MAURA

The beeping of the machinery in the hospital and the swish, swish noise of the nurses’ shoes on the tiled floors were slowly driving me mad as well as making me grateful.

Mad because of the constant noise when all I wanted was a little peace and quiet.

Grateful because I was still here to hear the noise. He hadn’t managed to kill me this time. He’d scared me but not killed me. I’d take what I could get. It was time, though. Time for us to take him down. I was going to be in the hospital for weeks, he wouldn’t be able to get to me while I was in here. That meant I could put everything in motion to bring him down. The thought of what he’d been doing for years, slowly getting more and more depraved as time went on, thinking he was without the bounds of the law. It would take time, but I’d get it done. I’d slowly topple his dirty little empire and do it laughing.

He was so arrogant that he didn’t think that the woman he abused and sold would ever turn on him. Little did he know that Bev and I were made of steel, and our wills were of iron. Between the two of us, we’d bring him down.

It took time, a bit longer than I’d have liked, and I was wondering if we’d ever get it done when he pissed off the wrong motorcycle club. Inadvertently, it was one that I had a vested interest in. We’d all worked hard to gather all the strings and bring him down. His downfall had been a fourteen-year-old boy that he should never have touched, but as arrogant as he was, he thought he was above punishment until he wasn’t.

Once it was all done and the dust had settled, I called my son, Cash, to come home and help me disband the company, the houses and set everything straight.

Then through Bev, I reached out to the MC. I wanted to see my grandson. The one that Cash and I’d hidden from the evil that was my husband and Cash’s father. What Cash and I’d done was despicable, leaving a young girl alone and pregnant like we had, but I’d rather that than have my grandchild or her subjected to our family in all its depravity. I would understand if they wanted nothing to do with us, but I’d still like to see him. Just once. My grandson was lucky he'd had a mother who was far stronger than me.

If it was the last thing I did, I was going to make everything as right as I could for their family. I greased a lot of palms and threatened as many people as I had to. All to ensure that their family was whole. Given half the chance, I’d welcome all four of their children into my life. I hoped they’d give me the chance.

I’d been so thankful that they did. Reaper was a good man and Abby, she was exactly as I’d thought she’d be. I didn’t deserve her graciousness, but I’d work hard at keeping it.

The surprise for me was that my attention was grabbed and held by the large, rough looking man standing near the back next to a beautiful redheaded woman with the saddest green eyes I’d ever seen. Theo Wright, single and had not been in a relationship since the late seventies and his daughter, Bellona Wright, also known as Noni, divorced with her ex-husband doing time for running arms.

Of course, I knew who they were; we’d had background checks done on them all. I wanted to ensure that the children I was placing with them would be safe.

There had been tentative agreements to keep in contact made the day they’d agreed to meet with us. Cash and I’d left the UK to go to the US, where he now lived with his wife and three children. I was taking time to rebuild relationships not only with my son but also with his children.

Surprisingly, it had been Abby who first contacted me. Over the next few months, she slowly helped me to build a relationship with my grandson Sam.

I’d been out of the UK about three months when I received the first text.

I’d not recognised the number except that it was a UK telephone number. But I’d laughed when I’d read the message with a reference to a comment he’d made to lighten the atmosphere when we’d turned up to meet everyone out of the blue.

Unknown number – It’s the Bad and the Ugly. Wondering how the Good is doing?

Me – I wouldn’t say Ugly, and you may have been Bad at some point but not in recent years. I’m doing good, thanks for asking.

Changing his name in my phone to the Bad & Ugly, I wondered where he’d got my number.

Me – Out of curiosity, who’d you get my number from?

Bad & Ugly – From Bev, but she made me work for it. I almost had to promise her my first-born grandchild.

Throwing my head back, I laughed, glad that I was sitting by myself in the little granny flat at the back of Lizzie and Cash’s house. If I knew my friend, she would definitely have made him work for it.

Still smiling, I typed back.

Me – Good, nothing comes easy in this life. Makes me feel better that you had to work for it.

Bad & Ugly – Babe, I have a feeling for you that I won’t mind working hard for it.

Bright pink spread across my cheeks at his comment. It had been a long time since somebody had flirted with me. Since the car accident, most people hardly looked at me with my face being so disfigured. I mean, it looked better than it had, but I still had a long scar from the corner of my left eye all the way down the side of my face until it disappeared below my jaw towards my neck. After everything I’d been through, I wore it like a badge of honour. I wasn’t self-conscious about it, I’d reached the stage in my life where I didn’t give a shit what people thought. I’d survived, and that’s all that mattered.

Me – Smooth talker.

Bad & Ugly – That’s the thing, I’ve never been smooth in my life, but with you, I’d like to try.

Over the next months, we built our relationship on text messages and phone calls. I’d found that while Theo was rough around the edges and sometimes a bit uncouth, under all that roughness, was a man with a heart of gold who loved his family and would do anything for them. That’s all I cared about.

I’d had the smooth, pretty man, and he’d turned out to be nothing but ugly and rotten.

This time round, I’d like to try the rough man and see where it went. I had a feeling I was going to be surprised by him.