Lay It Down: Bastards MC Series Boxed Set (48 page)

“I’m so sorry, Rob!” I didn’t know what else to say. He was barely keeping it together, and even though I knew how beneficial a good cry was, I didn’t know how to comfort him or how to make it okay. “You don’t have to tell me anymore.”

After everything he’d been through as a kid, a group like the Bastards, protecting kids and trying to help, made complete sense. I understood now and didn’t need him to keep going.

But he didn’t act as if he’d heard me. “My uncle Liam was a decent guy, but I was just too pissed off at the world to care. I missed my brothah. I missed my girls. I wanted to be back with them more than anything, even if I had to go back to the hellhole my parents lived in. I wanted to rock Lizzie to sleep one more time, to scare the monsters away for Megs, to knock out the kid bullying Colin, to tell Katie I loved her. I worried about them all the time, not sure if they were hungry, cold, scared… not sure who was taking care of them.”

“You were just a kid, Rob. Those weren’t your responsibilities!” I interrupted, aching to help the child he’d been.

“I know that now. But then? I was fuckin’ miserable. By the time I was a teenager, drugs were the only thing that numbed the pain, L.K. They made me forget how much I missed 'em, how I’d failed ‘em.” He bit his bottom lip, staring across the room, lost in memory. “I got in a ton of trouble from the day I moved in with Liam, but as I got older, it got worse. He tried to help, and at first he was able to cover for me, to make excuses to the world. But by the time I was fourteen, no amount of money could help me, and I was sent to Longcreek. My uncle came to see me every visitor’s day. And every visitor’s day, I’d yell, tell him I hated him, that I didn’t want him theah. He’d still come back the next time.” Rob smiled at the memory. “He told me once that he was a bastahd, but that meant that he was passionate, that he loved me more than I loved myself, and he wasn’t gonna stop ‘til he saved me.

“I got out aftah a few months and was headed right back to the old me when my uncle made me get in the car and took me to see Megs and Colton.” His voice broke. “I hadn’t seen ‘em since a social workah took me from the hospital. Megs was ten, Colton nine, and they were fuckin’ beautiful! So fuckin’ healthy. And so fuckin’ happy.” He smiled. “Their house was huge, with a backyahd and a tree fort, and they had their own rooms and more toys than fifty fuckin’ kids needed. They remembahd me and gave me the biggest fuckin’ hugs. It was the happiest day of my life.” His eyes watered, and I bit my lip to keep from interrupting. “That was it for me. I wanted them to know me, to be proud of me. I promised my uncle on the way home that I wouldn’t touch another fuckin’ drug. And I nevah did.

“I met Allison that summer.”

I held my breath, not knowing who he was talking about but sure it would be another devastating story.

He turned his eyes back to me, and the sadness I could see broke my heart. “She was perfect. A straight-A student, beautiful, funny, tons of friends, and I couldn’t believe she wanted a loser like me as much as I wanted her. My uncle tried to warn me, told me she came from a rough family, but all I cared about was her. I started writing to Katie, got to see Megs and Colton every month, and Ali filled the rest of my time. I was happy.”

The way he said the words made my hair stand on end, and I knew something awful was coming. I shook my head. I didn’t want him to tell me more. I didn’t want to hear how this story would turn any more horrific. He didn’t stop though.

“I’d seen bruises on her, but she always laughed ‘em off. We were so close that I knew she’d tell me if something was wrong, but she never did. We’d been together for almost a yeah when she came to me, crying. She was pregnant, almost four months. We were fifteen, both just kids ourselves, no idea how to be parents. We talked about running away, but I couldn’t leave my family, not when I’d just gotten ‘em back. So we talked to Liam, and he told us we could live with him, that he’d help us. Ali’s dad had other plans though, and decided since it was too late for her to have an abortion, he’d beat the baby out of her.”

I gasped.

“Turned out she’d been his punching bag for yeahs. I never would have let her go home if I’d known.

