I turn around and face him, knowing that this is as close to an apology as I’ll ever get from him. These men. None of them know how to apologize. It’s as if they teach classes to each other on how to avoid the words, I’m sorry, for their entire lives.
“I do love him,” I say softly.
“Yeah, gathered that,” he shrugs.
“I knew you wouldn’t like it. That’s why I’ve been keeping it from you. But Bates, he treats me better than any other man I’ve known, aside from you,” I admit with a small smile.
“Yeah?”
I respond with a nod, keeping my eyes connected with his.
“I’m his, and he’s mine,” I whisper.
“It might take me a while to accept it, to be cool with it. I only want you happy, Mary-Anne. If that’s him, then fuck it. I won’t say nothin’ else.”
I set down my coffee and run into my big brother’s arms. He envelops me in a hug and holds me close to him, blowing out a breath against the top of my head.
“Thank you,” I whisper against his neck. His beard tickles, but I don’t care.
“Now you comin’ to the house to see your nieces, or what?” he asks with a chuckle.
I nod and follow him out of the kitchen. When I see Brentlee wiping away a stray tear, I know that she was listening to every word we said. I can’t help but grin over at her. She smiles back and I hear Bates grunt.
“Women.”
“You’re surrounded by them,” I say with a smile.
“And as much as you all are a pain in my ass, I wouldn’t want it any other way,” he says, wrapping his arm around my neck and squeezing gently.
Together, we all walk to their SUV, where I find my two sweet nieces. One by marriage, and one by blood, but both my family. I love both equally.
They squeal with delight when they see me, and Stella, the oldest, starts to tell me all about her new Barbie jeep that her daddy Bates bought her.
I listen intently to every single word she says while Jelena wraps her sweet hand around mine and holds onto me the entire car ride back to Bates and Brent’s home in the country.
MADDOG
I pull up to the shitty house and turn my bike engine off. West and my other men look around, surely curious as to why we’re here. They’ll find out soon enough.
I have a promise to keep.
A promise that Mary-Anne probably forgot about, but a promise nonetheless. I stand, swinging my leg off of my bike before I start to walk toward the shitty little house. I reach around my back and pull my piece out, nodding to my men who follow suit.
Grisha Lukin is a mean, drunk sonofabitch, and I don’t put a damn thing past him. I don’t bother knocking on the door, kicking it open with one push of my boot. Piece of shit front door.
“The fuck?” Grisha slurs as he tries to stand from his spot on the sofa.
I look at the couch and see that there’s a permanent dip in the cushion from his ass. He’s big, like Bates. Strong as fuck back in his day, but now he’s older, slower, and drunker than he probably ever has been in his life. His eyes try to adjust, and I grin when they do. He’s discovered that my gun is up and aimed right at his chest.
“MadDog Duhart,” I grunt.
He looks at me with confusion.
“You like hitting women and children, I hear.”
He doesn’t wince at my words, doesn’t even blink, his eyes staring right into mine. Cold, blue, dead fucking eyes.
One of my men comes from the back bedroom with a woman in front of him. She’s thin, curvy, and by the looks of her, was a hot piece of ass back in the day.
However, now, she’s a fucking wreck. Her face is bruised and scarred, and she looks exhausted. Her hair is greying at the roots, her dress ill fitting, and her body more emaciated than naturally lithe, like her daughter’s.
“Never hurt nothing that didn’t belong to me,” he spits with a heavy Russian accent.
“Tie his worthless ass up,” I bark at West.
It takes West and my other man to wrestle the drunk fuck to a chair and tie him up with some rope.
The wife screams, but when I glare at her, she has the good mind to shut her fucking trap.
“You’re just as worthless,” I spit as West ties a rag between Grisha’s lips so he can’t talk.
“Why, why are you doing this?’ she sobs.
“You let your children get beat by this fucker,” I grunt.
“I couldn’t leave,” she blubbers. “They turned out fine,” she tries to convince me. Or maybe she’s trying to convince herself. I’m not quite sure.
