Wild Like the Wind (Chaos #5)(110)

“You’re very wise, Shepherd Ironside,” I whispered.

“I’m a man who wears the same patch Black earned and if it was me under dirt and those boys had my blood in their veins, that’s what I’d want, Keekee. When you let go of me, I’d want to be alone with you. And when you gave me to our boys, I’d want it to be about them.”

God, I loved it that he understood.

God, God, I loved it that he understood everything.

I stared into his eyes and felt the first tear fall, gliding a cold trail of wet along my cheek.

Hound didn’t try to catch it.

Or the one that came after it.

Or the one that came after that.

Or any of the others that silently followed.

He stood with me in my garage next to my dead husband’s bike that had been sitting in the exact spot he’d put it in nearly eighteen years ago and watched me as he held me while I shed more sorrowful tears for the brother he loved, tears that mingled painfully with joyous ones for finding the brother Hound was who I loved.

Only when I sniffed did he move his hands to the sides of my head and swipe his thumbs over both my cheeks.

“You need me to go?” he asked gently.

God, God, I so totally loved it that he understood everything.

I nodded and said nothing.

“You text when you want me back.”

It wasn’t an order.

It was a request.

So I nodded again.

Hound then moved in, pressing his lips to my forehead, holding my face in both hands.

I closed my eyes and he kept his lips there for what seemed like days, weeks, years before he pulled away, I felt the pads of his fingers dig in, and then he walked away.

I opened my eyes and stared at the Chaos patch on the back of his cut.

I kept staring at it, seeing it in my mind’s eye even after he closed the back door to the garage behind him.

In that moment, I didn’t have to think about it, dream something up.

In that moment, I just knew.

So, in that moment, I followed Hound’s steps, steps I’d taken time and again over the years, steps my sons had taken, steps their father had taken, steps Hound would take, and I walked to my house to get everything ready.



It was melodramatic.

I didn’t care.

It was totally over the top.

I didn’t care about that either.

It was cold as shit in my garage.

I didn’t even feel it.

I sat in my spandex pants with the crisscross laces that showed skin all the way up the sides of my legs, the tank I’d dug down deep in a drawer to find that was cut way low and laced together loosely at the tits, high-heeled black boots with a lot of buckles on them that I hadn’t worn in years, my purple bandana wrapped around my crown, tied in the back, my hair flowing out from under it.

I also wore Black’s cut.

I was vamped out, lots of makeup around my eyes, on my cheeks, tons of red lipstick.

All around Black’s bike was a circle of candles I’d lit, the only illumination to the space.

I had a bottle in my hand, primo tequila, the good shit, and around its neck was a ring of red from my lips.

I was astride Black’s bike.

“We didn’t have a lot of time,” I said to the tank. “But the time we had, we tore it up, baby.”

I bent over, pressed my red lips to that tank and did it hard.

Then I dismounted. I found the top, capped the bottle of tequila and set it aside. I took off the cut and folded it, arms in, Chaos patch up, and set it on the saddle. I reached into the pocket and pulled out the red bandana I’d stuffed there, wound it in a cord, tied it at the ends and set it on top of the cut.

I took off my own bandana and did the cord thing, but I tied that to a grip on the bike.

I’d already put the keys in the ignition.

I blew out the candles and kicked them to the back of the garage, getting wax all over my boots and all over the floor of the garage.

But I didn’t care.

I then grabbed the bottle of tequila and walked outside, then into the house, up the stairs, right to my bed where I had clothes spread out.

I took off my tank.

I took off my boots.

I took off my spandex pants.

I folded them all carefully and shoved the clothes with the boots in a bag of stuff ready for taking to Goodwill, the bag of stuff I’d dug through all my things while I was preparing for the ceremony and filled full with the Chaos Keely of yesteryear.

I went to the bathroom and cleaned off my makeup, scrubbed away my lipstick.

I walked back into the bedroom and put on my ripped, faded jeans.

I put on my socks.

I put on my cowboy boots.

And I tugged on my long-sleeved tee with a different ragged slit down the front that didn’t go very far or gape so wide it needed laces.

I pulled my long hair out of the back and then lifted it up to put on my choker.

I slid in some earrings.

I put on my blanket coat.

Then I grabbed the bottle of tequila, my purse, went out, nabbed one of the candles and got in my car.

I drove to the cemetery.

In the dark, I walked the oft-traveled path to Black’s grave.

I set the candle on the base of his gravestone and lit it.

I set the bottle of tequila next to it.

And I looked down at my man.