On arrival back in Athens, my first port of call was to settle Skylar back at the clubhouse and then take a ride out to the Sunshine Cottage Inn to check on Megan and Cleo’s progress.

As I walked into the reception area, I noticed the bright colors on the walls and the happy and cheerful staff going about their life-saving work. I had called through and arranged a room after the accident, and was hopeful that Megan was still here and accepting the help she so desperately needed.

“Hi there, can I help you,” the cheerful receptionist called out as I walked through the doors. Her beaming smile was welcoming, but I could also see the way she studied me. They were very careful and cautious here, and so they should be. They were protecting people, and every person who stepped through the door that they didn’t recognize was a potential threat.

“Yeah, I’m Eagle,” I told her with a lazy smile and her shoulders instantly relaxed, her posture becoming a lot less defensive as she heard my name. “Megan and Cleo… hoping I can have a visit with them?”

“Sure, I’ll call through and check for you.”

After a short time, a young woman stepped into the reception area and guided me through the hallway to Megan’s room.

“Megan and Cleo are in there. She’s looking forward to seeing you.”

After a quick knock, I carefully turned the door handle and opened the door a fraction to look inside. Megan had Cleo on her knee and was gently stroking her hair.

She looked up. “Eagle, I’m so happy to see you.”

“How are you doing? They treating you okay?” I took a look around. The room was simple— a bed, a bassinet for Cleo, a TV that was playing silently, and an attached bathroom. It was nothing fancy, but it was a place where she could feel safe and secure for a while until she figured out what her next step was.

“This place is amazing. They’ve given me everything I could possibly need for Cleo, and above all, I feel safe and protected. They’re looking into long-term housing for me as well, as I know I can’t stay here forever.” She looked up at me, her eyes sparkling in the light. “I honestly can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done for me, Eagle.”

She looked far too young to be holding that precious human life in her hands. I felt overly protective of her and Cleo. I wasn’t entirely sure why there was just a part of me that felt like I was responsible for them.

“You want to hold her?” Megan grinned, lifting up a sleeping Cleo to me. My body gravitated toward her, and I moved my arm close to my body so Megan could settle her in the crook of my elbow.

I brushed my finger across the top of her head, the baby strands of hair feeling like silk against my skin. “You don’t got any family around that are missing this little one?” I asked, keeping my eyes focused on the baby, but noticing the way Megan’s head hung down at the mention of anyone who might actually care.

“No,” she replied, her voice a careful whisper. “My mom has never been around. My dad died while on active duty a couple years ago… that’s when my stepmom got custody of me. She made it quite clear that she hated how I reminded her of my dad every day.”

My lip turned up in a sneer, and I rolled my shoulders, trying to keep the agitation at bay and focus on Cleo. “She the one who left those bruises?”

She cleared her throat. “New husband,” she replied simply and straight to the point, letting me know there would be no more discussion about this topic today. I had a really fucking shitty feeling in the pit of my stomach that those two words were also going to be the answer to the question, ‘How did you end up with Cleo?’ But I chose to leave that one alone, noticing the way Megan was already shutting down.

I didn’t want to take any of the light away from her that she’d found while she was here in Athens. I could tell she was already feeling more optimistic and excited about the future.

The conversation about her stepdad could wait for another day, but it was going to be sitting in the back of my mind, and I would find out. And then I would decide what to do with that information.

“So you’re going to stick around then?” I questioned, trying not to smile when Cleo blinked at me sleepily and stretched her little arms and legs, driving her tiny foot into my ribs.

That question brought a gentle smile back to Megan’s face. “Yeah, I heard Athens is nice.”

I nodded in agreement, happy that for now, they were staying close where the club or me could help them out if necessary. “It is, real nice.”

 

 

Polishing my bike was kind of like therapy to me.

I know some of the brothers often got the prospects to do it, but I found it somewhat peaceful, and there were very few men who I trusted to touch my baby. This bike had carried me all over the country, it was like therapy when I was feeling trapped or overwhelmed. To just wipe it down, make it sparkle, I owed it that much at least for the times where it had saved me.

“Hey man.”

I looked over my shoulder and spotted Leo standing in the doorway to the garage. It was attached to the far end of the clubhouse, a place where brothers could come to fix up their rides, build shit, have a bit of peace and quiet from an environment that was steadily becoming a little crazy, as we had more brothers joining the ranks and a handful of babies and children filling the space like never before.

It was all a learning experience for us, and I was seeing the older members of the club looking for houses close to the club, but away from the younger group of boys that were coming in. They were respectful of the old ladies and the fact that there were kids living in the clubhouse, but they also wanted to live that life we had all experienced as we prospected in the club. Parties, drinking, girls, going to church with a hangover the size of fucking Texas. There was going to have to come a point where we sat down and decided where the balance was.

“Hey, just making sure my girl is sparkling clean,” I told Leo as I turned back around and brushed over the detailed gas tank with my rag.

Leo chuckled. “Well, can you stop touching her for just a minute, there’s someone here asking for you.”