“You’re right; they did turn out fine, eventually,” I grunt.
“You know them. You’ve seen my Mary-Anne?” she asks with wide eyes.
“I’m Mary’s man,” I grin. Her eyes go wide and her jaw slacks.
“Impossible. My Mary-Anne isn’t even thirty,” she snaps.
Immediately after, she winces, obviously afraid that her outburst will earn her the back of my hand.
Gisha moves around in his chair and shouts something from beneath his rag. I lift my chin to West who removes his rag.
“You sick fuck. You touch my daughter, you pervert,” he yells. I burst out laughing.
I can’t help myself. It’s the funniest shit on earth. The fact that this worthless fuck is trying to judge me and parent at the same time, all the while, he abused and tormented his entire family for years—it’s fucking hilarious.
I put my gun down, ready to be done with this fucking piece of shit. I have a woman to get back to, and my grandkids to spend time with. What I don’t want is to ever see this scum breathing free air again.
Walking into the kitchen, I grab a butcher knife from the block on the countertop and then walk back into the living area.
“I might be a sick fuck,” I whisper leaning down close to his face. “But your daughter’s cunt feels like goddamn heaven around my cock. And I’ll be fucking her later, and filling her with my cum, and knocking her up,” I grin.
“You son of a—.”
The bastard doesn’t get to finish his thoughts, because I take the knife and slam it down on his wrist before I start to saw through his bones. There’s crackling and screaming filling the room, and all I can do is smile.
Before he passes out, I grab his hair with my hand and hold his lolling head up, right as I finish cutting off one of his hands.
“You hit my woman with your hands. Now you have no hands. Funny how that works,” I chuckle.
Then I slide the blade through his neck. The blood that wasn’t flowing out of his arm now sprays all over me. I turn to the wife, who is staring at me in shock, her body shaking against the man that holds her. She’s just as guilty as her old man. She may not have hit my Mary, but she allowed it to happen, repeatedly.
I give her mercy by only slitting her throat before I step back, picking up my phone and placing a call.
“Pops,” Fury says as his answer.
“Need a clean-up crew,” I announce. Fury curses and asks me where. “That’s the Lukin’s house,” he mumbles.
“Yeah, I know,” I grunt.
“What’d you do, Pops?” he asks.
“Taking care of my woman,” I grunt before I walk away.
My men follow behind, except for West, who I’ve instructed to wait for Fury’s men.
Fury assures me that a crew will be at the house as soon as possible. I don’t care. The only thing I care about right now is seeing Mary-Anne.
The clubhouse is empty when I arrive, save for a few whores who look at me with panicked fear in their eyes. I make my way toward the bathrooms, not bothering to check if Mary is in the room we’re staying. One look in the mirror, and I know why those bitches looked at me in horror.
I’m covered in blood, including my entire face. The only parts that are not stained with deep red are the whites of my eyes and my teeth.
I strip my clothes quickly and jump in the shower, washing the red stain off of my body complete
ly before I turn the shower off and wrap a towel around my waist.
Walking across the hall to the bedroom, I open it, halfway thinking that Mary is gone, but she’s there—dressed in a pretty dress, her back to me, bare except for a few strings, while the skirt of the dress skims the floor. I close the door behind me, making sure to lock it before I walk up behind her.
“Who’d you kill?” she asks, still not turning around.
I wrap my arms around her waist, pulling her bare back into my chest before I rest my chin on the top of her head.
“Doesn’t matter,” I murmur.
“It was my parents?” she asks, her voice void of emotion.
“Do you want me to answer that honestly?”
“Yes. I think I should know,” she whispers, her eyes still facing forward on the parking lot, where I walked toward the front door, covered in her parent’s blood.
“It was,” I admit.
“Why both? My mother never hurt me,” she says.
“She allowed you to stay in that environment. She allowed that monster to touch you, to hurt you.”
Mary-Anne doesn’t say anything. The silence of the room is deafening, but I don’t move, I don’t speak—I wait. Then she turns around in my arms, placing her hands on my chest and tipping her head back to look up at me.
