Tiffany…

Nik paused with the door half open and then shut it firmly. He turned and took me by the arms and drew me a little closer. The look on his face was indescribable and totally terrifying but I knew so completely that I had nothing to fear from him.

“Listen to me,” he said. “You are safe, everyone in this club is safe, but your ex-man? His buddy? Not so much when we find them.”

“You mean if you find them,” I said, because I didn’t really believe that they would. Silas was slicker than owl shit. Nik shook his head, once left, once right and the look on his face was stone-cold.

“There is no if in this scenario, Wahine. It’s when, and when we do, he’s going to have a really bad day.”

I sighed and stared off over the freshly fallen snow, so calm and so serene. “I’ll believe it when I see it,” I said. “I just don’t want to go through believing I’m going to be okay when it comes to Silas, only to have it yanked out from under me again.”

“That’s fair enough,” he said softly and sighed himself.

He knew how much and how many times I’d been let down before. We’d talked about it. I hated that I was so damaged, and while I trusted him and he knew I trusted him, there were still just some things I couldn’t trust anything about anymore. Silas was a big one of those things. So was law enforcement and the system that had failed me time and time again.

“Come on,” he said and reached out, hauling open the door.

I was enveloped in warmth as I went through the door, and he stepped in quickly behind me, shutting it firmly. We wound our way through a dim hall into a wide spot with open doorways leading into bathrooms, but not like the locker-style ones we’d used in the outbuilding. The one or two I could see were more like something in a home.

The other doors, I had to guess, belonged to more bedrooms, except for one large set of double doors. They seemed to lead into some sort of media room with a large couch and recliners in front of a TV bigger than I had ever seen before.

I followed Nik through an open archway and into the more familiar barroom I’d first entered this place through. A few women were sitting around a table, coffee cups steaming in front of them.

“Hey, Zeb.” A small woman with dark hair that was in the in-between phase of short and growing it out long smiled at us, her expression as warm as the coffee cup she held steaming between her hands.

Another woman, equally small but more delicate, with long auburn hair, turned around in her seat. She had some expensive-ass contacts in that turned her eyes a bright gold and she looked me over with such an expression of sympathy I shifted on my feet.

“Hayden,” Nik nodded to the first woman. “Ashton,” he greeted the second. “This is Tiffany.” He put his hand on my lower back and gave me a light shove forward. “Tiffany, Hayden is Reaver’s woman and Ashton is Trigger’s.”

“Oh, thanks for letting me borrow your guys,” I said and kicked myself immediately for how it came out. “You know, for teaching me self-defense. Sorry, that came out real bad, probably the last thing you want to hear out of a stripper where both of your significant others are concerned.”

They both laughed a little and Hayden stared down into her coffee cup, a charmed smile playing on her lips. Ashton stood up and pulled out a chair at the table saying, “Please, come sit with us. I’ll get you both some coffee from the kitchen.”

“I’ve got it,” Hayden said, standing. “I think you and Tiffany have far more in common and you two should talk.”

I took a halting step forward and froze at Hayden’s words, asking, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Please, sit and I’ll tell you,” Ashton said, smiling.

Nik’s hand returned to my lower back beneath my jacket, a warm and heavy comforting presence. He wanted me to sit and I trusted him, but still, I was apprehensive.

“Okay,” I said carefully, drawing out the word.

“Boy, we’re batting a thousand already,” Hayden remarked with humor, her tone light, and made her way behind the bar.

“Sorry, but word has gotten around about your situation with your ex.” Ashton put her hand on mine where I rested it on the table and I stiffened. “I’m so sorry to hear about your friend,” she said softly and it hit me right in the feels. I averted my eyes and stared at a random point in the room until I was sure I wouldn’t cry.

“Me, too,” I murmured, choked.

“My ex-husband was a real piece of work,” she said and I turned back. “The club fixed the problem for me. They will for you, too.”

“You sound awfully sure about that.”

“Reeeeally not their first rodeo,” Hayden said setting a tray with two coffees, cream, and sugar on the table. I flinched, and she froze, asking, “Shit. What’d I say?”

“He’s some sort of rodeo cowboy, her ex,” Nik explained. Hayden visibly cringed.

