A Ride or Die Kind of Love

by Chelsea Camaron

  I shoved as hard as I could, and his shoulders rocked back. As soon as I tried to scramble away, he wrapped both arms around me and leaned his chest into mine. My arms were completely immobile, and he dropped his head, so our faces were less than an inch apart.

  “You don’t need to worry about Kendra. I’ll worry about that. Hear me?”

  I glared back at him, not willing to have this conversation.

  “You hear me, Brenna? That’s none of your business.”

  His arms gave me a little shake, so I nodded, still refusing to say anything.

  “You say you got no man?” He waited a minute for an answer, but I didn’t say anything. “You just crawl in any man’s lap and bawl your eyes out? Huh? You just let any man crawl in bed with you and my daughter, curled up like a bunch of puppies?”

  I gasped at what he was insinuating. “Of course not! She didn’t even sleep with Tony and me!” Then, I realized the trap I’d walked right into.

  “You got any other man’s name tattooed on your belly?” he asked quietly.

  “It’s not your name.” I clenched my jaw tightly.

  “You have Draco tattooed on your belly,” he reminded me as if I didn’t know exactly what was written there.

  “Yes.” I nodded. “That’s not your name.”

  “We just pretending we don’t know what Draco means?” he asked incredulously.

  “I told you. It’s not for you.” I was beginning to panic at the direction this conversation was going.

  “Yeah, okay, Brenna. You wanna pretend like you and me aren’t what we are, that’s fine. I’m not gonna pretend. I’m not takin’ your bullshit either. Baby, I’ve been waitin’ five years for you. That shit’s never gone away. So, you can bitch and moan and make your own life miserable, or you can suck it the fuck up and get on the same page with me. I’m not goin’ anywhere.”

  I opened my mouth to argue that he was wrong, but Trix slammed open the door and jumped up onto the bed.

  “Hi, Mama! Whatcha doin’?” She looked back and forth between Dragon and me curiously.

  I was trying to inconspicuously pull myself out of his arms, but he wasn’t letting go.

  “Morning, baby girl. You hungry?” I asked her, trying to act like I wasn’t lying under a man she’d met just two weeks ago.

  She’d never seen anything even remotely like this when we lived with Tony. She had known not to come into our bedroom.

  “Yeah, can I have yogurt for breakfast? We have the good kind in the fridge. I checked!” She started squirming like she was in a hurry.

  “Sure. You remember where the spoons are? Next to the fridge in the drawer,” I answered her as she climbed back off the bed. “Sit up at the table!” I called, but she had already run down the small hallway, leaving my bedroom door wide open.

  “I think she just wanted to see what we were doin’ in here,” Dragon said with a smile.

  “Get off me! What the hell is a matter with you? She’s four! She doesn’t need to see some strange man in my bed, lying on top of me.”

  I finally slid away from him and crawled to the edge of the bed, climbing down and spinning around to send a glare his way. I expected him to laugh at me or be pissed. I figured with his hot and cold personality, it could really go either way at this point. What I didn’t expect was for him to stand up and pull on his jeans with a completely blank expression on his face. I stood there stupidly, trying to figure out where his head was at, as he pulled on his T-shirt, and I caught another glimpse of the tattoos covering his torso. They looked like little dots all over his skin. I couldn’t see them very well, but it looked like they covered his whole chest and stomach. When he finished dressing, he walked around the bed and stood, looking down at me. I was frozen to the spot by his complete lack of expression.

  “I’m not a stranger. I’m her dad. She knows I’m her dad. Don’t know who fuckin’ told her. I’m just glad I didn’t have to explain it. She’ll get used to me bein’ in your space ’cause I’m gonna be there a lot. She’ll also get used to me in your bed ’cause that’s where I’ll be sleepin’. Moms and dads sleep together. It’s normal. You got any other concerns, you’re gonna have to bitch at me later. I got places to be.”