“I’m sorry I let other people’s opinions cast doubt in my head about us, about you. I love you, Maxfield. I don’t think we’re wrong. I think we’re two lost people who have finally found what we’ve been looking for. For me, a man who will treat me well and take care of me. For you, a woman who can accept you for who you are—accept your life and the way you live it, but also be strong enough to stand up to you. But most importantly, I think we were both looking for love.”
I lower my chin and I take her in a deep, hard, rough kiss. My woman—mine.
Mary’s back bows as she presses herself closer to me, allowing me to deepen the kiss, and I know that she’s given herself to me.
All of her is now—mine.
“Make love to me, Maxfield,” she whispers. Again, my name on her lips goes straight to my cock.
I probably shouldn’t touch her. I’ve just killed her parents, and I’m sure fucking her is the last thing I should do.
However, with those big blue eyes looking up at me, begging, pleading for me, there’s only one thing to do. I make love to her, my Old Lady, my woman, the soon-to-be mother of my children.
Fuck.
I love this damn girl.
Chapter Twenty-Two
MARY-ANNE
We don’t speak of my parents again; but the moment my eyes meet Fury’s, I know that he knows. They soften on me and he looks at me with what I can only assume is—pity. I hate it. I shake my head and give him a bright smile instead of anything close to sad, because I’m not sad.
Not in the slightest.
I probably should be, and maybe one day I’ll regret not saying goodbye to them. Maybe. But I doubt it.
My father was an awful man.
Terrible, actually.
My mother was his punching bag, and she took his abuse, but she also stood back as he turned his abuse onto his children.
I can’t imagine what it’s like to be a mother yet, but I can only guess how it would feel to see anybody harm your child.
Just imagining somebody hurting my nieces make me maniacal—so mothers, they probably feel that times a million, and yet mine did nothing when my father was beating the shit out of me or my brother.
“I’m good,” I whisper to Fury who nods once and then shifts his focus onto his three-year-old, Danger.
“Poppy,” he squeals, running and jumping into Max’s arms.
Max catches him with a grunt and I can’t help but laugh at the exchange.
“Need a beer Pops? Mary-Anne?” Fury asks.
“Yeah,” Max grunts.
“I’ll have a water. But you guys stay here, let me get it,” I offer, running my fingers across Max’s lower back before I walk toward the kitchen.
“Oh, you’re here,” Kentlee smiles and envelops me in a hug.
“Not yet. I have to get beers for the men,” I grin.
Kentlee rolls her eyes as she walks over to the fridge and opens it, handing me two bottles.
I make my way back into the living room and hand bottles to the two men, who are now sitting down. Max is on the sofa, and Fury is in a chair with his feet up on an ottoman.
Danger is still in Max’s arms, whispering something to him, while Ellie sits curled into his side, and Bear sits cross-legged on the floor, looking up at him. They’re completely enamored by Max, and it’s absolutely breathtaking.
It takes everything inside of me to tear my eyes away from the sight, but I do. I need to get to the kitchen and make sure Kentlee doesn’t need any help. Once I find my way back, I find her staring down at a salad, and she’s crying.
“Kent?” I ask.
“We’re a family, and I’m crying, and I don’t know why. No, that’s a lie. I know why,” she says between sobs.
“Why?” I ask in confusion.
“My husband won’t stop screwing me. Watch out girl. The Duhart men, they’re fertile, and they don’t stop. Even when you say no more kids, they just throw another one in you,” she says, tears running down her cheeks.
“You’re pregnant again?” I ask in surprise.
“Yes, the bastard; and he’s so excited that I can’t even be mad,” she says before she stomps her foot.
“Congratulations, I think?” I say with a smile.
“I’m happy. I mean, I am so tired of being pregnant, but I’m also so happy,” she whispers with a shaky smile.
I walk over to her and I wrap my arms around her in a hug. She looks like she could use one, and I know I’m right when her arms wrap around me and hold me back tightly.
