Page 23 of Tusk's Fury

She’s gone before I can object. Tex busies himself taking off the twins’ parkas, gloves, and hats. They’re both adorable toddlers. The whole family is wearing gray parkas with matching gloves and hats.

An uncomfortable silence spins out between us. I’d asked Clara not to tell Tex about Victoria being Tusk’s baby, but by the look on his face I wonder if she told him I have a baby at all. While Victoria is nursing, I try and make light conversation, “I’ve just got the one, I can’t imagine how difficult it must have been for Clara with the twins.”

Steven is sitting on the floor playing with a toss cushion, while his sister, Stephanie, leans against Tex, with one hand grasping his shirt and the other curled against her chest. I am just noticing something odd about the turn of her hand when Tex mutters, “We’re fixin’ to get that taken care of when she’s older.”

I can hear Clara speak from the kitchen. “Tex, don’t be that way. You know Brittany isn’t mean about things like that.”

His lips press into a firm line. Clara comes back and sits down, pulling off her parka as well. Her hand drifts to the side to rest on Tex’s leg. “Stephanie was born with a congenital issue, something to do with how she was positioned in the womb. The ligaments in her wrist are constricted and she’s scheduled for surgery in the spring. One of the mothers at daycare said something about it, and he’s worried she’ll get a complex. Even though she’s too young to notice anything like that.”

“She said my daughter had a deformity,” Tex says, his accent heavy as he spits the words out. “Like it made her less than. We just want what’s best for her, but the docs say they can release the ligaments and she’ll be crawling just as good as her brother.”

“Well, I can’t imagine any of the brothers or their old ladies saying anything bad about her. Some people just don’t know when to stay quiet. And doctors can fix anything these days. They make even difficult surgeries look easy. I’m sure your daughter’s surgery will be a success.”

Tex asks, “Tell me a little somethin’. If you’re such a big fan of modern medicine, why did you go and get yourself a midwife?”

I laugh, I forgot that Tex is the bluntest person I’ve ever spoken to in my entire life.

Clara shoots her husband an annoyed look. “What he means to ask is if midwives are more common in this state, or if hospitals are not conveniently located.”

I shrug and move the baby to my other breast to nurse. Deciding to just be honest instead of inventing another lie, I tell them, “Maybe it’s the Mormon in me. I’m just going with what I know.”

Clara’s eyes fly open. “You’re a Mormon?” If Clara looked shocked, Tex was doubly so.

I motion around my cozy living room with one hand. “Do you see any sister wives around here?”

Clara’s expression turns bewildered. “So, you’re not Mormon?”

Sighing, I launch into an explanation, hoping to get it out of the way as soon as possible. “I grew up Mormon. There are different sects of Mormonism. Unfortunately, my family came from a fundamentalist Mormon sect. More often than not, they used midwives.”

A short silence follows while I adjust my clothing and put my daughter on my shoulder to burp her.

I know the hard questions are coming and steel myself for them. Tex is first, “How the fuck did you go from being a fundamentalist Mormon to being a club girl for a damn biker club?”

Clara visibly cringes at his question. I look him in the eye and shoot back, “For a guy who doesn’t like the idea of people being rude to his family, you sure feel comfortable being rude to me. Want to talk about why that is?”

Clara tries to smooth things over. “What he meant to say was—”

I cut her off before she can even get started. I might have tried to reinvent myself here, but I’m still the same outspoken Brittany underneath the new mom clothes.

Gesturing from one to the other of them, I tell her, “I don’t know what kind of song and dance the two of you are playing with me, but Tex is a grown ass man. He has the capacity to be polite. I’ve watched him be polite to his club brothers since he came to the Savage Legion. So, you don’t need to keep backtracking on everything he says. If he really feels the need to be rude to me, nothing you can do will make that okay for me.”

Tex interjects, moderating his volume and tone, “I wasn’t tryin’ to be rude to you, darlin’. I’m just shocked shitless and you gotta know how strange that sounds.” He glances away and adds, “Truth be told, I feel kinda like you lied to us.”

“Let’s be honest, when was the last time you asked a club girl anything about herself? No one ever asked me anything about my background. Club girls are there to entertain the brothers. I came to the Savage Legion with zero sexual experience and traded the only thing I had to offer for a chance to stay off the grid. The Legion gave me a place to live, food to eat, and took care of all my material needs. I didn’t want my family to track me down, and I wanted to experience worldly things. The brothers were more than generous in giving me worldly experiences. It was a win-win situation.”

I can see the little wheels turning in his head. “Is that why you were always so damn extra?”

I have to smile at his polite turn of phrase. “Yeah, sex was always a pleasant exchange, but the brothers liked the drama, you can say what you like, but I know they like the club girls fighting over them.” He opens his mouth to object, but I speak first. “Now, I know not all the brothers are like that, but most of them secretly love it.”

Tex closes his mouth. Then Clara states quietly, “You could have gotten off the radar any number of ways. You could have taken a job as a nanny, taught English overseas, or done any number of things. Why did you choose to become a club girl, to trade sexual favors for protection?”

I’m kind of shocked that my friend’s come out and said that. I never thought of Clara as judging me, but then I think again. I guess I never told her about my past, so she has every right to be shocked. Instead of tearing her a new asshole, I say, “Do you really want to know the answer to that question?”

She nods, so I tell her. “It was the quickest, easiest way to sully myself to the point that Silas Harper wouldn’t want to go through with the marriage my father tried to pressure me into. I’d be lying if I tried to convince you that having sex with the brothers was a sacrifice. It wasn’t, I enjoyed it. I was young, naive, and craved all the things that had been denied to me. That’s why I chose to stay with the Savage Legion.”

Tex practically growls, “Go back to the part about your old man trying to force you into marriage. ‘Cause it damn sure sounds like some dumb fucker need an ass kicking for doing shit like that to teen.”

I tell him, “Even in our strict Mormon sect, my father wasn’t allowed to marry me off against my will. Our sect was fundamentalist, but not one of those weird ones that did illegal things.”

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