Chapter Six

Chapter Six

Meg

"Stay with him."

Jonas rolled his eyes. "I heard you the first five times you told me, Meg. I promise I will not let King out of my sight."

"I know you think I am crazy, but I don't want anything to happen to King."

Jonas lowered his voice. "Is something going on that you're not telling me? Did he have a bad checkup or something?"

"No, no. His last checkup was pretty damn good. The doctor calls him a walking miracle."

"Then why are you hounding me to stick to him like glue?" he demanded.

Jonas and I were standing by the coffee shop near the front desk, waiting for Lo and Lennox, who were getting coffee.

"Because Lo is worried."

Jonas stepped toward me. "About what?" he asked.

I looked around to make sure no one was eavesdropping. "That he's not as good as he once was. That people are going to think since the stroke he's not… enough."

"You fucking kidding me?" Jonas growled. Jonas looked around accusingly. "Who the hell said something like that? I'm going to beat the shit out of them."

I grabbed his arm to ground him. "No one said anything; it's just something Lo is afraid of. He was struggling with the buttons on his shirt last night. You know how he gets when something that he used to be able to do is hard for him now."

"He throws shit," Jonas smiled. "Gets real feisty."

"Do not let Lo hear you call him feisty," I whispered.

Jonas' eyes sparkled with mischief. "You think he'll throw something at me if I do?" he asked.

I held up two fingers and motioned from his eyes to mine. "I need you to focus right now, Jonas. Stick close to him, and if it seems like he's struggling, help him, okay?"

"Is he planning on buttoning his shirt in front of everybody?"

God freaking help me with this kid. He wasn't even a kid technically, but it still felt like I was raising him. "If Lo doesn't throw something at you, I might."

"I don't know why either of you is worrying about this. Who the hell cares if he can't button his shirt or screwing in some tiny fucking screw is hard for him. King is so much more than any of these people here know. He could literally sit on the couch watching reruns of Fast and Loud for the rest of his life, and I would never be half the man he is. He should be dead right now, Meg, and he's not. So if anyone thinks they can talk shit about him or think that he's not as good as he was before the stroke, they are going to have to answer to me. And then when I am done with them, they're going to have to deal with every member of the club coming here to beat the fuck out of them. You don't have to worry about Dad."

My heart flipped at him calling Lo dad. "You don't call him that much anymore." Lo and I had adopted Jonas when he was just a little boy and his parents had died in an accident. Turtle, his dad, will always hold a place in my heart.

Jonas shrugged. "Just because I don't call him dad doesn't mean he's not my dad anymore."

I reached up and patted his cheek. "You're a good man, Jonas."

"Only because of you and King."

I tipped my head to the side.

"Dad," Jonas sighed. "And you don't need to worry about him today. Go have fun with Alice and Nikki."

I shook my head. "I'm only going to hang out with them after your dad's seminar."

"You're going to sit through all of the boring meetings today?" he asked.

I wrinkled my nose. "I don't really want to, but…"

Jonas shook his head. "You're not coming to the meetings." He nodded over my shoulder.

I turned, expecting to see Lo and Lennox, but was surprised to see Alice, Wrecker, Nikki, and Pipe headed our way.

"Something tells me you are going to be hanging out with Alice and Nikki sooner than you thought," Jonas whispered.

"Hey," Nikki called.

"Babe," Lo called. "I need a pen. This one ain't working." He held up the pen while the woman behind the counter searched for another one.

"Oh, uh." I dug into my purse, pulled out a pen, and handed it to Jonas.

"You're kidding me," Jonas laughed. He held up the pen, but it wasn't a normal pen.

"That's a bird," Alice laughed.

"You have a bird pen in your purse?" Pipe asked.

I nodded to Jonas. "Give that to your dad."

Jonas shook his head and ran it over to Lo.

"You gotta be kidding me," Lo called.

"That's what happens when you borrow my pens all of the time and never give them back to me," I called. Lo was notorious for stealing my pens and never giving them back. I figured if the pens were something crazy that he couldn't steal, I wouldn't be constantly buying them.

"I'll just leave this here," he countered. He signed the receipt and handed it to the clerk.

"I bought twenty-four."

Nikki and Alice busted out in laughter, and Pipe shook his head.

"Don't get any ideas," Wrecker grumbled to Alice.

Alice held up her hands. "I just want one so I can pull that sucker out anytime I need a pen."

I fished around in my purse and pulled out two more bird pens. Purple and blue. "Here you go."

Nikki grabbed the blue one, and Alice snatched the purple one.

"Score," Nikki cheered.

"Do I want to know what else you have in your purse?" Alice asked.

I held up my finger and dug back into my purse. "I'm always forgetting shit, so I have these handy dandy little notebooks in my purse." I pulled out two and paged through them to make sure I hadn't written anything in them.

"Better write this down because I'm forgetful AF," Nikki read off.

"We were just coming over to see if you had the list of ingredients for the banana bread, but now it's like Christmas," Alice laughed.

Lo walked over with Lennox next to him.

"Where's my pen?" I asked.

Lo rolled his eyes and handed me my coffee. "I should have left it at the register, but the clerk insisted I didn't." He reached into his back pocket and handed it back to me. "You can have your crazy bird back."

I smiled and tucked it back into my purse. "Thank you."

Wrecker nodded to King. "You ready to get this day of meetings going?"

