Breaking It All: A Hellfire Riders MC Romance (The Motorcycle Clubs) (7 page)

Anna

If the Guinness Book of World Records had an entry for “witnessed the most badass bikers sobbing,” my name would be written there. It’s a job hazard for every bartender. Some guys, I only have to pour them a couple of drinks and it doesn’t matter if they’re weekend warriors or hardened criminals. The tears just start flowing.

But if Guinness ever tries to immortalize me with a world record, I won’t include the tears I’m seeing on a few of the Hellfire Riders’ cheeks as Red Erickson is laid to rest on the hillside behind his house. There’s no drunken blubbering from these guys now. Just deep, quiet grief.

If I hadn’t already cried myself dry, my tears would be joining theirs.

On my left, Jenny Erickson stares blindly at the coffin, her face white and her eyes red. She’s all cried out, too. Now she stands rigidly, her arms wrapped around her middle, and I know she’s not hearing any of the words being spoken over her dad. I know the only thing holding her up is sheer willpower and the strong support of Saxon Gray, the Hellfire Riders’ prez.

I also know she’ll make it through. She always does. Because she’s as stubborn as Red was and it’s one of the reasons we became friends so many years ago—she just didn’t give up.

Jenny often calls me the stubborn one. I’m not. Not really. I just never know when to quit. Lately I’ve realized that’s something I need to learn.

My reason is standing on the opposite side of Red’s coffin. Zach Cooper—my brother’s friend. For years, they fought together as Marines, and my brother called him ‘Zed.’ Now they ride together as members of the Hellfire Riders MC, and he goes by ‘Gunner’ instead.

I would call Gunner my friend, too…but it’s not that simple.

I wish it were simple. Maybe seeing him would hurt less—and despite every promise I make to myself, I can’t stop looking.

When I met him ten years ago, I thought he was the most beautiful man I’d ever seen. Although time has hardened each of his features, and although he looks like he hasn’t slept or eaten much the past few days…he still is.

I’m not the only one who thinks so. Even here, where the atmosphere is heavy with grief, some of the women are stealing glances at him. I can’t blame them. The first couple of times I laid eyes on Zach Cooper, I couldn’t stop staring. He just didn’t seem
real
. People just aren’t that beautiful outside of movies or magazines—and everyone knows that’s makeup and lighting, not real life. Yet there he was. So I kept looking, until looking wasn’t enough. Until I needed to get deeper.

But he never let me in, and I never got much deeper than his skin.

Sometimes that’s deep enough, though. Small changes on the surface often betray what’s going on below. Ten years after our first meeting on the side of a highway, his cold is colder. His edges are sharper.

His hot is hotter.

His glossy black hair is slick with rain, his head solemnly bowed—but he’s tall, so despite his downturned head, his face isn’t hidden. Every breathtaking feature is laid bare before me. A few days’ growth of beard shadows his sculpted jaw, his decadent mouth firmed against grief. Thick lashes fan across wide, angular cheekbones. Beneath winged eyebrows, his pale blue eyes are downcast, his focus turned inward. Not praying. He doesn’t have faith in anything but his fellow Riders. Not crying. The only moisture wetting the stark planes of his cheeks is from the rain.

The downpour softens to a cold drizzle as the Riders’ old timers carefully lower Red into the ground. Red’s granite headstone is already here. He ordered it months ago, after he learned about the cancer. An older, matching headstone stands beside it—that one was for his wife. Over the years, Jenny and I have been out here on the hillside countless times, laying down flowers and weeding her mother’s grave. Now she’ll have two graves to take care of. I don’t intend to change the part where I’m helping her do it.

I slide my arm through hers. She glances at me, and judging by the glistening in her eyes, she’s not really cried out yet.

Judging by the painful lump clogging my throat, I guess neither am I.

Maybe that’s why Guinness doesn’t have a world record for number of tears shed. There’s no limit when you love someone. When you lose someone. There’s always more pain to feel. Even when you know the end is coming.

Red knew it was coming. So did Jenny. We all knew. So when Red called me up on Sunday morning, telling me Jenny might need me with her that day, I was crying before I made it out to my car. Because I knew what he wasn’t saying—he didn’t intend to come back.

Red held on for as long as he could before he took that final ride. Not a single Rider questions what he did. Though it gutted Jenny, neither does she. By the time he found out about the cancer, there was nothing to do. He couldn’t have it removed. Chemo wouldn’t stop it. So these last couple of months, the cancer killed him slow until it started killing him fast. By the end, he could barely breathe. He could barely ride. Pretty soon he wouldn’t have been able to get on his motorcycle at all. So he went out before that happened—and went out on his own terms.

