by Evie Monroe
She hung her head, almost like she knew I was lying to protect her, and tears slipped from her cheeks, landing on the boards at her feet. “Was he alone? Did you talk to him before—before—” She stopped and let out a loud sob.
“Like I said, none of us had time. He was gone too quick.”
I wanted to wrap an arm around her, but she fisted her hands, tilted her head to the sky and suddenly let out a loud, piercing scream. It was the worst sound I’d ever heard. Then she sank to her knees, covered her face with her hands, and started to bawl.
I put a hand on her shoulder, but she shook me away.
After sobbing for a while, which was pure hell in itself, she sniffled, and wiped at her eyes. “I always imagined something like this would happen. Especially when he started hanging out with the wrong crowd. That’s why I was so protective of him. I guess I always knew he was going to leave me. And I didn’t want him to go. He’s all I have. And now he’s gone.”
She sounded like a little child. She took a deep breath and looked over at me. “I always thought it’d be a police officer, knocking on my door at three in the morning. Not you.” She blew out the air and shook her head. “Not that it matters. Not that anything matters. I did everything in my power to keep this from happening, and it wasn’t enough. What a waste.”
I shook my head. “No. It wasn’t a waste. He knew you loved him, Charlie. He had a lot more than all of us guys have. You really loved him.”
“But it’s not enough. It wasn’t enough to keep him alive.”
Overhead, a seagull cried, and she hugged herself tighter. “I need to go,” she said after a minute, jumping to her feet, turning her back on the ocean.
Did she want to go home? I couldn’t imagine what an ordeal that would be, going back to the apartment she shared with her brother, seeing his room, his things, all traces of his life. How would she handle that? “Where?”
She let out a sad laugh. “Where else? I don’t have many choices, Hart. If I did, this wouldn’t have happened. If I did, he never would’ve gotten involved with people like you to begin with.”
People like me? So, I was no better than the people who’d ended his life.
Yeah, she was right. I’d fucking lied to her. Betrayed her.
And she wanted me out of her life.
She turned away and mumbled, “Besides, I need to feed my pets.”
In all of this, she still remembered her pets. I didn’t understand, but then again, I’d never lost anyone that close to me. I searched my mind for the right thing to say but came up blank. I wished she’d just let me hold her, but her posture, arms crossed over her chest, screamed Stay the fuck away.
Finally, something came to me. “I can go feed your pets. Why don’t you let me take you to my place? You can rest.”
“No,” she said definitively, as if I’d just offered to take her to hell. “You’ve done enough. I can just get an Uber.”
“You think that’s a good idea? You shouldn’t be alone.”
She stiffened, deliberately avoiding my eyes. “I am alone.”
“You don’t have to be.”
“No. Hart. I don’t . . . I can’t . . .” She shook her head and started to walk away.
I understood. I’d destroyed her trust, taken everything that meant something to her away.
She’d rather be alone than with me. Than with an asshole from a club, just like the clubs who’d taken her precious brother away.
I watched her walk all the way toward the road, her nose buried in her phone, ordering an Uber that would take her away from me.
And I had a feeling it would be for good.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Charlotte
On my last day of work at the Aveline Bay Veterinary Hospital, my co-workers threw me the party to end all parties. They had balloons and cupcakes and enough fanfare that one would think it was a kid’s first birthday party, and the funny thing was, I walked into the cafeteria on my last day of work, having absolutely no clue that any of it was going to happen.
“SURPRISE!” they all shouted as I went inside.
I just stared. I was leaving. Moving on. I wasn’t getting married or having a birthday or anything that required a celebration. In fact, I’d been so sad about it, because I really loved the job. But I needed to make a change, and it was the right time.
“We’re going to miss you so much,” Barb said to me, hugging me. She gave me a little envelope, and when I opened it, my jaw dropped.
It was a check for a thousand dollars. “What is this for?”
“We know things haven’t been easy for you in the past few weeks,” she said, squeezing my shoulders. “And we understand why you have to leave. But we wish you all the best. And we want you to have a good start.”