  As soon as he stopped talking, he wrapped a big hand around the back of my neck and pulled my face up to his for a quick kiss, rubbing his tongue along my bottom lip and then biting my top lip softly. His expression never changed, and before I could say anything, he had walked out into the hallway. I followed slowly behind him and watched him smile at Trix, kiss the top of her head, and then head out the door.

  It was like any other family in America—the kid ate breakfast, and the mom stood there in her pajamas while the daddy headed off to work. Well, almost the same, I thought to myself as I watched him slide his cut onto his shoulders and then listened to the roar of pipes seconds later.

  Not long after Dragon left and I got dressed for the day, we heard gravel crunching as someone drove toward the house. I’d forgotten how quiet it was out here. We’d lived in a neighborhood and then at the clubhouse, which always had people coming and going. The silence was nice and provided the added benefit of always knowing when someone was driving up. It gave me a little peace of mind; no one would get here on foot as we were too far out in the boonies. Trix ran to the window, already bored with the cartoons she’d been watching.

  “Auntie Vera!” she squealed and then ran for the door.

  Well, this wouldn’t be pleasant. Vera had been giving me the cold shoulder since the night we had dinner at her place. I was surprised she was showing up here. Trix threw open the door, and I caught sight of Vera opening up the back door of her car and then popping the trunk.

  “Brenna!” she shouted up to me. “Come help me grab these boxes!”

  “Be right there!”

  I ran to my room and grabbed some flip-flops from behind the door in my room. I guessed I could start leaving some by the front door, but I’d gotten in the habit of putting everything away the minute I got home. Tony didn’t like clutter, and after he’d tripped on my high heels once after dinner, I never left shoes out again. But this was my house, and if I wanted to leave stuff all over, I could. But just the thought of it caused my heart rate to spike, so maybe I’d try tomorrow…or next week.

  “What is all this stuff?” I asked as we brought in the last of the six boxes Vera had dragged over.

  Boxes were spread out all over the living room, and I could already feel the start of a panic attack coming on. They needed to go somewhere, anywhere, but our little house had virtually no storage.

  “Hey, what’s your deal? You okay?” Vera asked, looking at me like she couldn’t figure out what the problem was. By the look on her face, she could tell I was ready to freak out.

  “Uh, what are all these boxes?” I looked around the room.

  “It’s all your old stuff. When your pop sold his place, I went in and packed up your room. Clothes and shoes in some boxes and memento stuff in others. I didn’t bring the memento boxes. Didn’t think you’d have space for ’em. I packed all of your star books in with the clothes. Figured if you ever came back, you’d want to open those first.”

  The quiver in her voice told me what she would never say. I’d hurt her when I took off. Now that I had Trix, I could finally understand how she must have felt.

  I felt a knot forming in the back of my throat. “I’m sorry. I should’ve—”

  She stopped me when she wrapped her arms around me and hugged me tightly, her voice muffled in the shoulder of my T-shirt. I could feel her breath stuttering against me like she was trying not to cry.

  “That’s okay, baby. You’re here now.”

  I breathed in her smell of vanilla perfume and cigarettes, and my panic instantly faded.

  All of a sudden, she stepped away, tugged on the bottom of her Harley Davidson tank top, and went on like it’d never happened.

  “So, I brought by all of the clothes boxes. I mostly got stuf
f for Trix when I made that trip into town. A woman’s gotta have some clothes. I doubt your ass will fit into any of your old jeans—”

  “Ouch!”

  “But all those skirts and T-shirts you had will probably still fit.” She looked up, smiling from where she was using her pocketknife to cut open boxes. “I’ll even make some sundresses for Trix if you want…out of your old band T-shirts. Remember when I did that for you when you were little? Couldn’t even fit into the smallest size they had, and you still insisted on getting any band T-shirt you could get your hands on.”

  “You want some new dresses, Trix?” I asked my daughter who had climbed onto one of the largest boxes in the living room and was shaking her little hips. She looked like a miniature go-go dancer.

  “Yeah!” she yelled as she jumped off the box onto the couch.

  “Trix! Don’t jump on the couch!” In that split second, I was envisioning missing teeth and a trip to the emergency room.

