EPILOGUE
Peyton - 2 weeks
It was only a matter of time.
Before they all found out.
I really hadn't even been careful about it.
My car was parked at The Henchmen compound a few nights a week.
I was actually kind of shocked it took everyone this long to figure it out.
But there was no group of angry and concerned men at my door.
The information came as a phone call from Dusty.
"Ryan knows," she said, whispering because Ryan must have been in the apartment. "They're planning on having a talk with you on Sunday."
Then, the next afternoon, it was Helen blowing up my phone, insisting I bring Sugar with me to dinner.
"You'll be fine," I insisted when he seemed to go a little green at the idea.
"Says the one who isn't about to be castrated."
"They're really not that bad," I insisted, lying through my teeth. I imagined they could be exactly that bad if and when they wanted to be. "Besides, there will be all the girls on my side. Believe me, that is a formidable force of women. Helen especially. You'll be fine. And if you're not, you can just eat your feelings. American traditional tonight. All the stuffing, mashed potatoes, rolls, sweet potatoes, corn on the cob, and meat you can eat. Literally. She makes enough food for an entire army. Plus dessert." I didn't realize I made a moaning sound until he smiled at me.
"Always thinking with your stomach," he observed, knowing it was true. It was going to catch up with me someday. One day I would wake up and have the kind of metabolism that would make me gain ten pounds for looking at a donut. Until then, though, I was going to enjoy the one that let me stuff my face silly anytime I wanted, and only maybe left me with a teensy bit of padding that I needed to work off here and there.
"What are you doing?" I asked as he went into the closet. We hadn't even discussed it, but we had both moved a few basic items into each other's closets for situations such as these.
"Picking out something to wear," he said, sounding anxious about the prospect.
"What you're wearing is fine," I insisted to his clear insecurity on the matter. I imagined he'd never had a situation where he needed to meet a chick's family before. "All the guys will be in jeans and tees. Once in a while, Helen asks everyone to dress up, but not this week."
"You're in a dress," he pointed out, waving at my black and white checkered flirty 50's halter-top dress.
"I'm always in a dress," I said, shrugging it off. "Besides, this is a casual dress."
"Nothing casual about dresses, Peyt," he said, shaking his head.
"If you want to dress up a bit, go ahead. You have your funeral shirt here," I told him.
Yes, funeral shirt.
The only dressy item of clothing he owned was meant for the funerals of his buddies. That being said, it was a very nice matte black top. He'd worn it once when we had gone to Famiglia with Cy and Reese.
"But not the slacks," I added. "You'll feel too out of place if you go that dressy. Just the black jeans."
And with that, we put on our final touches, grabbed Hannibal so the kids could play with him, and headed out.
I realized in about one-point-two seconds of us walking into the house that while Ryan knew - and told all the others - that I was involved with Sugar, he did not know that I was bringing him to dinner.
One look at Helen said she was enjoying the hell out of the way that all the conversation in the living room stopped suddenly as the men one by one realized who was next to me, his hand at my lower back.
"Well, this is awkward," I said, nodding a little. "You're supposed to be on my side, woman," I declared to Helen.
"I'm on the side of what will be most interesting," she shot back, smirking at me.
"Traitor," I told her. "Alright, so... this is Sugar. Sugar, this is... well, everyone," I said, waving a hand out. "Sugar is expecting castration," I went on when all there was in there room was silence. "I would ask that you leave his..." I trailed off, seeing a few of the kids milling around, "funsicle alone. The rest is fair game."
"Gee, thanks, baby," Sugar snorted, giving my ass a slap.
"What? They feel the need to defend my nonexistent honor somehow. I just don't want them messing with the, ah, heat-seeking missile, that's all."
"Heat-seeking missile," Fee snorted.
"You're just mad you didn't come up with it," Lea shot back.
But I wasn't focused on them.
I was focused on Autumn who had broken away from Eli, and was making her way toward us, her eyes almost dreamy, thoughtful, as she looked at me, then Sugar, then the both of us as a whole.
"So you're the one," she said, smiling as she got in front of us.
"I'm the one," he agreed, hand giving my hip a squeeze that I somehow felt in my chest too.
I'd been feeling it a lot lately.