I needed the money. Joel’s funeral had put me in debt. It had also been a wake-up call. After the service, I’d gone home, looked around the apartment we’d shared, and decided that I couldn’t be there without him. Immediately, I started to make plans to leave. I found a job at a veterinary hospital just a town over, and it paid even better than my current job. Then I located a little one-bedroom apartment, in a high-rise overlooking the beach. It was almost insane, how easily the pieces fell into place. I only wished Joel could’ve been there to see it happen.
When I left the Cobra’s clubhouse that day, I realized what a lesson in insanity it was, going back to our apartment. Every little piece of it reminded me of him. I had a hundred pictures of him and me on the walls, our entire sordid, fucked up life together He’d left his clothes strewn all over the apartment, and they smelled like him. His whiskers from shaving—the ones I’d always told him to clean up, for fuck’s sake—still littered the sink.
I staggered through the place, feeling like I was going to throw up, and then I went to my bedroom and buried myself in the closet, where I couldn’t see or hear or smell him. I stayed there all day, until I got a call that night.
From the police.
“We’ve located a body that we believe is your brother,” an officer said. “Can you please come and identify him for us?”
So I did. I had to. I was the only one who could. It was the worst, most awful thing I’d ever had to do. When I looked down on the stretcher and saw what they’d done to him, I sobbed and fell on his body and told him I was sorry for not being a better big sister.
After that, I missed him every goddamn minute of every day. I broke down nearly every ten seconds. The first few days, I stayed in bed all day, wishing I could curl up and die.
Then, I did what I’m best at. I got out of bed, sucked it up, and started taking care of business, planning his funeral.
The funeral was a good thing. The first step to healing. I’d always thought it was just him and me, against the world, but countless people showed up at the funeral to pay their last respects. His friends. His teachers from school. My co-workers. Our neighbors. The service was actually crowded.
And at the funeral, far back by the road, because I didn’t think they wanted me to see—a line of men with Cobras on their kuttes, standing in front of their bikes, heads bent respectfully.
They’d left right as the funeral ended, while I fielded hugs and kisses of sympathy. I didn’t have a chance to see if Hart was among them. But I imagined he was. He’d probably organized the whole thing.
Hart had been checking on me, in the weeks since. No, he never talked to me, because I never answered his calls, but sometimes I’d hear a motorcycle outside, and when I rushed to the window, I’d see him driving by.
After the funeral, I drove back to the apartment, and it was like I could almost hear Jojo spurring me on. Get out of here, sis. You know you want to. Just do it.
So maybe it wasn’t Santa Cruz, but it was somewhere where I could shake off the dust. Start a whole new life. And I knew Jojo would be smiling down at me while I did it.
But as I was celebrating the end of this chapter, something very unexpected happened.
I
n the midst of all the well wishing, I started to get a little hot in that little cafeteria. Stuffy. I had trouble breathing and asked people if they were hot. They all said no, but Barb sent someone to turn down the thermostat. Then, they brought out a cupcake cake, a chocolate one from the bakery down the street that made the best desserts. I took one sniff of it, and it hung heavy in my nostrils, like something rotten.
I knew I was going to be sick.
As calmly as I could, I excused myself, went to the rest room, and threw up. I spent the next few minutes, dry heaving over the toilet, then wiped my mouth with toilet paper. After I flushed the toilet, I cupped water from the faucet in my hand and sucked it down. I looked at my sweaty brow and pale complexion in the mirror. The girl that stared back at me was terrified of what this might mean.
I looked up at the ceiling and sighed. Jojo, if this is your idea of a practical joke, it’s not funny.
I managed to make it through the rest of the party, nibbling on chips instead of cupcakes, and sipping lots of water, which seemed to settle my stomach. The second my shift ended, I kissed everyone goodbye again and high-tailed it to the nearest CVS.
