Making the Cut (37 page)

His rough hand stroked my face, reverence in his gaze.

“Because of who you are Gwen, you not only pulled yourself out of that blackness, but pulled out one of my best friends. You are strong baby, one of the strongest people I know. Never doubt that. Even after today, I nearly fucking broke down, seeing you hanging from that fucking ceiling. You were the one that brought me back from the edge, your spirit your faith in me.”
Tears were now falling down my cheeks at Cade’s words and the undisguised love in his gaze. I couldn’t believe the heart breaking tender things that were coming out of my gruff bikers mouth.

“I love you.” I said quietly. “Promise you will never try to leave me again?”

Cade’s gaze turned hard, possessive. “Nothing in this world is keeping me away from you baby.”

He then spent the rest of the night inside of me.

Chapter 15

One month later

“Yeah you go Vinnie!” I shouted at the television screen, almost spilling popcorn in my lap.

Amy snorted beside me and I whipped my head towards her.

“The Rock is so much better than Vin, he is kicking his ass.” She declared, eyes still on the TV.

I gasped. “How could you…? What makes you…? I can’t even believe you just said that!”

Amy rolled her eyes. “He has like 40 pounds on him and about six inches, in height, and width.” She grinned wickedly.

I threw a piece of popcorn at her.

“Take that back, Vin Diesel is like a thousand times more of a badass than
The Rock,
” I sneered at his name.

She threw an M&M at me. I caught it in my mouth and smirked.

“Vin Diesel is an
actor
The Rock is a WWE world champion, he is the badass of all badasses.” She proclaimed after giving me a high five for my catch.

“Um have you not seen XXX? Vin kicks some serious ass in that movie, he is like a freaking super hero, not to mention all the Fast movies.” I retorted.

“Gwen, you do know movies aren’t real right? He didn’t actually battle Columbian drug lords and do all that shit with the cars.” She was talking to me like I was a small child who is slightly slow.

“What do you think WWE is Amy?” I asked in the same tone.

Amy was robbed of her smart retort when I heard a chuckle from the door. My eyes landed on Cade who was leaning with his arms crossed, amusement dancing on his handsome face. Seriously it should be illegal for him to look that hot. He was in head to toe black. Black jeans, tight black tee, black motorcycle boots and his cut. He hadn’t shaved, so his face was rough with stubble, his black hair looking professional messed. He looked delicious and dangerous.

I sighed. “We are both wrong, I think the biggest bad ass of them all is standing in this room. My man could take both of them on and win.” I said dreamily, shamelessly checking him out.

“You aren’t wrong.” Amy breathed, doing the same thing.

Cade ignored us and his gaze settled on the TV.

“What are you watching?” He asked frowning.

“Fast and the Furious.” I replied, eyes back on the movie.

He watched for a beat with an eyebrow raised.

“Well it isn’t technically any of the movies, it’s just all the fight scenes with the hot guys from all six movies.” I added, eyes on Paul Walker.

Cade didn’t say a word just strode over and picked me up off the couch, throwing me over his shoulder. I squealed as he smacked my ass.

“I’m going to fuck you so hard you feel me in your throat.” He growled in my ear and I got instantly wet. “Then I’m going to burn that fuckin DVD.”

The month after my kidnapping has been one of the happiest of my life. Which was weird, you’d think after getting kidnapped and beaten again it would drag me back to battle with some old demons and maybe force me to reconsider my life with Cade. It has done quite the opposite.

Cade had hardly let me out of his sight the entire time, his protective instinct even more intense than normal. If that was humanly possible. I couldn’t say I don’t like it though because we have been having a lot of sex. I mean
a lot.
In the store, my bed, his bed, the beach, his bike. The club. At first he was reluctant, treating me like I was made of glass, especially since the bruising on my face got worse before it got better. For the week it took to fade, I would catch Cade staring at my face with a pained expression, knowing he was blaming himself. No matter how hard I tried to tell him otherwise, he was convinced it was his fault. There was no more talk of him leaving me though, he just got down to business.

One thing did come of my kidnapping. The club decided to get out of guns, immediately. Cade had left the morning after I was taken to take a vote at the club. He came back with a black eye, but the vote had passed. Turns out he and Steg had disagreed over the idea and it turned physical. Steg had been forced to pass the vote, as the majority of members wanted to get out. Cade had told me the legit businesses were doing well enough, not to mention the garage itself. He had also mentioned they did some sort of security work but hadn’t elaborated much, which made me infinitely more curious. Amy and I had started a stealth campaign to find out, although we had been foiled at every turn. Turns out they were good at the security thing.

Nevertheless, things with Steg and Cade were tense. Although the last time I had been at the club with fading bruises, Steg had silently kissed my black eye. At this, Cade was so pissed he looked like his jaw was about to shatter. I, on the other hand felt differently. I was beginning to seriously doubt my first impressions of Steg, he was tender with Evie and the kids around the club. But he was also a hardass and I couldn’t shake the feeling there was something bad under the surface, but he seemed to love his family.

The club had overwhelmed me with their show of support the last month, the boys all stopping in on a regular basis. They came and had dinner, not disguising their fury at my injuries, nor their relief at the fact I was still breathing. I saw a lot of them, they were always stopping by the store or the house just to make sure I was handling things okay. The person I saw the most of was Bull. We seemed to have established some sort of connection. I think knowing he was able to save me from the same fate as Laurie healed him slightly. But he would always be broken. He wouldn’t say much, just come and sit with me if I was alone in the store, come for dinner when Cade had to be away. I enjoyed his company though and tried my hardest to make him laugh at my stupid jokes. He didn’t, but I would keep trying.

