Page 36 of Brother to Brother

“Archer’s getting married in two weeks,” Reaver said, tears leaking out of his eyes. Blue grinned and gave me a silent nod of approval while Cell made things worse by bursting out laughing harder than Reave.

Fuck. My. Life.

“Awright, knock this shit off! I’m callin’ this shit to order,” Dragon said and I could have blessed him. Didn’t take long for business as fuckin’ usual after that. Thank fuck. I wasn’t good when the focus was on me.

Meeting went fast, the rest of the club brought up to speed on the happenings of the night before. A lot of these motherfuckers weren’t laughing so hard about my impending marital status after that. If anything, their humor turned to looks of respect in some cases, a little pity in a couple of more. I kept my mouth shut. I didn’t feel like talkin’ about it. Talkin’ didn’t settle a lot of shit for me. In fact, it was pretty fuckin’ useless all said and done.

Nox caught up to me after the meeting was adjourned, and asked me “You sure about this, man?”

“Yeah.”

He looked grim and nodded carefully, thoughtfully, “Okay.”

“Thanks,” I said and he nodded.

“Anything I can do?”

“Just do what you been doin’, help out with Noah and the like. Be a good uncle.”

“Always,” he said gravely.

I nodded, he slapped me on the back and moved off in a different direction. Dragon came over to me and asked, “You want to handle the ride to Arizona before or after this wedding?” he asked.

We’d been meaning to put a ride together to head out that way but the weather in parts of the country heading over wasn’t exactly favorable. With a lot of the brothers having kids or weddings of their own coming up, we didn’t want to risk injury or death on this run, so we decided to wait the few weeks for the conditions to become more favorable across the board. Now we were a chunk of the way into summer, it being June, and we could finally go – except in two weeks I was getting married, now. Fuck.

“After and we’d be coming from a stronger position, don’t you think?”

“That we would,” he agreed.

“After it is, then.”

He nodded, “Any designs on your honeymoon?” he asked and I hung my head and sighed out harshly.

“Not you too, man.”

“No, not me too. I’m bein’ serious. Shelly had a point back there for all she’s like you and goes about deliverin’ it wrong nine times outta ten. If you hadn’t thought about it, let me be the first one to offer you a weekend down at the honeymoon cabin at the lodge. You might want to see to startin’ this marriage thing off right – well, at least better than you have so far.” He said and I nodded, listening to him. He’d been married to Tilly a long time. Hell, as far as he was considered, her death hadn’t changed that. He still wore the ring.

“Yeah, speaking of, I better talk to Dani, she was making hints about rings and shit.”

“Sounds like a good idea, Arch. This woman is about to be your wife, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned about you, you’re like me. A forever kind of guy. In that vein, you might wanna not fuck this up.”

“Man, I am just not good at shit like this,” I confessed and he slapped me on the back.

“We know, which is why, in case you haven’t noticed, the club has your back in this too. Your honeymoon is where yer trainin’ wheels come off though. Just gonna be you and her.”

“It’s been me and her for a few months,” I said and Dragon shook his head and led me over to the bar.

“Sit your happy ass down, boy. I can tell we need to talk.”

I scowled, but did as I was told, “What the fuck now?” I demanded.

“Lemme ask you somethin’ and fuck all if it’s gonna get personal, but I’m just tryin’ to get you some perspective here.”

“Right, go ahead.”

“You been fuckin’ her these last three months?”

“Hell no, I been sleepin’ on my fuckin’ couch.”

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