Never Have an Outlaw's Baby: Deadly Pistols MC Romance (Outlaw Love) (9 page)

* * *

T
hree years this week
. Three blinding, painful, monstrous years.

It seemed like it passed in the blink of an eye.

The days I cried for him, too scared to go anywhere near his grandfather's house. All the rumors I heard at work about the murder, the decapitation, the worst crime this town suffered for generations.

People talked about how they'd been scared shitless. But I also heard the relief in their voices after a few weeks, when they knew the crime was too big to bring any outlaws back to Seddon anytime soon.

And they were still talking, gossiping, holding their children a little tighter each night when I started to get sick.

Really sick. Every damned morning.

It took me a full week before I could manage to sit down with the pregnancy test, and prove what my body already knew. It only took a day after I saw that neon pink line staring me in the face to decide what I'd do.

I had to keep it. This baby was a miracle grown in darkness, and he deserved a chance to fight, no different from me or Joker.

Joker. Jackson. The devil and the Adonis stuffed into one mortal man, now somewhere very far away, shattered in his grief.

I didn't know if he was alive or dead. As much as my heart cared, my head didn't. Not anymore.

It took all my energy to keep myself from getting in my car and driving up to Knoxville. I knew it wouldn't be hard to find him if I did, somewhere at the Pistols' clubhouse.

I thought about it a thousand times. How I'd break the news, and plead with him to come home, or at least give me a space here so we could start a life together with our child.

But he wasn't Joker anymore. He wasn't the man who'd swept me off my feet and carried this town on the Taylors' strongman reputation.

The man who'd looked at me, spoken to me, and forced me out of that cursed house was someone else. Someone I'd never let myself truly recognize.

His eyes were so vacant. His voice, so cruel. Dead to the world, and to me.

It was like he'd lost his soul in the hot tear I'd seen rolling down his cheek. Our love had gone with it.

A man this broken couldn't be my lover. And he damned sure wasn't going to be a father to my son or daughter.

It wasn't just Piece who'd been killed and buried that night.

Joker, the man I'd begun to love, was dead. So were the pieces of my ruined heart, driven into the ground for good, one shard at a time.

All we had left was our suffering. Both of us alone, condemned to our private hell.

I didn't have to think hard to imagine what he'd become. No man who wore the patch let something like this go lightly. He'd be hellbent on revenge.

He'd be reckless. He'd live for nothing besides blood, until he got back at the men who killed Freddy, or they killed him, too.

All the reasons I didn't dare put myself and the baby between him and the monsters who'd consume him every waking minute.

I had to live my own life. Had to raise my son. Just had to forget the man who'd helped me create him.

That's exactly what I did for three numb, lonely years.

* * *

I
was standing over Alex
, still staring into the building's parking lot, when I heard the knock at the door.

My hand went to my chest, soothing my ferocious heartbeat.

Jesus.
Who the hell could it be pounding away at this hour?

I checked to make sure the sound hadn't disturbed my baby too much. No, he laid there quietly, sleepy and peaceful as ever. Thankful for small favors, I moved out into the hall, my feet growing heavier with each step toward the door.

The bolt had fallen off the shoddy lock about six months ago. Now I
really
wished I'd bothered to replace it, especially when I cracked it open just enough to see the huge, dark silhouette standing there.

“Yeah? Can I help you, sir?”

He didn't answer with words. I was too stunned to scream when he shoved the door hard, slamming me into the wall. The door crashed against my shoulder and I fell over, bracing myself against the TV stand.

I was quick, but he was faster. The bastard wrestled me to the ground like nothing, his hand flying across my mouth as he kicked the door shut behind him.

It slammed like a bullet. I heard Alex, startled awake, crying over the insane thud of my heart pounding my ears deaf.

“Listen to me, and listen fuckin' good, dolly. This is the way it's all going down, and you don't got a choice. You scream, I gut you here on the floor. You start crying, maybe I knock you the fuck out, and head straight for your kid's room. You're gonna lay there like a good girl, look at me, and keep your damned mouth shut. It's easy, long as you don't do nothing stupid. You follow?”

I did. He'd just threatened the only thing I cared about.

My fear turned into a supernatural calm, the kind a person probably has in the wild when they're being stalked by a lion.

“Good. Fuckin' knew it wouldn't be real hard to drill it through your skull.” He let me go and stood up straight. I got a good look at him for the first time.

Even though it was dark, I could see the patches. DEADHANDS MC, GEORGIA. PRESIDENT.

A huge severed gray hand was stitched on his side, identical to the one he had on his back. Red was all over his cut, like thick spatters of blood sewn into his leather, and so was a half-skinned cartoon skull with one eye hanging out.

