On Monday morning, the fifth Monday of rooming with Yvette, Beverly’s fevered and agonized eyes were looking deeply into Yvette’s fevered and agonized eyes. Their foreheads came together and their legs gripped each other a little tighter. Breath, hot and hungry, heated each other’s panting breasts. The rhythm of her hand on her clit was now wild and fast, as was Yvette’s. Then Yvette’s body trembled in what was now a very familiar way, and Bev’s body answered automatically. Their voices mixed together, climbing, rising toward anguish.

 

“Oh shit, Bev!”

 

“Sweet fucking mercy!” Bev cried in response.

 

Then orgasms took them both, convulsing hips and clenching abs, until the agony receded, leaving only the afterglow.

 

They rolled away from each other, breathing hard, and contemplated the nothingness between the bed and the ceiling. It was just past dawn, and the golden light coming in through the windows of the small apartment above the general store in downtown Lakeside was warm and promising.

 

After both had showered and dressed in over-sized t-shirts (Yvette’s pink and Bev’s red), they made breakfast together: bagels and cream cheese with sausage cooked in the microwave. Leo would gag at the food they ate together, but this was a girl thing and he wasn’t allowed to join anyway.

 

Yvette’s cellphone rang at 7:30 with a ringtone that sent the long legs of the gorgeous blond skipping from the kitchen into the living room to answer. Bev knew it was Austin — not just from the unique ringtone which Yvette had set to be his, but also the time. He was calling before he rode into work, another milepost in what had become a morning routine.

 

Bev brought Yvette’s plate into the living room for her and then sat down at the little table. They had purchased it together two weeks ago and gotten rid of the old, rusty, worn table. Bev took stock of Yvette’s apartment, and it was much more hers now than it was hers and Crash’s. Most of Crash’s things were gone. They had been given away, or sold or trashed. There were three plants and a new coffee table in the living room, and the couch is new to them; it was a great deal they found at a yard sale, brown leather and overstuffed. Two Navajo rugs decorated the floors, which were clean, vacuumed, and nearly spotless due to the nervous energy fits Yvette still suffered from.

 

Bev’s own place had been cleaned and set to rights from the blood and damage from the invasion, but she was still afraid to be there alone. She was thinking seriously of either moving Yvette in with her, or giving the place up. The odd days when Leo was around, they were always at his house anyway — he had a tub, after all.

 

She finished her breakfast and went into the kitchen. She washed her plate and set it in the rack. Yvette suddenly asked Austin on the phone, “Excuse me, but did you just ask me to be your bitch?”

 

Bev turned around at these words, her anger rising. Austin seemed like a really good guy, so what the fuck was this?

 

But then Yvette was laughing and telling him she was just teasing, and that yes, she would ride with him this weekend with the club.

 

Bev relaxed and laughed at herself. How very protective she had become over this sister of hers.

 

Yvette’s call ended while Bev was still in thought. Bev was leaning back against the counter when Yvette sashayed in with her plate, looking so much better than she had a few weeks ago.

 

“About time he made a move,” Bev told her with a smile. “Any longer and I was going to keep you for myself.”

 

Yvette stopped and her smile disappeared. “Please don’t tease me like that.”

 

“Hmm?”

 

“Bev, I know that you aren’t serious and that you don’t get out of our togetherness what I get out of it. For you, it is just taking the edge off until Leo can rock your world again. I know that, and I accept that, alright? I’m so fucking grateful that you love me enough to stretch your boundaries a little for me. But…”

 

Yvette sighed. “It’s like your ghost stories. Remember what you told me about what Leo did to you that night? How it becomes so real for you. Your imagination is just too strong to be stimulated like that?”

 

“Yes, I remember,” Bev said, paying close attention.

 

“Well, I can blink and see you and me living together ten years from now with perfect clarity. We have guys, but it’s you and me. And Bev? It’s really good. And when I blink again to shoo it away, its leaving leaves a hurt in me, because I know that it’s never going to be like that. This is not going to last forever. So, please, it hurts when you tease like that. I’d be your bitch in a second if you asked. But you never will. And I’m very okay with that, really. I love you living here.”

