Everleigh…

I straightened with the frame for the hive I was working on in my hands. Chrissy had spoken to Golden’s girlfriend, Lys, about me and Lys had used several of her connections through her florist business to find me a beekeeping job. It was in the city, too, at the university-run conservatory in Hilltop Park. The big, old, glass building was full of growing plants from all over the world that needed pollination, and they needed an experienced beekeeper for their six hives.

Lys had managed to get me an interview, which really consisted of me proving I had the necessary skills and that I knew what I was doing, which I had, three weeks ago.

Things were far from perfect. Narcos was on suspension for his relationship with me, and could potentially be fired. Driller was also facing disciplinary action for his conduct surrounding his refusal to tell his higher-ups where we were at at any given time throughout the whole debacle.

As it turns out, his hunch was correct on that. The Knights of Crescentia had gladly given up their contact inside the Indigo City police department. It had actually turned out to be a small group of somebodies, all of them in Narcotics. One of them was Driller and Narcos’ very own Captain.

They were still trying to decide what to do with Narcos, considering it was the same Captain that had put him on disciplinary suspension without pay to begin with. Narcos was working with the police officer’s union to mitigate the damage, but the whole thing was one big, giant mess.

The only positive it afforded any of us was that he had the time off he needed to go house-hunting.

His lease had come up on his apartment, and we had moved everything temporarily, to his storage unit and were staying in Driller’s slightly larger apartment for the time being. I found it to be stifling, though, with the apartment’s lack of windows and light, though I wouldn’t admit it to either one of my lovers. Still, Narcos knew, and he also knew that if it hadn’t been for this job, with its green growing things and my ability to be outdoors flitting from greenhouse to greenhouse, I probably would have gone completely batshit insane by now.

The sound of a motorcycle pulling through the park caused such a confusing mix of apprehension and excitement in me that my stomach lurched, yet I maintained my focus on what I was doing, lest I injure any of the bees I’d been charged with caring for. When it was safe to do so, I straightened and looked around.

“Everything okay, Evy?” Professor Donnell, an older, thin man with round spectacles who reminded me of Captain Picard from the Star Trek series, eyed me from behind his beekeeper’s mask. He wore the full suit while I just kept to my self-made beekeeper’s hat. I lifted the thin veil of gauzy material back over the brim of the straw hat I’d affixed it to with my careful stitching and smiled precariously, nodding.

He didn’t know anything about where I’d come from, and I preferred it that way. I felt the knot of apprehension loosen in my chest when Driller popped up over the slight grassy hill that separated the area we kept the beehives in from the park’s driveway back to the greenhouses where we did the growing, which were much different from the big greenhouse where we kept the plants on display.

“Oh, dear,” Professor Donnell said, following my gaze. The sappy smile slid off my face and I waved Driller off. He stopped a ways away while the Professor explained.

“Please do be patient with us, I’d hate for you to get stung!” he called out to him.

“Thanks for the warning,” Driller called back, and then hung back while the Professor and I finished up reassembling the hive from our check.

When our work was done, a matter of twenty minutes or so, I forged across the grass, my full skirt brushing along the perfectly-mowed top of it and went to Driller, giving him a hug.

“You knew I was coming, right?” he asked.

“Of course I did, I just wanted to finish what I was doing and help out as long as possible.”

He smiled warmly and kissed the top of my head, giving me an extra squeeze.

“You all good, Doc?” he asked. “If so, we got a house to go look at!”

The professor pushed his glasses up on his nose, the fringe of his hair sweat-soaked and sticking up at odd angles from his scalp and I was glad I skipped the hot, heavy, beekeeping suits in favor of my cooler, lighter ensemble.

“Oh, yes, our work is finished. You two have fun!” he called.

I rolled my eyes slightly.

House hunting was proving to be difficult. We just hadn’t found anything that suited us yet. It wasn’t like we were being overly picky, it was just that we knew what we wanted and the right place with the right feel at the right price hadn’t come along yet. It was like the things we wanted were at each point of a triangle and everything we had looked at so far only had two.

Driller walked with me to one of the greenhouses, where I kept my things, an arm around my shoulders as he asked about my day. I answered his questions, relaxed and comfortable with the close contact. I felt a little sad that while I was growing to love him a great deal, I just didn’t find myself in love with him the way I was with Narcos. While it bothered me a great deal sometimes, it didn’t seem to faze Driller in the slightest, which was something I was eternally grateful for. In fact, he was so laid back and easygoing about it, I almost wondered if he were really human and not some sort of angel, sometimes.

