“What was that for?”
“For being stupid,” She says and her eyes are sparking with anger. She gets up and starts walking away.
“Where in the hell are you going?”
“Anywhere away from you,” She tosses back at me, but she doesn’t bother to turn around or stop. I get up and take off after her.
“Carrie, damn it.”
She’s walking along the concrete pathway by the lake.
“We’re on my bike! Are you planning on walking all the way home?” I yell aggravated.
“If I have to! Who knows maybe someone will pick me up along the side of the road and we’ll fall madly in love! I’m stupid like that. I can fall in love with man after man. Heck! Sometimes I fall in love with three a day!”
She’s screaming and it’s a nice evening, so the marina is not empty. People are staring at her likes she’s crazy. There’s nothing about our situation funny, but I can’t help the smile that breaks out on my face. I increase my pace and catch her, grab her arm and turn her around to me. The smile on my face dies when I see the tears in her eyes and how pale her face looks.
“I’m sorry Care Bear, it was a stupid thing to say.”
She pushes the hair away from her face and tugs until I let her go. I bury my hands in my pockets to keep from picking her up and carrying her away.
“I won’t do this with you anymore, Jacob. I can’t. If you don’t understand by now how much I love you? How much I’ve bent over backwards for you and swallowed your hateful words? Damn it! If you don’t get it by now, you’re never going to and I’m tired of banging my head against a brick wall! It hurts! I don’t understand what else I’m supposed to do so that you finally get it!”
“Get what, Care Bear?”
“That I love you! You and only you, Jacob Blake! I am not five years old, with a case of puppy love for the older boy! I am here now! I know you’re riddled with problems and God knows there’s nothing perfect about you! I get it! I live with it every day and I’m still here!”
I listen to her words. My heart picks up in beat. I want to believe in her…I think I’m starting to.
“You got to know that doesn’t sound like you love me. It doesn’t even sound like you like me, Princess.”
She stops her tirade and turns her head to the side like she thinks I am insane and hell maybe I am.
“I told you I’m not a girly-girl.”
“No, you’re mine,” I tell her and I almost believe it.
Carrie
I
am lying
in bed as the front door closes. Jacob’s headed to the club. He thinks I’m clueless to the secrets he’s keeping. I’m not. I know he’s not sleeping when he’s in our bed. Worse, the therapist called the house a couple of weeks ago wondering if Jacob had found other services. He had missed his scheduled appointments and failed to respond to their calls and letters. He’s been lying to me, saying he’s going to therapy.
I need to talk to him about all of this. I’ve been afraid to rock the boat, so I’ve let it go. I let a lot of things go. Most notably the fact that I am pregnant. I went to the doctor yesterday. I thought I had a vitamin problem because I’m just so tired all the time. I’m not. I’m pregnant. I. Am. Pregnant.
Yeah I keep telling myself that over and over and it’s still not totally sinking in. My hand moves over my stomach which is still flat of course, but I swear I can almost feel a warmth that has never been there before. I have Jacob’s baby inside of me. Jacob’s baby! I don’t know anything about being a mom. I don’t even have my mom to lean on to show me the ropes. I’m scared.
I lock down that thought before it blossoms. I’ve done that since my parents died. I can’t think about it, not right now. I can’t handle it! I’ll tackle it all later. That’s been my motto. At first it was, I’ll deal with it all after Dragon finds the man who hurt us. Now it’s after I get everything better with Jacob. I know it’s not healthy. I do. I just can’t seem to stop myself.
Like right now. I’m terrified of how Jacob will react. I should have told him the truth yesterday. I couldn’t bring myself to. I love him. I love him completely. These last six weeks have been the best in my life, even with all the other stuff going on around us. I don’t want to lose him and I’m terrified this might do it. Jacob hasn’t mentioned the future. I know he wants me with him. I feel like I’m helping him. He’s more open with me than I imagined he would be. He doesn’t say, but I know he wants to hear me tell him I love him. He gets this look in his eyes when I give him the words. I can’t explain it, but it feels like for a minute or two I might bring him peace and I want that. I want to do that for him.
