Stella groaned as she swam up out of sleep for the second time that morning. The sex had been incredible, but with less than four hours sleep, she felt like warmed over death. Thank God the romp this morning had been a quickie that had only last a half-hour or so. She didn’t know how she was going to make it through the day already, and if they’d spent a couple hours fucking their brains out this morning, she would probably end up face down in batter.

 

She was splayed across Gabriel, his hand laying comfortably on her back, his other on her arm. She felt a peace and contentment like she hadn’t for as long as she could remember. Part of it might be the fact that she’d climaxed more in the past six hours than she in the past two or three months, but part of it was also the comfort of being back in Gabriel’s arms.

 

She was amazed how quickly she’d become comfortable with him, as if he’d been gone for weeks, not years. Her feelings for him had bubbled up from the depths, dimmed and tarnished, but still there. Even after what he’d done to her, and his four year absence, she felt more for him than she did Tony, or any man since he’d left.

 

She yawned and stretched, her movement waking him. “Good morning,” he breathed, not opening his eyes.

 

“I have to get up,” she murmured but made no move.

 

“I know. I have to go, too.” He was still a quiet for a moment, the moved to kiss her. “I enjoyed last night and this morning…and thank you for telling me.”

 

“Do you want to see Katrina?” she asked quietly.

 

“Can I?”

 

“I’m going to go see her before work. You can go with me.”

 

“What about Connie? Are you sure she’ll want me around after what I did?”

 

Stella paused as she thought. “I think she’ll forgive you since I have. Everyone makes mistakes. She tried to get me to call you when I found out about Katrina.” She shrugged. “I should have listened.”

 

“You should have, if for no other reason than I could have helped support her. I would have done the right thing.”

 

She smiled. “I believe you.” She gave him a quick kiss then sat up before she decided to call in sick to stay in bed all day. “I have to shower and try to wake up.”

 

He nodded. “I have something to do today, but I’ll see you tonight?”

 

“You’d better,” she murmured as she staggered to her feet.

 

As she showered he dug around in her kitchen. He didn’t cook, but peeled her an orange and poured breakfast cereal into a bowl while the coffee maker earned its keep.

 

She stepped out of the bedroom dressed in her store uniform, the most beautiful women he’d ever seen. She smiled as he handed her a cup of coffee with a splash of milk.

 

“Thank you,” she sighed as the tasted it. He had it almost right with the milk but had forgotten the sugar. As he poured milk over the cereal she added a couple of spoons to her coffee.

 

“Mind if I hop in the shower?” he asked.

 

“No, but you’re not going to eat breakfast?”

 

“No. I’ll grab something later.”

 

She shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

 

When she stepped into the bath a few minutes later, he was out of the shower, standing at the sink brushing his teeth with his finger. She smiled as she walked up behind him and reached around to caress his manhood softly. He immediately began to stiffen and her smile widened. He certainly wasn’t a one and done, and despite her promise to herself she was going to take it slow with him, she was looking forward to Sunday afternoon, when she didn’t have to be back at work until eleven o’clock Tuesday morning. She was going to wear his ass out and find out just how many times he could fuck her in forty-eight hours.

 

“Looks like somebody is ready to go,” she purred as she kissed his back.

 

He didn’t say anything as his finger worked on his teeth. He finished and spat toothpaste into the sink before rinsing his mouth. “You keep that up, somebody else had better be ready to go,” he teased with a smile.

 

“Is that so?”

 

He turned and pulled her in tight as he stared into her eyes. “Count on it.”

 

She quickly kissed him with a giggle, feeling his pull again, then wriggled out of his arms. “Later. You need to get dressed if you want to meet Katrina.

 

He smiled and ran a hand over his face, chin and neck then scowled. He was a bit scruffy, but for some reason it looked good on him. Most of the bikers she saw at the diner, including those from the Iron Kings, had the bad boy look down to an art. While Gabriel had the same swaggering self-confidence and ripped and toned body as a lot of bikers, he was clean cut, clean shaven and minus the tattoos. That suited her fine as she preferred men with short hair and little to no body art. Especially when they looked like Gabriel.

 

“You look fine,” she said, reading his mind. “Katrina probably won’t let you pick her up anyway. It takes her a little while to warm up to new people.”

 

He nodded, then stepped around her and into the bedroom where he picked up his clothes and began to dress. “I’ll follow on my bike, if that’s okay. I’ll leave straight from Connie’s.”

 

“What have you got to do today, if you don’t mind my asking?”

 

“I have to ride to Charleston and pick up a few things for the club. The entire club is going.”

 

“But you’ll be back this evening?” She didn’t own him, but for reasons she couldn’t explain, she didn’t want him spending the night in Charleston.

 

“Absolutely,” he replied as she slipped his feet into his boots. “It’s a quick down and back. We should be back by six, seven o’clock at the latest. I’ll see you at the diner tonight.”

 

She nodded and smiled, relieved. “Good.”

