“Theo,” I whisper.
“I can’t wait for the rest of your life to play out,” Theo murmurs as he slips his arm around my shoulders and hugs me to his side.
“How do you think it will?” I ask, arching a brow.
“I think it’s going to be wild and crazy, but I think it’s going to be full of so much love and laughter, too. I think that after your years of being shut down and shut off that it’s going to fill you up with emotion, every fucking second of it.”
“You’re making me cry,” I breathe as I wipe the tears from my eyes.
“Can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings for you, Cleo,” he murmurs.
“Sweetheart?” Paxton says as he walks up to us, his brow furrowed in worry.
“I’m okay,” I grin with trembling lips.
“Yeah. Ready for bed?” he asks.
I nod but don’t walk away immediately. I wrap my arms around Theo and give him a hug, then I make my way to a very drunk Lisandro and give him a hug as well. I grip my hand around Paxton’s, and I let him lead me up to bed. Theo is right, I’ve never been so happy in all of my life.
Kidnapping, shooting, none of it matters. I have Paxton at my side, always looking out for me. I couldn’t make it if he weren’t, and I wasn’t living when he wasn’t. I was a shell, barely surviving. But now? I feel everything, and what I feel for him is everything, too.
“I love you, sweetheart,” he whispers as he pulls me close to his side once we’re undressed and beneath the sheets.
“I never stopped loving you, Paxton,” I confess.
“Fucking hell,” he murmurs, rolling on top of me.
I giggle as he kisses me, his tongue soft and wet, but insistent, sliding inside of my mouth. I don’t resist him at all, opening up for him the way I always have. This man—he has always been it for me, and I’ve always been his. Neither of us were really ready when we met all those years ago, still trying to find our footing in life.
It’s true, he hurt me when he left; but he thought he was saving me from a lifetime of pain. No matter what, we lost years of being together—but in doing that, I gained independence and he found a family and a home. He worked through his demons, and I believe, although he’s rough around the edges, he’s a better man for it.
The love of my life.
Paxton Hill.
SIX-MONTHS LATER
“Happy Birthday to you,” Lisandro belts out, a little excitedly.
I don’t know what else I’m going to wish for, but I bend over the cake slightly and close my eyes, blowing out my candle as I make my last and final wish.
It has been a tough six-months for the club and its members, but it’s nice to see all of them here today, celebrating my birthday with me. I watch as Serina, the ex-clubwhore, slides up against Grease and wraps her arms around his large stomach. He’s definitely not the kind of man I would curl up next to, but they both look really, really happy. In fact, she’s sporting her fresh Grease brand on her upper chest, and proudly.
“What’d you wish for, sweetheart?” Paxton asks, his hand sliding around my back and waist as I stand up.
“It was really hard, because I have everything I could have ever wanted.” I smile looking up at him.
Mary-Anne takes the cake and starts to cut pieces, being the organized take-charge-mom, and I don’t mind one bit. I never could cut a cake proportionately anyway. Paxton’s hands slide down and cup my ass, squeezing it gently before he smooths down my lilac colored sundress.
“Nothing?” he asks, lifting a brow.
I shake my head as I smile. I literally have everything I want. He doesn’t realize it yet, that he’s given me the best gift I could imagine.
I’m six-weeks pregnant with his baby.
When I say that it’s been a tough six-months, it’s not just because of things that happened with the club—that including Soar continuing to stay in prison, officially, for the next three years—but also the fact that Paxton and I had miscarried.
I didn’t know it at the time, but I was pregnant when I had been taken by the Aryan’s. I miscarried a few weeks later. We’ll never really know if the mistreatment I’d suffered from them had anything to do with our loss, but of course we always speculated.
Now, I feel good. At six-weeks, I’ve already had an ultrasound, and I’ve seen the baby’s little heart beating. I even have a picture to show Pax. I know he’s going to be so excited, once he gets past being scared, which will be amplified because of the loss we’ve already experienced.