I’ve been doing the same thing for more than a decade. Trying to go out on my own terms, cramming as much living into my life as I can. But in the past few months, I’ve realized I’m really just waiting for death to sneak up on me again and take what it didn’t take when I was a kid. I’ve been waiting for death to get down to business instead of just playing with me, like it did ten years ago, when I found a lump on my breast.

It has to stop. No more waiting for death to catch up to me. I’m not good at quitting anything. But I need to quit living as if I’m about to start dying.

And I need to let go of what’s killing me.

So these tears aren’t going to dry up yet. There’s always more hurt to come. Today I’m crying for Red, and for Jenny—and because of the pain in my chest that threatens to explode every time I look at Gunner.

I should just quit looking. But I can’t.

And all those other women are stealing glances, too, but when Gunner looks up, it’s directly at me—as if he felt my gaze on him. My breath stops in my chest. If his face is beautiful, then his eyes are something beyond that. Something indescribable.

Crystalline blue, those eyes should appear cold. Glacial. But they’re warm, instead. Intense, burning with concern—as if he’s silently asking whether I’m all right.

I’m not. I don’t know when I will be again. I’ll try to get there, though. To ‘all right.’

But I’ll settle for not hurting so damn much. This pain started out small. Just an ache. But it’s been growing for ten years.

And I can’t bear the agony anymore.

So I know what I have to do. When something is killing you—if you can, you have to cut it out. No matter how much it hurts. No matter how big the scar. You have to be brave, cut it out, and try to survive without it.

It’s just a heart.

Anna

An hour after the funeral, I’m in Jenny’s kitchen A) working through a pile of dirty dishes and B) desperately trying to think of something I don’t like about Gunner, so I can make myself
stop
thinking about him.

That’s the problem, though. I’ve tried to stop wanting him before. Of course I have. It just doesn’t work.

I have to cut my heart out…but first I have to find some way to sharpen the knife. Because just getting over him?

Been there. Tried that. Have the T-shirt that says,
Anna failed spectacularly.

Okay, and also C) I’m hiding a little, because I keep crying over Red, and I
really
don’t like showing my hurt to anyone outside my family.

But I can’t pretend losing Red doesn’t leave a big, gaping hole in my chest—and my mom keeps touching my shoulder or my back every time she passes through the kitchen. I’m not sure if she’s comforting me or herself. I just know I had to tell her “No more hugs,” because every time she wrapped her arms around me I teared up again.

As a therapist-turned-high school counselor, my mom’s a big fan of crying. It’s cathartic, cleansing. But she’s just as much a fan of respecting personal and emotional space.

Her emotional space is usually thick. She lets a few of us in—my dad, my brother, me—but considering how often she slips quietly into other people’s heads and hearts, she doesn’t let many of them slip close in return.

Today that space seems thinner, her emotions showing more easily. I don’t think it’s just the ache of losing Red or hurting for Jenny. This is more like the quiet fragility that sometimes came over her when my brother was deployed overseas, during those long days between hearing about a marine’s death on the news and hearing from Stone himself.

But my brother’s fine. I’ll admit the past week had me a little worried—he’s only been texting at weird times and he sounds
odd
. Not just stressed and frustrated but barely like himself. Gunner’s back, though, and the way they’re joined at the hip, that means Stone will be around here somewhere, too. I wasn’t sure they’d make it to the funeral at all but they must have flown in at the last minute.

So my mom has no reason to worry about Stone. Not that being the Riders’ enforcer isn’t dangerous, because it is. I don’t think my mom knows all of what goes down in the club, though.

It’s better if she doesn’t know. And even if she guesses, it’s better if she isn’t aware of all the details.

I shouldn’t be aware of all the details, either. But that’s another side effect of working at a biker bar. Some of the Riders talk when they’re drunk. But even when they aren’t drunk, some speak in louder voices than they should, simply to be heard over the music—and sometimes they talk about problems my brother has taken care of.

But Mom knows Stone can handle himself. And a threat that could stop someone like my brother? I can’t even imagine. It’d have to be something huge. Terrifying.

There’s nothing like that threatening him.

So I think my mom’s current fragility stems from worry about me, instead. Maybe thinking of how I could have been the one they buried today. I’m high-risk for new cancers, after all. And ever since I heard that Red was sick, I’ve thought about it more and more.

My mom might be thinking of it, too. But I won’t ask if she is. It’s possible that I’m wrong and she’s simply grieving Red. Our families were close. Jenny is almost like another daughter.

Bringing up my old sickness would only make her worry more, anyway. There’s something she taught me a long time ago: Whenever someone assumes to know what you are thinking about, that person usually reveals what is occupying her own mind. So I’m not going to mention the leukemia now and make her think that I’m obsessing over how long I have to live.

