It Happens (Bear Bottom Guardians MC 6)

I would’ve punched her in the face had I thought I could get away with it.

However, I’d never kept my dislike of the woman to myself. I’d made it abundantly loud and clear exactly how I felt about her—when Zee was with her and when he wasn’t.

There might’ve been one time that I accidentally, maybe on kind of purpose, tripped her because of how she was talking about Carrie behind her back.

Then there was another time that I heard her talk about my sister, who was ‘long dead and gone’ and ‘why can’t he just get over it already.’ That time I’d lost my shit a little harder than all the others. Needless to say, I might, or might not have, punched the bitch in the face.

My sister wasn’t something that you could ‘just get over already.’

My sister was a beautiful person, and she would forever be a fresh wound inside mine and Zee’s hearts. Just like his brother.

“You didn’t know shit, then,” I said. “Zee and I are new. We just got ‘together’ as you say. And there’s never been a time when what we have wasn’t completely, one hundred percent platonic until lately.”

She scoffed in derision. “Yeah, right. You expect me to believe that?”

I shrugged. “You can believe whatever the fuck you want.”

I didn’t care if she believed me. I also didn’t care if she fell off the curb and was run over by a bus.

She was completely inconsequential to me.

“You knew that I had a baby with Zee, right?” she asked carefully.

I tilted my head. “Yes.”

Or would have had she not miscarried it.

“I’m being punished now for misdeeds of my past.” Her lips thinned. “I didn’t want that baby. Even after I married Zee, I didn’t want it. When I lost the baby, I didn’t care. But now that I’m trying to actively have one with my new husband, I can’t stay pregnant. Do you know what that feels like?”

“You mean, do I know what it feels like to want kids and not be able to have them?” I asked. “Yes, yes I do.”

She curled her lip up at me. “And how would you know that?”

I lifted my hand up to show her the webbing of scars that ran up the length of my arm. “Because of this right here. When I was struck by lightning, this scar wasn’t the only thing that was left behind. The inability to have kids was also left with me. So yes, I understand what it feels like not to be able to have kids. What I don’t understand is why you wouldn’t have wanted the one that you were carrying of Zee’s. We haven’t been together long, but Jesus Christ. If I had the chance to carry his baby, I would do it in a heartbeat.”

Faster than a heartbeat.

“Well, I guess I can’t say that I’m upset about it all.” She shrugged. “I guess it’s fitting. You don’t need kids anyway.”

Annnnnd, that’s when I punched her.

***

Zee was laughing as I was hauled away in handcuffs.

At first, I thought that I’d get out of being arrested. The arresting officer, Leed, was one of my father’s men. He was the sergeant at arms for the Dixie Wardens MC Arkansas chapter.

He also had his hands tied.

Had I not been the one to throw the first punch. Had I not been the one to keep pummeling her even when he told me to stop. Had I not done it all in front of a damn camera that had captured the whole thing…

Needless to say, I deserved it.

What I didn’t deserve was Zee’s laughter.

“What are you looking at?” I snarled at the nearest person, a girl I graduated with.

She’d been a bitch to me my entire life, so I was unsure what anyone expected me to do.

“Nothing,” the girl lied.

I couldn’t even remember the girl’s name. Only that she’d been one of the ones to give me shit when I hadn’t wanted shit to be given to me.

“Be good, Killer,” Zee ordered, laughing his ass off as he walked next to me. “I’ll meet you downtown.”

I flipped him off from behind my back.

I would’ve waved that finger, loud and proud, had my wrists not been cuffed behind my back.

“Surely you could’ve cuffed her hands in front of her,” my mother trotted next to us. “She’s not going to run away. You know who her parents are.”

“Listen, darlin’,” Leed said. “The one and only time I underestimated this kid, she got out of her room, stole the keys to my Harley, and drove off with it when she was twelve. I will not be underestimating her again. Not to mention she and Raine had to be dragged apart.”

That was true.

Well, both things.

We had had to be dragged apart. I also might’ve stolen Leed’s motorcycle. But it’d been when I had just turned fifteen. Not when I was twelve. There was a little bit of difference in years.