Epilogue 2
“Stolen is such a strong word. I prefer the term borrowed,” Gunther complains as I deftly unbutton the top few buttons of my top before unhooking the cup of my maternity bra and freeing my boob. It takes Evan a second to latch on, and when he does, I remember I have an audience.
I try to turn away from them so they can’t see anything, but Hannibal puts a stop to that. “They have a problem with you feeding my son, they can all fuck off.”
“Trust me, I have no problem watching Lola feed her son,” a voice calls out.
Hannibal growls. “Don’t make me kill you, Toot.”
“Still as touchy as ever, I see.” Toot walks forward to give Hannibal a one-armed bro hug, but Hannibal leaves him hanging. “So rude.” He sighs before turning to me. “I’m not sure if you remember me or not. I’m Toot.” He holds his hand for me to shake, but I kinda have mine full.
“My bad. Here, let me hold your boob for you,” he jokes.
Hannibal launches himself at Toot, who sidesteps him at the last minute.
Toot is unceremoniously yanked back by Havoc. “Can’t you behave yourself for five fucking minutes?”
“Sorry, Dad.”
“Fucking save me from idiots,” Havoc mutters before shoving Toot away from Hannibal, who still looks set on murdering him.
“Hannibal, Lola.” Havoc greets us both as Nevaeh sidles up beside him.
“Hi guys.” She offers a genuine smile.
I feel a nudge at my elbow and look over to see Millie standing next to me in the same protective stance her father usually adopts. God, I love this kid.
“Havoc, Nevaeh, and everyone watching creepily from across the room, this is Millie. Our daughter.”
Millie jolts at my words, making me frown until I realize I said our daughter and not Hannibal’s.
“Crap, I’m sorry Millie. I didn’t mean to?—”
“No, it’s okay. I like it. I think my mom would've too. She’d like you for me.”
“Do not make me cry. I’m not wearing waterproof mascara,” I grumble, making her grin.
“Well, hell,” Toot begins, his eyes on Millie.
I glare at him and take a step forward. “Do not look at her with your slimy eyes. She’s fourteen and if you so much as breathe on her, I’ll rip out your lungs and give them to Hannibal to sauté.”
Toot’s mouth drops open in shock.
The guys behind me chuckle, but not half as much as Hannibal does.
“Wow, you’ve totally corrupted her.” Toot shakes his head and walks back to the rest of his brothers.
“He’s harmless, I swear. Mac, that’s his brother—” Nevaeh points at another guy who looks a little like Toot before continuing “—says he was dropped on his head a few times when he was a kid. We suspect brain damage.”
“Yeah, I can see that.”
“Hey!” Toot yells, making both clubs laugh.
“What’s everyone standing around for? It’s time to cut the cake.”
I close my eyes and sigh when I hear Ed’s voice yelling.
“Ooh, you got cake?” A stunning woman steps up beside Nevaeh, offering me a smile. “I mostly eat clean, but if I’m ever going to break, it’s because of cake. I’m Amity, by the way. G’s old lady.”
“The stuntwoman, right?”
“That’s me.”
“Oh my fucking God.”
I turn at the sound of Byte’s voice.
“What’s wrong?”
“Absolutely fucking nothing.”
“I feel like I should invest in a swear jar or something.” I sigh as Evan releases my nipple. I deftly tuck myself away and lift him over my shoulder, tapping his back.
“What’s going on with Byte?” I ask Hannibal but notice everyone moving to gather nearer the cake.
“Not sure.” Hannibal presses his hand to my lower back and ushers me toward the cake table Ed set up on the far side of the room.
I stop a few feet in front of it when I get a good look at it. Hannibal starts choking beside me just as Nevaeh, who had followed us over, starts giggling.
“Is that?
“Driller? Yeah.”
I couldn’t, in my wildest dreams, have foreseen Ed making a massive human-shaped cake. A human that looks uncannily like Driller. But just in case there was any confusion, he’s even wearing a cut with his name piped onto the chest.