“How about something like this?” he asks as he brings up a small jewelry box and opens it for me.
I gasp when I see what’s inside. There, twinkling back at me, are LeVian Morganite drop earrings in a strawberry gold setting with vanilla diamonds surrounding the large teardrop peach stone. They complement my ring—not matching it precisely, but still complementing it nonetheless.
“They’re absolutely gorgeous,” I whisper.
I know that Lisandro has had a hand in this, not only because the box is from his store, but because he’s standing behind Paxton with a shit-eating grin on his face. I throw my arms around Paxton and press my lips against his, opening my mouth when I feel his tongue slide against my lips. I want so badly to tell him about the pregnancy, but I don’t. It needs to be something special just between us.
“Okay, a toast,” Ginger calls out.
Ginger stayed here, seeking a quiet life, but she’s had anything but since Paxton and the rest of the Devils rescued her. Snake didn’t take her being kidnapped and abused too well, like any man wouldn’t. He confessed his love, apologized for his stubbornness, and expected everything to go back the way it was.
Ginger stood up to him and stood her ground. She’d been hurt for months, and she needed time. Begrudgingly, and with the force of Sniper, MadDog, and Fury, he left. That doesn’t mean that he’s left her alone. He’s called every single day since he left her here in Shasta. Not only has he called, but he’s also sent a box of her favorite chocolates every single week. She’s teetering on the edge, and I think she’s about ready to fall back into him.
“To Cleo,” she continues. “The kindest, sweetest, most beautiful woman I have ever had the pleasure of knowing. Your sweetness drips out and touches every person you meet. You are truly a woman that I aspire to be like. Happy Birthday,” she whispers as she wipes a tear from her eye.
Everybody shouts their agreement and then takes a drink from their glass. A baby’s cry interrupts us, and I look over to see Mary-Anne has brought her baby out from MadDog’s office, where he has a crib set up. He’s so hands on.
It’s actually really surprising, considering his age. I, for one, thought that he’d make Mary do all of the work, but he doesn’t. Every time I’m around, he’s got the sweet little girl wrapped in his arms or cuddled against his big chest. It’s seriously swoon worthy.
I watch my woman. I’m sure she doesn’t even realize the way she’s looking at MadDog and Mary-Anne’s baby girl, Riley. I can see the pure want in her eyes. I wish I could give that to her right now. When we lost our own baby, I thought she’d get pregnant again immediately, but here we are five-months later, and nothin’. I know I’m being impatient, but it’s hard not to be when you watch the woman you love yearn for something.
“You ready to head home, sweetheart?” I ask a few hours later.
“Uh, yeah,” she says, scrunching her nose up as she turns to me.
I look past her and chuckle. I don’t judge my brothers and their relationships. Serina is marked, she’s Grease’s Old Lady, but that doesn’t mean that she’s only with Grease.
In fact, the reason Cleo’s nose is all scrunched is because Serina is bent over, one of the guys is fuckin’ her ass as she blows her Old Man. It ain’t my deal, but it works for them, so who am I to judge?
“You know they always put on a good show,” I chuckle as I wrap my arm around her shoulders and lead her outside.
It’s a warm night, and we’r
e on the bike. We’re only a few minutes from home, but it’s long enough we can feel the wind on our faces and the freedom singing past us in the air.
“You know,” she says, looking up to me. “They really do,” she smiles.
“Let’s get home, start our own private show,” I grunt.
“Okay,” she breathes as she follows behind me.
“Oh, shit,” she curses as she slams down on my cock and grinds her clit against my pelvis.
I bite my bottom lip, wanting nothing more than to come deep inside of her. Sliding my hands up her sides, I pinch her piercings and tug, harder than I should, but goddamn. Cleo moans and leans back, wrapping her hands around my thighs as she starts to really grind and roll her hips.
Fuck.
I’m going to die.
