I Will Revel in Glory

by Stunich, C. M.

  “I’ll get your goddamn juice,” he tells me as Crown takes a seat on the opposite side of the table and then looks across the kitchen at Grainger like the man must’ve lost his fucking mind.

  “The hell is wrong with you?” he snaps, and Grainger pauses to look over at him, a spatula in his hand. He’s standing in front of the stove, a griddle laid out over two burners, making pancakes. I know, I know. Weird for me, too.

  “What? You don’t eat? Jesus Christ, Crown.” Grainger scoffs. “You’ve been walking around the compound like you’re too good to shit like the rest of us. Makes sense now, seeing as you’ve never seen a man cook before.”

  “I’ve never seen you cook,” is what Crown says in response, blinking in surprise at his sergeant-at-arms before glancing over at me. His expression shifts slightly, as if he thinks I might be suffering a mental break or something.

  I just stare back at him, calmly sipping my coffee.

  I’m sorry, I think, imagining that stupid sweatshirt with the cross on the back and wishing I’d been able to save Ms. Briggs’ life. I feel like a failure. I spent nearly thirty minutes crying in the shower this morning, but I don’t want or need any of the men to see me like that.

  “I’ve seen him cook,” Beast replies, sitting on my left and staring out the window across the table. Now that Grey is gone, we can actually open the blinds and look out at the hideous orange sunshine and the smoky sky. The wildfire situation hasn’t changed, but only because the winds have been stagnant.

  All we need is a change of weather patterns or a lightning strike and voilà, we’re in deep shit.

  “I suppose having my own home like a grown-ass man saved me from the sight before now,” Crown remarks, turning his gaze over to the window to study the sky. I love his profile. It’s strong, powerful, noble. As if he can sense me staring at him, he flicks his eyes back to mine again.

  “You did well last night,” he tells me, and even though I know that, by the rules of the club, I really did do well, it doesn’t feel like that. It feels like I got an innocent woman murdered by my father. Even though I’ve finally come to the painful realization that I love the man, he’s a blight on the very air he breathes.

  “Mm.”

  I continue to sip my coffee, pausing when Grainger slams down a plate of pancakes in front of me, and I lift a surprised gaze up to find his perpetually angry face glaring down at me.

  “Eat,” he says as Sin slips around behind me, putting my juice down before taking the seat on my right. “I’m not letting you skip out on meals with my baby inside of you.”

  “Fucking Christ, Grainger,” I snap, kicking out as hard as I can and nailing him in the back of the leg. He makes a growl of frustration, but he remains standing. Strong as fuck, even during a pretty grueling recovery process. He pauses at the griddle and then flips what must’ve been a test-pancake off a nearby plate and onto the floor.

  Feminist creeps up slowly behind him, snatching the pancake before doing his three-legged trot out the archway and into the living room. He’s found a special spot in Crown’s precious leather chair. I’m sure the hair all over his furniture bothers him, but he hasn’t said a damn word.

  “You don’t know it’s your baby,” Sin offers up, running a single finger around the rim of his own juice glass. His eyes slide to mine before moving back to Beast’s. My husband doesn’t offer up any sort of emotional reaction. Instead, he lifts his coffee to his lips slowly, calmly, takes a sip, swallows.

  “It’s my baby.” Just that from Beast, and even though Crown makes a face, he doesn’t say anything. Our eyes meet again.

  “Thank you,” I say before I can lose my nerve. It’s getting easier, those simple admissions of gratefulness. It’s hard. It’s the very beginning of cracking away at my shell, allowing small moments of intimacy that can’t possibly backfire on me. Initial steps, baby steps, into some sort of new normalcy.

  “For what?” he asks as Grainger sits down with a plate of pancakes for himself. He doesn’t offer up any to the other men, but there’s a towering stack of them on a plate on the counter. Just in case.

  “For letting them stay here with us.”

  Crown just stares at me and then sighs heavily as the edge of Beast’s lip quirks up in a smirk. He probably finds that funny, the idea of him living with me and Crown, rather than the other way around. I know that’s how he feels about it. But I need Crown to understand that I get how hard this must be. He’s used to having his own space, doing his own thing, having his house just so.

