Inc's Regret (Satan's Raiders MC Book 1) Read online

  I open my eyes and see I’m still in the room with Octavia and Zane, but the memories of my childhood come crashing back. My father did end up sending me to a reformation camp for gay or bisexual children. One where they starved us, kept us in cages, and made us lay in our own feces. We weren’t human to them. We were soldiers of Satan, determined to bring corruption on this world.

  Octavia thinks my parents are dead, ‘cause that’s what I told her . . . but they aren’t. They’re alive, livin’ back in the sticks of West Virginia. I go there once a year to see them, but that’s it. I don’t have a great relationship with my father. My mom is the reason I lie, because I love her so fuckin’ much.

  I can’t do this.

  I can’t be with him.

  I can’t be with her.

  I can’t fucking be with them, even if it’s what I want. I can’t fucking do it, because it will cripple my relationship with the only family I have left. I’ll lose my ma, and I can’t bear it. Cancer has almost taken her so many times . . . I can’t bear the thought of losing her because of who I am . . . who my father tried to pray out of me. Pray away the gay as they say.

  Octavia doesn’t even know how my father was to me when I was younger . . . but I don’t ever want to let her know about my torment.

  Before Zane brings me my water, I’m putting my clothes back on. Octavia must figure somethin’ isn’t right, ‘cause she comes up to me and places her hand on my forearm. “What’re you in a rush for?”

  “I’m leavin’, O’. I can’t do this,” I say, grabbing my cut I slide it back on and go for my boxers and pants. As I’m getting dressed, she’s trying to plead with me, begging me to stay, praying I won’t leave.

  Eventually, I grab her forearms and look her directly in the eyes. “I’m sorry O’, I tried this for you . . . but I can’t. I can’t fucking do this, okay? So, let’s leave it at that. Fuck, you probably knew this wouldn’t work anyway.” I rip my hands from the grip I have on her forearms and start walkin’ for the door. Zane’s leanin’ against the wall, maintaining eye contact with me like he knows what’s going on. He might think he knows . . . but he doesn’t have a fuckin’ clue.

  I grab the keys to my bike from the dresser by the drinks and shut the door behind me. A thump hits the floor and the heart-wrenching scream coming from the room I just left is almost enough to cause me to go back and tell her the truth.

  I can’t.

  At least, not now.

  Whenever my mother passes things might be different . . . ‘cause at the end of the day I’ll always long for the woman I’m leaving behind. I just can’t risk not being there for my ma when she needs me the most.

  She’s the strongest woman I know, but the illnesses that plague her won’t keep losing forever. I just need to do right by my family and be there for her when the time comes.

  After that . . . well, then I can have the woman I love again . . . if she’ll have me.

  Chapter One

  “You will always be motivated, so you must learn to always be disciplined.”

  ~ Bald Brothers

  Inc

  Present Day . . .

  “Sierra, what’s going on?” I ask my sister, who barely ever calls me these days. It’s not that we don’t get along or anything, but life gets in the way and we slack a bit. She lives in Charleston, West Virginia about a half hour away from our parents while I’m all the way across the States. They live in a small town on the literal side of the mountain. I think they only have one gas station out there these days because all the mom and pop shops have shut down.

  If it weren’t for the fact she called me three times in a row I might not have even answered. Breaker sent us a text a few minutes ago tellin’ us all to meet him at the club for church, so I rushed back over here. I didn’t even feel my phone vibrating in my pocket until I was pulling behind the club, parking my bike in my usual spot.

  “It’s Dad, he . . . um. He fell about an hour ago off a ladder.”

  “A ladder? What the fuck was that old geezer doing?”

  Sierra sighs, giving me the only indication, I need to know it was something he shouldn’t have been doing. “He was trying to clean the gutters and wouldn’t wait until Saturday for the guy I hired to get there.”

  Of course, he fuckin’ wouldn’t. “Serves ‘em right for not waiting.”

  “Tanner!” Sierra yells my name in a shriek chastising me for saying what she’s already thought.

