Epilogue
Leena
Six Months Later
I never would have pegged my father for having a family cookout.
Mostly because my father doesn’t do things like that.
He’s not friendly. He’s not social. The only thing that ever really mattered to him was furthering his cause—which ultimately was to have one of the most powerful clubs in the region.
That’s what I honestly thought about him.
Maybe shit changes. Maybe The Riders changed a fundamental part of him. Maybe having us taken, our lives threatened, awoke something dark and primal, a fatherly instinct inside of his tightly squeezed, black heart that he never knew he had.
Whatever the reason, I’m shocked as hell that he wanted to have a backyard cookout, complete with a real grill, actual hamburgers, deck chairs, and the works.
There are nine of us. Nine kids from nine different women. Clearly, my father never wanted to make that mistake again. He just preferred to make it with other people.
My brothers mingle around, my oldest two, with their girlfriends.
I don’t really know anything about them—how long they’ve been dating or if they’re serious or not—but they seem happy.
My other four brothers, Ivan included, amble around like they don’t really know what to make of the whole thing.
They shift from one foot to the other, barely able to sit still, like at any second my father is going to declare the real purpose of the gathering was to marshal the troops to war.
Unless it’s a war against some other secret rival club that none of us know about, there isn’t going to be one.
Six months. My father has been president of the Jacksonville chapter of Steel Riders for six months now.
Surprisingly, he loves it. Took to it like a damn fish to water.
And he shocked the hell out of everyone by proving he was willing to be rational and to share.
Like all along maybe he didn’t want the ultimate form of power.
He just wanted to be a part of something great.
Something bigger than himself. Like maybe…
maybe he was searching for a form of family too, as hard as it is to believe.
My father’s house is huge, and the backyard is even bigger.
Honestly, in the years that I lived there, I never saw it as full or as happy as it is today.
Steph sits to my right, Wing beside her.
She has his hand pressed between both of hers and looks utterly adorable.
Her face is absolutely radiant and below her knit sweater, the tiny swell of her stomach is just starting to show.
Wraith sits beside me in a lawn chair that lets out a groan of complaint against his large frame every couple of minutes.
He’s munching on his six burgers, though the fire in his eyes every single time he looks my way tells me he’d very much enjoy having something else for dinner. Or dessert. Maybe both.
I swear that I’ll never get tired of him.
The sweet kisses he shares with me like a secret, or the rough, scorching passion that hasn’t dimmed one single bit.
I keep waiting for it to get old. For us to drop out of that honeymoon stage and get sick of each other, but every time I wake up next to him, our limbs intertwined, Abby down at our feet, feels like the best day of my life.
The only dark blot on the day is the fact that Ami isn’t there.
She sends me texts once in a while. She’s invited me and Steph to go to Tampa to see her a few times, but we haven’t gone yet.
I want to. So does Steph. We probably will, if she reaches out again.
She seems happy enough, from her updates, even if she refuses to come home.
My father shocks the hell out of me by ambling up, his usually dark features schooled into their same brooding scowl, but his eyes are different. Somehow lighter. Kinder.
“Leena. Steph. Could you help me in the kitchen for a few minutes?” The question is forced out. He’s not used to asking for anything, but we’re no longer his to command.
I bite my teeth into my bottom lip, chewing at a piece of skin that I worry off, before I finally nod. Steph, as always, is so much more graceful. She pops up out of her chair, kisses Wing’s forehead, which makes him actually blush—honestly, they’re sickening at times—and smiles at our father.
“Sure. Lead the way.” She takes my hand in her own and tugs me along in her honey scented wake.
When the large patio doors close behind us and we step into the kitchen, I face my father, unable to contain my curiosity any longer. The kitchen is a huge mess, filled with empty burger boxes, condiment bottles, heads of lettuce, sliced tomatoes, onion peels, pickle jars, and dirty dishes.
“I swear if you ask me to clean this up, I am never coming here again,” I announce snottily.
Steph giggles. “I’d help you. We did eat, after all. Maybe it’s only fair.”
