I get her out of the shower, dried off, then carry her back to her bed. Her mom brought a fuzzy pair of pajamas that don’t get in the way of her IVs, and I made sure they grabbed her favorite socks, which I put on her before tucking her back in. “Sit by me?” she asks. I look at the bed and then at her.

“Not sure there’s enough room.” I’m not huge per se, but that hospital bed barely looks big enough to hold her, let alone me. Making my decision, I pick her back up and sit her in my lap, pulling a blanket across the two of us so she doesn’t get chilled. “There, this’ll work,” I tell her, gently brushing her hair back from her face. Fuck! Her hair’s still wet! “Hang on, we need to dry your hair, baby.”

Her look is incredulous. Kind of a cross between laughter and a pout. “Just braid what’s left of it, Talon. I can tell it’s shorter on one side so it won’t take long to dry, and you said we had to talk.” She taught me to braid her hair when we first got together, every once in a while she’ll ask me to do it for her, and it always makes me think back to the first time.

“Talon,” she calls my name as we’re sitting on her parent’s couch watching a rom-com. Don’t ask me the name because I lost interest a long time ago.

“Yeah, baby,” I respond.

“My hair is in my eyes, could you braid it for me?”

“Do what now? I don’t know how to do that shit, Claree,” and I don’t, my mom does that shit for my sisters.

“It’s easy, I’ll teach you!” she exclaims, jumping up off the couch and running towards Shelby’s room. She comes back out with one of her sister’s dolls in one hand and a brush and hair ties in the other. “You can watch me and do mine while I do the doll’s.” I hold back rolling my eyes, because if my friends could see me now, I’d lose my street cred.

“When I said I’d do anything for you, I didn’t mean your hair,” I tell her.

“Chill out, Talon. No one has to ever know that you do this for me. Plus, it would mean the world to me if you did this,” she says as she gives me those puppy dog eyes that get me every time.

“Fine, how are we going to do this?” I question.

She plops down between my spread legs and brushes her hair. “Okay so we have to split it in three sections….” step by step, I learn to braid hair. It’s not as neat as hers, but I think I did a pretty damn good job if I say so myself. She leans back into my arms and lays the doll down. “Thank you, now you can practice and eventually I won’t have to give you instructions,” she teases me.

“I don’t mind instructions,” I say nipping at her earlobe.

“I’ll remember that,” she breathlessly replies. About that time, I hear Chief coming down the stairs, and practically throw her out of my lap, and next to me on the couch. I grab a pillow and throw it over my ever growing hard on.

“Remember the first time I braided your hair?” I ask her.

“I remember, I also recall being thrown through the air,” she jokingly replies.

“Hey now, your dad scared the shit outta me back then.”

“He still does, Talon.”

I scoff at her words. “Naw, I just let him think that, baby. He stopped scaring me years ago when I realized his bark was worse than his bite.”

“Keep telling yourself that, handsome. I’m positive he knows ways to make life painful.” I instinctively grab my junk, that seems to be what he threatens the most when it comes to me. He’s also threatened to scalp me a time or two, but I doubt that Trinity would let him do any permanent harm...at least I hope that’s the case. I’m sure if he did attempt to hurt me, my mom would get her handy pliers out and scare the shit out of him before he had the chance to complete the job. My mom is still the running joke of the club, she threatens to pull them from her purse and the men suddenly become pliant and act accordingly, my siblings, Dad and I are no exception to those threats.

So yeah, I know he does. We’re not that kind of club, but Chief could put a world of hurt on folks if he wanted to, that’s for sure. I mean, thinking about what ‘happened’ to the officers who were on the take is enough to make me cringe. How five men managed to ‘fall’ down a flight of stairs is beyond me. I suspect they met the business end of his, and a few others’ fists. At least the department is clean now, and that’s the most important thing of all.

“Think of it this way, if this little one,” she says, rubbing her belly, “is a girl, you’ll already be an expert at braiding her hair.”

“Oh, hell to the no! No girls, nope, ain’t happening!” I can’t imagine having a daughter who looks like my wife, I’d have to keep a handgun on me at all times and have several shotguns lined up on the coffee table when she’d bring over boys...you know, that would be the time that they would all need cleaning and shit.

“Ah, baby, Steel needs a little sister to grow up and protect!” Fuck, she’s trying to make me bald and crazy at the same time.

“No, he doesn’t. Someday, he’ll have an old lady that he can protect,” I reply, pulling her close. “No girls, Claree, I mean it,” I state emphatically. “I don’t know how our dads do it,” I state.

“It’s not easy, they end up with punks like you,” Chief says, entering the door.

“Whatever, I’m a joy and you know it,” I tell him, ruffling his feathers.

“Joy? Ha!” he squints his eyes, “more like the devil who swooped in and stole my little girl from me.” I roll my eyes, because he’s a little dramatic when it comes to his girls.

“Dad, if you thought Mom would’ve allowed it, you would have sent me to a convent,” Claree says. “Hell, I’m still concerned about Shelby and Cora and their future where dating and boys are concerned.”

“Your mother won’t let me. Said something about we’d have to convert to Catholicism for them to be allowed at a convent. Since we’ve never really been church-goers, that went off the table already. As for dating, your sisters can date when I’m ninety and have lost my mind.”

“Turk! Are you talking about hiding our girls again?” Trinity asks, coming in behind him.

“Nope,” he says, popping his ‘p’, “mainly because you won’t let me. But, Mom has said the girls could come stay at the reservation.” The hopefulness in his eyes has me laughing so hard I nearly fall out of the bed with Claree still wrapped in my arms.

