They say what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. Well, he didn’t know about all that. But it sure as shit changes everything.

— James “Hawk” Young

Pain was a relative thing.

There were good types of pain: The burning strain on your muscles when you piled on another set of weights and lifted those bad boys into the air; the feel of a tattoo machine, those tiny needles dipping into your skin over and over again, soaking it through with beautiful ink; or that crushing ache in your chest when you thought you’d never have a family again, but then a little redheaded baby boy was placed in your arms and he looked up at you with those big, wondering eyes and he was all yours, your family.

That was the kind of pain Hawk could get down with.

Then there was the other sort. The pain caused by some backroom doctor picking bone shards out of his leg, and then stitching him back up without medicating him first. The pain from an angry fist hitting his face, or a pair of booted feet sent repeatedly into his rib cage. Or the worst pain of all, seeing the laughing face of a man you once called brother, as he inflicted all that damage.

Hawk didn’t remember much after ZZ had beat him senseless, no doubt retribution for Hawk having gotten him shot. Although the man had been cradling his left arm, he’d seemed just fine in comparison to how Hawk had felt.

What he did remember was the needles. Someone would come every few hours to inject something into his arm that dulled the pain, but also rendered him useless to do little more than lie there and stare at the dark, dank surroundings of whatever basement room he was being kept in. He fluttered in and out of consciousness, and each time he began to recover from the drugs, he was shot up with more.

Throughout it all there were times that he could distinguish voices, most of them speaking in Russian, sounding fuzzy and far away. But through it all, he’d frequently heard Deuce’s name and he’d clung to that. While he shivered and shook, both hungry and thirsty, and repeatedly pissing and shitting himself, he’d clung to the thought of Deuce, of his club, and of the lone sliver of pride he still had left: the fact that it wasn’t only him who’d dragged the Horsemen into this mess, but ZZ as well.

And then self-pity had begun to set in and he found himself going over and over again all the things he’d done wrong, all the damn mistakes he’d made. Once upon a time, he hadn’t believed in mistakes; it either was or it just wasn’t. He knew that wasn’t true now, that one lone decision could change everything, and he’d made a lot of bad choices over the years. Too many to count. He’d been lonely and greedy and therefore selfish, he’d been desperate and therefore vengeful, and he’d been rejected and therefore indifferent. And worst of all, he’d been out of his mind with regret and therefore complacent.

All. Fucking. Wrong.

You didn’t fix one mistake with another; he knew that now.

But the one person who needed to know that, to know how sorry he was for the many mistakes he’d made, was miles away, and he was beginning to think there was little chance of him ever having the opportunity to tell her.

And just when Hawk started to think he was going to die, starve to death, or overdose on whatever drug they weren’t allowing to leave his system, he heard Deuce. Not his name, but the man himself.

He heard Ripper.

He heard Dirty.

He heard Mick.

At first he couldn’t make out what was being said, but he recognized every one of their distinctive voices. And that was when he realized he wasn’t in that room any longer, freezing his ass off and covered in his own shit.

Beyond the familiar voices surrounding him, he could both hear and feel the rumble of an engine, the faraway grainy sound of music, all blessedly beautiful sounds telling him he was inside a vehicle surrounded by men who weren’t going to hurt him.

And for the first time in his life, he understood the meaning of home again. It wasn’t where you grew up; it wasn’t who you’d once been.

It was the people you surrounded yourself with.

“He’s been beaten and drugged,” he heard Deuce say. “Fuckin’ needle marks in his arm.”

“Leg’s broken too,” Mick said. “Shot straight through the tibia.”

“Speak English, motherfucker, not Swahili!”

Hearing Ripper so agitated, Hawk smiled. Or at least, he tried to smile. He couldn’t do much of anything at the moment aside from lie there like a fucking useless lump.

“I am speakin’ English, you dumbass shit. Ain’t my fault you never finished high school.”

“Both of you idiots, shut up. Ripper, call the club, tell Cage we’re gonna need a doctor.”

“On it, Prez,” Ripper muttered.

“And,” Deuce added, “we’re not takin’ him to the club. Tell Cage his guest room is about to be occupied.”

“Tegen will love that.”

“Tegen knows her fuckin’ place.”

“That bitch knows her place ’bout as well as Ripper knows what the fuck a tibia is.”

“Fuck off!”

“Shut your fuckin’ mouths,” Deuce growled. “That crazy bitch you’re talkin’ shit about cleaned my boy the fuck up.”

“She’s still crazy. Straight-up fuckin’ nuts.”

Hawk wanted to laugh but he still couldn’t see, probably because his eyes were swollen shut. Now that he was warming up, the pain in his leg was starting to burn something fierce, causing his thoughts to muddle.

Then he felt something warm press against his cheek. Maybe a hand.

“You hang the fuck on, you feel me, brother?” Deuce said, his voice low. “You got an unhappy redhead who drove through the blizzard from hell just to see where the fuck you were. She’s waitin’ on your ass, probably gonna bitch you the fuck out for lyin’ to her all these years. I’m givin’ you permission to put that blame on me like all the rest of these motherfuckers are doin’.”

For a moment, Hawk was confused, thinking Deuce was referring to Tegen, and Tegen being pissed at him wasn’t anything new.

