Chapter Five
Dawn
Rosalie
The sun was shining when my eyes opened.
So it was a sun-washed, tanned, defined, partially tatted
male torso that my eyes hit the instant they opened.
I knew where I was.
I was in my new bed in the carriage house pressed down the
side of Snapper.
And I knew why I was there.
I’d scratched the surface of precisely how extraordinary
being a part of Chaos was.
But more, I’d dug deeper into just how extraordinary having
Snapper in my life could be.
To say Carissa and Joker had filled my cupboards was an
understatement. It was a wonder the kitchen didn’t sink down into the
foundations a foot, it was groaning so much from food.
We made a dent in it eating chips and dip and sandwiches and
drinking beer and wine, cosmos and tequila shooters (I just had beer).
It was all fine and dandy until (what it did not take very
long to learn was) a hilarious woman named Elvira came over with her incredibly
handsome fiancé Malik and then all hell broke loose when she and Mom talked the
other women into playing quarters on my coffee table.
I decided to hang on the floor in the corner by the stairs
with Snap and Joker, letting Travis and Nash (Lanie and Hop’s son) crawl all
over us.
We got into tickle wars, fake wrestling, and generally being
human jungle gyms while chatting. Or the men did this. Any time one of the
little ones did something that might jar me, Snap snatched them up and let them
crawl all over him.
It was sweet.
It was Snap.
And seeing how amazing he was with kids was doing a number
on me.
While we sat and drank and played with the boys, we talked
about Joker’s builds (he was young, younger than me, but he’d become the
guy at Ride who designed and built their custom bikes and cars), Carissa’s
plans to become a hair stylist, and going through properties on Snap’s phone
that he was considering adding to his real estate empire.
It was then I learned that he didn’t just buy them. He
bought them, fixed them up like the one we were in, then rented them
undoubtedly at high rates in order to attract a certain tenant that wouldn’t
give him shit or leave his places trashed and probably lined his world with
cash.
He wasn’t trying to be a real estate mogul.
But as I listened to him talk casually to Joker about how he
handled six properties, his work at Ride, and his work with the Club, like it
was nothing, not to mention looking to add to his modest but growing dynasty,
he just simply was.
A biker becoming a mogul.
It was impressive.
It was attractive.
And it was surprising, but listening to him, I realized it
was another side of what was all just Snap.
The older men kicked back on my furniture surrounding the
women who were on their asses or their knees around my coffee table as they
proceeded to loudly and hilariously get smashed playing a game only college
students were unwise enough to play.
In that time, listening to the talk, enjoying the laughter,
I did this assessing my surroundings.
And I decided on a smaller dining room table so I could have
another seating area on that side of the house, definitely a reading nook so
that chair could be dragged in when I had company, and a portable crib that I
could keep in the garage (this last I added when Travis passed out on Joker’s
chest, and to my utter agony and profound delight, Nash did the same on Snap).
The women got shitfaced and loud, all but Carissa, who was
surprisingly crazy-good at quarters.
Eventually their men peeled them off the floor as they
declared undying love for each other, gave shit to their men for spoiling the
fun, and made plans to get shitfaced again, and soon, all the while their men
guided them into their coats, out the door, and then poured them in their
trucks.
Except Joker and Carissa, who stayed, hanging with Mom,
Snap, and me, them cuddled on one side of my couch, curled around each other
providing a human crib for Travis, Mom in my armchair, and me and Snap cuddled
into the other side of my couch.
Yes, I said cuddled.
I wasn’t being stupid, stupid Rosalie.
I was being stupid, dreamer, happy Rosalie.
And stupid, dreamer, happy Rosalie was the “dreamer” and
“happy” part of that because I saw that the night had just made my mom the
“happy” part.
There was also, of course, the important addition of Snapper
being a crazy-good cuddler.
Like we’d done it a million times before, with skills innate
to males and females passed down from generation to generation, even if we were
all together, the men talked and the women talked, holding entirely different
conversations in the same space.
Mom and I learned Joker wasn’t Travis’s dad. He was Travis’s
really awesome stepdad. They lived together, had Travis every other week,
Carissa worked at LeLane’s, and they’d gone to high
school together, been in love with each other then, but it wasn’t until
relatively recently they hooked up.
She gave us more and Carissa learned a lot about Mom and me.
Through this, sipping Corona, I watched her with Joker, the
ease they had with each other and with Travis, and I wondered if she knew about
the shit storm that was swirling around the Chaos MC.
If she did, it didn’t seem to bother her in the slightest.