He didn't look like much. Hair slicked back on his pony tail, a couple scars on his face, nothing I hadn't seen before in Uncle Robby's old bar.

Except for his eyes. One blue. One green. Both more sinister than anything I'd ever seen.

He was big. Mean. Brutal in every breath and every movement, a smug smile hiding behind his salt and pepper beard as he thumbed his switchblade.

“Let's talk business, doll. What I'm looking for is easier than a pig rolling in shit, and we can be best friends if you do me a solid.”

I put my hands on my knees, bracing myself, listening very closely without saying a word to this demon. I would've killed him if I thought I had a chance.

He had to know that.

It only made him smile wider as he slowly crouched, until his face was dead center with mine. “Name's Hatch. You don't know me, Summer Olivers, but I know you very fuckin' well. I know everything about anybody I want in this state, right down to the times they piss and fuck. My club's got eyes and ears fuckin' everywhere. You fuck up, you get a laser crawling across your tits. Only warning you get before a bullet blows through your heart. Or maybe you come home to find your brother's head hacked off and laying gutted on your bed, smiling from the holes where his eyes used to be...”

The asshole trailed off. My heartbeat quickened, taken back to that night when Freddy, Joker, and my last chance at a normal life died.

Murdered. Killed by this animal staring at me like a tiger. Hungry, taunting, and merciless.

“What?” I whispered. “How could you –“

“Don't play dumb. I know you were there, bitch, and so was that old man rotting away in a nursing home. So was your old boyfriend, Joker, now the Deadly Pistols' Veep. He's moved up in this old world, and left you in the fuckin' dust by the looks of it.”

God damn, he was good. Ripping open old wounds and rubbing salt in deep.

I kept my eyes glued to his, trying not to shake, not to cry, not to open up any weaknesses that would risk my Alex.

“Aw, come on, keep the waterworks off. I ain't here to patch up shit between fuck buddies. I'm here because you're bait.”

The only thing I'd ever hated more than this man was the single ruthless tear that finally escaped, rolling down my cheek. He reached out, catching it on his fingertip, staring at it like a bug he'd just caught.

My stomach turned when he raised a finger to his mouth, making a show out of licking it off. “Fuck, that's good. Makes me wanna do all the shit I came in here squawking about, especially with Betty G being so goddamned fuckin' hungry tonight...”

He held up his switchblade, shifting his fingers to the side, so I could see the name scrawled on it in a cursive script.
Betty G.

Jesus, he was talking about his fucking knife like a person. Psychopath confirmed.

My eyes were bigger than the saucers stacked in my cabinet, just several feet away.

If he took a step toward Alex's room, I'd have to make a run for it.

I'd run, fling the cabinet open, or pull one of the knives from the block, whichever seemed easiest...

“Shit, little mama, don't worry your pretty head. I ain't here to fuck with you and the kiddo unless you say no to anything I tell you. That, doll, is a very, very, very fuckin' serious offense.” Smiling, he stood up, running the finger that had been in his mouth across the edge of the blade.

He winced, exaggerating his pain. “Ouch! Betty's been sharpened up. Bitch almost cut me, and I can't have her making me bleed all over your carpet.”

“Why?” I whispered, hearing my own voice from a hundred feet away. “Why are you here? I haven't seen or spoken to Joker for years. You have to know that's true.”

I couldn't take him toying with me a minute longer.

“Yeah, and thank fuck for that, Summer. He won't see you coming 'til you're right on his doorstep, shoving his kid in his face. He'll trust you. He'll open up. And that's when you'll find out every fuckin' thing I want to know about his club and feed it back to me, straight down the pipe.”

It all made sense now. And I wished to holy God it didn't.

“Don't, please,” I said, shaking my head, feeling more brutal tears rolling down my cheeks. “I'm not a spy. I just want to be left alone.”

He looked at me for a long second, his face turning white. Then he tipped his rough head back and laughed, so loud he made Alex cry harder in the other room.

“Okay, okay, okay.” Hatch shrugged. “Have it your way. I'll kill the kid first and throw your worthless fuckin' carcass on top of his.”

I lunged, wrapping my arms around his boot, before he could even take one step toward my baby's room. Alex screamed, bawling louder in the other room, as if he could sense the evil coming.

“No, no, no, please! I didn't mean it that way. I'll do anything you say. Anything. Just please...don't go in there.”

Hatch stopped, his boot halfway raised above my fingers. He looked down at me.

“Give me your fuckin' phone. Right now.”