“I have no words,” I admit as Havoc steps up next to me. I look up at him. He stares at me like he wants to say something but has no clue where to start. I smile. “Everything turned out the way it was supposed to in the end.”
He lifts his hand and trails his finger down Evan’s face. “I loved you. I don’t ever want you to think I didn’t. When I asked for forever, I meant it.”
“We’re exactly where we’re supposed to be, Havoc. I’ve made peace with that. It’s time that you do too.”
“How? How can you even look at me and not hate me?”
“I did hate you for a while. I hated you, Khan, Driller, this club. Hell, I hated myself the most. And you know what I realized? It was fucking exhausting. I had to let it go to move on.” I look to Hannibal, who’s standing with Millie, watching me, waiting for a sign that I need him to intervene.
“I’m happy. And knowing how it feels, I know that we were in trouble long before Driller stepped in and fucked with us both. We were drifting apart.”
His shoulders slump. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. Sorrier than you’ll ever know.”
I swallow the lump in my throat. It would be so easy to lash out at him. I’m past most of my anger, but that doesn’t mean I can just forget everything. I’m a work in progress. But that’s okay because I know I’ll get there eventually.
“You want to hold your nephew?”
His eyes jump to mine. “Really?”
I nod. “Yeah.”
“He’s so small. I don’t want to hurt him.”
“You won’t. I trust you with him.”
He swallows. He’s not a dumb man. He knows I’ll probably never trust him one hundred percent. Words and promises won’t change that. But maybe, one day, his actions will. What I do know is that I can trust him with Evan. He’d never let anything happen to him—and it has nothing to do with Even being his nephew and everything to do with the kind of man he is.
He reaches for Evan and eases him onto his shoulder.
“He looks even smaller in your arms,” I admit.
I look at Havoc’s face, watching an wave of emotions passing over it as he gazes down at Evan—falling in love with him almost as fast as Hannibal did.
“Oh, man. Bikers and babies are far too potent a mix for me.” Marjorie sighs, fanning herself.
“You’re not alone,” Nevaeh mutters from behind me, making me chuckle.
“So give him one. He always wanted to be a dad.” I shrug.
“It’s not him I’m worried about. It’s me. I don’t know how to be a mom.”
“I’ll let you in on a little secret, Nevaeh” Marjorie says, lowering her voice. “None of us do.”
I nod. “She’s not wrong.”
“Lola, get up here and cut this thing,” Elmo shouts, holding out a knife for me.
I look at Havoc.
“I’ve got him,” he assures me
“Alright, watch he doesn’t puke all over your president patch,” I tease, feeling something ease between us. Yeah, we’ll never be besties, but maybe my boy will be the glue that holds the threads of what made us, us together—enough to be friends.
I walk up to Elmo and take the knife with a frown. “This is a hunting knife, not a cake knife. It’s a little overkill, don’t you think?”
“Trust me.” He winks as Ed steps up beside me.
“Cut!” Ed orders.
I roll my eyes at the bossy man. And because it’s a cake of Driller, I can’t resist slicing through his face.
When the cake separates, I burst out laughing at the red velvet cake inside with a strawberry jam sandwiched between. Now the knife makes sense—I get to stab the man and make him bleed.
I can’t resist stabbing him in the eye. A cheer goes up around the room as Hannibal saddles up behind me and wraps his hands around my waist.
“Huh, I went for the eyes too. Great minds think alike.”
I shake my head and chuckle. It’s in moments like this that I understand exactly how Belle fell for the Beast.
The party is still going, but the kids have gone home with May and Tracey, who are as obsessed with Evan as everyone else is. They also adore Millie, so Hannibal agrees, somewhat begrudgingly, to let them go.
“Hey, come with me.” I reach out my hand and tug Hannibal from his perch on the ledge where he’s talking to G.
“Be right back,” Hannibal tells him as he follows me, no questions asked. “Where are we going?”
