“What the fuck happened? You injured?” he growls. He’s a beast of a man. Everyone shrinks around his intimidating size, but not to me. To me, he’s my dad, and I need him right now. I throw my arms around his middle. “It’s Drew,” I gasp.
Pushing me back, he holds me by the shoulders. He sees affection as weakness, and his rejection leaves a little notch of scar tissue on my heart.
It’s a weird thing being his son. By all rights, I should be a tough, asshole like him, and I am in a lot of ways. I can hold my own. I like to box, and I can look after myself if I need to be on my own for periods of time while Mom is on a bender and he’s doing club business. But when it comes to emotions, I have them—unlike him. I’m sick at the thought of something happening to Drew. She isn’t just some girl; she’s my best friend.
Mason gets to his feet, coming to stand by my side. “We were messing around. She kicked me in the balls, and I pushed her into the pool. It was a nudge, a joke.” He shrugs.
“It wasn’t nudging.” I turn on him, placing my hands on his shoulder and pushing forward. “That’s a nudge,” I bark. Then I shove him as hard as he did her. “That’s a shove.”
“Hey,” he snaps, coming at me. I rear my fist back and clock him right on the nose, making him stumble. Blood streams out of his nostrils. “If she’s gonna be walking around with black eyes, so are you,” I growl.
Mason’s dad steps up, tipping Mason’s chin, looking at the small cut across the bridge of his nose. “Saves me doing it. We square, Prez?” he asks my dad.
“You’ll be covering the medical bill,” my dad informs him.
Mason’s dad grabs Mason by the scruff of his collar and marches him out with a nod of his head. “Come on, you little shit. Let’s leave them to it.”
“We can’t have violence in here,” a nurse walking the corridors tells my dad, frowning.
“Mind your damn business, woman,” he snarls. Her eyes grow wide, and her lip trembles. A couple minutes later, Drew’s dad comes out of her room, shaking his head. “She’s going to be fine. Stitches and a tetanus shot,” he tells us. “She’s asking for you, kid.”
I look up at my old man. He lifts his chin giving permission, and I rush to her room. As I walk up to her bedside, I wince at the Frankenstein line down her forehead.
She’s awake and smiling at me. “Always breaking the rules. You were determined to get me in that pool.”
I want to laugh, but my chest hurts. “I thought he killed you.” I shrug, feeling relief so intense my eyes water.
“I wouldn’t let ginger Mason Roily kill me.” She scoffs, then cringes, reaching up to touch her wound.
“Don’t,” I tell her, stretching for her hand and taking it in mine. She looks to where I’m holding her palm and curls her fingers between mine, gripping my hand in hers. The strangest part is I like it…
Two
Drew
Thirteen years old.
Heidi is being so obvious that she has a thing for Alec, it’s almost embarrassing. Her skirt is too short and top too tight, yet Alec barely looks at her. I don’t know how I’d feel if he did. Yes, you do.
“Hey.” I waltz toward them, whistling at the chrome and leather Harley Alec’s propped against in front of the clubhouse. His face lights up when he sees me, and my stomach flip-flops.
“What’d you think?”
“It’s a beauty, but you’re not old enough to drive it yet.” His dad giving him a motorcycle for his fifteenth birthday is crazy town. I got new sneakers for my last birthday.
“Oh God, who called the no-fun police?” Heidi rolls her eyes, folding her arms across her chest. “You can take me for a ride on it, Alec.”
“Nah, no girls are riding on the back of my bike.” He cocks his leg over to straddle the bike and pulls his helmet on. “You coming, Drew, or what?”
A smirk hooks my lip, and Heidi snorts. “He doesn’t see you as a girl.”
She’s such a bitch.
I climb on the back and wrap my arms around his waist. Before he pulls away, he pulls off his helmet and slides it on my head.
“We need to get you one.”
I flip Heidi the bird.
Yeah, we do.
We manage two laps around the grounds of the club compound before my daddy comes out, hollering at us. “You’re too young to be riding, and you, sweetheart, are never going to be on the back of any club member’s bike,” he barks at me.
Hypocrite.
“Well, that’s the stupidest shit I’ve ever heard,” Alec scoffs.
“What did you say, boy?” my dad warns.