Because I’m not. I’m quitting all that, too.

I’ll continue doing all the healthy crap that I’ve been doing for years. But I won’t keep expecting death to jump out of the shadows. Instead I’m going to assume that I’ll get the typical eighty years—and start living like it, too. And if I get sick again…well, I’ll deal with it then.

The kitchen door swings open and my mom comes in carrying another empty platter from the buffet set up in the dining room. A burst of conversation follows her through before the door muffles the noise again.

“Megan’s rounding up some of the other ladies,” she announces. “They’ll take care of the remaining cleanup.”

The kitchen counters are empty. All I have left to clean is the platter she’s holding. “It’s pretty much taken care of.”

“You’re only saying that because you haven’t seen what’s left.”

I can imagine. Almost all of the Hellfire Riders are here, along with their wives and old ladies, but Red wasn’t just part of a motorcycle club. He co-owned a construction company and had enough employees to fill another house. Then there are neighbors and friends, like my mom and dad. He was well-liked in Pine Valley, and in addition to paying their last respects, many visitors are bringing food to share.

While she slips the platter into the dishwater, I grab a towel and start drying my hands. “How does Jenny look?” I ask.

“Guess.”

I smile a little. I can’t remember exactly when we started doing this, but it’s a game we’ve played for a while: Take everything you know about someone and guess what their reaction will be to any given scenario.

With Jenny, it’s not really guessing. I know exactly what’s going on out there. “She’s holding up, because she’s got something to occupy her with all these people here. And if I told her that we’re back here washing dishes, she’d freak out and feel guilty because we’re cleaning.”

The arch of my mom’s eyebrows and the curve of her mouth says that I got it in one. Stone claims I often wear the same expression—except that, on my face, it just looks smug.

I don’t look a thing like my mother, despite wishing fervently for her genes when I was younger. Wishing didn’t turn my hair blond or my eyes blue. It didn’t make me any taller, either. I’ve been called an elf more times than I can remember.

Which…all right, I can’t really argue that. And I’m not like one of the majestic elves from
Lord of the Rings
, unfortunately. My mom might pass for Galadriel; stick me in green tights and add pointed ears, and I could pass for one of Santa’s helpers.

I don’t have any of my dad’s genes, either, but—personality-wise—I probably resemble him more.

She sighs, then looks around at the counters as if searching for something to do. “Have you seen Aaron yet?”

Unease skitters up my spine. I understand why I might not have seen my brother yet, considering the crowd and how I’ve been holed up in the kitchen, but I can’t imagine why he wouldn’t have sought out our mom for a word and a hug.

But he’s been gone a week, chasing down God knows what. Maybe he’s holed up, too, filling in a few of the Riders about what’s going on.

“I haven’t, but I saw Zach,” I tell her. My mom doesn’t refer to either my brother or Gunner by his road name. “So Aaron’s probably around somewhere. But good luck trying to text him and telling him to get his butt in gear.”

Not with the bad reception out here.

“It’s a miracle if he answers promptly even
with
reception,” she says with dry amusement. “I usually have better luck going through Zach.”

God, that shouldn’t hurt, hearing how easily she communicates with Gunner. From practically the moment he arrived in Pine Valley—way back when he and Stone were still in the Marine Corps, and he was visiting my brother while they were on leave—my mom and dad treated Zach Cooper like he was another son.

But, me. Jesus. Unless Stone or someone else includes me in a conversation with him, Gunner barely even speaks to me. I’ve never texted him. Yet my mother does all the time.

“Oh,” I finally say, but I can’t really remember what I’m responding to.

Her voice softens. “Anna. Do you want to talk about it?”

Yes.
But if I do I’ll just start crying again. “I really can’t.”

“All right.”

Her reply is so accepting, so easy. Because she probably knows I’m going to spill my guts to her, anyway. And she probably knows exactly what this is all about.

I blurt, “Tell me something bad about Zach.”

Her brows shoot up. “Bad?”

“Yeah.”

“Why do you believe I know anything bad about him?”

“Because you know everything about everyone. You probably see right through him.”

She regards me for a long moment. “Why do you believe there is something to tell?”

I notice she doesn’t deny knowing everything about him. “Because there’s
always
something to tell. He can’t be as nice and as perfect as he seems—”

“Perfect?”

Oh shit. That word says way too much. But since I can’t go back I go forward. “Everyone has secrets. He must, too.”

“And those secrets must be bad?”

“Why would anyone keep good things secret?”