“Like I said, batting a thousand.”

“It’s okay,” I said after clearing my throat. I doctored my coffee after Nik told me to go ahead and go first.

“I’m not really good at being social,” I confessed.

“It’s okay, we don’t have to talk about any of it,” Ashton said gently.

“Seriously,” Hayden agreed.

I licked my lips and stared into my coffee for a minute, not really sure what to say or even what to talk about. I was so used to not letting people into my life, so used to hiding behind my walls. It wasn’t necessarily because I thought that everyone I met was going to hurt me, though, if I were being honest with myself, that was definitely part of it. I think it was more that after so long, I pretty much felt like I was a waste of everyone’s time and pretty unworthy of being loved… until Nik.

I looked over at him, pleading with my eyes for him to start the discussion and save me from this situation, too, and he smiled at me.

“Ashton works the front desk at Trigger’s tattoo place and Hayden is an interior decorator,” he said, and I figured line of work, as long as it wasn’t my own we were talking about, was safe enough.

“Stripper sounds way more fun,” Hayden said dryly and I shook my head.

“Dealing with a bunch of crabby grabby entitled assholes is not my idea of fun times,” I said. “The money is pretty good, though, and it keeps me in pretty good shape. That’s how I got into it in the first place. As a means of exercise.”

“You pretty much described every single one of my interior decorating clients. Even the grabby part, just usually not me.”

“Get some real gems through the shop, too,” Ashton agreed.

“People suck,” Hayden observed dryly and Ashton laughed.

“People do suck,” I sighed heavily.

“There are still some good ones, I reckon,” Nik said and we three looked at him. “Sitting with three of the best, right now.”

“Oh, please!” Hayden laughed. Ashton blushed and I felt myself smile, I couldn’t help it.

“Flirting game is strong with this one,” I observed.

“It’s strong with all of these guys,” Hayden said. Ashton kept watching me, and I tried not to get uncomfortable under the scrutiny.

“The rest of the club should be getting up soon,” she said softly.

“Yeah,” Hayden nodded then observed, “You guys are up awfully early for living the vampire life.”

“Sleep is all screwed up,” I said bitterly.

“We called it an early night.”

“I bet,” Ashton said. “Emotional exhaustion is just as exhausting as any other kind.”

I nodded. I couldn’t disagree with her there.

“Want to come in the kitchen?” Ashton asked. “We can still talk while I cook.”

“Yep, Ashton is head kitchen witch around here and she will conscript you. None of us mind, though. We have a blast in that kitchen.” Hayden stood up with her coffee in her hand and I nodded. Food was sounding better by the minute and there was absolutely nothing appetizing to me about McDonald’s.

I looked at Nik and nodded and he smiled encouragingly and gave a nod back. Still, I wasn’t ready for the training wheels of his presence to come off, so when I got up to follow the women, I reached down and clutched two of his fingers with my hand, dragging him along with me. He, of course, followed. He was so damn patient and good with me like that.

In the kitchen, a big modern stainless steel monstrosity, Ashton pulled an apron off the hook and lifted it over her head, trapping her hair as she tied it around her slender waist. Hayden tossed me another one, a red one with black polka dots on it with ruffled edges.

I put it on, even though it was just a little bit ridiculous. I couldn’t argue that it was still kind of retro-cool in that rockabilly sort of way that was popular with a lot of the biker club women.

Ashton asked me, “You know how to make biscuits from scratch?” I shook my head and she smiled. “Well then, come over here, and I’ll teach you.”

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how I learned to make authentic, southern-style biscuits and gravy.

Hayden had been right, the kitchen was the central hub for a lot of the women. She and Ashton may have gotten things started, but eventually, other women from the club began to drift in and it would seem that all of them were here. The entire club.

It started with Hayley from the diner and another woman, slender with long dark hair and vivid blue eyes named Dani. Then came Everett and Mandy. Everett introduced herself as Dray, the vice president’s ol’ lady and I didn’t have the heart to really tell her that I knew who Dray was. He was, after all, Dragon’s son. Not to mention, all of the men of the club, at one time or another, had come through Sugars. Usually as a big group, but not always. Sometimes they came in two’s or three’s together and every once in a while, some of them came alone, like Dragon did for the most part.

