Page 162 of Relentles
But he remembered how his father respected his mother. He remembered their love for one another and their kindness to each other. His mom had been furious when his dad’s cheating was discovered with Kaleb Paul as the result. Once Kaleb’s mama gave birth to Quincy, she hadn’t wanted him, so Joe’s mother set aside her feelings and took him in. A year later, when Kaleb was eight and Joe was ten, his parents were killed. Kaleb’s mother called child protective services and they’d ended up in foster care. Joe refused to be separated from K-P, so they’d made the first of many pacts. They promised to behave so badly if they didn’t end up with the same foster family that the people would have no choice but to give them up. It worked. After an eight-month long separation, they ended up in a boys’ home, where they’d met the future Reverend Motherfucker, the madman, and the maniac. Cee Cee was thirteen, Rack was twelve, and Sharper was nine, all related and all there for eighteen months.
Cee Cee’s main goal was to buy a Harley and open a strip club. Sharper’s goal was to become wealthy at any cost, but he wanted a fucking biker club. Who knew the fuck why. Rack wanted to kill. The first week Joe and K-P arrived, Rack targeted Kaleb.
Joe had almost been kicked out of the home because he’d kicked Rack’s ass from one end of the building to the other, and swore he’d kill him if he looked at his little brother wrong.
His loyalty impressed Cee Cee. After he’d gotten out of solitary confinement, he’d found K-P safe because of Cee Cee and the five of them formed a friendship.
Cee Cee aged out first. Within a month of his turning eighteen, he’d gotten a girl pregnant and she gave birth to Bash. By the time Joe aged out, Cee Cee was a twenty-one-year-old single father with a Harley and a strip club. Joe never asked what happened to Bash’s mother and he never asked what he did to attain the money required to purchase his motorcycle or buy a strip club.
Logan wasn’t the only motherfucker Sharper convinced to form an MC. Cee Cee created the American Scorpions because of Sharper. Except Cee Cee and Sharper butted heads. They both wanted fucking control. Since Cee Cee was the president and Sharper’s name wasn’t anywhere on the charters, he couldn’t win. Cee Cee wasBoss.
Rubbing his neck, Joe grinned. Kimber decided Joe was Boss and so he’d began to refer to himself as such. Other motherfuckers decided he was Big Joe. Depending on his fucking mood he was either.Both.
Yet, he was still Joe, the kid from Seattle who’d lost his parents and learned to respect women because of his father. It was one of the important lessons he wanted to impart to Joey, Christopher, and Johnnie.
Joe ended up crossing paths with Logan because of Cee Cee. Just as he had with Kimber. Cee CeemarriedPatricia to protect Christopher, then went to his club in Portland to celebrate by fucking every woman he saw.
Classic Cee Cee. Always a motherfucker.
Because he was a motherfucker and Logan was a bigger motherfucker, Joe rounded up K-P, returning to Seattle with Kimber’s phone number two weeks after Cee Cee’s wedding.
He feared no one and respected few,exceptwomen. He respected every one of them. He looked out for the club girls and made sure he kept them away from Logan.
Cee Cee’s motto wasrespect few, fear none. Joe changed those words and made it his own,respect all, fear none.
One day, when he’d info dumped his life story to Dinah and believed their parents dying in the same manner gave them a dismal connection, he’d told her about Kimber. He simply didn’t want to hide anything from Dinah. He never had with Kimber. They were his women, the mothers of his children, and they deserved his honesty.
Swallowing, he gave Dinah a sad smile. “You aren’t Kimber, sweetheart. She was beautiful and I loved her, but I love you, too, Dinah. I want to kiss the ground you walk on for giving me Meggie.” He glanced toward the staircase. He wanted to see about her so bad, but he didn’t want Dinah to bar him from seeing his little girl. “Kimber’s gone, babe. I’ll always cherish her memory. My time with her—”
“You were going to marry her!”
“Fuck, Dinah, I want to marry you, but you keep turning me down.”
“Ask until I accept.”
“When the hell’s that going to be?”
“When you leave your filthy club and those filthy whores. When you stop going on about that black woman. You have a crush on her! When you forgetChristopher.”
“Then I guess you’ll never fucking accept because I’m not doing any of the above. I left my fucking club and I was miserable. All we did was argue. I want to please you, but a man has to be true to himself, babe, to be any good for anyone else. And I don’t have a fucking crush on Roxanne.” He did, but whatever. “As for Christopher—”
“As for Christopher, you put him above your own son! He reminds you of Kimber!”
Joe flinched. “Dinah, it’s true I haven’t been the best father to my son. Fuck, I was grieving. Cee Cee didn’t even let me go to her funeral. He wouldn’t return the engagement ring I purchased for her. He took his daughter, Celia, and barred me from her for a long time, then she had her first kid and Cee Cee sent me to take out the father because he beat her. K-P and me keep watch over her from afar.”
“I. Don’t.CARE!Fuck Celia and Kimber, and especially fuck Christopher.”
“You don’t even know that kid!” he growled. Dinah knew how to push his fucking buttons.
“You went back because of him. He took you away—”
“It was part of the reason, babe. Logan hates him.”
“I care how?”
“Because you’re a good, kind woman, Dinah. You don’t have all this hate and bitterness in you.”
“You turned me into this.You.”