“It’s a surprise,” I tell him, walking him back to the old place. We stop outside where Havoc and Nevaeh are waiting.
“What’s going on?” Hannibal asks.
“That’s what I want to know. Lola said for us to meet you guys here.”
“I have gifts,” I admit, walking toward the house.
“The first one is for everyone, but mostly for Nevaeh and me.” I lead them to the kitchen where I have the old blender set up ready and the slightly thawing package sitting beside it.
“What’s this?” Nevaeh asks, moving to the package as Hannibal laughs.
“Let’s just say Hannibal has a unique skill set when it comes to giving gifts, so I thought I’d share.”
Havoc nudges Nevaeh aside and unwraps the package before stepping back. “What the fuck?”
“Oh my god, is that a penis?” Nevaeh covers her mouth in shock.
“Oh, that’s not just any penis, Nevaeh, it’s Driller’s.”
Silence envelops the kitchen before Havoc starts laughing his ass off. Nevaeh joins him as I look up at Hannibal with a soft smile.
“He’d be rolling in his grave if he knew his dick was bringing us all together.”
Hannibal chuckles, shaking his head. “Are we gonna blend it, or what?”
“Hell, yes.”
“Fuck, I love you.”
I beam a huge smile at my man before I pick up the dead dick with two fingers and toss it in the blender and switch it on.
What happens next involves a small amount of running and screaming. The moral of the story? Make sure the lid is on the blender first.
Standing outside near the garage as Hannibal picks dick juice out of my hair, Havoc looks at me and frowns.
“A gift for me? I’m scared to ask after the last one.” He flicks a bit of dick from his chest, making Nevaeh gag.
“At least it didn’t go in your mouth,” she huffs, making me giggle all over again.
“I’ve already said I was sorry.”
“Sorry, doesn’t erase the taste, Lola.”
Hannibal’s chest is heaving as he tries and fails to hold back his laughter.
“Alright, focus people. I have a son who’ll want the boobie soon.”
“And a man who’ll want them too,” Hannibal murmurs, grabbing my hips.
“Behave.”
I turn to Havoc. “You ready?”
“No, absolutely not.”
“Oh good.” I pull the keys I gave to Al, who returned them tonight, from my pocket and hit the fob to open the garage door.
“Hey Havoc?” He turns to me as the door continues to open.
“Catch.” I throw the keys at Havoc, who snatches them out of the air.
He stares down at them for a minute before he lifts his head, and his eyes hit mine. “No.”
I nod, feeling myself tear up. “I couldn’t let him have it. Cleared out all my savings and had Al buy it and keep it until you came home.”
“And I never came,” he chokes out.
“But you’re here now,” I whisper as a few tears slip free.
He turns to look in the garage and groans when he sees his dad’s bike. Next thing I know, I’m being torn out of Hannibal’s hold, and I find myself in Havoc’s familiar arms.
“Thank you. Thank you so fucking much.”
“Can I have my woman back now?” Hannibal drawls, making me laugh through my tears.
Havoc deposits me in Hannibal’s arms before he drags Nevaeh over to see the bike.
“You’re a good woman, Lola, and I’m a better man because of you.”
I stretch up on tiptoes and kiss him hungrily just as a cell phone rings. We pull apart, checking our phones in case it’s Millie or something to do with Evan.
“It’s mine,” Havoc calls out before answering. “Hello?”
His face turns serious before he looks up to the sky and starts cursing.
“Alright, thanks for letting me know. I’ll handle it.” He hangs up and looks at Hannibal. “Midas has been arrested.”
“What? What for?” Nevaeh gasps.
Havoc looks at her before shaking his head. “Stalking.”
“Stalking? Who would he be stalking?” I ask, since I barely know the guy.
Realization hit them all at the same time.
“Ah, fuck,” Havoc groans, but Nevaeh just starts laughing.
“Well, this is gonna be fun.”