“But I’m so glad they did. You mean everything to me, Ava. I’ve got a lot to make up for. I know that.”
“Can we not talk about it?” she asked.
“I think we should. It has to come out, Ava.”
“You really want to know how lonely my life feels?” She tried to keep the tears at bay, but they seemed to have a mind of their own and fell down her cheeks. She swiped at them. “After the crap that happened with Derek, I had no one. My parents were dead. I had no friends. No hope. I came here to start a new life. I wasn’t looking for you or the club. When I found you, and my feelings for you began, I started to have hope, Smokey. I wanted to be by your side. I adored your club. I was falling in love with you and with them. I get that you don’t come alone. You’ve got your own little family. I get that it’s … not legal. You’ve got secrets to protect. I accepted that. When you did what you did, you shattered all my illusions. The club wasn’t my friend. They were putting up with me because I was the woman you were fucking.”
Smokey knelt on the floor beside her bed. “No.”
“Yes. You know it.”
“Ava, you started out as being the woman I was fucking, but slowly, you changed in their eyes. You became more.” He kissed her hand.
“If I did, someone would have stuck up for me. That never happened.”
“We fucked up big time, Ava. Me more than anyone else. They do as I say.”
Ava laughed. “Even though you told me a few hours ago that they do what they want?”
“It’s crazy, I know, but when it comes to the club’s security, I’m the one they turn to. If I had reason to doubt you, they would follow it. I had no reason. I told them that. Give us a chance, Ava.”
Ava sighed. “Can we just agree to think about it? We’ve been doing really good so far, don’t you think?”
“We have, but I want more.”
“You’re being greedy.”
“When it comes to you, all I ever want to be is greedy. I can’t get enough of you. That’s never going to change.”
Ava stared down at their hands, which were locked together. His touch made her feel alive, and she’d tried to fight it for so long, but it was no good. This was how he made her feel.
“What about the other women?” she asked.
“There are no other women.”
“The club women.”
“What about them?” he asked.
“They’re available to you all the time.”
“No. They’re for the club, Ava. I haven’t touched another woman since you were in my life. I can’t even stand to think of another woman.” He kissed her hands. “There’s no one else. If you want them gone, say the word, and I will kick them to the curb. You won’t be popular with the boys, but I don’t care about them. Whatever you want, name it.”
Ava stared at him and shook her head. “No. I don’t want you to get rid of the women.” She didn’t want them around him, but they were there for the brothers.
“Just say what you want.”
“Nothing. I want to see where this goes.”
He leaned down and kissed her lips. “I’m yours. I’m always yours.”
She really hoped that was true, but then she was worried to even give herself chance to hope.
****
“You don’t understand a word of it, do you?” Ava asked.
Smokey lowered the instructions and glared at her. “They said it was a simple assembly.”
“And it is supposed to be.”
“Are they written in Latin? That’s not even a language anymore.”
“I think it still is for botany. I’m not sure.”
“Well, unless these are instructions on how to build a rose garden, they’re no good.” Smokey flipped the instructions over and started to look at the pictures.
“Do you think we should call the store?”
“No. I can do this. The guy said it was an easy job.”
Ava held her hands up in surrender. “How many cribs have you put together?”
“This is my first one.”
“So you don’t have any children elsewhere that I should know about?”
Smokey glanced at her. “Are you trying to figure out if I’ve got something to hide?”
She tucked her hair behind her ear. It had started to grow out again, but it wasn’t as long as he liked it.
The coveralls she wore seemed to emphasize her bump as the fabric stretched across her stomach.
“We don’t really know a lot about each other, and seeing as we’re going to be sharing a child, don’t you think we should know some things? You know a lot about me.”
“True. I didn’t know everything until I got to know you.”
“Then tell me some stuff,” she said. “I promise I won’t tell.”
“I trust you.”
“Makes a change.” She offered him a smile, and he fucking loved it. He’d give anything to see that teasing look in her eyes.
“I don’t have any kids. Anywhere. I’ve been with a lot of the club women.”
She wrinkled her nose. “I didn’t mean that kind of sharing.”
“I know what you mean.” He sighed. “I don’t have a whole lot to share, to be honest, Ava. The club has been in my blood for a long time, and any life I had before that, it doesn’t fucking matter.”
“No siblings or anything?”
“Nothing. I have no family to offer you. Just me and the club.”
“That’s not a bad offer, Smokey.”
“I don’t know. You deserve to have a big family. I want to give you that.”
Silence fell between them.
He continued to look at the pictures, rearranging the pieces to make up the crib into different orders.
It wasn’t working. The paper had to be wrong.
“Are you thirsty?” she asked.
“I could do with a drink.”
“I’ll be right back.”
She got to her feet and left the room. With her out of the room, he reached into his back pocket. He’d gone shopping during the days she was in the hospital. He pulled out the gold band with a string of diamonds across the top. The ring had cost a fortune, but he wanted to spend every single penny he had on his woman.
Asking her to marry him wasn’t going to be easy. He didn’t have the right words of what to say to her.
Pocketing the ring, he went back to the list of instructions that made no sense to him. Life at the clubhouse had settled down and he’d been able to find the time to come and finally build the furniture for his kid’s arrival. The shack was back up and running. The sickness bug going around was simply that. No drugs. No cause to believe something untoward had happened. Carlos had already told him they weren’t going to have some product for a couple of months as they were dealing with some legal heat breathing down their neck. When it came to Creed of the Twisted Bastards MC, he was keeping his distance. Smokey had been able to close several of the fucker’s businesses and it had caused him to retreat.
There was no sign of them.
He had no doubt Creed and all the Bastards would come out of the woodwork at some point. Until then, he was basking in the few weeks of peace he had to win his woman back.