My insides melt.
Wish I could say I never thought I’d have Jade sitting on my lap, all wrapped up in me, but I’d be lying. Her and I, it was inevitable. Bound to happen, it was just a matter of when time matched fate.
Jade leans forward, placing the cards down onto the table and scooping up all of Lion’s money. “I should have mentioned I was good at this…”
“You get it from me,” Lion says, a proud smile on his face. It has been two weeks since Kyle has been put away, and I’m itchy as fuck to get my hands on him. I’ve thought of a thousand different ways I can kill him, and I know how I’m going to do it. I fucking know. My mom has been busying herself with renovations of our family house to keep her mind off the fact that my dad turned out to be who he was. Jade and I are driving down tomorrow to stay with her for a bit. Keep her company. She has been drinking and struggling with the guilt of Jade, too, and I think it might offer her some kind of closure if she and Jade sit down to talk.
Seeing Lion with Olivia was weird at first, soon after Bonnie passed. But if he feels even half of what I feel for Jade, then I get it. I understand it. Bonnie was important to him and the club, but Olivia is his Jade, and besides that, Jade gets to know her mom and dad. Together. After everything that she has been through, she deserves that. Bits were blurry as to how Jade came about in our house until Ollie cleared it up. Ollie had to keep her death story so that they could allow the plan to wash out. I also figure Ollie is, if not the, runner of Anonymous. She hasn’t admitted it, and probably won’t ever, but what she has been through and the way she carries herself with confidence reminds me of someone who leads an army, not a lost woman broken on the inside. I’d never tell Lion this, but Jade obviously gets her strength and heart from her mom. She had been tailing us for years, watching over Jade. When she gave birth to her, Kyle instantly had her ‘killed.’ He failed because Isaac helped her escape. I get the feeling that her story is a dark one, with the years unaccounted for before she joined forces with Poppy and the rest of the girls who Jade released.
Speaking of Poppy, Wicked hasn’t let her out of his sight. At all. Motherfucker is hella protective over her. It’s not helping that she’s attractive, and you put someone like Poppy around men like Gypsy and you’re going to have yourself a problem, despite the fact that Silver and he have been fucking around behind Fury’s back. They can fool Fury, but I see it all over their smug little faces.
Jade leans forward and ruffles Lion’s hair. “We can work on getting you better.”
Lion gazes at Olivia, shaking his head. “She’s a smart-ass like you.”
Olivia laughs. “Oh, I’m sure of it.”
Today is the day we bury Bonnie James. My heart is soft and my pain raw. Bonnie was the first woman who made me feel like I belonged here, a friend. I look over the few texts she had sent me while she was alive and I can’t stop thinking about how fragile life is. We never know when the end is near, we just have to live each day in oblivion and wait for fate to show up on our doorstep with a bouquet of flowers hanging over its scythe.
After I’ve climbed onto Royce’s bike, I press a kiss on the back of his neck, his hand on mine at his stomach. The bikes all roar together, pulsing loudly down the empty street as he kicks off and we begin our travel together for one last ride before burying her behind the clubhouse. Ollie is on the back with Lion, they are riding directly in front of us, and Wicked slightly to the right of Royce and I, with Gypsy on the other side of Wicked. I’ve come to learn that how they ride is their position in the club. A club that has become more family to me than I ever could think possible.
Wind claps over my skin, my hair flying out behind my body as Royce zips us forward, following the hearse onto the main highway that leads to Bonnie’s old neighborhood.
“Royce, I’m fine,” Mom says, patting my hand on her shoulder. She gazes absently out to the back lawn as her new little lapdog runs circles around the basketball court. Orson, Storm, Sloane, and Storm and Orson’s wives are here, with India, Orson’s wife pregnant with their second child. Jade and I arrived at Mom’s a couple days ago when Orson and Storm announced they were coming over. Naturally, that meant Sloane had to be here too. Mom isn’t okay. She’s fighting an uphill battle and only tends to react to Jade. I get it. Jade was the child who was always here, or maybe Mom thinks she owes her something. No one could have known how dark Kyle Kane was. No one. He hid it well. They all do. People expect monsters to come in nightmares, while forgetting to protect their dreams.