A Very Christopher Christmas (A Death Dwellers MC Novella) (31 page)

A week after Kendall delivered Matilda, Johnnie accompanied her back to Hortensia. It was early evening and everyone knew they were home, but he’d specifically requested they stay away.
 

The time had come for him to have another heart-to-heart with Kendall. Once she settled their daughter in her nursery and returned to their bedroom, Johnnie stood from the couch, beer already in hand.
 

She lifted a brow, looking pointedly at the bottle, but backed down at his narrowing eyes.
 

“I know you’re still angry, Johnnie,” she began.
 

Oh, she didn’t know the fucking half of it. “Angry?” he asked mildly and gulped from the bottle. He nodded. “That’s one way of putting it.”
 

Hand on her still-swollen belly, she stomped to him. “I just had a baby.
Your
daughter. The least you could do is cut me some slack.”
 

“No, Kendall, the least I can fucking do is not walk the fuck out and stay away until you’re following your doctor’s advice again. Do you know the shit you’ve caused? What the fuck is wrong with you?”
 

A question Christopher had asked over and over and Johnnie had always gotten pissed off over. Looking back, he realized he’d directed his anger at the wrong goddamn person.
 

“You could’ve gotten Christopher killed.”
 

“Christopher! Christopher! Christopher!” she blared. “I despise him. He treated me worse than dirt when I was having Matilda. He walked away and made Digger take over. That’s how much he hates me. Enough to risk our daughter’s life by ignoring my need.”
 

A time or two at the beginning of their relationship, Kendall had made Johnnie angry enough to want to commit violence, but he always pulled back. Because he loved her. Because he knew she’d been through so fucking much. But, fuck him, enough was enough.
 

“Stop blaming everyone for the shit you do,” he roared. “Christopher didn’t risk Matilda. You fucking did. You stowed away in the goddamn plane, knowing you were close to your due date.”
 

The color dropped from her face and tears rushed to her eyes. “That’s because I wanted to make amends with—”
 

“You can’t have every fucking thing you want. Even a goddamn child has that much fucking understanding.”
 

Her loud sobs almost drowned out his words.
 

“Save your fucking tears and listen to me for once.”
 

“I haven’t fully recovered from having your baby and you’re yelling at me,” she cried.
 

“I told you to shut the fuck up, didn’t I?” he gritted through clenched teeth.
 

“Y-yes,” she sniffled, somehow managing to contain her bawling.
 

“Then do it.”
 

Eyes wide, she stared at him while Johnnie wrestled with his anger, on the verge of tearing his hair out.
 

“I love you,” he told her, “but even my love won’t be enough to save our marriage if you don’t stop being such a selfish witch. Every goddamn thing that goes on is for your benefit. Not mine. Not Rory’s.” And Rory was afraid of her, something he needed to discuss with
her, but not when he was so fucking angry and she looked hurt to her core. “We can’t have a one-sided marriage. Hear what the fuck I want and take it into consideration.”
 

“Or what?” she challenged, recovering enough to fire back at him. But that’s what Kendall did.
 

“I’m going to ignore that for now. You’ve got to understand that from this moment forward, we compromise. No more sticking your nose in club business. No more keeping me from my beer. No more fucking recitals at Charlotte and Brooks.”
 

“How’s that compromise? It sounds as if it’ll all be about what you want.”
 

“Why shouldn’t it, as long as it doesn’t fucking hurt you or our marriage? Not one fucking thing I’ve said has one fucking impact on
you
unless you allow it. You don’t like beer? I do. You like fucking opera? I fucking hate it. We can have separate playlists or we can share a playlist that has half your songs and half my songs. You want to go to those horrid events Charlotte hosts? Wonderful. See you when you get fucking back.”
 

“So this is the way we’re going to be?”
 

“Yes! Happy, for the first time since you’ve gotten pregnant.”
 

She gasped. “How dare you? You’re responsible for my condition.”
 

Fuck, she wore him out. Instead of addressing that, he continued with the argument he’d been having. “What you desire doesn’t mean taking away my pleasures. That won’t happen ever again. As for our children, they’ll call us Mom and Dad. Not Kendall and Johnnie. Understood, Kendall?”
 

Folding her arms, she raised her chin. “And if I don’t?”
 

He glared at her. “Are you really challenging me to give you an ultimatum?”
 

They stared at each other and, for a moment, Johnnie thought Kendall would tell him
yes
. If she had, he would’ve walked out. What else could he have done? She’d caused all kinds of havoc that got him suspended from the club and her, Val, and Christopher kidnapped.
 

But, instead of an affirmative answer, she lowered her lashes and said, “N-no, Johnnie.” Rushing to him and sitting, she threw her arms around his neck and sobbed. “I’m so sorry. For everything. But Christopher took my job at the law firm. He—”
 

Pulling away from her, he grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “Shut up,” he ordered. “Get over it. The sooner you face the fucking facts, the better off you’ll be. You’ll never, ever,
EVER
get Christopher to like you. Brooks likes living so he won’t allow you to rejoin the firm. There are others you can apply to.”
 

“No, please, Johnnie! Brooks respects my opinions. He’s like a father to me.”
 

And spoiled her like a father. Brooks had allowed Kendall to have the run of the department she worked in, just to make her value herself. But she’d run the fuck over him as she did with Johnnie and Charlotte. Even Megan had grown tired of Kendall’s demands.
 

