“Yes.” I give her a tight smile. “I’m married.”
Tank, Cady, and I say our goodbyes. I walk them out of my office and through to the lobby, and tell Margot, my assistant, to take their contact information and set up an electronic file for them in our database.
Back in my office, I watch through my window as the two of them leave a few minutes later. Tank opens the door of his truck for Cady and waits for her to climb in, then shuts it gently behind her.
As they drive away, it’s hard not to envy them. It’s obvious that this petite, spunky woman and her huge, tattooed biker are destined to go the distance together. They’ll weather whatever storms life throws at them.
And now, my job is to help make sure the little girl they love is by their side.
2
Striker
“Hey, asshole!”
A hard boot kicks against my leg, jolting me from a hazy black nothingness.
“Wake the fuck up!” the voice says impatiently, loud enough to split my goddamn head open. “Jesus, you look like shit.”
Reflexively, I kick back blindly, but my foot doesn’t connect with anything. I let out an incoherent sound halfway between a groan and a shout. At first I’m not sure if this is a dream I’m just emerging from, or if it’s real.
But fuck me running, judging from the hammering in my head, my guess is I’m awake.
The boot nudges me again, harder this time.
“Goddamnit, Striker!” Tank’s angry growl shoots a dagger through my pounding skull. “I ain’t got time for this shit!”
I flinch away from the sound. “Not so loud, dude!”
Slowly, reluctantly, I work my way from horizontal to vertical, giving my head time to adjust. I squeeze my eyes together, and brace for the light that’s gonna stab at me when I open them. Letting out a deep breath, I open my eyelids to see Tank standing above me on the couch, holding a bunch of envelopes and flyers in one hand.
“Jeezus,” I hiss. “Where’s the fire?”
Tank takes a step back. “I’m surprised the fire ain’t comin’ from you.” He grimaces. “You got enough alcohol on your breath to be a human blowtorch, you drunk motherfucker.”
“Who let you in, anyway?” I grumble.
“The door wasn’t locked,” Tank tells me. “I’m guessin’ whoever your guest was last night left it open when she split.”
In spite of myself, I grin. “Yeah, I suppose she must’ve.”
“It’s after noon,” Tank gripes. “And Jesus, it smells like shit in here.” He gives me a critical once-over. “You look like you got the shit end of the stick last night. You lose another fight?”
“I didn’t lose the fight,” I correct him, lifting a hand to my face. Ouch. The shiner I got from Aristo’s left hook is gonna be with me for a while. And my jaw’s pretty sore, too. “I threw it. I gotta make that shit look realistic, right?”
Tank groans. “Why the fuck are you throwing fights, Striker? I thought you had more self-respect than that.”
I let out a bark of laughter. “Self-respect don’t pay my bills, brother. Besides, I know I can take the assholes I fight. I don’t need to prove anything to myself, or to anyone else.”
“If you know you can take ‘em, why don’t you get Rudy to book you some real fights?” he challenges. “Ones where you don’t have to fake shit to get paid?”
“What the fuck do I care? More to the point, what the fuck do you care?” I say, wincing as the volume of my last words sends a lance of pain through my skull. “The money’s the same shade of green either way.”
Underground fighting is something I’ve been doing for years. I started out before I joined the MC. Been doin’ it off and on ever since, to make extra scratch. Tank used to do it, too. The two of us were on the local circuit together for years. Hell, Tank was even a better fighter than me. But he got sick of it after a while, and eventually he walked away from it completely. Me? I’ve been workin’ the fights twice as often lately. The money’s good.
Sometimes throwing fights, the money’s even better.
And letting someone kick the shit out of me feels like the penance I deserve.
“What the fuck ever,” Tank growls, rolling his eyes. He tosses the envelopes and other shit onto the couch next to me. “Here. Looks like you haven’t checked your mail in a while.”
“Thanks,” I say.
“So, what’s the deal?” he challenges. “Were you just gonna sleep all goddamn day if I didn’t wake you up, asshole?”
I rub a rough hand over my face. “So it’s noon. So shoot me. I’m an adult, last I checked, which means I can get up whenever the fuck I want.”
Tank sighs, looks down at my coffee table, and lifts a boot to shove the empty beer bottles and other shit cluttering it off to one side. A few of the bottles fall onto the floor. One rolls to a stop at my feet. I notice a pair of pink panties next to it. Huh. I don’t remember those from last night.
Then again, I don’t remember much from last night.
Tank clears enough room for himself to take a seat, perching on the edge of the table. “What the fuck is wrong with you lately?” he asks. I can hear the concern and disgust in his voice. “You’re livin’ in a garbage dump, brother. Christ, when’s the last time you cleaned up around here?” He sweeps his arm around the place.
“It ain’t that bad,” I say dismissively. “And by the way, let me remind you I didn’t invite you in, so you can fuck off with the complaints about the state of my living room.”
“The hell it ain’t!” he snorts. “It’s like you’re homeless, except you got a roof over your head. This ain’t like you.”
“Brother, this is absolutely like me. Do you not remember the constant festival of booze and pussy that is the Lords of Carnage lifestyle? I mean, I know you’ve recently turned into a family man, and all of a sudden underground fightin’ and partyin’ hard is beneath you.” My lip curls. “Has parenthood and domesticated pussy wiped your memory clean in such a short time?”
Tank unexpectedly became a father a few months ago, when one of his exes literally left a kid on his doorstep and skipped town. What happened after that is a long fucking story. But in the end, he got a great daughter out of it. Not to mention an old lady who’s hot as hell, and tough enough to keep my MC brother and best friend in line.
I ain’t gonna lie, though. Even though he’s about a million times happier lately, it’s been kind of a drag that he ain’t around to hang with me as much as he used to.
“Come on, Strike,” Tank frowns, suddenly more serious. “You know what I mean. You’ve been hitting this shit a lot harder than usual the last few months. It’s one thing to party, but I dunno. This is different.”
“Different how?” I counter. “I ain’t been doing anything different than I usually do. Drinking, fucking, fighting. My three favorite hobbies. Oh, and riding. My four favorite hobbies.” I correct. “Which used to be your four favorite hobbies not so long ago, if I remember right.”