She had her man. She had her son. Her man loved her son and
her son worshiped her man.
In the bubble of Carissa’s world, all was good and happy
even if the bigger bubble of the Chaos world was in danger of exploding.
Along with this I came to realize that I really liked
Carissa and Joker. I liked them all. I liked that there was food and booze and
fun and loudness and laughter. I liked that no one pushed Snap and Joker and me
to join in, they let us be quiet in the corner with the kids. I liked that
there were kids and they were part of what was happening in a natural
way. I liked that once some folks left, we got something different, mellow and
comfortable and relaxed. I liked that Snap fit into all of this like he was
born to it. And I liked that Snapper fit me (and Mom) into it like we’d been
there for years.
Liking all of this, lulled by all of this, eventually I
passed out on Snapper’s chest, still in the throes of nodding to try to stay
awake as Mom and Carissa chatted.
The next thing I knew, Snap was lifting me from the couch.
“I can walk,” I’d mumbled.
“That’s good, baby, because you just got over a concussion
and I could get you up normal stairs, but it’d be a tight fit not to slam your
cranium into the center pole of these.”
He put me down at the foot of the staircase and I glanced
groggily around as, with Snap’s hands on my hips spotting me, I lurched up the
stairs.
The space was dark and empty.
“Where’s Mom?” I asked.
“Joke and Carrie drove her home.”
“Oh.”
I made it up to the bedroom, through the bedroom and
bathroom, managed to snap on the closet light and stood swaying, staring at a
set of drawers in the closet.
“Where do you think my pajamas are?” I asked Snapper, who’d
followed me.
He opened and closed two drawers.
And there they were in drawer number three.
I snatched up a pair that was shorts and a loose cami in a peach/mauve/lavender/gray paisley and then pulled
off my tee.
That was when I sensed Snap leaving me.
I put on my pajamas, saw High had set my suitcases just
inside the closet, decided I was too exhausted to dig through them for my
toothbrush, and then lurched into the bedroom.
Snap was standing at the end of the bed, arms crossed on his
chest, ankles crossed with boot heel up, toe down on the wood floor, watching
me.
“Why aren’t you in bed?” I asked.
His body jerked and his brows cocked.
“Bed,” I muttered, making it to the side of that piece of
furniture and yanking down the fluffy duvet.
Very fluffy.
Upon sleepy inspection, totally choice.
“Babe,” Snapper called softly.
Bent over the bed, I looked to him, focused on him, saw he
had not moved, and stated, “I’m stupid, dreamer, happy Rosalie right now, Snap.
Please don’t mess it up.”
“You’re not drunk,” he noted.
“No,” I confirmed.
“Honey—”
“Don’t,” I whispered.
In the dark lit generously from the huge window behind the
bed, we stared into each other’s eyes for long moments before he reminded me
quietly, “We haven’t had our conversation.”
“You’re messing it up,” I said quietly back.
“I’m not that guy,” he informed me.
“You’re still messing it up,” I shared.
“Help me out here, Rosie, ’cause you mean the world to me
and I don’t wanna do dick to fuck my chances of
having a shot with you.”
Okay.
God.
Just when I thought he couldn’t get better.
He got better.
“Then don’t leave me tonight. Because tonight has been
perfect. Mom was happy. I was happy. We haven’t had a perfect night since Dad
got sick. The only thing that could make it not perfect is you leaving me to
sleep alone. I’m not talking about anything else. Just sleeping and not doing
it alone.”
“All right, baby, you want that, I gotta
know, the dawn comes, you aren’t gonna be pissed I
took advantage.”
“We’re gonna sleep. There won’t be
any advantage to take,” I replied.
“Sleeping together is an intimacy, Rosie, no matter what
happens, or doesn’t, when you’re doin’ it,” he
informed me softly.
I loved he thought that.
God.
Better and better.
“The dawn will not bring that for you, Everett,” I
whispered.
It took him several very long seconds to make his decision.
He made the right one when he pulled off his thermal and let
it fall to the floor.
Rather than stare at his chest and perhaps start drooling, I
crawled into bed.
I watched as, drawn by moonlight, his beautiful body in gray
boxer briefs got in the other side.
He settled on his back.
I scooted toward him and settled into him.
He shoved an arm under me and curled me closer.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Fuck yeah,” he answered decisively.
“Maybe this isn’t fair,” I muttered, having second thoughts.
“Rosie, honey, you put me here, you change your mind now,
you’re gonna have to pry me out.”