Spawn

The more time I spent with Kimera, the more time I wanted. She might make me want to growl and order her about, but if she’d been a woman who never said a word back or didn’t have a mind of her own, I wouldn’t want her. Meek and mild wasn’t what I fancied.

After washing up after dinner and Lash’s examination of Troian’s incisions, I thought we’d just kick back, maybe watch some television, or maybe I’d get lucky and convince Kimera to take a walk with me. Something I hadn’t tried to do yet. Only that wasn’t what happened. Instead, a challenge was issued by her, and it called our manhood into question. What kind of men would it make us if we didn’t step up to take the challenge? Piss poor ones, that was what.

Now, having her refer to herself and Troian as superwomen didn’t offend or challenge us. We had no problem agreeing with her statement. It was being called mere mortal men and told God chose women to have the babies since we were too weak to do it. That we objected to. I had no choice but to defend our manly honor.

“Now, don’t disparage the strength of us men, especially your future husbands. I’ll have you know, I’m tough, and I could have the babies if I was able to.”

I knew it was too much to hope she’d take it back, but she laughed and added more. She seemed to think that if I puked once or had an ache, it would kill me, or I’d lie around the whole pregnancy and for years afterward lamenting about it and would never have another kid. While I agreed there were some men like that, they weren’t bikers. We were a hearty breed apart.

Lash tried to get his woman to tell mine that he could do it, but she teased him that she didn’t want to hurt his delicate man feelings. Those were fighting words and what formed our bet. Since we couldn’t actually have a baby to prove it, we’d have to inflict pain another way. For us, that was a fighting match.

I had no problem participating in one or more. I knew our other brothers would want in on it, too, for no other reason than it had been a while, and they loved any reason to fight. However, no good fight was complete without a reward for winning. Lash brought it up, and I agreed.

“Oh really, and what pray tell is a suitable reward in your book?” Troian asked.

Since it was his woman asking, he answered. “You let me do anything I want in the bedroom for one night. I promise I won’t hurt you. All you have to do is relax and go with it. I’ll make you scream harder and longer than you ever have.”

Instantly, I knew I wanted the same from Kimera. When she rolled her eyes at me when Troian didn’t object to Lash’s statement and asked me what mine was, I told her, “Well, Hotcake, I think Lash has the perfect idea. So the same. I hope you don’t have to use your voice for a while afterward, say a few days, because you won’t have one when I get done with you,” I said with a big smile.

I was pleased to see I stunned her, but she recovered quickly and couldn’t leave it alone. She accused me of talking big, and it would be more than just her and Troi who would judge us. She wanted the other old ladies and Annie to help them do it. I wanted to snort at her assertion they would be unbiased judges. I told them that wasn’t unbiased, but when Troian asked if we wanted to call off the bet, there was no way in hell I’d do it. Lash was of the same mind.

That’s when the idea of adding money to the bet was voiced and agreed upon. I told them to give us a few days to get the fight night set up with the other guys and taunted them that they couldn’t back out if they were scared.

It was with reluctance that I said I had to leave not long afterward. I wanted to stay and keep sparring with her, but I had some work I had to get done tonight. Kimera couldn’t let that last opportunity for the night to razz me go. She grinned at me as she piped up with, “Goodnight, Studcake. I know why you’re really leaving. You have to start intensely working out for the fight, but it’s no use. You’ll still lose, so save the sweat.”

“You won’t know what hit you, babe. Dream of me winning tonight,” I told her as I made my way to the door, flexing as I went.

I decided to go to my house rather than the room I had at the clubhouse. I still stayed at the clubhouse, but not often. Usually, that only occurred if I was working on something and fell asleep. I’d lived most of the first several years happily in the clubhouse. We all had, well, except for Reaper. He’d had a house since his younger sister, Harper, had lived with him. As time passed, a few more of the guys built houses and placed them inside the compound fence, like our friends, the Warriors, did. Even if we were single, we liked the idea of having the security of the fence, our brothers, and more. That was even more important now we’d begun to have families.

While I worked, I tried to see my house objectively. Was it a house Kimera could see herself living in and being happy? I thought it was a great one, but if she didn’t, then I’d be willing to have another one built. This one could be bought by one of my brothers. I’d always secretly wanted a family, even if I believed it wasn’t a guarantee I’d have one. With this goal in mind, I didn’t build a small one or two-bedroom house. Mine had four big bedrooms. Although if she wanted those six kids she spoke of, we’d have to either add on or they’d have to share.

Growing up, it had been me until I was ten years old, and my baby sister, Alecia, was born. We never shared a room, and I took on the role of being her protector from the moment she came home. We were still close, even though she lived in Montana, where our parents still lived. I hated that I only saw them a few times a year, along with her four-year-old son, Tommie.

She’d married her high school sweetheart. I didn’t know him well since I was all the way in Virginia and part of the Punishers, but the times I’d met him, I’d never taken to him. There was something unsettled or flighty about him. I tried to talk her out of marrying him right out of high school, but she was determined. They got married a month after graduation, and two years later, she gave birth to Tommie.

It wasn’t long after she had their son—Tommie was six months old—that her husband, Bryan, came home one day and told her that he didn’t love her anymore and he wanted a divorce. She’d been devastated, and no matter how many times she had asked him why, he wouldn’t explain himself. Rather than beg him to stay with them, she walked out and granted him a divorce.

Bryan didn’t waste time moving away to Utah. I think he thought it would keep him from having his ass beaten by our dad. Hell, if it wasn’t due to Alecia’s pleas to let him be, for Tommie’s sake, I would’ve flown there to find him and laid his ass out. The bastard had next to nothing to do with his son, and Tommie didn’t understand why.

Hell, he wouldn’t even pay child support, though the court ordered him to do it. Each time she took him back to court to force him to do it, he’d mysteriously lose his job or have to quit due to his physical ailments, which he claimed prevented him from being able to work consistently. In truth, he was a goddamn lying piece of shit. He worked under the table and hid his money under his new wife’s name.

Luckily, he hadn’t had more children. So, doing what I did best, I made sure the bastard didn’t live the good life while not paying for his son. It seemed every time he stashed money away, made extra, or whatever, he’d end up being hacked or otherwise losing his cash. The bank couldn’t seem to figure out how or who was doing it. When he thought he’d smartened up and kept his money in the house, it was stolen. When he buried it, lo-and-behold, it disappeared too. I’d keep finding ways to make him miserable until my nephew turned eighteen, then I might let him off the hook. It wasn’t because he dared to divorce my sister that I did it. It was his refusal to help care for his son.

I’d been trying to convince her and Tommie to move to Virginia, but they wouldn’t do it as long as Dad and Mom were in Montana. I couldn’t blame her. My parents helped out a lot with my nephew. He adored their small property. It was the horses he loved. He was big enough now, though, that I was hoping to get her to bring him here to visit me rather than me going to see them. Mom and Dad had come a few times over the years, but never her or Tommie. Finding an old lady might be the way to get her to do it.

It was with these happy thoughts in mind that I finished up what I was working on and crawled into bed hours later. If all went well, we’d soon have Lash’s woman free of her disgusting excuse of a family, and I’d be free to spend the bulk of my time pursuing the woman of my dreams. I was determined to make Kimera mine.