Chapter 9 – Christopher
Guilt was a motherfucker, either freshly served, piled on a little at a time, or just there, hanging over an assfuck like a goddamn cloud.
Listening to Megan rifle through the vanity drawer in the bathroom, knowing without even asking what she was looking for, hearing her intermittent “where are they?” kept Christopher rooted in bed.
But her sob hit him in the center of his chest. Somehow, he dragged himself to his feet, weighted down with his own fuckery.
He couldn’t bring himself to go into the bathroom. He stopped in the doorway and clenched his jaw. His wife was leaning against the counter, her fingers gripping the edges, her head hung, and her shoulders shaking.
She wanted her birth control pills. Friday morning, when he stole them and deleted her reminders, she was thinking about Harley’s play and still in shock because of Gypsy’s death. Yesterday, Megan focused on Diesel’s birthday.
Undoubtedly, she was still mourning her friend. That was probably where some of her tears came from, but something always clicked in her head with her pills to make her remember them. He just hadn’t counted on that happening so soon. Nor had he thought he’d feel so fucking guilty and uneasy.
He sidled a glance at his closet door. Thankfully, he’d remembered to move them from his sock drawer and put them in the pocket of one of his old cuts. Not that it mattered. New or old, she wouldn’t have touched it. His colors was the only thing in his life off-limits to her.
Another sob escaped her, and he shifted his weight, the movement startling her. She jerked and raised her teary gaze to him, her eyes pools of blue that threatened to consume him.
“Hey, baby,” he said gently. “Why you cryin’?”
He had to ask. Otherwise, she’d become suspicious.
She hung her head again, her golden hair streaming around her. “I can’t find my pills,” she said around pitiful sniffles. “I know…I th-thought I had the old pack and the new pack in that drawer.” She pointed to the drawer in question. “They aren’t there, Christopher. I’ve looked everywhere.”
He didn’t have pants on to shove his hands in his fucking pockets, so he pursed his lips instead.
“I d-don’t remember if I took them yesterday or the day before that or the day before that.”
It had only been two days.
She covered her face and fucking cried. He felt like doing the same. He hadn’t even thought about those motherfuckers until he heard her in here.
“Suppose I’m pregnant?”
Instead of answering, he rushed to her and wrapped his arms around her, her back to his front. He rested his chin on the top of her head.
“It’s okay, baby,” he whispered.
“It isn’t!” she screeched. “Jo isn’t even home yet. Rule is still in LA. Gunner barely knows me anymore. I can’t be pregnant right now.”
Squeezing his eyes shut, he tightened his hold on her. “Megan, baby, if you got another kid in you, we’ll find a way to make shit work. I swear.”
“How? We both know you’d worry yourself sick if I got on an airplane to visit Rule, or if I picked up Jo or Gunner, while I was pregnant.”
He didn’t know what to say to her, except confess his fuckery, and that he wouldn’t do. She might leave after she karate chopped his nuts. Preferable to her walking away. He hadn’t thought his actions through when he’d swiped those pills.
Fuck, that wasn’t fucking true. He had considered whether he should do it, then said fuck it.
“I love you so fuckin’ much, Megan.”
She nodded and sniffled again. “I know, and I love you with all my heart.”
“You don’t like lil’ babies no more?”
“I love them, but I already have a newborn and a toddler.”
“Gunner turnin’ four this year. He ain’t gonna be a toddler much longer.”
“Jo is four months old, Christopher. Four months, but her adjusted age is zero months. She was due March 23rd.”
“I thought she would’ve been a month old now.”
Megan shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. If I’m pregnant and I carry the baby to term, chronologically Jo will be fourteen months, but developmentally she’ll be ten months. Don’t you remember how it was with Axel?”
“Barely.” Sighing, Christopher dropped his arms, grabbed her hand, and guided her to her makeup table. He prodded her to the stool. “Axel ain’t had a lot of the issues that Jo had.”
“We were lucky.” She met his gaze in the mirror, hers miserable and wet. “He was lucky.”
“He was, but so was Jo. Our girl gonna be fine.”
Misery blanketed Megan’s face. She nodded, drew in a deep breath, glanced away, then met his gaze in the mirror again. “Did you take my pills?” she asked hoarsely.
Somehow, he didn’t wince or react in any fucking way except to shake his head. “Fuck no, baby.”
“Are you sure? It wouldn’t be fair if you did. That’s going too far.”
Annoyance flashed through him and he gritted his teeth.
“You promised me you’d stop manipulating me and lying to me.”