  “Don’t even start with me on that shit. If he hadn’t of gone up there, he wouldn’t be in this position, now would he?” I question her, but she can’t say jack shit to me because she knows it’s the truth.

  “Mom’s a wreck,” Sierra says, lowering her voice quite a bit. Mom must be around her, but I guess she is a wreck. They’re in their late seventies and her husband just fell off a damn ladder.

  “He break his hip or anythin’?”

  Sierra sighs heavily into the phone. “I have no idea. It’s too early to tell. Mom called me right after it happened, I left work and drove straight over to her house. We’re at the hospital now, but I needed to call you and update you. Mom’s been very persistent that I call you now and not in a few hours.”

  I nod, brushing my fingertips through my hair and suck in a deep breath. “Yeah, she around?”

  “Mhm, you wanna speak to her?”

  “I do.”

  “Sure, one sec,” Sierra says to me.

  “Tanner, oh baby, your dad fell and . . . the way he was screamin’, baby, I . . .” her words come to a halt and I hear sobs coming through the other end.

  “Sorry, she’s getting really worked up. Want me to call you and give you an update when I have one?”

  I couldn’t give a rat’s ass if the fuck died, but I act like I give a damn because of my mother. Sierra on the other hand can’t really stand our dad either. But I’m sure that’s because of the way he treated her as a kid. Hell, he fucked us both up pretty damn good. I’ll be nice though, I guess, but it’s only ‘cause Mom is right there with her. “Yeah, sure. I gotta go though ‘cause I have a meeting, but keep me posted on how Mom’s holdin’ up.”

  “You know I will,” Sierra’s tone is aggravated as she hangs up the phone, but I know she deals with our dad because our mom loves the old bastard. He’s done a lot of wrong in life, but he’d never be the type to admit he has.

  Dismounting the bike, I go up to the back door and punch in the keycode, then head straight down the hallway and go in the room where we have church. From the looks of it, I’m the last to arrive so I shut the door firmly behind me and go to my seat.

  Breaker wastes no time clearing his throat and looks to us brothers. We’re all here except Agony and Fury, who’re out manning the part of our actual club that’s one of the most poppin’ biker bars in Los Angeles. They’re prospects so they don’t have their place in this room yet, but considerin’ they’ve both been prospecting for a year-and-a-half . . . I’m wonderin’ when Breaker is gonna patch ‘em both in. If you ask me, they’ve earned their place as part of our club.

  “The Guatemalan fuckers are moving in on our territory,” Breaker’s words are laced with venom and he sounds about ready to give the order for us to take their entire gang down. He’d come to an agreement with their leader for a while, and it worked for about three months before shit went sideways.

  Armor, our road captain, scoffs from his seat, “Of course they fuckin’ are, greedy motherfuckers.”

  Meanwhile, one of our full patches, Sarge, shakes his head. “I wish I was surprised, but I’m not.”

  “What’re we gonna do about it, Prez?” Chains asks.

  “Gettin’ them the fuck outta here, right?” Ice, Breaker’s dad, speaks up. He’s only recently been patched back in after getting sober. He’s called Ice for a reason and it wasn’t because the man was a fan of winter weather.

  Breaker nods. “Damn straight. I’m done with this bullshit and I’m tired of pussyfooting around my own damned city, but,
I didn’t just bring you all here to talk about the fuckin’ Guatemalans. I heard about Twister doin’ somethin’ out in Virginia and I’m likin’ the idea. I’ve spoken to him and he’s cleared me on adopting it, so, as you all know our biggest ally is the Reapers MC out in Montana and Nevada,” all the brothers around the table nod in understanding, “Stoney negotiated some sort of deal with the Iron Vex MC up in New York. They’re callin’ it a regency program and—”

  “What, like that fuckin’ king and queen shit?” Ops, the club’s enforcer, asks.

  “Would you shut the fuck up and wait until I’m done?” Breaker snaps at Ops, then keeps going. “But yeah, the king and queen shit. So, I talked to Zane and we’re a go with the idea. Basically, one of the Reapers will come down here and one of us will go up there. It’ll only strengthen our alliance.”

