I don’t go to capture her again. She’s right. This is for the best. We both need our freedom. I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking, kissing her like that, like I had any right to do it.
I whirl, giving her my back. The only part of me she fucking deserves. “Because,” I snarl, a wounded animal. “I can’t even fucking look at you at the moment.”
“Well,” she snaps right back, always up for a fight. “That’s perfect, because the sight of you has always made me sick.”
She’s wounded too, an angry bear with a thorn in her paw, but she’s always been like that. Always. Even before she met me. What hope did I have with this woman who has a temperament like a rabid dog? If someone else wants her, they can damn well have her with my fucking blessing. The asshole obviously doesn’t know what he’s signing up for. Did he give her his balls in a bag when he met her or is that coming? I almost feel sorry for the bastard.
This time, when her steps scrape past me, I don’t stop her.
***
It takes a few hours, but eventually I pull my head out of my ass enough to realize it was my wounded pride, years’ worth of it that’s to blame for the poisonous words I spoon fed her right before she left.
I don’t really think she’s a whore. If she has someone else, then honestly, I guess that she just has someone else. We were forced to come together and sign that marriage document. We weren’t ever a real husband and wife. She might have given it a chance if Tracker hadn’t got to her first. Maybe. Either way, it turned out the way it did. Our club and the Olson clan almost came to war, but we didn’t. Those marriages produced two happy unions and I’m glad for my brothers. I don’t even hold it against Tracker, who is still working hard every day just to stay clean.
Not a single one of us chose our upbringing. We didn’t choose our birth or the circumstances surrounding it. We didn’t choose to grow up with alcoholic, addict, abusive, neglectful parents. We didn’t choose to get chewed up and spat right the fuck back out by the system. Every single one of us would have picked a different path, but here we are, all us men, brothers, a part of Steel Riders. No matter how we started or even what road to hell we were on, we’re a part of this club now and that means something.
Tracker might have been using when he decided to betray The Riders. He might have been desperate and hatched a deal with a rival who wanted to either beat us or join us. He might have tried to sabotage everything out of a warped, coke-induced desire for revenge, but in the end, Steel and Edge made the decision to get him help and keep him as a brother. He’s doing better now, and I honestly don’t hold what happened against him.
I knew everything that Ami told me, but I wanted to hear it out of her mouth. I wanted to hear her say the words. Tell me that it wasn’t me. Tracker already confessed everything, after Ami, Leena, and Steph’s dad shot him and gave him back over toSteel. My brothers know it wasn’t me who hurt her in any way. They know that I took a bullshit beating myself, just to prevent war from cropping up between our club and Ami’s father and brothers. They know that I did what it took to make it right because I’m a Rider and whether that means marrying someone I don’t even damn well know, doing my job every single day, or getting pounded on because it needs to be done, I’ll fucking do it.
The Riders, my brothers, are everything I thought I’d never have when I turned up at the clubhouse wanting to prospect back when I was a twenty-year-old with no hopes and no future.
Seven years later, I’m still here.
So yeah. Once I had an hour to think and unglue my head from between my own ass cheeks, I know it wasn’t Ami who was in the wrong. She wants a divorce? I’ll give it to her. Shit hasn’t exactly been easy for her or fair for her this past year. I made everything worse acting like an asshat sack of dicks because I had my panties in a twist.
I’ve heard the words from her mouth now.
I feel like I can just let it go.
Let go of the past.
As I peel out of the driveway on my bike, I realize that I still don’t want to let go of her. When I think about her with another dude, a guy who is probably a pussy who couldn’t even protect her if his life depended on it, I start to grind my teeth.
By the time I make it to Wraith and Leena’s place, I feel like I’ve worn the enamel completely off. I don’t even know what I’m doing there, exactly. What I really want to do is demand to see Ami. I want to tell her that she’s my wife and that she’s mineand that I felt her kiss me back. That maybe we could have had something. That maybe we still can. That I never would have chosen to get married if I hadn’t been forced into it and maybe she wouldn’t have either, but it worked for Wraith and Wing, so maybe it could work out for us, even if we’re stubborn assholes who hate each other.
The second I tore my head out of my own ass, though, I realized that wasn’t a good idea. None of that will ever get put out there to see the light of day. I guess I’m here to tell Ami that I’m sorry and that I’ll sign her stupid papers and that will be that.
At least that’s my plan.
Until Leena answers the door looking confused and tells me that Ami texted her an hour ago, telling her that I signed the papers so she’s going back home to Tampa.
Chapter 9
Ami
Inever meant to fuck up my life.
I’m sure my father thought that was my intention. Maybe my mom did too. That’s why he decided to marry off his three daughters and get us out of his hair. Because I was wild. That was the rumor. Because I liked to go to parties and hang out. I liked to have friends. I liked to be liked. That translated into me being wild and out of control, so at twenty-two I was parceled off with my sisters.
For the last year I’ve been trying to put my life together.
I’m going to graduate right away. Get a decent job in a steady, boring career like everyone else. I’m going to have a nice house one day, a car, maybe even a cat. All the things my parents thought weren’t in the cards for me, because they, like everyone else, thought I was little more than a slut sleeping around and partying all night.
I’ve heard it from a lot of people.
I just didn’t think Gage would be one of them.
