Page 23 of Ink

I start to wiggle out of his hold but he tightens his grip, keeping me firmly in place. “Promise me Ink. Promise me again that you won’t do something insane.”

A slow smile spreads across his face. “One man’s definition of insane is far different from another.”

I roll my eyes at him and his attempt to wax philosophical to get out of a promise. “I’m serious, Ink. I mean it.”

He clamps his mouth shut and huffs out a breath. “I promise that I’ll do my best to remain an honorable man.”

This time when I pull out of his grasp, he lets me go. “Sit back down. I’m going to get the first aid kit.”

He breathes out a low chuckle and sits back down on the stool. “Sweetheart you are too good to me. Hey, wait.” He makes a showing of sniffing with his nose turned up in the air like a cartoon wolf. “What’s that I smell?”

I lean up against the door jam of the bathroom that is still visible from the kitchen, crossing my arms and giving him a petulant look. “A breakfast casserole. I couldn’t sleep so I got up and made one. It’s in the oven. It should be done in about ten or fifteen minutes.”

He lets out a slow breath and the contentment on his face shines through. “One of the many reasons why I’ve fallen in love with you.”

I had just pushed off from the door jam when his words hit me. What? Did he really just tell me that he is in love with me? I had to hear that again. “What did you just say?”

He stands up straight and looks at me. No pretense, no beating around the bush. “Carmen baby, I am in love with you. I think I’ve been in love with you since that first night I came up to your table in the bar and you had so much sass in you, I wasn’t sure what to do with it. You were and are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid my eyes on and you are so smart and sassy, not to mention funny. You fucking get me, like all of me. You don’t care that I have tattoos all over my body, you don’t care that I’m a mechanic. In fact, you probably like that since your piece of shit car is always breaking down.” He laughs for a second at his own joke.

“You’ve seen my mug shot for Christ's sake every time you hang out at the clubhouse. You know all the dirty parts of me and while I wish I could take back some of the things I’ve done in this life, including the fact that I treated you poorly all those months ago. I wouldn’t because everything led me right to where I was that night at the bar so I could meet you.”

At some point during his speech my feet move of their own volition. By the time he’s finished, I’m standing in front of him, so close I can see all the colors in his eyes. I don’t feel the tear falling down my cheek until he reaches up to wipe it away. “I don’t know why I’m crying,” I whisper.

“Hopefully, it’s tears of joy. Carmen baby I love you.”

The tears fill my vision and cascade down my face when I try to blink them away. “I love you, too.”

I thought those words would scare me to utter them out loud but they didn’t. I feel a calm wash over me as Ink gathers me into his arms. He’s mindful to keep his bleeding hand away from my body as he uses his other hand to rub slow circles on my lower back.

“You don’t know how happy it makes me to hear you say those words to me.” He leans his forehead against mine and softly kisses my lips slowly and softly until we begin to lose track of time. I step back, remembering his hand.

“Ink, let me get the first aid kit. Your hand.”

“I could care less about my hand right now.” He mumbles under his breath but steps back for me to go get the kit.

I retrieve the kit and when I come back into the kitchen he’s sitting on the stool at the breakfast bar again. I look over his shoulder at the oven and I have five minutes to finish up his hand. It looks like the bleeding has slowed down but I wipe it clean again and put a clean bandage over it. Once I get it all covered up and bandaged we sit together and wait for the casserole to be done. We talk like a normal couple, about our day, what we need to get done, and what we would both be doing this evening. It was like nothing had happened in the night. Like he hadn’t just beat the shit out of someone.

This is my new normal.

Ink

Yet again, I’m running on little to no sleep. At this point, I’m living off of energy drinks and mint gum. I want a cigarette so bad but once Lucia and Carmen came to live with me I swore them off. I don’t want Lucia inhaling that into her tiny lungs and I don’t want her to think it’s a cool habit to have. After the night I just had, the urge to light one up is so strong I chew my gum so hard my jaw hurt.

After dropping off Lucia at school I get over to the garage and get to work. I want to take my mind off of all the club shit and just work with my hands. All this bullshit drama is too much for me. I want to go back to the days of just working on engines and pining away for Carmen. Granted, I never want to do the latter again now that I know what I have but damn, I need this bullshit with the Oregon club to be over with.

I wince as I use my injured hand to get a cap off a radiator. It’s a small price to pay. Rider and I work together for a good part of the morning in silence. We don’t talk about what happened and I’m okay with that. He doesn’t mention it and I sure as hell don’t. Griz, who I didn’t expect to see today at the garage, strolls into the room three hours after the start of the day and goes straight to work. To say that I am surprised to see him here today is an understatement. I figured he would have his hands full with the club and dealing with taking out the trash.

I look over to Rider and he shrugs his shoulders in response. I mean the man does work here but we are both surprised to see him. Griz, much to his credit, doesn’t seem phased. He went straight to work like he did every single day. The only thing that gives him away is when I get a good look at his hands. They are rough with cuts, swollen and bruised. It looks like he punched a brick wall for hours.

“Do I want to know?” I finally cave and ask him.

He simply shakes his head. I swallow hard knowing what that means, coming to terms with my part in all of it. I don’t regret what I’ve done and I won’t tomorrow either. Carmen and Lucia are both mine now and I will never regret doing anything for them, for my family.

We work the rest of the day in relative silence, each compartmentalizing the experience in whatever way we need to. I try to keep my mind on my work but most of the time my thoughts keep drifting to Carmen or the MC’s current bullshit. More often than not, I think of Carmen and how she gave herself to me. Trusting me, telling me she loves me. I know it’s a big deal for her, but I honestly never expected she would say it back right away. I was prepared to wait—however long it took. I can admit that I screwed up by ghosting her and I strive to make up for those mistakes every day and this is my reward.

When four-thirty rolls around I can’t clean my hands fast enough to get out of there. Just as I am about to make my escape Rider, who had been the quietest out of the three of us, pipes up. “You wanna get a beer tonight?”

I know he probably wants to blow off steam but I am itching to get home. Then I remember that Carmen is going to be spending the evening with Rayleighn going over their wedding and she is going to take Lucia with her to play with Colton. I’d be all alone at the house and that is depressing so I nod my agreement. “Yeah. Let’s do it. I’ll meet you there.”

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