CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT Lake Mary

Rebel—

The next morning, we check out and have breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Kyle, Rafe, and Sutton join us. I study the three of them. Sutton cuddles up to Rafe, and the two show all the signs of new love… or at least lust.

Kyle sits across the table, doing his best to ignore the two, but every now and then, I catch his eyes straying.

After breakfast, Rafe leaves to give her a ride back to her car, and the three of us linger over a last cup of coffee. The view of the ocean out the floor-to-ceiling windows is breathtaking.

“I can’t get over how beautiful it is here,” I murmur.

Brayden laces his fingers with mine, leaning in his chair. “We’ll have to take a ride down the coast sometime.”

My face lights up. “Oh, I’d love that.”

“You should take her to see the redwoods, too. They’re really something,” Kyle suggests.

“Yes! I want to see all the things.”

“You could live here a lifetime and not see all the things, babe,” Brayden replies.

I cuddle against him and kiss his cheek. “A lifetime sounds nice.”

After a while, we hear the rumble of Rafe’s motorcycle returning and stand to leave. Brayden pays the check, and we walk out to the bikes.

“You get a number, Romeo?” Brayden asks Rafe.

“You know it,” Rafe replies, grinning.

“Of course, he did. He’s a man-whore,” Kyle gets the dig in.

“I can’t help it if all the women love me,” Rafe replies.

“Let’s go before his head gets so big his bike tips over.” Kyle rolls his eyes and moves to give me a hug. “It was great seeing you again, Rebel.”

“I’m glad you guys dragged us out. I had a wonderful time.”

“Let’s go home,” Brayden says, and we all mount up and head out.

When we reach San José, the guys split off with a wave, and Brayden heads toward his trailer. Once we’re inside, he grins and backs me to the kitchen counter, then lifts me onto it, pulls up my shirt, tugs down my bra, and takes one nipple into his hungry mouth.

I thread my fingers through his hair and drop my head back, relishing the erotic sensations. He moves from one to the other until they’re both engorged and red and sensitive to every drag of his teeth and lick of his tongue.

He lifts his head and kisses my mouth, then bumps my nose with his.

“With my father in Catalina, we’ve got a couple of days free. Feel like taking a trip up into the mountains? The club’s got a cabin on Lake Mary. I’d love to show it to you.”

“Will he care you’re using it?”

“He’ll never know. Come on, it’ll just be the two of us.”

“That sounds wonderful. It would be nice to be alone with you.”

“You’ll love the place. It’s beautiful up there.”

Excitement floods through me. Everything with him is new and thrilling. I wouldn’t care if we just went grocery shopping. It would be exciting, but this is so much better. “Then let’s go.”

He leads me into the bedroom, then pulls a duffel from the closet and tosses it on the bed. He throws in some clothes and toiletries. I haven’t even unpacked, so we just zip up my bag, and we’re ready to go.

This time we take his truck, and as much as I absolutely love riding on the back of his bike and clinging to his waist, it’s nice sitting beside him because we can talk.

And we do—all the way up there. We chat about everything. No topic is off limits.

He takes my hand and brings it to his mouth, kissing the back, and admits what I know is hard for him.

“I was lost without you, Rebel. I crawled in a hole and didn’t want to leave it. I was drinking more than I should have, and I didn’t care about anything. Not the club. Not my brothers. Nothing. Not even riding my bike gave me joy.”

“I’m so sorry. I felt the same way. I didn’t want to get up in the morning and face another day without you. Another day with nothing to look forward to, because you wouldn’t be in it. I just didn’t care anymore.”

He squeezes my hand. “But now you’re here, and I feel like I’ve crawled out of a fog, and everything is sunny and bright again.”

I lean toward him, but there’s only so close I can get with the console between us. “I wish this was an old truck with a bench seat, so I could scoot next to you.”

He grins. “They don’t make ‘em like that anymore, sweetheart.”

“Crushing the hearts of lovers everywhere,” I add.

He chuckles and brings my hand to his mouth again for another kiss. “We’ll just have to settle for holding hands. Draws out the anticipation. That’s one point in its favor.”

I waggle my brows. “Anticipation is good.”

As we climb higher into the mountains, the scenery grows more beautiful. I power my window down and breathe in the fresh air. It smells like pine trees and flowers.

When we finally arrive, I’m in awe of the crystal blue lake as still as glass, looking majestic with the reflection of the tall trees on its surface.

The cabin is close to the water, with the most amazing view I could imagine. It’s so much more than I expected.

“Oh, Brayden. It’s lovely.”

We climb out, and he shows me around the cabin. We don’t make it far before we’re trying out the big bed.