I get up, shower and let thoughts run through my brain while I wash my hair. I could go to the garage and surprise Jacob. The Tahoe is out there. Jacob insists I keep one to get around during the day. I should buy a car. I have all this money just sitting in an account that I haven’t really touched. It was my parents but using the money somehow makes their deaths seem real. Which is stupid, you can’t get any more real than dead. Still, that’s what I think about every time I start to spend it.
I should take lessons from Nicole or Dani when dealing with this stuff. I want to be Jacob’s for life, not just for now. I didn’t think that was possible, but it’s been months since we first made love and it has been six weeks since we’ve been completely together, so I’m starting to hope. That’s nothing to sneeze at right? Surely in all that time I’ve come to mean something to Jacob. A man like that doesn’t just come home to one woman—the same woman, unless she’s special. I may be new to all this, but I have read a lot and I’ve seen how Nicole and Dragon are with each other and even Six and Vida (it’s getting harder and harder to think of her as Lips).
I should take a page out of Nicole’s book. She wouldn’t hide this and worry about how Dragon would react. She would face it all head on. I need to do that. If I am going to be the woman of a Savage MC member I need to start facing things and not hiding from them.
Decision made, I finish my shower and head downstairs to find something to eat. I grab a quick piece of toast and juice. I’m not a breakfast person, but that seems like something an expectant mother should do. I go a step further and make a basket of tuna salad sandwiches, chips and pickles for lunch. Not gourmet, but it works and Jacob and I can spend lunch together.
The only moment of indecision I have is dressing. Jacob made a comment about my jeans yesterday. I think he liked them and I do love being on his bike. Still, dresses are who I am and they are comfortable. Plus, I don’t know, maybe it’s good to have something loose against my stomach? I have no idea. I make a note to stop by the bookstore in town on the way and grab that pregnancy book the doctor recommended.
I finally decide to put on my sage green sundress with the little pink roses on it. Jacob likes it. Well, he liked taking it off of me the last time I wore it.
I make it to the club around noon and head straight for the garage that Jacob has been working in. Freak is standing out front talking with Nikki and Frog.
“Hey, Red. What are you doing here looking so gorgeous? Dancer ever drops the ball baby you’re going to have to give me a chance,” Frog says with this big smile. I shake my head at his words, but laugh when Freak slaps him on the back of the head.
“Ignore him Red, he forgot his brains in his ass. You lookin’ for Dance?”
“Yeah I thought I might steal him away for lunch.”
“He just took a break from work. You can catch him in the club though.”
I smile, trying to hold on to the courage that brought me here. Nikki might have seen I was wavering, even if she didn’t know what was going on, because she grabs my hand.
“We’ll go in together. I need to check with Nicole on something.”
Freak pulls her back to him before we can leave and slams his lips against hers in a kiss that is so intense and carnal you can feel the heat just from watching it.
“Behave yourself, stud,” Nikki breathes against his lips when they break apart.
“Remember my promise, woman.”
Nikki licks her lips, but doesn’t say anything else. I bite my tongue to keep from asking what the promise was!
Then she grabs my hand and pulls me along to the club.
“Things seem to be going good with Freak.”
“Girl, you have no idea. I’ll tell you some time though, just bring a fan,” she says with a laugh, wiggling her eyebrows in mock suggestion. We’re both laughing as we open the doors.
It takes a minute for my eyes to adjust from the bright sunshine to the darkness of the room. When it does, the laughter clogs in my throat.
Jacob is sitting at the bar with Tash, a club Twinkie in his lap. They’re laughing. Her hand is playing with his hair while she drags a finger down the side of his face teasing his lips. She’s dressed like the Twinkies always are, almost naked. Today though her white, see-through shirt and clearly no bra or panties, seems worse. It is worse, because she’s in the lap of my man. She’s in his lap and he’s not pushing her away. Instead his hand is on her thigh. Sure the shirt is between his touch and her skin, but he is holding her thigh! He is letting her sit in his lap! He is…laughing with her! I thought I was the only one who made him laugh! I thought I was…the only one.
Something inside of me screams, no and then I hear his words. I hear him talking about something that should be private. I hear him talking about me, about us. I hear him and just like that my new found will to face things head on and be stronger crumbles around me.
