"You're not a hypocrite. You didn't expect to have to see any of it. Your shock is understandable. That was not something any of us wanted you to see."
"Are the police going to need to talk to me?"
"No. Reign wanted you guys out of there. He doesn't want you involved. But they might show up here. To inform you. You should be his next of kin, right?"
"I don't know. My mom probably is if he never bothered to change any of his information. But, I guess, technically, I am it. He never married or had kids."
"They are going to want you to handle the arrangements eventually, though."
"Okay. What about Jacob? He's been hanging around Third Street."
"I don't know if anyone will be around to say that he was," he told me carefully, not wanting to say the words, even though they hung heavy in the air between us.
He and his brothers had gone off to exact revenge. Which meant that all those men my brother used to rub shoulders with would be dead.
"I know, babe," Colson said, nodding. "I would understand if you rescind that old people date idea," he told me, gaze skittering away. "But you are going to have to be stuck with me just until we figure all this shit out."
"I did—"
"For what it's worth, I didn't kill anyone tonight," he told me. "But I would have," he added, giving me eye-contact again, direct, long, making me feel his certainty. "And I can't say that, in the future, I won't need to. That's not how this works."
"I, um," I said, wetting my lips, "I wasn't going to say that. About taking back my interest in an old-person date."
"What were you thinking about then?"
"How funny fate is," I told him.
"How so?"
"If we had never moved next door to you, and if you hadn't just so happened to be sitting out front that night Jacob snuck out, and you hadn't taken an interest in helping, this would be a very different night for me," I said, the truth making my stomach twist. "I would likely be getting word right about now that my son was dead."
"We don't kill kids, Eva."
"No, but in the heat of the moment, when things are crazy, when guns are being drawn, and adrenaline is running high, would you, for one hundred percent certain, be able to tell apart a kid from one of the other men? If he was pointing a gun at you? He could have died tonight. Because of my brother," I added. "That puts things into a little perspective, I guess. And he would be dead tonight if you hadn't decided to step in and help out. There's a part of me that doesn't like the biker lifestyle. I'm not going to lie about that."
"I get that, babe. Believe me."
"But I also have come to see that you are all good men. It's quite the internal struggle," I admitted. "I was wondering the other day why the more average women that your brothers are married to decided to get involved with it, to bring kids into it."
"Love." He said it simply, with certainty. "Those men love those women like the shit you see in books and movies. They would do anything for them. And, I think, when you have a love like that, you don't give it up. Because it only comes once in this life.
They would do anything for them.
I hadn't been able to make my high school sweetheart stay with me even though I'd borne him a child.
One guy hadn't called me for a second date because I'd needed to take two phone calls since Jacob was at home sick and my mother wanted to ask me a couple questions.
I couldn't comprehend someone doing things for me. That had never been the life I led.
Except, well, until recently, right?
There was no denying that Colson was doing things for me.
More than any previous man in my life.
This man had literally never seen me at my best. He saw me wrung out from work, stressed over my mom, crying over my son. He'd seen me first thing in the morning with flat hair and sleep in my eyes. He'd seen me lose my mind—and the contents of my stomach—and hadn't wanted to run away screaming.
He'd just scooped me up, taken me home, taken care of me.
"What?" he asked, eyes going quizzical.
I couldn't imagine the looks that must have been passing on my face. But I imagined they mirrored the mix of emotions passing through me in the course of a few short moments.
Confusion, uncertainty, wonder, realization, and whatever the hell that strange warm sensation was across my chest.
"I don't know," I admitted. "I just... this probably sounds crazy considering the circumstances. But it's been nice having you in my life."
"Babe," he said, reaching to put his massive hand over my wrist, squeezing, "it's been nice being in your life. And I think it will get better from here," he added, giving me a smirk.