“Not happening,” Trinity growls out at him, “mainly, because you’d love nothing better than to tuck them away while they learn pottery and stitching. Fuck that, my girls are not going to be made to hide from the world.”

“It’s not the world I want to hide them from, it’s the prepubescent boys with one thing on their minds I want to keep them from. Those fuckers are nothing but trouble, look at what Claree brought home!” he says, placing his hands on his hips, and having a stare off with her.

Claree gets a look on her face and I brace for what she’s about to say. “Mom? We can set up dating profiles for them when they’re old enough and approve the candidates beforehand.”

“Claree!” Chief growls out, “watch it, little girl, I may not be able to take it out on you, but your man is the exception to that rule. Keep it up, and he’ll pay the ultimate price for your mouth.”

“Hey now, what the fuck did I do?” I question, just as Mom comes walking into the room. Seeing the stand-off, she glares at Chief, smiles at Trinity and my woman, then walks closer.

“What’s going on?” she asks. I hear how soft the tone is, but my mom’s tones are deceptive at best.

“Oh, Turk’s running off at the mouth again,” Trinity states, raising her brow at him.

“Do I need to pull out my pliers?” Mom asks, pulling her purse off her shoulder and opening it. “You know, it’s been awhile since they’ve been used, I think they’re lonely, Chief, would you like to give them a work out?”

“Hell no, woman, you’re dangerous!” he hollers at her, eyes wide. “Shouldn’t you be home killing someone off in one of your stories?”

“You know what? That’s a good idea, how about I make you my victim?”

Deciding that the three parents need to leave, I look at each of them and say, “Was just about to talk to Claree and tell her all the news. We need some time.”

Chief sits in the other chair and says, “Go on, not stopping you.”

“Really, Dad? Do I sit in on yours and Mom’s conversations?” Claree asks.

“Not sure you’d want to,” Trinity mutters, “our ‘talks’ always end up in bed.”

“Mom! Really? Eww,” Claree shudders. “Need bleach, Talon. That’s something you just can’t unhear and not visualize, uck!”

“How do you think the other kids arrived?” my mom asks.

“The stork?” Claree asks. Her voice sounds so hopeful I have to bite my cheek to hold back a laugh.

“Nope. Plain old-fashioned sex,” Mom replies. Great, now I’ve got that visual in my head of her and Dad.

“Mom! Come on!” I call out in disgust. “Knowing it, and hearing it, are two totally different things. Can you all please leave so I can talk to my woman in private? I said please, but I meant it as a command. Go!”

“Well, aren’t you the mouthy little alpha?” Mom questions. “I like it!” She gathers her things to get ready to leave. She kisses me and Claree on the heads and goes to walk out the door. She stands there with her hand on the handle, looks at Chief and Trinity and asks, “Well?”

“Fine, whatever,” Chief mutters under his breath, while grabbing Trinity’s hand. They say their farewells and finally it’s just me and my girl.

“Well, that was interesting. Why were they here again?” I ask her.

“To be nosey,” she answers. “What did we need to talk about, Talon?” I can hear the worry in her tone and run my hands along her sides to soothe her.

“Nothing bad, baby. In fact, it’s so fucking fantastic, I’m still trying to wrap my brain around it all. Let’s see, where do I start? Okay, first of all, when I went from a prospect to a patched member, my pay didn’t change, so they’ve fixed that and made it retroactive. Cara already did a direct deposit that not only catches my pay up, but also the monies from the businesses that I wasn’t getting.”

“Are you kidding? Holy shit, that’s a lot of money, isn’t it? So, does this mean you won’t have to work as much anymore and will be home more often?”

“Yep, for starters. And I need to decide which business I want to focus on, so that’s something to think about as well. Also, your folks paid the rest of your tuition off and also paid for everything we’d already put out for your schooling.” When I tell her this, she scrunches her nose up in thought, but doesn’t interrupt me. “Your mom apologized, saying that they should have done it long ago since they had planned to pay for you to go to school in the first place.”

“How...how much, Talon?”

“No clue, I haven’t looked at the numbers. I just know that it’s enough that we’ll finally be in the green, and be able to live, not just exist.”

“Holy shit! We’ll be able to save and buy things for this little one and get Steel some more clothes, he’s growing like a weed and I’ve been meaning to go get him a new pair of shoes but haven’t had the time.”

“There’s more, baby.” I hate interrupting her thoughts, but I need to get it all out and in the open.

“More? Hell, at this rate, I’ll need oxygen again,” she teases.

“You know where we always dreamed of building our home?” I ask.

“Yeah.”

“Axe deeded that land to us. Capone and Jaxson will get with us to build our dream house, covered by the club.”

“Am I dreaming?” she asks out loud.

“Maybe, if so I’m there with you. All of our dreams are going to come true, Claree. You, me and our kids, we’ll be able to put down roots and finally not struggle from paycheck to paycheck. I’d like to take us on a family vacation, I think we deserve it,” I tell her.

“Can we go to the beach?”

“Wherever you want. Let’s get you outta here first, okay?”

We stay curled up with one another, talking about our new future, until she dozes off in my arms. I’m one lucky motherfucker, that’s for sure. I nearly lost it all, only to have it come back tenfold and then some. That ring I’ve been looking at, that I can now afford to get, is something I’ll be getting as soon as she’s discharged. It’s about time I make her my wife and not just my old lady.