And there it is.

Is she only a fuck buddy and toy to him?

I can deal with a simple fuck buddy, but if he is closer to her than that, it will eat me up inside. I don’t mind sharing his affection with whores.

“We’ve also been good friends for years as well.”

And the jealousy monster rears its ugly head. I excuse myself from her as quick as I can, rattle off the number to Berry as I pass the kitchen, and flee upstairs.

I am the convenient friend, the one replacing the bitch downstairs because I live here. My stomach ties itself in knots as I land face first into my mattress. The only person who truly knows about my past and knows more details than I have told anyone else is a fraud of a friend. A friend I love and who apparently conveniently loves me.

This will be the worst lockdown.

***

Winter

Staring into the eyes of a woman who has fucked my husband on multiple occasions isn’t fun. At first, I wanted to strangle her. She is lucky as fuck I cannot get out of this bed and cause her bodily harm. The club is about to become overrun, and I am stuck in this bed and away from it all. But even though I want to be down there and to be helping, I have to think about Braxx and my child.

“So, we gonna be cool?” she asks, pulling me from my thoughts.

“You plannin’ on tryin’ to seduce my husband while you’re here,” I question.

She crosses her arms as my husband walks in. “I don’t try to fuck married men. I don’t have many morals, but that is one that I pride myself in.”

Yeah, we will see, you slutty cunt.

“Everything okay in here,” he asks.

“Am I stressed, yes, but not about this.” I point to Dizzy. “I hope she stays true to her word. I’m stressed about not bein’ able to help, and it gets lonely as hell up here.” I tell him the truth.

“Hell, I can have the ladies take shifts visitin’ ya so that you can get to know everyone, if ya want,” Dizzy offers.

For the first time, I actually enjoy the words that come from her mouth. “I’d like that.”

She uncrosses her arms and ignores my husband as she leaves the room. I think she might actually try to get me to like her.

“You won’t have a short amount of company at least,” he tries to joke and I can see the stress rolling around on his shoulders.

“It’ll be okay, babe. We’ll get through this shit. We always do. Maybe not unscathed, but we do get out of it.”

He sits down next to me on the bed. “Angel, any other time I would be itching for somethin’ to happen, but when you’re pregnant and on bed rest…”

I scoot further onto the bed and pat for him to lie down next to me.

“How about I let you tell everyone the sex of the baby,” I offer.

Braxxon lies down next to me and runs his fingers through my hair. “Naw, that’s somethin’ we should do together.”

“I’ll tell the women, you can tell the men,” I say, sighing.

He chuckles. “No, how about I carry you downstairs for dinner and fix you up a nice spot on the sofa and we can announce it together?”

Get out of this bed? “Yes!” I shout, and he gives me a frown to warn me to be careful.

I cup his cheek with one hand and use my thumb to rub his double lip piercing back and forth. “Can you give me a bath though? I don’t want to sit up here all day in my filth, and then eat dinner smellin’ awful around strangers.”

“Yeah,” he answers as he sits back up. “Come here, Angel.”

He picks me up and walks me to our bathroom, to love me as my husband, and not a stressed out biker. I love my man.

***

Somewhere across the lands

Tatiana

I say I love you to my dad and hang up the phone. I peer over at Shadow who is texting crazily on his phone. “You’re not gonna believe this shit.”

Shadow breaks from his phone and gives me his attention. “What?”

“My dad and Storm are headin’ back to Nevada early because the club is on lockdown, and you’re to keep me far from the action that is about to take place.”

He does not let me say another word before he is dialing a number on his phone.

“What the fuck is going on?” he screams into the phone. None of the brothers approves of being left in the dark, and us being gone is leaving Shadow in the dark. “You’re not fuckin’ with me?”

If they want me to stay gone and not be around, it is bad. My dad never wants me away from the MC when the shit hits the fan.

“No brother, we got here a few hours ago,” he says to whomever he is talking. “Fuck, dude, it takes time to drive across the country, and you think I was gonna let your niece drive? Fuck no. We stopped so I could sleep at night.”

“I want updates on this shit. I hate I’m not there.”

Great. He’s going to be a real asshole on this trip. I understand we aren’t away on vacation, and we are here to help his friend, but hell if he isn’t going to be extra douchey while we are here.

A knock sounds at our hotel door, and Shadow groans into the line. “Danick’s here, man. I gotta go. Keep in touch.”

Shadow tosses his phone on the dresser and strolls over to answer the door. When it opens, I am transferred from real life into fiction because there is no way in hell he is real. I gulp loudly enough for Shadow to hear, and he laughs. Glad he thinks it is funny.

When Danick comes in and Shadow slams the door shut, they enter into a bro hug.