 

Bev stepped to her and pulled her into a loving embrace, then kissed her cheek and then her neck. “I am sorry for hurting you. I really am. But that vision isn’t so far off, you know. It’s always going to be—”

 

And then she remembered. No, it was not always going to be her and Yvette. Leo's hunt was coming to an end, and all the pieces were moving into alignment just as he had planned. He had been playing a deadly game for the riders, a very deadly game, that so far he was winning, even with his own brothers stabbing him in the back seemingly every chance they got.

 

In the end, though, after the endgame with Vasquez and his cartel, after he lowered the vengeance of the Rogue Sinners on the cartel for the vicious murders of Woody and Emma, Leo had to die. He had to disappear. At that moment, she will have to choose whether to go with him or wait for awhile and maybe come later — but when would she be ready to leave Yvette?

 

All of this rushed into her heart, which pumped tears into her eyes. She tried to think of something to end the sentence with that wouldn’t be a lie, because she can’t give Yvette a lie after she bore into her heart like that.

 

And what the fuck had she been thinking? Just moments ago, she was thinking happy thoughts of them moving together into her cute little place in rural Lakeside and playing house together, with Leo just across the road. And how cool would that be?

 

Well, it would be very fucking cool if it was ever going to happen! But it’s not!

 

Yvette was looking at her. She had pulled back and was searching Bev’s eyes. “What’s wrong?”

 

“I just got ambushed by a memory,” she tried.

 

“A bad one from the looks of it.”

 

“Yes and no,” she said, and wiped her eyes. “But the really fucked up thing about it is that I can’t talk about it. Hush hush, secret squirrel business from Danny.”

 

Yvette searched her eyes, and then, very calmly, said, “You’re going to leave me.”

 

Bev looked at her, her mouth and brain aching for something to say, something to deny it with, but nothing was there except a big hole. She burst into tears and ran from the room. She fell into bed, sobbing.

 

Yvette came in and curled around her protectively, keeping the world at bay — now who is mothering who?

 

When Bev calmed down, she turned and snuggled into Yvette.

 

Yvette asked, “Can you tell me when?”

 

“A month from now, two months from now, six months from now — does it matter? When would it be right? I want that ten-year vision too, or at least something close to it, something with you in it.”

 

Yvette ran her fingers through Bev’s hair. “So, you wouldn’t even be coming back, then. Just, gone.” Her voice was hollow and empty. “Like, dead.”

 

“Oh god, Yvette! Please don’t think of it like that. Please!” Bev cried and kissed her neck, then caressed her shoulders and hips.

 

“Leo’s doing this, isn’t he? Why can’t I have something without him fucking with it? Why? What have I done to him? What? Did I get drunk and offer him a blow job and didn’t pay up or something? What?”

 

“Oh god, Yvette, that is so fucking unfair!” Bev burst out. “If you fucking knew, you would puke at how you are feeling right now,” she added with a snarl. She forcefully got out of bed, her eyes drying up fast.

 

“Knew what?” Yvette demanded, following her, her voice rising. “What could I possibly know that makes what he’s been doing right? Huh? He’s gone all the time. He rides without colors. Look at that fucking truck he has now! He’s selling us out! Everyone fucking knows it, too.”

 

Bev slapped her.

 

Yvette fell back against the wall, wide-eyed and shocked.

 

“Listen to me, and listen good,” Bev told her in a threatening voice. Yvette was unsure about Bev’s sanity at the moment, so she listened. “Right now, right this fucking instant, Leo’s risking everything for this fucked up club that can’t wait to crucify him. One false step, one fucking whisper, and he dies. He’ll be murdered, and it won’t be fast, either. He hates that fucking truck, hates everything about that fucking truck! He would like nothing more than to take that truck to a chop shop and let them have it for free! You know what he sees every time he sees that truck? He sees me, raped, tortured, and dead in a pool of my own blood. That’s what he sees in that truck.”

 

“Oh god,” Yvette whispered. “You’re serious. That truck was your attackers’?”

 

Bev suddenly realized that she had gone too far and said far too much. “Shit!” she spat, and stalked toward the kitchen.

