to work or something?”
Hayden sniggered. “Actually, I do.” His gaze sought mine. “You going to be okay?”
“I want to take Hayley Jade down to the local school and enroll her.”
Hawk’s mouth pulled into a straight line. “That’s not safe. Not after what just happened here, and that was behind our gates. Josiah’s people…we underestimated their reach. I never thought for a second they could use our own club members against us, and yet that’s exactly what happened.”
The funny thing was, I knew all that. I should have been terrified, and a part of me was. Of course it was. My sister had been murdered. Someone had tried to murder me. I certainly didn’t want the same thing to happen to Hayley Jade.
But that had happened right here. Behind the perceived safety of the gates where I should have been one-hundred-percent safe.
But I wasn’t. I wasn’t one-hundred-percent safe anywhere. Nobody was. Most people didn’t have their husbands chasing them down in the name of cleansing their sins, but the world was a dangerous place. People walked outside their homes every day and ran the risk of getting hit by a bus or being abducted while on their morning run.
It didn’t mean they stopped living.
I had. I’d forced the world to stop turning around me and my daughter in the name of fear, and look where it had gotten us?
She still wouldn’t talk, and that was breaking my heart.
The world outside these gates was no more dangerous than keeping her inside it.
I stared at Hawk, knowing I was right but wanting him to feel good about it too. He’d earned that right. He and Queenie both.
“She’s never going to get better sitting around here with all of us. She needs school and other kids and a therapist. I want to get all of those things for her.”
Queenie’s expression morphed into one that was full of pride. “Mama Kara is back.” She stood and wrapped her arms around me, hugging me tight. “I’m glad to see it.”
I smiled into her soft shoulder, a sense of pride welling up inside me too. I’d been weak when I’d arrived here. Broken. And everything that had happened a week ago should have broken me more.
Except it hadn’t.
It had just made everything I wanted clearer.
Hayley Jade healthy, happy, and in school.
Hawk.
Hayden.
The three H’s of my heart.
One of those H’s was still scowling at me.
Ice noticed too, and cleared his throat. “The other prospects and I could help,” he offered. “We can station a guard outside her classroom.”
Queenie raised an eyebrow. “And terrify all those kids?”
Ice shrugged. “Outside the school gates then.” He glanced at Hawk. “If you want.”
Hawk switched his stare to Ice, considering his proposal.
Poor Ice seemed ready to pee his pants under Hawk’s intense scrutiny.
I reached over and squeezed his hand encouragingly, while giving Hawk a glare of my own. “I think that’s a fantastic offer. Don’t you, Hawk?”
He let out a huff, his opinion of the prospects clearly not high.
Ice was like a kicked puppy who still wanted the love of his owner, and it was painful to watch.
“Fine,” Hawk said through gritted teeth. “I’d do it myself, but I need to be with you. The other guys all have things going on with the club. But not the other prospects, Ice. Just you. I don’t trust any of you fuckers to do a good job, but the others even less than you. Until all of this settles down and we work out something with the school about bringing on extra security, you’ll sit your ass outside those gates from nine ’til three, every day Hayley Jade is there. Capiche?”
Ice grinned at his VP. “Yes, sir.”
Hawk raised an eyebrow at the formal language.
Ice shrugged. “Yes, boss?”
Hawk rolled his eyes. “Just go get ready, you kiss-ass.”
Ice skittered away, clearly pleased with his new role.
I touched Hawk’s arm. “You could try being nice to the prospects occasionally, you know.”
“I would, if they could try having a half a brain between them.”
Queenie let loose a deep belly laugh that I loved. “Don’t worry about the prospects, Kara. They know what they’re signing up for when they join. All the boys go through it. Makes them better club members in the end.”
I wasn’t sure I agreed with that. I’d been in Ice’s shoes. Where people with more authority than you had full control over your life and you had to be perfect in order to gain their approval.
But then, unlike me and Josiah, Ice had a choice about whether he wanted to be here or not. He could walk away at any time.
That was not my experience. So Ice and the other prospects mustn’t have minded being the brunt of Hawk’s bad moods. Even still, I hoped for Ice’s sake that they made him a full member soon.
Hawk glanced at his phone. “School day starts in an hour. If we’re going to do this, let’s do it.”
Butterflies picked up in my belly at the thought of leaving Hayley Jade in an unfamiliar place for an entire day, but I forced my feet across the common room and knocked on her door before letting myself in. “Hey, sweetheart. Are you awake?”
She sat on the floor, already dressed and her hair brushed, a book on her lap.
I blinked, surprised she wasn’t still in her pajamas. But then I remembered where she’d grown up, and it wasn’t actually that unusual she was already capable of getting herself ready in the mornings, even though she was only five.
Shari was a good, Ethereal Eden woman. She’d started teaching Hayley Jade young. Laziness wasn’t tolerated, and women especially were expected to rise early in order to bake bread for the man of the house’s breakfast.