That annoyance turned into anger.
“You told me I could be me without worrying you’d leave, Megan.”
“Did you take my pills?”
“No,” he said flatly, digging his heels in. What the fuck did she expect him to do? If he admitted the truth, what the fuck would she do? “If I did, then fuckin’ what? You ain’t never had a problem before with what the fuck I do.”
“It was my mistake not to set boundaries.”
Horror washed through him, and he recoiled. “I ain’t never had boundaries with you, and I ain’t about to start now, Megan, so shut the fuck up.”
She turned and faced him, her eyes huge and vulnerable. “This doesn’t have to be an argument.”
“What the fuck you want it to be then?” He thrust his fingers through his hair. “You always fuckin’ enjoyed bein’ mine.”
“I’m still yours. That won’t change.”
“If you changed, that fuckin’ changed.” He laughed bitterly. “Ain’t it fuckin’ obvious?”
“Boundaries are good, Christopher,” she said softly. “You should be proud of me and want me to protect myself.”
He gasped. Outraged…indignant…appalled…somefuckinthing that he was too that to even fucking describe. “Protect yourfuckinself? From my fuckin’ ass?” Even more than that? He sounded like a shocked bitch.
She had the fucking nerve to nod.
Clasping his hands together, he turned in a tight circle, hurt to his fucking core. “You fuckin’ lied to me. You told me everything was back to normal.”
“It is—”
“The fuck it is! When the fuck you decided I can’t do what the fuck I want to you without you leaving?”
“Repeat those words,” she yelled, growing angrier by the minute. “Tell me how that sounds, moron.”
“I ain’t got to repeat those motherfuckers, Megan. Cuz I know how the fuck they sound. Like you mine. Like you fuckin’ love me and trust me.”
“I would’ve divorced you if I didn’t love and trust you.”
“There’s that fuckin’ ‘D’ word again. You wanna divorce me?”
“No! But I don’t want you to take my stupid pills for your comfort either.”
He choked, and his eyes bulged. Thankfully, she mistook his reaction as more anger than worry that the jig was up. “You’ve lost your motherfuckin’ mind,” he roared, still doubling down. “How the fuck stealin’ your birth control pills comfort me?”
She swiped at a stray tear and glared at him. “It’s still in your mind that I’m leaving you. You’re trying to manipulate me into staying by getting me pregnant.”
“No the fuck I ain’t. And if I was, I wouldn’t be wrong. You’d stay. You couldn’t leave because you’d be filled with my kid.”
“It would only delay it. If I wanted to leave you, nothing would stop me. Besides, I didn’t have to come back when I left a few days ago.”
“So now you regret that, too?”
“Christopher—”
“Tell me what fuckin’ boundaries you settin’ and why now?”
Her face crumpled.
“Lemme fuckin’ guess. This still about motherfuckin’ Torie, huh, baby?”
“Just listen to me—”
“Fuck you.”
“Right back at you, jerk. You brought her up. I didn’t.
And it isn’t about her. It’s about everything.
I don’t regret going to LA and I don’t regret coming back.
I never want to leave you again.” She started to cry again.
“The brothers mistook everything between us. They propositioned me for bl-blow jobs and a-anal sex and r-regular sex.”
“What the fuck you said?”
Again. Because she’d told him before and he thought they’d moved past this. Hearing it from her one time was enough to drive him insane. Hearing it from her again, when she was so torn up, sent him over the fucking edge.
“They laughed in my face and spread horrible rumors about me,” she went on.
“They overdosed my son! All they saw was me smiling and looking the other way, no matter what you did. They didn’t see us or me.
They stopped seeing you. What happens here spills over there.
” Sobbing so fucking pitifully that Christopher’s heart hurt, she swiped her hands over her cheeks.
“I learned so much from you. You taught me to read people. To read a room. To figure out situations. You are formidable. Some things I overlooked because they were non-issues. You made me so mad a lot of times, but I enjoyed matching wits with you. But it’s time for us to change.
It’s time for me to change. You aren’t always at the club when I’m there. ”
That wouldn’t be a problem. He’d kill as many motherfuckers as he needed so she’d feel safe again.
She squeezed the bridge of her nose, tears still sliding down her cheeks.
“I’m sorry. Our issues have been resolved.
It’s just…Rebel. I’m thinking about all of that because of those videos of our daughter.
I’m thinking about what the bikers and club girls might do to her or say to her or.
..if everything I rehashed affects me, what’s going to happen to my baby if they do it to her? ”