 

“Bev?”

 

“You can’t say any of that to anyone. Do you understand? Let them curse and witch-hunt and all that other fucking crap they are doing. Do not breathe a word of this to anyone, or Leo is dead. And so am I.”

 

“You?”

 

“Those attackers weren’t random, Yvette. They knew exactly who they were after. If even a whisper of what Leo is doing reaches their ears, they’ll kill me in front of him, just to make sure he suffers as much as he can. That’s not a boast or a game, Yvette, that’s cold hard facts. So if you’re okay with me being raped and killed, spread the word.”

 

“Bev! How can you even think that?!” Yvette cried. She fell on the couch, bawling.

 

“Ah, shit,” Bev said, defeated, and came over to sit with her. “That was so fucked up to say to you. I’m so sorry. Want to slap me back? I deserve it.”

 

Yvette sobbed, “I love you Bev. I did everything for you. I asked if he meant you too, and he laughed and said you were a whore and yes, you too.”

 

Bev’s mind puzzled through Yvette’s words. She was stunned at what she came up with. Softly, she asked, “Yvette? Baby? What are you saying?”

 

Yvette stiffened, and a look of shock froze her face. Her voice was slow, barely there. “Oh god. Oh god. Oh dear god, no.”

 

“What is it?”

 

Yvette looked at her. “I can’t” she whimpered. “Oh, please, don’t leave me now! Don’t hate me!”

 

Bev brought her into an embrace and rocked her. “It might hurt me, Yvette, but I won’t hate you. I’ll always love you. And I’m pretty sure of what you need to tell me already. Let it out, baby, let it out and we’ll deal with it. I promise I won’t leave you, not like this. Not ever like this.”

 

It took several false starts. The words choked her, and for a moment, Bev was sure she’s going to puke on them.

 

“I did it,” she said in a hoarse voice.

 

“In the clearing. Crash took you with him,” Bev pressed gently.

 

Yvette shuddered. “You knew?”

 

“No,” Bev told her in a soft voice, “not until you said what you said about doing it for me. But then all of the puzzle pieces Leo described about the crime scene made perfect sense. I still love you. I’m still not leaving you.”

 

“Are you going to tell the police?”

 

“Oh, fuck no. You saved my life. Hell, you saved the lives of most of the people in the club. On top of that, the man who attacked me was the man you would have met, and he would have killed you both. There is no doubt about that. Crash was dead either way. The only one who had a chance of living was you, and you took it. I thank god you had the strength to do it, too.”

 

Yvette sat up and looked at her through watery eyes. “You’re sure about that? Really sure?”

 

“No doubt at all. His name was Ernesto, Ernesto Morales.”

 

“Yes.” Yvette nodded. “That’s what Crash said while we were out there. Ernesto was going to bring him $100k in cash, and then we were riding out of here in style.”

 

Bev shook her head slowly. “Never would have happened. Ernesto was an enforcer for the Vasquez Cartel, a killer. Crash was nothing to him. He would have gotten out of his truck, looked around, saw that it was a good place, and before Crash could say a word, he would have shot him. He might have raped you first, but you would have been next. Then he would have taken the boxes and drove back to his place. He would have read through the files, found out about Leo, and then he would have begun killing everyone in those files. Everyone.”

 

“Crash said that too,” Yvette choked out. “That every one of them was going to pay. They were all going to die. All of them. That’s when I asked about you. And he said definitely you, since you were Leo’s little whore.”

 

Yvette looked down at her hands. “So, I went to the car and got the gun out of the glove box. He was still babbling about how there wasn’t going to be a club anymore, and it was all going to burn. I told him I loved him, and then I shot him.”

 

They held each other’s hands, leaning into each other like the living victims of a storm or refugees of a war. Survivors, both of them.

 

“Come to bed with me. I want to hold you, baby,” Bev told her, and she urged her by pulling her hand.

 

Yvette followed. Bev took off her shirt and then pulled Yvette’s off her. She lay her down and held her, soothing her body with deep loving strokes. She told her she loved her. They stayed like that until mid-afternoon.