Chapter 20

Ending work-related emails with ‘fucking dickbags’ is apparently unacceptable.

-Rafe to Parker

Rafe

“Are you sure you’re okay with going?”

I looked at Janie over my shoulder. “Yes. What the hell is the big deal?”

“They’re a little…much. Alpha as hell.”

Janie and I were on our way to a Dixie Warden MC party. It was being held in Benton, Louisiana about an hour and fifteen minutes away, and all of the family—Free family anyway—was riding over there in a group.

“I’ve been penetrating organizations for a very long time, honey,” I told Janie. “I’ve been working with Hail Auto Recovery for a while now. I’ve worked for the FBI, CIA, and a few other organizations as a contract agent. All of which had me dealing with a large group of ‘alpha male men’ as you call them. Trust me when I say I can handle myself.”

Janie sighed, then closed her eyes.

“I’m tired.”

“Then sleep,” I told her, reaching for her hand.

She clutched onto it, then leaned over onto my arm, which was resting on my truck’s console.

We’d originally planned on taking my bike, but James and Shiloh had ridden James’ motorcycle, originally planning on leaving Scout and Rebel at home. But Tegan had ramped up his annoyance factor and had started sending cops out to the compound on bogus noise complaints.

And since everyone in the compound was coming to this ‘family picnic’ as Janie kept calling it, they didn’t want to leave the two teens at home by themselves.

So, they’d hitched a ride along with us.

Which worked for me because it looked like it was about to rain anyway, and Janie didn’t look like she was feeling too well.

“Is your head still bothering you?” I asked.

“Yes,” she answered. “It’s been bothering me since I stopped drinking coffee.”

“Why did you stop drinking coffee?” I asked.

“Because it made my stomach upset,” she said.

“Did you switch to a different brand or something?” I questioned.

“No.” She shook her head. “I think it’s all this stress with you. I think I have an ulcer.”

“Ulcers are…”

“Okay. I used to get them a lot when I was a young kid. I’m prone to them,” she said. “Sorry for you. So, don’t stress me out.”

I laughed. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Maybe you should go to sleep so the rest of us can, too,” Rebel murmured sleepily from her position in the back seat.

Janie flipped her off, but she didn’t say anything else until we were pulling into the driveway an hour later.

The next twenty minutes went like this…

“Hi, how are you. This is Rafe. He’s my man.”

“Hi, Rafe. I’m ***insert woman’s name here***. I’m so and so’s wife.”

“Hi, nice to meet you,” I’d reply.

And, so, it went, until I’d met about eight million and two people out in the front driveway and yard.

The men, however, were a little different.

All of them, and I do mean all of them, wanted to know who the hell I was. Torren, the man who owned the house we were currently parked in front of, had narrowed his eyes at me and asked my ‘intentions.’

At this point Janie had wandered away, giving me ‘man time.’

Apparently, that ‘man time’ consisted of me getting the third degree.

By not one. Not four. Not even ten. By at least twenty men—some of those men including the boy-men that belonged to the men.

Janie was a very loved person, and all of them wanted to make sure that I had what it took to withstand them.

And, by the time I was finished and walking away to get a beer, I wasn’t sure if I’d won them over or not.

Most likely not seeing as I was ‘way too old’ according to Silas.

Silas, who himself was ‘way too old’ for his wife.

But whatever.

I wasn’t one to judge.

But, as I found the beer, and then meandered through the throng of women, children, and random dogs, I found myself steering clear of all the men. Which was how I found my way into a room where I could hear a piano playing.

I found the room and came to a halt in the doorway as I took it all in.

There was a large, open room with one single thing in it: a baby grand piano.

It looked like it cost a whack, too.

I’d never had anything as nice as that.

My father refused to buy me anything that I could possibly ruin. Not that I ruined anything. I feared for my life too much to ever do anything that could possibly draw his wrath.

So, I stayed silent, did what I was told, and played piano on the stupid piece of crap he’d found for me.

Then he’d put it into the garage, so he didn’t have to hear my ‘racket.’

I found myself wistful as I watched the girl play through her music, wincing every so often when she missed a note.

I stepped into the room and walked to the side, so I wouldn’t walk up directly behind her and scare her. This way she would see me coming, and maybe not freak out.

The girl looked up, grimaced, but kept playing.

She was about eight or so, and clearly unhappy to be playing.

She was tapping at the keys, face looking hard, as she tried to play the music on the sheet.

“This blows,” she said, slamming her hand down on the notes, making me grimace.

“Having problems?”

The little girl looked up at me, and I realized instantly who she belonged to based solely on how much she looked like the woman I’d just met—the one who’d opened the door. Tru.

“I suck,” she said. “This sucks. I hate this sucky piano. But I’m being forced to finish because I refused to do it earlier. And now this is my punishment.”

“Why?” I questioned, leaning a hip against the side of the piano.

My eyes trailed over the girl’s stubborn features.

“Because my mother is forcing me to play, and it sucks,” she said. “It’s too hard.”

“Is anything easy worth it?” I asked cautiously.

“Taking a nap is easy,” she said. “And naps are always worth it.”

She had me there.

My lips twitched.

“Scoot over.”

She frowned. “I don’t know you.”

I shrugged. “I don’t think I’d be in your house right now if I wasn’t a person that was supposed to be here.”

I mean, I had to pass by at least twenty fucking bikers to get in here…

She nodded. “Mommy wouldn’t have let you in.”

I agreed with a nod. That had been true, too. I’d been documented by no less than thirty women, too. Including this one’s mother.

