Revolution (The Lone Riders MC Series Book #1)

by Betham, Michelle

  ‘He took one in the shoulder,’ Kip said, sinking to the floor, resting his back against the couch, pulling off his hat and pushing both hands through his hair. ‘Hit his head when he fell to the ground. That’s why he’s out cold.’

  Lexi felt a wave of fear so big crash over her that she almost couldn’t catch her breath, but as quickly as that fear had hit her, it dissipated, to be replaced with something she could only describe as a the biggest shot of adrenalin as she heard another truck pull up outside.

  Moving as fast as her legs would allow she ran out of the clubhouse, outside into the rain, stopping by the entrance, closing her eyes briefly until she heard the door of one of the rigs slam shut. Opening her eyes, she watched as Tay jumped down, watched as Cain and Luca, Blake and the others all piled out of their vehicles. All of them battered and bruised and soaking wet, dirty and tired, but alive.

  ‘Coby?’ she whispered, running over to Tay, letting him pull her into his arms, hugging him tight. ‘Where’s Coby?’ Her heart was beating so hard and so fast, so loud she could hear it above the sound of the pouring rain.

  ‘Hey, baby…’

  She pulled back slightly, looking from Tay to the others, watching as they walked with bowed heads back inside, to safety. ‘Where’s Coby?’ she repeated.

  Tay also bowed his head, closing his eyes for a second, leaning back against the side of the truck. ‘It’s all my fault, Lex. Baby, I’m sorry…’

  ‘Where is he, Tay?’

  ‘I’m here, kid.’

  She swung around, not knowing whether the sound of his voice was just a dream or whether he was real, and it wasn’t until she saw him standing there, her tall, brave, Scottish soldier, that she could finally believe he was alive. ‘Coby…’ She couldn’t stop the tears from streaming down her face as she ran to him, his arms falling around her, enveloping her in the tightest of hugs, his mouth falling on to hers, kissing her like his life depended on it. And she clung on, holding on to him, never wanting to let him go because some of those things she’d feared would happen tonight – it obviously hadn’t gone to plan. She could only thank whatever God there was up there that Coby had come out of it in one piece. And hope that he would make sure Jesse was afforded the same privilege. ‘For a second there…’

  ‘I know, baby, I know. But I’m okay, I’m fine.’

  She looked up at him. His face was dirty, spattered with mud and faint spots of blood – she could only assume that the rain had washed off most of the rest of it. His clothes were soaking, bloodstained, and filthy, and just looking at the state of him terrified her. The fear seeped through into her bones, it was so strong.

  ‘Things just got… they got complicated.’ Coby looked over at Tay, who held his VP’s gaze. ‘But I think we’re all gonna be okay. We sent out a message tonight. A message a lot of people won’t forget easily.’

  She didn’t want to know the details. She didn’t care. Not tonight, anyway. Not right now.

  ‘Christ knows how Jesse was the only one of ours to get hit, because it got fucking crazy out there, but…’ Coby’s eyes were back on her, his head cocked slightly. ‘Where is he? Jesse?’

  ‘He’s… he’s inside. Kel’s treating him. Kip said he took a bullet to the shoulder.’

  ‘Yeah… big pussy knocked himself out when he hit the ground. Made it all look worse than it really was.’

  Lexi didn’t miss the quick smile that passed between her stepfather and Coby. What kind of shit had gone down tonight?

  ‘He’s gonna be okay?’ Lexi asked, still holding on to Coby. She wanted to hold on to him forever, never let him out of her sight. But she knew she could never do that. So she was going to make the most of holding on to him now.

  ‘He’s gonna be fine. Kel’ll have that bullet out by the time we get inside and the big idiot’ll be sitting up swigging a beer like it was nothing but a splinter. Won’t let no shoulder injury stop him from drinking, huh?’

  She tried to smile, but she was failing to see the humour in this situation. She wasn’t as immune to it as much as the men were.

  ‘I’d better go see Angie,’ Tay sighed, pulling off his hat and shoving it into his back pocket. ‘See what shit she’s got ready to throw at me.’ He walked over to Lexi and Coby, squeezing Lexi’s waist, kissing her quickly. ‘Your man here, he’s a hero. And your boy, he should be very proud of his daddy. See you inside, sweetheart.’