But then he heard Ripper mutter, “She’s probably just pissed findin’ out that little leprechaun of hers is actually a Russki, and property of the Red Mafia.”

Suddenly Hawk realized it wasn’t Tegen that Deuce was talking about, it was Dorothy.

So, she’d come back to Montana for him?

And she knew everything now? And she was upset?

Upset meant she gave a fuck.

“What?” Ripper said, sounding affronted. “No one thought that was funny? Dude, that was funny. Cox would have thought that was funny. Dirty? No? Fuck, bein’ clean has made you lame as fuck.”

“It was kinda funny,” Mick said. “But not really.”

“Jesus Christ,” Deuce muttered. “Just shut the fuck up. All of you.”

And if Hawk could have grinned, he sure as shit would have.

• • •

Hours passed. Days? Weeks? He didn’t know.

Hawk was in and out of consciousness, sometimes shivering with unbearable cold, sometimes burning with stifling heat and sweating profusely, and sometimes both. He only caught snippets of conversations, purposely hushed voices accompanied by the sound of footsteps. He saw flashes of blurred faces, and every so often he’d feel a touch, sometimes excruciatingly painful, radiating up his leg, spreading higher and higher, gripping his chest like a vice until he’d pass out from the pain. Other times it was gentle, something soft and cool on his skin, fingertips fluttering up and down his arms, hands cupping his cheeks. A kiss pressed against his lips.

During his small moments of clarity, he tried to sort through the scrambled mess of his mind to pinpoint Dorothy, whether or not she was really here, that he hadn’t just imagined Deuce mentioning her presence. He would jerk at the sound of a soft feminine voice, or when he thought he saw a flash of red, only to realize himself unable to move, unable to blink through the cloudy haze, or speak anything resembling coherent words.

And through it all Hawk dreamed. He dreamed of his childhood and having the world at his fingertips, thinking his father was a king, thinking that someday he would be a king as well. And then of the death of his father, and his time spent on the streets, afraid for his life. He dreamed of Deuce, the night the man had found him, of the club and the boys. And then he dreamed of meeting Dorothy for the first time, her long red hair and bright green eyes, and how they’d both come together as a means of escaping the cruel reality of their lives, but how it had backfired on both of them.

He dreamed of the selfish young man he’d once been, thinking that the world had owed him something in return for all he’d lost.

And he dreamed of Christopher, who in a lot of ways had been the means to his end. The end of the man he’d once been, and the start of the man he’d become. A better man. A father.

He dreamed of the way things had been and the way thing were now, and he dreamed of how he wished they could have been, how he wished they were now.

Until the fever finally broke and he woke the fuck up.

• • •

Blinking through the semidarkness, Hawk tried to focus on his surroundings, unable to discern a damn thing other than he was in a warm and comfortable bed, although he was anything but comfortable.

His throat was painfully dry, his head was throbbing, and his leg twice as bad. He tried to sit up and felt his leg scream in protest. Okay. Scratch that. Instead, he reached out with both hands, fumbling at his sides. His left hand found a tabletop and his right . . .

Damn.

He squeezed the soft flesh once, twice, and smiled. Yeah, sure as shit, that was definitely a breast. He reached farther, squeezing the other, his smile growing wider. He knew these breasts, had once been well acquainted with them. Perfect-sized mounds of malleable flesh covered in freckles, topped with nipples just a little too large. Nipples that would shrivel and peak beneath his fingers and mouth.

Despite his injuries, Hawk felt his body responding to his thoughts. He was considering trying to maneuver himself into a more accessible position to continue touching her when Dorothy let out a small sigh. He snatched his hand away just as she rolled toward him and into his body. Her leg nudged against his injured one, sending pain shooting through him. He breathed through it, not really caring about the pain, just wanting her to keep touching him. He’d been so long without her, without the touch of another human being that actually gave two shits about him, that whatever pain he was in didn’t fucking matter. As long as she kept touching him.

Her arm crept over his midsection as her cheek nuzzled his chest, and he pulled her even closer, running his hand down her back, over the curve of her ass, and then back up again and into her hair. Feeling the scar that lay beneath it, he softly grazed the raised and bumpy skin over and over again, feeling a wave of sadness wash over him. He should have been there. If he had been there, if he would have stayed and fought for Dorothy, this might not have happened.

It was something he’d never forgive himself for, something that would haunt him until the day he died. That his ego couldn’t handle another rejection from her, and because of that she’d been shot, and he’d nearly lost both her and their son.

But alongside his guilt, he felt something else, something he hadn’t felt in a very long time. Holding her, touching her, even after all this time, he marveled at how natural it felt. How right it felt.

Feeling content, he closed his eyes. As he started to drift off again, both his body and mind still exhausted from all he’d physically endured, he felt her shift.

“Hawk,” she whispered sleepily, her breath tickling his skin. “I love you.”

He didn’t respond, just closed his eyes and let those three stupid words sink inside him. She was still sound asleep, and he thought that maybe they’d had been the result of a dream, or caused by her worry for him. But regardless of why she’d said them, it was the first time he’d heard those words since his father had been killed.

And the pain that hearing them caused within his chest, the pain inside his heart, was very much the type of pain Hawk could get down with.