I looked around, moving my shaking hand down to my pajama pocket. I pulled it out and handed it to him. His nasty face got nastier, twisting into a sadistic smirk as he hurled it against the wall so hard I heard it splinter. It left a dent in the wall, going out with a flash, before the pieces bounced on the carpet.

“Here's your new one,” he said, stuffing a newer, crappier flip phone into my hand. “You use that shit to check in with the only number on it. You see it ring, you drop whatever the fuck you're doing, and fuckin' answer. Even little Alex. Understood?”

“Yes,” I said, nodding painfully.

Yes. Somehow, someway, I'm going to fucking kill you,
I thought to myself.

“Awesome. You're pretty smart for a bitch without a man,” he growled, turning around. “You leave tomorrow for Knoxville. We'll tell you the place you're staying when we hear you're on the road, and then you'll get the orders I know you're waiting for with baited fuckin' breath.”

“Okay. I understand,” I said, each word drying my throat like a desert.

“No, that's the shitty part, Summer, I don't think you do.” He looked at me as I blinked in confusion, his mismatched eyes shining. “I'm gonna walk out that door, get on my bike, and fuckin' leave you with your brat. You just stay on the floor for the next hour before you start cleaning up the mess.”

I stared at him dumbly as he licked he gazed straight through me. “This is the part where I get to have some fun, and show you how fuckin' serious this is so you don't do anything stupid.”

There wasn't any time to wonder what the hell he was talking about. His hand struck the side of my face like a head-on collision.

I blacked out before I even hit the floor.

S
ometimes I thought
about what a fuckin' idiot I used to be.

Thought about that night I lost Piece, my grandpa lost his freedom, and I left behind the shithole town that had the only woman I ever gave a shit about fucking more than once.

Those thoughts drove me to the range, or else the closest bottle of good Tennessee brown honey.

Today was one of those fuckin' days. I'd just got outta church, listening to the Prez yammering about the latest big plans.

Bingo was on his leash. Had to hold him tight to keep him from galloping around like a tornado when he felt the wind brush his face.

The big hairy Irish Wolfound licked my face when I leaned down to put him on his chain. Damned dog loved to run all the fuck over, and we normally let him, but not anywhere the brothers were shooting their guns.

“Good boy,” I growled, reaching into my pack for a fresh bone. He barked excitedly as I tossed it on the ground in front of him, watching as he dug into it, happier than any creature had any right to be from something so fuckin' simple.

If I could still smile, that shit would've done it.

Didn't take much to please a dog, long as he was fed, stroked, and walked. Took a lot more to please a man.

Took even more to undo the bad shit. And good fuckin' luck ever wiping out the truly awful, tragic stain on a man's soul.

I hadn't figured out how. All I had was a release valve for the blinding rage out here.

Soon as my nine was in my hands, that demon energy flowed out of me, bit by bit. Flamed out in each and every bullet I fired at the torn wooden targets and weather mannequins we used for practice.

Taking aim at a half-cracked face peeking out behind some old boards, I fired. Missed. Gritted my teeth 'til they almost fuckin' broke and tried again.

Had to kill these venom thoughts, one shot at a time.

One bullet for the good times in Seddon, at Robby's old bar, places and people as done as this plastic motherfucker was about to be.

One more for the sick, sorry fucks who still owed a blood debt to me. They'd ripped apart the only fuckin' family I'd ever had, killed my twin brother, and burned him in a barbecue pit. Put the old man in a place where he couldn't take a fuckin' piss without some nosy cocksucker leaning over his shoulder.

Pulled the trigger again for Summertime. Whatever the fuck I'd said to her that night when I was blind to everything except raw bloodlust, revenge, and hate, it worked.

The dummy's head exploded into a thousand pieces on the third try. I grunted to myself, satisfied, knowing it'd be at least ten minutes before the urge to kill swept over me like a fresh tidal wave.

Those evil words stayed with me, even after I stuffed my gun in its holster and watched the dog, chewing his boney treat to a mess.

Evil or not, they'd done their job. They'd kept her the fuck away. They'd saved me from the demons for a few more hours.

Only goddamned thing I ever asked for.

I'd been outta my fuckin' mind to think I could ever bring a girl like her into this sick, toxic life. Sure as shit wouldn't pull her deeper, drowning her, painting a goddamned target on her back like Freddy and Grandpa, or all the other boys in this club and their old ladies.

Fuck the past. Fuck it all.

“Bingo, you big damned badass,” a voice growled. I looked up to see Firefly standing there, our big Enforcer, a new rifle hanging over his shoulder, leaning down to pat my dog on the head while he snarled into his bone.

“Leave him be. He's chewing his heart out.”

Firefly smiled. “Don't take much, does it? I'll bring him a new one next week. Whole fuckin' club might as well get its jollies in before the Prez takes us to the grinder.”

