Pulling up outside of Connie’s made a heavy sigh leave my lips as I dismounted my Fat Boy. The suspension creaked as it righted in absence of my weight, reminding me of all the shit I’d put it through in the recent years. The thought made me notice the wear of my tires as well, and I mentally added my bike to my growing list of things to fix.

“Come on, boss,” Lamb said, noticing me frowning at the bike. “That shit can wait until later.”

I nodded without a word, irritated just to be back here as Ripper and Lamb fell in line beside me. I didn’t bother bringing Jax this time, seeing as he was the only brother Anna would let close at the moment, and I wanted him near her to look after her. It wasn’t like she was being cold to the brothers, but they had all noted her distance to the club, which put me on the receiving end of a lot of pointed looks I chose to ignore.

We headed up the steps, listening to the old wood creak before the bell rang out and announced our arrival. I didn’t bother to look elsewhere as Charon sat in the far corner, coffee in his hand as he looked straight at me, a Cheshire-cat smile showing white teeth under his smug face.

“Wolf,” he purred, the corners of his eyes wrinkling the dark skin as he looked as pleased to see me as a cat that ate the canary.

“Charon,” I replied, not hiding any of my irritation as I dropped into the leather chair. I didn’t trust the fucker plain and simple, and I didn’t give a shit if he knew.

“So, how’s the little birdy liking her newfound freedom?” Charon asked, his yellow eyes flickering across the diner, trying to disguise his glance to where Lamb and Ripper were setting up at the counter and flagging down a waitress for coffee.

“She’s stuck in a hospital bed for now. There’s not much she can do,” I grumbled, thinking back to my conversation with Ash.

After hearing she had woken up, I figured it was about time I explained the situation to her. Lamb had sorted it only a day or so after she had been admitted to the hospital, under a false name of course, and with a little bit of persuasion of a few of the doctors we knew who came to our parties, he had managed to blur what her injuries were on record so the only match to the gunshot wound on her chest would be to the body that turned up in the morgue, which had been burned and buried in the nearby cemetery.

“Hmph,” Charon huffed, taking a sip of his coffee.

“I owe you a favor,” I growled, my tone unhelpful, but I also couldn’t help it, since the words felt bitter on my tongue. “Not just for Ash, but for intervening during the attack on the club, too.”

“So, you owe me two favors?” Charon asked, almost surprised that I’d offered them separately. I hated being in debt to the bastard, but it didn’t change the fact that I was.

It also didn’t change the fact that I could see that the little glint in his eye wasn’t just because he had a new toy to use as he wished, but because his plan had gone so well.

When Kay, who had managed to get out of the compound and to a phone, had called him, he was way too ready for help. Apparently, him and a group of his brothers had been nearby in redwood and had managed to get on the scene to lend a hand in the fastest time on record.

I wasn’t mad at Kay however, how could I be? Half my Angels had been at my side and not at my club, and from the numbers that had charged the compound, I knew she had no choice but to ask him. I knew it was unlikely that Charon knew everything that would happen—although he was about as predictable as a coin toss—but I still couldn’t fight the feeling this was what he’d wanted all along.

And I didn’t have to.

“I know this is what you wanted all along, Charon,” I growled, hating the stale taste of the words on my tongue.

Charon’s dark eyebrow jumped, eyes glancing at me with a heightened focus, his golden eyes fixed on my next words.

“Lamb figured it out,” I said with a sense of pride in my vice president as I could see the surprise in the flinch of Charon’s eyes as he knew, from meeting Lamb once, that I wasn’t lying. “He found out about the little warning notice you got from Ash’s father. Didn’t realize you were all so chummy with each other.”

Charon let out a deep, lighthearted chuckle, his eyes rolling slightly. “We’re not,” he explained. “Our world is an old one, Wolf. Tradition runs deep.”

“In the world of corruption?” I scoffed.

“The only world that exists,” he retorted, his hands subtly rocking his mug, the sound of the bottom rolling over the wooden table filling the air as I downed the rest of my coffee. I didn’t bother trying to ask him his reasons; he’d probably have his fun dangling false truths in front of me, never allowing me to reach the real reason. He’d be playing his games with the club in the future, no doubt, with our alliance and two favors owed, so I didn’t bother to start chasing his tail early. I went to rise from the table but paused when Charon stopped his mug, looked up, and with the playful curl of his lips replaced on his dark-toned face said, “If you knew, why did you still make that second deal with me?”

