“Nope. Not to my Prez’s girl, and…” He pulled a face. “I mean, I don’t even know what you’re going to be to me yet.”
My mouth worked uselessly for a few seconds as I tried to process just how messed up this conversation was. When Ama was about to speak, intending on saying only God knew what, I quickly inserted, “Dad, it’s a little soon to be talking about this stuff.”
He slouched back in his La-Z-Boy and shrugged as he settled his mug on his jean-clad knee. “Not according to Ink.”
“Why? What’d he say?” I grumbled.
“That he was wifing her.”
Ama’s eyes flashed. “That’s what he said?”
My dad nodded, his gaze flashing between her and me. “That’s it. Pretty much word for word. I wanna know how you feel about that, Lawrence.”
I winced, because the question didn’t only catch me on the raw, but I didn’t even know what I felt about that. “I guess I’m glad,” I said hesitantly.
“Glad that another brother is wifing your woman?” He cocked a brow at me, and I knew Dorie, God love her, nudged him with her foot even though I couldn’t see it from the sofa across the room.
Dorie and my dad may only have gotten together because my birth mom had dumped me on him when I was five, but that didn’t mean their relationship had all been about the convenience. I had three sisters to prove otherwise.
Three sisters who were somewhere in the house, giggling and shit—I could hear them from down here in the place my pop had bought to make a family home for us when I was young.
I could remember him back then. He’d been young and brash, pretty much like me now I guessed, but when my mom, the bitch, had dumped me in Rutherford on a father I’d never met before? He’d manned up and hadn’t hesitated to take me on.
Hadn’t mattered that he knew shit about kids, or that his life wasn’t exactly conducive to having a child tagging along for the ride. He’d taken me in and raised me well. Dorie had helped, in fact, she’d helped so much that one day, she’d moved in and had never moved out again.
That was when a baby sister had popped up.
When Dorie had demanded I call in because she hadn’t seen me in over a month, Ama had decided to come with. I knew the two got on well, which made things helpful, and I wasn’t averse to spending some one-on-one time with my family so that they understood where we were at.
I didn’t need Keys interjecting with his random key jangles, or Ink grunting as I discussed anything my parents had to ask.
It wasn’t like we’d been hiding shit, because we hadn’t. But still, this was what I defined as an awkward conversation. And yet, as I sat there, I watched Ama charm them both. Not that she worked hard to do that. She was just herself, just the woman I fucking loved.
Christ.
How had this happened?
Where had this all-encompassing love come from?
It felt like it was newly discovered, but it wasn’t. It had been there all along. Just waiting for me to man up, to grow some balls, and to take her for my own.
When the doorbell rang and my dad got to his feet, was I surprised at what we found there?
Not really.
When Ama’s folks came striding in with a keg of beer, and Ink and Keys showed up too? I knew we had us a party in the making.
We spilled outside, and suddenly burgers were on the grill, and steaks and fixin’s made an appearance too. Through it all, Ama stayed by my side. Laughing as she joined in, showing the strength that blossomed inside her whenever we were together.
The MC had some tough times ahead. Shit had worked out with the dirty spur-sporting cop, and we were currently supplying him with weapons. It went against the grain, but not being hit up every week on raids was even better.
Sometimes, you had to deal with the devil to get shit done, and in this case, the devil had a badge. That was MC life. You rolled with the punches and took your happiness where you could get it.
For me?
That happiness was by my side.
I recognized a good thing when I had it, and I wasn’t dumb fuck enough to let things drop.
Pressing a kiss to Ama’s hair, I murmured, “You okay?”
She beamed up at me. “Of course, I am.”
I grinned. “Thought you’d still be feeling grossed out.”
Now that she’d managed to pull apart a tattoo machine and put it back together again, Ink had decided she was good to work on oranges. But today, after getting thirty oranges under her belt, he’d brought out the big guns.
A side of pork.
She’d done a good job as well. I’d taken a picture and was threatening to have it framed, even though she’d been white as a sheet throughout the whole procedure.
Amazing how far she’d come in six weeks. Not that she’d be ready for human flesh for a long time, but still, it was nice to see her own her talent, and do more at the parlor than just play receptionist and autoclave technician. It felt like a step forward, and that was what I wanted for her—to keep the past buried and to walk along a route that led to the future.
She pulled a face at me. “It stank.”
“It didn’t.”
“It fucking did,” she grumbled. “My nose was inches away from it.”
“You sprayed it with perfume,” I reminded her. Had almost choked us all out too.
Ama laughed. “You know it stank then or I wouldn’t have wasted perfume on it.”
“True. You’re just squeamish.”
Her nose wrinkled but she didn’t hide from it. “You okay?” she asked, throwing the question back at me.
I nodded as I stared at our families mingling in the backyard of the house that had been mine since I was a boy.
“Funny how shit turns out, isn’t it?”
She nodded. “Yeah, it is. Especially in such a short space of time.”
“He’s doing better,” I murmured, tipping my chin at Keys. I reached up and tugged at her earlobe, where his claim was inked behind the sensitive flesh. “You helped him. Not sure he’d have handled everything so well if you—”
“Pfft. He’d have been okay.”
“Don’t diminish your importance in his life, babe. He lost his sister and learned his dad had lost parole rights…” My jaw clenched at his father’s stupidity.
She patted my chest, then spun around so she was leaning into me. I pressed my lips to her temple and whispered, “Wish I was inside you.”
A soft laugh escaped her. “You’re the one who wanted to visit your folks today.”
“Dorie was moaning,” I grumbled.
“Can’t blame her. You’re her only son, babes.”
I bit my lip at her easy acceptance of something that was true, yet wasn’t. I eyed the woman who’d helped raise me, and saw her and Lucie were hooting about only God knew what. Then I cut a look at Ink and Keys who were bitching about something with Axe and Flame, and then Wolfe and Dagger were hanging with my daddy. My sisters had come out and were jumping in the blow-up pool, and overhead, the stars had made an appearance, disguising the grass that really needed mowing, and the bike parts that took up a large chunk of the lawn because Wheels had been working on restoring in it during his spare time for the past two years.