AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“A couple months ago? You didn’t know about him until then?” Maverick frowned, thinking, and then his expression darkened. “You mean she kept your kid from you for ten fucking years?”
While it felt surprisingly good to have Maverick build up a rage on his behalf, Eight couldn’t let it go. He was trying to make something real with Marcella and Ajax; it felt good to care about them. He meant to bring them both into the Bulls family, so he had to be straight about the situation.
“No,” he said. “It’s not like that. We were just fucking around, and we stopped when she got pregnant. She wanted the baby, and I didn’t. She didn’t like my answer, so she told me to fuck off. I was fine with that, so I fucked off. We’ve been doing our own things ever since. I never knew Ajax.”
Mav’s expression had become inscrutable. “Until now. What happened?”
With Beck gone, Eight didn’t talk about his life with anyone. He was trying to open up with Marcella, but that was a struggle. Maverick was definitely not on his heart-to-heart list—which was why he hadn’t asked for his advice about Ajax and Marcella. Despite the similarities of their situations, and their good rapport now, there were decades of history between them when they’d barely been civil enough to each other to sit at the same table together.
However, he had to make a path for Marcella to feel welcome in the club, and that wouldn’t happen if she were shrouded in mystery. Maverick was the one sitting here, asking the question. So Eight sacked up and said the truth.
“I’ve been asking myself that for months. I don’t know. But I went looking for them a couple months ago, and now … we’re trying to make it work.”
“’Make it work’? Wait—you’rewithhis mom?”
Eight nodded. “Her name’s Marcella. She’s coming to the party.”
Maverick smiled. “Goddamn. Have you ever been with a woman—like that, I mean?”
“Like what?”
“You know—seriously. In a relationship.”
“No.”
Now Maverick grinned broadly. He laughed and clapped his hands together. “And they say old dogs can’t learn new tricks.”
Normally, Eight didn’t care about getting shit. He’d dealt out dump trucks full of it in his life, and he could take it as hard as he gave it. But lately, he’d been feeling raw and disoriented. And currently, he was still steaming over JJ.
Maverick was pissing him the fuck off. “So glad to have your approval, Mav. Now you can fuck off outta here.”
Still chuckling, Mav stood. “Sorry, brother. Really.” At the door, he stopped. “If you want to talk, I’m here. I mean that truly. I know a little bit about making a wrong right with the woman you love. And I know a little about becoming a dad to a kid who thought you didn’t exist, too. I won’t give you shit. My right ear is yours, if you want to talk.”
That last sentence brought down Eight’s spikes a little. It was the way Mav always expressed a sincere desire to listen. He was deaf in his left ear, the hearing lost in damage from years of fighting in the McAllister boxing ‘league,’ which was really a way for the guards to make jack on the backs of the prisoners, with no concern for their well-being. It was a slavish, brutal way to get through prison. Eight had been pulled into it, too.
He and Mav had a lot in common, actually.
“Maybe,” he said.
Mav nodded and left him alone.
Goddamn, but life was hard when you gave a shit.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Yvonne leaned on Marcella’s bathroom door. “You’re seriouslywiththis guy now?”
Leaning over the counter, applying mascara, Marcella managed a side-eye. “Don’t judge, Vonny. It’s working.”
“It’s working. Right. The meathead redneck who dumped you the second he knocked you up is totally Mr. Right. Obviously.”
Marcella shoved the wand back in the tube. “The sarcasm is obnoxious, sis. Back down—and keep your voice down, too.” Ajax was in his room, playing video games online with his friends. There were two closed doors between them, and he was wearing a headset, but he could come out at any time to use the bathroom or get a snack.
Yvonne and Chase were hanging out here this evening, planning a night of homemade pizzas and a horror-movie marathon while Marcella went to a party at the Brazen Bulls clubhouse.
Marcella was nervous. She knew how to dress to impress, but she wanted to make a really good impression on these people, and she wasn’t remotely sure what to expect. Eight said they were mostly all family men, with wives and kids, but he’d also said that parties like this got pretty wild. Also, the Bulls were abiker gang. Their version of ‘pretty wild’ was probably several notches above what normal people would imagine.
“That Ajax doesn’t know is proof positive you know this is fucked up, sis.” Yvonne said.