I had also found out (to my immense relief) the club wasn’t behind the explosion at the Spider’s clubhouse therefore not responsible for the murder of a whole gang. Cade had told me they had more than a few enemies, which included the mob (yes the legit Sopranos type…ekk) who were responsible. I know they were far from good men but I was still firm on my belief that two wrongs didn’t make a right. Which seemed to differ from the clubs version of justice.

Another thing that happened was I finally told everyone in my life about Cade. A thing I had putting off doing partly because I wanted to make sure things were solid with us before declaring my love for him to all my friends and family, but mostly because I was a wuss. It didn’t go exactly as I planned though as I discovered when I rang my mother a few days ago. I sat in my office working up my courage after I had been chatting to my mother about random things for about ten minutes.

“So did I tell you Nancy Goodwin, you know that girl Alice’s mother?” She didn’t wait for me to reply, like usual. “You know the girl you went to high school with? Quiet girl, nose always in a book, but a pretty wee thing?” Again my mother didn’t wait for me to confirm I knew who she was talking about.

“Well it turns out she has been having an affair with a
thirty year old man and is now pregnant with twins.
” She whispered the last part as if it were the codes to a radioactive bomb.

“Mum I’ve got a boyfriend.” I announced, not reacting to her earlier statement. Although I was shocked, Alice was only a couple of years younger than me, her mother was no spring chicken.

“Oh honey I’ve been waiting for you to tell me for
weeks
I’m so glad we can finally talk about him.” She gushed sounding excited.

“What do you mean ‘you’ve been waiting for me to tell you’?” I asked quietly.

“Oh darn.” My mother whispered quietly back and I knew something was afoot.

“Mum!” I demanded with one word.

“Oh its nothing, Amy just sent me a picture of you and your young man. He is smoking. I knew you might be hesitant to tell us, but I know what a man in love looks like and that boy is smitten. Not to mention Amy approves and I trust her judgment even though she did like that awful collection by Versace…”

“Mum!” I snapped, trying to erase hearing Mum calling Cade ‘smoking’ and plotting Amy’s murder at the same time.

“Lets go back to the part where Amy sent you a picture of me and Cade.”

“Cade and I darling.” I rolled my eyes at Mum’s correction of grammar. “Like I said, I approve, even if he is a bit rough around the edges, he is one fine male specimen.” I cringed at the thought of my mother checking out the ‘specimen.’

“Are you happy Gwen?” My Mum asked, seriously now, with a bit of emotion in her voice.

I sighed. “Yeah Mum, I love him.” I told her quietly.

I heard silence over the phone then a sob. “Mum?”

“I’m fine dear just happy to hear you are happy. Oh no, the Stevenson’s have just turned up. They are here an hour early, seriously these people. I haven’t even changed out of my gardening clothes! I hate to cut this short Gwen, but I will have to talk to you later. I’ll call when your father is around. Love you sweetie pie, I am so happy for you.” Her voice broke slightly at the end.

“Love you too Mum.”

I rang off quietly seething at Amy, trying to think of ways to get away with her murder. I shelved that thought, deciding to cross someone else off the list.

“I am wearing fur underwear, I repeat fur underwear. What the fuck do these stylists think they are doing? I will do almost anything in the name of fashion, but the matching booties are where I draw the line.” Ryan answered the phone without a hello, launching into conversation like always. I giggled.

“Well hello to you too my darling friend.” I greeted sarcastically.

“Did you not hear me Gwennie? Fur underwear. It’s freaking 100 degrees out here, I am sweating my man parts off.” He complained.

“With great modeling prowess comes great responsibility.” I told him sagely.

I could almost see Ryan scowling down the phone.

“How’s the little town anyway? Been to any ho downs?” He quickly changed the subject, obviously over his tantrum.

“Ha ha Ryan, you do realize it is in California, by the beach right? Whatever. I’ve got something to tell you.”

“Oooh you’re finally getting a boob job?” He asked excitedly.

“No!” I exclaimed, looking down at my B cups self consciously. I actually had toyed with the idea of increasing my chest to a more substantial size, not Pamela Anderson, just more than a handful. But Cade had been showing me he more than appreciated my mere handful, I had been feeling good about them until now.

“Dammit.” He mumbled, “I was going to be your nursemaid, had the perfect outfit and everything.”

I scrunched up my nose at my gay friend nursing my boobs back to health.

“Well sorry Florence ain’t gonna happen.”

“Oh well I’ll find the use for it.” He replied mind obviously wandering.

“Ryan. Something to tell you, kind of important?” I probed.

“Oh go ahead girl tell me the news.” He said, sounding less interested.

“I have a boyfriend.” I blurted, deciding to dive straight in, hoping Amy hadn’t beat me to the punch on this one as well.

There was silence on the other end of the phone.

“Hello? Have I finally managed the mean feat of rendering Ryan Jackson speechless?” I asked sarcastically, hoping his response will be a happy one. I got my answer when I heard a squeal girlier than mine down the end of the phone. I held it away from my ear a second.

“Crap Ryan you promised you’d warn me when you do that, I don’t want to go prematurely deaf.” I whined, maybe understanding why people kept saying that to me.

“Oooo weee girl this is
fantastic.
You are finally back on the horse! You are back on the horse right? In the biblical sense? He better be hot, what am I saying you are in the middle of nowhere. Please don’t tell me his sister is also his cousin.”