  My stuff is all over his room. Boxes stacked in the far corner, suitcases and duffel bags full of clothes strewn across the reading nook. And since his bathroom is the nicest and most well-lit one in the house, my makeup is scattered across the counter, covering every square inch. When I walked in today, I saw him standing there smiling as he fingered a stick of black liner. Pretty sure he likes seeing my stamp all over the farmhouse.

  “You truly know how to test a man’s patience,” he tells me, this particular sort of warning tone in his voice that makes me shift and rub my thighs together. Yes, sir. I’ll be a good girl. I swear to fuck. Just tell me what to do. I feel like Crown can sense it, the way he shifts in his chair and narrows his eyes slightly. His hand curls into a fist on the table. “But more importantly, how are you feeling today?”

  I think about that question as they all turn to look at me.

  How do I feel?

  “Like shit,” I offer up, shrugging my shoulders and picking up a fork to poke at my pancakes. Grainger cooked these for me. I think about that. I really fucking think about that, how we got from point A to point B, and it blows my mind apart. If I weren’t so relentless … If they weren’t so relentless.

  If they hadn’t come for me.

  I’d be a mafia princess right now. Instead, I’m taking a bite of a surprisingly fluffy pancake and casting a suspicious look in Cade’s direction. He pretends not to notice, cutting up his own pancakes.

  “You made the right choice,” Beast tells me, but I don’t believe it. Even though I know he’d only tell me the real and honest truth. Guilt swarms over me, but I can’t let it drown me. Last night was a disaster in so many ways. I didn’t end up getting vengeance for my sisters. All I did was save a monster at the expense of a grieving mother’s life.

  I am damned to hell, damned to burn, damned to rot and fester, damned to be a feast for maggots and worms.

  “How so?” I clarify as Sin makes a sound of frustration, reaching out and snatching a pancake off my plate. He rolls it up and then bites the end of it off, like it’s a burrito or some shit.

  “You think if the mafia was able to carry out a hit on a chapter president that the club would let it go? This ‘peace’ shit you’re talking about with your buddy Grey would never happen.” He takes another bite of his food as I think that over for a minute. He isn’t wrong about that. I know it. Doesn’t make it any easier.

  Why couldn’t Cat just let that woman go? She wasn’t an ongoing threat; she was clearly manipulated into accepting such a horrible task. And the cops? They were going to let it happen, a murder right inside the precinct. Of course, the death of a notorious MC boss wouldn’t really have bothered the local community.

  The city of Ashbury probably would’ve rejoiced.

  I take another bite of my food, staring down at my plate in thought.

  And that FBI guy? Grey Wolfe—the organization, not the man—has his brother. Or … at this point, had is probably a more apt word.

  “Cat saved Grey’s life,” I say, just in case the guys haven’t picked up on it. What they have done, however, is run a freaking bug detector over every inch of this place to look for hidden cams or mics. That’s how worried they are about their own president. That’s what I woke up to, padding out of my husband’s bedroom to find Crown using a walkie-talkie lookalike to scan the house for surveillance.

  A shiver traces down my spine.

  “Fuck, that would piss him off,” Gr
ainger remarks absently, finishing his plate and then standing up. He chucks it into the sink, and I see the slight twitch of Crown’s mouth as he takes note of Cade’s habits.

  This is going to be an interesting adjustment, that’s for sure.

  Cade turns around and leans his ass up against the kitchen counter.

  “So the don suspects his son, huh? That won’t go well. We’re more likely to see your friend dead than taking over his father’s empire.” Grainger pauses at the sound of footsteps on the stairs, and then Reba’s stepping into the room, her eyes sweeping the four men.

  She isn’t—and has never been—afraid of leather-bound outlaws.

  “Mornin’, Gidge,” she says, nodding my way in greeting and patting Feminist’s head as he bounces up behind her and licks her hand. “Boys. I hope you’re treating this woman right. I won’t accept anything less.”

