Masked & Miserable: A Novella of the Sacred Hearts MC (Book 3.5) (8 page)

Disney…

It was quiet and dark and about a week after me becoming a
fully patched member of the Sacred Hearts. I lay in Aaron’s bed, his head on my
chest, listening to him breathe and felt contentment swallow me whole. Life was
good. Really good. The club was doing well adjusting to having me and Aaron
together and there were only a few looks of discomfort and only one of the out
of town members had left stating he couldn’t handle watching two dudes hold
hands. As soon as the door had shut behind him Dragon had turned to Data who
wordlessly had gone for his media room.

No one even seemed phased by the dude leaving and no one had
spoken on it since. Aaron and I hadn’t changed a god damned thing about how
affectionate we were with each other. If anything the more comfortable we grew
with the guys and the more comfortable they grew with us the more Aaron and I
sharing a kiss or a swat on the ass seemed to be commonplace, phasing no one in
the slightest.

Ashton and the rest of the women had immediately adopted Aaron
as one of the Old Ladies. Some conversations had taken place and some ground
rules had been established and I think once that had happened and some of the
mystery had been taken out of things the more things seemed to dovetail with
one another nicely.

It had been agreed upon that Aaron was firmly in with the
Old Ladies and was for all intents and purposes the girl of the relationship
when it came to the club and club business. We decided we’d worry about the
finer points when it came to how we interacted with other clubs later. While we
could give a fuck about what the Suicide Kings thought, we weren’t entirely
sure how to go about things when it came to getting together with other
outfits. For the most part this was okay. My relationship status was breaking
new ground for the club and we were kind of the pioneers on how this would
work. Playing it by ear was just how it was going to be and we were all okay
with that for now.

“What are you thinking about?” Aaron asked quietly and I
startled a bit, I thought he had been asleep.

“Just about how we’re forging new ground as a club, but
mostly about how amazing you’re being with putting up with all of this while we
figure out how things work,” I told him. He shifted and turned onto his
stomach, resting an arm across my chest, his chin on his arm. He peered at me
through the deep gloom of the fall night and I smiled knowing damned well he
couldn’t really see me for shit without his glasses. I reached out to the side
table where they rested and plucked them off the tabletop and slid them onto
his face for him. His lips curled into a little appreciative smile and not for
the first time I was struck by just how damned beautiful he was.

“Andy…” he started then let out a breath… searching for
where to start. I raised my eyebrows, amused and smiled patiently waiting for
him to continue. “I first saw you and I thought, ‘Wow, this guy isn’t afraid of
what people think of him!’” He swallowed, “I didn’t realize how all the colors
and images were a diversionary tactic, that you were making it so people
wouldn’t look too closely.” I blinked. I’d never thought of it that way before
but what he said made sense.

“I never thought of it that way before,” I said honestly,
speaking my thoughts.

“When I saw you it was instant attraction and the more I get
to know you, the more, I don’t know, content? No, the happier I am. We’re like two
peas in a pod it feels like.” He smiled and I felt my lips curve as I watched
his.

“I’m comfortable with you too, you came at just the right time
and changed everything for the better and I can’t tell you…” I was interrupted
by my phone vibrating across the bedside table. We both looked at it and with a
little sigh of impatience I picked it up. It was Revelator and there was no
telling what he was calling for so with a gusty sigh I raised my eyebrows at
Aaron. He smiled a little broader and told me to answer it so I did.

“Hello?”

“You near the shop?” Rev asked by way of greeting and he
sounded fucking irritated. I knew the feeling.

“I’m at Aaron’s, so yeah why?” I asked.

“Fucking alarm, go check it out?” he asked. I felt my frown
ease and glanced at Aaron who was already moving off of me.

“Yeah,” I grunted. I couldn’t bitch, Zander had checked it
out the last couple of times.

“Thanks kid,” he hung up.

“Wonder what crawled up his ass and died,” I mused aloud.
Aaron shrugged. I pulled on my discarded leather pants and pulled on the black
button down shirt, doing it up right quick. I’d taken Aaron on a ride after I’d
gotten off work and we’d dressed for the road and for the chill but also to
look nice enough if we’d decided to go out to dinner or stop at a club which
yeah, hadn’t happened. We’d come straight back here for another rousing round
of extremely hot sex.

Aaron held out my jacket and cut and I shrugged into them
and zipped up, pulling on my gloves. He held out my helmet and leaned in for a
kiss like some dutiful housewife. We hadn’t even needed to speak. I marveled at
him, not for the first time, and kissed him fiercely.

“Hurry home, I’ve been sleeping better with you in my bed
than without,” he said gently. I gave him a crooked grin.

“Should only be twenty minutes, tops. I go, I clear the
alarm, call the company and bitch and come back,” I kissed him one more time
quickly and plucked the helmet from his long fingered hands. He closed the door
quickly behind me against the pervasive autumn chill and I huffed out a breath,
watching it plume in the damp night air.