“I owed a girl an apology; you were the only way to do it.” I looked out to the door, seeing Lamb and Ripper catch my eye from their seats, stopping the waitress who had just put down their food. She spoke to Lamb for only a few seconds, blushing heavily at his smirk before picking up the plates and heading into the kitchen before returning a moment later with two to-go boxes.

“Even if it costs your club?” Charon returned to me.

I looked at my brothers as they headed toward the door, their backs wide and strong, the skull and black wings crested over their wide shoulders protecting them with the same force it had done for generations. “The club will survive,” I said, lifting my chest. I looked over my shoulder, glancing down at Charon, with his connections, money, power, and will, and added, “We’re not that weak.”

With that, I turned my back on the president of the Grim Reapers, the head of the most powerful MC of the west coast, on the bastard that I owed too much, but I didn’t do it with weakness.

I did it with strength. I did it showing the emblem with the meaning that went beyond a simple club, beyond a simple creed and pair of wheels.

I did it showing that the Black Angels were more than just a club.

* * *

I sat in the clubroom, still pissed about Charon despite the fact it was a few days since we’d had our little meeting, when the entire room went silent.

I looked up from my stool to see Lamb’s hand had stopped moving, cloth around the glass as his head was turned away from me, light brown eyes narrowed.

I spun on my stool, turning away from the annoying paperwork scattered across the bar top, and I looked in the direction that had everyone’s attention.

Ash stood in the doorway, hair tucked up into a bun, dressed in what I knew was one of Anna’s large hoodies and leggings as she staggered into the doorway, out of breath.

“Ash?” I heard Jax’s voice first as he rushed to the door just as Ash began to sway forward. He lunged, catching her just as I heard the glass slam down beside me and saw Lamb’s body blur past me. He followed Jax as he picked her up and placed her on one of the couches as I moved from my stool and rushed over.

“What the hell are you doing out of the hospital?” I growled, shoving my way into her line of sight.

Her sunglasses covered her eyes, but I could see the glare that wrinkled her face and bowed her lips into a frown. My reflection glinted off the light cutting across her glasses from the few windows that weren’t boarded up—we were still waiting for the replacement glass to be delivered.

“The food sucked,” Ash groaned, dropping a slender hand over her face as she took deep breaths in. “Is it just me or is the room spinning?”

“For fuck’s sake,” I growled. “Kay!”

A few seconds later, Kay came thundering down the steps into the clubroom, eyes wide and panicked as she searched for the people in the room, looking for danger. “What’s going—”

She didn’t get time to finish before I heard smaller feet rushing toward the stairs, but they stopped at the top, and not even a heartbeat later, I saw Bell flying down the stairs.

Mint, who happened to be standing next to the stairs, turned and with his lightning-fast reflexes, caught her before she sent both her and her mother crashing face first into the floor.

Bell’s long, dark hair hung like a sheet over the both of them. Mint spluttered as he tried to get it out of his mouth, while Bell quickly jumped back out of Mint’s arms and rushed back so fast, she almost hit the stairs. “Sorry.” She blushed, her face looking down to the wooden floors, bright red.

“Jesus Christ, princess,” Mint groaned, slapping his lips as his fingers grasped a ghost of a hair. “Do you really need that much hair?”

“Whatever,” Bell grumbled, her shocked expression turning into an eye roll as she turned away from him and moved over to her mother, who turned and without hesitation, smacked Bell upside the head, earning a yelp.

“Don’t run down the stairs,” she scolded. “You’re clumsy enough as it is.”

“Mom!” Bell gasped, holding the back of her head.

Well, it wasn’t like we didn’t know. Bell must have been the clumsiest person I knew, which ended up in me forbidding her hanging out with Anna—as much as I could—considering the stupid situations that my girl got herself into.

I heard Ash chuckle from beside me, and both mine and Kay’s attention spun toward her.

