Page 22 of A Biker's Tiny Present

“I’m sorry,” he answers and nods, verifying my worst fear. “How much do you want me to tell you?”

“I want it all. Don’t leave out any details. I need to know what happened to her.”

“You sure?”

“Please, Tiny,” I take his face in my hands and beg him. “I can’t move forward unless I know.”

It may be macabre, and I’ll probably have nightmares for a few days, but I need details in order to process.

I hate that I never get to talk to my sister again. I hate how Nicky will grow up not being able to remember how amazing his mother’s hugs were. And I hate even more that Tiny has to sit here and tell me everything that happened to her. He had to witness it once already based on the haunted look in his eyes, and now I’m forcing him to trudge through the mud all over again.

“Alright,” Tiny says with a sigh. “If it becomes too much and you need me to stop, just say so and I won’t say another word.”

“Tell me,” I beg. “Please.”

Sitting in Tiny’s lap, not letting go of my grip on his Rebel Repairs sweatshirt, I listen as he tells me the horrors that his Brothers found in that asshole’s house. He tells me about where they found her body, what physical shape she was in, and what they suspect had been done to her.

I listen as he goes into gruesome detail about the torture he inflicted on the man who murdered my sister. I take in every word and absorb the knowledge that a man is currently being turned from bone and flesh into ash, then washed down the drain erasing his existence from the land of the living. I take it all in as tears flow down my cheeks, crying the poison of knowing he existed from my mind.

From this day forward, only happy memories of Taylor will be shared. Only stories of her joyous moments will be told to Nicky as he grows. I will give her son a great life and raise him in her honor.

With Tiny by my side, I will teach him to love others, not spread hate. We will guide him to be fierce, but also loyal and kind and courteous. We will raise him to know it’s not okay to lay a hand on a woman out of anger. So much from our childhoods will be used as lessons to give our boy a better life. I don’t mind ifhe follows in his father’s boot prints and joins the club when he’s old enough, because even in the short time I’ve been here, I’ve witnessed the character of these men.

They are strong. They are sturdy. They are our future.

Tiny carries me back to our bed and I snuggle in as he underdresses, shedding the heavy stress of the day. Crawling in beside me, Tiny rolls me over and pulls my back into his chest. “Tomorrow morning we’ll talk with Whiskey about a funeral for Taylor,” Tiny whispers in my ear. “That okay?”

“Yea.” I nod as new tears start to fall, but these ones are happy tears. Happy that I know she’ll be laid to rest properly, happy I’ll get to say goodbye to my sister, truly content for the first time in two days.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

TINY

It’s Monday morning and I should be getting ready for a busy day at Rebel Repairs, the club owned auto and motorcycle repair shop where I work, but I have more pressing things to do with my time. More important things like attempting to drag my Vixen away from my adorable son and up to our room to talk.

Our weekend was pretty chaotic and we need some time to get on the same page before the even crazier stuff starts happening next week. We’re T-minus nine days out from the most important shindig this club has ever had, and I want all of my ducks to be a perfectly straight line before then.

Last night when I got back from taking care of the trash, I asked Sunshine if she could watch Nicky for me for a couple hours today and she said she’d love to. I just happened to ask within earshot of a handful of other women who live here too, and they all barged into our conversation and included themselves in my morning plans. And that’s how I ended up in the clubhouse kitchen, wrestling Nicky away from Riley.

“But I don’t want to leave him all alone,” Riley pouts as I successfully extract him from her arms.

“He won’t be alone.” I blow raspberry kisses on his chubby cheeks, making him giggle like I’m the funniest person in the world, then plop his little butt back into the highchair right beside his new best friend, Krew. “He’s right next to his best bud.”

Krew, Duchess and Whiskey’s son, is four months old, two months younger than Nicky, but I can already tell they’re going to be thicker than thieves as they grow up together. Whiskey and I are going to have to watch them like hawks.

Duchess has Krew in the bouncy seat thing up on the island because he can’t sit up on his own yet for long periods of time. Nicky’s neck muscles are a bit more developed in his senior age compared to his friend, so that’s why he’s graduated to the big boy highchair. He’s also recently started eating cereal and mashed fruits and veggies, so he needs to be sitting up.

Who am I and what has my life become? If you would’ve asked me three days ago if I would be reading blogs with articles on the feeding schedules and stimulation exercises for infants from the ages of zero to one year, I would have called you an idiot and laughed in your face. My life has done a complete one-eighty in the last forty-eight hours, and it’s all because to this woman. As Riley slept last night, I had the internet browser on my phone searching things I never pictured I’d ever have to worry about.

Not letting go of her hand in fear that she’ll bolt back down to the kitchen, I lead Riley up the stairs and straight into our room. I tried to have this conversation with her when we woke up, but a hungry baby delayed my plans until now. I was barely able to claw her away but now I have her right where I want her.

Plopping my ass on the couch, and pulling Riley down sideways on my lap, I prepare myself for this conversation to go any of a dozen different ways. I think I know what she wants, and she should know what I want because I’ve told her over and over since we met two days ago, but I need to be sure.

Folding her hands in her lap, not meeting my eyes, Riley starts talking before I can even open my mouth to say a word.

“What do you think about making a set schedule for us to share custody of Nicky?” As her words meet my ears, I’m thrown into a downward spiral of panic. She keeps speaking. “We’ll have to switch some things around, like I can move to the overnight shift because your shifts are only days. I can have him during the day while you’re at the shop, then you come to the house after and take over so I can leave. We can alternate weekends and work around your schedule for the club.”

“No,” I bark out before she goes any further, making me dizzier with her crazy and unnecessary plans. “Neither of us is gonna switch shifts to swap days or any of the bullshit. I don’t know where you’re getting these crazy ideas from, but you and I will raise Nicky together.”

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