“You doing okay?” he asked, leaning against the inside of the doorframe as I hung my beekeeper’s hat on an exposed nail.

I smiled and nodded, “Of course, why?”

“You looked, I dunno, almost sad there for a second.”

I sighed, then spoke my mind, something both Narcos and Driller had been encouraging me to do more of.

“Sometimes I worry about you,” I murmured. “I feel, I don’t know… guilty.”

He smiled and it was a good smile, before he pushed off where he rested his shoulder and came to me. He paused in front of me and caressed my face lightly with the back of his knuckles.

“You love me, don’t you?” he asked.

I nodded, “I do…” I trailed off, trying to figure out how to tell him in a way that wasn’t quite so brutally honest, but he winked at me, and I think he knew in his own way.

“That makes me feel pretty good, Bright Eyes.”

“Yeah?” I asked, and I knew it held an edge of melancholy.

“Considering how in love you are with my best friend, the fact you’ve got any room for me left in that big ol’ heart of yours… I’ll gladly count that among my blessings,” he murmured.

I smiled and bowed my head and said carefully, “Someday you’re going to make some woman very happy, the way Narcos makes me happy.”

He tipped my chin lightly with his fingertips and his eyes were serious when they met mine.

“I can’t tell you how happy I am for the both of you, baby. What you two built in the face of all that fucking bullshit? Well it’s a goddamn miracle and it couldn’t happen to two better people. I’m grateful that you two make room for me in the face of it all.”

I smiled, happy tears threatening, and hugged him tight. He laughed and hugged me back, saying “Right, can we drop the heavy emo shit for now and get going? Your man is waiting for us.”

I laughed and nodded stepping back and said, “Sure.”

“Oh,” he said, and I turned from taking up my purse, my eyebrows going up. “In case you were wondering, I love you, too, girl.”

I smiled and laughed lightly and he reached out; I stepped past him and he put a hand on my back, a comforting, gentlemanly gesture and let me lead us out the doorway.

The ride to wherever this new house was was freeing. The wind therapy blew away some of the cobwebs and cares. We went over the bay bridge, which was always one of my most favorite rides to embark on. Nothing but water stretching out wide, and the road rushing beneath the bike’s tires, the wind washing over me, my fears and doubts left to drown in the bay.

Driller was a little more of an adventurous rider than Narcos, gunning the engine, going faster than my beloved, less concerned when I wrapped my legs around him and threw my arms wide, tipping my face into the sun. The laughter he sent flying behind him hit me full-on in my soul and I felt as bright on the inside as the summer afternoon sun shining down on my face.

The salty air whipped past us, and I put my arms back around Driller, cuddling against his back, the Indigo Knights colors rough against my cheek but in an undeniably comforting way.

When I’d first hooked up with the Steel Wraiths, Sledge had told me everything about how an MC was supposed to operate, about the principles they held dear, about brotherhood, about family, about how it was supposed to be you and your brothers standing against all comers, protecting what was yours and living life on your own terms.

It had sounded beautiful, and freeing, and I had wanted to believe that it could really be that way, but I quickly realized that the outlaw life? It was simply trading one ‘man’ for another. Instead of government ruling over them all, putting them in shackles, in chains, they had worn chains of their own making, shackled themselves to a life with no roots, dooming themselves to a life of constant running, constant kowtowing to men stronger than themselves.

They’d turned themselves into animals, fighting for scraps from the president’s table, stabbing each other in the back, cutting each other’s throats to rise in the ranks, shitting on anyone lower than themselves in the hierarchy just to make themselves feel better.

It wasn’t even a bastardized version of what it was supposed to be, but all of them were so focused on themselves they couldn’t see how their chosen leaders kept their boots on their necks, kept them down in the ranks while they laughed at the gladiatorial show the members put on while they feasted.

Of course, I had been just as blind in my own way. Buying into the bullshit, going from bad to worse myself.