Kay took one look at Ash before the mothering fury descended on her beautifully mature face. Her short boots stomped across the floor as Ash all but went quiet, the gray pallor of her face turning even paler when Kay reached her. Her hand went to the hem of Ash’s hoodie, and without even a breath, she tore the material up over her torso, revealing the white bandages wrapped around her stomach. “What the hell is wrong with the two of you?” Kay snapped, seeing the little blotches of red leaking out of two of the six wounds padded with extra bandages under her chest.

“I had no other choice.” Ash groaned as Kay took over, commanding Jax to grab a bowl of hot water, for Bell to grab her first aid bag for suicidal idiots, and for Mint to grab a towel and a bottle of water and the purest vodka. Lamb took over getting the bottle of water and vodka, handing both to Kay as she shoved the water into Ash’s palm, telling her to drink before she passed out.

“I’d prefer the other one,” Ash said, eyeing up the vodka bottle on the floor. Kay only gave her one look before Ash quickly shut up.

From what I knew, the nurses wouldn’t allow strong pain medication for Ash, considering she was an alcohol addict, but had her on small volumes of alcohol so she wouldn’t go into withdrawal before her injuries had healed.

“What do you mean, you had no other choice?” I interrupted as Kay got to work unwinding the bandages carefully from around Ash’s stomach, bitching about not being able to move her to the kitchen for stitching her up until she stopped the bleeding and assessed the damage.

“How else would I get her here?”

“Who—”

I shouldn’t have even bothered to ask as the brand-new door burst open on the other side of the room, cold wind blistering through the clubroom as the devil herself came spitting fire through the doorway. “Ash!” she roared, her eyes blindly searching the room until she spotted her friend before she managed to drop behind the back of the couch.

It was like an inferno had gone off inside of her as her eyes locked onto Ash, the white burning against her furiously flushed skin, a deep, grumbling growl coming from her lips. “You’re dead.”

Anna’s feet rushed her forward in a blind rage as she headed for Ash, and I barely had a second to dodge around the couch and step into her warpath. Anna didn’t even look at me as she tried to dive around me, hands lunging out to grab Ash, who let out a shriek of fear.

I moved on instinct, my head ducking down, arm going around her waist as I dropped my shoulder just underneath her waist and stood. Anna let out a scream of both fury and shock as she went up and over my shoulder, her face meeting my back as I wrapped my arm around the back of her legs.

“Wo—” she started to scream, but before she could, it ended in a gag as she slapped her hand over her mouth.

“Shit!” I hissed, my feet rushing as fast I could straight to my room, through the mess on the floor, and into the bathroom. I barely set her on her feet before she turned and lunged for the toilet, hurling the contents of her stomach into the bowl.

I scrambled around for the glass Anna insisted on leaving next to the sink, and filled it up, waiting for her to stop before handing it to her.

Anna’s small hand shook as she took the glass from me and took a small sip through deep breaths as she rinsed her mouth out, spat it into the bowl, and flushed.

“Shit,” she breathed. “Don’t do that to me ever again.”

I looked down at her, her blonde hair tied into a small ponytail on the top of her head, skin pale and makeup free, as she shifted to sit her back against the counter. She looked so small and tired. “Are you always like this?”

“Always pissed off or always throwing up into a toilet bowl?” she joked, chuckling to herself before meeting my eyes, her baby blue ones dulled by the lack of light in the small en suite. She sighed. “Yeah, morning sickness—which is never strictly morning, may I add—is a bitch.”

I watched as her eyes moved around the bathroom, slowly tracing everything as she sat there, nursing her glass of water, her hand rested across her stomach, her thumb brushing up and down in a thoughtless, casual movement. When her eyes made their way back to me, they turned into a scowl. “Why the hell are you smiling?”

“It’s just...” I sighed, my hand reaching up to scratch my neck as I leaned against the wall and let my knees bend to slide down to the floor, the cold tile against my back making me shiver. “You look beautiful like that.”

“I’m as sick as a dog, and you tell me I look beautiful?” Anna scoffed, shaking her head before her eyes began their second track around the room. I saw her pause on the clothes draped on one of the towel rails, no doubt noting that the laced bra and leggings draped over them were hers from when she had put them there a few weeks ago.