Moving one of my hands, I press my thumb against her clit and start to stroke her. If I don’t speed this up, I’ll be the one coming first, and I can’t let that happen on her birthday—or ever.
“Pax,” she breathes as she pushes against my thumb.
“Come, sweetheart,” I grind out.
Her legs start to tremble and then her pussy clamps down around me. I breathe out a sign of relief as she cries out. I wrap my hands around her waist and thrust up inside of her a few times before I follow her over the edge in my own climax.
“Oh, my god,” she whimpers as she falls forward, her chest pressing into mine with each breath she tries to catch.
“Happy Birthday, sweetheart,” I murmur against her hair.
“It is a happy birthday,” she announces as she lifts her head. My eyes catch the new earrings I bought her in the moonlight, and I grin, assuming that’s what she’s referencing. “I’m pregnant, Paxton.”
It takes a second for her words to register, and then I sit up and flip her onto her back as I loom over her. There’s a sly grin on her lips, and brightness shining in her eyes.
“Say it again,” I demand.
“I’m pregnant, Paxton,” she whispers.
“Fuckin’ shit,” I gasp before my lips crash against hers in a hard kiss.
Then I lift in a complete panic.
“Are you okay? Do you need to go to the hospital? What do you need?” I worry.
“I went to the doctor, everything is good. They’re going to keep a really close eye on me, but everything looks awesome right now. It’s still really, really early,” she whispers. I can see the worry etched in her features, even though she’s trying to hide it.
“I’m so happy. Worried, but happy,” I whisper as I lower my head so that our foreheads are touching.
“Me too,” she admits.
“I fuckin’ love you, sweetheart,” I rasp.
“I love you so, so much, Paxton. Thank you for the best birthday I could ever imagine.”
ROUGH & SHAKEN
A SHORT STORY
PART ONE
Ginger
My phone rings. I don’t even have to look at the caller ID to know who it is. It’s him. Snake. Prescott. The man I’ve loved since I saw him from across the crappy bar almost two years ago.
I moved to a sleepy little Canadian town when I turned twenty-five. It wasn’t because I’d wanted to. It was because my uncle, a grumpy assed old man, had become ill and needed help with his bar. He didn’t have kids; he didn’t have anyone. He’d served in Vietnam, and as soon as he came back to the US, he packed his shit and went to Canada.
A lot of people assumed he’d been a draft dodger, but he wasn’t. He served his country and did it with pride, but it fucked him up, so he left. My mama didn’t blame him even a little.
So, when he got sick and couldn’t run his bar, she packed my bags and told me to get to Canada and help him out. Didn’t matter that she hadn’t seen him in decades, family was family and family helped family.
I’d always been a kind of lost soul. Nothing called to me after high school. I fooled around at community college, but never found anything that interested me. At twenty-five, I’d been working aimlessly at a waitressing job. Mama said I was the only one who could go, because I was the one most like uncle Cash.
My first night there, uncle Cash’d frowned when I showed, but he didn’t push me away. Instead, he pretended as if he’d known me my whole life, and he started showing me how to run his business, coughing every so often and holding his stomach. He had cancer, pancreatic; there was no beating it.
On my third night, a Friday night, my eyes widened in surprise when a wild group of men came inside around midnight. They were outfitted with leather vests, holey jeans, tight t-shirts, beards, muscles, chains, and boots. I’d never seen so many sexy men in a group in my entire life.
One stood out to me, though, as if he was a beacon. He was almost the tallest, but not quite. He was the most muscular, and I swear, his beard made me drool a bit. He was beyond the word sexy. I didn’t know what word fit him. Maybe it hadn’t been invented yet.
I sucked in a breath and made my way over to their table. I didn’t want to, I didn’t feel steady enough, but uncle Cash said I couldn’t hide behind the bar and wait for customers to come to me. He said I needed to get out and push the booze. So, that’s what I did.
