Shield

by Anne Malcom

  “Surprise! I pried myself away from Cade’s spawn to come shopping—oh my God. Shit, I’m so sorry!”

  Luke and I were on the sofa. My apartment opened onto my living room.

  Both of our heads snapped toward where Gwen was standing, hand over her eyes, keys dangling from her fingers.

  “I’m just going to go away to Chanel. I’ll be hours. Hours,” she repeated. She then turned and paused, hands still over her eyes. “I just want to say that this makes me very happy. Well, not me totally barging in on you doing the nasty, but you and Luke doing the nasty. It’s, like, fucking awesome,” she yelled.

  I cringed.

  Luke grinned.

  Then the door shut.

  “Did Gwen just walk in on us in the middle of having sex?” I whispered.

  Luke’s grin widened. “Yes, she did.”

  I expected him to pull out, discuss this turn of events. He did not, he moved his hips in deeper and I gasped. “In the middle,” he rasped. “Which means I’ve got a lot more fucking to do.”

  And then discussing the turn of events didn’t seem important.

  At all.

  There was a knock at the door. “Is it safe to come in?” Gwen yelled.

  It was three hours later.

  She really had good thoughts about Luke’s stamina.

  She wasn’t wrong.

  One-point-five of those hours was filled with delicious sex.

  Another one of them was filled with us arguing. Screaming, actually.

  “I can’t believe Gwen walked in on us,” I said, pacing the room, my silk robe trailing behind me.

  Luke was sitting on the sofa, jeans on, commando, top button undone. It was really fucking distracting.

  “She’s had better timing,” he said, smirking.

  I stopped pacing to glare at him. “Is that all you have to say?” I snapped. “She has both the biggest heart and biggest mouth in Amber, maybe the world. She’ll be on the phone to Amy right now. And Amy’s mouth is even bigger, somehow. She’ll tell Brock. And those men gossip like old Italian woman.” I put my palm to my head. “Cade will know by now,” I groaned.

  Luke pushed off the sofa, and my eyes devoured his chiseled abs, the V of his stomach and the peppering of hair peeking from his jeans.

  He grabbed my neck and my gaze went to his eyes. “They were gonna have to know. Somehow. Eventually. I know you wanted it secret, but I plan on forever, and forever with you is forever with your family. And there’s no secrets in your family. It was better to get it sorted sooner.”

  I glared. “Better?” I repeated. “Really? Do you think since now you don’t have a badge and secret folder on the club—which I’m sure you didn’t think I knew about but I know you, so I know it exists, or existed—that they’ll welcome you?” I paused, stepping out of his embrace. “No, they won’t. You’ll still be the cop to them. Always.”

  The softness left his eyes. “I don’t give a fuck if they think that,” he clipped. “As long as to you, I’ll always be your man. Not the cop. But that’s not the case, is it? I’ll always be the cop to you too, won’t I?”

  I stuttered at the hurt in his voice, despite the fact that it was rising with anger. “I’ll always be the woman who stopped you from being that, won’t I? From being what you were meant to be. And Gwen, my sister, the one who just walked in. She’s the one you should’ve been with. Who you wanted to be with.”

  Luke froze. Actually froze, like my words had rendered him immobile. He didn’t seem to breathe for a long second.

  “You didn’t just fucking say that,” he hissed.

  I crossed my arms, wishing I hadn’t said it, but I did, so I had to own it. “It’s the truth.”

  “It is fucking not!” he roared. He kicked at the coffee table and it wobbled slightly, then toppled to the ground. “I know you’re scared and hurt, and this is fucking so magnificent that it’s terrifying, but that’s no fucking excuse for you to spew that absolute bullshit.” He glared at me.

  I didn’t blanche at the glare. I used anger as a vehicle for my most vulnerable thoughts. “You wanted her when she first came. Even with what we’d been through before,” I accused.