  “Trix, you’re gonna give your mama a heart attack.”

  Trix giggled as Vera pulled her off the couch.

  “Why don’t you go out front and play? Leave the door open.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but one look at Vera made me close it again. I didn’t know how she perfected the Mom look, but she’d been using it on me for as long as I could remember.

  “Okay, here are the rules.” I stopped Trix as she headed out the door. “Stay away from Auntie Vera’s car. No climbing on anything. You can play in the grass, but stay off the driveway. And if a car comes, you get back inside right that minute. Do you understand?” I waited until she nodded and then let go of her arm. She ran outside, and I turned back to Vera. “Can you help me get these boxes unpacked?”

  “Sure, you better grab a laundry basket.” She started rifling through the first box as I headed toward the hallway. “These clothes are gonna need to be washed. I made Slider store them in the compound, so who knows what they’ve come into contact with through the cardboard.”

  I grabbed a basket out of Trix’s room and got down to work with Vera.

  Vera was a lot like a mother to me, but she was also my best friend. While we sat there on the floor, it felt like I had never left. We laughed over gaudy rhinestone tops and talked about what had happened in the club since I’d left, and I told her about life with Tony. She was pissed for me, and halfway through my story, she got up and grabbed us a couple of beers out of the fridge.

  “We’re gonna need fortification.”

  We got through the boxes quickly, putting my astronomy books on top of the TV as we found them and sorting the clothes into keep and charity piles. A lot of the clothes were far too small, but by the end of the second box, I had a load of laundry washing in the machine. It was weird going through my old clothes. I had dressed like the perfect wife for so long, and I was nervous to get back into my old gypsy skirts and sundresses. I was listening to Trix talk to herself on the front porch and rubbing an old Drop Kick Murphy’s shirt between my fingers when Vera spoke.

  “I’ve heard what you told Slider, but now, I wanna hear it from you. What the hell is going on with you and Dragon?”

  Chapter Twelve

  Dragon

  I left the house this morning, knowing my day was going to be shit. I didn’t want Brenna to worry. I didn’t know where she got her tender heart from, but I knew she’d freak if she found out what today was. The nonsense from five years ago was finally catching up to me, and I was going to be in a world of hurt tonight.

  When I got to the clubhouse, everything was quiet. A few of the boys were sitting around, drinking coffee, but boss man hadn’t come in yet. I walked up to grab a cup just as Poet came in from the back hallway. I wasn’t sure where we stood because most of my time since Brenna got here had been taken up with my trip to Boise or dealing with my girls. I was hoping we could wait to talk after my deal this afternoon, but he headed straight for me.

  “Dragon. Got a minute?”

  It was a question, but there was only one answer.

  “Yeah.”

  I walked to the corner of the room to give us a little privacy, but I knew our conversation would be all over the club in a matter of hours. I sat down on one of the couches and rested my elbows on my knees. I wasn’t sure what I was most embarrassed about—the fact that I had no idea who Brenna was the night we’d met or that I’d been pretty much hiding all the shit that went down for over five years.

  “Shit is not going to go well for you today.” Poet coughed and then took a sip of his coffee. “I can’t say that I’m glad you were with Brenna. I’m also pretty goddamn angry that you and Grease kept that shit from me. Ya kept my baby from me for five years. That was Brenna’s choice, but a choice she made, so she didn’t see you.”

  I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t argue the point because everything he was saying was true. If I woulda manned up, Poet would have dragged Brenna’s ass back here, especially if she was pregnant.

  “I had no idea what was in that girl’s head when she ran outta here. Figured she stayed away because she was embarrassed—maybe she didn’t want that husband of hers to know where she came from. Maybe that was part of the reason but not all of it. Once she was gone, I’m thinking he wasn’t gonna let her come back here anyway.”

  I stopped him, asking a question I’d been wondering for weeks. “Why didn’t you keep an eye on her? Fuck, Poet!”

  “Son, I don’t think you wanna be steppin’ on my toes right now,” he answered calmly, but I knew by the way his accent deepened that I’d pissed him off.