  ‘Yeah. We won’t be long.’ She looked up at Coby, reaching up to run her fingers over his scarred cheek. ‘What did you do?’

  His hand covered hers, squeezing it tight, bringing it up to his lips and kissing it quickly. ‘I made sure we stay safe, baby. That’s what I did.’

  She closed her eyes, leaning forward so their foreheads touched, his hand still clinging tightly on to hers.

  ‘I need you so badly right now, Lexi. And I don’t care that it’s raining or that I’m covered in some dead bastard’s blood, I don’t fucking care. All I care about is you.’

  ‘It’s freezing out here,’ she whispered.

  ‘I don’t care. I really don’t.’ He slowly unzipped her shorts, pushing them down her legs, his mouth on hers, kissing her hard and deep. ‘I don’t fucking care.’

  He lifted her up, her legs wrapping around his waist as he carried her over to one of the tables outside the clubhouse, the ones covered by the huge overhanging canopy, offering them both some shelter as he sat down on the bench, Lexi straddling him, their mouths still together.

  It felt slightly weird, a little twisted, even, having sex under these circumstances. But just knowing he was alive and back where he belonged was enough for Lexi to know she was going to do it anyway. She was beginning to think she’d do anything for this man so deep were the feelings she had for him now. So deep and confusing and real.

  ‘I love you so much, kid,’ he murmured, his lips now covering her neck in tiny, feather-light kisses as he gently lifted her up, just a touch, before pulling her back down, slipping inside of her so easily she couldn’t stop a long moan from escaping. She was getting her shot of something safe and strong, that toxic poison she was addicted to now. She could feel it spreading out within her with every rotation of her hips, its warmth and its blinding power taking over everything. ‘I love you so much.’

  Her fingers slid between his on her thighs as she continued to move against him, pushing down on to him, finding that rhythm, picking up pace, both of them hitting that hard-fought-for climax together, clinging on to each other as their bodies bucked and jerked. ‘It’s okay, baby,’ she whispered, her mouth resting against his as she felt him explode inside her, his relief almost palpable as he continued his release long after hers had subsided. ‘It’s okay.’

  When he’d finished, he went almost limp in her arms and she held him against her, letting him catch his breath, pull himself together. Whatever had gone down tonight, he’d needed whatever this had been. He’d needed some kind of outlet. Some kind of release.

  ‘We’d better get inside,’ she said, kissing him slowly before climbing off him. She quickly retrieved her shorts from the wet ground, pulling them on, not caring that they were damp and dirty. She’d go change them once they were back in the clubhouse. ‘Coby?’

  He opened his eyes, looking straight at her. ‘Call Charlie. I want my son here, Lexi. I want him here.’

  She sat down next to him, taking his cut and bruised hand in hers. ‘Not tonight, baby. Everything’s too confused, too raw.’

  He reached out to touch her face, gently stroking her cheek with his thumb. ‘I want him here, darlin’.’

  She leant forward, kissing him slowly. ‘I know, baby. I know. We’ll start making plans in the morning, okay?’

  ‘Aye,’ he sighed. ‘Okay.’

  ‘Come on. Let’s go clean you up.’ She took his hand, pulling him to his feet, slipping her arm around his waist, his arm lying loosely across her shoulders as they finally made their way into the clubhouse.

  ‘What the fuck ha
ppened to you?’ Luca asked, looking Lexi’s rain soaked body up and down as they walked past him.

  She turned her head and threw him a knowing smile. ‘Soldier boy here needed a bit of mommy medicine.’

  ‘Jesus, Lex. You handing that out on prescription?’

  Coby gave Luca the finger without even turning around, pulling Lexi even closer to him as they moved further inside.

  Jesse was sitting up now, his arm in a sling, a beer in his other hand just as Coby had predicted, while Angie tried to clean him up with a bowl of water and some towels.

  ‘Told you he’d be okay,’ Coby whispered into her ear, and she squeezed his waist, the relief sweeping over her. ‘I’d better go check on him.’

  Lexi reluctantly let him go, watching as he playfully messed up Jesse’s hair, saying something to him she couldn’t catch, but whatever it was it seemed to amuse the rest of the guys as laughter filled the clubhouse.