Drawing my switchblade, I stiffened up, standing over a stump with a spare sharpener we used to keep our shit stabby. “He ain't taking us anywhere, brother. It's the goddamned Deads screaming for blood.”

“Can't argue. Won't be easy, though. Some of our boys got a good chance of getting shot to shit on this run. Deads got the numbers. We've got the brains, the balls, and bigger fuckin' bullets. Only question is if it'll be enough.”

I snorted, ripping the sharpener up and sliding my knife through it. “You're going soft like Skinny boy, Firefly. Ever since you married that chick and knocked her up. You're talkin' like you're afraid.”

“Afraid? No.” I could practically hear the steam hissing out his mouth. “Fuck yeah, family changes a man. I'm gonna have a kid hanging on my arm in five or six months. I ain't going back on anything the Prez orders, and neither is Skin, because both of us have got a fuck of a lot more to fight for here than you do.”

My eyes tried to dig a hole through his skull. He didn't have a fuckin' clue.

Firefly and Skin, they'd go off like bombs for their women, their kids, putting the patch last. For me, these colors came first, second, and third, equal partner to the bloodlust boiling me alive for over three fuckin' years.

None of the brothers knew what really happened to Piece.

They didn't know about the blood oath Prez promised me the night I reported in. Didn't know he'd told me to keep it quiet because we didn't have the strength to fight like we needed to in those days.

Dust slapped his big arms around me, pulled me close that night, promising we'd rip the throats out of the sorry fuckers who'd done my brother one day, when the time was finally right.

Prez got me drunk. Held me back. Stopped me from going deep into Georgia on a suicide run, with nothing but my gun, a pack of grenades, and enough rage to blast myself to kingdom come.

Would've done it, too. Would've driven into the Deads' clubhouse and blown myself up like something outta the shit overseas.

Firefly's rifle cracked. I blinked.

We'd stopped talking. I slid my knife against the stone hard and fast, thinking about skinning the fuck outta every sick motherfucker I could find who wore the bloody hand on their cut.

His shot went straight through the boards hiding the dummy whose head I'd taken off, and kept going. The mannequin's body joined its head in a million pieces, shattered beyond redemption.

“Goddamn, this baby's got a kick. Helluva a scope on her too,” he said, more to himself than me. “Haven't had this kinda firepower in my hands since the army days.”

“That's one big fuckin' check mark in our column,” I said. “Quit worrying so much about the op. We're gonna kick their asses so hard into the ocean, the Grizzlies will be on their damned knees, begging for our routes. Haven't ever let death stop us before, and we're not gonna start.”

“Brother, I'm telling you, you've got it all wrong. Ain't death I'm worried about.” He looked up, anger in his big blue eyes. “It's my wife and kid coming up without me that's making me stand here and practice the shit outta this gun 'til I've got it right. It's a motivator – not a damned detriment.”

“Whatever. We'll see about that.” My fingers began burning.

I had to test my knife. Firefly's mad eyes stayed on me the whole time as I laid my hand against my tree bark, taking the freshly sharpened blade in the other. I started stabbing that fucker right between my fingers like a jackhammer.

All the brothers winced when I did it. Turned their stomachs, expecting me to lose a finger or two every time.

Fuckin' pussies, all of 'em.

They thought I was outta my damned mind.

Maybe I was, ever since that night when the lights went out forever.

My blade stabbed faster, faster, dangerously close to carving off one of my digits, closer on the next thrust. Fucked up as this shit was, it
always
took the edge off.

Reminded me how close death and dismemberment lurked every day, wearing this patch. Reminded me to be fearless, hard as a stone, ready to do whatever it took to keep my Veep patch and mean it.

Reminded me that giving yourself something to lose was fuckin' stupid. With two brothers going soft thanks to their girls or babies on the way, it'd be up to me to pick up the slack, to charge in and cut every throat we needed to, without any second guessing.

Some of those sick bastards probably had old ladies and kids, too. That family shit would make them hesitate, and it'd be fatal when my knife went through their throats, before they put theirs through mine.

Firefly sat on a log, cleaning his gun, when my fingers finally cramped up and gave out. I dropped the knife, letting it clatter against my boot. Picked up some mud when I reached down to grab it, and I wiped it on my thigh, feeling a little hate streaming out my body.

Wish there were a whole lot more going with it, but fuck if I hadn't stopped wishing long ago.

Bingo started barking just then. He'd dropped his bone, causing it to roll down the small incline, just outta reach from the spot where he was straining on his chain.

