“Mija,” Abuela calls me from the doorway. “Can you help me a moment?”
“Sure,” I call out and quickly walk with her out to the front door with her.
Once we reach my car, I am surprised when she stops and turns to me handing me my own keys and purse. “You have something you need to do today. Inside your purse you will find a letter. Let your heart guide you and take time for you today. We will be here when you get back.” Her soft old, wrinkly, shaking hand runs across my cheek.
“Before his death, I asked him to write you a letter. You see, he came to me and he described what he was feeling. He could feel his death or end was coming. He was worried about you, not his own life, about who would take care of you. He knew he would have unfinished business to take care of. I just helped to guide him to an answer. He sat for hours thinking of every word, knowing you would need him. I think a part of him needed you too, to see his words and love.” She stalls for a moment, allowing me to feel through the bomb she just dropped on me.
“Let this bring you peace, because there was love there between you and him. You have a choice to be faced with and know that this has come full circle. The three of you, your paths were meant to be intertwined. But now, you need not to feel guilt or regret. You gave Solo your heart completely. But it’s time for you to move on and find happiness. Te amo. You have so much life to live, be brave and fearless.” She squeezes my hand and shuffles back inside leaving me alone.
Anticipation fills my head and I start to panic at what she could have possibly be sending me to do. Getting into my car, I take in the view and relax. I feel brave enough to do what she asked me to and start the engine. I think about it all and drive around for an hour. The pain ever-present but not crippling. I let my gut lead me and I find myself at the place that Solo proposed to me at.
I haven’t wanted to come here in over a year. This is the exact spot where we promised each other forever. Before I get out of the car, I take the white envelope out and pop the door open. I rest my body on the hood and look out over the valley and remember the night Solo and I made love to each other here.
I blink and the sting of guilt in me is pushing forward to be released. This time, I accept the agony because it is time to be freed. I sit in the dirt, alone with the letter in my hands, and I wait a moment because I need to feel him. My heart will always call to him, always be a part of him. Taking a deep breath, I pull out the letter and I read the words. My heart pounds violently against my chest. The whole time! She had this with her this entire year and never gave it to me? I’m grateful, but at the same time it’s unbelievable.
Tami,
Hey blondie. I can’t describe what I have been feeling these last six months. It’s been the most confusing in my life I have ever felt. I want you to know that I have loved every second we have spent together. Every single second. I could live off your love the rest of my life and be completely happy.
The day at the hospital I saw you and Pawn together in the bathroom. Your love with Pawn is different from ours. I couldn’t understand it at first. But then I did. While we feel love for each other, you and Pawn matched. The same earth-shattering passion we didn’t have.
I don’t know what will happen tomorrow, but I felt that you and I had limited time. If in the event, for whatever reason, I am not here with you tomorrow, I fucking love you. I want what is best for you and live out your dreams. If that is with Pawn, then that is what is meant for you.
We gave each other everything we could and now you need to give that to Pawn, but more. Do not let a day pass by thinking that you don’t mean the world to me. Don’t you dare think that I didn’t love you. If you’re reading this, I am not here any longer. Go to Pawn and don’t be afraid. Don’t hold back. Once he realizes your love like I did, there isn’t a thing on this earth that will stop him. He won’t leave your side but will love you and share a life we dreamed of. Live that love for me. I’ll be watching over you.
Always & Forever,
Solo
It takes me several passes to get through the letter. Through all the tears and blubbering, I cry out for him. It’s hysterical. He’s right, the guilt and the wondering that I have lived with has consumed me. I did, I did love him. Why was he only meant to love me for a short time? Only to die and leave me with this hollow dark pit. He’s not here to help me through this, but he is. Solo made plans to support me.
My chest heaves with agony and my heart bleeds for him. “I fucking love you too, Solo, for always and forever.” I clutch the letter to my chest. “I hate that you left me here. We would have been happy together.” I plead with him to take his words back to heaven with him.