When I got home, I walked around the maze of disarray that was my half-packed apartment. The animals were having fun with the new décor, and Opie curled up to nap in one of the cardboard boxes. I took a second to pet them, then went into the bathroom, read the instructions on the box, and peed on the wand.
Two minutes later, I had my answer.
I was pregnant.
I walked out of the bathroom, stunned, and collapsed on the sofa. “Not funny, Jojo,” I said aloud, as Bert jumped onto my lap. I started to stroke his fur. “Not funny at all!”
All right, so this threw a big wrench in my plans. But that was okay. I was a survivor. I’d make it work. I lifted my phone out of my purse and noticed I had a missed call. From Hart, again. For at least the tenth time.
You know you should call him. He needs to know this. Jojo’s voice, again. And he was right. I couldn’t keep something this big from Hart. He deserved to know.
So I picked up the phone and punched in a call to him. He answered even before it had started to ring. “Charlie?”
My heart twisted. Once upon a time, I may have hated that nickname, but not anymore. His voice struck a chord deep inside me. “Hi, Hart.” I took a deep breath. “What are you up to?”
He paused before saying, “I’m at the garage. How are you doing?”
“Okay. I’m all right,” I said, as Ernie came by and crawled onto my lap. I gnawed on my lip. “I was wondering . . . can I come over there? I want to talk to you.”
Even though he’d been trying to get in touch with me, my heart still hammered in my throat. I’d been ignoring him for a long time, trying to heal. Well, more than a few times I’d gotten the urge to call him, but I’d always suppressed it, reminding myself that associating with people like Hart had gotten Jojo in trouble, ended his life.
As I sat there, waiting for his response, I told myself it would be fine if he didn’t want to talk. I’d be better off. I’d survive, even as a single mom, in a strange place, on my own. I always had.
Deep down, I didn’t believe that I’d be better off without him. It was Jojo’s voice that always came in, whenever I tried to tell myself that. He’s not like those Fury guys. I told you. He’s a good man.
“I’m just getting off my shift,” he said after a few minutes, his voice sounding hard and emotionless. “I can swing by your place.”
“Oh. Sure. That’s good. Thanks.”
“See you.”
He ended the call and I looked around. The place was a pigsty, but I couldn’t do anything about it. I scrambled to the bathroom mirror and splashed water on my face and brushed my hair back into a ponytail.
Only a few minutes later, I heard the sound of his bike coming into the parking lot. I took a deep breath and fixed my hair again, then looked at Ernie and Bert, who were probably wondering what I was so nervous about.
“I’m not nervous,” I insisted to my silent little audience, with their droopy little sad eyes, but then I opened the door before he’d even knocked.
Hart stood leaning against the doorframe; fist raised to knock on the door. He dropped it. The light of the streetlamps behind him shadowed his face so I couldn’t read his expression. “In or out?” he said in a low voice.
I always wanted him in, no doubt about that. I pushed the door open a little and he took a step closer to me.
I knew he’d come directly from work and hadn’t cleaned up yet. He had streaks of grime up his thick forearms, and smudges of grease turned his white t-shirt black. A light sheen of sweat coated his face, and he still had a thick red scar over his eye from a month ago, giving him a perpetually raised eyebrow asking a question.
He looked around my mess of a living room. I’d been working on it for a week straight and still hadn’t managed to get everything packed. And I still had to bring myself to go through Jojo’s room. I’d kept the door closed, so that if I didn’t think too hard about it, I could almost believe he was in there sleeping. Every time I thought about going through his stuff, my heart clenched in my chest.
“You’re leaving?”
His eyes seemed to scrutinize every last thing in the room, silently judging me. “Yes. I got a job in Baldwin. Up the coast. I thought I’d move closer to it.”
“It makes sense. Baldwin’s not so far from here.”
It wasn’t. Just ten miles north. But those ten miles would make a difference. I wouldn’t constantly see the street where I taught Jojo to ride a bike or his elementary school or the Jack in the Box where he used to work. “I figured I could do with a fresh start.”