  “We have a strong enough fuckin’ alliance with them. For fuck’s sake, Octavia married Zane and has a kid with him,” I snap out, not even givin’ a damn that my tone is coming out disrespectful as fuck.

  Breaker cackles, “Well, since you’re the first one to shoot down my idea you can go up there.”

  He’s got to be fuckin’ around with me right now, so I laugh, “Yeah, right.”

  “Yeah, right, so you have a fuckin’ week to get your shit ready before you head up there.” Breaker stares me down and I know he’s not pullin’ my leg. He’s dead serious, and more importantly, he’s fucking with me since I spoke out against him, in front of the entire damn club. God dammit.

  Chapter Two

  “Winter is the time for comfort, for good food and warmth, for the touch of a friendly hand and for a talk beside the fire: it is the time for home.”

  ~ Edith Sitwell

  Octavia

  Tugging my winter coat closer against me, I shield Neo from the wind as we walk from our house down to the club. All the bikes are parked safely in the garage, but it only means the parking lot is packed with car after car.

  I push my way through the front door of the clubhouse and spot Zane sitting on the couch with his hands over his face. Ugh, he only does this when he’s stressed. So, I close the door behind me and get both Neo’s and my coat off, hanging them up on the rack on the wall by the door. Heading over to where Zane is, he glances up and immediately attempts to shift his face to something else, something that doesn’t look so frustrated and exhausted. He can’t fool me, though. We’re married after all, and I’d like to think I know the man better than anyone else.

  “Look who woke up,” I say with a cheerful voice. Neo giggles loudly at his father and wiggles like a worm until I let him down on the floor. He runs over to him and Zane puts on a brave face, picking Neo up into his arms, he sits him on his leg and begins bouncing him.

  “What’s my little man doin’ up so early?” Zane questions him with a smile, then looks over to me with furrowed brows.

  “Hey, don’t look at me. You know I don’t like waking up at six in the morning. If it were up to me, we’d sleep in until ten. But this guy, he had to wake up repeating ‘Dada’ over and over again until he woke me up. That being said, I’m gonna go make some coffee.” I start to walk toward the kitchen and Zane chuckles.

  “Already beat you to it. Might still be hot too.”

  Turning back, I shoot him a smile. “And this is why I married you.”

  He cackles. “You married me because it was arranged.”

  I shrug my shoulders. “Yeah, well if that wasn’t already in the works this would’ve been why I married you.”

  As he chuckles at my statement I go into the kitchen, grab a mug from the cabinet, and make my coffee just the way I like it. I put two packets of sugar, add a dash of pumpkin spice seasoning, and then pour some cream in, then swirl it around with a spoon. It’s no pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks, but it’ll have to do.

  I take a sip as I round the corner and walk back to the couch, seeing Neo laughing and smiling ridiculously at Zane. There’s just something about him that Neo absolutely adores, but I can’t blame my little guy. Zane’s fucking amazing. At first, we weren’t on the best of terms considering our marriage was completely arranged, but, in the end it all worked out. Hell, I still count myself so lucky because Zane loves a child that isn’t biologically his.

  Neo, my one-and-a-half-year old, is actually fathered by my ex, Inc. Zane and I had one night with Inc as a test to see if we could all get what we wanted. Inc didn’t want to give me up because of the arranged marriage between Zane and I, forming an unbreakable alliance between my father’s former club, the Satan’s Raiders MC and Zane’s club, the Reapers MC. Little did I know Zane’s bisexual, so, he had needs too . . . needs and wants that I obviously couldn’t satisfy. At the time I didn’t want to give up Inc, so we came to a conclusion . . . we’d see if he could be our third. I’d still be able to be with the man I loved, while being able to give Zane something he wanted too. The plan seemed perfect, but after we all had sex, Inc ran out of the hotel room and I haven’t heard from him since. It’s been over two years since I’ve seen him, since we’ve had a simple conversation, stared at one another across the room. In a simple man’s terms, it’s been two years since my life completely changed. I wouldn’t trade it for the world, though.

  “You were up early,” I say, watching his features. I want to see if he’s going to deflect or be honest with me. Sometimes he’s such a macho man, refusing to talk about feelings and all that.

