I don’t know whether its rage, shock, or a combination of the two causing it, but my first instinct is to tell whoever is at the door to fuck off, and then try and calm him down. It can’t be good for his blood pressure getting this worked up. Ducking under his arm I instantly recognise my mistake. And in hindsight why Tank is acting this way.
You know when people say bad things come in threes? Well, I would like to amend that to epic things come in threes, and it looks like today is the day I experience my share of that.
First it was Tank’s wife, or very soon to be ex-wife, showing up in Blackwater at Mo’s to warn, intimidate, belittle, in reality who cares what she was here for, the fact she was here was enough all on its own. Next came Tank’s declaration of love. Now if that isn’t surreal after all the years I’ve spent pinning after him, I don’t know what is. In saying that, it’s also the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me and I loved him even more for it. Now this…
In my wildest dreams I couldn’t have concocted a better plot for a shitty daytime soap opera. Jesus Christ. Dead parents’. A friend who was kidnapped, beaten, and shot. Another friend that was shot by a bikers deranged ex-wife, the twin sister of aforementioned friend marrying a rival MC president after deserting her critically ill son, leaving him with his father that had no idea of his condition. A woman’s story sadder than anyone’s has the right to be, one of resilience and survival. Men in an MC that aren’t what they appear to be. Unrequited love. And now… Holy shit. Tilly. The thought hits me like a ton of bricks. Where is my sister? If she’s had to face them first this could be bad. Very bad.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Priscilla
Priscilla’s Rules to live by 101
“In this family we curse, drink, laugh, overshare, yell
hug, and tell inappropriate jokes. That’s what family is for!”
Trying, only somewhat successfully, to gather what little strength I have to deal with this situation, I turn away from them to face Tank. He’s glaring at them over my head, and now I know who elicited this reaction from him, and I don’t blame him for how he feels. Inside I’m reacting the same way. I don’t even have time for the humiliation to register that they quite probably, who am I kidding they definitely heard us having sex, that’s an issue for another day.
I think I’ve dealt with enough in the last few hours. I’ve reached my limit on all things fitting into the category of ‘let’s freak Priss the fuck out’, and I’d like to instate a moratorium on all things related to, or involving me more than likely having a forced mental vacation for the next let’s say; year. Better yet, make it five years. That should give me just enough time to recover from this latest revelation.
Steeling myself I grab Tank’s hand holding it tight. He gives me strength just by being here, he doesn’t need to do anything just his presence is reassuring. It always has been. I’ll need that now, to get through this I’ll need him.
“Can you please get someone to call Tilly, and ask her to go straight home and wait for me there? I’m going to tell Mo I need to take the rest of my shift off.”
I’m pleading him with my eyes, and I can tell when he realises I’m talking to him because his face softens a degree, his eyes becoming tender. Nothing else about his outward expression changes, but I’m well versed in deciphering his subtle nuances, so I know he’s starting to cool off. Only a fraction, but anything’s better than I’m-going-to-kill-you-with-my-pinkie-and-burn-your-remains Tank, so I’ll take this as a win.
Tank strokes his thumb across the side of my hand the sweet caress so unlike his usual rougher than sin persona, and it makes me melt a little on the inside. It’s hard to keep a good mad going when you’ve got a sweet, hulking big, alpha male showing you he cares about you.
“Yeah Beautiful, I can do that. I’ll get Glock on it now.”
Pulling his phone out of his pocket he types out a quick text re-pocketing it again in seconds. I swivel around a hundred and eighty degrees with my back hard up against Tank’s chest, and my arms crossed against my chest.
“This is when I give you the chance to explain what in the name of all things holy is going on.” My hand shoots up to stop him from speaking, I’m not finished, and they’ll damn well hear me out if they know what’s good for them. “I’m not done yet,” I snap. “When I’m finished you’ve got five minutes to convince me not to walk away forgetting you were ever here. I only hope you know what you’re doing because this will gut Tilly, and if you so much as hurt her feelings I will make sure you don’t live another day without being reminded how you fucked up.”
It’s true. All of it. I might not be able to kill a man, or woman with one finger, but I can promise you if someone, anyone, hurts my little sister I will ensure that before they take their last breath they don’t ever forget their mistake. Clearing his throat the man in question speaks. His voice washes over me, and memories, good and bad assault me making my knees buckle. If Tank wasn’t standing behind me I would have hit the floor, I know it.
“It’s good to see you girl we’ve missed you so much. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, Honey Bee.”
That’s right, standing less than two feet in front of me, in the flesh, in a hallway at the back of a fifty-year-old diner, ten minutes after I just had sex with Tank for the second time, and currently wearing no panties because the big bastard stole them, is my mom and dad.
You might ask why I wasn’t throwing myself in their arms hugging the hell out of them. Why I’m not comforting my mom who has tears streaming down her face openly sobbing. Why as a daddy’s little girl when I was younger I’m not disturbed by the look of devastation written all over the face? Part of me wants to do all of those things, it’s a small part, but I can’t deny its existence. The overwhelming majority of me wants to smack the crap out of them for everything they’ve put me through, but mainly for Tilly. Tilly deserved better.
