and my father walked in with Declan by his side. Deck was on his own two feet, but it was obvious that he wasn’t doing too well. Sweat was beaded up on his brow and his body was shaking. Still, our eyes locked and I swear, I saw relief in them for just a moment before he noticed someone else in the room. Durbin. He bypassed me and went straight for him, and when he spoke, my heart broke. “Help me.” That was it, just two words and then he couldn’t hold himself up any longer.
“Oh God!” Lily cried out from next to me. I reached for and just wrapped an arm around her thin waist and pulled her close.
“It’ll be okay. We knew this was probably how it was going to be,” I told her while trying to reassure myself with those words as well.
“Oh, Ever! I’m so glad the girls weren’t here to see that.”
“Me too.” My father came to us then, and didn’t bother picking which one of us women needed a hug more, instead, he scooped us both into his big arms and held us tight to him. Then he kissed Tiger Lily on the head and leaned in to whisper in her ear, although I still heard what he said to her and felt her body shake with the emotions she was holding back.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t bring Merc back with me too. He’s going to come home though. Jay will see to it. When they’re back, we’re having a discussion about family, and not excluding them from things.” She tipped her head, acknowledging his words and then he leaned in and kissed me on the cheek. “Baby girl, give him a little time. He needs to heal.”
“Did he even recognize us?” Lily asked.
“He did,” I said at the same time my father nodded his head.
“He has memory of everyone, though he’s still missing things,” he told us both as he took us to one of the couches to be seated in order to get Lily off her feet. Dad focused his attention on me though. “The whole way back he kept mumbling about not wanting you to see him like this. He didn’t want us to bring him to the house because that’s where he thought you’d be waiting.”
“He should know better,” I managed to huff past the emotion that was threatening to choke me.
“All he knows right now is the itch he has for the poison that cunt was pumping in his veins.”
My eyes met my father’s then, and I didn’t bother to hide the fury in them. “When that baby comes out of her, I better get my time in,” I demanded.
“Ever, I don’t think,” he started to say.
“It’s not about you or what you think. It’s not even about any of them either,” I spoke, my voice grew louder with each word, and I realized I had everyone’s attention. “What she did… She stole time from us that we can’t get back. She stole moments and memories, and she turned him into something he never was and now never can escape. She took our Deck from us. He might be back, he might get better, but he will never be the same Deck. She stole that. I know everyone here thinks they deserve a piece of her because he’s your brother, your friend, your President. He’s more than all of that to me. He is my best friend, my lover, my champion, my fucking hero, and when I tell you that the line starts here and I don’t care if any of you get your piece of revenge, so long as I do, then I fucking mean it. This club owes me. Now, it owes my family even more because he should have never been out there to begin with.”
The room was dead silent until Trunk spoke. “We’ll take that under consideration.”
“You think so?” I asked. “I’m not giving you a fucking choice here, Trunk. I don’t give a good goddamn about your ‘boys only’ rule or any of your other bullshit you plan to spout at me. That man, the one who was just brought in here so broken he couldn’t even look me – his best friend, wife, life fucking companion – in the face. He is mine! I will handle that vile piece of whore flesh you’re keeping in the pit and you won’t say a fucking word about it. This isn’t a vote. You don’t get to