Page 22 of Brother to Brother

“Of course I’m not,” I said gently, “The girl you all left in Arizona was scared and pregnant with her first child; the woman you see now is a mother to a one and a half year old boy. They’re worlds apart, Archer.”

He looked like he tasted something bad, took a drink of his coffee to wash it down and said, “Well regardless, the Pres out here wants to see you and the boy on Friday, so fix you and the kid some dinner and meet me at the club after I get off work,” he said. I felt myself pale and he eyed me, before asking, “Now what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, he isn’t… I mean I won’t be expected to…”

“Naw, he just wants to meet you. May not have been official, you bein’ Grinder’s ol’ lady, but the chapter out here agreed it best that you be treated that way.”

“What way?” I asked needing to hear precisely what he meant.

“As the property of a fallen brother, with all the protections and aide that comes with it. You know how it goes, Mel. We take care of our own,” he said softly.

I nodded, I knew how it wassupposedto work, yes, but the Arizona chapter sometimes had its own ideas, and back there, Noah and I were nothing but a laughing stock and little better than trash. I may have earned it, I may have gotten in way over my head as little better than a slut to be passed around between brothers, but it’d been better than the alternative of staying under my parents’ roof. Plus, title aside, I didn’tfeellike a slut. Grinder was the only brother I’d really been with. He’d protected me from the others despite his refusal to be faithful to me, or to make me any kind of an official girlfriend or ol’ lady.

When I’d come up pregnant, I might as well have turned into a leper as far as the rest of the guys had been concerned and when Grinder had left? Well, I found myself alone and I didn’t want to be passed around so I simply had stopped going around the club and its brothers. At least until I started to really show, and by then, it was like they’d all decided I was contagious or something. None of them wanted anything to do with the pregnant me. I’d thought it was because I was the reason Grinder had left… now I knew different. Now I knew it was likely because he had died and the Arizona chapter’s president had told the lot of them not to tell me.

“Mel?” I snapped out of it, before I could dwell on it too much, my refusal had spurned the Arizona chapter’s Pres. but good. I’d had to think about Noah, and Dom’s reputation for turning out girls, getting them hooked and strung out and eventually turning tricks for him – well I’d wanted no part in that. Not with a baby on the way.

“What the fuck you thinkin’ about so hard in there?” Archer demanded and I rubbed my face with my hands.

“A lot of things,” I said and drew in a shaky breath.

“Well lay it on me, I’m not too keen on the zombie staring off into space routine when I’m tryin’ to talk to you,” he said and I flinched inwardly. Shit, last thing I wanted was to trip Archer’s famous temper.

“After you left, to follow Grind out here, Dom started making hints about taking me for his own for a while. ‘Trying me on for size,’ he called it. I turned him down, told him I was pregnant and it was Grinder’s. It seemed to piss him off. They all left me alone for the most part after that. I think that’s why no one told me. Dom told them not to, because I wouldn’t go there, you know?”

Archer chewed the corner of his bottom lip and gave a single nod, once down, once up, “Yeah, I could see Dom pullin’ some shit like that. If word got out he got a pregnant bitch hooked on his shit and was turnin’ her out for profit, especially with Dragon and the mother chapter sniffing around, things would’ve gone real, real bad for him. These boys out here don’t play that kind of shit at all. It’s supposed to be one of the club’s tenants. ‘No women, no children,’ but Dom always had a slightly different idea of what that means.” Archer heaved a sigh, “It get much worse once Grind wasn’t there to keep him in check anymore?”

“I honestly don’t know, I stayed away once Grind left. I wanted to protect Noah, I thought he’d come around, you know? Come back, or send for me… I never in a million years thought he would just up and leave us like that.”

Archer grunted, “He never got the chance to come around, at least not really. I’d like to think he would have too, but honestly I don’t know that he would. We had a real fucked up upbringing comin’ up in the system like we did. Grind was always pretty fuckin’ adamant that he never wanted kids. I think it really freaked him the fuck out when you turned up knocked up. He probably thought you did it on purpose to trap him or some shit.”

I felt my face crumble, that was pretty much exactly what Grinder had accused me of, and it’d crushed me. I closed my eyes and whispered, “Please, please,please,watch your language around Noah?”

“Shi-ffffu-da- I am so not good at this, am I?” he asked and I couldn’t help the smile.

“Not really, but if it helps, neither am I. I feel like I’m a terrible mother.”

“From what I’ve seen so far, you do alright. You haven’t killed him yet, and kids are pretty resilient.”

Thanks for the rousing endorsement,I thought to myself and tried not to feel sick.

“Anything else I should know about back home?”

“Like what?” I asked, keeping my tone light despite how dry my mouth had just gone.

“Nothing, I guess. Just miss it from time to time.”

“I don’t see how; it’s beautiful here, so lush and green.”

Archer nodded and I perked up, “Aren’t you going to be late for work?”

“Yeah, I’ll just stay a little late to make up. It’s not a big deal, we don’t have set hours as long as we work eight hours five days a week or ten hours four days a week, Dray doesn’t give a fu-“ I raised my eyebrows and stopped him with a look. “Yeah, that’s the look I remember,” he said with a bit of a grin.

“We’ll bring you lunch later since I failed to make one for you.”

“Good deal, thanks.”

“Just living up to my end of the bargain,” I said under my breath.

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