When the Last Rev ended, everyone mounted their bikes and the procession got underway.
Quietly and slowly, they made their way home—back to the Ravens’ compound on the outskirts of Frederick, Maryland. Maverick knew he had to at least make an appearance at the reception, though his gut had him wanting to head back to Alexa’s. Because instinct said the worst was yet to come, and experience had taught him that abusers didn’t abuse just once.
Her brief reappearance into his life had reminded him of promises he hadn’t been well tending and triggered every one of his protective instincts, not to mention stirring up all kinds of shit inside him he thought he’d boxed up tight.
And as if Maverick hadn’t already been climbing out of his skin with worry over Alexa—whether she wanted him worrying about her or not—Bunny’s attack whipped up all the old guilt inside him and made him need to know that Alexa was okay.
Or, if need be, ensure that she would be okay. Whatever that took.
After all, once, he and Alexa had been tight—not just lovers, but friends. Alexa had gone from the kid sister who clearly worshipped her big brother and his best friend, to the teenager with the smart mouth and the quick wit who loved to keep him and Tyler guessing what she’d get into next, to the ambitious woman who worked two jobs to put herself through school while bearing most of the burden of taking care of her sick mother. She was giving and tough and had always made him laugh and smile—even when shit at home had made that damn difficult. All of that plus the fact that they were together as a couple for three years before it all fell apart, and Maverick couldn’t let what’d happened to her go unaddressed.
Because she was the first and only woman he’d ever loved. The fact that she’d broken up with him and moved on without him? That didn’t matter if her life was on the line.
At the very least, Maverick owed it to Tyler Harmon to take care of his little sister. After all, it wasn’t like Tyler could do that job himself. And Mav had once promised Tyler he’d always look out for Alexa.
But even more than that, Maverick needed to watch out for Alexa because he’d once failed his mother when she’d been in a similar situation, and that failure ate at him a little bit every day, like a slow dripping leak of acid deep inside his veins. Even all these years later.
Then, Maverick had been young and naïve and weak. He hadn’t realized all the kinds of evil that lurked in the world. But that wasn’t him anymore. Now he knew. And he refused to ever make that same mistake again.
“WHAT THE HELL’S the matter with you?” Dare asked as he joined Maverick for a drink.
Maverick had been sitting at the far end of the bar in the Ravens’ clubhouse for the past few hours, in the midst of the party celebrating Jeb’s life but not really a part of it. The driving bass beat of a rock song blared out all around him, and people laughed and joked, but Maverick barely heard anything.
“Nothing,” Mav said, staring down at his whiskey.
“I excel at moody motherfucker, remember? I know it when I see it.” Dare wasn’t just the club president, he was also Maverick’s cousin, though for years they’d been as tight as brothers. Calling each other out on their shit went with the territory.
“The past is a pain in the ass, that’s all,” Maverick said.
“Well, that’s the goddamned truth.” Dare grimaced as he slid onto a bar stool and flagged down Blake for a drink. Jeb had been his best friend, and the prospect served up the whiskey with bleakness in his eyes. Prospects were probationary members who wore the club’s cutoff jackets but without the club’s colors and patch on them—those had to be earned through loyalty and dedication to the club and were a privilege of full membership.
“How you feeling?” Mav asked his cousin when Blake stepped away. Dare was only five days out from multiple gunshot wounds and surgery, but he’d thrown himself back into club business as quickly as he could. It showed in the darker-than-normal rings around his brown eyes.
“I’m feeling like I might kill the next sonofabitch who asks me how I’m feeling.” Dare raked his dark hair back off his face and gave Mav a look.
And Maverick got it. He did. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try to shoulder as much of the burden around here as he could until Dare was on his feet again. Which was why he’d already pushed off the delivery of his current custom bike order by two weeks. He’d offered the customer a twenty percent discount for his inconvenience, and that’d smoothed over any hard feelings. And Mav had enough cred built up in the business to take the hit. “Yeah, well, I won’t ask how you’re feeling if you don’t ask me what bug crawled up my ass.” He smirked and tilted out his glass.