don’t want you to stress yourself out and end up in a bad place again.”
Marshall laughed under his breath, shaking his head. “Still the hero.”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Harley said sharply.
Marshall’s lips quirked up, familiar and arrogant. “Just giving you hell. You’re right. That would be smart. I need to find NA meetings around here anyway, get my stuff sent from the ranch, and touch base with the psychologist they referred me to out here. But my first order of business is seeing Mom and Dee. Think you can go with me to talk to them tomorrow? I have to figure out how to explain to Delaney’s girls who I am and who I was.”
“Absolutely.”
Marshall carefully put the picture of his wife and baby in his wallet and shoved the wallet in his back pocket. His expression turned serious again, and he said, “If Annie and Destiny, Dad, and the stories of my Dark Knights brothers taught me one thing about life, it’s that we don’t know how long we’ll be on this earth. We have no guarantees of tomorrow, and neither do the people we love. I did the best I could at the time, but I’ll never get back the years I missed out on with Dad. I don’t know what your plans are with Piper, but I know love when I see it, and you two give it off in droves. Don’t waste a second of the life you have with her. Don’t put everyone else first, and yourself last, which is what you’ve always done. I’m not surprised you didn’t realize you loved her when we were younger. You were in hero mode, and that’s not a bad thing, Harley. Dad raised you to be a good man, to take care of the rest of us. You were saving Piper from me, and you did a good thing. But don’t stay in the background. Give her all you have now. And don’t just be her hero. Be your own hero. Because while you’re busy putting off your dreams, thinking in terms of one day, that dream can be stolen away in a heartbeat.”
The door to the pub opened, and Jiggs bounded over, covering Harley’s face with sloppy kisses. “Guess you should meet my buddy Jiggs.” Jiggs climbed on Marshall, covering his face with kisses.
Marshall loved up Jiggs and said, “He’s as touchy-feely as you are.”
Harley’s heart beat impossibly faster as Piper stepped inside, looking sweet and worried in a sweatshirt and cutoffs. After everything Marshall had said, he wanted to run to her, sweep her into his arms, and never let her go.
“Do I need a body bag, a medic, or a bottle of tequila?” Piper asked as she stepped into the bar, closing the door behind her.
Marshall looked at Harley and said, “Don’t waste a second.”
He didn’t plan to. Not with Piper and not with him.
“I saw Marshall’s bike and figured Jiggs and I would wait out on the stoop,” Piper said, righting chairs as she approached. “But it went silent for too long, and I thought you’d killed each other.”
“No dead bodies,” Harley said as he pushed to his feet, wincing.
Jiggs sniffed Marshall as Harley offered his brother a hand, helping him to his feet.
“Just a couple of bruised egos,” Marshall added.
“It looks like a little more than that. Ouch, Marshall, that black eye looks like it hurts. At least you got the burly one back on his cheek.” She put her arms around Harley, and he winced. She lifted his shirt, revealing hints of what he was sure would be bruises on his ribs by morning. She pressed a kiss there, and then her lips curled into a sassy smirk and she said, “Where else did you hit him?”
Marshall and Harley chuckled.
“In the heart mostly,” Marshall said. He started to pick up fallen chairs. “I’m going to head out after we get the place fixed up and give you guys some privacy. Unless you want me to stick around to go over things with Piper?”
“I think I can handle it.” Harley touched Marshall’s hand, stopping him from fixing the chairs, and said, “I’ve got this.”
“Sorry, brother, but I clean up my own messes these days,” Marshall said, and he went back to helping put the room back in order.
When they finished, Harley asked Marshall where he was staying.
Marshall picked up his leather jacket and said, “With Ike Preacher, a Dark Knight over in Harmony Pointe.”
“Really? I hired his company to bring