Protect (15 page)

These children weren’t for sale. These were
loaners. Cheaper, returnable. Maybe their holders themselves kept
them for their own use. Who the fuck knew how these pricks thought?
But to her it meant they weren’t sought out, studied, stalked, and
taken. If they weren’t being randomly snatched in groups when the
occasion came up, they were being handed over.

Sharon’s stomach knotted further at the
possibility of parents handing their children over to monsters like
these. There was not one scenario she could imagine where she would
let
anyone hurt Brayden. Offer him up for abuse. She
couldn’t fathom the desperation that would bring up the
possibility.

And that was
her
luck. She felt it,
and was grateful for it, all at the same time.

It was nearly eleven by the time she made use
of the showers off the locker room. A quick rinse was needed after
what she’d seen that day. In her car she berated herself for
texting Fritter in the middle of all that. There was no way she
could bring herself to do what they usually did.

“Still looks like an alien,” Fritter mumbled
to Knuckles, who knocked him hard with one bony elbow.

“They all look like old men when they’re
born,” Knuckles agreed, taking David Junior from Jayce like a pro
and making Fritter look at him in a whole new way. “But you can see
Buck in his face already. Look at his nose. His chin.”

Fritter was likely scowling, but everyone was
starting to sound nuts. “No fucking way. His head is a little dried
up apple. It doesn’t look like either of them.”

“
He
totally looks like Buck,” Tiny
rumbled in that deep baritone voice, peering over Knuckles’
shoulder, wiggling his fingers at the little spawn, smiling.

Smiling
. Tiny was making
baby-faces.

“I don’t understand where I am anymore,”
Fritter mumbled, draining the last of his beer. “Anyone want
another one?”

“Nah, not right now,” Tiny replied, still
making those fucking faces.

Still stunned, Fritter headed to the
Buckingham’s patio, passing Gertie and Jolene on the way. He gave
them both his best gentlemanly nod, stopping in the land of women.
At least
here
he knew what to expect.

“So, what do you two lovelies have on your
mind tonight?” he asked, accepting the one-armed side-hug from
Gertie then the full on kiss on the cheek from Jolene.

“Gertie was just scaring me into being
grateful for the fact I can’t have kids,” Jolene answered with a
little smirk. “Tell me again about the mucus plug?”

“Fuck that,” Fritter said on a belch, heading
back on his first trajectory and ignoring their amused giggles
behind him. He slid the patio door open just as his phone buzzed in
his pocket. He checked the screen, feeling the smile start before
he was sure who it was.

Sheriff Downey, in need of his services
again.

He replied with his standard
OK
and
tucked the phone away while making for the fridge. As he did so the
front door of the house opened at the same time there was a
tentative knock, and he backed off from the fridge to see who was
at the door.

The first thing he noticed were two little
people running at him full speed, each one attacking a leg as the
wave of insanity reached him. With a grin he ducked down to grab
Libby McClune around the waist, picking her up and delivering a
loud, sloppy kiss on her cheek with too much of a smacking sound
that made her squeal, “Uncle Fritter! Gross!”

“That’s right,” he agreed as he set her back
on her feet. “Boys are really gross. Stay far, far away.”

“Hi Uncle Fritter!”

“Jayce Junior!” He greeted his Prez’s son
with a formal handshake. For just a second the kid looked
disappointed, then Fritter wrapped an arm around his middle and
hefted him up sideways, swinging him back and forth a bit. “What’s
your mom feeding you? You’re getting so heavy.”

At the mention of her, Trinny appeared, too.
She had a large gift bag with blue tissue paper sticking out the
top and a reusable grocery store bag. He set Junior down and moved
forward to help her, pausing so she could give him the same kiss on
the cheek most old ladies did. “Trinny,” he said warmly, giving her
a wink.

“Fritter.”

“You look good.”

“Thanks. You, too.”

The grocery bag was heavy. Peering down he
saw a casserole dish, then looked up hopefully. “Is that hash brown
casserole?”

She laughed, and it was like old times all of
a sudden. “What else would I bring to a biker celebration?”