“This is the most fucked up crazy family. But you know what?” she asks lifting her head. I look at her and wait for her to continue. “I wouldn’t want it any other way. Seriously. We’re fucked up, but we’re fun and happy, and every day is just so—awesome,” she whispers.
The rest of the evening is spent laughing with family and eating good food. After the kids go to bed, neither Kentlee or Fury blink when Max pulls me down onto his lap and wraps his arms around me. In fact, Fury did much of the same with Kent.
I know that it will take some time before we can be this comfortable around Bates, but for now, I’m happy with what we have.
Kentlee, Fury, and Brentlee are accepting of my relationship with Max, and Bates is tolerating it, which is all I can ask for from my older brother.
Max and I leave around midnight and head back to the clubhouse. We’re going to stay in town one more day, and then we have to take the new clubwhore we traded with us back to Cali.
I’m not ready to leave. I want to spend more time with my family, but I know that Max wants the trade over with so we don’t have to deal with them anymore.
“We’ll come back in a couple weeks, how’s that sound?” he asks as we walk into the room we’re staying in, as if he can read my mind.
“Really?”
“Yeah. Three days in town isn’t long enough for us to spend with our family, sweetness,” he murmurs, which means that he misses his grandchildren, too.
I nod with a smile on my lips before I kiss him and then start to strip down for bed. There’s no use in wearing pajama’s anymore; Max always takes them off of me, either in the middle of the night or first thing in the morning, so for now, I give up.
I crawl beneath the sheets as he does the same on the other side, completely naked as well, and wraps his arms around me, pulling my back into his chest.
“Get some sleep tonight, sweetness,” he murmurs.
“Okay, Maxfield,” I yawn.
“Love you,” he grunts in my ear.
“I love you, so much,” I sigh.
“I’m not sorry I killed your parents, but I’m sorry they’re dead, sweetness,” he mur
murs as his thumb rubs the bottom of my breast gently.
“Me too. I feel the same way. Does that make me a bad daughter?” I ask, a question that’s been bothering me this evening.
“You couldn’t be if you tried. But they weren’t real parents, sweetness. Not even close.”
“You’re right,” I murmur into the dark room.
Max doesn’t stop stroking my breast, and I fall asleep, wrapped in his arms; but more importantly, wrapped in his love.
MADDOG
I walk into church, and the air is charged. I know that Sniper is already here. The club knows that we had heated words, and like the gossips they are, they’re waiting for a showdown. Well, tough shit. They ain’t gonna get it.
I’m done.
He was cool to Mary and even spent the day with her yesterday. As long as he’s good to her, treats her with respect and love, I could give a flying fuck how he feels about me.
My eyes catch Sniper’s and he lifts his chin in a greeting. There’s no hate anywhere in his eyes, and I know that we’re cool. Or, as cool as we can be, seeing as I’m fucking his little sister.
I make my way over to my son’s side and sit down where his VP, Drifter, would normally sit. Then he calls the meeting to order.
I tell the club the update with the Russian’s. How we’ve started moving product from Frisco to Denver, and what to expect from now on, including the dues cuts for being lookouts.
“Any news on The Cartel since the shitstorm with Blow?” I ask.
Not too long ago, Dirty Johnny’s woman was held for ransom by Blow, who used to be a president in Canada. He had been stripped of his title and banned from the club for being a fucking idiot.
He was working with The Cartel, and though he died, his men ratted out the plan before Fury killed them—their plan being to cut off the Russian’s supply and then kidnap our women and children for sex slaves.
Yeah—fuck that. Nobody touches our Old Ladies, and nobody even thinks about touching our kids. But, fucking hell, The Cartel is still underground, and we’re all just sitting around waiting for them to strike.
There’s a tapping on the desk, and I look over to see Torch rapping his finger nervously. He looks up at me, and we lock eyes. What I see is a mixture of worry and anticipation before they completely shut down and I see nothingness.
Notorious Devils MC Complete Collection: BoxSet Page 102