After Everett and Mandy came a man named Aaron, who was apparently considered one of the women, which confused me until one of the brothers, a tall, slender man full of vivid tattoos, walked in and kissed Aaron like he wanted to eat him from the mouth down. It was unbelievably hot, and I think I stopped and stared a little too hard because a lot of the women watched me nervously for a reaction. I sighed; we were in the Bible belt, after all.

I didn’t want or need them thinking I was one of the narrow-minded cum buckets I was sometimes forced to work with so I told the truth, “Do that again, I’m going to need some alone time,” I said. Smiles broke out and the tension drained out of the room like water from a bathtub.

After Aaron came a platinum blonde named Shelly with a kid on her hip, smiling at me in a way that said she knew something and she was pleased by it, which made me slightly uncomfortable.

Right on her heels came Mali, sporting a pair of sunglasses, groaning and saying, “Please, for the love of Christ, tell me there’s coffee.”

“Out at the bar,” Hayden said, grinning.

“Real coffee, or the swill these barbarians claim is coffee?” Everett asked.

“Did you make it?” Shelly asked.

“No,” Everett answered.

“Then it’s swill,” Shelly said with a shrug, and Mandy laughed.

“Good point,” Everett said. “You can have swill now or wait like ten minutes and have the good shit.”

“Fuck,” Mali barked. “Swill now, good shit in ten minutes. I can’t handle anything this early without caffeine.”

“Come on, I’ll see what I can do with what’s out there.”

They went out and it was just enough people leaving the crowded kitchen that I felt like I could breathe marginally better. I kneaded biscuit dough and flattened it, cutting out rounds and laying them on the industrial cookie sheets lined with parchment paper while I took everything in.

“Anybody know how long we’re staying here?” a woman who was new asked

“Bails,” Dray’s voice called from out front, “Will you let those capable ranch hands take care of shit for you for once in your fucking life, and stop worrying about everything on that farm of yours?”

“Yes, cousin dear!” she called back, rolling her eyes.

“I’m Bailey,” she said with a smile.

“Tiffany,” I said softly and jumped when someone gathered up my hair from off my face behind me. I froze and yelped, “What are you doing?”

“It’s driving me nuts,” Hayley said. “You can’t cook for people with your hair in your face like that. You’ll get it in the food if you’re not careful.”

“Then I’ll be careful. Please, let it go,” I said.

“Not gonna happen, not while you’re working around food. Besides,” Everett called, “You’re a hottie.”

I blinked gathering tears away and was glad they didn’t spill, muttering to myself, “Clearly you haven’t gotten a load of my face.”

“We have,” Shelly said, bouncing her kid on her hip. “And Everett’s still right.”

I felt my face flame in embarrassment and dusted the flour off my hands, “Did you need anything else?” I asked Ashton.

“You can help me bring out the dishes,” a soft voice said. I turned around and a young girl, and I do mean young, smiled at me. “I’m Maren, Nox’s Ol’ Lady,” she said. What I heard was, I’m Maren, Nox’s barely legal teen. I’d also immediately thought to myself, who’s being the judgy cunt now?

“Sure, just let me wash my hands,” I said.

I did and resisted the urge to immediately pull down my hair before I helped her haul out plates and stack things on a table at one end of the bar. Mandy and Everett were already setting up those metal tub things over warmers, the kind that caterers used, on its top, and I had to admit, when you were feeding this many people it was a good idea and a good investment.

Something crashed and a kid screamed toward the back.

“Here we go,” Hayley sang, and she and Shelly both headed in that direction.

“Tell Dante he’d better be behaving himself,” Mandy called after them. “And send Melody for some coffee if she needs a break!”

“Will, do!” Shelly called back and disappeared through the archway, calling out, “Hey, hey, hey! What’s going on here? You giving your mama trouble?”

“It can be a little bit of a madhouse at times, especially with all the kids,” Maren said.

“Who you tellin’?” a moody teen boy sitting at the bar playing a handheld video game muttered.

“Sage!” Maren snapped and I could see the resemblance.

“Little brother?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he answered. “What’s it to you?”