The stranger eyed me up and down, then the rest was history. He took me home that first night, and every night after. I had his name tattooed on my body, my neck, by the three-month mark, and by six months we were fighting. The back and forth was exciting, stressful, and heartbreaking.
I was about to surrender, give him the control he wanted over us, our main reason for fighting. I was trying to be in charge, but Snake was a man, a leader, a president of a motorcycle club; no woman could be in control of him—ever.
Then I was kidnapped. Held for months by the scariest, cruelest men I had ever encountered in my entire life. It’s hard not to think about, the countless numbers of hands that have been on my body, pawing at me, then violating me.
I try not to think about it, to pretend that it didn’t happen, but every time I close my eyes, its right there slapping me in the face—the cold hard realty that it was indeed my life for a time.
Now, six months after my rescue, I don’t feel worthy of Snake. I was damaged, and I’m not good enough for him. But he won’t leave me the hell alone. Why won’t he just leave me alone?
“Hello,” I say bitchily into the phone.
“Hey, peaches,” he murmurs, his voice deep, husky and too damn sexy for his own good.
“Prescott,” I whisper, using his given name instead of his road name.
“How you doin’ today?” he asks.
It’s the same question he asks me every day.
“Better,” I answer.
It’s the same answer I give him every day.
“Miss you,” he mutters.
I close my eyes, pinching them closed so tight that I see stars in my vision. I usually don’t answer him when he says this, but today, I do.
“You shouldn’t, but I miss you, too,” I admit as I open my eyes. Tears start to fall down my cheeks.
“You ready to come home to me yet?” he asks.
“No,” I whisper.
“Bar’s doin’ good. Brothers are runnin’ it, turnin’ profit,” he says, changing the subject.
Uncle Cash passed away three months after my arrival. He left me the bar in his will, as well as his house. The house was wrecked. Snake and his brothers helped me fix it up, then Snake moved in. I kicked his ass out, but he still came over when we’d be on again, at least to sleep with me.
“I’m glad,” I say, bringing my knees up and resting my chin on them.
“You need anything?” he asks.
“No,” I say.
He’s set up an account for me and deposits money into it, claiming it’s my income from the bar, but I know better. I know him better. I don’t mind, though. I’m keeping a tally, and I’ll pay him back once I get back to Canada, back to my life—which I should probably do, sooner rather than later. It’s been six-months. It’s been long enough.
Snake
I end the call and turn to my computer. I don’t even have to fill out my information, or Ginger’s, anymore. I’ve sent her so many boxes of chocolate that both of our addresses and my credit card number is saved into the system. Chocolate covered pecans straight from South Georgia. I know they’re her favorite, and from her home state, my little Georgia Peach.
“You get your woman handled?” Free, my Vice President, asks as he walks into my office.
“Fuck, no,” I grunt, closing my eyes after I press confirm on the chocolate order.
“It’s been six-months. She stays away much longer, thinkin’ she’ll get some fucked up shit in her head and it’ll be hard as nails to get her stubborn ass back here,” he advises.
“Yeah. I’m leavin’ tomorrow,” I admit.
“Yeah?”
“Think you can hold the fort down for a week?” I ask.
“A week?” he chuckles.
“It’s gonna take a day for me to get there, a day to talk her back into my bed, two full days of fuckin’ her to talk her into coming back with me, a half a day for her to talk herself out of coming back, another half a day to talk her into coming. Then two days to drive her ass back here,” I say, counting the days on my fingers.
“Got her all figured out, do you?” he asks with a big smile on his face.
“Fuck yeah, I do. Love that woman. Know everything there is to know about her,” I shrug.
“You sure about that?” he asks as his eyes darken, most likely thinking about the time she spent held hostage by those sick fuck racists.
“Whatever I don’t know, she’ll tell me,” I murmur.
“Don’t count on it,” Free announces as he stands up and walks out.
Rough & Ready (Notorious Devils Book 5) Page 28
