“So yeah, that’s why he was weird about me helping out. I had to beg him to let me do it, plus he and Harlem were right next door in the fucking pawn shop,” she says.
“I get why he was cautious,” Deanna says. “I’m surprised he even let you do that to be fair.”
“He took some convincing,” she admits.
“I know I’m done with two, but to have another baby in the house.” Deanna hugs herself. She had her second baby around a year ago. A son for Cash and a brother for Caprice and Callaghan.
After we’re done with hugs and kisses and congratulations, she sits back down, tears in her eyes. “Tag says he doesn’t care if it’s a boy or a girl, but I mean, can you imagine him holding a baby?” she coos.
“Oh, we’ve seen it,” Crystal laughs. “Multiple times, and it’s hysterical.”
“I’m so happy for you,” I say, meaning every word. “How are you feeling about it?”
She shrugs. “Nervous, but also excited. I just really hope this baby isn’t huge, but it is Tag’s sperm after all.”
Everyone laughs, almost sympathetically.
We don’t often see Luna emotional. She’s one of the toughest in the group, but she takes the tissue from Summer gratefully. “So I’m gonna be huge, like really huge, but Tag already can’t get enough of it. He’s been so attentive.”
I somehow have a hard time picturing that, but I’ll take her word on it.
“Well, this calls for a toast,” Star declares. “Luna, you should do the honors.”
“I second that,” says Amber.
“Third!” Lace chimes in.
Luna clears her throat, raising her glass—which we now know contains sparkling water—“To the Queens of the MC. Let our legacy live on. History books will talk about us as women who took our lives into our own hands, never fearing our enemies. Oh, and we got a lot of dick along the way.” Everyone erupts in laughter, clinking glasses, and I know I’ve found my forever family.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT
Nova
I didn’t think I was nervous. I didn’t think I was anything, but now Luna and I are about to head into the infamous dry cleaners, I’m having second thoughts.
“You look worried, why are you worried?” Luna asks, glancing at me.
I puff my cheeks out. We’re sitting in Luna’s G-Wagon down the street, waiting for the okay. There are trucks and parked cars lining the street with the MC boys inside them. No motorcycles, because it would be a little hard to ignore all the straight pipes. Sawyer is situated directly across in his truck with Pipes and Logan.
“I think she looks a little pale,” Payden says from the backseat. And we have a wingman. Payden isn’t coming in with us, but she insisted on waiting in the truck, reminding us she can shoot if she has to. “I have mints, and a hipflask.”
“I need to keep my wits about me,” I tell them. “And I’m fine, this is just, you know,a lot.”
“If you’ve changed your mind, one of the other girls can—-” Luna starts, but I cut her off.
“No. I have to do this. Iwantto do it. It just makes me sick what the police unearthed from that freaking house,” I say. “Plus, it’ll make this Forest guy even more suspicious. Sawyer said Barry has been talking to him on the phone, keeping the guise going that he’s hiding out after the raid following the gas leak. It’s not gonna hold forever, but Forest and Regi are greedy, they still want this to happen so they can get the fuck outta dodge.”
There were children as young as twelve. What in the hell is the matter with these people?
So far, there have been no arrests because we have Barry tied up at the warehouse, and Willow has some men she’s interrogating. You’d think this operation would lie low, but no, Forest isn’t one to give up just because half of hisstockwas just discovered by the police. It never stops them. I half wonder if they believe there really was a gas leak.
“I don’t see why we can’t just put a grenade under the damn dry cleaners with all of them inside it — making sure all innocent parties have vacated the neighboring properties, of course,” Payden says. “Seems like a good plan to me.”
“In theory it is,” Luna agrees. “But remember this Regi guy can’t be located, which is why we’re going after Forest.”
It does feel a little bad ass, I have to say.