I didn’t acknowledge the slight tweak in her expression, remaining silent as the coolness of the tiles bled through my cut and shirt into my back, causing goose bumps to rise on my thick skin.

“What are we doing?” She sighed, catching my attention as her head lolled back against the counter. “How on earth did we get here?”

I looked up, the dim lighting reminding me that I hadn’t turned on the light when we’d barged into the room. A deep orange glow sank through the little window at the top, the streak way up above us as it brushed the ceiling and painted the white tiles a bright citrus amber.

In the darkness, Anna’s skin and hair might have looked darker, but her baby blue eyes were bright, almost luminescent amongst the dullness.

“It’s been a hell of a year,” I admitted, thinking back to how easy life was this time last year. Hell, Hunter hadn’t even met Mallory back then, and all we’d been thinking about were the cold runs ahead of us and how on earth we were going to ride if, for once, Oregon was blessed with snow and ice. Although it ended up being a mild winter again, we had all brought out the hot Irish coffee and camped inside most of the month, enjoying company, girls, and drinking to our hearts’ contents as we waited out the winter before we started taking more runs again in the spring.

And then, when spring finally came, it had brought heaven and hell with it, and everything had been a hell of a ride since.

“No kidding,” Anna scoffed. “First the Hell’s Runners, then the Grim Reapers, and now the guy who controls the English government.” Anna shook her head. “We sure have a way of dropping ourselves in big piles of shit.”

“We’ll get through them,” I said, my hands reaching for my forearms, the faded ink somehow like a script of history carved into my skin, a story reminding me of how I had gotten here. “We always do.” My eyes looked up, and I saw Anna’s blue somber ones looking back at me.

In my forty-five years, I had seen enough hell in my life to know when heaven was looking back at me, and even in the dark, tiny confines of the bathroom, pale and tired, I could see the brightness she cast on me. The light she represented, and one of the only symbols of hope left in my life.

“I love you,” I said so casually, and so calmly, the words just slipped straight out of my mouth.

Anna’s blue eyes widened, her pale brows lifting slightly as her walls went up, soft, pink lips beginning to open.

“I’m not saying this because I’m trying to win you over right now,” I reassured her. “I just wanted you to know.”

Her lips closed and she nodded as her eyes dropped down to the white floor, looking far beyond the porcelain tiles.

We sat in there for a moment longer, and when I was sure she wasn’t going to throw up anymore, I reached for the bathroom rail and pulled myself to stand.

Anna’s eyes snapped to mine, our silence disturbed as I reached my full height, the bathroom shrinking around me as I felt the blood rush back into my legs, making them twinge with pins and needles, before I reached my hand down to a doe-eyed, uncertain Anna as she looked at the big palm in front of her.

“Come with me,” I said, my voice calm and relaxed as her blue eyes studied me with caution, the corners of her eyes wrinkling back at the hand. “It doesn’t bite.”

“I do,” Anna quipped dryly, but nevertheless, she lifted her small hand, and her fingers wrapped around the length of my palm, allowing my rough, calloused hands to hold her small, softer ones. Her skin was cool to the touch as I pulled her to her feet, careful to keep her balanced as she righted herself in her thin sandals on the tile floor.

She was quiet but watchful as she allowed me to lead her out of the bathroom and through the doorway. We passed through the hallway and entered the clubroom. Heads turned our way, but my mind was quiet as we walked through the room, paying no attention to any of them as their eyes followed us out of the door.

I was careful to keep my pace slow as we walked across the parking lot, and I made sure not to pay any attention to Anna’s curious looks as we passed my bike and the cars and headed straight to the gate.

Pipe, who was wrapped up in a jacket, a smoke on his lips, gave us curious looks as we passed him, an eyebrow raised to his hat.

The sound of my heavy footsteps and Anna’s softer ones following behind me continued down the street as we walked five more minutes, down past the clubhouse to the emptier part of town a few blocks over, and the longer we walked, the closer Anna’s body drew toward my heat.

When we were far enough, I slowed down to a stop and turned to face her.

Her cheeks were flushed red in the cold air, faint clouds of cold air coming from her lips as her blue eyes studied my face, picking apart my silence.