  “You know I have manners, Miss Keller,” Beast offers up as I look toward Reba and her gaze lands on the plate of pancakes in front of me before flicking back to look at Grainger. She’s always hated him the most—and with good reason.

  My best friend knows every sordid detail of what’s happened between me and these men. Having her around brings me more comfort than I care to admit. She’s like … a shield between me and the raw intimacy that I know needs to take place in this house.

  Also, she’s in danger being here. Every second she spends at my side is a mistake. Cat proved that to me last night. I need to get Reba off the compound.

  “Grainger cooked for me,” I say, pointing at the counter with my fork. “Grab some hotcakes and sit down. We need to talk about a plan to get you off this property.” I look over at Sin and Crown. “Can we just … take her off-site? Will Cat allow that?”

  Cat told Crown that Reba wasn’t to leave the property without his permission. The chances of him giving in are slim, but I’m afraid. I’m afraid that things are going to go south quickly, just the way they did last night.

  I can’t risk Reba’s life for a second longer. I need to get in touch with Grey, learn more about this convent, figure out how to get her there …

  The boys exchange a look that freaks me out a little.

  “Before I go,” Reba starts, pausing between my chair and Beast’s, her green eyes wet as she looks down at me. I can see how hard whatever she has to say is, how deeply it’s affecting her. She seems almost unstable on her feet, like she might need to sit down, or she’ll fall.

  Beast seems to sense that and stands up, offering out his chair for Reba. She slides into it with a grateful sigh and carefully folds her hands in her lap.

  “I know you probably … buried my parents somewhere. Could you take me there?” She looks up, letting her gaze trail over Sin and Crown. “I’d like the chance to say goodbye, at the very least.”

  My heart constricts in my chest as I reach out and put my hand over Reba’s folded ones.

  We all know that isn’t a possibility: I can’t allow Reba to have that sort of information. If she somehow let it slip, we could have the FBI here digging up bodies. Even worse than that, if Cat thinks Reba has dirt on the club, he’ll bury her himself.

  My eyes meet Sin’s, and he blinks at me in recognition. Lie for me, my gaze says, and I hope he understands me. We can just take Reba to some random, pretty spot on the compound and let her use that as a place of contemplation.

  “Yeah, I can show you later,” Sin agrees, his voice even and calm. It’s so at odds with the way he speaks to me when we’re alone. He’s a romantic, but he’s also a sneaky little dom, isn’t he? “Not today though. I have business at the big house.” He offers me a look. “Do you want to come with? Pretty sure Nellie’s going crazy up there by herself.”

  He finishes his juice and stands up, slipping past me but not before reaching out to ruffle my hair. The move gets him a dark glare in response, but he doesn’t even see it, slipping up the stairs to his room.

  “I’ll talk to Cat,” Crown offers up with a sigh. “He seems … slightly more agreeable after last night. We saw him briefly at church this morning.” His eyes shift to Beast’s for a minute, going half-lidded in frustration. “Which you didn’t attend.”

  “Can’t leave Gidge alone,” Beast offers up, standing behind Reba with his huge arms crossed in front of his chest.

  “You’re lucky the other men are afraid of you,” Crown offers up with a long sigh and then he too is taking his coffee with him and leaving.

  Reba meets my gaze, but she doesn’t look afraid.

  She never has been afraid of this club or anyone in it. Maybe she should have been? Maybe, all those years ago, when she sat beside me in kindergarten, I should’ve shoved her off her chair and made her cry the way I did to many other children. I should’ve driven her away from me and saved her all of this pain.

  “Does … your brother have a grave?” she asks, and I just stare at her.

  I don’t want to talk about Gaz right now. I certainly don’t want to see his grave.

  I ignore her, standing up and taking my phone with me.

  And then I put a call into Grey’s number and hope like hell that he answers me.

  Nellie’s scrubbing the kitchen when we come in, her hair pinned back as she struggles to get something burnt off the bottom of a pan. Her blue eyes drift over to me, Reba by my side, and she smiles.

  It’s such a nice smile, too. There’s a kernel of happiness to it that I haven’t seen since … fuck, it’s been years. Years. Before my sisters’ deaths, absolutely.

