“Knives—”
“You come first. End of discussion, Mary. I love you, but please, do not push this. Mason might not be dead to any of you, but he is to me. The sooner we figure this out, the sooner he can leave.”
I know Knives doesn’t mean that. He is angry, and he has every reason to be, but we won’t be able to move on. Knives will regret having Mason leave his life again. I can’t push him though.
“And don’t get me started on if he knows you. What if he helped your dad get to you every night?” Knives shakes his head and gets up from the chair, then lays down next to me. “It’s something unforgivable. I’ll kill him myself if I find that out.”
I want to say Mason had nothing to do with me, but I don’t know that, and I can’t comfort Knives if I don’t have the whole truth. Instead, I run my fingers through his hair and take Reaper’s advice.
Tomorrow is a new day, but a voice in the back of my head whispers: Only twelve more.
It’s eight in the morning. Everyone is in Church. I’ve never seen every chair taken up before, but here we are. I sip my coffee, unable to bring myself to look at Mason, who is sitting right across from me. He’s staring at me too. I can feel it, that invisible cloak blanketing me and the energy warping the hair long my arms, taunting me to look.
But I won’t.
I won’t give in.
He left me hanging for twenty years; he can deal with the fact that I’ve moved on from his death.
“Thomas,” he says my name to get my attention, but I ignore him. Is it childish? Maybe. I feel like I have the right to be fucking mad. No. Mad isn’t the word.
Devastated.
He was my only friend in the world, a person I thought would never betray me. He did what he said he’d never do: he betrayed me.
“Thomas, please, you have to talk to me. I know—”
Tongue slams his knife between Mason’s index and middle finger. “He doesn’t have to do a damn thing, Mason-jar. Keep asking him to talk; I’ll feed your tongue to Happy. Your voice is fucking annoying.”
Tongue yanks the blade from the wood and sneers at Mason. “And I don’t give a damn that you know Knives. I stabbed my own brother, right in his tongue. If I can do that to him, imagine what I’ll do to you.” Tongue rubs the onyx blade against Mason’s cheek, but Mason doesn’t flinch.
A few other members trickle into the room and shut the door. My thoughts are on Mary. She’s still downstairs recovering from the concussion Socks gave her. I’m worried about her, but instead of being there with her, I have to be here, because somehow, someway, my formerly dead brother is connected to Mary’s father.
Small fucking world.
Too small.
If Earth had a twin planet, I’d take Mary and get the hell out of dodge because the way people are connected here makes me unsettled.
The gavel made of one of our first enemies slams on the table as Reaper calls Church into session. Everyone has a cup of coffee in front of them; the room fills with the aroma. Sips are the only thing that fills the silence.
I hate the quiet anyway. It’s too loud, with endless bouts of possibilities and leaves me alone with my thoughts.
Can’t have that.
“Okay,” Reaper says, already pinching the bridge of his nose. “Before we start. You bastards are going to listen to something, and hopefully, some of the tension will be gone.” He pulls out his cell phone, and I smile around the rim of my mug.
I know what he is going to do, but I’m not going to say anything. This is his moment, and he is proud and excited. He presses play, and the biggest, cheesiest, happiest fucking smile blooms across his face as his baby’s heartbeat sounds in the room.
“That’s my fucking kid. It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
Everyone sitting around the table bangs on the wood, then cheers, all except for Mason because he isn’t a part of this life and doesn’t know what to do.
Now who’s the outsider?
“Reaper, congratulations, man,” Mercy says, holding out his hand.
“Thanks, Mercy.”
“Way to go, Reaper!”
“Happy for you, Prez.”
“I hope it is a girl, so she drives ye nuts,” Skirt says from the back. For the first time in weeks, he doesn’t have Joey strapped to his chest, and he seems a bit lost. Out of habit, his hands go to his chest, as if he feels her there, but then when he feels air, he scratches his pecs to play it off.
“Don’t you dare, Skirt. I can’t handle a girl. I’ll kill all the boys.”
“Aye, the boys,” Skirt’s voice darkens, becoming threatening. “I’m going to make them fight me to take Joey out on a date.”
“You’ll kill them, Skirt. How is that fair?”
“Ye don’t fight fair, ye fight to win, and if they are smart boys, they will figure that out.”
“Jesus, okay,” Reaper says, pressing the mute button on his phone. When the heartbeat stops, he frowns, plays it again, and takes a breath.
I think Reaper is more afraid than he lets on. Losing their first child in a miscarriage fucked with him. It would mess with anyone, but now that Sarah is pregnant again, if he isn’t listening to that heartbeat, for a moment, it’s like he thinks it will vanish.
It’s how he was all night. I don’t think he slept.
“We need to get on track. We should hear from the FBI agents. They’re the reason why we are all here, right?”
Mercy stands beside Reaper and gestures for Mason to get up. Tongue snarls in Mason’s ear as he stands, trying to scare him, but Mason still doesn’t react. I know Tongue is on a mission now. He will have to scare Mason, or he will be a nightmare for us all.
“Thomas—”
“Don’t fucking talk to him,” Tongue says, pushing Mason forward.
None of my MC brothers correct Tongue for what he did. Mason has found himself in the wolves’ den, and I don’t know if he will make it out alive.
Mercy clears his throat. “Okay, I know there is a lot of tension in the air. There are a lot of issues that need to be addressed. The first place to start is with you, Knives.”
I finish off my coffee and smack my lips together, then throw the mug right as Mason’s head. He dodges it, green eyes wide with shock. “I’d rather not, Mercy. Let’s talk about how to save Mary.”
“No. You’ll be too pissed off. This needs to be addressed,” Mercy says, “in order for this to go smoothly. Mason, explain.”
Mason pulls out an extra chair from the corner, turns it around, and straddles it. Looks like some things don’t change at all. It’s the only way he sat in a chair when we were kids. Always too cool for school. “My name is Mason Fletcher. Thomas Underwood is my foster brother.”
“Was. This isn’t a fucking soap opera, Mason. Get on with it so we can move on to more important business.”
“This is important. You want to know what happened to me? Do you remember Louis? Well, he was a kid of a drug lord. The cops? They just shot me, but they didn’t kill me like they thought. I survived. I was in a coma, but when I woke up, I was somewhere else. Witness protection, so no one could find me. I couldn’t come to you, Thomas. I wasn’t allowed to.”