She looked around us, the urban area surrounding us with the white picket fences, driveways, and porches with those bench swings and flower boxes. “Wolf?” Anna said, with a tone of caution. I let my gaze wander to my right, to the house with the faded blue door and rustic wooden panels covering the brick walls, shutters closed over the windows. Anna’s eyes jumped from the house to me, back and forth, quicker and quicker. “What is this?”

“I value my position as president,” I said, causing Anna’s gaze to stop solely on me. Her pink lips pressed into a tight line, eyes narrowed. “I love being around the club, I love being the person to protect my brothers and to lead them when times get tough. I love that. I would do anything for the club.”

I took a step back onto the white pathway leading up to the door. Anna’s step was reluctant, but as I tugged, she followed me stiffly up the pathway and up the creaking porch steps until we stood squarely on the ragged welcome mat. The iron number 1 reflected our images in a bronze wash as we stood close enough to smell the rusted hinges next to the aged paint peeling from the door.

I let go of one of her hands only for a moment as I reached into my back pocket. Her eyes followed every millimeter of movement as I pulled out the silver key and placed it into the lock.

The door clicked open, and due to the house being built on the slightest of hills, the door fell open in a slow, smooth gesture as it welcomed us in.

I stepped in, but Anna stopped, her body halting on the welcome mat as she looked down to the threshold of the doorway. “I can’t.” She shook her head. “Wolf, with everything you said in the hospital room before, I—”

“No,” I interrupted, Anna’s face stilling for a moment before her pale blonde eyebrows rose to her roots.

“No?” she repeated.

“I didn’t say anything to you in the hospital room that day, Anna. You didn’t let me.” I saw Anna’s eyes narrow on me, and her lips begin to open as she no doubt was ready to argue with me, but I stopped her. “I hesitated. For a single moment, I couldn’t answer you. That’s what happened in that hospital room, Anna.”

“That’s because you couldn’t say it. You couldn’t say that you would put our baby first!”

“That wasn’t what you asked me, Anna,” I growled, stepping back out of the door and into her space. “You asked me whether I would ever choose the club over our baby.”

“What’s the difference?” Anna yelled, her brows weighing on her eyes as she shook her head, her face hurt, victimized as she tried to pull out of my grasp. “Let go.”

“No, Anna. I won’t let go because I’m going to clear this up right now, and you’re going to listen to me once and for all.”

She looked down at her hands, to where her slender wrists were held between my thumb and forefinger, and then to the steps and down the porch before giving one last pathetic tug on her wrists, knowing they wouldn’t come loose, knowing there was no running away from this one.

“You asked me whether I would choose the club over our child,” I repeated, keeping my voice steady and clear as I made sure to lower my head and look straight into her blue eyes. The slight ring of yellow around the center of her pupil was clear and on me as I said, “I wouldn’t.”

“But you said—”

“I said nothing, Anna,” I growled. “I said nothing because I couldn’t think. I couldn’t say it thoughtlessly, because the one thing you don’t understand, Anna, is that our child and our club are no different to me.”

“What?” she said, completely stunned as she looked back at me, her head softly shaking as she took another step away from me, tugging on her hands.

“It’s ‘club before all,’ Anna. It always has been and it always will be.”

“Then our child—”

“Is club,” I finished, catching her by surprise.

“What?” she blurted, the confusion written into the groves of her frown as she searched the softness of my face for the reason as I gave her, with the deepest simplicity, the answer that I had come to. The answer that I knew was true. And the answer that I knew was what I truly wanted.

“My club is made up of the people closest to me. The people I know who are worthy of protecting, of sacrificing everything for. The club I chose to love. And my club is my brothers and their women. My club is you and it’s me. And our club is everything in between us,” I breathed, stepping forward, so close to Anna that I could smell that sweet but spicy scent of her skin as the soft clouds of her breath touched me. “The reason I hesitated is because our child is already club. There will never be a day that I won’t put it above all, and there will never be anything I wouldn’t do to protect it. And just like I would never sacrifice a brother, and will never sacrifice you, I will never sacrifice our child. Never.”