“It didn’t work. Hannah was a fightah, even in the womb. Ali though, she wasn’t as strong as our dottah. Her dad went away, and when she got released from the hospital, her family wouldn’t let her go home. It was a small town, and a fifteen-year-old pregnant girl was not the kinda kid most parents wanted their dottahs around, and suddenly she was the shunned girl, not the shining stah. As she drifted away from me, I watched, hoping after the baby came that Ali’d be okay. She wasn’t. I knew she was using as soon as she started. I was terrified for Hannah, pissed off that Ali’d do that shit aftah I told her about my childhood. The day I caught her dealer in my house, with my very pregnant girlfriend, both shooting up, I snapped. I fuckin’ came unspun. If my uncle hadn’t come home and stopped me, I’da killed him.

“I was sent back to the youth centah, this time as a violent criminal. I missed Hannah bein’ born, missed her first cry, her first smile.” He swallowed hard as the memories clearly became too much for him to bear. “I only got to hold her a handful of times, but I loved that little girl with every paht of my soul. Liam had her for a few yeahs and would bring her when he came to visit. She reminded me so much of Lizzie—dahk curly hair and chubby cheeks. The most beautiful baby girl on the fuckin’ planet.

“I was determined to be a great dad, to be everything mine wasn’t. More like my uncle. I had this need to be someone my baby girl could be proud of, to right othah’s wrongs, and stand up for the kids who couldn’t stand up for themselves. There’s a lot of shitty stuff that happens in a correctional facility, L.K., even when you’ah in theah with kids as young as ten. Matty and I had become friends, and he always had my back, even when he thought I should mind my own fuckin’ business. But everything good I was doin’ didn’t matter ‘cause I was still stuck inside. And when Ali came, after two yeahs of being a fuckin’ lowlife, to take Hannah, my uncle had to give her back ‘cause she was the mom. She had the fuckin' nerve to come to Longcreek and gloat. Told me I'd ruined her life and that I'd nevah see Hannah again.

“I was in the middle of a fuckin’ science class when the guahds and my counsellah pulled me out, haulin’ me to the office. They brought Matty in, figurin’ it would soften the blow.” His voice broke again, and this time, tears rolled down his cheeks and he brought a fist to his mouth. “There is nothin’ in this world that will help you when someone tells you that your dottah is dead, that her mother’s boyfriend killed her, and that both are missing. There is no pain that comes close to knowing you failed the people you love again, that you didn’t save her.”

I didn’t think, just pushed myself off the couch and flew at him. I pulled him against me so hard that he didn’t have a chance to resist. Even sitting, he was almost as tall as I was standing, and I could feel his tears as they soaked through the shoulder of my shirt. I held him tightly, letting him know that he wasn’t alone in this terrible memory. My tears slid down my face, and I bit my lip. Jesus, this evening had not gone as I planned it. I had no idea that this was where our conversation would take us, and if I had, I would have stopped it before it started. I didn’t know how long I stood there, but I waited until his body stopped shaking and his breathing had returned to normal before I eased my grip.

He cleared his throat, sitting back and pulling me onto his lap. “You asked me if I evah killed anyone.” He shrugged before he wrapped an arm around me. “I meant to kill him, L.K., because he took her from me. I got off ‘cause I had a brilliant attorney, but I would do it again, even if it meant spending the rest of my life locked away.”

I nodded, understanding perfectly. I would do the same thing for my children, without a second thought. I turned my head to look at him. “And Alison? What happened to her?

He met my gaze, face hardening in resolve. “She took the cowahd’s way out and ran. Just disappeared. I haven’t found her yet. For all I know, she could have died in an alley with a needle in her arm.”

The fierce look in his eyes was too much, and I had to look away. I leaned my head on his shoulder. “And the Bastards? You started the club, didn’t you? Right after that?”

“Matty and I started it together. I don’t know what he’s told you about his time locked up or why he was theah, but when we got out, I had to come home to Boston, get away from the memories. I needed to channel my energy into something else. Mateo’s my best friend, so he came too. We fell in with a rough club and were prospects. It wasn’t enough for me though. The prez was the one who told me to start the Bastards, and he lent me some money and gave me a list of contacts. We had friends who wanted in, and they had friends. It didn’t take long before we were an official club.