  “No I fucking didn’t!” he yelled. “I wanted you so fucking bad, and it hurt every inch of me that I couldn’t have you, that I never would. I could barely even look at you, Rosie.” He began pacing the room. “I could barely fucking look at myself. So I started to do shit to try and make you hate me. Because I’d never stop loving you. It would be painful but at least fucking bearable if you hated me. If I knew you weren’t bathing in the misery I would be submerged in.” He paused. “So yeah, I turned myself into that man. Let my anger and hatred for our situation fuel that shit. You need to know, that night at the opening was one of the fuckin’ hardest things I’ve ever had to do. Second to watching you collapse into my arms in the shower a year ago. So no, I’ve never really wanted anyone but you. I’ve pretended to. I got really fucking good at that, and I almost fooled myself. But never was it the truth. You should know that. You’re meant to know that, know me better than that.”

  He yanked on his boots.

  “And you’re fucking one to talk,” he said, straightening. “You did everything but parade your men in front of me.”

  My hurt from his words mingled with anger. “And what was I supposed to do, Luke?” I yelled. “Stay chaste and innocent on the slim fucking chance the high and mighty cop might choose to slum it with the criminal? I was pretending too, Luke. And I fucking sucked at it. You, on the other hand, no doubt had calls from the Academy for your fucking stellar performance.”

  He stared at me while he pulled on his tee.

  “I’m not stayin’ here while we spew this shit at each other. One of us will say somethin’ we regret.” He paused. “I’m done doing shit I regret in regard to you. You’ll always be Rosie to me. Just fucking Rosie. My fucking Rosie. And it’s that simple for me. But it’s not that simple for you, is it?”

  “No!” I yelled. “Of course it’s not that fucking simple. Us, we were never fucking simple. Stop expecting me to be someone who’s going to relax into this and forget the world around us exists. Forget the past exists. I’m torn in fucking two, Luke, and I don’t know what to do, who to be.”

  “You, Rosie. Just be you.” He said it softly, but it impacted as if he’d yelled it.

  And then he walked out.

  “Yes!” I yelled back to Gwen, the events of the hour before still echoing in my mind. I reached for another glass so I could pour her some wine. I’d already had two. And now that she wasn’t breastfeeding, she had a lot of making up to do.

  I had a lot of making up to do with my sister. It had been a year. A year of her being a mom, being a wife, being a crazy fucking bitch. I’d missed out on a lot. I missed her.

  I should’ve hated her.

  Gwen.

  Not at first. At first, she was the beautiful, exotic woman with pain behind her eyes but a kind smile that swept my brother away from himself. Who yanked him into something that wasn’t the quest for revenge he’d started the day our father died.

  To set him on some sort of track for living instead of just fighting.

  The day of my barbeque, when he only had eyes for her, when he dragged her off like a caveman in a show of his version of affection that was almost unheard of, I didn’t hate her. No, I loved her. Because even though he didn’t smile—in fact, he scowled more than usual—I knew my brother was venturing toward happy.

  Because of her.

  And he deserved whatever version of happy that our version of life could provide him.

  And by the looks of the ghosts and demons behind Gwen’s pretty face, she deserved it too.

  But life, or love, was rarely that simple.

  Or casualty free.

  It just so happened that I was the casualty of my brother’s bloody and drama-filled road to an unexpected fairy-tale ending.

  The one where he knocked up Gwen, lost her wh
en she left after her brother died and she found him in bed with another woman, and then he went halfway across the world to get her back. And he brought her back here, where she belonged. At the club. With him.

  She ended up shooting and killing the man who shot Steg—while nine months pregnant. And then she gave birth to my niece in the clubhouse with my brother delivering the baby. Oh, and her kidnapping came before that.

  So not the traditional happy ever after.

  Though, considering every man’s road to love, marriage, and the babies in the baby carriage, it kind of was the Sons of Templar version. It wasn’t a courtship without at least one kidnapping, an explosion or a drive-by shooting.

  You’d think I’d be kidding, but I wasn’t.

  Though, those weren’t my stories, despite the fact that I managed to get tied into every single one.

  Me and Luke.

  But because of the drama-filled romances that demanded every inch of the club’s attention, our relatively uneventful dramas went unnoticed.

  Which was the way it needed to be.

  The way it had to be if I wanted to keep my family.