Anna stood still, her small head only reaching the middle of my chest as she looked straight forward, her face stunned, and her mouth speechless. I saw her mind processing my words, her face flickering from one emotion to the next so fast I didn’t know what to think, until I felt the timid but gentle squeeze of her hands in mine.

I took a step backward, and despite not looking at me, Anna’s small foot took that one simple step over the threshold and into the hallway. “I bought this because it’s near the club,” I explained, looking up and around the interior, knowing it was completely different to every aspect of mine and Anna’s personality; the aged wooden floors, floral patterned wallpaper, and the single old rocking chair in the corner. “But I also bought it because that meant the club was near home. When I walk onto my compound, I can be the president I want to be, but I also want to make sure that when I step through that door, that I can be the husband and the father I want to be for you and for our child.”

“Husband?” Anna repeated, her head snapping up to me, just as I felt the small smirk pulling up onto my face.

“I know everything I just said to you was a lot, Anna.” I lowered my body and got down on one knee. Anna’s blue eyes went wide, and her head pulled back as I pressed her hands against my lips, the velvet softness of her skin and the spicy scent of them treasured by me as I stared back into her eyes. “But I want you to know that, although I can’t guarantee that I won’t ever make a mistake again in the future, I will never do anything to risk losing you again. I will never hurt you like I have. And I will never make you feel like you can’t be with me. There’s nobody else but you. No other bitch for me. I need you.”

Anna’s white teeth raked over her pink lips as she said, emotion tangled through her voice, “You think calling me a bitch is going to make me forgive you?” She couldn’t hide the slight smile pulling at the corner of her lips, the slightly paler pink her lips went as she bit down on the inside of her cheek to stop herself from smiling wider.

“Yeah, I do.”

“You’re a bastard, you know that, right?”

“Yeah, I know.” I couldn’t help the smile spreading across my cheeks as I took a deep breath and looked up to the girl who was at the center of everything I ever wanted, ever needed, and could never live without. “Marry me?”

“No.”

I felt my heart jump with joy as she acc—

Wait.

“What?” I blurted, my face taking on the shock as I quickly rose back up to my feet, my eyes bearing down on Anna as she pulled her hands out of mine, letting them flop down by my side. “What do you mean, you won’t marry me?”

“I mean I won’t marry you,” Anna retorted, the sarcasm thick in her voice as she propped her hands on her hips, adding an extra eye roll as she point-blank rejected me. The stunning shock felt like a blast from a shotgun as every part of my chest began to hurt, and when I turned to look at her, to open my mouth and demand why she wouldn’t be mine, she held up a finger to stop me.

“I won’t marry you, Wolf,” Anna repeated, rubbing salt in the wound. But then she lowered her finger and I noted the gentleness taking over her face as she looked at me, her lips showing the genuine smile. “But I’ll forgive you,” she said. My mind began to catch up as she added, “We can start from there.”

“You forgive me?” I repeated, and it was as if a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I only now realized how much I had yearned for her forgiveness, more so than her acceptance of my proposal, more so than anything, as Anna’s arms reached up to the collar of my cut, grabbing a fistful and tugging down.

“I forgive you. Now, hurry up and kiss me before I change my mind; you’re too bloody tall for me to reach,” Anna growled, tugging hard on my collar, forcing my head down and toward her face as she pushed up onto her tiptoes.

“As you wish,” I growled as my arms wrapped around her back, pulling her toward me until our lips crashed against each other.

The sweet taste of her mouth was like a sledgehammer to my body as all of my senses were overwhelmed with the taste of her, yet I knew it wasn’t enough. Her hands that desperately clung to my cut let go and lunged around me, gripping the back of my neck, fingers catching the short ponytail at the bottom and pulling until a growl tore through my chest, urging me harder as I took a step forward, slamming the blue door closed as I pushed her back against it.

She broke the kiss, pulling me back as her blue eyes looked into mine. “Wolf...,” Anna breathed.

“What?” I panted back, my voice strained with lust.

“I’m going to throw up.” Anna gagged, and in a second, I had her planted on her feet; then she raced toward the open door at the end of the hallway, lunged for the toilet, and hurled into the bowl.

Still the most beautiful thing I’d seen.