Page 87 of All Our Ghosts

I can't help but smile wrapping my free arm around her. Maggie has always been kind of like a second mother. Aside from Marlowe, she's the only other person who never gave up on Cole and I.

"Quit sending those poor prospects to get food for you." She pulls back and smacks my chest with a playful scold. I grin and glance down at Kadence.

"Sorry, Mags," I say sheepishly, looking back at the older woman and feeling like a teenager again. "I've been... preoccupied."

Maggie's eyes glide to Kadence with a bright smile. "It's good to see you again sweetie." Her brow raises knowingly as she notices our connected hands. "Well, well, well.." Maggie giggles, looking back up at Kade. "I had my money on Cole, but you two fit."

Kadence chuckles and I feel like I'm completely out of the loop.

"Cole?" I ask, looking down at Kadence.

"He picked me up from here... the second day I was in town." She smiles looking back at Maggie.

"I'm glad you decided to stick around," she says with a knowing look between the two of us. "Alright, go! Go sit down. Cole already ordered three Lee Specials for you all."

I smile and nod. "Thanks, Mags."

She pats my arm, squeezing it gently and getting that same sorrowful look in her eye that people usually do after I come out of hiding. One that saysI'm sorry your sister was brutally murdered, she was a good kid. I hate it but for Maggie, I know she means well. "Don't be a stranger, Holden."

I feel that same twinge in my heart again and nod. "Yes Ma'am."

She moves over to another set of patrons and I tug Kadence towards the table Cole picked. That lightness I felt from seeing Maggie quickly dissipates at the sight of Cole's grim look. Not quite grim, but regretful, maybe? I let Kade slide into the booth first, my eyes never leaving Cole's.

"Are you both sure you want me here for this?" Kade's voice breaks through our glare as she shrugs out of her jacket and sets it on the bench between herself and the wall.

I'm simultaneously focused on Cole and her. Making sure she's fine and that Cole knows better than to help her when I'm around.

I slide in next to her, leaning back in the booth. Her thigh brushes against my leg and it’s a quiet reminder she spoke to us. "Yeah, Sunflower. You should be here."

"He's right," Cole says, glancing over at her. "I uh.. I ordered already."

"Maggie said you did," I reply with a little more bitterness in my voice than I meant to.

I can feel Kade's gaze flickering between the two of us. She's just as nervous to witness whatever this sit down brings as I am. My hand slides over her thigh under the table giving her a soft squeeze of reassurance. In an instant I feel her hand over mine, tangling her fingers with my own and giving me her own soft squeeze. I didn't just bring her here for Cole's apology. Kadence grounds me more than she realizes, and as her thumb runs over my index finger in a soothing motion, I know that whatever we have is more than just two broken people finding solace in each other.

Cole clears his throat, folding his hands together on the table as he glances between the two of us.

"I owe you both an apology," he starts and I narrow my eyes. "Kadence, I have no right to tell you who you should be spending your time with. I also know that you witnessed Wolfe getting arrested because of me... I know that things don't make sense right now but I'm sorry that I brought you into it." He leans back into the booth shaking his head. "I've been trying to hold shit together for so long and now it feels like it's unraveling at the seams."

I shake my head. "It's not–"

Cole stops me with his own shake. "I've had the string in my hand more often than not, Pal."

He stares at me and I can't help but feel remorseful. We were supposed to be a team, running the club together, and all I've done is fuck it up and leave it on his shoulders but still my best friend blames himself. "I let you down. I've let this club down more times than not in the past month and a half. Stokes wants all of us. The club gone, and full control of Moon."

"How can he do that?" Kadence asks the same question that burned the tip of my tongue.

Deep down I knew though. The girls that inhabited Moon came to us because they had no other choice and needed a safeplace to stay fed and clothed...not all of them were strays in a bad place. Hell, even Layla had a family that loved her, she just chose this life, chose a new identity for whatever reason. I was sure the girls that Stokes brought to us sometimes weren't just lost women. They had families too, ones that cared about them. We never forced the women he brought to stay. If they ever wanted to leave they could but most of the time they don’t. Whether they’re too content to care or that this is a better life for them... We never know whether they're missing daughters or sisters... We never could prove it and the idea made my stomach roll. We were helping him feed his addiction and the women never complained.

"He has a lot built up on the club. Transactions, ledgers of the runs we've done for him and the ones we haven't. Handguns are easy to move when they're packed into bedrolls." Cole admits more freely than I would have.

I haven't told Kadence everything that the club does outside of running the garage. Guns were just a small portion. Moon brings in most of our income with the shop coming in second. We mostly transport weapons for other clubs. A middle man between MC's that don't feel the need to know each other face to face.

"They take the guns just over the border into Nevada, from there we don't know. They get distributed by the other MC's." I say glancing down at her.

If she was pissed, I wasn't going to let Cole take the brunt of her anger. I also had a hand in making the deal with the other clubs back when I was VP. Now, that's Falcone's territory. Her features are blank and I realize that I'm just as corrupt as her ex. Pulling her back into shit that she shouldn't be in.

"Stokes found out," she states, furrowing her brows and filling in her own blanks.

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