When I caught him watching me, when he pulled me onto his chest at night, when he ran his fingers through my hair, when he wrangled the remote away from me because he didn't like my choice in movies, when he disobeyed the car stereo rules, when he tossed me one of his offhand compliments, when he was sweet with Savea and sarcastic with Jamie, when I woke up to find he had already taken Hannibal out for me.
The heart squeeze.
I knew what it meant.
I should have been terrified.
I would have been just a few weeks before.
But, for some reason, that wasn't what I felt.
All I felt was a weird, warm, contentedness.
Because it wasn't scary.
It was new and foreign, but comfortable, something I actually looked forward to when it happened.
"She's a pain in the ass," Autumn declared.
"I know it," Sugar agreed.
"Hey!" I objected.
"But even so, I love her. And if you hurt her, I will pour honey on it and let rats eat it," she said with a beaming smile.
To his credit, Sugar just smiled back. "I have been warned."
"Well, then, welcome. Good luck with the boys," she added, grabbing my arm. "The ladies have to get the food plated," she explained as she pulled me away.
"Peyton," Lea scolded as I stuck my ear in the doorway to the living room, trying to overhear what was being said to Sugar. And I knew something was, because even above the sounds of the girls talking, I could hear the deep rumble of masculine voices from the other room. "Come and help. They aren't going to hurt him," she assured me.
"They just want to make sure he understands how things are here," Scotti explained.
"And he's a lifelong biker," Lea piped in. "He can handle it."
Ten minutes later, we brought the plates into the dining room, the men knowing the drill, so they all filed in and found their seats as we did so. Sugar hung back in the doorway, giving me a head-jerk, silently demanding I follow him into the other room.
I nearly dropped the heaping serving platter of green beans in my hurry to get across the room.
"We just talked to him," Shane told me as I rounded his side of the table.
"That had better be all you did," I warned, slapping the back of his head as I moved.
"Hey!" Rush exclaimed when I hit him too.
"I'm sure you weren't innocent either," I informed him as I finally made it to the doorway. "What did they say? I want to know everything," I demanded when we were alone in the living room.
Sugar shook his head at me. "They love you, Peyt."
"That isn't an answer," I pointed out.
"They love you, so they want to make sure I'm not dicking you around."
"Did you inform them that I, in fact, was the one dicking you around?"
"Told 'em that I knew I was in this almost from the beginning. And that you took some convincing."
"And?"
"And they had a good laugh at that. Apparently, baby, you got quite a reputation for being a royal pain in the ass. Even with your family."
"They were supposed to be threatening you!"
"Think they might realize that you are not the kind of woman to go into a relationship blind, that if you thought I was good enough, that I must be."
"There wasn't even a tiny threat?" I asked, feeling almost a little offended that they hadn't given him a talking to.
"I was informed that if my problems blow back on you, that I would be wishing Autumn had gotten her hands on me first."
"Well, good," I said with a nod.
"You wanted them to leash into me?"
"Maybe a little."
"Think you can handle yourself, Peyt," he said, pulling me against him by the hips. "And no one needs to threaten me to make me treat you right," he added, tilting my chin up so he could press his lips into mine.
"If you don't get your ass in here," Shane called, "I am taking the last of the rolls."
I pulled roughly away from Sugar, just barely remembering to grab his hand as I stalked into the dining room. "Like hell you are!"
Sugar - 2 months
"I'm coming," Peyton said, tone a little firm.
"Why?" I asked, head tipped to the side.
"Um, where do I start? She was a stripper, forger, clubwhore, addict, and has got to have the best of stories."
"And, you know, my mother," I supplied, smirking.
"Yeah, that too," she said, waving a hand at me as she dug through her snack cabinet.
I wasn't offended that her interest was more in her past than my relation to her. Especially since she had such a small hand in raising me. And I had no illusions about my ma and her past. She'd led a colorful life. She had it cleaned up before she had Dante, but it didn't erase all the shit she had done. Of course Peyton, with her like of all things non-conventional, would be into the idea of meeting her.
"Peyt, it's an hour drive," I said as she packed a literal armful of chips and candy onto the counter.
