If the club offers anyone protection, then we protect them with our lives. We’re all veterans here. We all know what that means.
“Her ex might turn up, and he could be dangerous,” I state. “She claims he was never violent towards her, but a desperate man might do anything.”
There are nods all round.
“I’m moving in while she’s here,” I state. “I’ll be the main guard.”
Snips swallows his sandwich and lets out a belch. “Excuse me,” he mutters.
Barrels shifts in his seat and fixes me with a steely stare. “No offense Luke, you’re one tough motherfucker,no doubt about that, but do you think you’re the best man for this job?”
A spike of hurt pierces my chest at the implication that I might not be capable of protecting a woman. But Barrels almost made it to Sergeant Major before leaving the military. He doesn’t say it to be hurtful. He says it because he’s thinking of what’s best for the mission.
My hands clench into fists, and I push them against the arms of my chair so I rise up on my fists. Perhaps he’s right. Maybe a cripple isn’t the right choice to protect a woman. But I can guarantee no man here feels the way I do about Isla. What I lack in body parts I make up for in determination. There is no way I’d let anyone get to Isla.
“Let him try me.” I grit out the words, and the room falls silent. Several sets of eyes stare at me in surprise.
Then Bit Rate chuckles. “You’ve got it bad, man.”
I turn my head, and the smile slides off his face. “I’ve got a woman and baby who are running scared. Let that fucker come near her, and I’ll show him what a cripple can do.”
It’s big talk, and I hope like hell I can follow through. But there’s no way in hell I’m leaving this up to anyone else.
Snips clears his throat. “If you’re intent on being this woman’s superhero, why the hell are we all here?”
Good point. I take a calming breath and get onto the real reason I called the meeting.
“Isla doesn’t just need protection; she’s struggling with a newborn baby. She’s up all night feeding, she’s not sleeping enough, that’s making her more anxious, andthat makes the baby anxious, and then the baby doesn’t want to sleep and she sleeps even less.”
“You want us to look after her baby?” Specs looks incredulous, and I don’t blame him. He’s the only man left, apart from me, who’s still flying the single flag.
“No. I want your old ladies to.”
The guys look at each other, finally getting it.
“She needs round the clock help. She needs meals cooked for her. She needs someone to watch the baby so she can shower and get some time to herself, and she needs someone to do pick up a night feed so she can keep sleeping. Does anyone have one of those breast pump expressing thingies?” I hold my hand up and squeeze my fingers together in an attempt to mimic an expressing machine.
There are some raised eyebrows, but I’m not going to explain the hours I’ve spent on the internet learning about breastfeeding and expressing and chaffing and all this other shit I never knew I needed to know about keeping a baby alive.
Some of the men looked blank, since not all the ladies choose to breastfeed, but Hops pipes up.
“Yeah, we’ve got one that’s still works. You’ll need bags to store the milk, and new bottle nipples.”
“We’ve got some spare breast milk bags,” chimes in Barrels, which I’m pretty sure is a line the ex-First Class Sergeant never thought he’d ever say back in his military days.
The rest of the meeting turns into a discussion on what their old ladies have and what we need to buy andthe best way to store breast milk. Phone calls are made to the women, and pretty soon we’ve got a roster worked out, I’ve ordered anything we don’t already have, and Kendra has arrived with the breast pump, which is a scary-looking contraception and reminds me of when I visited my cousin’s dairy farm when I was a kid.
We’ve also worked out which one of the women will do a night feed so Isla can keep sleeping once she’s got the expressing thing.
The meeting ends and the men trail out, heading to the kitchen to find another bacon sandwich.
Raiden slaps me on the back. “You did good, kid.”
His praise makes my chest swell. He’s been like a father to me since he rescued me from a dark place two years ago, and I’ll never be able to repay him for that.
“But she’s going to need some time.”
I frown at him. Are my feelings that transparent? “It’s not like that.”
