Have Gun, Will Travel (The Bare Bones MC #5)(61)

“Post a guard at my nursery?” I grinned.

He handed me a glass of water and the pills. Suddenly his attitude was so gentle. He was the epitome of the classic gentle bear. “Maybe. Maybe we’ll need to do something like that. I know you need to get back to your job.”

“Yes,” I slurred, gulping four pills at once. “Lots of stuffed animals waiting for me.”

“What? But I don’t want you going back to your tiny apartment. That place is the pits. You’re moving in here with me.”

“I am?” The idea had never occurred to me. Everything was moving so fast. But then again, maybe everything was moving at just the right speed.

“Yes.” Sax took my chin between his fingers. “I love you, you know that, Bee. I already let you get injured because I didn’t leave a guard on you today.”

“You didn’t know Tormenta would get away from you.”

“I could have predicted the possibility. It could take months, even years, for this whole thing to die down, Bee. And I want you with me anyway. I want you to have all the kids you want.”

I nearly choked. “Kids…with you?”

“I hope to hell with me. Listen.” Sax kissed me on the forehead. In the stillness of the pine forest, I could hear the crunch of a car’s tires on the driveway. “I’d better get back out there, talk to cops, let them see I’m okay. Put this shirt on and get under the covers. The cops might want to question you.”

When Sax shut the door and I slid between the sheets, I had never felt safer. He wants me to have his babies…I had never been more flattered and honored in my life.

Was it possible I had finally attained the safety and security I’d been longing for since leaving the convent? It seemed too good to be true.

But I was definitely off to a good start.





EPILOGUE




SAX


“With this water the past is washed away. All the fear, sorrow, and danger that has trapped your soul is washed from you.”

Sax handed Beatrix the bowl of warm water. Taking the sea sponge from it, he kneeled and began “washing” her legs.

If the collaring ceremony had been performed, say, at the house of a fellow in the community, Beatrix would have been naked. But because they were crammed into Ford’s office at The Citadel with twenty other people, she had changed into a simple short shift. Lytton was playing the part of the officiant. Ford and Maddy had finally taken a romantic trip to Greece and Italy for a few weeks. Roman Serpico was there. He had profusely thanked Sax for taking out the * who’d turned his father into a sporting good. Of course Roman only wished he had been the one to do it, although he understood the situation. To make up for taking that joy away from Roman, Sax had allowed him to oversee the transition of Tony Tormenta’s head into a dartboard. Sax didn’t know and didn’t want to know, but suddenly, it was done.

So far there had been no retribution. Sax had even heard from a few guys within Tormenta’s organization that they were relieved to be rid of him. He was becoming out of control, they said. It was painful to work for him. Some guys even thanked Sax. It might be too good to be true there would be no blowback from the ops Sax had run, but two months later, that seemed to be the case. Their pants would be down around their ankles for many months to come waiting for Tormenta’s camp to make a move.

Lytton intoned, “Now is the time the two incomplete people realize something is missing in their lives. They’ve come into each other’s lives to fill that void. They have felt the same emptiness. Today their souls will combine and their lives will be whole. We invite everyone here to share today, to share their joy.”

Sax finished “washing” Beatrix’s neck. He admired the way the water had trickled down and bathed her breasts so the thin cotton was plastered to them. Bee was capable of so many looks, and today she was the innocent, eager virgin. Sax imagined she couldn’t wait to get him alone, to display her slutty side, to let her inner whore run rampant. In the two months they’d been living together, he hadn’t regretted choosing her for one moment. He’d made the right decision staying in Pure and Easy and letting a few minions run the road for him, going to mineral shows, selling his wares. Cassie helped him run Box of Rocks—in fact, she was there now holding down the fort—and Bee went to her Flagstaff nursery every day. It was the perfect, idyllic setup Sax had forgotten he had once wanted with Anna. She had even cooked naked for him a few times in nothing but an apron and high heels.

Taking the bowl of water from Bee, Sax took a goblet from Lytton that contained a lit candle. Handing this to her, Sax took the sage smudge stick from Lytton and lit it. Starting again at her feet, he smudged Bee up her entire body, front and back, winding it around her like a kinbaku rope.

Sax said, “I pledge my heart, mind and soul to your welfare. I willingly give you everything I am, everything I ever will be.”

A few of the older guys, Duji and Tuzigoot, coughed, so Sax gave the sage bundle back to Lytton and allowed him to pour some oil into his cupped hands. Clove, anise, and ginger bloomed inside Sax’s nostrils as he shared a sly look with Bee. She had been cleaned, perfumed, and now she was being oiled. It wasn’t a strange feeling for Sax, performing this ritual in front of his brothers’ eyes. He was used to performing in public. But he imagined Bee was a bundle of heart-pounding nerves. It wasn’t your usual biker ceremony.