It’d been raining, the ground having that slick wet sheen
from it, and the clouds still hung overhead but thankfully, the rain had
stopped falling so I wouldn’t be getting soaked. Aaron and I had made it back
to his place just as the first fat drops of rain had started to pelt us. We’d
stashed my bike underneath the stairwell and I put my weight behind pulling her
out now. I rolled her down the short cement walkway and out from under the apartment
building’s eaves onto the glimmering blacktop of the back parking lot.

It was a short ride to the shop and I had a sinking feeling
in my chest the moment I pulled up into the lot. The alarm was blaring loudly
into the night, too loudly, because the front window to the shop had a gaping
hole in it, the glass ragged and angry where a brick or something had been
thrown through it. I stopped my bike and got off, pulling my cell from my
pocket. I turned my back on the shop and plugged my opposite ear with my gloved
finger while the call rang through to Zander.

“Yeah?” he asked.

“Hey boss, it’s something this time. The front window’s been
busted out and…” I didn’t get to finish my sentence. The world erupted into a
cacophony of light and I was thrown forward onto my face. The lip of my German
style helmet connected with the gritty asphalt a fraction of a second before my
cheek did. My hand spasmed around the phone in a crushing grip as I felt my
face slide forward across the rough ground. I couldn’t hear, I couldn’t really
see, my vision blurring and I had no fucking idea what had just happened.

I lay there on my stomach, stunned, my face scraped raw on
the ground, a burning sensation in the back of my right thigh. I blinked and
tried to drag some air into my lungs, the breath knocked clean out of me. I
think the rain had started to fall again. Big fat drops with some real
substance pelted the back of my jacket and cut. The heel of my left hand burned
from a raw scrape but my wrist, my wrist was a deep, sharp, grinding pain that
made me gasp.

My hearing came back in stages, my sight recovering much
faster. I tried to push myself up but I was just so disoriented. Bits of paper
and charred wood and things were pelting the ground around me. I blinked,
confused as one of the burning pieces of paper landed inches from my nose. I
blinked and focused on a playing card, the edges blackening and curling, flame
licking along the image of the King of Hearts… The Suicide King. I groaned and
shook my head and tried to drag myself to my feet again. I could hear sirens in
the distance and the steady even thump of my heart.

No. Not my heart. The steady even thump of booted feet,
growing closer. I turned my head and blinked at a pair of black motorcycle
boots and frayed light denim before one of the feet drew back and flew forward,
I threw my arms in front of my face just in time, the kick skidded off my
forearm which was the one I’d hurt in my fall. Agony licked through my wrist
and the boot glanced off my helmet. The sound of a fire truck’s horn split the
acrid night air and the booted feet took off running, spooked by how close. I
blinked at the retreating image of the Suicide Kings colors and suddenly Aaron
was there, shouting, running across the parking lot at me the lenses of his
glasses alight with the raging fire behind me, consuming Open Road Ink, and my
livelihood with it.

I let my eyes close as fire fighters and police moved in, I
wouldn’t open them again until I was in the back of the ambulance and we were
moving, Aaron’s hand clutching my uninjured one. I didn’t want to see him hurt
and I didn’t want to watch it burn.

I felt sick.

Disney…

The Suicide Kings blew up Open Road Ink. It still seemed so
surreal, like something that didn’t happen in real life. This is something you
saw on TV, not something that happened in the really real world, but watching
TV didn’t hurt like my wrist or the back of my leg. It didn’t have the people
you loved most crowded around your hospital bed looking at you with expressions
of grave concern.

“Alright, alright, give him some room!” Doc said good
naturedly. Everyone except Aaron and Ashton moved off. Aaron held my good hand
while Ashton’s small hand petted up and down my shoulder under the hospital
gown. Brightly colored patches of my skin winked through the openings where the
shoulders of the white and light blue open-assed monstrosity snapped together.

“Am I good to talk?” Doc asked waving effusively in the
direction of the club members crowding my little ER alcove. Zander, Trig,
Reaver, Ghost and Dragon were all here. Hayden had done her best to drag the rest
of the crew off for hospital cafeteria coffee or vending machine coffee much to
Everett’s protestations. She’d finally declared loudly that she’d go with them
but wouldn’t be drinking any of that shite, in her fine Irish accent.

I nodded at Doc to let him know it was okay, absolving him
of any HIPPA violation sins and he nodded and let out a pent up breath.

“You are one lucky son of a bitch Disney,” he said without
preamble. “Your wrist is busted, but not too bad, you needed some stiches in
the back of your leg from a chunk of flying glass,” he held up a baggie with a
wicked sharp piece of broken glass in it, stained with my blood and his lips
compressed in a thin line, “If you hadn’t had your helmet on and been wearing
all that leather you’d pretty likely be burned. It was a good thing you had
your back to the blast too,” he shook his head and let out a gusty sigh.

“Didn’t see this coming,” Trigger remarked and it was as if
his words bore the weight of the world in regret, “Should’ve but didn’t.”

