Page 90
In fact, I’m going to make sure we’re home early and Thea is tucked into bed so we can get started before it’s too late. I want this to last, and maybe even go into a second round tonight.
Keely gets ready to leave, feeding Thea and changing her one last time. For whatever reason, she’s not convinced I can handle that myself. It’s funny, because I’ve done both more than once, but if she’s all hot to do that, I’ll just let her have at it.
Watching and smiling the entire time, because she’s that fucking adorable.
When she’s ready, I give her a kiss at the front door, then watch as she hurries to her car and leaves for her meeting. Less than ten minutes later, Hippie’s bike comes roaring down the street and pulls into the parking spot that Keely just vacated.
Jerking my chin in his direction, I watch as he dismounts from his bike, then walks toward me. I’m holding Thea, so I step to the side to let him in. She’s half asleep for her afternoon nap, and I know I should put her down in her crib, but I can’t. I just want to hold her a bit longer.
Keeping her close to me.
I know when she’s fallen asleep, she turns into complete dead weight, and I love it. I’m not sure why, but having her sleep on my chest fills me with something I can’t quite pinpoint, and I don’t think I give a shit what it is, either.
But I can’t focus on that right now. This conversation needs to happen, and it needs to happen now.
“It’s Gauge,” I announce. Hippie’s brows rise, and I know he’s probably got not a fucking clue what I’m inferring, so I continue. “He’s going to be the one who will tell us what the fuck is going on. His woman alluded to something going on with his father that he wasn’t happy about. She said Cake had signed them up for something he didn’t agree with.”
“Fuck,” Hippie hisses. “We need to talk with Gauge.”
He’s right. We do. “Dare was there, and I talked to him about it, but I wanted to make sure you’re on the same page. We dig deeper into this, we find out the truth, and that means…”
“Civil war,” Hippie states.
As the sergeant at arms, he has to be on board with a war of any kind. I know he geared up for one a few months ago when we started buying weapons and stockpiling. But that doesn’t mean he’s ready for a war with our own people—with the fucking original chapter.
“Civil war,” I murmur just as Thea wiggles against my chest, making my heart squeeze.
War could mean I won’t be here for her. It could mean a million different things. Loss of income, enemies who are stronger than us. It could mean loss of respect and out bad of the Iron Flame MC, the only family I’ve ever known.
But then I think about Keely and how much I fucking love her. If we as a club turn a blind eye to what Cake and the others are doing secretly, it’ll be the end of the Iron Flame anyway.
If the Russians have control of us, we’re no longer living the life we choose. We’re no longer free. We’re their pawns and controlled by them. I don’t want that, and deep down, I don’t think anyone else does, either—money or no money.
We need to protect our future, and our kids’ futures. We sit back and let these other clubs, let Cake, of all people, turn us into the Russians’ bitches, then we should have just let them have Chassis and agreed to an alliance.
Because where I’m sitting, all that shit we did, protecting her the way we did, it was all for nothing. Granted, it worked out the way it was meant to, but that’s not the fucking point of it. And I didn’t join the Iron Flame MC to fucking learn Russian.
“So we’re agreed?” I ask. “Talk to Gauge, figure out what the fuck is going on there, and then a meeting with Dare for the play.”
“Fuck,” Hippie hisses.
“Yeah,” I grunt.
Fuck.
The world is forever changed and evolving, even if it’s not always the way we’d planned and predicted. But for the first time in my life, I have anything and everything I could have ever wanted, and I’ll die to protect it—and kill to keep it.
If that means war.
Then buckle the fuck up, baby.
EPILOGUE
KEELY
ONE MONTH LATER
The knock on the door doesn’t surprise me. I’m waiting for Alex to stop by. He has the afternoon off and, thankfully, will be able to watch Thea for an hour and then take her to the clubhouse. Brock will take care of her for the rest of the afternoon since I have a class and hours I’m still catching up on.