Lo shrugged. "I'm hoping they don't put me to sleep."

"I'd like to just skip to your pinstriping seminar this afternoon," Pipe called.

"Yeah, me, too," Lo agreed. "I much prefer to keep my hands busy than to just sit around listening to some guy drone on about water runoff or accounting for the future of body shops."

"Uh," Wrecker grunted. "I am for sure going to skip the accounting one. I leave that all to Alice."

"You got stuck with all of the office work, too?" I asked Alice.

Alice wrinkled her nose. "I mean, yeah, but Nikki and Karmen help me a lot. The math is sometimes not mathing for me."

Wrecker glanced at Alice. "Maybe we shouldn't tell people that our accounting is less than stellar."

Alice bumped her shoulder into him. "Easy, beardilocks. I don't think Meg and King are going to run around the hotel telling everyone the accounting at the garage sucks." Alice lowered her voice. "It only halfway sucks."

We all laughed, and I had to admit that Alice was a hoot.

"Why don't you guys come with us to the store while the guy's head to the morning meetings?" Nikki suggested. "We did a little Google before coming down and saw there is a Walmart a few miles away."

"Sounds good to me," Lennox replied. "I'd much rather wander around shopping than sit in some boring meeting."

"And," Alice drawled. "We noticed there is also an outlet mall right by the grocery store."

Lennox pressed a kiss to Jonas' cheek. "Check ya later, sexy. I'm shopping."

I glanced at Lo who had a genuine smile on his lip.

"Go," he laughed.

"Are you sure?" I really didn't want to leave Lo. I knew that Jonas would kick ass if anyone tried to make Lo feel bad, but I still wanted to be close to him.

Lo nodded. "Babe, go."

"I'll be back in time for your pinstriping seminar, okay?"

He leaned down and pressed a kiss to my lips. "I know you will be."

"Ready for my water to break at any time," I added. Lo shook his head and stepped back.

"What?" Alice laughed.

I waved at her. "I'll explain in the car."

"Behave," Wrecker grunted at Alice, his voice tinged with a hint of warning. "I don"t want a phone call asking for bail money."

Alice scoffed, her defiance evident in her tone. "Oh, please, Wrecker. When is the last time I did anything remotely bad that would get me arrested?"

Pipe chimed in with a smirk. "July fourth, three years ago. You girls bought some fireworks from some shady guy on the side of the road. You popped the trunk for us to get them out, a cop pulled up, and we found out you bought some freaking illegal ass fireworks. You bought illegal fireworks from an undercover cop," he emphasized, his words dripping with amusement. "Thankfully, the cops figured out you guys had no freaking clue what you were doing and just got a warning not to buy fireworks from the side of the road."

Alice rolled her eyes, dismissing Pipe with a wave of her hand. "He didn"t even pull out his handcuffs, Pipe. That does not qualify as getting arrested."

"Are you sure your name isn't Meg?" Lennox asked. "That sounds like something Meg and Cyn would do."

"We just break beds," I laughed.

Alice pointed at me. "Another thing you are going to have to tell me about in the car."

Something told me there were going to be a lot of stories we were going to be telling each other. "Only if you tell me more about your cows and how you came up with their names."

Alice pressed a kiss to Wrecker's lips. "Try not to fall asleep, beardilocks."

"You got money?" he asked.

Alice winked up at him. "I've got the credit card, baby."

"Hell," Wrecker grumbled.

"Have fun," Lo whispered to me.

"I'll be back by two," I promised.

"Yeah, yeah," he chuckled. "I'm with Wrecker. Make sure you don't get arrested."

"Yeah," Jonas laughed. "I'm the only one who does jail time in this family."

I wagged my finger at Jonas. "For the last time, joking about being in prison is never going to be funny."

Jonas shrugged and pressed a kiss to Lennox's cheek. "If it wouldn't have happened, I never would have met Lennox."

Lennox patted his cheek. "Love you."

It was Nikki's turn to say bye to Pipe; they were on a different level.

"Don't buy any more shit we have to haul home in the cooler," Pipe grumbled.

"I'm gonna put you in that cooler and haul you back home," Nikki threatened.

"Are they always like this?" I whispered to Alice.

Alice laughed. "Normally, no, but Pipe seems to have something up his butt."

"A freaking cooler," Nikki called. "He's got a cooler up his butt, but you don't see him complaining about having breakfast in the room and the freshly baked banana bread we're going to make." Nikki folded her arms over her chest. "Now tell me you love me, and give me the credit card."

Pipe begrudgingly pulled out his wallet and slapped a credit card in her hand. "I love ya, crazy ass."

"And I love you, grumpy." She reached up on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to his lips. "Try to pull that cooler out of your ass while I'm gone."

"Nikki," Alice laughed. "You were doing so good until that last part."

Nikki put her arm through Alice's. "Yeah, well, what can I say? I'm not perfect."

"Okay," Alice drawled. "You boys go do car stuff, and we're going to do a little shopping." Nikki and Alice headed to the front door, and Lennox and I fell in step behind them.

I glanced at Lo over my shoulder and blew him a kiss before we stepped into the revolving door.

"You think this is going to be crazy?" Lennox asked.

I glanced at Nikki and Alice and couldn't help but wonder if that was what Cyn and I looked like when we set out on an adventure. "I mean, aren't we always up for an adventure?" I asked Lennox.

"Well, whether we're up for one or not, I think we're walking right behind one."