“Fine, I’m Ashe,” she said, scooting over. “Do you know how to play?”

I tilted my head up and down once. “I do.”

“Then show me what you got, because I’m this,” she held up two fingers about a quarter inch apart. “Close to quitting. I might as well play soccer if it’s going to suck this bad.”

I would’ve held in the laugh if I could have.

But I couldn’t.

It just burst free before I could try to choke it back.

“I’m glad someone finds my life amusing,” she grumbled.

Apparently, the life of an eight-year-old forced to play the piano was not an easy one.

“I know you can’t hold your hands quite like I do yet, but when you get older, and with more practice, you’ll find that you can,” I said.

Then I proceeded to teach her the basics. Something in which she’d likely already learned if she was taking lessons as she said. But, you had to have a solid foundation to be able to build on it.

So that was where I started.

“Wow,” the girl breathed. “Can you play faster?”

I grinned. “Can I play faster?”

I then proceeded to play “Great Balls of Fire” by Jerry Lee Lewis and thoroughly impressed my student.

As well as the audience at my back that showed a few notes into the song.

***

Janie

My eyes followed Rafe’s progress around the room, and toward the sound of the piano playing, and I grinned.

“I know that look.”

I looked up to find Tru staring at me.

“What look?” I teased.

“The one where you look like your heart is walking around this room, and you want to go find it,” she said. “You look like you’re in love, honey.”

“I am,” I admitted. “But…I’ve always been in love. With him. At least for the last couple years since I could understand what love really was.”

“So, this is him.”

I looked over at Sebastian’s wife, Baylee, and grinned. “This is him.”

“He really is a lot older,” she surmised. “But he’s cute. And that graying thing he has going on is hot…just like mine. I swear to God; the first time Sebastian saw that gray in his beard he freaked. Your man looks like he rocks it, though.”

Rafe really did.

Though most of his hair was still jet black, a few bright and shiny strands at his temple and top of his head were coming out. His beard, though? Yeah, that thing was rocking the gray beard hairs like crazy.

It was hot as hell, I had to admit.

And there was something to be said for an older man seeing as Rafe knew exactly what to do…

“Older men are better, in my opinion,” Sawyer, my grandfather’s wife, said with a smile, echoing my thoughts. “They know how to do stuff more…efficiently.”

“Grosssssss,” my stepmother, Shiloh, cried. “I do not want to hear how efficient my father is!”

Everyone burst out laughing, as they always did when this came up.

“I agree,” Sebastian came up to Baylee’s back and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, pinning her to his body. “Where’s this Rafe character? I feel like he’s been gone too long. We didn’t scare him off, did we?”

I pointed in the direction I’d seen him go and then saw Sebastian’s eyes narrow.

“What’s he doing back there?”

“Bathroom?” I suggested teasingly.

“Hmm,” Sebastian grunted. “Guess we’ll have to check on him to make sure he didn’t fall in.”

Then he started to walk away while calling out for Torren in the next moment.

I sighed and started to follow, shaking my head at the two of them as they moved.

“Sometimes I wonder if y’all are actually grown men,” I called to their backs.

Torren threw a grin over his shoulder at me.

Then all words were halted when we arrived in the hallway to hear a little girl’s laughter, followed by Rafe’s deep worded reply to that laughter.

“What the fuck?”

Torren sped up and came to an abrupt halt at what he saw in the room.

Sebastian stopped shoulder to shoulder with him, and I had to squeeze through shoulders and arms to see, too.

And what I saw was quite honestly amazing.

Rafe was showing the little girl a few things with the piano. A note. I wasn’t sure because I had no clue what all that gibberish was about.

“Wow,” the girl breathed. “Can you play faster?”

Rafe grinned at the young girl. “Can I play faster?”

He put his fingers on the piano, and then he started to play.

The first notes of the song started, and I found myself smiling wide.

Sebastian threw his arm around my shoulder and pulled me into his big, warm body.

I laid my head against his chest and watched as my man taught a little girl how to play Great Balls of Fire on the piano. You know, if she could actually see it. His fingers were moving so fast that I wasn’t sure she was really even watching.

More like admiring.

Hell, we all were admiring.

“Where in the hell did that come from?” Torren, Ashe’s father, said as he watched his daughter admire the way Rafe was playing. “I need him to teach her every week. I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen her sit there without fidgeting in some way.”

“Or complaining,” Tru muttered from behind me. “God that girl. She was the one who wanted to play, too. It’s not like we forced her. We bought the piano…then she decided she’d rather play soccer instead.”

I shook my head.

“You can’t have him. We have him,” came my father’s reply.

I rolled my eyes again.

Were they seriously fighting over a man?

“I only need him once a week for about an hour and a half. That’s it.”

“You haven’t seen his computer skills, then.” Uncle Sam’s reply came from the back of the room. “Or the way he can find out information like Silas once did.”

Jesus, the entire hallway was filled with people!

“Like Silas still does, you mean,” Torren countered.

I rolled my eyes.

“Fifteen years of piano lessons,” Rafe said as he stood up and turned. “I sometimes play when I want to get rid of some of my frustration.”

I blinked.

“You never told me you could play the piano!”

I grinned at my sister Rebel’s outburst.

“He didn’t tell anyone, apparently,” I drawled.

Rafe rolled his eyes.

“Whatever.”

“Play something else,” I ordered.

“You’ll have to get a few beers in me, first,” he said. “Playing makes me think about old times, and old times aren’t always good times.”

I knew what he meant exactly.

And immediately grimaced at remembering just some of what he’d explained during the course of our relationship.