Slowly, my breathes even out and my hand loosens its death grip around the paper. I’m fighting against what I have to do and what I want. Right now, it doesn’t make sense. My head and heart are at war against each other, but I have his words to get me through the next part; moving on.
When the nightfall comes down, and the darkness covers the world, I decided I need to go back and face the truths I wish I could leave buried.
Chapter 19
Tami
Those first few steps back into the clubhouse are the hardest. It’s as if this place holds all our truths and secrets. Walking in is an agreement to your family and yourself to pick yourself up from the ground and fight. But I won’t let Solo down. Tomorrow, I’ll read his words and maybe one day I will understand them better. I find Kat at the bar and slide into the stool next to her signaling for a drink.
“Cash okay while I was gone?” I let out a long sigh. Worry is always chasing me. It’s not just me anymore. Everything I do also has a ripple effect for him.
Kat pats my back, “Of course, Abuela has been with him this whole time and Emilia. They are laying down in the spare room.” She always knows when to press me for answers. Right now, the support with the quiet is exactly what I need.
Instinctively, I look around and I notice that Pawn was missing from the clubhouse and I do wonder where he’s been all day. But I don’t have to wonder long when he stumbles in through the door with Topaz, the in-house stripper for these guys who makes house calls.
Tank chokes on his beer and his fist clenches when he catches who Pawn brought in with him. It’s obvious to everyone where he spent his day, high and getting laid by strippers. I knew today would be a messed-up day for him, but the rage that builds in my gut is pure hate. Thank God, Cash went with Emilia and the other kids to lay down in the spare room. Not only do I want to protect him from Pawn, but also me. My temper is lit. I’m so fucking pissed off, I could kill him. He has a son he could spend his time with. Cash could be his everything.
I glance at Kat next to me to see if she picked up on who walked in. Her eyes zero in on Topaz and then she turns to me. I hold up my beer signaling that I’m okay, but cheers, this could get entertaining. She quirks an eyebrow and smirks. Earlier, I told her what happened between us last night. She wasn’t happy about what happened, but she understood. Kat gets up from her seat to stand by my side. Tank’s eyes light up and he sits back watching the scene unfold.
We all know shit is about to go down, the air is suffocating all of us with the tension. Pawn is loud, greeting and shaking hands with all the brothers before he gets to me. I take a long drink of my cool beer and turn in my seat to face the other way, ignoring that he’s quickly approaching me. Fuck him.
The stool is whipped around and I come face-to-face with an angry biker. My beer is spilt over my arm and the counter and I slam my glass down to meet his bloodshot eyes that are glaring into mine. He snarls, his liquor-soaked breath in my face, “What are you doing here?”
“Get away from me, Pawn,” I growl back, the warning tone clear.
“Here to snag another brother since you buried one already? Too chicken shit to be alone, Tami?” snarling his disgust for me.
“I only loved two men in my life.” My voice raises, and I growl back, “one is dead and the other one is about to di
e if you keep running your mouth.” I shove my body past his and away from the bar. I don’t get far before I am spun around like a rag doll and my chest is squeezed up against his.
I’ve lost all sense of where I am and try to shove him away from me and shout back, “Does it make you feel better that you fucked someone else, Pawn? Does that stripper fulfill that empty void you feed with alcohol and weed?”
Topaz holds her hands up and starts to backtrack slowly toward the way she came in with Pawn. “I was just dropping him off.”
He grips my cheeks and pulls my attention back to him and growls, “Not even a little fucking bit since I wasn’t fucking you.”
I think this is the moment I full on snap. They say you have a limit and I never understood that until today. That girl I was before all this is gone. Here stands a woman that is broken and tired.
My nails sink into his arms and I shout into his face, “Maybe I would love a dirty fuck. God fucking knows you could never get the job done.”
The men snicker and Pawn’s evil face scans the room before coming back to mine. But I’m not done, not by a long shot.