"Um, well, it's a road trip. And if you don't pack for it like a kid who was given free rein in a candy shop, you're fucking up."
"So, I'm guessing we are taking the truck," I said, making it clear her hearse was not an option. We took it when she was driving because she was attached to the damn thing, but I was not driving that thing myself.
"Well, I can't eat Cheetos on the bike," she said, throwing all the goodies into a bag. "And don't be eye-fucking my Kit-Kats. If you want some, bring your own," she warned.
"I think I will survive the one-hour drive without Kit-Kats," I told her, doing so with a smile because, well, this fucking woman.
"Okay. I am ready," she informed me, putting the straps of the bag on her shoulder.
There was no nervousness, no trepidation in her. Even though I knew for a fact she, like me, had never had a 'meet the family' introduction before. But, well, Peyton just didn't think about things that way. The 'will they like me' way. She was just herself no matter what. If you liked that, great. If you didn't, she was still going to keep on keeping on.
I think that was why most people liked her.
Self-assurance and that 'take me or leave me' vibe was contagious. It made everyone around her feel more sure of themselves in turn.
"Oh, and I have a special playlist!" she declared, so enthusiastic about it that I really should have been suspicious.
As it was, I didn't think twice.
So we got in the new - well, new to me - truck I had bought off Repo because the bike wasn't always an option... and neither was her hearse, and she plugged in the AUX cord.
Then I understood her excitement.
What was on that playlist, you might be wondering?
Pour Some Sugar on Me by Def Leppard
Sugar by Maroon 5.
Sugar on the Side by Blondie.
Sugar, We're Going Down by Fall Out Boy.
Sugar, Honey, Honey by The Archies.
The list went on and on and fucking on.
There were at least fifteen songs on the playlist.
And Peyton belted out every last one of them.
It was ridiculous, sure. But it was also kinda sweet if you thought about it. She actually sat down at her computer and fucking searched for songs with my name in the title. Even if she did it with the intent to fuck with me, it meant I was on her mind that much.
It was nice knowing that, knowing she thought about me like I thought about her even when we weren't around each other.
Her playlist started over again just as I was driving down the main road that led to my mother's house, and Peyton, never one to be quiet for too long, half-turned to me, biting into a Twizzler. "How is Reign holding up?" she asked, tone serious. She didn't do serious often, but after the shit blew up with V, and she was around to witness some of it, she knew this situation called for it.
"He's dealing. They're all... dealing," I said, shaking my head, not sure what they were going through. Shit got rough there, crazy. The blowback hit everyone hard, but Reign and his family the most.
I'd always viewed taking a life as an unfortunate part of our lifestyle, something to be done without emotion. Certainly not joy.
But knowing that vicious bitch was finally fucking dead?
Yeah, I was never so happy to learn about someone catching a bullet.
Even if I didn't see it.
I hadn't been there.
It wasn't my story.
Someone else would have to tell it.
"That was..." she trailed off, shaking her head, at a loss for words. And, yeah, Peyton was never at a loss for words.
"Some fucked up shit," I supplied for her, reaching over to give her thigh a squeeze.
"Yeah," she agreed, exhaling hard, then wiggling her shoulders, trying to shake it off. "Okay. So. Your mom. Is she going to be excited to see me?" she asked, but there was no worry there. Everything about her said she would make her happy to see her.
"You're about to see for yourself," I told her, pulling the car up to park outside a small white house.
They're all like five inches apart, Peyton had observed as we got into Staten Island. When you have even halfway decent sex, all the neighbors will know how many times you came.
That was true, too. There wasn't a lot of breathing room here. Street after street of house on top of house. But, for all intents and purposes, that was how the people there liked it. It fostered connections, made a community. At least that was what my ma claimed. I hadn't lived there enough as I got older to see that for myself.
I had barely gotten around the truck to put my hand at Peyton's lower back when the door burst open.
And out walked my mother.
Considering the rough life she had lived, Candy had aged well. She was still tall and thin with long, dark hair that she left down around her shoulders. There were some small smoker wrinkles around her lips, but other than that, she was holding up well.
Her eyes went to me first as she moved down the stairs that led up to the front door. "Seany baby!" she declared, arms spread somewhat dramatically. "And who is this?" she asked, eyes going to Peyton as she got to the last step.
