Out of the Ashes (Sons of Templar MC 3)

It had been laughably easy to storm their poor excuse for a clubhouse. They may have been recruiting heavily, but most of the shitheads they recruited were idiots who laid down their guns pretty quickly when they realized they were outmanned and outgunned.

Logan glared at him and said nothing.

Cade didn’t seem outwardly bothered, but a muscle in his jaw ticked. Bull itched to put a bullet through his skull, but the club was aiming to go legit. Which meant murder was frowned upon under their new rules. Or at least was a last resort.

“Your choice,” Cade told him, “You can agree to stay the fuck away from Amber and our women,” he tightened his grip on Logan’s collar at this, “or Bull here can drill a couple of rounds into you kneecap and see how you feel toward such a situation after that,” he informed the sorry excuse for a president.

Bull stepped forward, his trigger finger itching as he clasped his gun.

Logan paled slightly, his eyes darting to Bull. “Fine,” he gritted out.

Cade let him go quickly, his body falling to the floor. “That wasn’t that hard now, was it?” he asked, wiping his gloved hands on his jeans. His face turned cold. “You do know we don’t give second warnings. We even catch a glimpse of your patch we’ll be burning this place to the ground. With you inside it,” he promised. And it wasn’t an empty one either.

With that, Cade and the rest of the club left. Each stepped on a piece of shit as they made their way out, laughing at the groans emitted from various prone bodies.

Bull failed to feel any relief over the fact they had finally gotten rid of the problem that had been a pain in their ass. Exacted revenge on the men who had threatened his woman. That was because she wasn’t his woman after this. Couldn’t be. This problem may have been taken care of, club might be cleaner than before, but he didn’t want to risk that feeling again. The feeling he got when the kid had informed him Mia and Lexie were in Hope. The feeling he got when Mia had told him about her encounter with the Lost Knights. Fear. Fear that was like ice in his veins. That was a weakness he didn’t need. He was willing to live in darkness so Mia and Lexie could have cloudless sunshine.

I had done a lot of dumb things in my life. A lot. Thinking it was okay to eat an entire batch of raw cookie dough, for example. Letting Lexie convince me to go vegan for a week. Okay, a day. Got bangs. Married a guy who talked with his fists. But this took the cake. Or at least ran a hot second to marrying a loser who talked with his fists.

“Mom? We going to get out of the car?” Lexie asked from beside me.

I glanced over at her. She was smiling at me, her face lit up with excitement. A casserole dish sat in her lap.

“Yes,” I snapped at her. “Eventually,” I added.

I really didn’t want to go into the unassuming yet rather cute little house. Like I would rather watch seven hours of “American Idol”. But I had already committed to the thing and I didn’t want to face Rosie’s wrath by bailing. I also didn’t quite know how to explain to Lexie that Zane had ended it with me, whatever it was. The only reason she was in the dark was because Zane had disappeared on a “run” the day of the whole incident with the bikers. Gwen had been the one to inform me of this when she called to make sure I was okay the next day. I had played it cool and not let on I was reeling from being dumped. I didn’t want to broadcast that to anyone just yet. I needed to lick my wounds, regroup. I wasn’t letting Zane off that easy. Without a fight. I knew that look in his eyes when he left. The thing that flickered before the shutter went down. He thought he was trying to protect us by leaving. He didn’t understand he’d be hurting us worse than anything else could by disappearing. I tried to run my eyes over the multiple bikes at the curb, searching for Zane’s. I didn’t know how long he’d be away for, but I’d been harboring a hope he might be here today.

“Mom,” Lexie snapped her fingers in front of my face.

“Okay, okay, I’m getting out,” I conceded, opening my door.

She grabbed my hand before I could get out. Her eyes searched my face. “You know, Mom, you need to talk to me about anything, you can right?” she asked softly, with understanding that reflected how beyond her sixteen years she was. I swear there was a wise old woman in there wearing a teenager’s body.

I did my best to give her a genuine smile. “I know, Doll—same goes for you. But you seem to have your life completely sorted and have rendered your poor mom obsolete already,” I half joked.

She gave me a long look. “Never,” she promised. “I’ll always need my mom.” She gave me a smile and moved to get out of the car. I did the same.

We walked side by side, as we headed around back, as Rosie had instructed us to.

“Do I look okay?” I whispered in Lexie’s ear as we rounded the corner to the backyard.

“Yes Mom, for the millionth time you look okay,” she said with exasperation.

“Okay? Just okay?” I hissed.

She stopped walking and turned to me. “Well, the first time you asked, if you recall, I said you looked great. I also said that the second. I’ve lost the will to answer this question. You know you look good,” she told me with a raised eyebrow.

I couldn’t disagree. I had taken an extra effort with my appearance today, hoping Zane would be here and I could sway him with some good old-fashioned sex appeal. I’d straightened my usual wayward curls so my hair dipped way long down my back. Like my kid, I was big on the “no makeup” look, which of course meant at least an hour of makeup application. The blouse I had on was Lexie’s, which meant it was slightly tighter in the bust area; not a bad thing with my current goal. It was sleeveless and had a deep v at the front and back, and was form fitting all the way down my waist. My jeans were my oldest and therefore most kick ass pair. They were so light they were almost white and fit me like an effing dream, if I did say so myself. I had my usual sky high heels on; this time, cork wedges. I hoped my outfit might help me tame a wild biker. Or at the very least distract him from his macho man protection goal.