Stop it, Hannah.
Moms are tough. They figure shit out. Go to the hospital, bring this kid into the world, and figure out the rest.
God, I was going to murder Mason and Garrett when I saw them—but only after I knew the child was safe.
I got up, cleaned myself, and hurried to the car. I probably should have called for an ambulance, but Jetts weren’t known for their stubbornness for nothing. I wasn’t so bulging as to not fit in the driver’s seat, but it wasn’t like it was as easy as it had been under normal circumstances. But I got myself out, hit the road, and sped off to the nearest hospital.
The pain I felt along the way, as well as the sickness, was starting to intensify. I should have fucking called an ambulance. But, well, if I’d done what I “should have fucking” done, I’d probably be working in some office without the slightest of concerns about my belly or boys.
And if I knew that Garrett would be by my side as this child came into the world, I could live with whatever happened along the way. That was, at this point, my only request. Just have Garrett holding my hand and witnessing the birth of our child.
As soon as I got to the hospital, I parked in the nearest spot—I think it was handicap, but I was sure people would understand—and waddled into the lobby.
“Maternity wing?” I said.
A swarm of doctors and nurses came to my aide and guided me down the hall, up an elevator, down another hall, and into a room. They asked me so many questions, and I had what felt like so few answers. I picked up snippets of what they said, and a couple of things sunk in.
Most notably, at thirty-six weeks pregnant, it was too soon to be giving birth.
But again, when had Jetts ever done anything according to schedule? When had we ever relented to anything other than each other—and even then, only on the rare occasion?
Of concern, too, was that neither Garrett nor Mason had called me back. I feared that this meant that they were on some sort of club business that would make it impossible for them to pry themselves away and come to the hospital. And if that were the case, it was extraordinarily unlikely that they’d get to come away at any moment.
They put me into a room and had me lay on a bed, changing into one of those hospital gowns that always looked ridiculous on TV. They started asking more questions, but my mind was just on Garrett and Mason.
Wherever you guys are,I thought,please just come here. I need you both. I need you to come help bring this child into the world. Bring the next Marks and the next Jett in.
Please.
And then I felt intense pain.
The contractions had begun to really kick in.
And I would soon be at the point where birth was not a matter of hours, but minutes.
Garrett
Everyone was in the clubhouse for one single purpose.
Kill some motherfucking Bandits.
I’d hated that Butch and Cole had put the shackles on us in the name of “initiation.” I’d hated that we’d been reduced to a club of petty crime while we waited for the chance to show what we’d already done a couple times before—kill. But no more.
We had the six officers—me, Brock, Steele, Zack, Connor, and Mason, who had shown up a minute or two late because he was talking to Hannah. I was curious to know what it was about but decided discretion was best here. We had four prospects in total, and though I hadn’t bothered to learn their names, one, they’d have to earn that, and two, even if I was a nicer guy, I think I could be forgiven for not having “learn the names of new club members” at the top of my to-do list right now. And we had Butch.
Cole was not there—the family life kept him out of the bloodier parts of battle now, although I had my suspicions he couldn’t stay away forever. Fighting and fucking were not exclusively my interests, after all.Although strange how fucking now really only applies to one.
Nevertheless, eleven of us was, obviously, a hell of a lot better than the original six—and back then, many of us really only fought when we had no other choice but to.
“You will have military-grade rifles and body armor,” Butch said.
“Fuck yeah,” Connor grumbled.
“Bout damn time,” Mason said.
“We will drive by their clubhouse on the east side of town and do multiple attacks. If all goes well, many will die.”
I knew we were all tough motherfuckers, but I just loved that Butch was a biker’s biker. He spared no detail and kept nothing shut, yet didn’t speak for the sake of sounding dramatic or intense. He just laid out the truth and let everyone else fall in line as they needed to.
