Yes, I thought, sitting in the sun, my girls around me, holding his gaze, taking in his smile and carrying his child, Aunt Bette was absolutely right.

Sometimes it happens in weird ways that included fights, blood, drunkenness, kidnappings and pregnancies.

But dreams came true.

* * *

“It was good form, your brothers not pulling knives or shooting anyone when Mitch, Brock and Hawk’s team beat your team in baseball,” I noted, lying cuddled naked in bed with a naked Tack in his room in the Compound.

It was late. The barbeque was over. Aunt Bette and Uncle Marsh were at their hotel. Tab and Rush were at home. And Tack and I decided to keep partying in private.

“Lawson didn’t tell me he had a secret weapon,” Tack mumbled. “Fuck, you see that kid hit?”

“Yep.”

“Jesus,” Tack muttered. “Got an arm on him too. He’s only eleven.”

“I noticed that too.”

“And Lucas’s boys weren’t far behind him. Older, fuckin’ powerhouses.”

“Yep.”

“We didn’t stand a chance.”

“Nope.”

Tack fell silent.

I did too.

Then I broke it with, “Rush make his decision?”

Rush had graduated high school and Rush told his father he was thinking of joining Chaos. I was surprised this wasn’t a given but, for some reason, it wasn’t.

“Not yet.”

“What’s holding him back?”

“I don’t know, maybe our shit gettin’ a woman he cares about stabbed five times?”

My head popped up from his shoulder and I looked through the dark at his shadowed face.

“Me?”

“Only some shit you can shield your kids from, darlin’, my kids ain’t dumb and their mother had a big mouth that also was loud, both of those making it harder to shield them at all. They heard me and Naomi fightin’. They heard what it was about. Hard as I tried, bitch wouldn’t shut up. This only led to what happened to you. And, babe, you know Pipe went down.”

Only weeks after my drama, Naomi’s old man had gotten into his car, started it and got blown to smithereens. Lescheva might have been out but the Russians kept good books. They knew who owed them a debt and those kinds of debts got paid.

Elliott paid it.

Pipe Dahl paid it too.

Naomi didn’t waste time moving onto her next victim. She shacked up three months later with a biker in Boulder.

Rush saw her occasionally.

Tabby, never.

As for me, even though I never saw her, Boulder wasn’t far enough away. But it was something.

“Rush isn’t all fired up about Chaos,” Tack finished.

“But you’re not on that path anymore,” I pointed out.

“Darlin’, you got stabbed five times and his stepdad got dead.”

“Pipe dying had nothing to do with Chaos.”

“Not sure Rush sees it that way.”

“He couldn’t do better than the Club,” I announced heatedly and the air in the room went still but I ignored it and kept talking, “What’s he going to do? He loves cars. He’s great with them. You got him that bike for Christmas and every good day with clear roads we’ve had since then, he’s been on it. He knows everything about cars and bikes. And –”

“He couldn’t do better than the Club?” Tack cut me off to ask.

“Well, yeah. Brothers and blood. What’s more important than a lifetime of loyalty to both?”

“Jesus,” Tack murmured.

“What?” I asked.

“Jesus,” Tack repeated.

“What?” I repeated too and his hand came up and cupped my jaw.

“Your what is that those layers keep strippin’ off, baby. And sometimes, when they do, what’s uncovered shines out so bright, it takes the wind out of me.”

His words took the wind out of me.

Tack went on, “This mornin’, you gave me one of the most precious gifts a woman can give her man. And now, you just gave me another one.”

What did I do?

“I…” I faltered then asked, “How did I do that?”

“I claimed you into my world and then you gave me you. But, Red, me claimin’ you and you existing in my world is one thing. You accepting it is another.”

Oh, that’s what I did.

My body relaxed into his and his hand slid from my jaw into my hair as I pointed out, “I took my place in it a long time ago, honey.”

“You love me, you love my kids, you feel deep for my brothers but until now, I didn’t know you also loved the life.” His hand in my hair pulled me close so he could touch my mouth to his before he let me back an inch and finished, “And that’s a gift, baby. One that means the world to me. Thank you.”

