“But you wear it everywhere,” Chey says with a ruffled brow. I can’t tell her why—it’s an order—but she’s not making it very fucking easy to keep my mouth shut. I just want to get in, get out, and get back here for a fucking nap.
“I just can’t, okay?” I snap. Because, shit, I already want to wear my cut and can’t, and now she’s giving me the riot act over it. Cheyenne’s green eyes bore into mine, making me feel like shit. I don’t like not telling her shit, but Duke said not to. Nic knows what we’re doing, but not because he wanted to tell her. She has a pushy fucking temperament and outright asked him when Forsaken was going to finish the job on Darren one too many times, and the dude cracked. With any other chick, I’d say he was pussy whipped, but I know my sister, and it’s a fucking miracle he held out as long as he did.
“I want to tell you things, okay, baby? I want you to know what’s going on and the shit we get into, but I can’t. I have orders.” I let the words fall between us and allow the tension in the room to rise. Something about this is upsetting to Chey in a way I didn’t expect. She’s always been Forsaken, and that means she knows when to go along with the program, but she’s not doing it right now. “Why are you this upset over my cut?”
“Last time Dad left the house on a job and he didn’t wear his cut, he got locked up for thirteen months and seventeen days,” she says firmly.
My shoulders fall, and I cross the room, immediately wrapping her in my arms. She’s still clutching my cut to her chest, both limbs and leather squished between us as I hold on to her like my life depends on it.
“I sound crazy,” she admits. And yeah, she does, but fuck if I don’t like it. She’s worried about me, and she doesn’t want me to get hurt or to get locked up. For that, I’ll take crazy.
“I’m coming back to you tonight,” I say and place a kiss to her forehead. Reluctantly, I release her and take a step back. She gives me a nod and a fake smile. It’s not confident enough for me to believe it, but it’s going to have to be enough for now.
When I turn to leave, Nic is waiting in the doorway with Robin in her carrier. She and I have never been especially affectionate, but something’s changed since she gave birth. Before, she was always so tough and mean and bitchy. But now she’s someone’s mother. She fusses over my niece the way I hope our mother cared for us when we were infants. I can’t imagine Nic leaving her kid, though. Not with the way she watches her sleep and checks on her breathing. Seeing this side of my sister makes me want to be better to her and for her. I didn’t expect to feel any different about the whole baby thing after she was born, but I do. Robin is this tiny little human, and she can’t do a damn thing for herself. It’s up to us—all of us—to be good to her. I want to be good for her, just not with any more fucking diapers.
As I pass, Nic reaches out and places her hand on my covered bicep and says, “Let’s go.” The ferocity in her eyes is surprising, and I choose not to argue.
Robin and her carrier are kind of heavy, so I don’t know how she balances it without any issue, but she does. My sister has taken every bit of her anger and protective nature and channeled it into being the mother I wish I had. Her conviction takes hold of me in a vice grip of emotion, but all I can do is nod. Everything that led up to Darren’s hospital stay floods my mind. He threatened to beat the baby out of Nic that night. So cold and calculating in his abuse, Darren had wanted to make not just Nic suffer, but her baby as well. And because of him, Mindy and Holly suffered, too.
I zoom down the hall and through the living room to the front door where Duke is standing with the front door wide open. He’s leaning against the doorframe, his expression flat, and he’s fiddling with his phone. Without looking up, he says, “When I say to be ready at noon, I fucking mean twelve o’clock, not ten after.”
“Sorry,” I mumble and slip past him out the door, trying to get away from the blowup Nic’s about to cause by tagging along. Meeting up with me, Duke shoves his elbow into my side. He looks up from his phone for a moment, digs into his jean pocket, and tosses the keys to the black van at me. I catch them easily and walk to the street where the club’s van is parked. The same van he and I used to dump Darren in his daddy dearest’s driveway.
“Quit apologizing. You sound like a fucking pussy,” he says. I climb into the driver’s seat of the van and start her up just as Duke climbs into the passenger side.
“Okay.” If Duke wants me to stop apologizing, then I will stop fucking apologizing. I wish I could stop screwing up, but that’s unlikely.