  ‘Guess you don’t feel much like laughing, huh, darlin’?’ Angie stood next to Lexi, her hand sliding into her daughters, giving it a brief squeeze.

  ‘I don’t find any of this remotely funny,’ Lexi replied, her eyes still very much on Coby, who was now sitting down on the arm of the couch, swigging from Jesse’s bottle of beer.

  Angie stayed silent for a moment or two, watching her daughter as she watched the man she was now inextricably connected to. The father of her child. ‘Is this still what you want, Lexi?’

  Lexi turned to look at her mum. ‘He’s what I want, Mum. And if this is the price I have to pay to be with him, then so be it.’

  ‘And Ozzie?’

  She turned to look back at Coby, who was still smiling, still laughing, despite the things he’d been through tonight. Things Lexi wasn’t sure she wanted to know about. ‘His dad will teach him good. He’ll keep him safe.’

  Angie sighed, letting go of Lexi’s hand.

  ‘You okay?’ Tay asked, walking over to them, quickly kissing Angie.

  ‘Yeah. I’m fine. I’d better go sort out the bathroom in the apartment. There are a few people around here who look like they could do with a good wash.’

  Tay waited until Angie had left before he spoke to Lexi. ‘And what about you? Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m just glad you’re all alive. How I feel doesn’t come into it.’

  Tay looked down into his beer. ‘All of this, it was my fault.’

  ‘Yeah. I know it was.’

  ‘And I don’t expect you to forgive me or even…’

  Lexi looked right at him, leaning back against the pool table. ‘Whatever happened tonight, it’s over. Done. Okay?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Lexi. For everything. For all the shit we caused you, all the pain and the years your mom lost with you. The years I lost with you. For the fact…’

  She held up a hand. ‘Stop talking, Tay. Just, stop talking. Please.’

  His eyes stayed on her, and for the first time in a long time Lexi could see an honesty, a sincerity in those eyes that she didn’t think she’d ever seen before. Or maybe, for all those years, she’d just refused to look hard enough.

  ‘You really love my mum, don’t you?’

  ‘Baby, you know I do. And I’m sorry for doing what we did to your daddy, but…’

  ‘He understands. Now. I understand. Now.’

  He smiled, a small, almost nervous smile. ‘I only ever wanted you to love me, Lexi. I only ever wanted to take care of you, to make sure I did right by you.’

  ‘And I let you down. I let my mum down. I wasn’t the easiest of people to be around, Tay. I was angry and upset at mum and dad splitting up. And I know Kip was almost eighteen when it all happened, so his coming over here to the US was completely his own decision, but I was still a kid, I was given no choice in the matter. And I was angry that I’d been uprooted from the country I’d grown up in, taken away from the people I loved, the club – my family. And I took most of that out on you. And even when I’d begun to love this place, to finally call Paradise my home, to love this club like I’d loved the Newcastle chapter, I still couldn’t bring myself to love you. Because I still blamed you – I blamed you for things that didn’t even matter anymore, things I couldn’t even remember. I just needed someone to hit out at.’

  ‘I didn’t try hard enough, Lex.’

  ‘You tried harder than anyone should have had to, Tay. Thinking back, I wouldn’t have blamed you for turning your back on me completely. Because once I stopped blaming only you and started blaming this club for any shit I got myself into, that was when I should’ve listened to you. Instead of moving further away from it all. And then all the crap with Jesse…’

  ‘We all messed-up, kiddo. But maybe now it’s time to stop talking about blame, and make that new start we all need. The new start this club needs.’

  ‘Coby wants me to call Charlie. Start making arrangements for Ozzie to come over to Paradise.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Tay sighed, pushing a hand through his hair. ‘Maybe he’s right.’ He looked at her again, his dark eyes kind. Warm. And if she’d maybe just given him that chance she might have realized they’d always been that way. ‘You ready to put the truth out there?’

  She nodded, looking over at Coby. ‘I think it’s best we start doing that as soon as we can,’ she whispered. ‘If we really do want this club to have a new start.’

  ‘Do you want me to talk to Charlie?’ Tay asked.

  She shook her head. ‘I’ll call him tomorrow.’

  ‘You gonna be okay, sweetheart?’