I stopped, folding my arms as I turned around. “Who?” I asked, but he was already walking back down the hallway that passed Op’s office and led to the main room. “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I murmured in annoyance and tossed the rag onto a bench before following after him. As soon as I got close enough, I was going to slap him around the damn head.

Leo stopped in the doorway, and I did just that. He rubbed at the spot and scowled at me.

“This is the last time I do something nice for you, asshole.”

“What the fuck are you…” My words trailed off as I finally focused in on the guy standing across the room. Well, not standing per se. He was leaning heavily on a pair of crutches, and smirking at me like the cocky bastard I knew he was.

I jogged across the room, my arms going around my brother and lifting him off the floor, his crutches both clattered to the ground.

“Put me down, you big ape!” He laughed, but despite his protests, he was squeezing me just as tightly as I was him. “I’m broken, you need to be gentle.”

Scoffing loudly, I placed him on the floor and helped him into a chair at the nearest table. “That what you tell all the nurses?”

He grinned, his boyish and almost innocent smile was one that had gotten him out of virtually every shitty situation since we were kids. While I was quiet and liked to take my time, standing back and assessing a situation, Jake was the kinda guy to walk right in with a ‘let’s just do it and see what happens’ attitude. One which I knew he’d toned down since he joined the army, but still popped up here and there, driving his commanding officer fucking crazy.

“Seriously, what the hell are you doing here?” I asked, pulling out a chair and sitting opposite him.

Leo came over with a smug grin on his face and took another seat at the small table. “He called one day when you were out to ask if he could come here for a week or so until they had a space open at the rehab unit in Washington. I asked Op, he said yes, then we just didn’t tell you.”

“Fuckers,” I mumbled, but with a smile on my face. I appreciated the fact that they let my brother come here to stay, it wasn’t often we had outsiders remain on the property.

Jake grabbed hold of his leg, his face twisting as he pulled it in closer to the table.

“Okay, so fill me in. How much damage did the shot do to your leg?”

He looked at me as if he was annoyed that I’d caught him out. He was in pain, and I knew the wound was still fresh, but my brother was also fucking strong, so for him to be showing signs that he was uncomfortable then there was something wrong.

“It’s nothing I can’t work through,” he said, trying to blow me off with a wave of his hand, but I stared him down, completely unsatisfied. His brow pulled together. “Fine. There’s some nerve damage, as well as a little bit of muscle damage, but hopefully, I’ll be able to build it back up.”

I glowered at my little brother, not liking the way he was trying to play things off like they were no big deal. Nerve and muscle damage was a big deal. It would all depend on his recovery, but these were things that could stop him from doing the job he loved. “Seriously Jake, you nearly fucking died. Don’t pretend like that was nothing, or that it’s going to be a piece of cake. It’s gonna be hard,” I told him, my voice stern like how I used to speak to him when he was younger, and trying to pretend that his D grades were just a starting point for negotiations with the teacher.

I could see him fighting the urge to roll his eyes at me. I tried not to step into that father role too often because of the relationship we’d had with our actual dad, but I hated when he didn’t take shit seriously, especially his health and how it could impact on his future.

Our childhood had been somewhat of a fucking mess.

Jake and I had two younger twin sisters, who were just babies at the time our dad lost his shit. Dad lost his rights and I hadn’t seen the girls since they were adopted out, and honestly, I wasn’t all that upset about it. I wanted them to have a better life, one where I wouldn’t have to answer questions about why their mom was dead, and why their father was in jail—at least until they were old enough to hear the honest answer.

Jake and I had moved in with our grandmother. She was too old to really do much other than to keep food on the table and to give us a place to sleep, which was why the twins couldn’t come with us, but that had been the only option at the time that didn’t involve us being put into foster care. I’d eventually joined the army when Jake was fourteen. He continued to live with our grandmother, but it was me that tried to attend all his sports games when I was home and speak with his teachers about where he was academically.

“What will be will be,” Jake said, his shoulders slumping. “Nobody knows right now what will happen, I have to wait until I can get into physical therapy and then just push my hardest.”

I reached over and slapped him on the back. “And I know you will. If anyone can fight through this and get back out there, it’s gonna be you.”

I had faith in Jake that he would fight with every ounce of strength left inside him to get back with his team because that was what he loved, the army was where he thrived. He was never academic, but he played sports, and he was damn fucking good at whatever sport he tried.

“Okay, so now that the sappy bonding shit is over, can we have a drink or something?” he asked with a grin.

Leo raised a brow. “You on any pain meds?”

“Nothing crazy, just the over-the-counter shit,” he replied, waving off Leo’s remark.

“Beer it is then,” Leo grinned and headed for the bar.

We sat chatting and catching up for a few hours, not moving from that spot. My brothers came and went, the ones who hadn’t met Jake before introducing themselves and instantly forged a connection with him. Jake was the life of the party, a little bit cocky, a little bit class clown, but deep down he was a sweet kid who had a lot of love for the people he cared for. He would protect them at the drop of a hat, no questions asked, which was why he connected so well with my brothers in the club because that’s exactly what we stood for.