I’d bet Hayley Jade already knew how to do that.
I knew then I was making the right decision. While there was nothing wrong with a child her age being able to dress herself, or help with the baking, there were other things she needed to know as well.
How to read the book on her lap being one of the biggest.
I knelt beside her and pointed at the words on the page. “Mr. Crocodile was having a bad day. His tummy was sore.”
I paused, shifting so I was sitting cross-legged on the rug with her, facing each other. “Would you like to be able to read those words yourself?”
Hayley Jade looked up, her eyes big with interest.
She didn’t say anything, but saying nothing wasn’t a no, so that was a start. I was going to have to get her into school whether she wanted to go or not, but her wanting to go, and feeling safe there would make all the difference. “You know how Remi and Madden go to school? I know they’ve told you about all the fun things they do. Drawing and coloring and singing and playing.”
She gave a small nod.
“Well, there’s a school you can go to as well. They’ll teach you how to read that book all by yourself, and there’s other kids there to play with. Would you like to come see it with me and Hawk today?”
Shock spread through me at the giant smile that split her face. It was so wide and full of pure joy that it broke my heart.
She’d wanted this, and I’d been keeping it from her, with my own fears too thick in my head to see what she needed.
I wanted to sink beneath the sense of grief that brought up in me, but I wouldn’t.
Like Queenie had said, Mama Kara was back. I didn’t want to let her go again.
A middle-aged woman took Hayley Jade’s hand and led her into a classroom filled with other kids running about the place and causing general chaos from the moment the woman had stepped outside to greet us. She let out a whistle and then called out, “One, two, three!”
Like a miracle, the kids stopped and chanted back, “Eyes on me!”
Hawk blinked in surprise as the kids all plonked themselves down on a big mat in the center of the classroom, staring up at their teacher and Hayley Jade in interest.
The teacher, Miss Winters, smiled at the students. “Everybody, this is Hayley Jade. She’s new to our class. Do you want to know something special? Hayley Jade has a secret superpower. Do you know what that superpower might be?”
The kids gaped and shook their heads.
Miss Winters crouched so she was closer to their heights. “Well, Hayley Jade’s superpower is her listening ears. She hears everything we say and understands every word, even though right now, she doesn’t speak. Who else has super listening ears? Can you turn them on?”
The kids fiddled with their ears, miming turning on switches like robots.
Hayley Jade did it too, and I smiled from where Hawk and I stood in the doorway, watching on quietly.
“Good job! Now can everyone welcome Hayley Jade to our class?”
“Welcome, Hayley Jade,” the kids chorused.
Hayley Jade just beamed at them all, her intelligent eyes taking in the classroom like it was Disneyland. I supposed to her, it was. There were no classrooms at Ethereal Eden, especially not ones filled with toys and books and educational games like this. It was all brightly colored alphabet posters and kid art.
“Damn, she’s an awesome kid,” Hawk whispered to me, staring at her with pride in his eyes. “She didn’t even cry. And look at her. She’s absolutely the smartest kid in that room. She’s going to leave all these other kids in her dust.”
I couldn’t help but smile at him, and then at my daughter as she waved to us, her excitement so clear in her little face.
“I think that’s our cue to leave,” I whispered to Hawk.
He grunted his disapproval, but I threaded my fingers through his.
“Let her fly on her own wings. She doesn’t need you right now.”
He made a face. “Don’t say that to me. I like her needing me.”
I chuckled, pulling him away from the door. “She still does. But just before nine and after three on weekdays, okay?”
He huffed but waved to her and eventually let me close the door.
As promised, Ice was positioned by the front gates, chatting with the school’s security guard. Talk of fences and new security systems floated back to me, and if I’d had any last worries I was doing the right thing here, seeing how seriously they were taking Hayley Jade’s safety put the last of them to rest.
We’d had a meeting with the school principal and told her everything. She’d listened calmly and assured us we weren’t the only ones in a domestic violence situation and they had procedures in place when it came to the families affected. She’d walked us through every security measure the school had, and even Hawk had admitted he was impressed.
We made our way back to the club van and got in.
Hawk glanced over at me. “What now? We’re kid—and Chaos—free until three?” A devilish look crossed his face. “I could—”
I interrupted him before he could suggest something dirty. Which I knew was exactly where his mind was going. “No. No sex. We’ve done something for Hayley Jade, now we need to do something for us.”
His fingers crept toward my leg. “Last I checked, orgasms were for us.”
“You said you’d volunteer at the hospital with me.”
Hawk groaned, “No I didn’t.”
But we both knew he had. “I can always go by myself…”
He stared at me.
I giggled. “Then maybe you’re volunteering too?”
He put the van into drive. “This is going to ruin my street cred, you know?”
I smiled to myself. So would the way he was caring for Hayley Jade like he was her father, but I didn’t mention that.