She was really starting to annoy me with this.Pissingme off, even. See? I’m changing.
“Could you just put aside all of your damn prejudices for one minute? You met Harley. You can see he’s gentle, and kind, and protects me. And you met Rocket, and sure, he’s a bit of a dick sometimes, but he’s also not a bad person. I just finished a scanning project for him, and he was so grateful for the help. This is-”
“Unpaid work? This is all unpaid stuff? They’re taking advantage of you, C. You should be earning for your hard work, not servicing two men like they’re-”
“Servicing? You know what? I can’t do this with you right now. I’m… I can’t listen to you when you’re being so unreasonable. You’re being a bitch!”
We both fell silent, and then V grinned widely. “That’s my girl. It’s only taken you your entire life to tell me off! I’m a bitch, huh? Harsh.”
Why was I giggling now? Damn her!
“You really were though.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to expect the worst of Harley. He seemed nice in the few moments I spoke to him, although the other guy, I don’t know… it was hard to tell, what with him all bloody like that. I’ll try, okay? I’m still licking my wounds, but I’ll try.”
I nodded. I really couldn’t ask for more right now.
“Okay. And Rocket’s paying me for my work with a custom spray job on my motorbike. It’s going to be gorgeous.”
V lifted her hands, shrugging at me. “Well, why didn’t you just say so?!”
Chapter Thirty
ROCKET WAS A WHINY bitch for the rest of the day, but when Caroline returned, we grabbed her stuff, and got the hell out of there, since Rocket would be joining the other guys for the toy run, and I’d be taking her to the clubhouse. It was a dilemma, to be honest, because I didn’t want her to experience the club the way it had been when it was a bad place, but to facilitate the knocking down and rebuilding, she had to help me redesign it. Could I have done it alone? Badly, yes. Did I want to do it alone though? Fuck no.
We grabbed a quick meal at her place, and then headed to the club once I knew the guys were getting on the road. I took her on the back of my ride, and we pulled up down the road from the clubhouse, so I could let her watch the parade of bikers heading out, some in costumes, and all bearing gifts, or sacks of parcels.
Seeing her wide eyes, as we stood alongside my ride, and waved to them as they passed, really gave me a little hope that maybe she’d start to realise that they were good people, and she could be around them. Sure, they were rowdy as fuck at times,sometimes appallingly so, but there had to be a way to make it work for her and them.
“That was magical!” She gasped, leaning against my side, as we watched the last few guys disappear off down the road.
Originally I’d wished I could go with them, but being here with her, and to see her delight as she witnessed them leaving? That was fucking unmissable. A moment in time that could never be replaced, or equalled.
“Yeah. It really was, huh? Okay, let’s get in there, and give you that tour. There will be two prospects on the gate, but that’s it.”
When we reached the gate, the prospects, Joey and Alan, were aware of our planned arrival, and were quick to open up and let us pass through. Once we were on our feet, and free of helmets, I introduced Caroline to both of them, but didn’t take her close enough for anyone to even try shaking her hand.
I turned us so we could face in at the compound from the gates.
“Okay, so we have a gated compound, approximately forty acres, and it houses these few crappy little buildings, and it’s a complete waste of the space. We also have the surrounding fields too, but they’re unused as yet.”
Caroline was already nodding, her fingers moving around in front of her, like she was trying to map it out for herself.
We were far enough away from the prospects that they couldn’t overhear us, but I stepped closer anyway, just to catch another enticing waft of her scent.
“The building here,” I pointed accordingly to the small square block, “is our storage centre, and it’s literally just a large room with shelving. It holds pretty much bugger all, and it’s lockable, but not necessarily impenetrable.”
Caroline nodded, turning to point at the office building, which had been recently rebuilt after the fire at Halloween, but was still unfit for purpose in my eyes.
“And this one?”
“Offices. The Club President and our tech guy, you’ve met Grease. He’s our tech specialist, looks after security, among many other things. There’s also a small lounge inside, with a pool table, and fridges for beers and stuff.”
“Can I see inside?” I grinned, taking her hand and heading over to it, pointing out the other buildings along the way.
“The small building over there is what we call Church. That’s just what we call biker meetings, and the far off building there, the sprawled out one, is lodgings. Some of the guys live here, and others just room here at weekends and stuff.”
She was taking it all in as we walked, her eyes firmly focusing back on the offices, and before we even stepped inside, she was on the same page as me.