Jake was chatting with Blizzard, and I looked up when I heard Skylar’s soft laughter float in, followed closely with her body. She was just one of those people whose presence entered the room first, lighting it up with positive energy. She and Jess were giggling like school girls and playfully pushing each other.

“Sky!” I called, drawing her attention to me. Her smile beamed, and I couldn’t help but grin back as I waved her over.

She said a quick goodbye to Jess and walked toward us, her hips swaying with that natural sex appeal that I loved. It wasn’t forced, it was just her. Her blonde hair fell loosely around her shoulders, and her eyes reminded me of the ocean, deep but playful.

Sky had somehow managed to get through the angry scowling face that I initially used to avoid people trying to get close to me. With my brothers I was far more open, still quiet and happy to not be the center of attention, but I felt like I could at least be somewhat myself around them.

Sky, on the other hand, made me fucking laugh, and I found myself enjoying her company and listening to her talk about the things she was interested in and passionate about. She really was like a ball of positive energy, and after what she’d been through as a child, I admired her strength and resilience to not let that taint her and make her angry at the world.

She rounded the table and bumped me with her hip. “How was your day?” she asked happily.

“Pretty damn good actually,” I told her, before pointing across the table at Jake who was observing our interaction intently. “This is my brother, Jake.”

Her eyes grew wide. “Oh wow! I’m really sorry to hear about you getting hurt, but I’m glad you’re doing okay.”

He smirked. “Well, thanks… Sky, was it?”

“Sky or Skylar, either is fine,” she said with a nod before looking down at me. “I have to go help Jess get dinner started. I’ll catch up with you later?”

“I think I’ll go order takeout,” I murmured, but it didn’t go unnoticed, and soon there was a sharp pinch underneath my arm. I almost shot out of my fucking seat. “Holy shit, woman!” I cursed, my hand going to the spot and rubbing it furiously to try and ease the ache.

She was already backing away with a delighted smile, pointing at me sharply. “You will eat it, and you will like it, so help me God.”

The doors to the kitchen swallowed her, and my brother didn’t waste a single second now she was out of sight. “I’m sorry, did I miss the part when you got an old lady?”

Lifting my beer to my lips, I rolled my eyes. “Sky isn’t my old lady,” I muttered, cringing before I even managed to say the other words. “She’s a club girl.”

Three, two, one.

“You are fucking with me, right? You fucking like her, I can tell. But she’s a damn club girl!” I knew he was going to notice that things between Sky and I were a little extra than what she was like with the other boys. You know what, I didn’t give a shit. I figured Jake would give me shit, try to talk me into making shit official.

But I could actually see the fire blaze in his eyes, one that I really hadn’t seen alight too often.

“Any girl in the world and you pick the one who has had every single one of your friends’ dicks inside her,” he spat at me across the table in a mixture of disgust and shock.

Leo scowled at Jake. “Not every one of the boys have—”

“Have you?” Jake threw back, and a chill went up my spine because I knew that Leo at some point had been with Sky, but now that he had Hadley, it was as though the rest of that bullshit was wiped free. We didn’t speak about the girls’ pasts. Harmony, Chelsea, and Hadley at some point had slept with brothers, but not one of us would ever call them on it or make them feel like they didn’t deserve happiness because of what they’d done.

Yeah, Sky was still a club girl and did that get to me a little? Yeah, it did. But I didn’t think any fucking less of her because of it. It didn’t make me want to spend less time with her. In some ways I guess it made me want to spend more time with her, because I was getting to the point where I was wondering if it was worth pursuing something more, just to see where things could go. And the more time I took up, the more I hoped she might see things the same, and the less time there was for my brothers.

“Jake!” I growled with a serious warning in my tone, hoping he would shut his fucking mouth right now because Leo was staring at him with such intensity that a weaker man would have made a run for it.

“Hadley was a club girl, you think I shouldn’t be with her because she fucked my brothers?” Leo asked, his tone tight but I could tell he was trying not to just rip Jake a new one out of respect for me.

Jake’s back went a little straighter, but his voice softened slightly, the disgusted look on his face turning to one that resembled sadness. “Look, I’m not here to judge what they do. But I want to make sure the person that my brother is having some kind of feelings for, isn’t the type of girl who just likes to be the center of men’s attention and is gonna drag him along by his dick while she’s off having her fun elsewhere.”

Leo looked at me out of the corner of his eye.

We were both thinking the same thing.

This had nothing to do with Sky and everything to do with something going on inside him.

Jake held up his hands and forced a grin. “I’m sorry, okay? I’ll try to keep my opinions to myself next time,” he joked, searching for his crutches. “Now how ‘bout you show me to where I’m gonna be sleeping so I can lay down before dinner.”

I stood with him, helping him get his balance. “Come on princess, better get some beauty sleep ‘cause I think I can see a wrinkle on your forehead.”

He tried to hit me with one of his crutches, but I jumped out of the way. “You just wait, brother o’ mine.”

And like that, things were back to normal.

I missed him, more than I thought I did.

I just hoped he was telling the truth when he said he was going to keep his opinions to himself. Because if he says that shit around Sky, he’s really going to put me in a place where I don’t want to be.