Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 76821 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76821 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
I still did that on occasion.
For nostalgia purposes.
But I’d started to appreciate a ride on a bike.
There was something just as comforting and familiar in the slightly cool metal of the handlebars and the space provided by the open sides.
There was no music, but the rumble of the bike had become something almost meditative for me.
It was a moonless night, the only light on the backroads coming from the stars and my headlights that illuminated just a few feet in front of me.
There was freedom in the way the wind whipped past me, chillier than the stagnant air, cooling me off even in the hottest part of summer.
As I leaned into the curves of the roadway, a little spike of adrenaline rushed through me, chasing away all those old thoughts and attitudes that had been clinging to me for days.
It wasn’t long before my shoulders felt looser.
But I kept going, wanting to chase just a little more peace before I went back to the clubhouse and whatever crazy the guys had going on over there.
I had to say I questioned Huck’s choice to move the club out of Miami where it had originated. That was where all the action was.
And, from experience, it was easier to blend into a crowd there if shit was going down than it was in the more rural area of Golden Glades he’d settled on.
He’d always insisted that the reason rural was an advantage over a city was that you always saw someone coming.
If there were a shitton of food and road traffic in front of your clubhouse, it was impossible to tell where a threat might be coming from.
And, when it came to going for a ride, yeah, it was definitely superior to live in the middle of nowhere.
I’d passed a total of three cars on the backroads before I finally decided it was probably smart to head back home. At least show my face for a couple of minutes at the party.
If there was one thing I’d learned after living at a clubhouse full of guys, it was that they would always find shit to rib you about. Like being old and boring and going to bed instead of having at least one drink at a raging house party.
Should it matter?
No.
I was a grown-ass man.
But sometimes it was just easier to give them fifteen minutes of your time to avoid a week of smartass comments.
It was something like living with a bunch of younger siblings in that way.
And since I’d had a pain in the ass younger brother growing up, I’d long ago learned how to handle this type of shit.
The only ones who got to avoid the parties completely were the guys who got shacked up and had kids.
But I didn’t see that shit happening for me. If it hadn’t happened yet, I doubted it would.
The thing was, I’d never been avoiding it, either. I hadn’t really been the manwhore that guys like Remy or Alaric have been. Sure, I liked the company of women. Who didn’t? But I’d always thought I’d find someone.
That someone just… never crossed my path.
And, it seemed, the window was starting to close. I mean, sure, men could technically have kids up until the day they kicked the bucket, but I figured not many women were going to want to start a family with a guy who might be in his mid-fifties—or later if kids didn’t happen right away—when the kid graduated high school.
I had the club kids to kinda fill that void, though. I hadn’t really expected that when I’d join up. How much of a family aspect there would be to the club. And not just the “brotherhood,” but the girls and the kids.
Holidays and birthdays and even just random cookouts were always wild and loud and bursting with energy and love.
It was nice.
My family had been small.
It wasn’t a bad thing. Just different. I hadn’t known what a big family could bring to my life until I had one through the club.
Women who checked in on me when I was sick. My brothers who had my back, no matter what. The kids to watch open Christmas presents, or toss a ball around with. Hell, even the animals that provided love and amusement.
Just the kind of shit that had been missing. Shit I would have continued to miss if I never got myself a woman or kids.
That was the kind of shit my mind was on when I was about halfway back to the clubhouse, driving through a backroad that maybe only had four houses total that I’d seen, all of them set back from the street, half-hidden by giant tulip trees and long-limbed oak trees draped in Spanish moss.
Quiet. Peaceful.
The kind of place I could see myself settling into one day. When the club life no longer suited me.