  So back to my point, where it all began. For Gwen and Cade, at least.

  They wouldn’t say it, or at least Gwen wouldn’t—my stoic brother turned to a marshmallow around his wife and children and would shout from the rooftops that it was love at first sight. That didn’t mean that it was a relationship at first sight.

  Gwen’s demons were dark, even for Cade. Or maybe they resembled Cade’s so much and that was why she fought it. Why she gave Luke the prime opportunity to distract himself with a woman who didn’t represent everything he despised.

  A clean woman.

  And that’s why I should’ve hated her.

  My mind went back to that moment, before she and Cade were concrete. When I realized how brittle Luke and I were, despite everything that had already happened between us.

  It was a week or so after Gwen came into town, four years ago now. At the store where I would end up spending some of the best times of my life. It just so happened one of the worst occurred at the opening party. At the opening when Luke only had eyes for her. Or no, it was worse than that. His eyes had touched mine the moment he set foot in the store. But they didn’t stay on me. The pointed movement of his gaze, of his attention to Gwen, hurt more than if he didn’t see me at all. But because I was Rosie, carefree on top of all of those monsters I was so good at hiding, I did the only thing I could think of.

  Drank myself into oblivion.

  But I didn’t shift the blame of that hurt to Gwen. It would’ve been easier. That’s why so many women threw around words like “skank,” “slut,” “bitch.” Because it was easier to blame a skank for taking away your man than it was to realize that man wasn’t really yours in the first place.

  So I didn’t do that, didn’t poke my head in the sand and blame an innocent woman who I hoped would become my sister one day.

  Instead, I accepted a job in her store, swallowing all my pain and banishing it from sight.

  And I did what I shouldn’t have done.

  I hoped.

  Firstly, my hope wasn’t for me. It was for my troubled brother, who didn’t look it but was extremely vulnerable. I hoped that he would finally find some kind of happiness that made him live, not just survive. That he’d have someone to fight for instead of someone to fight against.

  And then there was my own selfish hope. That I’d somehow imagined the dismissal, the intensity of Luke’s gaze toward Gwen.

  But hope was for idiots.

  That day in her store when Luke came in, eyes and coffee only for her, invitation of an uncomplicated and drama-less life open.

  I didn’t hate her.

  I couldn’t.

  I did hate myself a little in the moment they walked out the door, Luke’s hand on the small of her back. I hated that I wasn’t clean and uncomplicated and that I represented everything Luke despised.

  There weren’t very many times in my life when I wanted to be something other than who I was.

  That was one of them.

  I hated Luke a little in that moment too. For making me crave another skin, another identity, for showing me what a fucking farce I was. What a fucking fraud.

  But that was it. Love and hate were entwined; one could not exist without the other. And sometimes they existed at the same time. Within the same person.

  Gwen burst in, almost weighed down with various Chanel bags. Her eyes went to the couch first, grinning wickedly.

  “I half expected you to still be going at it,” she said, waltzing into the room, eyeing it as if she was expecting a naked Luke to be hanging off a sex swing. “You have a lot of making up to do, after all.”

  I poked my tongue out at her. That was better than crying. Or telling her that we might’ve been over before we began. And I felt profound fucking guilt at using the smiling beauty as a weapon in a fight with Luke.

  That was low. Even for me.

  She grinned wider, dumping all of her bags on my dining room table.

  “These are all because of you, just so you know,” she said, nodding to the bags.

  I raised my brow and handed her the glass of wine. “I’m pretty sure you had a love affair with the double C before you met me.”

  She took the wine. “True, but I’m a mum now. I have a love affair with my children and my husband. You made me cheat on them with Chanel. And seriously deplete their college funds.” She regarded the bags, chewing her lip.

  I laughed. “You’ll always cheat on Cade with Chanel.”

  She nodded. “True.” Her attention went to me, eyes narrowing like an eagle’s. “Now spill,” she demanded. “Everything. And then you better apologize to your favorite sister-in-law for not calling her the second this happened. If I like the sordid details and apology enough, I might just give you your birthday gift early.” She nodded to the bags.

