Chapter 11
BODHI
“We got Bodhi out in town twice in one month. I feel like I should go play the lottery.” Rune leaned against the back of his chair, arms folded over his chest as he perused over his bar.
He wasn’t working tonight, but because the man didn’t know how to take a full day off, he was making sure that all his staff were set to go.
And if somebody needed something, he immediately bounded up and went to help them.
Then one of my brothers or his crewmates would force him to sit back down again.
Making Rune Carter take a day off was indeed like winning the lottery.
“I can go right back home, you know,” I said smoothly before taking a sip of my beer.
I had spent the past three days deep in my art, working on project after project and then a few commissions for furniture pieces.
My hands were sore, covered in scrapes and nicks, but in the end, I could barely feel them all.
Each night I spent the night with Kiera, either in my bed or hers.
It was odd to think that Kiera felt so comfortable in my bed.
Maybe because it had never been Courtney’s.
My wife had never slept under my roof, so it didn’t feel as if I were letting an intruder in. Because Kiera wasn’t an intruder.
I wasn’t the same man that I had been when I had been married to Courtney.
I had been young, innocent in a way that felt almost dumb, and I thought maybe some people could be better.
Dad had tried to break us over the years, though he had mostly taken it out on Callum.
I’d taken a couple of blows, but my big brother and my sisters had done their best to protect us.
I knew that life wasn’t happy and dewy and filled with stickers and gold stars.
Not everybody got their happy ending, but I’d thought I’d had mine with Courtney.
Then the fire had come, and that man had taken everything.
So no, I wasn’t the same man who had married my wife. Nor was I the same man who had been physically forced and removed from that fire.
I hadn’t been able to save her or my babies. Yet, in the years that had passed, now that people started to believe that maybe I wasn’t a murderer—even though the murderer was behind bars—why didn’t it feel like a full betrayal to be with somebody else?
“I’m glad you’re out,” Finnian said, his gaze on his phone rather than anyone else.
“I am here for you. Always,” I said dryly.
“You’re so nice,” my brother said, not bothering to look up from his phone.
“Who are you texting?” I asked, confused.
Finnian looked up, blinking as his eyes focused. “Promise and I are trying to figure out what to do with the girls’ birthdays.”
“Aren’t their birthdays a little while away?” Rune asked as he took a seat next to me.
“We’re trying to figure out how to make it work with both of our schedules, and what themes. Making sure that Mia and Ella feel like they each have their own birthdays without being forced to celebrate together all the time is awfully hard.”
“They’re not even five yet. Are they going to remember this?
” Atlas asked, leaning against the back of the bar.
He had his leg propped up, ice on his knee, though we made sure that nobody in the bar could tell.
He was visiting for the weekend and needed to get back to the team soon.
Having time away from the ice—even during the most critical of moments in his career—was good for his mental health, according to the team.
“Four- and five-year-olds can remember things,” I said softly.
Atlas held back a cringe and gave me a nod. “Good to know. I think you should have three birthdays then.”
Finnian just blinked at him. “What?”
“Three birthdays. One for Mia, one for Ella, and then a double birthday because they’re twins.”
“And what happens when they have another kid who’s not a twin, and they don’t get two to three birthdays?” Rune snorted.
“Hey, hey, hey. Promise and I are not having any other kids. I’m just glad that we’re friends at this point.”
“I’m pretty sure he meant separately,” I added softly.
Finnian blinked. “Oh, right. I guess if Promise gets married again and has kids, and one’s not a twin, things will be different.
But no, I don’t think three birthdays will work.
For now, the girls want to celebrate together, but if they ever want to do something separately, I guess we can make that work. ”
“Lucas and Olivia always have separate birthdays,” Callum put in.
“And he’s right. I should talk with Thatcher. He knows about this whole twin thing. And he has a girl. He’s good at this.”
“At least you have Promise to work with, Thatcher and Kellan each had to do that just on their own. Yes, they had their parents, but they didn’t have someone else to help them out.
” I took another sip of my beer, my mouth oddly not going dry or filling with bile while talking about kids.