“When they didn’t find any bastard dealings on our part they
went for the legitimate ones,” Dragon grunted. Aaron’s fingers tightened around
my own.

“Are these people trying to kill you?” Aaron asked me, his
deep dark eyes drilling into my own. Several of us startled, some of my
brothers traded guilty looks. Ashton reached across me and put her hand over
Aaron’s. He startled and looked at her.

“It’s not always like this,” she murmured. “Some things
happened, one of them hurt one of us, we tried to forge a friendship from the
tragedy, then over the summer we invited them to join us on an outing and they
hurt one of us again… badly. We couldn’t be nice a second time.” Her golden
eyes were at once sad and burning bright with a ferocity I’d never seen in her.
She looked to Trigger and Reaver and something passed between the three of
them. Aaron swallowed.

“What am I missing?” he asked. Dragon cleared his throat.

“That’s club business, son,” our president said and Aaron
nodded, his eyes seeking out my own.

“What happens now?” he asked and he was a little too pale
for my tastes.

“That’s club business too,” Reaver said solemnly and Doc
sighed, resigned.

“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I’m getting too
old for this,” he shook his head, “Church?” he asked Dragon.

“As soon as you can get to the house.”

“Off in three hours.”

“That’ll do,” Dragon said and Doc nodded.

“I’ll get your discharge paperwork started. Concussion
watch, he has one,” Doc said to Trig and Zander, who grinned. Zander… shit, I
mean Revelator, Rev… the name changes were happening quicker than heat
lightning lately and I was having trouble keeping up. Anyways, Rev sometimes
took on fights in his spare time. Underground MMA shit, for fun, to make a
little money on the side, but mostly as a way of blowing off steam. As a result
he’d had more than a few concussions he’d needed babysitting through and I’d
been the babysitter. Guess it was time for him to return the favor. Aaron
squeezed my hand again and I looked up.

“You’re staying with me… right?” he asked and I blinked.
Dragon answered for me.

“Naw, I think it’s best if all of y’all come to the club
house. You too lover boy. Leastways until we get some things figured,” Aaron
chewed his lower lip and nodded finally. I frowned.

“How did you get to the shop?” I asked him.

“I heard the explosion, I threw on some sweats and I ran… I
don’t know how I knew, I just did. I just knew it was you,” his face crumbled
into lines of confusion, fear and concern and I pulled on the front of his
sweater, bringing his lips down to mine. He was in his pajamas, feet stuffed
into Converse without the benefit of socks, his plaid pajama pants in blues and
greens clashing with the burnt orange sweater he’d been wearing earlier on in
the day. His lips moved carefully across my own and I sighed. He rested his
forehead against mine and I had no way of telling him that I had been just as
scared as he was of losing what we had going on between us when it was still so
fragile and so new, of how afraid I was that I could and would still lose it. I
didn’t think Aaron was handling this too well and that scared me. It scared me
more than when I was laying on the blacktop outside the shop with pieces of
building raining down around me.

“Just please don’t go,” I whispered, “Not yet,” Aaron drew
back startled.

“I’m not going to,” his voice was gentle and held some
finality. I nodded, mute for the moment, afraid my voice would betray me. I
didn’t think I could keep it steady. Plans were being made around us for
transportation and the like, who would be riding with who and that sort of
thing. Ashton offered to take Aaron home for some clothes and things but he
simply pursed his lips and shook his head his hand tightening around mine.

I closed my eyes and tried to rest a little bit. Doc brought
me some blue hospital scrub pants that were, of course, too short in the legs
for me but they covered my ass and that was a marked improvement in my opinion.
They’d cut my pants off to get at the back of my leg. Doc wouldn’t let them cut
my jacket and cut, which to be honest, were more than a little worse for wear.
The patches on the back of my cut were singed bad and the leather pitted and
torn around them from flying glass. The double layer of the leather vest and
the leather of my jacket had stopped it from reaching my skin, the single layer
of leather the pants had afforded my legs had done the job except for the
bigger piece of glass. I had some cuts and scratches on the back of my neck where
there was a gap between my helmet and collar but they weren’t too bad. The
scrape on my cheekbone stung like a son of a bitch but Doc had smeared some
pain relieving antibiotic ointment on it after a nurse had cleaned it.

Aaron helped me pull my jacket and cut on over my bare chest
and I leaned on him, arm around his shoulders as they transferred me into a
wheelchair for the trip to the lobby. I wanted to protest the chair but I felt
like I’d been hit by a truck so I didn’t, which maybe I should have with how
many looks of concern it earned me. Aaron and I would be riding with Trig and
Ashton to the club. I may have drowsed some leaning against Aaron in the back
seat because the trip felt really, really short.

Too soon, Trig was pulling open the back door and I was
leaning heavily on both him and Aaron as we made our way into the club and down
the corridor to the room that had been designated as mine. I think I was asleep
before they even laid me down on the King sized bed, which was little more than
a mattress and box spring stacked in the middle of the floor.