Tilly was eleven when they “died”. While I was heartbroken, Tilly was destroyed. As in, absolutely irrevocably destroyed. I tried my best to comfort her when she needed it, which was often. Wipe away her tears. Teach her how to cope with her grief, and with time things got better. Not the same. Not close to how it was before. But we made a new kind of okay with each other. She relied on me for everything at that point in her life, and in some small way I relied on her too. Having to wake up in the morning, even if it was to make her school lunch, do her hair, or remind her to pack her homework in her backpack was a reason to keep going.
When someone dies, especially if it’s someone so close to you, someone that you have known all your life, leaves a void. In our case our parents “dying” didn’t leave a crack, something that you can move past; it left a chasm. One that we would have to find ways to go around. A chasm that we didn’t dare traverse for fear it would engulf us. The fact was our parents were our world, and learning to live in a world without them was scary. Downright petrifying actually.
Our mom quit her job working as the receptionist for Chasers when she was six months pregnant with me, and never returned to it. My dad was more than happy to be the sole breadwinner in the household, essentially I think that was his goal to begin with. Mom was twenty-one when she found out she was three and a half months pregnant with her first baby, that would be yours truly. She was lucky dad had been patient up to that point, waiting almost three years since they were married at eighteen and a half, fresh out of high school, to knock her up. The type of man my dad is, every overbearing possessive inch of him, I’m honestly surprised she managed to hold him off so long. I have no doubt in my mind that he would have been pushing for babies as soon as he slipped the wedding band on her finger.
Being a stay at home mom meant she could come to every one of my gymnastics practices, events, and pep rallies when I was cheerleading. She baked treats for after school. Always had a hot meal on the table for dad when he got home after being at the club, or Chasers all day. And she doted on Tilly profusely.
Like I’ve said before, having a mom at home was pretty common practice for the members of Devil’s Spawn MC that had children. It’s still the way most of them do it today. Kendall was at home with Lexi from the time she was put on bedrest after developing high blood pressure in her fifth month of pregnancy with Wheels. She only went back part-time, well a little more than part-time but we don’t tell Cage about the extra hours, and what he doesn’t know doesn’t hurt him.
Lou was home for nine months with Anna, the last three of her pregnancy and the first six of her life before her mom took over babysitting Anna so that Lou could go back to work Monday through Thursday. After having Cal, who’s ten months old now, and staying home for the same amount of time Lou cut her hours back even further, cutting out Thursdays shift altogether.
V owns KAV-e-ART, so she makes her own hours, but a lot of the time you can find Kellen there with her if she isn’t at home with him, or taking him to football practice, or if he isn’t with Arrow.
The new generation of Devil’s Spawn men are a hell of a lot more accommodating to the women in their lives, and a damn sight more in control of the caveman tendencies that run deep in their veins. There’s no way in hell, my mom Sally, Brenna, or Carly when she was married to Reaper would’ve been allowed to work, part-time or not. And yes, I did say allowed. Even in this century these men are ridiculously anchored in the middle-ages as it relates to their beliefs regarding women.
In the end if it works for the couple, and the family who am I to judge whether it’s right or wrong. All I know is that in the case of my parents it worked. Well. They were a team. Mom took care of us, the house, the bills, and dad provided the money, and safety and security for her to do that. Looking at them now I can tell they’re still just as tight as they’ve always been.
Six years is a long fucking time to have two integral people missing from your life. The two people you believed hung the moon and the stars. The people that you went to with everything. When they “died” mom was forty-years-old, dad was almost forty-one. Now at forty-six and seven consecutively, they look much the same, but at the same time so very, very different
Maybe that’s because I’m not looking at them through the same naïve nineteen-year-old girls’ eyes anymore. Maybe it’s because in their absence, because they didn’t die, not really, I was left with the responsibility of my younger sister, which made me mature faster than most. And maybe, just maybe it’s because when I look at them now I don’t see the good times we had. The times we vacationed with moms parents in Florida. The countless Sunday breakfasts we had sitting around the scarred kitchen table while our dad told ridiculous, but hilarious in a corny way, jokes that had us double over in fits of laughter. I don’t hear my dad’s voice telling me he loves me as he hugs me before bed. And I don’t hear my mom humming in the kitchen while she ices cupcakes, for no reason other than because she can.
No. What I hear now are the voices of the police officers that came to our front door to inform me that they were gone. That they were never coming home. I hear the sounds of Tilly’s cries. The whimpering noises she made in her sleep. And the screams that ripped from her throat for years after when she had nightmares about their death. I remember the eerily quiet Sunday mornings I spend alone at the breakfast bar drinking coffee because I can’t bear to sit at that fucking table. I can vividly recall the last time a cake or cupcake was iced in that fucking kitchen. It was six and a bit years ago, the memory burned into my brain seeing as it was the morning of the day they were “killed”. Regardless of them being here now I don’t think I’ll ever forget that memory. It was the last time our family was a family. Afterwards, it was just Tilly and I alone against the world. That’s what they did to us. That’s the memory they’ve left me with. Us, me and Tilly, alone.
