“There’s been drama,” I countered. “More than enough of it. Maybe we’re done.”
He laughed. Actually threw his head back and cackled. “No, my girl, done is something we aren’t, nor will we ever be,” he said once he’d finished. “Especially you. You aren’t one to live quiet, my girl. Not one to love quiet. It’s comin’. Just make sure the causalities are other fuckers who ain’t you,” he ordered.
I smiled. “Of course. You taught me well.”
He grinned back, full of melancholy that I’d never glimpsed on Steg’s face. Every funeral, every injury, every battle, Steg was dry-eyed and determined. He was the face of the Sons of Templar, after all, and emotions meant weakness.
The Sons of Templar weren’t weak.
But now, in the corner of the room, I was watching. Not weakness, but some other kind of strength.
“It’s in your blood,” he said. “Your daddy did the real work, raisin’ a little girl who could outshoot me before she finished elementary school, instilling loyalty in you that almost made you throw away your own happiness for the club that your father taught you to die for. I just picked up where he left off. And even at seven, the job of raisin’ you was done. Only thing I had to do was give you enough space, enough freedom to be, but enough direction not to get yourself killed.” He squeezed my hand. “You’re a good woman, Rosie. You’re the heart of this club, just remember that. So making decisions to fill that heart up is never going to break the club.”
His eyes went to Luke once more, whose eyes were on me, dancing with a playfulness that I didn’t think would’ve been possible today.
Maybe wishes did come true.
For a time, at least.
Chapter Nineteen
Two Months Later
“Motherfucker is dead,” I said as soon as I opened the door.
Just because it had been two months of what I could only call peace, that didn’t mean I wasn’t prepared for chaos.
I had expected it to be my own. I was okay with that. I was ready for that. Partly because I was used to it. Mostly because I had Luke at my side and felt all corny and cliché that with him, with us finally together, we could do anything.
It wasn’t perfect. Life never was.
But it was something close to it.
We fought. A lot.
We also made up. A lot.
We were basically living together. Most of our time was spent at his place because it was bigger, closer to all my favorite restaurants and had more exciting surfaces to have sex on.
He had tried to get me to move in with him almost immediately after we’d gotten home from Amber. I’d said no. Not because of the normal reasons about it being too fast or that I needed to keep my independence or whatever bullshit women spouted when they were too afraid to make a dangerous decision.
Because no matter how much I liked the space and location of Luke’s or the coziness and residency of my shoe collection, neither of them were home.
Now that I’d decided to jump in with both my Manolo-clad feet, I was going all in, in Rosie style. So we were looking for a home.
Together.
But I was not about to rush into where that new home would be. Like Cher said in Clueless, “You know how picky I am about my shoes and they only go on my feet.” That was my attitude about our home. And also my shoes.
Luke was patient. “If this is going to be your home, your real one, your first real one, then take ten months to choose, babe. Take ten years. I’ve found my home. I’m holding it in my arms. So I’ll wait for the perfect four walls and roof. As long as I fall asleep and wake up with you, the rest is just details.”
Of course he just had to go all romantic. And I looked like an asshole for caring about the four walls and a roof. I loved him. A lot. But that didn’t mean I didn’t want the perfect house.
It was busy, house hunting, working together, hanging out with the family I’d missed greatly, and having all the sex. So busy that there wasn’t time for too much drama. Or at least stuff that was out of the ordinary. Being in love with a man who you also worked with bounty hunting and such could be perceived as drama.
I perceived it as just another Tuesday.
But now drama was at my door. In the form of Polly.
With an eye so bruised and swollen that she likely couldn’t see out of it.
“He did this?” I seethed, gently bringing her into my arms.
She didn’t say anything, just sank into my embrace and sobbed soundlessly.
“Fucking Craig,” I hissed.
I held her for a while, my anger growing. It mingled with my hurt, my immense pain at seeing another innocent girl battered at the hands of an asshole man. It would’ve hurt with any one of my sisters, friends or strangers. But Polly was different. She was the last of them. The last of my girls who didn’t let the ugliness of the world tarnish the beautiful way she saw it. That didn’t mean she didn’t know sorrow, but she had this way of enduring it, not letting it make her hard.
Like Laurie.
Laurie had been broken and battered and murdered in the end.
Again, that sore spot that never quite healed and never quite would throbbed with that pain.
Because now it was Polly. I prayed it was the first time. That it wasn’t any worse than it looked. And it already looked pretty fucking bad.
It didn’t matter if it was one punch or five. First time or tenth. The mere act of taking someone who loved and lived so gently and then treating them so brutally was the ultimate sin.
And deserved the ultimate punishment.
I pushed Polly backward so I could gently frame her face and inspect the purplish red bruise steadily growing.
It was fresh.
Hours old.
“Are you hurt anywhere else?” I asked, using all my effort to keep my voice gentle. Looking at Polly, she needed gentle. She needed gentle hours before, but I couldn’t change or control someone else’s actions in the past. I could only control my actions in the present.
And my actions against them in the future.
She hiccupped. “No,” she said shakily.
I nodded. “He didn’t… do anything else?” I asked, praying to whoever was left to take care of this ugly world that the answer would be no.
She blinked, confused.
In her confusion, I found my relief. Because she didn’t know what I was talking about, for a second at least. If it had happened, the worst, she would’ve known. Her body and mind would’ve been reminding her of it, not allowing her the momentary luxury of confusion.
“No,” she realized finally, not knowing she’d already answered my question. “No, God, no. He just hit me,” she whispered.
I grabbed her hand. “There’s no just,” I said firmly. “There’s no spectrum of just a little bit of bad. Hitting a woman once or a thousand times is the same sin. I’m so sorry it happened to you, my Pol.”
Again, she sank into my arms, sobbing loudly that time.
I really wanted to cry too. But I stayed strong.
For my friend. For my sister.
And for the coming revenge I would make sure I personally delivered.
“Thanks,” Polly whispered, taking the mug of tea I offered her.
I hadn’t even realized I had herbal tea. I found it stashed in the back of the cupboard, a remnant of Polly’s temporary habitation.