Renewed Rider: A Lost Saxons Novel #4

by Ames, Jessica

  Powering up the computer, I drop my bag into the bottom drawer of the desk and quickly fire off a text message to my father while I wait for it to load up. I have no idea where he is, but I wish he would come home. Logan says I shouldn’t worry about him, but I can’t help it. Dad can be rash at times, particularly when he’s upset and I know this entire situation has hit him hard. Tap was more than a Club brother to him; Tap was real family.

  I stare at my sent message, waiting for one to come back. It doesn’t. I wait for a few moments longer and nothing pings back, so I let out an annoyed breath and turn my attention to the computer. With more force than is necessary, I click the mouse and slam my fingers across the keyboard. When Jack gets back to Kingsley, I’m going to beat him senseless. Don’t get me wrong, my father is his own man, and I realise I’ve been absent from his everyday life for the better part of a decade, but I’m back now and the least he could do is tell me when he plans on doing a disappearing act.

  As I stare unseeing at my emails on the computer screen, I chew on my thumbnail. I hope he’s okay. I may have been out of the loop for a while, but I do know my father and I do know him well enough to know this situation is eating him alive. Jack Goddard is many things, but he’s not a man to suffer fools and he’s not a man to be taken for one either. I just wish he would come home and try to sort things out. I just got my father back in my life and now he’s God knows where.

  Pushing a hand against my knee, I try to stop it jiggling, but nervous energy runs through me. Everything still feels so raw, so up in the air and I hate it. I hate it so much. I wish I could turn back time and fix everything, although how I can fix this mess, I have no idea. Mostly, I wish I could ask Tap why.

  Pushing those thoughts from my overloaded brain, I try to focus on my work.

  Chapter Three

  The first monthly family day get together since Tap’s death and Dylan’s betrayal feels different, wrong. Derek and Slade sit together, away from the action, but their conversation seems tense. There’s also a weird atmosphere between Logan and Dean. They’re not openly hostile towards each other, but they’re not exactly being friendly either. Well, at least Logan isn’t. I have no idea what their beef is, but Liv, who now looks like she’s carrying a small football under her dress, is watching her man and mine with a growing discomfort. And this is pissing me off. The woman is pregnant and does not need the stress. God knows she’s had enough of that in the past few months; hell, in the past few years, given she lived with Simon ‘psychopath’ Wilson.

  The entire day feels awkward and about as fun as having a root canal done. Looking around the area set up at the back of the clubhouse for these events, everyone is spread out, sitting in their own separate huddles. This is not usually the case. Usually, family events are a party atmosphere. We all sit together, talking and joking and we have a blast. I love these things; they’re such fun.

  Usually.

  Today, it’s awful.

  Even the one while Wade was in the hospital recovering from a gunshot wound was less dreary, although me and Lo had just announced our engagement, so I guess there was a good reason to celebrate. Today’s party seems more like a wake.

  The others must be able to sense the atmosphere, too, because Dorothy, Dean’s gran, made her excuses and left early. Mary, Logan’s mum and my soon to be mother-in-law, has spent most of the day in the kitchen, and the other women have kept to themselves. Jeanne, Sammy’s gran, and my grandad didn’t even come.

  And the brothers seem moody and… off.

  I hate it.

  After an hour, I want to go home because this is a special kind of hell that is being made all the more torturous by whatever is going on between my man and my best friend, so when Logan snips at Dean for the fifteenth time, I lose it.

  I lean between them, take Liv’s hand and give my best friend a hard smile. “I’m taking Liv over there.” I point to an empty picnic table. “Once you two have worked out whatever lovers’ tiff you’ve got going on with each other, come over to us.”

  “I don’t think so,” Dean tells me at the same time Logan says, “We haven’t got any tiff going on.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Logan Harlow. You and Dean have been bitching at each other all afternoon and poor Liv and me are stuck in the middle of it.” I turn to Dean who is straightening his kutte while staring at me like I’ve lost my mind. “Your old lady doesn’t need the stress of whatever this is. We’ll be less than ten feet from you. Now, sort it out, and then come and find us when you have.”

  I give Liv a slight tug to get her moving, and I have to do this because she’s practically Velcroed to Dean’s side. He does let her go, though, with minimal fuss, although she glances over her shoulder at him as we cross the grass to the table. She loves him, of that I have no doubt, but a little loosening on the reins won’t hurt her for an hour or two.

  I climb onto the bench and sit. Liv takes a little longer to manoeuvre herself. She’s six months pregnant now and has a cute baby bump that is enough to slow her down a little when it comes to awkward things like picnic tables.

  “I thought they were never going to stop,” Liv complains, but her eyes still seek out Dean from across the compound.

  I follow her line of sight and watch him and Logan in what looks like a serious conversation. I’m not worried. Even if they decide to throw down in the middle of the grass, it’s better they just get it out of their system and work it out.

  It doesn’t look like it’s heading that way, though. Neither of them is that annoyed—unlike last time they went head-to-head. That was when Dean thought Logan disrespected me. There was no holding back then. Dean slugged Lo right in the chops. Wade had to get between them and I took an elbow to the face trying to stop them killing each other. Looking at their body language right now, I’m pretty sure we’re not in danger of punches being thrown.

