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Eight looked surprised … and almost cowed. “Uh, we’re good.”
Felicia turned to Marcella. “You want to know what’s what for women in the Bulls?”
“Yeah, I do,” Marcella answered.
“Then you want to come with us.”
She really did. “Yeah, thanks.”
Clearly disappointed, maybe even hurt, Eight looked at her and said, “Marce.”
A tiny, dark-haired woman scooted into the mix. Marcella flipped a few mental pages and remembered that she was called Sage. “We won’t break her, Eight. Promise.”
Eight smiled at that little woman in a way that tweaked Marcella’s jealousy a bit. Then she remembered that Eight had introduced her as Becker’s old lady. Becker was the friend who’d died.
Felicia grabbed her hand. “Bring your drink. Come on out back. We’re setting up in the throne room.”
Eight let her go, but he looked like a lost puppy.
~oOo~
The ‘throne room’ was one of those gazebo things you could buy at Lowe’s or Costco. It had a metal frame and a canvas roof and walls, lights strung around the frame, and a heat lamp set up in one corner. It was big enough to accommodate three outdoor sofas and two matching chairs, and there were big cushions arranged on a woven plastic outdoor rug.
All the old ladies she’d met, and a few other young women, were arranging themselves on those seating options. Felicia parked Marcella beside her on one of the sofas. As she looked around, she tried to test her memory. Felicia beside her. Then Jenny. Squeezed in next to Jenny, at the far end of this sofa, was a very pretty young blond Marcella was ninety percent sure she hadn’t met. Then Mo, sitting regally in one of the armchairs. Sage was beside her, at one end of another sofa. Then … uh … Willa? Yeah, pretty sure.
Beside her was Jacinda, the private detective. Another very young woman at her side. She was small and dark-haired, with huge brown eyes. And she was, it seemed, deaf.
On the third sofa was Leah, then a redhead … Marcella didn’t remember her—oh wait. Cissy or something like that. Then Deb. In the other armchair was a curvy woman about as tall as Marcella. Kari was her name. Phew. Okay. Was that everybody? Except the two youngsters, who, based on the way Jenny and Jacinda behaved with them, were daughters.
It eased Marcella’s mind quite a bit to find all these women here whoweren’tthere to service the men. These were the women who made that feral band of shaggy bears inside into a family.
“Did everybody meet Marcella?” Sage asked, talking over the chatter of the women as they settled in together. As she spoke the question, she also signed it.
The dark-haired beauty Marcella thought was deaf clapped her hands. When she had everybody’s attention, she shook her head and signed something.
Jacinda said and signed, “Marcella, this is my daughter, Athena. She says hi and welcome to the family.”
“Yes, welcome,” several other women murmured in concert, all of them making the same signs.
Playing back over the past few minutes, Marcella realized that all the women had been signing as they were coming together here in the throne room. Had the whole club learned to sign for one girl? DidEightknow how to sign?
It moved her more than she could say, more than she was prepared for, to think that the Brazen Bulls had learned a whole language for one girl. It rocked her perception of outlaw bikers, that was certain. It changed her understanding of Eight fundamentally.
Swallowing down the sudden swell of emotion dammed in her throat, Marcella smiled and waved. “Hi, Athena. I’m sorry I don’t know how to sign.”
Jacinda interpreted her words into ASL.
Smiling—she was really stunning—Athena signed, and her mom interpreted, “That’s okay. I read lips. It’s hard in the dark like this, but otherwise I’d be able to understand your speech. But would you like to know how to sign the letters of your name?”
“Sure. Please.”
A few minutes later, Marcella knew how to spell her name in ASL.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Eight was freaking out.
Marcella had been back with the old ladies for an hour. He’d gone back a couple of times to eavesdrop, but all he’d heard was a lot of loud chick laughter. He’d heard Marcella’s laugh as part of the chorus, and that hadn’t settled his mind any.