“Good luck ever getting laid with that attitude, kid.” He scowled at me and got up, stalking away like a thunderhead. Maren sighed and I apologized.

“Sorry, I don’t relate to kids the best, my filter is kind of out of whack when it comes to them.”

“It’s fine, he’s that age and since my dad died it’s just me. Well, me and Nox.”

“Which one is Nox?” I asked.

“Shredded guy, tall with dark hair. Um, I know that’s like a third of the guys in the club,” she laughed, “But they’re all in Church or out looking for somebody right now.”

“With a name like the Sacred Hearts, I should have guessed there was some sort of religious angle. Catholic, am I right?”

“Oh, these boys don’t actually go to church, honey,” Everett said.

“That’s just what they call it when they do one of their official meetings,” Mandy said.

“Oh, should have figured it meant figuratively, not literally.”

They shared a laugh that I was comfortable being part of, too.

“So where are they all?” I asked.

“Probably out back around the fire pit. They’re planning on building what they call a chapel this spring,” Maren said. Everett hissed a little and Maren jumped.

“What?” I asked.

“I might have just overshared,” Maren said apologetically.

“Ah, gotcha,” I said, adding, “If it makes you feel any better, I know how to keep my mouth shut.”

“It does, but still, you’re new around here and better safe than sorry,” Everett declared. “Club business is just that – club business.”

“I understand,” I said and leaned back against the bar.

“Good deal,” she smiled at me and yelled, “Coffee’s up!”

I heard a little laughter and Mali groaned, “Thank fucking God.” I turned and found her leaned over a table in the common area.

“Hungover?” I asked.

“Yup.”

“Hair of the dog?”

“Fuck no, I really would start puking then.”

Everett laughed.

“Anything else I can do?”

“Not really. Many hands make light work,” Maren said.

“You’ve pitched in more than enough,” Everett declared.

“Okay.” I stepped back in, just inside the door to the kitchen and hung up the apron where Ashton had gotten it from. I stood around for a moment not really knowing what to do with myself, or where Nik had gotten to, though if I had to guess, he was with the rest of the guys. I drifted over and sat across from Mali. She was really the only person familiar to me here and I didn’t know what else to do with myself.

“I want to die,” she moaned, her voice muffled where it was buried in her arms on the tabletop.

“Tequila?”

“God, no, I really would be dead if it was Dragon’s tequila. This is a bourbon hangover.”

“Ew, no good.” She looked up, propping her chin on top of her folded arms.

“How you been?” she asked, “You know, other than your friend?”

“Heard about that, huh?” I asked softly and stared out the front window.

“Hard not to, Babe. Small town and an even smaller club, plus my man was the one fixing the hospital records to cover Doc’s ass.”

“Ah, thank him for me, would you? I would hate for that doctor to get in trouble. Delia didn’t really have any family worth anything. We, uh, we were sort of each other’s family.” I choked up and sniffed and Mali nodded.

“Same for me and Kyle now. Um, Data is his road name. If it weren’t for the club, we’d be the only family each of us would have.”

I nodded. It seemed like a lot of misfits and strays found their way here. Mali smiled and nodded when I said as much, though super quietly.

“We are nothing if not the outcasts of the rest of society,” she said with a gusty sigh. “Honestly, fuck them anyhow. They don’t know how to really live. These guys?”

“Totally do,” I agreed.

I’d noticed that about everyone here. They were all vibrant and full of life. That life may not be easy by most of the rest of society’s standards, but in my opinion, the rest of society didn’t necessarily know what they were missing.

“Here they come,” Mali said, staring behind me.

I turned around to a bunch of boulders in black leather piling through the archway from the back. Some of them were shivering and bouncing in their black motorcycle boots, some of them blowing into their hands.

“We need to get that chapel built,” one of them griped. “It’s too fuckin’ cold to be standing out there jawing like that in this kind of weather.” He was tall and had dark hair and I wondered fleetingly if he was Maren’s Nox.

“You could always take your happy ass back to Arizona,” one of them grated, a man with long brown hair in a loose ponytail down his back, just starting to gray at the temples.

“Shut up, big brother,” the dark-haired one muttered.

