“No, not that, stupid, the woman, you gone soft. Never thought I would see my big bro soft over a woman, you’ve been so hard for years.” He grinned at me, hitting my shoulder good-naturedly.
I knew what he meant. I rarely let a woman near me touch me, I haven’t given them a reason to think I’m interested; if the plonk is on my lap, I throw them off. Not interested. But Maxine was different; she made me feel, and that was new to me, and I wanted to investigate it.
“Talking about gone soft, what’s this I heard you sharing gossip?” I probed back, giving him a look that said I wasn’t the only one changing.
“You know how I feel about that scrag, and if I had my way, we would never have her around. She’s toxic, makes the rest look like angels. When I heard her latest, I knew she was jealous and trying to get rid of her. Before she even went into the club, she didn’t know that Max had been part of us for years. But thought I’d share it with the Prez, just in case there was some small truth in her spiteful comment.” He would have beaten the woman black and blue if we treated women like that, but both my brother Zero and I have never hit a woman, and don’t plan on doing that any time soon. Throwing them off your lap and causing them to fall was different from physically raising a fist.
“You and me both, I just left the Prez, telling him the same, get rid of her, before she claims someone was going to be a daddy, I wouldn’t put it past her to do it.” Zero cringed at the idea but nodded in agreement. Some of these girls will try anything to be given a cut. Still, they never will; they might not remember all the rules. Still, one of those rules was that if a recognised unclaimed woman announced a baby, the baby would be DNA’d to find out who the dad was, then claim the child as club property; plenty of claimed women about that would care for the child, till it was old enough to become inducted in. Don’t know how other clubs handle that, but we don’t accept having to claim a scrag just because she got knocked up.
“You bringing Max in?” He asked as we walked towards the kitchen. I liked that he gave her a shortened name; I have been thinking along those lines, too.
“Yeah, Prez ordered me to bring her in. I am hoping she will accept it and not give me too much grief.” We entered the kitchen and grabbed a coffee, waiting for Max to return. I had seen her go down the hall to the Prez’s office. Knowing her, she will want a coffee after she catches up with him. My bladder tells me I am not waiting, and I head to the can, returning to find Max drinking coffee.
Zero and some of the lads came with us, moved her gear. One of the guys had asked if he could live there; he got a woman now and was ready to find a place for them. Most people lived away from the clubhouse. Prez agreed even before Max knew she was moving out.
On the way back, Max spoke from her heart; it almost melted mine, as she was close to tears at all the changes in such a short time.
“You know the guys love the artwork on your bike, can’t blame them for wanting such a good job on theirs,” I counted her argument.
“Sure, I get it, but I don’t want to spend all my time painting. How about I do one bike, take a break to do some work on a wreck, you know I got to let the paint dry between coats, I can work on the bikes, while the paint dries.” She counted, desperate to keep doing what she loved most: bringing wrecks back to life.
“Perfect, we can use that as a baseline, and go from there. We got this, I got your back.” I would fight to make sure she was happy. This was new to me, and I found I liked this small change in me.
Maxine POV
Tank and the guys helped bring up my stuff, and Tank helped me put it all away. Just as he promised, one corner was set up with a desk, where I placed my laptop and printer, making that corner my office, which was until Tank could get a corner in the shed sorted for me, I asked that it would be lockable, has good lighting, and power, I am interested to seeing what he can figure out for me.
“Put your mat there, so that’s your side of the bed.” Placing the mat there made me all tingly inside, like I’d made a claim, too.
We stood together and surveyed the room with keen eyes.
“That works.” Tank wrapped his arms around my waist from behind and rested his chin on myhead.
“Yeah, I like it. Thanks.” I didn’t explain what I liked about it, and he didn’t push; he grunted acceptance of my approval, and that was enough.
“Come, let’s work on the shed, get that sorted once and for all.” He nudged me towards the doorway, and I let him take me to my new workplace.
The shed had plenty of natural light, which I liked most. It would make painting so much easier; the natural light and the open double doors would give good ventilation.
“This corner was where I thought you would like your office; the large window would be good when on the computer or doing a lot of paperwork. Don’t ya, think?” Tank was right; it was a nice corner. I noticed some power points that could be utilised, as well as plenty of space for shelving and storage cabinets.
“Can you get this secured, like a wall there to give me privacy, and lock the door at night? I trust the guys, but you have parties, the visitors might not be as trusting.” I argued that he should dispute the need to lock this room.
“I hear ya, will speak with the Prez, see if we got the materials on site.” He looked around the shed. They had cleared it all out; only my grandpa’s things were here, and a few of mine. I hadn’t expected they would give me a whole shed all to myself. I noticed they had also brought in a few bikes, which I assumed they wanted me to work on. One looks like the rider could not possibly have survived. Still, I am not about to ask those types of questions; that’s a hard story to tell, and I, for one, am not ready for more emotional stuff; I have enough going on in my head, in some ways, all these changes that were happening had helped keep my mind off all that I had lost. The vast family unit I had gained was how they made me feel, and they have said a few times that I was family.
I liked that feeling. One I hadn’t managed to capture with my blood relatives before, yet here it was, almost immediately, that they insisted I was family.
Sticks was lovely, I had known her before, when she came to the shops, and offered cakes she had cooked. I never really tried to get to know them. I had thought I would finish my apprenticeship, then find somewhere away from this town to get a job and live as far away from my family as possible, but I guess my real family, whom I’d been with all along, didn’t realize it yet.
We spent the next two hours, working through the shed, making it my workshop, setting up the wash bay, the lathe, everything retested after I moved some around, then where we first placed them, I opened up an area for the bikes that need little done, a service of something, a painting area, and the place was starting to look like how I had imagined my workshop would look like if I ever had one in the future.
“Food time.” Sticks arrived with a plate of sandwiches. I hadn’t thought about food, but now that it was here, my stomach growled to let me know it wanted filling.
“Thx Sticks,” Tank thanked her as he took the plate and grabbed my arm, leading me to the box to sit on, so we could eat. What I didn’t expect was that he placed the plate on the floor, sat, pulled me onto his lap, causing me to squeak in surprise, then picked it up again.
“Eat.” He commanded.
“Bossy much,” I grumbled as I obeyed and took a sandwich.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.