As night falls, a big full moon cuts a trail of shimmering gold across the lake, and the sky is full of more stars than I’ve ever seen. It’s like diamond studded velvet.

This afternoon the temperature was in the upper seventies, but now, at this elevation, it’s dipped into the forties. I stand on the porch, wrapped in an Afghan, listening to the night sounds. “It’s peaceful here.”

Brayden comes up behind me. “It is. I’ve always loved it at the cabin.”

I lean against him, and his arms wrap around me. “Wouldn’t it be nice if we could just stay up here and leave the rest of the world behind?” I muse.

He kisses my temple. “That would be nice. Though, you’d probably go stir crazy after a while.”

“Do you think there’s any good fish in that lake?”

“I’m sure there are.”

“You could fish, and we could live off the land,” I say, dreamily.

His body shakes with laughter. “Honey, I’m not much of a fisherman. Sorry to disappoint you.”

“That’s okay. You could hunt deer, then.”

He chuckles again. “You want me to kill Bambi?”

“I suppose not.”

“This is a nice place to visit, but I don’t think you’d want to live up here.”

I shrug. “I don’t know. It’s pretty awesome. And I think if you build me a fire, I’ll be hooked for good.”

He kisses my neck and nuzzles my ear. “What are your dreams, Rebel? For real.”

I think about his question for a long moment, staring at the water. “I thought I had it. If you’d have asked me before I met you, I would have said I already had everything I could want. I suppose I would have been kidding myself, though. In the back of my mind, I’ve always wanted children, a family of my own… But that was always in the abstract, you know?”

“Yeah, I think I do. So, now what’s your dream? Is it still doing car repairs?”

“It’s what I’m good at. It’s what I enjoy. But you’ve shown me there’s a whole world out there to explore. I think now I’d like to travel. It never really crossed my mind before, but I like seeing new places.”

“You think you could be happy here?”

“I’ll be happy wherever you are. As long as we’re together, that’s all that matters.”

“What about your family?”

That gives me pause.

“It’s not like you haven’t thought about it. You must have,” he prods.

“I have, and I would miss them. We’re a close family. Always have been. And it’s not just my family. It’s everyone. My grandfather… Undertaker, and Blood, who’s always been like an uncle to me. Ghost and Jessie, Hammer and Tink. All the kids in the club I’ve grown up with. I’ll miss them all.”

“That’s a lot to give up.” He rubs my arms, pulling back a few inches. I feel his concern and turn in his arms.

“What is it, Brayden?”

“I don’t think your father is going to just let you go. Do you?”

“I’m an adult. He can’t stop me.”

His sudden laughter is sobering. “Rebel, it’s like you don’t know biker presidents at all. He’ll do whatever he has to do. And in this club, I’m ruled by men like our fathers who outrank me. If they lay down the law, there’s nothing I can do but—”

“But what?”

“But give it up.”

“I don’t want you to do that.” My anger flares.

“So maybe I go to Birmingham,” he whispers, and I frown.

“What do you mean? Your chapter is here.”

“What if I switched chapters?”

“You’d do that for me? Leave all your brothers?”

“I’m not saying it’d be easy, but there’d be one advantage—besides you, of course.”

“What’s that?”

His gaze moves over my shoulder to the distant water. “I wouldn’t be in competition with my brother anymore. I wouldn’t be second to TJ in everything.”

I study the tightness of his face as he looks out at the lake. It’s obvious this has eaten at him for a long time. “But Brayden…”

His eyes drop to mine, and I’m not even sure what I was going to say.

“I mean it, Rebel. It could be our only way forward, unless I give up my patch.”

“But you wouldn’t have your father looking out for you. You’d be on your own, barely knowing anyone in the club. Here you have your father, your brother, all your friends.” I back away from him. “No, I don’t want that for you.”

“It may not be up to you this time, Rebel.”

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“It means if you don’t want me to walk away from the club, then this is a decision you’ve got to let me make. You’ve got to trust me and in whatever I decide. Can you do that?”

I give him a small, sad smile. “I just want us to be together, and I want you to be happy. If you’re not happy, how can I be?”

“You don’t think I feel the same? You don’t think all I think about is your happiness? How are you going to be happy so far from your family? You’re close with them, with your mother. It’s different for girls, even I know that. Family is everything. Last thing I want to do is take you away from yours.”

“We don’t have to decide this now, do we?” I feel like my heart is breaking. No matter what choice we make, it’ll affect one of us drastically.

“No. We don’t have to decide anything now.”

“Why can’t this be easy?” I whisper, leaning against him.

“Loving you is the easy part. The rest we’ll figure out.” He wraps his arm around my shoulder. “Come on. It’s getting chilly. I’ll build you that fire.”