  “Do you know what’s wrong with them?” she asks, brushing a blonde strand of hair behind her ear.

  “Officially, no, but I can guess.”

  I’ve known both men my entire life; I may have been gone a while, but I still know how they work, how they tick.

  Liv rubs a hand over her stomach. “Feel free to enlighten me, because I’m completely clueless. All I know is their bickering is driving me bonkers.”

  “Obviously, I don’t know for sure, but I’d guess Logan’s put out that Dean didn’t include him in the fact-finding mission to find out who betrayed the Club.”

  And me.

  I think Lo’s really put out that he wasn’t brought in on anything that involved me, and I can understand that. I would be the same. He sees it as his duty to take care of me.

  I only suspect this is the issue because of little things he’s mentioned in passing a few times now.

  “These men are crazy,” Liv mutters, but a smile plays on her lips.

  I lean my elbows on my knees and stare over at the two men in this Club that mean the world to me: my fiancé and my best friend. “That they are, but we wouldn’t have them any other way.”

  “Right,” she agrees. “Although all of this, all this mess was my doing. If they should be mad at anyone, it should be me.”

  I hold up a hand, stopping her because I’m tired of hearing this same shit from her.

  “Liv, you didn’t cause this. You didn’t make your ex do what he did, you didn’t make Tap or Dylan betray their family. They all made their own choices. You really do need to stop blaming yourself.”

  She glances down and I see the frown gracing her brow.

  “How can you say that? If I hadn’t come here, none of this would have happened.”

  I see her point, I really do, but she’s also wrong.

  “Dylan and Tap, whatever crap they were cooking up, was in the works long before all this stuff with Wilson happened. They would have used anything to get their agenda across. Honestly, I don’t know if Tap was ever loyal to us.”

  Saying that hurts because I realise how true that is. />
  “And Dylan certainly never came into the Club with any loyalty, honey.”

  Liv winces suddenly, rubbing at the side of her stomach.

  My heart stutters as I stare at her belly. “Are you okay?”

  “Oh, yeah, it’s just a twinge. My body aches and cramps in ways I never knew it could.”

  I make a mental note to talk to the other old ladies and women about a baby shower. It’s time. Maybe it’s a little early, but given how crazy things are at the moment, we need something good to take our minds off all the shit. And Liv deserves to have her baby celebrated—her and Dean both.

  “What are you two crazy bitches talking about?” Sofia’s voice draws my attention as the youngest Harlow sibling appears at my back, the other women with her.

  She slips onto the bench next to me while her sister, Mackenzie, sits next to Liv. She kisses the top of her head and hugs her before she leans across the table to squeeze my hand. Jamie, Sammy, Clara and Paige take seats on the grass around the table.

  “This party is more like a funeral,” Jamie complains tugging at the grass.

  She’s not wrong.

  “Oh, thank God it’s not just me thinking that,” Clara interjects. “I was worried I was being dramatic, but honest to fuck, I was thinking of hitting the wine.”

  Kenzie lifts her hands and signs, “Maybe we should go into town instead. I could really go for a Sex on the Beach and not have to deal with… whatever this is.”

  Sofia’s nose wrinkles. “What would you know about sex on the beach?”

  Kenzie’s expression is mischievous as she signs, “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  Jamie translates for Paige, who doesn’t know sign language yet, but we’ll teach her. She’s Wade’s old lady and that makes her one of us. And despite everything, I find myself smiling because this right here is what the Club is about. Family. And somewhere along the way, we’ve lost sight of that. Maybe we need a reminder.

  “Actually, I really wouldn’t like to know, Kenz. I get scarred enough as it is with Logan drooling all over Beth.” Sofia flicks her dark hair over her shoulder and glances in the direction of her brother and Dean. “Speaking of Lo: are they about to fight? Do I need to find Jem and Ad?”

  I twist towards them and watch as Logan throws his hands in the air. Dean just shrugs. It looks bad from a distance, but I can tell from Logan’s stance he’s not about to lose it. How his sister can’t tell that, I don’t know. Logan is one of the most in control people on the planet when it comes to his temper. Dean seems pretty calm too.

  “No, they’re fine.”

  “I hate this shit,” Sammy complains, wrapping a finger around her bubble gum pink hair. “Ghost has been like a bear with a sore head for weeks.”

  I know what she means; Logan has been the same, and from both Paige’s and Liv’s expressions, Wade and Dean have both been that way, too. I don’t blame them either. The boys grew up with Tap; the newer patches like Wade and Weed didn’t, but they still thought of him as an older uncle type figure. And there was the small incident of Tap and Dylan trying to have the brothers murder Wade. Paige let that nugget slip to us girls, not that she needed to; it was the worst kept secret. I found out from Clara, and Logan filled me in on some things, although not all of it. He kept a lot of it close to his kutte.