Dancer
(Just before Carrie’s arrival)
I
’m exhausted and
I keep messing shit up. I’ve been trying to get a fucking spring in a fucking carburetor for the last fucking hour! I can rebuild those son of a bitches with my eyes closed I’ve done so many of them and yet, I’m so tired I can’t concentrate. I don’t want to be here. The men are talking and laughing so loud my head feels like it is being bombarded. There’s people everywhere and it’s unreasonable, it’s completely unreasonable, because truly it’s the same bunch who are always here and not even as many as normal. Still, it is making my skin feel as if it is trying to crawl off my body. The faces and the voices all mix into one blurring roar in my head. It’s like they are all on a carousel that spins around so fast and quick that I just catch images of them flashing in my head. Then they spin again with a whirl. Their combined voices are like a strange sadistic music and blends until all I can hear is gibberish. Gibberish but with mocking laughter in the background. My heart drums a million beats a minute and jars my body with its force.
Panic attack. I’m having a fucking panic attack in broad daylight. Each person that comes up to me is hidden by unseen arms, unseen hands reaching out to grab me. Reaching out to grab me and pull me down into the darkness. My hands shake, a cold sweat breaks out over my skin. I’m dizzy. I’m going to fucking lose it in front of my brothers. NO! I CAN’T!! I throw the parts down on the work bench and stomp out of the garage.
I want to fucking run. I want to run so fucking far that I can feel nothing but the burn of the air in my lungs. I can’t do that either. If I run they will all know, they will know and it will all crumble around me and I’ll lose Carrie. I make it to the back of the garage and lean against the block wall, slowly falling to my ass. I bring my knees up and put my head down and breathe deep.
This one might have been the worse yet. My hands are trembling. Hell, my whole body is shaking. I have been doing so well. I cope so much better when Carrie is with me. I’m a grown ass man, and I need a woman around to hold my hand. It pisses me off. I do not want to be weak. A weak man can’t take care of himself. He can’t defend himself. I do not want to be this person. I need to be different for Carrie. I just don’t know if that is possible.
I get a little control and decide on a couple of drinks before going to my old room to nap. I need Carrie. I need her so bad, it’s all I can do not to jump on my bike and head back to the house. Instead I pull myself up and go into the bar.
I down one shot after another. I’m on the fifth when Tash, a club Twinkie, comes over and slides on my lap. She feels wrong. She smells wrong.
“Dancer baby, I thought being in the joint might have changed you.”
My heart stalls. Is there talk? Does she know something? Did Dragon tell the men?
“What do you mean?” I ask my voice gruff. My hand grabs her leg tight. She doesn’t seem to notice. Hell, she probably thinks I want her there. Really I’m trying to keep the room from spinning and fighting back the traces of the panic attack that is still in my system.
“I was starting to think we had lost you to the land of soccer dads and minivans. Figured we wouldn’t see you around here until you had a ring through your nose and a couple of kids screaming for attention,” Tash laughs her fingers moving along the side of my face and moving close to my lip.
My emotions are all over the place. An image of Carrie with babies at her feet… but not just any babies, my babies flash in my head. Then I feel the sweat still popped out on my neck and the pounding beat of my heart from the earlier panic attack and immediately get jerked back into reality. I am not father material. I can’t even protect myself, how can I protect kids? Hell, I almost got Carrie killed if you get down to it.
“Fuck, if there is one thing I’m not cut out for girl, it’s being a dad. You won’t ever catch me with my balls cut off for some woman. You know me better than that shit. The only van you might catch me in, is one rockin’ if you get my meaning,” I say, giving a half-hearted attempt to laugh it all off.
She laughs and the noise is shrill and annoying. She bends down like she’s going to kiss me. Fuck, I don’t want that. I don’t want her anywhere near me. Her perfume is about to make me gag. I’m about to pull away when my world stops turning.
“You dildo, juggling, thunder cunt! What the hell Tash? Did you
NOT
learn to stay away from a brother who is spoken for?” Freak’s woman, Nikki demands. That isn’t what destroys me though. No, what does that is Carrie’s quiet gasp.