“Our brothers could help, for a change.”
“And would help in a second if I asked.” She winks at me and I have to smile back at the teasing twist of her lips and the gentle blush gracing her cheeks.
“That’s not why I asked you in here,” our father breaks in.
He stands to the side, his arms crossed over his ample chest. He doesn’t really look like a healthy man, all his features sagging with age, but in his prime, I can see that he was actually something, or rather, someone that women would find attractive.
He was probably once tall and broad. He has that kind of animal power that other men want, and women fall all over themselves for.
Gross.
I hate realizing things like that about my own parent.
To my surprise, he heaves a sigh. My father doesn’t sigh. He’s never not in control, or at the very least, completely collected, at least on the outside.
“I wanted to tell you, that all those months ago, I know you didn’t understand my decision.
I know that you’ve thought of me as a tyrant and that I haven’t been a very good father.
The truth is, I never knew how to be. I left you with your mother, Stephanie, because she’s a good woman who I knew would love you and care for you better than I ever could.
I wanted to screw you up as little as possible, so I stayed away.
I provided for you the best I could, financially, to give you the things you needed and wanted. ”
Well hello. That certainly is news to me. Apparently, it’s news to Steph too, or maybe it’s just the pregnancy hormones, because her eyes well up and tears start trickling down her cheeks. She makes no move to brush them away, just stands there, eyes shimmering, prettier than ever.
“Leena, I know you have even less reason to think of me as a father. All I know how to do is raise boys. Tough, strong boys. I was raised that way. Harsh. Without a gentle hand. I don’t know how to be loving and kind.
I didn’t know how to ensure you had a good future.
I gave you both the best shot I had,” he pauses and his eyes go from me to my sister.
“When I asked Steel for three husbands, it wasn’t just to trade you off, though I know you saw it that way.
I wanted to give you a future. I wanted to give you the things I never knew growing up and the family I wasn’t able to give you.
Steel’s a good man, and I trusted him to make good matches. ”
“You- you could have let us choose for ourselves,” I say roughly, probably also unfairly, in the face of an uncharacteristic display of emotion from a normally hard man.
“I thought about that,” my father admits.
His eyes dart around the kitchen, obviously uncomfortable.
“I also thought that if it didn’t work out, you’d go on to do that for yourselves.
I wanted to give you the chance. I didn’t want you to wade through the bullshit first, to be used by men like- like me.
Men who would find out who your family was and want you for what it meant for them.
Any man who treated either of you badly, I would find and kill.
I thought this way, I could avoid a high body count. ”
Both Steph and I stare at each other for a few stunned minutes. Finally, she laughs, that sweet musical sounding laugh that she’s always had. Even I have to smile.
“You tried that with Tracker,” I admit. “It didn’t work out.”
“It’s not my fault the bastard has a chest of steel and was pumped up on enough drugs that shooting him didn’t seem to make a difference.”
“It’s a good thing,” I remind him quietly.
“The Riders took him back. He’s still trying to get clean, but he’s sorry.
Sorrier than you can imagine. My own husband…
his past… he’s a good man. He deserved another chance.
He deserved someone to love him and a family, like everyone else.
Sometimes life makes us into people we don’t want to be. Or we let it.”
Tracker has been given another chance, though I think this time everyone knows it’s his final one.
Final final. Addiction can make people do things they otherwise wouldn’t, and Steel and my father hope that once Tracker is clean, then the man he used to be will emerge.
People don’t think about one-percent MCs having compassion, they only know the violence, but at the heart is a strict moral code.
Some things are unforgiveable, but other times, even the worst offender deserves a chance to make things right.
My father swallows audibly, as loud as a gunshot. My mouth nearly drops open, because my father does not act like this. Ever. He’s never been anything less than hard. Vulnerability, regret, gentleness—those are things he isn’t.
Until now.
It makes me realize that it’s not too late. That people really can change. Or maybe it was there all along, and we just never gave it a chance. I never saw below the surface, and he never gave me that glimpse I so desperately needed.
“I hope that’s true for us all,” he chokes out.