Total pages in book: 150
Estimated words: 142818 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142818 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
All eyes turned to him, as usual.
Including mine.
My heart did that little flutter like it always did when I saw him.
Except he looked a bit different than he did when he’d dropped me off this morning. I hung up my apron and rounded the counter, arriving in front of it at the same time as him.
He didn’t hesitate to greet me the same way he did every day, yanking our bodies flush together and kissing me in a way that wasn’t fit for public consumption.
As he always did, Julian called out. “Get a room before all my customers think they can do that in here!”
He was always smiling when he said it, and he had not seemed at all surprised about Elden and I being together or me being pregnant.
Nothing much surprised Julian.
Because I was not yet immune to Elden and his badass powers, I kissed him back without commenting on the change in his appearance.
But I managed to pull back enough to inspect his face up close.
“You have a black eye,” I glared at the bruise.
“It’s not black yet, a little red maybe,” he shrugged.
“You have a cut on your cheek,” I sucked my teeth.
“A scratch,” Elden corrected.
“What happened?” I demanded, putting my hands on my hips.
“We’re not gonna talk about it here.”
I rooted myself to my spot. “We are going to talk right here, right now.”
He considered me, as if he were assessing how serious I was. “This needed to happen.”
“You and my stepfather?” I deduced.
He nodded.
“Men!” I threw up my hands. “Are you all like this?” I looked to Julian.
“We’re definitely not all like that.” He motioned to Elden.
I tried not to smile.
Elden’s fingers went to my chin, gently turning me to face him.
“Like it or not, this is the first step to things getting close to sorted between us.”
“I don’t like it,” I muttered.
Elden flashed me his teeth.
“Not fair,” I whined. “You can’t just smile at me and win every argument.”
Elden chuckled.
“Now he chuckles!” I groaned. “I’m powerless against you.”
“Ditto, baby,” he murmured against my mouth.
“Out of here!” Julian demanded. “Before you get pregnant all over again.”
It was my turn to chuckle as we did what Julian asked.
And although it was biologically impossible, when we made it back to the club, Elden did his best to get me pregnant all over again.
I went back to school because even though I was questioning what I really wanted out of my future, I knew I didn’t want to drop out. I wanted to close this chapter, whatever that meant.
Elden came with me.
Not something I’d expected.
“You have a life here,” I’d argued when he started packing his bag the day before I was scheduled to leave.
“I have a life here,” he countered, placing his hand on my stomach. “Here,” he whispered, love shining in his eyes..
My heart skipped about a million beats as it did when he got all soft and romantic.
“What are you going to do every day?” I asked. “I don’t think there are many pastimes for biker badasses on campus.”
“Rhode Island chapter needs an extra hand,” he explained. “I’ll keep myself busy.”
I chewed on my lip. Although I had a pretty wild imagination, I had yet to ask what Elden actually did on a day-to-day basis. I knew that he worked part time in the garage. I knew that because he’d come back to our room wearing coveralls, rolled back halfway to show off his incredible torso, grease on his cheek. I’d all but pounced on him every time.
I also knew the club owned a bar, did a lot of charity drives. But they weren’t called ‘outlaws’ because it sounded cool. Although it really did.
“Ask me,” Elden said.
I stared at him.
“Ask me what the club does,” he clarified. “Know you want to. Know it’s probably been driving you crazy.”
It had been. But I’d been doing really well with not thinking about it. Mainly because I had a lot of other things on my mind the past two years. “I don’t know if I want to know,” I admitted. “I mean, secrets were the foundation of the first eighteen years of my life, so I certainly don’t want more of them. But I know the things you do are in direct opposition to a lot of the things I believe.”
“Like what?”
“Well, you’re involved in a club that blatantly excludes women for a start.”
Elden’s eyes lit up. “You’ve made your feelings about that known since the moment you arrived here.”
“And I won’t give up on the crusade to let women patch in,” I informed him. “Especially if we have a daughter.”
Elden’s hand went to my stomach, as it tended to do a lot these days. “I expect nothing less.”
I stared into the eyes of the man I loved. The father of my baby. “What is the club involved in?” I whispered.