Wild Wind: A Chaos Novella (Chaos #6.6)(87)

“Not sure I believe that, but okay,” he said.

Aw, that was sweet.

So sweet, Archie listed to the side and bumped her shoulder against his.

Hound grunted and raised his beer to his lips.

“She loved family,” she whispered when he put his beer back to the bar.

Hound again caught her gaze and his expression was no longer worried.

That was when he listed to the side and bumped her with his shoulder.

Archie took that as her invitation to lean into him…and just stay.

So she did.

Which was where she was five minutes later, shooting the breeze with Hound Ironside, when Jagger strolled in with Mal.

Mal’s attention went right to…well, everything. Suffice it to say, a biker hangout that looked like a seedy bar, and proud of it, was new and fascinating terrain for Mal.

Jagger’s attention came right to her with his dad.

And one could say, when he saw them together, his expression was no longer worried either.





It was later.

Days later.

Or, precisely, the morning after the night where she and Jag watched the documentary Blood, Guts and Brotherhood.

She went first to her mom just to say hi.

Then, as she usually did, she wandered the quiet space and stood in front of the black marble marker that had a weathered tequila bottle sitting at the base of it, a bottle that was mostly full.

And as she usually did, she wondered how that bottle hadn’t been nicked.

She then looked at the stone.

“Life is all kinds of fucked up,” she said quietly to Jagger’s father. “If you weren’t gone, I wouldn’t have him. And if she wasn’t gone, he wouldn’t have me.”

There was no sound, no breeze, no wind through the trees, nothing.

Just quiet and peace.

“I don’t know what to do with that,” she admitted.

There was no rustle of leaves.

There was nothing.

“I guess the only thing I can do with it is think that you gave me him, and she gave him me.”

The sun shone down on Archie and black marble, it warned her skin, it glinted the stone.

“You were a good man, Graham Black,” she uttered an understatement.

Archie reached out and touched stone that was cold, even under the sun.

“Thank you.”

Still, nothing.

But peace.

And with that, Archie walked away.





Epilogue



Thrill of the Wind



Jagger



One month later…



When Jagger walked into his mom and Hound’s kitchen, Dutch was already sprawled at the table.

There was no Georgie.

Which made Jag feel better since he’d been ordered to come to breakfast and Archie was not invited.

But only a little bit better because this was weird.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

“Well, hello to you too,” his mother said by way of answer, turning from a counter that had some food prep stuff on it.

Jag didn’t let up.

“Where’s Hound and Wilder?”

“They’re out to breakfast,” she told him.

Say what?

“I thought we were here for breakfast,” Jag noted. “Why are they somewhere else?”

“Okay, getting you caught up,” Dutch put in. “It’s official that this is weird on top of weird because I asked this too, as well as why Georgie was expressly left out of this get-together. Ma didn’t have a lot of answers. And like I’m sensing the same from you, I’m not a fan of the mystery.”

“I heard there was a drama at Ride yesterday,” Keely cut in to remark.

Well.

Shit.

“It wasn’t a drama…as such,” Jagger lied.

Keely stared at him.

Dutch didn’t sound annoyed or impatient anymore when he said, “It was totally a drama, brother.”

Jagger sighed before he explained.

“Okay, so Archie decided she wanted to buy the Bronco Joker and I restored. She came around to work things out with Tyra. Someone told me she was on Chaos, I went in and Tyra was trying to hold the fort considering she knew what was going down, since she took my check for the Bronco, and Archie was making it clear she didn’t understand what was going down. So I was forced to tell Arch I’d already bought it for her, and was waiting for the perfect time to give it to her. She was a little miffed that I did that.”

“Miffed and loud,” Dutch added.

Now the asshole was grinning.

“As you both know, she tends to be chill,” Jag reminded them. “It’s just on certain occasions when she’s just…not. And like she doesn’t hesitate to communicate anything, she doesn’t hesitate to communicate when she’s not.”

“You do know that women are capable of purchasing their own modes of transport,” his mother pointed out.

“If you think you have anything to say that Archie hasn’t already shared, you’d be wrong,” Jag told Keely.

“I further heard she drove away in that Bronco,” Keely drawled.

That was when Jagger smiled.

His ma shook her head, came to him and took his left hand in hers.