Chapter 50
“Have you ever been to Yellowstone?” Savage asked as he gripped the steering wheel.
“I haven’t been anywhere,” I said, pulling my eyes from the window as I watched the flat terrain glide by.
He reached over and took my hand. “I thought we could see some stuff on our way up to Idaho.”
“Sounds good.” I forced a smile, trying to remain cheerful despite the heaviness on my heart.
Two days after the funeral, we’d left Waco. We’d stopped at Willa and Duke’s on the way out of town, and they hadn’t tried to talk Savage into staying. His mind was made up. And because they loved him, they let him go.
When Willa hugged me goodbye, she said in my ear, “Check in once in a while.”
“I will,” I promised.
I would be their lifeline to Savage. No one expected him to remain plugged in.
He’d left his motorcycle at their house because it was still winter in Idaho, and it was dangerous to ride. But it was also too close to the club for Savage’s wounded heart, and it would hurt him too much to be reminded of a future he might not have.
“Want to stop for lunch soon?” Savage asked, shattering the silence.
“Yeah, that sounds good.”
My phone pinged and I reached into my bag to grab it. It was the Jackson family group text.
Jazz
Come back.
Virgil
Agreed. Three Kings isn’t the same without you demanding I put money in the swear jar.
There was a whole slew of messages, and even though I wanted to reply, I turned my phone on silent and put it back in my purse.
“The Old Ladies?” Savage asked.
I shook my head. “The Jacksons.”
“Ah.”
He fell silent again.
“Did I tell you that they put Cozy and Riley in the thread?” I asked. “Seems the entire Jackson clan is settling down.”
I realized I wouldn’t be around to watch their budding relationships. I would miss out on girl talk and people committing to each other and moving in together. And I’d miss seeing Virgil interact with Riley’s daughter, Clementine. I wondered if she would be able to nag him into getting her a puppy.
By choosing Savage, I had inadvertently chosen to cut myself off from people I’d just begun to bond with.
“I’m sorry,” he said quietly.
“For what?”
“I can see it on your face,” he said. “You don’t want to leave town.”
“No, I don’t,” I admitted. “I mean, I do. I do think we need some distance. But three months? That’s so long.”
“It’s not that long.”
I placed a hand on my stomach. “Long enough that I’ll be sporting a big belly when we get back.”
“I didn’t think about that,” he murmured. “I didn’t think about a lot of things. I guess I didn’t realize how much this would affect your life, not just mine. Pretty selfish, huh?”
“We’re doing the best we can, Savage,” I murmured.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“You need what you need.” I shrugged. “And you need this more than I need to be in Waco. That’s bound to happen over the course of our life together, Savage. There will be times when my needs will be more important than yours and vice versa. And right now, you need this. And I need to be with you. So, let’s see some stuff on the way up to Idaho and take a breather. Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
He looked relieved.
How could I ask him to turn around? He had demons he was trying to outrun. But demons were relentless, and they always caught up with you and swallowed you whole.
Savage’s phone buzzed on the nightstand of the motel room. He reached for it and unlocked the screen.
“Well, that’s one bit of good news,” he said, setting his phone down and then cuddling me close.
I snuggled into his embrace. “What is?”
“The club found Dr. Winchester. Now they’ll take care of him.”
I let out a sigh of relief. “That is good news.”
“But is it enough to help you sleep at night?”
“Eventually . . . probably.” I propped up on my elbow so I could look at him. “Are you upset that you weren’t there to help the club find him?”
“Yeah. But as I’m learning, I can’t do everything myself.”
“You’re learning that, are you?” I teased.
I traced his chin with my thumb.
“You want to tell me about your nightmares?” he asked.
“I don’t remember them,” I lied.
“I don’t buy that for a second. You’ve been having them every night for the past several days.” He grabbed my finger. “Stop trying to distract me.”
“You’re already going through it, Savage. I don’t want to add to your stress.”