  I’m fairly certain Paige wasn’t supposed to say anything, but she sang like a canary at Weed’s birthday party. Us girls were sitting in the clubhouse common room after we were evicted from Lace, so Weed could have his strippers. The prospects brought us back to the clubhouse together. None of us were ready to go to bed, and none of us wanted to while our guys were still partying. We were sitting around, helping ourselves to the clubhouse bar when Paige spilt her guts about everything that happened in her flat. I think she was shaken to her core and just needed to tell someone what happened that day, what Dylan did to her and Wade. Our men might think we’re in the dark about things, but eventually we find out everything. We have a better spy network than the secret service.

  Sofia’s brow furrows. “That’s Ghost’s usual setting, isn’t it?”

  The big enforcer makes Wade look positively chipper.

  “Not with me, it’s not. This whole situation is crazy. I can’t deal with it. I need normality to resume. I need my man to be happy. I also need him to stop following me around like my bodyguard.”

  I want this too, but things are not going to calm down until Dylan is caught. Although where the hell he is, is anyone’s guess.

  “Well, be thankful you have a man to follow you around,” Mackenzie signs. “I have Jem living practically in my pocket.” Her eyes roll.

  “Ungrateful,” Jamie says. “Your brother is hot.”

  Mackenzie’s nose wrinkles as Sofia mutters, “Ew,” under her breath, but the other women all make noises of appreciation, because Jem might have a motor mouth and be seriously annoying at times, but the man is easy to look at.

  There’s only one Harlow brother I have eyes for, but if I wasn’t head-over-heels in love with Logan, I wouldn’t exactly kick Jem out of bed—as long as I could tape his mouth shut.

  “Oh my God,” Liv moans, and all eyes come to her. At the alarmed looks, she adds, “Relax, I’m fine. I just need to pee for the hundredth time.”

  “Fuck me,” Jamie mutters. “I thought we were going to deliver a baby Saxons in the picnic area.”

  Liv glares at her. “Don’t even joke about that. I want a hospital, with an epidural.”

  Mackenzie helps her up, even though Liv’s perfectly capable of standing. She’s not really that big yet, but Liv’s suffered with fairly intense morning sickness through her pregnancy so far and from what both she and Dean have said, it’s been pretty bad.

  Kenzie goes with her, Jamie and Paige moving into their seats while they’re gone.

  “We need to sort a baby shower for Liv,” I say as I watch them head into the building.

  “Oh, that’s a good idea,” Clara says. “Were you thinking of at the clubhouse?”

  “Or Lace,” Jamie chips in, gathering her short red hair off her nape before letting it go.

  That earns laughs all around.

  “Here,” I say. “I don’t think Dean will approve of us throwing a party in honour of the mother of his child in a strip club for some reason.”

  Sammy snorts. “I can’t imagine why not.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with Lace,” Paige interjects. “It’s a high-class establishment.”

  We all stare at her a beat, then burst out laughing. I helped with the redevelopment of Lace after Wade was given management of it; I picked better colours and furnishings, but high-quality might be pushing it. I’m not a miracle worker.

  “Well, it is,” Paige defends, and I can’t help but grin at her indignation.

  She’s a good fit for Wade, fiery and no nonsense. I think he needs that in a woman. From what I know of him, he needs a partner who will call him on his crap and won’t let him get away with it when he’s being an arse.

  “Sugar,” Clara says, running her fingers through the grass, “it could be the Ritz and Dean would still throw a wobbler. Liv’s his woman and she’s got his kid in her. And Lace… Lace is a strip club.”

  Paige frowns and then sighs. “Must you all disparage mine and Wade’s hard work?”

  I listen to the girls continuing to banter back and forth and realise this is what Tap and Dylan tried to destroy—this sense of family. Because as much as the boys consider themselves brothers, these women are my sisters in every way that counts. The boys might be willing to bleed and die for each other, but I would do the same for these girls. They’re family, each and every one of them, and this past few months we’ve lost sight of that. We all have.

  My eyes scan the barbecue area, taking in the backs of kuttes, the Lost Saxons emblem staring back at me, the leather and denim, the faces of men I love and adore, and I feel a lead weight in my stomach. We’re more disjointed, more separated than we’v
e ever been before and that can’t be allowed to continue. We need to remember what it means to be family again. I didn’t give up everything to come home to this.

  I push up from the bench suddenly, so abruptly Sofia sitting next to me lets out a squeak.

  “I’ll be back in a min.”

  I don’t stop to explain nor do I come back when the girls shout at me. I make a beeline for Logan. He’s still talking to Dean, but he seems calmer now. Hopefully, their issue is now sorted. As I approach, he glances in my direction and his face softens. Then his brows draw together as he sees whatever emotion is in my face.

  “Beth?”

  Dean steps back as I move between them, my fingers going into Logan’s kutte and I curl my fingers into the leather, holding on to him like rope tossed to a drowning woman.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt,” I mutter over my shoulder to Dean, “I need to borrow my man for a moment.”

  “Everything okay?” Dean looks a little bemused and I don’t blame him because I’m acting crazy right now.

  “It’s perfect. Liv’s in the bathroom. Mackenzie is with her, before you freak out.”

  “I know,” he says. “I saw her go inside.”

  I stare at him a beat, then mutter, “You’re not right in the head, do you know that?”