  “Hi honey,” she says, putting the pan down and stripping off the hilarious black gloves she’s wearing. Does she know that she looks like a serial killer with them on? The black latex stretching up her inked arms. Regular housewives wear yellow gloves or pink ones. Really, anything but that ebony latex that looks like the same sort of gloves we were wearing when we were loading up the FBI guy and Ms. Briggs into a pickup truck.

  “Hey,” I say, leaving Crown, Beast, and Grainger out front while Sin follows us in. He waits just behind us, trying to offer up some level of privacy. He’s always there, when it comes to family stuff, and I like that. I loved having him as a part of my life growing up, fucked as that sounds. Really, though, if you think about it, we grew up together. Sin was just sixteen years old when he started hanging around the club. That’s … so goddamn young.

  I shove my hair back, realizing how hypocritical and completely insane that sounds.

  “We’re here to help out,” I offer lamely, studying Nellie and this strange new domesticity that she’s taken on. She’s still Cat’s wife though; she knows a lot. She’s been through even more than that. I try to imagine Cat curling up around Nellie at night, telling her all of his fears, his insecurities.

  But nope.

  Does not compute.

  Nellie blinks at me, her attention moving to Sin before returning to my face.

  “How are you feeling?” she asks, and I frown slightly. “I remember being pregnant with every single one of you.” She moves over to stand in front of me, putting her hands on her hips and smiling. As if by magic, Cat comes in the back door and then there he is, the devil himself.

  Since Nellie is used to the tension between me and Cat, she ignores it.

  “You were the worst,” she continues with a laugh as Sin shifts uncomfortably behind me, and Reba tries her very best to just smile through a moment that’s equal parts awkward, sweet, and dangerous as hell.

  Cat is staring at me.

  I can feel his gaze like flames against my skin, eating my flesh away, using the fat beneath my skin like fuel.

  Shit.

  “I was bloated like crazy, and I couldn’t stop throwing up.” Nellie laughs again, shaking her head. “I remember with Gaz, my breasts hurt, and I was obsessed with orange juice …”

  “Please stop,” I choke out, but Nellie takes my pained expression for exaggerated embarrassment instead of what it actually is: agony. Complete and utter agony. I feel like I’m being ripped
apart emotionally, and I don’t want to hear another fucking word about Nellie and what it was like to be pregnant with any of my dead siblings.

  Nellie chuckles and then reaches up like she’s going to touch my cheek. She pulls back, the way she’s always done, but I grab her hand and press it to my face anyway. That lights her up from the inside like it’s fucking Christmas.

  Speaking of … I was with the mafia for Christmas. You know what we did? Nothing. Nothing at all. I barely even recognized that the holiday season was rushing by. Did Nellie cry? Did she think about me during each special occasion that I wasn’t here for? Not that it matters. We haven’t done much for the holidays since, well, you know.

  “The only change I see in you is thicker, shinier hair, and”—here Nellie goes out of her way to annoy me by pointing at my chest—“you keep rubbing at your boobs. Are they sore?”

  “Christ, woman,” Cat growls out, but not without affection. He really does love my mother, despite … everything. You just saw him shoot an innocent woman and an unarmed man in the head, I remind myself. You just saw him kill your fucking brother the same damn way. “Knock that shit off.” My father looks me over, but not unappreciatively, his eyes drifting over to Reba. He doesn’t like having her here; he isn’t going to let her go. I can see that much right now. And it scares me. It scares me so damn bad. “Glad you’re here,” Cat tells me, lifting his gaze from my face to stare at Sin over my shoulder. “I was going to call her down here anyway.”

  He turns away and then glances back at me.

  “Come with me—just you.”

  Cat takes off out the back door, expecting me to follow.

  His words … they’re not a request, and my entire body goes cold. I’ve got my Magnum beneath Beast’s jacket, but I’m still worried. A quick look at Sin shows that he is, too.

  “Follow him,” he tells me, sliding his phone from his pocket, likely to text the other guys. “We’ve got you, Gidge.”

  I believe that. More than I’ve ever believed anything in my life.