 

“I’m ready,” he said as he stood. He looked a bit rumpled, wearing the same clothes he wore yesterday, but he couldn’t help that. He would stop for a quick change before he joined his brothers.

 

***

 

He opened the car door for her, being on his best manners, then pulled her into a quick kiss before she settled into her car. He trotted to his bike, his ass getting wet as he sat on the dew-covered seat. Normally he would have wiped it dry with a towel first, but he wasn’t home and he didn’t have time.

 

He followed her to Connie’s. He couldn’t have found the small house on his own, but as he followed her, he recognized landmarks here and there. He’d been to Connie’s house a few times with Stella, and she had always been welcoming, but he steeled himself to accept whatever abuse she heaped on him without comment. He didn’t need her approval, and he wouldn’t damage his chances with Stella by being anything other than the perfect southern gentleman, no matter how nasty she got.

 

As Stella turned into the drive, he recognized the house. Nothing had changed in the four years since he’d been here last. Even the car in the carport was the same, a white 2005 Buick LeSabre Limited. He parked behind Stella’s car and stepped off. He knew it was ridiculous, but he was actually tentative about meeting Stella’s grandmother. She knew Stella and her mother didn’t get along well after her father had died, so it was Connie he had to win over.

 

“Don’t be nervous,” Stella teased as she opened the door to Connie’s house.

 

“Does it show?”

 

“Only a little. Grammy! We have company!”

 

Connie Hayes appeared in the kitchen then froze, her eye fixed on Gabriel. He could tell she recognized him, but hadn’t yet put together where she knew him from, then he saw recognition dawn and her face hardened.

 

“Gabriel?”

 

“Yes, ma’am.”

 

“He’s come to see Katrina.”

 

Connie’s eyes flicked to her granddaughter then back to Gabriel. “You told him?”

 

“Last night.”

 

She seemed to be waiting for him to say something.

 

“I’m glad she did. I’d have never left if I’d known,” he said softly.

 

“Easy for you to say now.”

 

That stung, but he refused to bite back at her. “I made a terrible mistake, I know that, but I want to try to make it right.”

 

Connie watched him a moment then softened. The fact he was here to see his daughter and admitting he’d made a mistake tempered her attitude toward him, and it wasn’t his fault he hadn’t been involved with Katrina. “I think there were plenty of mistakes to go around,” she said, looking at Stella.

 

He could sense there was some hidden meaning in the comment, but he didn’t know what. “That’s behind us now. The important thing is I want to do what’s best for Katrina. If that means staying away…” He paused and he could feel the wetness in his eyes. “…then I’ll stay away. But she’s my daughter, too, and I want to help however I can, even if it’s just financial. I don’t like Stella working two jobs.”

 

“I can’t make my car payment along with everything else from what I make at the store,” Stella said.

 

“I’ll finish paying off your car. I want you to turn in your notice, tonight.”

 

“I’m not asking you to do that! You can’t come in here and start ordering me around,” Stella snapped.

 

“I’m not ordering you,” he said softly. “If I pay off your car, there’s no reason for you to keep working. It’s for Katrina. Getting off at midnight then having to drag her home in the middle of the night? What kind of life is that? She needs her mother at home at a reasonable hour.”

 

Stella looked to Connie. “He has a point,” Connie said, holding her eyes.

 

“Let me help you, Stella,” he said softly. “You and Connie have managed alone these past four years, but you don’t have to do that anymore. I can help. I want to help. I want to be part of Katrina’s life. I want her to know her father.”

 

Stella looked between Gabriel and Grammy, then smiled. “Thank you.”

 

He smiled softly. “May I see her?”

 

“She’s still sleeping, but I was about to wake her up,” Connie said.

 

“I’ll get her,” Stella said as she moved out of the kitchen and deeper into the house.

 

After she was out of the room, Connie turned to Gabriel. “Why’d you come back?”

 

He didn’t know if Connie knew about the Iron Kings, so he decided to gloss over the details. “I was transferred from Charleston to Greenfield.”

 

“You’re working steady now?”

 

He smiled. “Yes. I work as a bond runner. I track down fugitives who skip out on bail, place them in custody, and return them for trial.”

 

“You’re a cop?”

 

“No, not exactly. I’m only licensed to track down people who try to evade trial.”

 

“That the only reason you came back?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“I don’t want to see my granddaughter’s heart broken again.”

 

“No, ma’am. I made that mistake once. I won’t make it again. Leaving her was the worst decision of my life and I have regretted it ever since.”

 

“Why didn’t you come back before, then?”

 

He smiled slightly. “Stupid. Then I didn’t want to hurt her again.”

 

Connie looked at him. He was obviously on his best behavior, as he’d always been when around her, but something was different about him. He seemed more comfortable in his skin than she remembered.

 

“Katrina, can you say hello to Mr. Gabriel?” Stella asked as she carried the bed-tousled little girl into the room.