“How could you just leave us?” My voice drops. “Never have you asked if Cash is okay, never asked if I am okay. You made your bed, Pawn. I tried to be there every step of the way, but no, you take care of you, just like you did before.” I grip his cut and pull until our noses are mere centimeters apart, “I won’t take Cash away from you, because he needs you. Don’t think I’ll be your bitch ever again, you have enough of those, baby.”
Pawn loses it and laughs in my face, “He’s not yours, Tami, he’s mine. You have him because I let you have him.” The smug look on his face begs me to slap the shit out of him. I let go and I step back and swing my hand for his cheek. The burn is intense. But nothing compared to the storm brewing in my body.
Pawn’s face whips to the side from the blow, and slowly he brings it back to face me. Murder shines in his gaze when he sizes me up.
“Fuck you, Pawn, he is mine! I’ll bury your ass if say those words to me again. Don’t forget which one of us was off getting high and laid,” I yell at the ungrateful bastard. “I may not have birthed him, but he was born into this MC because you were gone. We took care of him because we loved you. He was gifted to me with trust.” I thump my chest and then point a finger at his face, “I did my best to keep you included with the letters and pictures you sure as hell never gave a fuck about. Don’t think for a second that your words can push me away like they did before. Watch yourself, I’m not that young woman you left in the dust. You hurt your son and you will answer to me, got it?”
I shove him away from me, the adrenaline giving me the strength to do it and I take off down the hallway. I try to slow down, but it’s near impossible. Emilia tries to stop me, but I have my baby and his bag in my arms within seconds and we are out the door of the room. With a sleeping Cash, I silently storm back down the hallway and flip Pawn off on my way out with my son.
Pawn
You know in life when you have gone too far? Well, today is my day. I heard it loud and clear. Tami, I never read her letters, not one. It’s hurt her and I have destroyed us today with my anger. But, I also see it coming, or rather the big pissed to hell and back biker. Tank pushes himself up from the couch and slowly approaches me. Coming for his prey. Clapping his hands, he snarls, “The Oscar for the biggest dick of them all goes to you today. You ungrateful bastard.” He stops just right in front of me. I cringe when I see it, his fist headed for my nose, but there is no stopping it. Blood sprays on impact. “You little fucking disrespectful puke. You want to pick a fight with my lil’ T? Come at me bro, fight a man.”
Something in me needs to feel the release or maybe I am just that suicidal. I ball up my hand into a tight fist and swing for his face. He easily dodges them and bounces around, taunting me, and slaps me in the face, “You like being a little bitch, I’ll slap you like one.” His hand comes from the left and slaps me hard, the sting igniting the fuel that’s been burning for years.
“Fuck you, Tank,” I roar and charge him. Wrapping my arms around his waist, I take us both down to the floor. Tank makes an oomph sound when my weight lands on top of him, but he quickly gets up on top of me.
He knees my stomach. “Keep acting like a victim and your old man has won.” Tank grabs my shirt, lifting my head off the floor, and punches me in face. Lights out.
Ice cold. I heave, fighting for air, coming to. Freezing water drips down from my hair and I sit up from the floor to find all the brothers glaring down at me. Tank holds an empty bucket in his hand.
I wince when I touch my face to wipe the water away. Blade holds out his hand and pulls me up from the floor and I sway a bit before I drop onto the couch. The look on all their faces is enough to sober me up.
“Everyone but the brothers need to get out.” Blade’s voice thunders and can be heard clearly by the entire room. The women are seething and walk past me with disgust.
“We’ll settle our shit later,” Kat threatens and leaves out of sight.
“I don’t ever want to hear you ever say again that Cash is not Tami’s. Or hear you say that shit to her ever again. There is some shit I can tolerate, and that is not it. We are better than that to put the women down that support this club and you.” Blade takes a moment and stands with his hands on his hips.