"Peyton," Peyton supplied for herself.
"Peyton, you look like a smart girl," she started. "What are you doing with some outlaw biker?" she finished, giving a chin jerk over toward me.
"Getting him into all sorts of trouble," Peyton supplied, making my ma laugh, liking that.
"And you," she said, tone suddenly going all mom on me. "You don't tell me you're bringing your girl to dinner? What if I didn't make enough food?" she asked, whacking me upside the back of my neck.
"Ma, please, you made enough food for the entire fuckin' neighborhood."
"Is that any language to be using in front of your mother, you little shit?" she asked, beaming at me as she - hand to god - squeezed my goddamn face like I was still five-years-old. "Alright, let's get you two inside. Your brother needs a talking to," she added, turning and going up the steps.
"He always does," I agreed as we followed her.
Dante was just... young. And, as it often went when you were young, stupid. He wanted to be some badass, wanted to be, well, like me. For some reason, my ma thought I was the one who could talk some sense into him. She didn't see the hypocrisy there.
We walked right into the living room, the carpet red and dated, but clean. The furniture - floral printed and hideous - my mother's design tastes never graduated past the early 90s.
And there on the couch was Dante.
At eighteen, he looked like a mini version of me, albeit with different eyes, as his were a deep brown. He was tall, dark-haired, strong but not bulky, casually cocky. Really, with the bone structure, there was no denying we were brothers.
"'Ey!" he said, jumping up off the couch, reaching out to snag my hand, using it to pull me against his chest, slamming a hand down on my back. Overly friendly for me, but it was the way buddies around here greeted one another. "Sug, it's been forever, bro," he added as he moved a step back. "And you brought a girl," he said with a smirk, eyes moving over Peyton.
"Show some fuckin' respect," I growled, whacking him on the back of the neck the same way my mother did to me.
"Yeah, respect. That's what he needs," my ma agreed, standing there with a hand on her hip, ready to goad me on. "You know what he did last week?"
"No, Ma. What'd he do last week?" I asked, giving Peyton a small eye-roll, but only because I knew my ma couldn't see.
"He calls me at three a.m. from the police station, Sean. The fuckin' police station. Like I raised a goddamned delinquent."
My gaze went to Dante, brow up, waiting for an explanation as he threw himself back down on the couch. "Gonna explain yourself?" I asked, knowing he had no real father figure, so I was trying my best not to pat him on the back about his first stint behind bars. In my life, that shit had always been celebrated as a right of passage. But, I had to remind myself, I didn't want that life for Dante. So I needed to be the damn adult here.
"Nothin' to explain. She's overreacting."
"Dante..." I said, tone a little harsh, making him stiffen just a bit. But that just a bit let me know that he was still malleable, that there was still something to work with in him.
Then, well, this fuck just said the most Staten Island goddamn thing known to man.
"Real talk. So I was down by Mick's getting a slice, right? And this fuckin' stunad walks up and tries talkin' to me like he didn't deadass throw hands at me last weekend. Reminded him of that and he started fuckin' spazzin'. Shit got heated. That's it."
Dante had barely finished speaking when I could feel Peyton pulling at the corner of my shirt, trying to get my attention. When my head turned, I found her eyes dancing, her face fucking beaming.
I love them! she mouthed to me.
And so she did.
Peyton - 1 year
I didn't calm down, per se.
Some people had used that phrase.
Because I didn't actively seek out situations to flash or moon people. And didn't dance on bars anymore. And hadn't been to a rave in a while.
I hadn't calmed down.
I had settled into something else.
A slightly different life full of bikers and badass babes, on top of everyone else I was already always surrounded by. My days were always full-up between work and the gym and Sugar and time with friends. There just wasn't any time for the kind of shenanigans that got me locked up in the past.
Thought you'd moved out of town, Lloyd, a local detective, said when he saw me at She's Bean Around one morning. Haven't seen you in a cell for a while.
The funny thing was, I hadn't stopped doing illegal things. In fact, I likely did more illegal things than ever before. Owning a gun without a permit, shooting it within city limits, actually shooting someone.