She gives me a pointed look. “Good things…such as caring for someone? Yes, indeed. Why would someone keep that secret?”

I groan in frustration. She always does this. You start talking with her about someone else and she flips it around and makes it about you.

But all right. She has a point. This
is
about me. “I need a kick in the ass. Something to make me stop. Seeing him all the time… I just can’t. Not anymore.”

She sighs a little. “I know, honey.”

“But I don’t…” My breath hitches in my chest. “I don’t want to leave.”

“I’m selfishly pleased to hear that.”

Because she must have wondered if I would. “But what should I do? Just tell him I don’t want him around anymore? Don’t come to my house, don’t sit at the bar? But it’s Aaron’s house, too. And at the Den, he sits at the bar to keep an eye on everyone.” As sergeant at arms, that’s his job—just like slinging drinks is mine. “I don’t want to make things awkward for you and Dad, either.”

“It wouldn’t.” Her steady gaze holds mine. “Unless you’re asking us to choose between you and Zach? Or suggesting that we shouldn’t invite him to our home anymore? No more Thanksgiving, no more Christmas?”

“I’m not suggesting that.” I never would.

“Then whatever you do, however you decide to move forward, the only awkwardness will be between the two of you.” Elegant brows arch over eyes sparking with sudden laughter. “Which will be no different from all the awkward silences of previous years.”

God. “Thanks, Mom. I’m so glad my angst amuses you.”

Though I know it doesn’t really amuse her. She’s just very good at helping me balance my emotions—and at pulling my head out of my ass.

She takes my hands, her expression serious again. “This will be good for you.”

“Moving on?”

“Moving
forward
. It might be good for Zach, too.”

I scoff at that. “I don’t think it’ll make a difference to him at all.”

She gives me an unreadable glance. “I suppose you’ll find out.”

I don’t think there’s anything to find out. Nothing’s different now than it was ten years ago. I’m just Stone’s little sister. “Well, whatever. I’m just going to try to get over him.”

“Yes. Try.”

Oh, God. She’s using her agreeable tone, which makes it impossible to tell whether she’s actually saying, “Yes, you
should
try,” or “Go ahead and try, but we both know it’s futile.”

To argue with her would be futile, too. Because she’s not even arguing. She’s agreeing. Maybe. But that problem I have with not being able to quit? Yeah.

“I’m not in love with him,” I tell her.

“Of course you aren’t.”

Lord help me. There goes her
other
agreeable tone. And I should really, really quit.

But I can’t. “I don’t know him well enough to be in love with him.”

“Now
that’s
true.” She kisses my forehead while I try to wrap my brain around what
wasn’t
true. “Now stop digging your hole. Go on and check in on your father. You know how he gets when he’s talking to Thorne, and I don’t need a new motorcycle sitting in our garage.”

“The motorcycle is never the problem,” I tell her. “It’s the kutte you have to worry about.”

The kutte and all the obligations that come with it.

“The way your dad drives, I worry about the motorcycle.” She purses her lips and adds lightly, “I’d enjoy it if he just wore the vest.”

Oh, Lord. I’m old enough to handle the thought of my parents getting their kink on, but… Okay, no. I’m not.

And she likely said it to send me scurrying out of the kitchen that much faster. Guess how Anna will react to the sexualized image of her dad in a kutte? There’s only one possible outcome: I skedaddle.

My mom knows me well. So she must know I’m not in love with Gunner. I’m
not
. You have to know someone before you can fall in love, and Gunner never let me know him.

I know some things. After almost a decade, of course I do. He’s only lived in Pine Valley for the last six years, but he’s been Stone’s friend longer than that.

I know he went straight into the Marine Corps after high school, and that’s where he met my brother.

I know he’s a nice guy. Some women say nice is boring, but not me. I can’t stand assholes who are dicks to everyone and who don’t care if they hurt someone. And Gunner, I knew he was nice before I knew anything else about him—even before I knew how gorgeous he was. Because we met when he pulled over on a highway to help me change a flat tire. I didn’t know who he was; he didn’t know who I was. But he stopped in the middle of nowhere to lend a hand.

I know
nice
doesn’t mean he’s not really fucking dangerous. I’ve seen what his fists have done and I’ve heard his bullets have done worse.

I’m not supposed to know that, but I overheard it at the Wolf Den. What I’ve never heard? Anything that makes me think less of him.

I know he likes his job on the city’s maintenance crew because he enjoys working outside. I also know his favorite part of the workday is lunch. Not because he eats, but because he pulls a paperback out of his back pocket or opens up the ebook reader on his phone and sits down with it for an hour. He’s read more than almost any other person I’ve met—and every Christmas, he gives me copies of the books he liked best that year.