Scars of Yesterday (Sons of Templar MC 8)

I regarded him. He was the same age as me. We’d gone to high school together, but he’d always seemed older. Even though he was a joker, smiling easier and talking a lot more than his president, he was born to wear this cut. Though most of the time he was approachable, kind and funny, there was something that changed in Brock when need be.

And there was a need for him to change then.

Cade was in the hospital.

It was bad.

Half of the club crowded the hospital waiting room while the half that wasn’t here was at the clubhouse, holding a wake. Brock was taking over as president, because there wasn’t a guarantee that Cade would pull through.

Though I’d known all of these men before they’d put on the cut, I’d always gotten a little bit scared when they put on their masks.

But I wasn’t scared anymore.

And I sure as hell wasn’t about to bow down.

“Brock, I’m not sure I give a fuck about what you think is a good idea,” I replied. “I’m not asking your permission. I’m telling you to take me to my goddamned husband.”

Brock’s eyes flickered to the side, to his wife who stood beside me, holding my hand so tight that the bones could’ve been broken for all I knew. I didn’t feel anything.

Something passed between them. Something secret. Something that they only shared, not for the world.

I didn’t have that anymore.

Not another raise of my brows that Ranger would know meant I needed him to rescue me from a conversation I didn’t want to have. No furrowing of Ranger’s brows that I knew meant he needed me to wrap my arms around him.

No more messages.

I couldn’t talk to the dead.

Amy must’ve silently told him something. Given him permission maybe.

Brock stepped aside. “He doesn’t look—”

“He’s dead, Brock,” I said. “I don’t expect him to look any other way.”I was wrong. He didn’t look dead. That was the worst part. Maybe if the bullet had gone through his forehead, ruining his face, it might’ve been different. I might’ve been able to hold on to that.

But it wasn’t one bullet. It was three. They’d hit him in the stomach, shoulder and heart.

I knew that because I undressed him. He was still wearing the clothes I’d watched him put on this morning. I couldn’t bear to look at my dead husband wearing the clothes he’d put on. So I’d undressed him. I touched the single chain around his neck. He’d had to replace it from the one he originally gave me all those years ago, the one I gave back to him as I reminder I was always there. Always waiting. He’d never taken it off. Never, even in the hardest of times. It had blood on it now. My hands were steady as I unclasped it and shoved it in my pocket.

Then I’d looked at the bullet holes. The blood staining his body. The one I knew so well.

His face didn’t have any blood on it. No marks to show his violent end. Nothing but the faint lines from our years together and a slight tan since we’d taken a day at the beach with the kids last weekend. Someone had closed his eyes.

His lips were stained a faint pink. They were cold. He was cold. Not as cold as a dead person should be. I guessed it hadn’t been long enough.

I brushed the hair from his face then leaned in to smell it. A faint trace of smoke lingered, but mostly it was the shampoo that still sat in our shower.

How could the shampoo bottle still be full when he wasn’t going to be around to empty it?

I leaned back, continuing to stare at him. Made myself stare at those bullet holes. At the blood.

I stared for a long while until there was a gentle knock at the door.

Evie.

Had they drawn straws? Seen who’d got the job of coming in here to rip the hysterical widow away from her husband’s bloody corpse?

No.

Evie would’ve wanted to be here. It was her job. Despite the fact that her husband no longer held the gavel, she was and always would be the matriarch of the club.

She had no soft, pitying look in her eyes. She was too accustomed to the reality of this life for that.

“I need water,” I spoke before she could. “Warm. Soapy. And a cloth.”

She nodded once, not questioning my request. When she looked to Ranger, she didn’t flinch, didn’t look away from his body. She looked at him a long time. Like he was still alive. I was thankful to her for that. For not looking away from my husband like he didn’t exist anymore, even though he really didn’t.

She left, coming back quickly with what I needed.

I thanked her with my eyes when she set everything down beside me.