My mom dries her tears on the sleeve of her pretty, pink, long sleeved shirt, and it brings me to the scary realisation that I’m going to have to break this to Tilly. I don’t know why the colour of moms’ shirt makes me think about telling my sister, probably because she’s here in the flesh, maybe because that fucking shirt was the last thing I ever saw her wear. That thought relights the fury that started as a low simmer in my veins bringing it to full boil.
“I don’t want to hear you’re fucking sorry. I want to know what the hell you’re doing here. Why now? You’ve got four minutes now, I suggest you move this along because I’ve got things to do.”
Dad eyes me with curiosity. I can’t tell if he’s proud, or disappointed in the way I’m speaking to him, but I don’t give a shit either way. He can think whatever he wants. Both of them can. My dad, Jones, is still a handsome son-of-a-bitch even at the ripe old age of forty-seven. His dark three inch long hair is only now starting to show signs of grey, I mean chrome, at his temples, and his eyes are still the same aqua colour as my own, only creased at the corners with several new lines now.
He’s maintained his impressive build doing God knows what, but at six foot four and 230 pounds of lean muscle, he’s still in good shape. Add to that the two half sleeves of tattoo’s I know are under his black t-shirt, and the perma-scowl he wears when he’s dealing with anyone other than my mom, me, Tilly, or one of his brothers at the club, and he looks every bit the biker he has pretended to be. Blowing out a deep frustrated breath dad looks to Tank, and then refocuses on me, his eyes narrowing dangerously when he spots Tank’s hand resting possessively on my hip.
“Something you need to tell me boy? I thought we discussed this shit years ago, and I told you it wasn’t going to happen.”
Tank lets out a bark of a laugh. Not a humorous one. One filled with the all the distaste he’s obviously feeling.
“I don’t give the first fuck whether you want this to happen, or not, it has and it is. There’s not a damn thing you can say or do that’s going to make one bit of fucking difference to me. I’m only here because my woman isn’t doing this shit alone. I don’t know what your fucking end game is here Jones, but I can tell you right now if it hurts my woman or Tilly I’ll hunt you down, and fucking kill you myself. You’re lucky you’re still standing now.”
It’s clear that dad is using every bit of restraint he can muster not to step forward and yank me away from Tank. On that note, I really do have to start calling him Hunter again. I stopped because I was pissed at him, and the only thing I could think of at the time, when he started ignoring me over a year ago, was to call him by his road name. Seeing as we’ve moved past that now I should probably resume normal programing and call him by his given name. The one that no one other than his family, me or Tilly are allowed to use. But I digress. This situation is hostile enough without me dropping the ball by not paying attention to the two dangerous men in front and behind me.
“We’ll talk about that shit later. Mark my words Tank we will talk though. But by my count I have a little less than three minutes if I’m going to fulfil my daughters’ request.” I flinch at the term. I can’t help it. It’s been six years since I’ve been anyone’s daughter, and I’m not sure if I even want the title now. Watching me shrink further back into Hunter dad continues. “I can’t go into all the details here even if I wanted to, but by the looks of it most of them are irrelevant anyway. It goes without saying that if it could have been avoided we’d never have left you and your sister, but the choice was made for us, and there wasn’t anything we could do to change it. The plan was set in motion, any deviating and people could’ve ended up hurt, or worse.”
Manners are secondary at the moment when I interrupt asking,
“I have one question, and depending on the answer I’ll let you keep going, or I’ll walk out and this will be the last time you ever see me.” Moms’ eyes widen in fear, and dad while remaining unmoving looks like he’s been slapped. “Did any of the guys like Uncle Priest, Uncle Pipe or Uncle Reaper know about this?” It might seem like a strange question, but I need to know if any of the men that I’ve come to trust with mine and Tilly’s life had any part in my parents’ betr
ayal. I don’t understand why it’s so important I know the answer. But it is. And all I can tell you is that I won’t stay in Blackwater, Hunter or no Hunter, if this has been one big fucking conspiracy. And I won’t let Tilly about our parents’ reincarnation either.
“No. None of them, Honey Bee. They don’t even know we’re here, and they won’t until I’ve seen both of my girls. We even came in through the back. Mo really does need to change where he stashes his spare key, I think everyone in Blackwater knows where to find it, and could use it to get in.” Relief fills me instantaneously. The knowledge that the men that have acted as our protectors for years are under the same false impression as we are offers a sense of calm in the storm.
That sense of peace doesn’t last long, but nothing good ever does I’m learning.
“We wouldn’t have left if we didn’t absolutely have to honey. You have to believe us. If you don’t believe anything else, believe that,” mom says weakly. I’m not entirely heartless when it comes to her suffering, but she brought this on herself when she chose to follow dad leaving her daughters behind, and I refuse to cave this early on. I can’t promise I won’t down the track, but not right now.
Saviour: A Devil's Spawn MC Novel (Savior Book 3) Page 17