He caressed Kendall’s back and kissed the top of her head. “I love you,” he repeated again. “But you’ve got to do one other thing.”
 

“Go back on my medicine,” she supplied around her tears.
 

Smiling, Johnnie threaded his fingers through her hair. “Will you?”
 

“I love you, too, and I want our marriage to succeed. I want to be the best wife and great mom and role model for Matilda. I just thought it showed how much we respected them as little people to have them call us by our names. I wanted them to know that we—”
 

“Have lives of our own,” he finished. “But how can you want to teach them respect one way? Rory is afraid of his own shadow because he’s expected to be perfect at the table. On the potty. At school. You call
him
sir and mister while insisting he call us by our names?”
 

Kendall leaned back and blinked, her eyes widening. “Oh my God! I’m a horrible mother,” she wailed, covering her face with her hands.
 

“No,” he soothed, removing her hands and tilting her face to him. “None of us are perfect. You’re a work in progress.”
 

“You’re right! Everything you’ve said is right. I promise I’ll make an appointment with my doctor first thing Monday morning.” She hugged him. “I love you! I love you so much.”
 

He caressed her cheek and ran his lips over hers. “I know, sweetheart. I love you just as much.”
 

Their love would carry them through the good and the bad times, but he felt he’d finally had a real breakthrough with Kendall. Just in time to have a great Christmas and New Year.
 

Unfortunately, he’d be enjoying the holidays away from the club.
 

 

“The Scorpions were in the market for arms,” Riley explained, two weeks later, via Skype, as Christopher sat in Brooks’s office with Val, Digger, Mortician, Stretch, and Cash. Ordinarily, Johnnie would be in attendance, but Christopher had yet to revoke his suspension, and he wasn’t sure when he would. “The arms dealer was promised a hefty fee if he got you to their territory. They wanted you out of the country to have you alone and completely at their mercy. McCallister was expendable to them. Once he performed his duty and got them the guns and you, they disposed of him.”
 

“Let me fuckin’ see if I got this shit straight. My motherfuckin’ half-brother, Charles, been plannin’ on takin’ me out because I fuckin’ pinned the Torps’ bombin’ on his outfit?”
 

“Yes,” Riley answered.
 

“He needed fuckin’ light weapons and knew I had them?”
 

“Right again.”
 

“He was willin’ to pay a bunch of fuckin’ bills to get those guns, then intended to strong arm Brooks and the club after they fucked me up?”
 

“And retrieved the money McCallister claimed you’d agreed to refund for changing locations.”
 

“Lyin’ motherfucker.”
 

Riley nodded. “From what I’ve pieced together from my sources. That’s about right.”
 

“Even if they woulda killed my ass, that don’t mean my boys woulda went fuckin’ down without a fight.”
 

“With you gone, the power would’ve been neutralized,” Cash explained. “That’s the way I see it.”
 

“Unless there was some other motherfucker as strong as you ready to take your place,” Mortician added. “Johnnie strong, Prez, but I don’t think he wanna be in your position.”
 

As much as he hated to admit Mort was right, Christopher knew that he was. “Don’t make a fuckin’ difference now. Motherfucker suspended.”
 

None of the general membership knew of the bullshit that had gone down since church wouldn’t take place again until after the new year. It was all part of Christopher’s work-free holiday policy.
 

“How many more of Cee Cee’s sons left?” He knew Tobias and Charles were alive. Frank had also been one of Christopher’s half-brothers. “Including Frank and the one you put the hit out on several years ago, there’s Lenny.”
 

The delivery fuckhead who’d shoved a hood and Christopher’s cut on some assfuck and showed the body to Megan. He was fucking lucky he’d already been taken care of.
 

“And then there’s Bradley,” Riley concluded
 

“Alive or fucked up?” Digger asked.
 

“Alive,” Riley answered.
 

Tapping his fingers on the conference table, Christopher searched his mind on how best to handle those three motherfuckers. They had to fucking die. Case fucking closed. It was just the timing that pissed him off.
 

Ryder remained in the Neonatal unit because his lungs needed a little more development. Still, he was due to be released in four days on the eve of Christmas Eve. Megan had gotten home a week ago, but she couldn’t do much until she healed, yet plans for the party and Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve forged the fuck on. Christopher
had
to be home for her.
 

He scratched his jaw. “This what we gonna do. Get them three motherfuckers here. Tell Charles I wanna have a face-to-face. This the season of peace and forgiveness. Yada, fuckin’ yada, yada.”
 

“Where?”
 

Considering Riley’s question, Christopher glanced around the conference room. He wouldn’t get them on club grounds unless they was stupid motherfuckers. And he certainly wouldn’t fucking go to a place
they
chose. Although he was choosing this spot, it seemed neutral enough. Club attorney or not, most lawyers didn’t want motherfuckers grounded in their offices.
 

Brooks probably didn’t either, but oh fucking well. Motherfucker needed to get back in Christopher’s good graces and they all knew it.
 

“We do it here.”
 

“Here?” Brooks echoed. “In my conference room?”
 

“You gotta fuckin’ problem with that?” Christopher growled.
 

Widening his eyes, Brooks immediately backed down and shook his head. “Of course not.”
 

“We on brain detail I guess,” Mort said with a sigh, looking at Digger.
 

“I guess the fuck you is,” Christopher confirmed.
 

“If I get them to agree, when do you want me to set it up?” Riley asked.