  She nodded again, holding out her arms, suddenly wanting to hug this man who’d tried to be a dad to her when her own father couldn’t be, through no fault of his own. Why did it always take something frightening and serious to make people realize what was important?

  Tay stepped forward, pulling her into his arms, holding her close, and she closed her eyes, feeling his tears spill out on to her shoulder, something which only served to make her cry, too. ‘I do love you, Tay.’

  ‘Hey, I know you do, kiddo. I know you do.’ He pulled back slightly, sniffing loudly, wiping his tattooed forearm across his eyes, throwing his head back briefly. ‘Jesus! What a fucking night!’

  ‘Go see my mum, go on. She might come across as this hard-faced biker bitch sometimes, but she needs you. More than she’ll ever let on.’

  Tay smiled, leaning forward to kiss her quickly. ‘You really did grow up good, Lexi Hart.’

  ‘Yeah. Eventually.’

  She watched him walk back across the clubhouse to the bar, reaching over to get himself another beer from under the counter.

  ‘Can we be friends?’

  Lexi turned around to see Deena standing there, mascara streaming down her tearstained face. ‘We can try,’ Lexi said, gently wiping the black streaks from Deena’s cheeks with her thumbs. ‘I guess you’re still getting used to all this shit, huh?’

  Deena nodded. ‘Does it ever get any easier?’

  ‘You were with Jesse for five years. You’re a bone fide old lady, so if you’re not used to it yet then you better start learning fast. If you really want to be with him.’

  Deena turned her head to look at Jesse, who was talking to Luca, Blake and Kip, all of them still dirty, rain soaked and blood stained, and none of them seemed in any real hurry to change that. ‘They don’t seem all that bothered,’ she said quietly, turning back to face Lexi. ‘About what happened tonight, I mean.’

  ‘They’ll be bothered.’ Lexi smiled, handing Deena a tissue. ‘They just won’t ever show it. Not in front of us, anyway.’

  Deena tried to smile back, running the tissue over her face, drying her eyes. ‘I think me and you, we got off on the wrong foot.’

  ‘Yeah. I think we probably did. Look, I… I really am sorry, for hitting you. A lot of crap’s been going down – personal crap – since I got back here… It’s a long story… and I guess I need to break that habit I have of taking my shit out on people whose fault it really isn’t.’

  ‘Well, I pro
bably shouldn’t have called you a whore.’

  ‘Water off a duck’s back, sweetheart.’ Lexi shrugged, turning to head off down the corridor that led to the apartment. She really needed those clean, dry clothes now.

  ‘Lexi?’

  She swung back around to look at Deena. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘I’ll look after him. I promise.’

  Lexi smiled. ‘I know you will. But you need to make sure he looks after you, too, okay?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘See you around.’ She finally made her way towards the apartment, kicking the door shut and stepping out of her wet shorts the second she was inside, finding a pair of her own skinny jeans in the drawer of the dressing table. She was just glad she kept some spare clothes in the clubhouse otherwise heaven knows what she’d have had to change into. None of the guys owned anything she was particularly keen to borrow.

  She’d just pulled on the jeans and was scraping her damp hair back into a ponytail when Kip walked in, hands in his pockets, his dirty blonde hair all messed up and wet. She turned around, throwing him a small smile. ‘Your turn for the shower, huh?’

  ‘Coby’s looking for you.’

  ‘I’ll go find him in a minute.’

  ‘What’s going on, Lex? With you and Coby, I mean.’

  ‘Not tonight, Kip. Please.’

  ‘It isn’t just as simple as you turning up back here and suddenly the two of you are ridiculously in love, is it?’

  She looked down at her fingers gripping the edge of the dressing table. ‘No. It isn’t.’

  ‘Jesse, he… he says he was talking to Coby tonight… well, not talking, exactly, but… he says Coby said something that just didn’t add up.’

  Lexi raised her head, her eyes meeting her brother’s. ‘Like what? What did he say?’

  ‘He said that – he said it had taken him years to know that he loved you.’

  Lexi frowned. ‘Coby said that?’

  Kip nodded, sitting down on the edge of the bed. ‘According to Jesse. But when Jesse tried to push him on the subject Coby just shut him down, and then all this shit kicked off…’