Ohmigod!

I was thinking I just heard Tack say, “thank you”.

“Did you just say ‘thank you’?” I asked in order to confirm.

“Spoke English, babe.”

“You just said ‘thank you’.”

A pause before he muttered, “Now she’s bustin’ my balls.”

“I am not!” I snapped.

“Now she’s servin’ up attitude.”

Well, I was doing that.

“Give me a break, handsome, I’ve been with you just shy of a year and in that time I’ve been kidnapped, I kicked ass twice, I was stabbed, got married and you got me pregnant. Through all that, you’ve not once said ‘thank you’ to me. Even when I got that mammoth parts order right without having to ask you a single question. Let me savor the moment.”

“Yeah, I was savoring that moment too and that moment was tender until you got feisty.”

“Uh… you pledged your troth to me, Tack. It’s not like you don’t know I get feisty.”

“I pledged my troth,” Tack repeated.

“Yeah.”

“You just said I pledged my troth.”

“Yes, that’s what I just said.”

“What’s a troth?”

“I don’t know, I just know you pledged it.”

I heard and saw Tack shake his head on his pillow then he stated, “Babe, advice. A man expresses his gratitude, you do not throw attitude. You kiss him and, maybe, suck his dick to show your appreciation.”

Okay, now we were back to the Tack I knew.

“I think I’ve already cemented my biker bitch status, Tack, this very conversation being evidence of that. Lessons are no longer necessary.”

“Right, then, how about you get busy suckin’ my dick ‘cause I want you to?”

That went through me like a hot knife through butter and my legs shifted.

“Always greedy,” he muttered.

“Like you don’t like it,” I muttered back.

“Hard to talk, you got a mouth full of my cock,” Tack remarked.

That went through me too.

“Quit turning me on when I’m feeling feisty,” I snapped.

“Red, best time to turn you on is when you’re feeling feisty.”

This was true.

“Babe,” he prompted when I made no move then, “Tyra,” he prompted again when I still made no move.

“Oh, all right. I’ll get busy.”

“Obliged,” he muttered, a smile in his voice but his hand didn’t leave my hair to let me get down to business. It pulled me close so my mouth was touching his. “Think about this, darlin’, before you go down on me and brace, baby, ‘cause I’m about to get sweet and you need to process it fast so you can move on to suckin’ me off, not fast.”

As requested, I braced but I also held my breath.

Tack didn’t delay in trumping the best sweet he’d ever given me. Something he did often. Something his words proved I’d never get used to.

“I thank you for helpin’ me make that baby inside you. I thank you for takin’ your place in my world and likin’ it. I thank you for bein’ a good stepmom to my kids and givin’ Tab what she needed and never had. And I thank you most of all for bein’ you, givin’ as good as you get in all the ways you can, makin’ sure my life is never boring and makin’ sure I go to bed content and wake up happy to face the coming day.”

My throat closed because my heart swelled so big it took up my entire chest but I didn’t get a chance to start crying because Tack kissed me. I did give a little sob into his mouth before I got over it and decided to concentrate on kissing him back.

After that, I got down to business.

* * *

Tack

Tyra was out, her body heavy against his when Tack gently rolled her to her back.

He rolled into her and, as he’d done countless times since that day, his hand moved over her skin.

The scars were gone but their memory remained. He knew each location where the knife plunged into her flesh and he ran his fingers across the skin he’d paid a fucking mint to make smooth again.

And, as always, he ended the journey of his hand at her throat.

Resting lightly there so as not to wake her, he let her pulse beat into his fingers and he did it until it washed the memories away.

But this night and the ones to follow for the next seven months, the path of his hand didn’t end there as it usually did.

It moved down to her belly.

And into the darkness, to his sleeping woman, he whispered, “You don’t know this, baby, but some men have dream women too.”

Since she was asleep, for once, Tyra Allen had no reply.

Palm flat against his woman’s warm, soft skin, Kane Allen settled into his wife in the bed in the room where they started and he fell asleep.

* * *

Seven months later, Rider Allen was born.

And the first thing Tack did was wrap two fingers around his throat.