“MC’s are fuckin’ risky, L.K. Starting a new one and getting the AMA to sanction you as a real club isn’t easy. We wanted to be aboveboard—completely legal, so everyone would take us seriously. But to them, we were just a bunch of criminal kids. The cops called us a gang, othah clubs ignored us or picked fights whenevah they could, and the AMA wouldn’t even acknowledge our existence. One day Mateo and I were talking about what the Bastahds were and what we wanted them to become. The answer was simple. We protect the innocent, ahh passionate about what we do, and we’re not gonna stop ‘til we save ‘em all.”

I realized suddenly that that had been his uncle’s definition of a bastard, and just like that, it all made sense.

“To do that though, we have to step outside the boundaries of the law. We can’t hold people accountable, or save the people we want to save, if we don’t. We spend ninety-five percent of our time inside the gray area. We may not sell drugs or do illegal shit to make money, but we’re still not welcome by the AMA because we’re not law-abiding citizens. We decided that they could all go fuck themselves, and we happily accepted our roles as outlaws. We wear those patches with pride."

I thought about the 1% diamond that each of them had on their cut.

“Look at me." I lifted my face to his, and he gave me a small smile. "I told you once, L.K., people are afraid of us for a fuckin’ reason. Like you said last summer, the general consensus is that we’re vigilantes. Some see us as heroes, othahs think we ahh sadistic fucks. We all have our own demons, stories that ahh worse than mine, and we’ll do anything to keep kids from going through the same shit we did. We try to protect the ones who have no one else to protect them. And we protect the ones we love at all costs”—his eyes bore into mine, as if driving the next words home—“including keeping them in the dahk because ahh secrets will hurt 'em.” He moved his head slightly and kissed the top of my head. "You'ah ahh family now."

I didn’t know what to say. This group of broken men, all tough and scary and freakishly weird in their own way, were the most amazing people I’d ever met. I wanted to support them in any way I could because I knew they were helping more people than they were hurting. And even though I didn't want to, I could understand Matty’s insistence to shut me out. Whatever secrets he was still keeping weren’t important anymore. Whatever it was that he’d done that he thought was so horrible didn’t matter to me.

Chapter 15

Jo

I didn’t want to get out of bed. I wasn’t sure what time it was, but I could tell it was definitely late morning because of the amount of sunshine invading Matty’s room. I needed caffeine, to pee, and to get dressed before Cris showed up—not necessarily in that order. I couldn’t find the energy to move though.

I’d stayed up with Rocker well into the night. We’d talked about my kids, my future plans, and anything else I could think of to keep his mind off of what he’d told me. He’d been so deflated, nothing like the man I’d come to know, and I wanted to distract him for as long as possible. He’d finally given in though, telling me he had early appointments today, and he hugged me and kissed my hair the way Matty did before he headed down to his room.

I’d sat up for a long while after he left, trying to process everything I’d learned, before I gave up and headed to bed. I might as well have stayed up. I’d only tossed and turned, begging for what seemed like hours for sleep to come. I’d gotten up and taken a steaming hot shower at one point, hoping it would quiet my mind and relax my body into slumber. It hadn’t.

I stretched, my muscles screaming in agony as they protested any movement. My phone rang, and I grabbed it begrudgingly, not even looking at the screen. Only Cris would be calling me at this time of day. She probably wanted to know why I wasn’t ready.

“I’m still sleeping,” I growled, breaking into a yawn.

“Morning.” The low, sexy voice drawled, full of amusement, and I could almost hear the smile on his lips. “Sleep well, sunshine?”

“Not really.” I stifled another yawn. “I sleep better when you’re here with me.”

“God,” Matty groaned. “I’d do anything to be there with you right now… guarantee you wouldn’t be so grumpy.”

I smiled and chuckled.

He sighed. “I didn’t mean to wake you up, Joes. I’m driving to a visit and thought we could talk for a while.”

I sat up, instantly awake. We used to do that all the time. Whenever one of us was on the road, we’d call the other.

“We can talk later if you want to go back to sleep.”

“No!” I practically shouted.