It wasn’t until Narcos and the Indigo Knights that I realized that a club could really operate the way they were initially intended to, and that when they did, it was beautiful. The members were each happy and healthy, the women bonded to them glowing with pride, healthy, loved… There was such love among the Indigo Knights and it was so beautiful it made me ache with sadness that it had taken me so long to see what could be, what should be…

We wound through a neighborhood of newer, cookie-cutter houses, down closer to the water where the houses became older craftsman cottages and bungalows. I perked up when the houses became different, older, cuter. The yards were maintained and well-tended, fenced neatly.

I spotted Narcos’ bike parked against the curb in front of an adorable little cottage and the realtor, Georgia, standing beside her champagne-colored Lexus in the driveway in front of the little added garage.

Narcos gave a wave as Driller guided his bike smoothly up to the curb and I jumped off into my beloved’s arms first thing, my heart swelling with love to so full I thought it would burst.

“Hey, babe. How was your day?” he whispered into my ear, his warm breath stirring my hair, tickling my neck.

I smiled and just held onto him for an extended moment before answering, “Fine.”

“Yeah? That’s good to hear.”

“Looks good,” Driller called, the bike’s chugging ceasing. Georgia picked her way down the sloping drive in her heels and came towards us, smiling.

“I like that it needs work,” I whispered.

“Yeah, me, too,” Narcos murmured as we looked at the dilapidated paint job on the outside of the house.

“It just came on the market. We didn’t have time to pretty it up at all, but it’s exactly what you’ve said you’re looking for,” Georgia said.

“Let’s have a look,” Narcos declared, and tucking me between himself and Driller, we all followed Georgia up the drive and onto the little front porch.

She unlocked the door and shoved it in, and I think I immediately fell a little in love.

“Oh, my god… the floors are original wood,” I breathed. They had all of the character a century or more could bring to them.

We went through the whole house, room by room, and talked about what could be rather than what was. There was a lot of work that would need to be done before we could even move in, but I wanted it. I wanted it so badly.

“Could you give us a minute?” Driller asked and Georgia smiled her perfectly-painted lips, patted her perfectly-coifed brunette hair and with a nod, turned and clipped sharply to the front door across the hardwood, in her heels that matched her Lexus outside.

“She already knows she’s sold it,” I said softly.

“Yeeeah,” Narcos drew out the word, and Driller finished his thought.

“She just doesn’t know for how much, yet.”

I snorted and fought not to laugh.

“It’s so beautiful, you guys, and I grew up in a house like this, although in much worse shape.”

“Yeah? I didn’t know that,” Driller said.

“Mm, mine had a spiral metal staircase and the attic was converted into a whole other room,” I said.

“That’s an idea,” Narcos said.

“You thinking what I’m thinking?” Driller asked.

“Our office up there, keep work out of sight out of mind?”

“It would let us keep the third bedroom down here as a guest room,” I said.

They looked at each other and nodded.

“Did you see the shed out back?” Narcos asked, and we drifted to the back door. The deck would need to be replaced, but I wasn’t really a fan of decks. I preferred paved patios that were more one with the garden, but sure enough, there was a newer shed out there on the edge of the back yard.

“Could make it into one of those she-shed things for you, Bright Eyes. Only fair if we take over the attic,” Driller said.

“I could keep my own hive back here,” I said softly. “There’s room and there are gardens all through the neighborhood.”

“I think we’re all agreed,” Narcos said, beaming and I bit my bottom lip and grinned.

“Think we can get it all done by the time my lease is up?” Driller asked.

Narcos and I both nodded and laughed.

“With the rest of the club as backup, hell, yeah,” Narcos said.

“Fuck, man, we’re totally buying a house,” Driller said, and rubbed a hand over his hair.

“Well, we are,” Narcos said and Driller gave him a flat look. I left them to argue while I looked around on my own, drifting out the door and into the fenced back yard that was desperately in need of a new fence, but that would come along with everything else.

“I could put down roots here,” I said and turned back to the guys, and Narcos smiled at me, love and pride radiating off of him like heat shimmering off the sidewalk out front.

“Baby, you already have.”

He was right. I could already feel a growing attachment to the place, and I looked up into the summer’s blue sky and sighed.

“We all agreed, then?” Driller asked.

“Let’s do it,” Narcos said, and I don’t think I could smile any bigger.

“Let’s hope our offer is the one that’s accepted,” I said and we went back into the house hand in hand, and out to deal with Georgia.