  He cocks a brow and nods. “Yeah, couldn’t sleep. A lot on my mind.” Okay, well I guess we’re going with the stereotypical macho man shit today.

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “Not really, O’. Sorry.”

  “No need to apologize. I only want to be here for you if I can.” Zane isn’t an overly emotional man. Every now and again he does confide in me, but other days he wants to take this approach and doesn’t speak up at all.

  “I appreciate that more than you know.” I smile softly at him, taking his sly hint he wants me to stop questioning him about it. Zane clears his throat. “I do want to let you know about something. You going to be busy, or you got a sec?”

  I have meetings for my company at odd hours of the day, considering one of my investors can never be in the same place for too long. I own a website where clients can subscribe and they get exclusive photos and videos of my girls. It’s an artistic way to take nude photos, not looking raunchy like the other sites. Most of the women I hire are victims of abuse or have some sort of past they’re trying to flee from, so it makes me feel good knowing they’re safe and able to provide for themselves.

  I sit down on the couch and lean back against the cushions, making myself comfortable as Neo squirms in Zane’s arms. Zane puts him down and Neo runs around the joint. I swear, when he’s older he’s going to be on the track team. The kid can run, and man he has so much energy. Keeping my eyes on Neo, I speak to Zane, “Yeah, what’s up?”

  “Boss called the other day and told me about something she’s doing with the Devil’s Riot MC. It’s called a regency, where she’ll send one of her people down to their club and vice versa. The point of doing it is to strengthen the alliance between both clubs while also keeping tabs on what’s going on. I liked the idea, so I reached out to your brother.” Breaker, the Prez for the Satan’s Raiders MC. “I spoke to him about the concept and he’s in agreement with me. Granted, our alliance is strong because we’re married, but I like the idea of having someone else here. We’d have to send one of ours down to Breaker at some point, but, after the club’s history with being betrayed I think this is smart.”

  I furrow my brows together. “Breaker might be a dick but he’d never betray you.”

  “I’m not insinuating he would, but I do think this is a good thing. It’s an insurance policy he doesn’t. After all the shit that’s happened over the last few years . . . all the betrayal . . . all the death . . . we need to think smart and I think this is smart.” I’m not doubting the fact he is, but I’d be able to unde
rstand it more if it was something with another club, like the Skulls Renegade MC down in Tennessee. Zane’s been on good terms with them for years, but I don’t see him doing the same thing with them.

  “He’s my family. He won’t fuck with the club,” I state, knowing Breaker can be a dick, and I mean the world’s biggest one . . . but he’d never hurt the Reapers. They’re my club too, so he’d never think of hurting me in such a manner.

  I glance over to him for a second and see him shake his head, showing me his obvious frustration. “If what the club’s gone through over the past few years has taught me anything, it’s that we can’t hand out our trust without reason, even if they’re family.”

  I rise from the couch and throw my hands up in the air. “Are you kidding me? What about my uncle? Are you going to have someone come here from the Sons of Gods MC too?” My uncle is the Prez of the Sons of Gods MC in Birmingham, Alabama. I know the Reapers are on good terms with them, but if he’s so dead set on doing this with my brother’s club, then he can do it with everyone else too.

  “No, because I don’t rely on your uncle often. This is for deeply rooted allies, like the Satan’s Raiders for us. Hell, we’re deeply rooted with the Iron Vex at this point too, I might . . . I might be doing the same with them after a time.”

  I shake my head, ready to tell him it’s a bad idea, but then Neo starts to cry. Naturally, I go over and pick him up, able to figure out almost instantly he’s hungry. When you’re a mom you can decipher their cries, almost like another language. One I’m fluent in at this point I might add. I head for the kitchen but stop dead in my tracks and turn to look back at my husband. “What if Inc’s the one who comes here? Have you even thought about that? About how it would change our family?” I cock a brow and ask him, but he doesn’t say a word at first.

  “You worry too much. He made it apparent as fuck he doesn’t want anything to do with us, and I doubt he’d be volunteering or sent here, given your past together.”