This was one of his vices. No one made it
like Trinny. Hash browns, bacon, cheese, butter, and some kind of
sauce that apparently had onion soup mix in it. Whatever it was, he
loved it and ignored the calorie count.

“You’re the best, Trin,” he bellowed, giving
her a big hug.

After another somewhat stilted laugh from
Trinny, he returned back to the kitchen, setting the bag on the
counter. He nodded to Trinny, about to offer her a beer, but
something made him shut up. The kids had blown through, leaving the
door to the patio open, and they had attacked their father out on
the deck boards in view of the windows.

Trinny was watching them and he came to stand
beside her. There were few things that made Jayce McClune appear
soft
, but his kids were the two things at the top of the
list. Possibly, the third was standing next to Fritter right
then.

“Jesus,” she whispered, and he wasn’t sure if
she meant to speak out loud. “They love him so much.”

Fritter ran his hand back and forth on her
upper back. “He loves them, too. He misses you guys a lot.”

“Well,
them
anyway.”

Fritter frowned, then looked outside again.
Jayce was on his knees, one kid under each arm, trying to fill him
in on what he’d missed since the last time they’d all been
together. The Prez of the Red Rebels MC had red-rimmed eyes as he
nodded and laughed, totally absorbed in the world of his son and
daughter.

“When you comin’ home, Trinny?”

Her back straightened under his hand, so he
removed it. “I can’t, Fritter.”

“We’ll keep you safer. We don’t take that
shit so casually anymore.”

“So it’s gotten even more dangerous?”

Fritter shook his head. “Not what I mean,
Trinny.”

“I gotta go. I wanna meet this baby.”

Shit. He watched her head out onto the deck,
heard Jolene and Gertie squeal their hellos, and then there was a
whole lot of woman-hugging that he was not allowed to find arousing
at all. So he got that beer he wanted.

As he opened it the front door swung inward
again
and he greeted Tank and Rose, late to the party. No
one expected them to be on time. Ever. They were always late
because they were always fucking. Not that he could blame Tank.
Most of the time Rose was around Fritter was at least half-erect
and not just because the whole club had seen her naked. She was
intrinsically hot, even fully dressed, and he avoided touching her
for that reason alone.

“It’s about time you two got here,” Fritter
chastised, taking his first sip of the fresh drink. “Kid’s almost
in high school.”

“Fuck you,” Tank greeted him cheerfully, and
Fritter couldn’t help but notice that Rose’s shirt appeared to be
inside-out.

“You two fuck on the way over here? Where’d
you stop? You on your bike?”

“None of your business!” Rose exclaimed,
properly outraged and classy with that British accent. And there it
was; he was hard again.

“You might want to fix that top. You’re
inside out.”

She looked at the hem of the sleeveless
shirt, then up at Tank with a sheepish grin before heading off to
the bathroom to straighten herself up.

Tank’s face, to most, would appear to be
locked down but Fritter saw the smirk anyway. “You have a quickie
on the bike and she gets totally naked?”

“Stop talking about my old lady naked or I’ll
break your face.”

“You got it.”

“Where’s Buck and Gertie?”

“Outside.”

He followed his VP out into the sunshine,
letting the newcomers fawn over the newborn as he sank down onto a
bench beside their tech officer, Spaz. Spaz was nursing a beer and
looking pretty buzzed, too.

“You get the baby craze, man?”

Spaz immediately shook his head. “No way,
man. Freaks me out.”

“Freaks you out? How?”

“That’s a life. It’s gonna be a person one
day. Driving. Working. Buying a house. Taking up a hobby. I mean,
what if you raise a serial killer?”

Fritter took the guy’s beer away, sniffed it,
then handed it back. “Why you being so fuckin’ weird?”

“Just think of the waste, man.” Spaz flung
one arm out to indicate the yard. “All this. All this love, man.
Any one of us willing to do anything to protect that little baby,
right? You would, right?”

“Yeah man, of course. That’s Gertie and
Buck’s kid.”

“So we do all this, and what if ... he wants
to be a janitor?”

Fritter snorted. “What?”