  “My birthday is in ten months,” I protested, not sure why I was arguing against a free Chanel bag.

  She sobered a little. “Well, a late one, then. I missed the last one.”

  I opened my mouth to give her yet another apology.

  She held up her hand. “I get it, babe. Trust me, I do. Your brother did, even if he’d never admit it. You’ve been almost front and center with every drama we’ve had. Every wound, every blow, it hits you too. I should’ve seen it earlier.” She squeezed my hand. “I’m sorry.”

  She was apologizing to me for me running away and leaving my family in the lurch? Yeah, I could’ve never hated her.

  “It’s not up to you to say sorry,” I whispered.

  “It’s a girlfriend’s duty to see things in her sister that she doesn’t see in herself. So yeah, I do owe you an apology. But I also demand details. You and Luke, how long has this been going on?”

  I grinned. “Oh, about twenty years.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know. But I mean the porno-worthy sex on the couch kind of stuff.”

  I raised my brow. “You knew?”

  “About the porno couch stuff? Not until I was presented with it. Luke’s got a great ass, by the way. And your rack is perfect.” She winked.

  I rolled my eyes.

  “About the stuff before?” she said. “Yeah, I knew.”

  I frowned. “Was it that obvious?”

  She smiled. “It’s a girlfriend’s duty to see things in her sister that she doesn’t see in herself, remember?”

  I swallowed, remembering a conversation with Laurie in high school so long ago. My heart ached for a moment, and I let it. I’d learned that, when it came to grief that came with loss, it was pointless to fight it. That was one thing that even the strongest person couldn’t fight against. You had to let yourself feel the pain or else it would eat you alive.

  “You’re not going to say anything to Cade, are you?” I asked.

  She frowned. “Of course I’d never snitch. Even to my husband.” She drained her wine, walking to th
e counter to fill her glass once more. Mine was still full. She turned to me while pouring. “But why is this a secret? It’s something you need to be shouting from the rooftops. Or at the very least something to share with the people you love. Let them exhale, finally knowing that you’ve got the happiness you deserve.”

  I sipped my wine. “It’s not that simple, Gwen. You know that. You know the club. You know my brother. He hates Luke. He’d hate me too for bringing him into the family.”

  Gwen scowled. “Your brother adores you. You could blow up his Harley right in front of him and he’d compliment you on your bomb-making skills. Nothing, especially your happiness, would make him hate you.”

  I took another sip. “It’s not that easy to erase the history of hate.”

  She continued to frown. “It is. You’re just making it hard. What are you clinging to, Rosie? Honestly? If it’s the club, you know they’d bleed for you. Die for you. So you think that them getting over some stupid macho feud in order for you to be happy is going to be the end of the world? Maybe when things were different, before my time and these men hadn’t been exposed to love and happiness and how it’s so much better than a life of blood and bullets. And if you’re worried about your brother, I’ll take care of him.”

  “No, it’s not that. Or it’s not that anymore. But it’s him. I’ve ruined him, Gwen. He was on the straight and narrow. He was good, and I pushed him off his path. He killed for me. He went against every single one of his morals for me. How am I meant to live with that?”

  Gwen pursed her lips. “Firstly, he might’ve been walking on the straight and narrow, but have you ever heard of happiness being found on the straight and narrow? No. He was walking that line and maybe, without you, he would’ve stayed on that line. But thank God he didn’t. That would’ve been a long and lonely road. Unfulfilled. I knew it the second he looked at you. Or, more aptly, actively tried not to look at you.” She sipped her wine. “And here’s another thing. Not that either man would ever admit this, but Luke and Cade are similar. Almost identical. Albeit on different sides of the law, but alpha knows alpha. And they don’t make decisions that they don’t want to make. They don’t want to forsake that control for anything or anyone except the one. They’re serious about that. Luke wouldn’t have taken off that badge for anyone unless he knew. Trust me, he knows. He took a long time to get there, not because of how he felt about you but how he felt about himself. Maybe that’s why he was so conflicted about all of this, because he actually respected all the men he thought he was so determined to lock up.”