Rough Ride (Chaos #5)(10)

“Tack, let me,” she whispered.

He studied her.

Then he backed off.

She came closer to me and the brunette approached with her.

Mom got closer to my side.

When she did, that was when I wanted to cry.

We’d lost Dad three years ago and I, honest to God, to that day, did not know how either of us had survived it.

But I knew there’d come a time, and I prayed it would be far in the future, when I’d face a world without my mother in it and I didn’t know how I’d manage it.

“Hey, Rosalie,” Tyra greeted like she’d just walked in.

“Tyra,” I replied.

She tipped her head toward the brunette. “You remember Lanie?”

Right, yes, I remembered then. Her name was Lanie and she was Tyra’s best friend, now Hop’s old lady.

I checked out the other woman and noted again she was incredibly beautiful and had my body structure, with more length and less breast tissue.

“Yeah, I saw you around the Compound,” I said, then gave her a “Hey.”

“Hi, Rosalie,” she responded on a small smile. “Nice to officially meet you.”

I nodded and gestured to my side. “Did you guys meet my mom?”

“Yes,” Tyra answered. “We introduced ourselves when we came in.”

“Great,” I said, not meaning it, and that sounded in the word.

“I think I need to explain something to you,” she declared.

“I’m not sure you do,” I retorted.

Mom got closer and linked her pinkie with mine.

I held on tight.

Tyra kept talking like I hadn’t.

“They’re feeling this.”

Damn it.

Now I was getting mad.

“They are?” I asked sarcastically.

“They made you a promise and they didn’t keep it,” she pointed out.

“I made my own decisions and I knew the consequences,” I returned.

She kept on her bent.

“They are not men who don’t keep promises.”

I shut up in order to let her finish so this could be done.

“They need to keep that promise now, Rosalie. They need to look out for you,” she shared.

“And what if I don’t want them to look out for me?” I asked.

She gave me an amused smile, a short shake of her head, and replied, “That doesn’t factor.”

I stared at her. “That’s crazy.”

She then gave a slight shrug. “That’s Chaos.”

Okay, I was fed up with this.

“Listen, the police are involved,” I informed her, though I knew she knew. “I’m done with Throttle. Throttle is way done with me. They meted out their brand of justice. I contacted the authorities to mete out mine. I don’t know if there’s anything more to play out but that doesn’t matter for you guys. Chaos has no part in this anymore. When Throttle took me to his brothers, it became about him and them and me.”

“There is no you,” Tyra told me.

That ticked me off.

“Of course there’s a me,” I snapped.

“Not when you belong to Chaos,” she volleyed.

I heard Mom take in a breath.

“I don’t belong to Chaos,” I returned.

“Honey,” she said softly, “even if the brothers, each and every one of them, didn’t claim you because of what you did for the Club and what you endured because they fell down in protecting you, which they do, you’re Snap’s.”

Oh no.

Not on your life.

I started to say something but she lifted her hand and kept going.

“I’m so sorry. This is a lot. So much is happening to you, Rosalie, and I hate that for you. But you can lie to me. You can lie all you want. Just never lie to yourself. You know where that stands better than I do. A brother claims a woman, she’s owned by the Club, and when it’s Chaos, that’s a good thing. Trust me.”

“I am currently, and for the foreseeable future, not property of any member of the male species,” I declared, then, for good measure, decided to add, “Especially not a biker.”

“I’ll leave that part up to Snap,” she muttered.

“Okay, Tyra, listen—” I started angrily.

“Rosalie,” she whispered. “Please, I’m begging you, let us take care of you. We need to take care of you.”

At the sincerity in her tone and the look in her eyes that shared she knew my pain in a lot of ways right then, I went still.

And when I went still, my mom’s pinkie released mine so she could curl all her fingers around all of mine.

“I can understand that right now, you don’t want us, but for us, you’re our family and you’re feeling pain and in a serious situation that was caused by our issues,” Tyra explained. “Think about that. Think about how you’d feel if the role was reversed, if you were me standing in front of a woman who had what happened to you happen to her. How would you feel? What would you need to do?”

“And how, precisely,” I began acidly, “did what happened to me become about you?”

“Because we need to atone and you’re you and you’re the kind of person with the kind of heart who’ll need to allow us to do it.”