“What if that makes him happy? What if he
loves ... janitoring? What if he’s the best fucking janitor in the
world?”

“What are you talkin’ about? If he’s happy
that’s good.”

“So why does he need all of us if he knows
what he wants?”

This obviously went deeper than too many
beers. “You been smokin’ pot or hash?”

“Hash,” Spaz answering immediately,
earnestly.

“Don’t worry about the kid being a janitor.
The world will always need janitors.”

“I know. We should all just be janitors.”

“Holy shit,” Fritter muttered and got to his
feet. “I’m all for experimentin’ in a responsible manner. But in
your
case, just say no, young blood.”

He passed the rest of the backyard barbecue
party by sticking to the outer edges with Knuckles, as per usual.
These family events tended to be when the women took the reins and
called all the shots. The men moved tables and chairs around,
manned the grill, and served beers. And kept quiet unless spoken
to.

The men who had paired up with women also
stuck close to their old ladies, he noticed. There was definitely a
division there. The club was changing; he could feel the
difference, and for the first time it worried him.

Not that they weren’t all bestest buddies
anymore. Fuck that. He was happy his friends found good women that
they could depend on. It made for better barbecues, that was for
sure. Before Trinny came along they were more likely to order pizza
or Chinese every night. But the club felt
complete
somehow.
It was hard to describe. It was more like this life was a
sustainable choice now that families were springing up all around
them. Not just something they were
doing
until their
circumstances forced them into something else.

They chose this; they could make a life with
it no matter what the circumstances.

There was also a helluva lot more to lose.
They’d gotten that first taste when Trinny was shot, taking Jayce’s
second daughter and any chance of more kids. But now? Hell, he
couldn’t imagine giving nearly the shit he did right then for the
club without all the attachments of his brothers. These were his
women too, in a way. His kids. He’d lay down his blood and, if it
came to it, his life for them. They were all just extensions of the
brotherhood.

Heavy thoughts for a sun-faded backyard in
early July, and no one had so much as suggested that Fritter was a
deep thinker. It was more something he
felt
, watching Trinny
laughing, sitting on a patio chair next to Gertie, similarly
perched on another one. Libby was on her mother’s lap, head resting
on her chest, fighting to keep her eyes open just a bit longer past
bedtime.

On the grass Tank, Jayce, Jayce Junior, and
Mickey had an over-sized softball and were playing an odd, four-man
version of catch. The adults had beers, Jayce Junior was the only
one with a mitt. Buck and Tiny were in discussion, sitting on the
edge of the low deck. Buck was in front of his woman, leaning back
into her legs. Every now and then she’d reached out to touch his
hair, or he’d take her foot in his hand and tickle the arch.

Knuckles was on a lounger, making it earn its
name, sucking on a root beer. Fritter was on a second lounger,
angled to face the other one. He’d watched his beer intake since
he’d have to head out soon. A guy shouldn’t drunk-drive to meet a
cop. Just not a smart thing to do.

“You’re very sedate, Fritter.”

“It’s a warm day.”

“How’s your mom?”

Fritter shrugged. “The usual. She works way
too fuckin’ hard.”

“She still doesn’t know you paid off the
house?”

“She’ll know the next time a statement comes.
She’s puttin’ more into her retirement than that mortgage, anyway.
She’s too proud to just let me buy everything.”

Knuckles laughed. “That’s a good thing,
Fritter. Means she can take care of herself if you get locked up
again.”

That set his jaw. Going away that last time
was what landed them in Markham. They’d been sharing bills since he
was old enough to lie about his age and work. He went away for
assault after a bar fight, ended up in Kings County Penitentiary.
She’d gotten a decent job at the nearest laundry service she could:
Markham Medical Center. The rest was history. “I know she can take
care of herself. I just wish she didn’t have to work so hard to do
it.”

There was a nasty cough that had started
about five years ago. It never got worse, but it wasn’t going away
either. His mom had always worked in large industrial laundry
centers, or at dry cleaners. Fritter had his own worries about the
cough but she wouldn’t get it looked at. That was money, too.
Better to just put your head down and work
, that was Ma’s
view.