“Right,” I said, the word leaking from my mouth like blood from a wound. “Right then. Fuck you all very much.”
I turned on my heel, the train of my wedding dress dragging behind me as I pushed through the doors into the waning spring sunlight. Benny, Carson, and Ares leaned against the car, but the second they saw me, they stepped forward and enfolded me in their embrace.
Tears streamed down my cheeks, but I only noticed when Benny sweetly rubbed them away with his thumbs.
“Wait here a second, Cress,” Buck called from the doorway of the clubhouse.
A low growl worked itself up Carson’s throat, and he stepped forward with his teeth bared. “No, you fucking wait there. She came to you for help, and it’s obvious you turned her away.”
“You don’t know what she’s askin’ for,” Bat protested, but he did it weary, running a hand over his face up into his hair as if he wasn’t convinced of his own argument.
“I don’t give a fuck. Someone you love comes to you for help when they’re so lost to grief they can’t see straight, you don’t turn them away without a bloody good reason.”
“You want her to go to jail after all this?” Buck growled.
Carson stilled, then turned to look at me. His eyes were hard, but his mouth softened as he saw me wrapped up in Benny and Ares. He turned back to the crew gathered on the stairs and shrugged. “I’m thinking after everything that’s happened, it’d be good to give her the chance to make her own choice about what she’s got left to live for when the love of her life’s been ripped away.”
He turned back to us, and barked, “Get in the car. We’re goin’ back to our place.”
We got into the car, but I didn’t remember doing it or the drive to their small bungalow off Main Street. I was in a fog as Benny drew me a bath, as he and Carson talked about whether one of them should sit on the toilet with me so they could make sure I didn’t do harm with myself, as then it was decided that Tayline and Rainbow, who arrived at some point, would sit with me and read to me.
I thought they read from Paradise Lost, but I only guessed that because one line resonated like a struck chord in my head and wouldn’t leave my thoughts.
“How can I live without thee, how forgo
Thy sweet Converse and Love so dearly joyn’d.”
Cressida
* * *
I was ready that night when they came for me. The night was dark as ink spilled across the town, no moon to illuminate the way, clouds veiling the stars of their shine. I sat on Benny and Carson’s front step in black jeans and a black long-sleeved tee, King’s hunting dagger affixed in its leather sheave to my belt. Benny and Carson were in bed, wrapped up in each other and softly snoring while Rainbow and Tay dozed in the guest bedroom in the same bed I had pretended to go to sleep in. I was betting they wouldn’t wake up. It had been a long, awful two days for everyone, and they’d been there for me through all of it without much sleep.
So, I waited on the front stoop and tried not to focus on the acute throbbing pain in my chest that radiated throughout my entire body like a strobe light.
It didn’t take long past midnight for them to come.
The familiar rumble of motorbikes grew to a muted roar as five Harleys rounded the corner of the small cul-de-sac and parked at the curb. I was off the step and moving toward them before they could even take their helmets off.
Nova was at the head, handsome face transmuted by wrath and sorrow. “Ridin’ with me.”
We didn’t have to talk about it, about why he, Priest, Curtains, Boner, Axe-Man, and Cyclops were there in black at the dead of night, about why I’d been waiting there for them.
They got it, me, and what had to be done.
They were showin’ me in the way bikers could how much they loved me.
Enough to make me an accessory to their crimes.
Even though pain blasted through my chest as I zipped up my leather jacket and swung a leg up to climb on the back of a bike that wasn’t King’s, I did so quickly, needing to feel the road beneath me, riding toward a future bright with violence.
“Tight, Queenie,” Nova ordered as I wounded my arms around him. “Not a joyride.”
No, it wasn’t.
We roared off as a group, Nova riding in front with the rest fanning out behind us, a formation of leather-backed geese. I held tight and stayed quiet, letting the rush of wind drown my thoughts and the bite of cool air replace the harsh ache of mourning.