I guess it was fair to say I simply got better at doing things that would normally have me in a cell.
But I damn sure hadn't calmed down.
Life had just shifted in a new direction.
And, what's more, I liked it.
I liked these new people, these new situations, this new less party-focused life I was leading.
Jamie had moved out, finding herself a permanent situation.
Savvs, well, let's just say that she found somewhere else to crash at night.
And Sugar, yeah, he moved in. We still had the room at the compound, and on nights when there were parties, barbecues, drinking games, we crashed there. But for the most part, he was here with me, demanding food for sex, helping me paint over the godawful neon green I had decided to paint my living room wall for some unknown reason, taking Hannibal for walks in the morning when he learned that I was inclined to throw things at him when he tried to wake me up early to do stuff.
The Mallicks and Rivers had, over a few months of Sunday dinners, taken a liking to Sugar, demanding stories about his life in the MCs, but only the other ones. Not The Henchmen. Because they were all somewhat allies, and they knew that what went down there wasn't their business. They liked that he had taught me to use a gun, that he had been the one to point me toward self-defense classes, that he had, in their minds, done what a man was supposed to do - protect his woman. And teach her to protect herself.
"If you do not have pizza with you, you can walk right back out that door," I called, not looking up from where I was bent over the coffee table working on a puzzle. Tame, I know. Except the puzzle was an orgy of all the Marvel and DC characters. Hulk had a really nice green cock, in case you were wondering.
"You didn't ask for pizza."
"And yet, you are not allowed in here without it."
"You're a fuckin' trip," he said, sounding like he was smiling. "I'll order it. But your ass is gonna have to wait for them to make it," he added, dropping down on the couch next to me, reaching for the penis pillow and tossing it onto the accent chair. He, like Jamie, just barely tolerated their presence in the apartment.
"I thought you didn't have to go to the compound today," I said, putting the pieces back on the table.
"Didn't."
I hated asking where he was. It felt like something nagging wives did. "Did something come up?" I tried instead.
"Yeah, baby, something came up."
My brows drew together as I raised my head, not sure why he was being so damn cryptic. But then I saw his sleeve rolled up on his shoulder, and a bandage covering half his arm.
"What'd you do now?" I asked, smiling, shaking my head.
"That's some real nice concern you got for me there," he said, knowing damn well I was not the 'wring my hands and tend to your boo-boos' kind of woman. "Nah. I went to see Hunt."
"Hunt?" I asked, brows drawing together. "As in... Hunter? Mallick?"
"Know any other Hunts?"
"But you always have Paine do your work," I said, shrugging. As far as I knew, people tended to be loyal to their tattoo artists. I was loyal to mine. Even though I had one in the family, I still kept going to my girl one town over.
"Figured Hunt would appreciate this one," he said, reaching up to snag the tape at a corner, so he could pull the gauze down and discard it.
And there it was.
A freaking mermaid.
Right there on his arm.
With my eyes, my hair, my piercings, my tattoos, my damn boob size.
He had branded himself for life with my likeness.
I knew it was supposed to be all about rings and ceremonies and crap like that. But to me, to us, this meant more. This meant life in a way that a ring that could be slipped off as easily as you slid it on meant.
"It was time," he said as I found myself uncharacteristically at a loss of words.
"Yeah," I agreed, pulling my leg up, resting my foot on the couch cushion. "I agree," I said, reaching to pull off my sock.
I had been getting away with socks.
It was winter.
I took to wearing high heeled combat boots instead of my usual stilettos. I had claimed my feet were cold when he got me completely naked.
Because I wanted it to be a surprise.
I wanted it to heal.
And then show it off at the right moment.
The moment didn't get any righter than this.
So off went my sock.
Down went his gaze to the inside of my ankle.
And then his head threw back, a laugh rolling through him.
"Get it?" I asked, looking down at the little bag of sugar with wings attached. "It's Sugar and it can fly."
"Jesus Christ," he said, reaching to slam an arm down on my shoulders, pulling me closer, pressing his lips into my head. "I fuckin' love you, Peyt," he said, the words easy.
And, with him, they were easy for me too.
"I love you too, Suga Suga..."
He cut me off with a kiss before I could finish singing the song.
XX