  I didn’t care. The thought of Brenna and Trix in the world with no protection made me want to puke. “I got nothing to lose now. Today’s judgment day, right? Might as well ask what the fuck you were thinkin’.” I didn’t care if this got me more of what I had to look forward to later. I wanted to know what the fuck he’d been thinking.

  “Son, I’m gonna explain this once, and then you better never question me about it again.” His face looked normal, but his eyes had gone the coldest I’d ever seen them. “I had eyes on Brenna. Always. Boys from a chapter up north kept her on their radar at all times. Eyes only. They saw her only when she left the house. None of them saw nothin’ to make them think that she was in trouble. They were watching for outside problems. Didn’t think to watch the husband.” He shook his head. “She chose him. Figured she would come home if she wasn’t happy. Took her a while, but that’s what she did. Now, I’m done with fucking story hour. You want to get back on my good side, you’ll get the fuck out of this clubhouse and let me forget that you just questioned me about something you got no business in.”

  He stood up and walked back to his room without saying a word to anyone else. I still had questions, but I figured that was all I was gonna get from him, so I left. I was anxious about today, and I needed to keep busy or I was gonna lose my mind. Plus, I had business in town that I needed to take care of.

  When I got to my apartment, the door was unlocked, and I walked right in. Kendra was sitting on the couch, painting her toenails and talking on the phone. Didn’t know how many times I’d told her to lock the fuckin’ door when I wasn’t here, but the chick never listened.

  “Tracy, I gotta call you back. My man’s home!” she squealed and then launched herself off the couch and wrapped her arms and legs around me. “Where have you been?”

  “Takin’ care of shit at the club. I told you to lock the door.” I glared down at her. “Lock. The. Door.”

  I pushed on her thighs to get her to let me loose. She dropped to her feet and immediately started bitching that I’d ruined her toenail polish. Seriously? She was in her own fuckin’ world. I was standing by the front door, obviously waiting to leave, and the bitch had no clue. I stood there for a second, hoping that she would notice that something was up and ask me about it, but she went back to painting her nails. Finally, I just jumped right into it.

  “Yeah, Kendra, this is no good anymore. You need to find another place
to live.”

  I watched as she stopped ranting and blinked at me for a couple of seconds, like she couldn’t understand what I was talking about.

  “What?” she asked me, all wide-eyed and surprised.

  I didn’t know why she was surprised. I got home from my run and avoided her for the past few days, and she still hadn’t noticed anything was wrong. Usually, when I got back from a run, I would be all jacked and need an outlet. I was always here the minute I got back and checked in. I’d get some relief and then head out to be with the boys. Sometimes, she came with me, and sometimes, she didn’t, but I always hit home as soon as I’d checked in with Slider.

  “Yeah. You got two weeks to find a new place. Feel free to be stay here until you do, but I’m not gonna be here.”

  “Where are you going to be then?” Finally catching on, she was not happy. She was doing that thing women do when they were pissed—the hand on the hip with the head cocked to the side.

  “Not your business where I’m gonna be. It wasn’t your business before. Why you think I’d tell you now? Find a place to live, Kendra.” I just wanted to get out of here. I had a couple errands to run before I headed back to the clubhouse. My head was already preparing for the rest of my day, and I was barely paying attention to what she was saying.

  “What the fuck, Dragon! You’re just going to dump me? Out of the blue, no explanation?” she asked and I nodded. “Is this because of your bitch of a baby mama who hid your kid her entire life? Seriously? You’re dumping me for that redheaded skank?”

  “Woman, you’re testing my patience. It’s none of your goddamn business who I’m with. That’s the mother of my child, and you’ll show respect when you talk about her, or I’ll throw your ass out now with nothin’ but the clothes on your goddamn back!”

  She shut up pretty quickly when I started yelling, and by the time I was done, she was crying. I felt bad for her, but I had so much shit on my plate, and I just didn’t have time for this.

  “Kendra, find a place to live. You can have this place for the next two weeks. You can’t find another place by then, you call me, and we’ll figure something out.”