I dove on Emerald, and she actually giggled as I hugged her tightly to my body. My cheeks hurt from the smile which was plastered to my face, and I honestly felt a little giddy. I had my sister back, after six long years. I couldn’t wait to show her the amazing things in this world that we’d always been told were the work of the devil.
Eventually, I dragged Emerald out of Op’s office and down to my bedroom to find her some clothes that might work until I could take her shopping. Deacon was officially off duty so he was outside waiting to take us to his place so I could help her get set up.
Op was amazing, he’d allowed me the rest of the day off to spend with my sister and get her settled. This was why I loved the club. They might have these rules, and I respected them for that, but they were also understanding and supportive when things happened that were out of our control.
Emerald sat at the edge of my bed while I dug through my wardrobe for anything that I thought she might wear, which honestly really came down to maxi dresses given that she wasn’t quite prepared yet to damn herself to hell with things like shorts or even jeans.
“This room is nice,” Emerald said, her eyes roaming the small space that I called home. “What is it that you do here? Maybe I could work here too, and get my own room like this.”
I stalled, my hand freezing on a pair of sneakers I thought she might fit into. “I um… I do a lot of things.” I couldn’t look at her. I wasn’t ashamed of what I did for the club, but it was going to take a long time before Emerald would understand and accept how different this place was to the world we grew up in.
“Hey, Sky…”
I spun around to see Camo standing in the doorway. He looked at my sister in confusion. “Uh… I see you’ve got a visitor, I’ll come back later.”
“I’m off duty, but I’ll be back in a few hours,” I told him as I continued digging through my old clothes at the bottom of the closet.
“Such a shame, ‘cause your ass looks damn fine right now.” He groaned, and my whole body stilled.Shit.“Come find me when you get back in ‘cause I’m dying to get my hands on it, but Kev has been fucking greedy with you lately.”
“Yeah, sure.” His heavy footsteps retreated down the hall, and I could already feel my sister’s dark glare. “Don’t judge me, Em,” I said with a heavy sigh as I climbed up off the floor to face her. “I do what I do, things are different—”
“You let them have your body? Not just him? How many of them?” she asked, looking at me with a mixture of disgust and horror. “Sapphire—”
“That’s not my name!” I snapped, instantly feeling bad for getting worked up. But it’s hard not to when I’ve finally got her back, the one person who had my back growing up, and she’s sitting there looking at me like I’m a horrible fucking person.
“It’s filthy,” she hissed, turning her nose up at me like she’s a fucking princess.
“It’s life, Em. These guys treat me with respect, they look after me, and they protect me. Can you say the same about where we come from?” I challenged her, knowing full well the Brothers did more for me than the Colony ever fucking did. I took a deep breath. “I’m happy here. Because of the Brothers, I’m going to school. I have a job. I get to have fun and go on adventures and live my life the way it was meant to be lived. And now I have my sister back, I want to share it all with her.”
I saw her processing what I’d told her. The thing about Emerald was she liked to have facts, she liked to have information before she made decisions about anything. The girl was smart, so advanced for her age that while most of us went to school until ten, they pulled her out at eight because she’d already learned what they needed to teach. It was the reason why we always tended to get into trouble because the both of us were continually asking why.
Finally, I let out the breath I was holding when her mouth turned up in a gentle smile. “School you say?”