“Shit. Hold up, boy.” I looked down, noticing how the fuckin' thing had gotten lodged in that little pit we used to hide our spare guns.

Not an easy climb. I got down on one knee and slid, turning to see Firefly standing by my dog at the last second.

Lost my grip somewhere along the way and fell three feet, smack in the mud, right on my ass. Overhead, Firefly and Sixty looked down at me, laughing their asses off.

“You need a rope down there, bro?”

Fucking shit.
Sixty's crap didn't deserve a response, so I reached into the muck, digging around the cold metal box to see where that damned bone had gone.

Took about a solid minute for my hand to come up with that chewed up, dirty, mottled white stick. That was when the wrecking ball crashed through my brain.

I toppled back against the wall, twitching like a current went through me. My eyes weren't seeing the club's spiderholes anymore.

Instead, I saw the
hell
in grandpa's fire pit three goddamned years ago.

My brother's bones. What was left of his scorched cut. They'd burned him, bones and all, incinerating his leather, his clothes, his flesh. His whole fuckin' body.

Everything except the head I'd found, next to grandpa, who was barely breathing after his heart attack.

They'd ripped out his fuckin' eyes. My eyes, the same hazel set we shared as twins.

That sick, soulless grin from my own flesh and blood haunted me. Stalked me like a demon through time and space, always sideswiping me like this during the most mundane bullshit.

Damn.
Damn!

I quietly cursed the shit out of everything now, swinging the bone, holding my muddy face up to the sky and screaming.

“Joker! Fuck's sake!” Firefly's booming voice cut through the nightmare. “Get a damned rope. We're coming down for him.”

“No!” I snarled, shaking my head.

Holding the bone between my teeth, no different than my dog, I pushed my fingers deep into the muddy walls of the pit where I could find the wooden boards. They were rotten and dirty but they held a man up. I climbed through the slippery shit with brute force, one push at a time, hauling myself over the ledge about two minutes later.

I ignored the hands my brothers held out. The bone plopped outta my mouth and the big dog started growling, staring at me all covered in mud.

“Shit, Veep, you okay?” Firefly asked, shaking his head.

“We've gotta get a fuckin' gate around that thing,” I said, standing, shaking off the muck clinging to my jeans.

Picking up the bone, I carried it over to my dog and took him off his chain. He plucked it up in his mouth as we made our way through the clubhouse, heading for my room.

Time to go. I'd drop Bingo off and then hit the showers, blast all this crap away, before I hit the bottle or my bike.

Didn't know about the order just yet. Shit, maybe I'd ride into town, check out the new skin shop, the Ruby Heel. The girls there were easy, desperate to suck the cock of any man wearing this patch.

Probably thought it'd bring 'em more money than what they got in tips at our joint. Or maybe they just got wet for any man with a bike, a cut, and a dick between his legs that could fuck them to high heaven.

I stopped by the sink near the back, jerking the bone outta the wolfhound's mouth one more time. Rinsed that shit off before I gave it back to him, stroking his head. “Savor the fuckin' flavor, wolfie. Took a little detour through hell to bring it home. You're welcome.”

He looked up, wagging his tail. Bingo whined through his clenched teeth, snug around the bone. We walked into my room and I left him by his bed, gently closing the door behind me.

Skin stood at the end of the hall, looking at me like he'd just seen a ghost. “Christ, Veep, what the fuck happened to you?”

“Just a spill,” I said, wondering why the fuck the universe was conspiring to keep me dirty. “What's your deal?”

“You've got a visitor.” His smile jerked up, following the scar going across his cheek, and I sure as hell didn't like it.

“Visitor?”

“Yeah, some chick, showed up at our gate and called your name. Lion and Tin were gonna chase her away 'til she insisted she knows you.”

“Better be Honey-Bee,” I growled, thinking about the skinny little stripper with the sweet ass I'd fucked three times the other night.

“
Definitely
isn't Honey-Bee, brother. Meg's been busy telling her you're bad news.”

Stopped myself just short of telling his old lady to fuck off. Woman had no business telling her girls who they could and couldn't fuck in this club. Would've said we'd fucked up making her lead manager at the strip joint, but she had the business end down, better than any of us.

Besides, I really didn't need a fuckin' fight when I was still dripping mud on the floor.

“Fuck me, Veep. You've got your hands full,” Skin said, his eyes following a clump of mud sliding off my jeans to the floor. “You want me to tell the boys to send her away?”

“Nah. I'll do it myself, jettison whoever the fuck she is so I can clean up.” I walked past him and Skinny boy shrugged, careful to sidestep so I didn't brush my muck on him.

Rage nipped at the back of my brain. Fuck, why today? Why now with these damned disruptions?