Nik came in through the back and I felt myself perk up. He didn’t see me sitting here with Mali, and instead went into the kitchen first. He scanned the room out here next when he didn’t find me in there, and spotting me, lifted his chin. I gave a nod and he headed my way.

“I didn’t even see you disappear,” I told him, smiling to try and take any perceived accusation out of my comment. I added, “I was so wrapped up in I was doing that when I looked up, I hadn’t even noticed you’d gone.”

“You know you don’t have to do that with him, right?” Mali asked.

“Do what?” I felt my smile falter.

“Stroke my ego,” he said. “Craft what you say around my feelings. Only insecure douchebags need that.” He pulled a chair from another table and dropped onto it, leaning forward against its back.

“You can have mine,” Mali said. “My man’s back at the controls.” She jutted her chin past Nik and he and I both turned. The black curtains blocking the view inside the little glassed-in fishbowl had been whisked aside, revealing a wall of TV’s and monitors, computer towers and keyboards. A man stood inside talking on a cell phone and waved Mali towards him. She went and kissed him decadently, dropping into his lap after he sat in a rolling desk chair.

He kept an arm around her as he typed one-handed, like it was as natural as breathing. I couldn’t help but smile at the genuine love between them. They had a partnership and it was easy to see. As effortless as breathing.

“How are you holding up?” Nik asked. “And, sorry I got called away.”

“It’s fine, really, that’s all I meant by saying it the way that I did.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Silence lapsed between us and he studied my face finally saying, “You didn’t answer the question.”

“I’m doing as well as can be expected, I guess,” I said, swallowing hard.

He nodded and reached out, covering my hand with his. I gripped his fingers and drew breath to say something when a female voice from the kitchen shrieked at the top of her lungs, “Breakfast!”

Light chuckling swept through the men and women standing around talking in small knots and people just naturally fell into a single-file line to move along the bar buffet-style.

“Stay here,” Nik said, low and soft. “I’ll bring you something.”

“Thanks,” I murmured back and he winked at me.

Before he could get back to me, Trigger and another man I didn’t know pulled up a chair each.

“How are you doing?” Trigger asked. I bit my lips together and tried to decide how to answer and he grunted saying, “That good, huh?”

I let out an explosive breath and said, “Yeah, that good,” and it sounded miserable even to me.

“I’m Ghost,” the other man said, and I looked him over. Compact but well-proportioned, he held himself like a cop or a military guy and shoveled food in his face like a prisoner. If I had to guess, I’d say some flavor of former military and the eating habits could be from the same or because of some kind of ex-con status. Delia had waxed on about the club’s reputation in the criminal world so I was betting ex-con, but then again, a lot of these guys were seriously surprising my preconceived notions.

“Tiff,” I answered him, and he gave me a nod.

“You’re not harassing the woman are you?” The platinum blonde, Shelly, dropped into the chair Mali had vacated and suddenly the two-person table was seating five. Or would be as soon as Nik got back.

“No, wife of mine, I’m not. I just sat down and managed to introduce myself.”

“Oh, well, good,” she said and winked at me. I pulled the hair tie off the end of the braid Hayley had put in my hair and ran my fingers through it, shaking it out and combing it over the scarred half of my face.

“You got any plans today?” Trigger asked.

“No, not really,” I answered.

“Feel like trying some more shooting? We got a range out back. Might be a good distraction for you.”

I nodded, “Okay.”

“Oi!” Nik cried, “I go to get my lady something to eat and nek minute every one and their dam cuz moves in on her? What the shit is that?” His tone was light and joking, and Trigger and Ghost both laughed quietly and tried not to choke on their food.

“What?” Shelly asked. “She’s the new shiny object for this lot of ravens.” She winked at me and I smiled back a little nervously. While I was used to being the center of attention at work, I wasn’t really equipped to deal with it in my personal life. At work, I wore a persona, slipped on the personality of Francesca like a second skin. Out here I was just plain, old, boring, Tiffany and for the most part, I liked it like that. The extra attention was especially hard because of Delia… God, poor Delia.

I stared down at the plate that Nik put in front of me and took the fork he offered with a murmured, “Thanks.”

He squeezed my knee under the table and I forced a smile and looked over my plate with much trepidation. I wasn’t hungry at all. Whatever appetite I’d had had completely fled.