Page 15 of Room Twenty: Owning Their Angel

When we pull off into a parking lot, I’m a fucking mess. I can see the strain on the faces of Bedlam and Scope as they slide into the vehicle with me. Bedlam is running his fingers through his hair as agitation rolls off him in waves.

“This is a nice town,” his voice is gruff like he’s having to work to force the words out of his mouth.

“It is,” I agree as I scrub a hand down my face.

I’m fucking exhausted. We couldn’t sleep once we had a plan to get our woman which means we left New Orleans really fucking early. Now that I’m here and she feels so close, I just want to go to her and curl my body around hers while promising to never let her go.

But I can’t.

“Maybe this is the right place for her,” I hate the words as they come from my mouth.

They feel wrong and I want to swallow them back down, but they’re out there now. Just because I hate the idea of not having our woman with us, doesn’t mean it’s not the right thing to do.

“What the fuck?” Scope’s voice is full of fury, “How the fuck can you say that?”

I look back at him where he’s stretched out across the back seat as Bedlam waves his hand in a gesture meant to encompass the town we just drove through. “You saw this place. It’s nice and clean. Even though people looked at us, they were more curious than anything. No one was frowning. The sheriff or cops or whoever hasn’t shown up to run us out of town even though we clearly don’t belong here. It’s fucking nice.”

“You said nice twice,” Scope points out really fucking unhelpfully. He sighs and rests his head back on the top of the seat. “I get what you’re saying. But she belongs with us. We need to get her and then get her the fuck back home.”

It feels like I’m being torn in two because I understand where both men are coming from. Is there even a middle ground? I have no fucking idea. What I do know is that there’s one voice missing from the conversation, even though my heart sinks at the idea of her choosing to stay here instead of coming home.

“We already know we fucked up with Heather. We made decisions for her without including her. We decided we knew what was best for her and look at where it’s gotten us,” my voice sounds hollow because without her that’s exactly what my life is like.

Guilt churns in my stomach because we never took the time to look at the choices we were making through her eyes. We should have, but we thought we knew what was best. We never even gave her a chance to tell us how she feels or what she wants.

“We did it for her and we were thinking about her the entire time,” Bedlam defends.

“I’m not saying we weren’t,” I point out. “I’m not even saying I would do it differently, but we should have talked to her. Even if no one else knew that she belongs to us, we should have made suresheknew. Maybe then she wouldn’t have run.”

Silence descends in the car, and I rub my chest right over where my heart is beating, an ache growing with every thud. I miss her. I’ve never missed anyone like I’ve been missing her for the last three months.

“It doesn’t matter,” I break the silence, my eyes fucking burning. “We can’t change what has already happened.”

“No,” Bedlam sounds like a petulant child, “we can’t.”

Scope’s leg starts to bounce in the backseat, and I can feel his anxious energy like a wave through the enclosed space. I want to give him shit about it, but I’ve already stewed in my nerves and anxiety for the entire drive. I’m in no condition to tell him to tone it down.

“We need to go and see her,” Scope insists. “No matter what happens after, it’s the first step.”

I nod along with Bedlam. Scope is right. We can’t figure out a way forward without seeing our woman. I don’t know what will happen after and not knowing is eating me up inside.

We had such a clear plan before. Get our patches. Claim our woman. Build a life with her as our center.

It was so fucking clear.

Now, I’m not so sure, but I do know we all want that still. It’s why we’re here.

Without a word, Scope and Bedlam slide out of the cage and stride back to their bikes. It’s one of those moments where words aren’t necessary.

What would we even say? That everything is going to be okay? There’s no need for rainbow platitudes when we don’t know what is awaiting us when we see Heather again.

It takes only a few minutes to get to the real estate office, but there isn’t any parking right out front. We go half a block down to grab some spots and then we meet on the sidewalk. I wince because I don’t know if Heather heard the bikes and if it will be a big warning to her that we’re here. Will she run again?

It doesn’t matter because I look down the sidewalk toward where the office is, and my breath catches in my throat. It’s her. I swear she wasn’t on the sidewalk just seconds ago, but now she’s moving away from us and toward the office. Where the fuck did she come from?

Does it even matter?

“Jesus,” Scope grunts which tells me he sees her too.

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