Page 78 of Wolf.e

“You watch out for them,” she tells me.

I smirk, as if I wouldn’t. My job is to work the fear out of them. Take that last final bit of hesitancy from them and stomp it out. They’re there as a machine, not to feel. Then and only then are they ready to front line it.

“Don’t worry about me. Shell and I have each other. As long as we know you and Sean are together, we’ll feel better.” Her voice breaks. I know this is hard for her.

“I’m not even going to be put in harm’s way, Mom, and if I am… that’s my fate.”

“I just hate to see you leave. When you get back, you need to shed some of this anger you have for him and focus on your future. I know I’m not a good example. I’ve stayed with your father through everything.” She reaches over and pats my hand, I know the speech that’s coming. Theresa Wolfe doesn’t let things go, not until she gets her own way. Even now, with no prospects for me, her brown eyes are full of hope. It makes the guilt surface tenfold because I know there’ll never be a woman I settle down with or tie myself to, and that’s what she wants.

“You aren’t him. You need to let that go. Find a woman to be your queen. You’ll be taking over this club one day. A life alone is a hollow one.” She grins “Finding a woman to love is the beginning and end of everything.”

I take a sip of my drink. “Thanks for the Ted Talk and The Great Gatsby quotes.” I smirk, reaching over to put my hand over hers. “I have a woman to love—you. And Jakey will be taking over, not me.”

She smiles and shakes her head. “Darlin’, he barely makes it through the day without making a piss poor decision. He’s more your father than you are. Ray won’t have it. He’s looking at you.”

She smiles wide. “Once you’re president, you find yourself an angel to be your queen. One who will be a safe haven for you in this bullshit way of life. One who will give you sons you can raise to be your legacy. Not his.”

I’m not in the mood to talk with her about things that will never happen. Instead, I’ll leave Mom with hope that it might.

“None of that matters now. If I make it back, I’ll deal with that. Ray will be riding for another couple years at least, and I just don’t see him passing up his own son. Jakey will straighten out.”

“When you make it back,” she says as I pull my hand away to go back to my food, savoring my last lunch with her before I leave.

I take another bite as four things happen simultaneously. Someone screams as a red El Camino screeches to a halt beside us. I feel a sharp pain in my shoulder before I see the gun and hear the invasive, unmistakable sound of gunfire fill the air.

I look at my shirt quickly soaking with blood, and I ready myself to dive on top of my mother who’s sitting across from me, but I’m too late. The car tires squeal, spinning and smoking as it takes off, and my mother—the only woman I’ll ever love—is already slumping out of her chair. What’s left of her short life is seeping out of the bullet wound in her temple.

I didn’t even have time to draw my weapon. I failed her.

I sit up in bed clutching my shoulder. The scar from the bullet I took when she died aches on nights like this. I’m drenched in a cold sweat. The shuffling of feet makes me act before my mind tells me not to. I grab my .45 from under my pillow and aim, watching as the flash of onyx hair darts behind the door with a scream.

Brinley. Not an intruder.

“Fuck.” I lower my gun. She fell asleep on the couch in my living room and I just covered her and let her stay there.

“You cannot sneak up on me,” I tell her, my tone angrier than I am.

She doesn’t answer.

“You’re safe,” I say, forcing myself to sound less aggravated.

“Flashback?” she asks without coming back into my doorway, obviously terrified. I blow out a breath and run my hand through my hair.

“Come here,” I tell her.

Normally, I sit in this haze, remembering how I found the fucker that killed my mother and slit his throat just an hour after she died. The memory of his life slowly draining from his eyes usually soothes me back to sleep, but as Brinley comes forward in just my t-shirt, the haze of that day starts to fade.

“From your time overseas?” she asks quietly in the dark.

I take a deep breath and lay back in my bed, allowing her to climb in beside me, pulling her close because fuck, I just want to.

She fits under the crook of my arm like the space in my body was carved out just for her. I breathe deeply, her jasmine scent blends with the scent of me in her hair, on her body and I can’t decide which one I like the idea of better.

“My mother died in front of me. The day I left for my last tour in Kuwait. My father was a piece of shit. He beat her, fucked around on her. He was uncontrollable from the day she met him. The night before she died, he fucked and beat the wrong girl. She was the daughter of a rival Puerto Rican gang. An eye for an eye, they said. My father didn’t have a daughter, so they killed her. He killed her.”

“Jesus,” Brinley breathes out, lightly tracing the ink on my chest. “Layla told me how much you loved her. She says Ax talks about her all the time.”

“She was like his mother too.”

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