“We never talked about it,” Savage said quietly. “Not really.”
“You walked in just after the worst of it,” I said with a sigh. “You saw everything. I didn’t think there was really a point of rehashing it.”
He waited and I knew he wasn’t going to give up. Not until I told him how it was making me feel.
“It’s the same nightmare,” I said quietly. “I wake up in a room, strapped to a table. My stomach is big. Really big. And it’s—you can see my stomach move because the babies are ready to be born. Only I don’t get to have them. The Grand Patriarch is standing over me and he’s cutting open my stomach and stealing my babies from me. He laughs and laughs, completely unhinged as he pulls them from my body. There’s blood everywhere and I try to scream and make him stop . . . and then I wake up.”
He stared at me and then his expression darkened. “You’ve been keeping that from me? Jesus Christ, woman!”
“What are you going to do?” My voice cracked. “It’s my nightmare. It’s not real. It didn’t happen. Well, I mean, I did wake up strapped to an exam table.”
“Evie . . .”
“And I was examined against my will . . . but the club found the doctor and it’s over.”
“It’s over,” he agreed. “But not forgotten. You don’t just move on from that.”
“No. That takes time,” I agreed.
“I’ll hold you, babe. And tell you that you’re safe, that the babies are safe. And when we get to Idaho, I’m teaching you how to shoot.”
“I know how to shoot.”
“What?”
I raised my brows. “I lived on a farm. There were coyotes.”
“And you didn’t think to shoot your husband and be done with it?” he asked.
“The thought briefly crossed my mind. But if I got caught it would’ve been premeditated. And if I didn’t get caught, then I still would’ve had to dispose of his body. I still would’ve had to go on the run.” I suddenly started to laugh. And laugh. I laughed so hard my sides began to hurt.
Savage just stared at me.
“Oh God,” I wheezed. “I’m so messed up!”
“Why? Because you thought of murdering your husband prior to actually doing it?”
I shook my head. “No. I just never thought I’d be able to say it out loud without being sick. I’m certifiable, aren’t I?”
“No,” he said softly. “This is what it’s like. I told you it would come at you in weird ways.”
I bit my lip pensively.
“What is it?” He asked as he brushed a strand of hair away from my cheek.
“Why haven’t we been intimate?”
“We haven’t been intimate for several reasons,” he murmured. “I cleaned blood from your face. I sat in the bath with you while you shook. You need time to heal, Evie. There’s no rush. And you can’t rush it, even if you wanted to.”
“Are you telling yourself that as much as you’re telling me?”
“Yes.” He paused. “But this is different. Acid’s death . . . that’s my fault.”
I wouldn’t give him empty platitudes. But I didn’t want to make it worse by agreeing with him.
“You know what Prez told me?” he asked after a long silence. “I was sitting there, and they were weighing this against all the things I’ve done . . .”
“What did he say?”
“He said that even though I was loyal and willing to protect the people I love, I live my life selfishly, and that’s why Acid is dead. He told me I’ve spent my life asking for forgiveness, but never permission. Taking a bullet for a brother is one thing but putting them in a dangerous situation is another thing entirely. That’s been sticking with me.”
He swallowed, like he was trying to swallow his pain.
“I’m the human equivalent of dynamite,” he said. “I walk into situations without thinking them through, and I make them worse. He’s dead because of me, Evie. I didn’t mean to, but I killed him.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I remained silent.
He sighed. “You can’t go back. Can you?”
“No. Only forward. So, let’s go forward.”
“It’ll be slow,” he warned me.
“No doubt.”
“And now we both have nightmares.”
“I’ll comfort you, and you comfort me,” I said. “Maybe it’s supposed to be this way. Maybe we’re the lucky ones.”
“Lucky? How do you figure?”
“Eight billion people in the world. And somehow we met. We met, and we fell in love, and now we’re a family.”
“Lucky,” he repeated.
I placed my hand on his heart. “So lucky.”