 

Katrina turned away and buried her face in Stella’s shoulder, but not before Gabriel could see she had her mother’s coloring, large eyes and round face. Even though he’d only gotten a glance, he thought she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

 

“She beautiful,” he breathed. He didn’t know the first thing about kids, but he wanted to hold her so badly he could barely contain himself. “Hello, Katrina,” he said softly.

 

“Can you say hello?” Stella asked, giving Katrina a little bounce, then grinned at Gabriel. “Give her a little time. She’s still half asleep, and like I said, she’s slow to warm up to strangers.”

 

He nodded. “I understand,” he said quietly.

 

Connie watched Gabriel and was amazed to see his eyes glisten with tears.

 

***

 

Gabriel spent the next hour trying to win over Katrina. When he could delay no longer and had to leave to meet his brothers, Katrina would answer direct questions, but kept her distance from him and wouldn’t engage in conversation with him, but he considered it progress and remained hopeful. He’d desperately wanted to kiss Stella goodbye, and would have had she stepped outside with him, but he wasn’t ready to kiss her in front of Connie. He felt like he’d made progress there, as well, and was treading carefully.

 

He’d roared into the parking lot of the clubhouse scant minutes before they were scheduled to hit the road. “I thought you weren’t going to make it,” Doc said as they stepped out of the clubhouse.

 

By the time he’s stopped by his apartment to throw on clean clothes and filled his Harley with gas, he had cut the arrival time fine. “Had things to do this morning. But I’m ready to ride.”

 

The men mounted up and their bikes barked to life. They pulled out of the clubhouse on a wave of thunder, and headed east and south on I-26. None of the brothers wanted to spend the entire day on the road so they hammered the bikes, riding ten to fifteen miles per hour over the posted speed limit of seventy.

 

The trip was a fast round trip to pick up the seed money for the club. The Greenfield chapter was receiving the one hundred grand as a loan from the mother chapter to giving them operating capital until they could get on their feet. Beginning next month, they would start paying it back at $2,100 a month for the next forty-eight months.

 

They were in the Charleston clubhouse less than a half-hour before the wheels of their bikes were rolling west, back along I-26, though they stuck much closer to the posted speed limits on the return trip. None of them wanted to try to explain to a cop why they were carrying one thousand dollars in cash, each $10,000 bundle neatly bound with its mustard colored currency strap.

 

The trip back to Greenfield was as uneventful as the trip to Charleston, and they rolled into the clubhouse a bit before seven. They gathered the money from the hogs and counted it quietly on one of the work tables in the room. Tony was still there, working around the bar that had been installed while they were gone, and they didn’t want to call attention to what they were doing.

 

Everyone agreed the money was all accounted for, and as Tony approached, Royal placed the bundles of cash in the safe and swung the heavy door shut, twisted the locking mechanism handle, spun the combination dial, then removed the key.

 

“I didn’t know you guys were opening a bank,” Tony teased as the door swung shut on the safe.

 

Doc smiled. “We operate strictly on cash. If we can’t pay cash for it, we can’t afford it.”

 

Tony snorted. “You’d be surprised how rare that is. I have your first bill ready for the work that has been completed.”

 

“Let me see it,” Doc said, holding out his hand.

 

“Hang on, I’ll have to get it from the truck.” He stepped out, returning a moment later with an itemized bill. “This includes all the electrical and plumbing upgrades, and the work I’ve done through yesterday.”

 

Doc scanned down the list. “How are we on the budget?”

 

“A little over, but not bad. The plumbing was going to be the big hitter in the first bill, and it was. Of the $4,850, $3,600 is plumbing, as you can see.”

 

Doc nodded. “We’ll give you five grand, and you can just credit the overage to our next bill, okay?”

 

Tony chuckled. “Hey, that works great for me! Nobody ever pays in advance.”

 

Doc nodded at Royal. “Get it for him.”

 

Royal opened the safe, making sure his body blocked the combination, and pulled one hundred dollar bills from one of the bundles. He reclosed the safe, locked it, then counted the fifty bills into Tony’s hand.

 

Tony smiled then folded the money into his pocket and scrawled Paid on the bill before shaking both Royal and Doc’s hands. “Been a pleasure doing business with you. I’m going to finish trimming the bar before I leave tonight because the sheetrockers are supposed to start tomorrow. I don’t want to be in their way, and I don’t want to have to keep running outside to cut trim.”

 

Doc grinned as he looked over the gleaming bar. “Make sense,” he said as he dragged his fingers over the finely polished top. “It looks great.”

 

Tony nodded. “Yeah, it does. Wait until the mirror, cabinets and shelving goes up, then it will really pop.”

 

“Doc, I need to go if we’re done here,” Royal said.

 

“Safe locked?”

 

“Yeah, but I’ll check it on the way out.”

 

“See you tomorrow, brother.”

 

“Tomorrow.”

 

Royal walked out, the rest of the Iron Kings not far behind him, leaving Tony to return to his work. It took him almost two more hours to finish the trim around the bar, and as he flipped the lights off on his way out, he wondered just how much money they had placed in the safe.