“If you need to patch over to another club, let me know. I won’t have you destroy what we have here or Tami. She belongs to all of us. And Solo, he was our brother. To say I’m disgusted with your actions doesn’t cover jack. Do something like this again, I will cut your patches off myself.” The Prez stands firm and waits for me to acknowledge his words.
Pushing past the remorse and the pain, I stand from the couch and regretfully apologize, “Aye, Prez, I hear you. It will never happen again.” My skin crawls with the guilt behind my actions and with each word said. I took out my hate for myself on Tami. Why? Because she is the person I care for the most, besides my son. She made me realize what a fuck up I can be, especially today.
One by one, they each file out of the bar area. I’m left alone with the smell of my own fuckup and it smells pretty fucking bad.
Chapter 20
Pawn
“Hey, fuck face,” Jenn gloats from the other side of the parking lot. “Looks like you finally hit rock bottom. What are you doing about it?”
“What the fuck are you talking about, Jenn?” Slowly, I set my bike on its kickstand. I parked around the back of the tattoo shop in hopes of avoiding people. No such luck here.
“Well, those bruises and a broken nose look pretty bad, so I called you a fuck face. And by what I saw, you deserved it.” She taunts and smirks at me and pushes her sunglasses on top of her head.
A few strides and I stand in front of Jenn after getting off my bike my shoulders raising to my ears, “And what is your point?”
“You’ve been abused your whole life, Pawn.” The cheeky face she once had drops and a forlorn one replaces it. “You only know how to hide or feel angry to show emotion because others make you weak in your eyes. So, you tore Tami apart and pushed her away along with your brothers. Pretty soon, you won’t have them anymore either.”
Jenn is right about one thing; I hate showing any weakness, it has become my control. If others can’t see it, they can’t hurt me. And fuck if it doesn’t stem back to my old man and being locked up in jail or juvey. I’ve used my fists for years to get past the pain and smoked away the emotions.
My body shifts from one foot to the other not knowing what action to take. If she were a man, I would fight. Why do I stand here? I guess that is because I need help. I feel it deep in my gut if I don’t start today, I may as well pack my shit and leave like Blade threatened yesterday.
Jenn watches me and patiently waits for me to come to terms with her words. I think of Tami, Cash, mom, and my brothers. Can I be different and what does that mean or look like? I nudge my chin at her and cross my arms over my ch
est to brace myself for the impact of what comes next.
“You need to know you are loved, Pawn. Most importantly, you need to love and forgive yourself. Possibly others too or find a way to move past them. Deal with your past, find love, make yourself better, and then learn to love others.” Jenn’s soft face is alarming, usually she’s wrapped up tight and unreadable.
“What do you mean find love? My mom cared for me, I know she did,” my voice raises. “Fuck my dad. That asshole can eat a bullet for all I care. Solo was my brother. He was my best friend…” I choke on the end, unable to finish. Tami picked Solo and not me.
“You’re fucking pissed at your mom for not leaving your dad and not protecting you. She chose your dad over you.”
“Who said that?” I scream into her face and pound my chest, “I know she loves me.”
Calmly, Jenn looks me square in the eyes. “Ask yourself why you’re so pissed I said that. Why Pawn? Don’t bury this shit. Work through the dark and ugly. Grab that shit with both hands and for once admit the truth, to yourself, for you.”
My chests heaves with each breath, instinctively I want to fight, but it’s not Jenn I should be fighting. I gasp and swallow my pain like a razor blade sliding down my throat. “The kid in me wished and begged for my mom to leave and she never would. She was weak and I don’t want to be her.”
“But you are.”
My head snaps back in disbelief. “Explain that one to me.” The sarcasm drips off every single word.
“Gladly. You are like your mother more than your father. She cares too much that it has crippled her choices. You learned more from her than you ever did him. Deep down, you are more upset at her than you are your father. She is the one that betrayed you. Hating your father is easier because you don’t care for him.”
Loving You Forever (Battle Born MC Book 7) Page 10
