Piper
It’s quite strange, watching Logan play with my baby cousins, watching him run around the lawn, chasing them. And when he catches up with one, and lifts them high up into the air, their screams of delight echo around the yard and I can’t help but smile. He’s the man he never wanted to be, and yet, he’s the man he always was, in reality. What he used to be, what he was before, that was just a front, something he could hide behind so he didn’t have to face up to a reality that had hurt him. I’ve never told him that, of course, I think we’re done with the analyzing, we’re just getting on with our lives now. Our new lives. So, yeah, all of this is still a little strange, but only because we’re trying to get used to a very different kind of normality.
“Hey.”
I look up as he sits down beside me, hanging his head for a second as he catches his breath, and then he raises his gaze and he smiles, and I feel a hundred fireworks go off inside of me, yeah, it’s that clichéd. He does that shit to me, and I’m taking it all, every loved-up second, because no-one knows when the next pile of shit is going to land.
“Hey back. You done playing now, huh?”
His grin widens and he draws his knees to his chest as he looks back out at the kids playing, the barbecue being set up at the far end of the yard, the gathered crowd laughing and drinking and to the uninitiated onlooker this probably seems like nothing but a typical family and friends’ get-together. And, I suppose, that’s exactly what it is. Well, maybe it isn’t typical, ‘cause this afternoon’s barbecue is the first of many meetings my father’s ‘crew’ have set up, there’s work to do here, at the heart of the Cabbetto family.
I’ve come home, to New Jersey, and Logan’s come with me. My father’s set us up with a home and a life, and I’m grateful for that. He once wanted me dead, but I trust him enough to believe he’d never do that again, as long as I do what’s expected of me now; what’s expected of us. I’m back home, I’m a Cabbetto again, and Logan, he’s now part of my family, too. He’s been trusted with his own ‘team’ of men to carry out my father’s business while he’s in California handling the Devil Hounds alongside the Death Knights, the club Logan’s left behind him now. And I’m no biker queen, not anymore. But I’m no mafia princess, either. I’m Piper Cabbetto. And I have my own ‘team’ to look after, my father knows I’m not willing to go back to what I was before, I’ve changed too much. He knows I need to be a part of something, and I am. I’m helping the younger members of our huge extended ‘family’ grow up to look after themselves, to protect themselves. I’m teaching them shit they might never need to use, or shit that might, one day, save their lives. Am I OK back being part of a world that tried to kill me? I’m fine with it, in reality it’s all I know. But Logan, he’s known normality, known what it was like to live a life that wasn’t messed-up and wrong; a life that didn’t involve danger and fear. Before Reba walked out on him he had what most people would call an ordinary life, but that disappeared the day she left. And he can’t go back, I don’t think he wants to, so we’re here. We work for my father now, and in return he makes sure my ex-husband doesn’t come for us, because I still don’t know how Vanni really feels about what happened. He’s a very clever, very proud man, he has people everywhere, and what I did to him; what Logan did to him, that’s not what club brothers do. It’s not what old ladies do, it’s the ultimate betrayal, and when that happens, people pay. We’ve escaped that, and I still think that’s down to my father. So we owe him. And we’re both fine with that.
“So, we gonna go for it, then?”
I turn my head to look at him, and his eyes meet mine. And he smiles again, and I can’t help but smile back. “If that’s what you want.”
“Your dad’s sorted out a couple of Harleys for me to go look at tonight. Says his contact can get me a good price. You gonna come? We could drop by Kellie’s on the way home, grab one of their short-rib sandwiches and a beer.”
“Last of the big spenders, huh?”
He shrugs and flips a cigarette between his teeth. “This bike’s costing me big, sweetheart. Gotta make cuts somewhere.”
He throws me a wink and I laugh as he pulls me over, and I straddle him, removing the cigarette and quickly kissing his slightly open mouth.
“You gotta make sure you look after me. My daddy’s watching now.”
I’ve got my tongue very firmly in my cheek, and he knows that. My father trusts Logan. That’s why he didn’t send us away, instead he kept us close, ‘cause he saw something in Logan. Something he could use, something that gave Logan that focus he needs, and although I know he hasn’t forgotten what happened – he loved Reba, once, and what he saw… that’s going to stay with him for a long time. But he has a purpose now, he’s needed. And he’s good at what he does, he commands respect and he gets it, even from men who’ve worked with my father for decades. They like Logan. I love him. We risked a lot to get here, to get to where we are now, and this life we’re living, it’s still a risk. My father’s world is just as unpredictable as the one Logan lived in as part of the Death Knights, although, the two are intertwined now. My father’s part of that club, he’s working with that club, he’s merging his world with the one both Logan and I had once been a part of. We’re all one family now, to all intents and purposes. And I guess that’s OK, it keeps a certain familiarity within our respective circles. But I think we’re safer here. I think we’re gonna be fine, we’ve come home. We’ve come home…
Logan
I’ve been a soldier, a biker, and now I’m working for one of the biggest organized crime families on the east coast, although their business spreads far and wide across the entire country, as I’m quickly finding out. It isn’t just California where Frankie Cabbetto has dealings, he has them everywhere. And I’m part of the ‘team’ that heads up this New Jersey branch of the ‘family’. Am I here purely because of Piper? Of course I am. Without her they wouldn’t want me here, come on, I know that. But she’s by my side, I got my girl, she’s mine now, and we’re making a life for ourselves here, as part of the Cabbetto empire. I guess we just can’t shake off that danger, and I don’t want to. I think we both get off on it, we need it in our lives. Besides, I tried normality once and that didn’t go so well. I’m more comfortable around crazy shit and bad people, it’s where I belong now. And one day I’m gonna marry my gangster girl and we’re gonna have tiny Cabbetto kids that are probably gonna grow up within this twisted world, but at least they’ll have a mom who can handle a gun and a daddy who can take a man down with one swipe of a hand. They’ll be fucking safe, I’ll make sure of that.
“We’re doing OK, Piper. Aren’t we?”
She smiles, and I feel my heart – a heart that once used to be stone cold hard as hell – beat that little bit faster.
“You ask that question every day, Logan, and every day I give you the same answer. We’re doing good.”
She takes my face in her hands and she kisses me slowly, her tongue sliding into my mouth, man, she tastes incredible. And I still can’t believe the risks we took to get here, that I almost backed away from this because I was too fucking scared to admit how much she meant to me, Jesus! Me, scared, of loving a woman again. But I’m not scared now. And that promise I made myself what feels like an eternity ago now? That promise means shit. I have one loyalty now. The Cabbetto Family. Piper Cabbetto saved me. I was damaged goods, fucked up, but she made me see I didn’t have to stay that way. She made me see that falling in love isn’t a weakness, that happiness is something that was meant for me. She made me who I am now, so no woman is ever gonna bring me down that low again, it isn’t gonna happen. I won’t fucking let it…