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“Mom,” I groaned.
Tessa walked over and hugged me.
Holding her, she must have sensed my mood because when she stepped back and looked at me, she whispered, “What happened?”
“It’s nothing.”
My father chirped, right before he threw down his cards. “Take that, you fuckers!”
“Son of a bitch,” Snoopy moaned.
“How the fuck does he do it?” Popeye asked.
“He cheats,” Happy laughed as York squealed, slapping his hands down on the tray of his chair.
“I do not!”
Rolling my eyes, I ignored the old bastards, as I glared at Happy, who smirked at me, before shuffling the deck of cards. How that fucker got here before me, I would never know. After the damn vote, I left and hightailed it home. Unless he teleported his ass here, we should have arrived at the same time. Yet, there he sat at my kitchen table, drinking my beer as he played cards with the dad and the Rejects.
“Montana?”
Diverting my attention back to Tessa, I sighed. “It’s nothing babe. Really.”
“You’re lying,” she whispered, narrowing her eyes.
I lightly nodded the mouthed…Talk later.
Kissing her forehead, I greeted my mom before heading over to my son, whose face lit up like the fourth of July upon seeing me.
After everyone left that night, I sat in my home office, staring into the fire as I held a tumbler of scotch in my hand. Tessa walked in, sitting on the couch, curling her legs up. She said nothing as she watched me.
I tried to act normal. I tried to engage with the others, but by the end of the night, all the laughter faded. My family looked cautiously at me. My dad just stared in worry. My mom hovered close to Dad. The Rejects ceased all talk. Even Tess refused to leave my side. The only one oblivious to my mood was York.
In the end, I excused myself and hid out in my office until everyone left. It was the coward’s way, I know, but until I could come to terms with the fact that Tessa was in danger because of me, I wasn’t going to be good to anyone.
“Tell me?”
“Going to have company for a while.” I muttered, slowly turning the tumbler in my hand. How the fuck was I supposed to tell her what was about to happen? That our semi-quiet life, a life we were still trying to navigate, was about to be open to everyone.
“Okay.”
The silence was deafening.
I knew Tessa wanted to pick and prod at me until I told her everything. What the hell could I say? That someone from my past is fucking with your future? That the reason you haven’t found a hospital to hire you is because of me. Until this mess is over, I’m going to have Storm keep the tracker I didn’t tell you about in your shoulder active, so I know where you are at all times?
Yeah, that last one was going to go over well.
Not.
Regardless, I had no choice.
To keep Tessa safe, I would do what I had to.
With a unanimous vote, I was in lockdown while the club dropped all commitments to find whoever was behind the blacklisting. Not only my life, but Tess’ was about to become an open book. Every detail of our personal lives and club dealings was about to be discussed, broken down and investigated.
“The club put us both on lockdown.”
“I don’t understand. I thought you only did that when there was a threat to the club?”