“That also makes sense.” He hadn’t moved from the door.
“Sit down?”
“Sure.” He navigated around the boxes and sat down on the sofa. As he did, Bert piled on top of his lap, yawning like he’d found his new bed. Hart didn’t make a move to remove him. In fact, he started to pet him, gently, like an old pro. “You wanted to see me?” He put his feet up on the coffee table. “I’m here.”
I nodded and came up with what was probably a grim smile as I sank down on the other side of the couch. “Yes. I just wanted to let you know that I don’t blame you for anything that happened, where my little brother was concerned. It’s not your fault. He liked you. You looked out for him. That’s more than a lot of people would do. So, I guess . . . thank you.”
He sucked in a breath and let it out. “You raised a good kid, Charlie. I’m really sorry that it happened the way it did. But we’re not letting it go. The Cobras, I mean. The Fury have shit on us enough and we’re done. We’ve voted to take out the Fury. Whatever we have to do, we’re not going to stop. We have to avenge Joel’s death.”
I shuddered. “I don’t want anyone else to get hurt. They deserve whatever happens to them, but . . . what about you?”
He leaned over and touched my knee, giving me a surly little look that made my nipples stand at attention. “I’ll be all right. But thanks for caring.” He sucked in a breath and let it out, yawning, looking around at the bare walls. “That what you wanted to tell me?”
“Um . . . well . . .” I bit the inside of my cheek. I realized I hadn’t prepared. I wasn’t sure how to say this. I’m pregnant! – just like that, seemed like a real conversation killer. Plus, I was moving away to another town. And he and the Cobras were getting into a war. And that was the last thing I needed—to bring a baby into a world of violence. That was asking for an outcome like what had happened to Jojo. This was impossible. “I guess.”
He studied me. “You sure?”
No. God, no! I could almost hear Jojo’s voice echoing with mine. Tell him. He’ll be a good father, and you know it. Then go and jump him.
I rolled my eyes. I could just imagine Jojo saying that. And I most definitely was not going to jump anyone.
As much as I kind of wanted to.
But then he stood up
and started to walk to the door, and I saw my life flash before my eyes. Actually, I saw the life I hadn’t lived yet—years and years of not being with Hart, spending every single one of those long days filled with regret over letting him go.
It was such a painful thought, I gasped aloud.
Then I shot up, like a bullet fired into the air, and followed after him. “Um, actually . . .”
But stupid me, I didn’t realize Mags was under my feet. I went flying again, this time, in a total free-fall, with only Hart’s hard body to break my fall. I was on a collision course with his broad back and massive biceps.
Luckily, he turned around at that moment and caught me in his arms. “Whoa,” he said, lifting me upright, a small, amused smile cracking on his lips.
I blushed furiously.
“I thought you never trip?” he gritted out in a sexy voice, making me tremble with a need that went deep into my bones.
God, he was so beautiful. So dirty and raw and beautiful, with his light blond hair falling in his face and those incredible hazel eyes, showing all their amber flecks in the orange lamplight. I had no doubt that if the baby inside me had inherited even the tiniest smidgen of his traits, he or she would be a little heartbreaker.
I leaned into his hard muscles, drank in the scent of motor oil, and decided right then and there that there was no way I could let him go. Running my tongue over my lips, I traced a finger over his eyebrow, over the scar. I was quivering like jelly. “You got this that day. Because of Jojo. It makes you look tough.”
I let my finger linger there, lightly, until he snatched it in his big hand. He kissed the tip of my finger, then lifted me into his arms. I let out a little squeal as he said, “You’re in danger here. That much is clear. If I’ve gotta save you from yourself . . .”
He carried me in his arms back to the couch, where he sat down with me on his lap. “If you insist on saving me,” I said lightly.
He raised that scarred eyebrow in a bigger question. “So you don’t want me to leave?”
I shook my head. Then I took a deep breath, and I let it out. “I’d be lying if I let you go. Because I love you, Hart.”
