“Look at that thing,” Trev said. “It’s half my size.”
“It’s for a fucking dog,” Jessa said. “Not a biker.”
Blaine laughed. “Here. Put your back on it.” Blaine rolled a chair to the end of the table. “Put your feet here.”
It was all happening so fast.
Trev took off his leather cut and his shirt. He was ripped with muscles and tattoos. The tattoos were scattered and random. They were absolutely terrifying. Everything from religious tats to skulls with snakes coming out of the eye sockets.
Jessa stared and froze.
“Hey,” Blaine said. “What’s…”
She looked at Blaine. “I haven’t… a person… not since…”
“Shit,” Blaine said and ran a hand through his hair. “Shit. Then I’ll do it. Guide me.”
“He should be numb,” Jessa said. “But if we knock him out, he can’t ride.”
“Then give me something local,” Trev said. “Or just hurry up and fucking do it.”
Blaine touched Jessa’s shoulders. “I can’t let him go to a hospital. Trev runs with a different kind of crew, sweetheart. He’s patched in with us, in Frelen. But he used to run with the Lost Men. He’s wanted in a dozen states.”
“Fourteen,” Trev said. “Had a little run in back on the east coast a couple years back. Led a chase from North Carolina to South Carolina. Got away though. Hey, how about this fucking bullet in my arm.”
“Okay,” Jessa said. “I’ll do it. I can’t promise…”
“Jesus,” Trev growled. “You’re not getting paid for this. I’m not judging you.”
Jessa went to work. She gathered up supplies and a local for Trev’s shoulder. In her mind, however, all she saw was herself sitting on the floor with her baby. The baby staring at her, smiling.
Let me tell you the romantic story of how I took a bullet out of your Daddy’s friend’s shoulder. Yeah, some men take the mothers of their baby out to dinner. Buy them flowers. Hold their hands. Not your Daddy. No way. It was far more romantic to see weapons, gunshot wounds, blood, and death…
The second Jessa started to work on Trev, she shook with fear. The bullet wound was clean and the bullet was right there. She refused to look at Trev’s face and she refused to talk about a thing. Her focus was on his shoulder, trying to force her mind to pretend that Trev was an animal.
Well, he was. They were all animals. They were outlaws.
Jessa sucked in a breath and jammed a pair of tweezers into the wound. She held her breath and felt the bullet. Trev hissed and his body flexed. Blood gushed for a few seconds as Jessa slowly took the bullet out.
She held it up for them to see and hurried to put her hand to the wound to stop the bleeding.
“Got it,” she said.
“Goddamn, I love you,” Trev said. “Now stitch me so I can go have a beer.”
Jessa looked at Blaine. He nodded. “You did good, sweetheart.”
Blaine put his hand out and she gave him the bullet. She then stitched Trev up and excused herself to rush to her office. There she quickly dropped to her knees and threw up.
She then sat on the floor, her back to the desk. She hugged her knees and cried.
She cried for all the innocence that had been lost. The natural progression of it was a battle against time that everyone lost. But the innocence Jessa lost when she walked into the house that night to find Meghan and Janey gone. Then to see Vin standing there. Him lifting the gun.
I should have died.
That night she had found the strength to run. She managed to hide well enough that Vin left.
And now all this.
Back Down Devil MC.
Vin back.
Blaine getting her pregnant.
Yet it all somehow made sense. She didn’t feel bad for Mike and what had happened. Or for Luke. Or for anyone that Blaine took care of.
That was the scariest part. The innocence stripped had given way for rage and revenge.
Jessa touched her stomach.
For you, baby. For you.
The door opened. When Blaine saw her on the floor, he scrambled to her. “What is it?”
“I’m…”
“The baby?”
“No. The baby is fine.” She looked at Blaine. “You really care?”
“Of course I care.”
“Then… when does it end?”
“It doesn’t, sweetheart. You can’t stop the fight. But we have each other, right?”
Jessa nodded. “Blaine… Vin was going to kill me that night, too.”
Blaine hung his head. “Fuck.”
“I’m sorry. I have to talk about this.”
“Okay. Talk to me.”
Blaine inched closer, his powerful outlaw arms making Jessa feel safer by the second.
“You called me in a panic. You screamed at me. You sounded angry. Drunk. You sounded like you were going to kill…”