From the surprised looks on my siblings’ and friends’ faces, they were noticing too.
Usually, everybody steered clear of conversations about kids around me.
But with my family, my siblings procreating, and all my friends’ kids starting to grow up, conversations tended to be about those kids alone.
You couldn’t hide from it. And if I wanted to be part of this town again—albeit still on the outskirts—I needed to find a way to be okay with it.
Though maybe being with Kiera, if only for the moment, was helping things. That wasn’t scary at all.
“Did you guys want to eat?” Rune asked.
“I figured we could order some food,” Atlas said. “But your team is so afraid to come over here because you keep micromanaging them, that we’re never going to get fed.”
“I’ve got you, Atlas. Don’t worry,” Penny said as she sauntered over. She was one of the new hires and practically salivated when she looked at the hockey star. I met Finnian’s gaze, and my brother smirked.
There were two other single people at this table, yet Penny only had eyes for Atlas.
I paused at that, thinking. Callum was taken, Finnian and Rune were single, and yet I hadn’t counted myself in that.
Before, it had always been because I never wanted to date again or be with anyone, but now, I promised Kiera it would only be her. And I’d meant it.
Well, hell.
“Do you know what you are focusing on with your next batch?” Rune asked.
Callum leaned forward, a frown on his face. “I have a list of ideas, but we expanded so much in the past year, always at capacity, I don’t want to build another factory or get to the point that we’re so big that some conglomerate wants to buy us. I like being niche. It’s hard to find that balance.”
“Well, if you need something built, I’ve got you,” Finnian said with a wink, his attention back on his phone.
This time, though, I knew he was dealing with countless customers who needed him to work on something.
He was building his own business step by step, and that meant long hours—even when he had the girls.
I was proud of him. He had stepped up as a teenager and hadn’t backed down once.
Even when I had been broken, not able to even hold one of his kids, he had been right by my side, doing what he could for me.
I needed to be better at being there for them too.
We ordered our food, and a few more people came up to Atlas to talk about the game. The place started to get a little more crowded, and while we discussed an upcoming event for the town where they needed me to work on building one of the larger pieces for the play, my gaze caught a flash.
Rune immediately stood up, as a few other flashes filled the room, and then everybody started speaking at once.
“Is Kiera West here? We heard that this is the place where the rock star turned drug addict is hanging out these days. I see that we have an injured Atlas Carter. Do you have any comments?”
Drug addict? They thought she was a fucking drug addict?
I moved forward without thinking, and I hadn’t even realized I was standing until someone put a camera in my face.
“You’re Bodhi Ashford. The man who killed his family in that fire, aren’t you?”
There had to be at least thirty of them, people shouting things, and not making any sense. Where the hell had these people come from, and why were they here?
“That’s him. He killed his wife and kids and burned them to a crisp.” Nathan leaned against the jukebox, folding his arms over his chest. “Bastard got away with it too.”
I had my hands on his shirt and threw him against the wall in the next instant, but then Atlas pulled me back, and the sounds of a hundred photos being taken filled my mind as I tried not to kill the man. I would not go to jail over Nathan but maiming him would be helpful.
“Let’s go, buddy. Rune has it handled.”
Chest heaving, I let Atlas drag me out of the back door, as my siblings and Rune handled the mess.
“What the hell?” I asked, spinning on the ground.
“Breathe, Bodhi. Something wasn’t right in there, and you have to be smart about this. It’s not just you. It’s Kiera too.” He paused. “I have a feeling somebody sent those people.”
I frowned, looking up at the worried expression on Atlas’s face. “What do you mean?”
“There were way too many people to just stop by. And how would they know Kiera was here? I would make sure that she knows that something happened, and her management knows. But I don’t know.
It smells fishy. They just happened to know about Kiera?
Just happened to know about you? I was a lucky accident.
And the media already knows that I got hit in the knee and need to ice it.
They’re going to talk, but I’m fine with that kind of talk.
Whatever that bastard Nathan said is a lie.
But we all know how rumors spread. Make sure Kiera knows that something’s going on. ”