CHAPTER NINETEEN
CAPONE
With Tara in New York, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I considered flying to the Big Apple and sitting in the waiting room of the hospital there, but I talked myself out of that. If I got caught what would I say— hey, guys, I was in the neighborhood?
I didn’t want to be at the clubhouse, and the thought of going home to my bare apartment was just fucking depressing, so I called Hawk, and had him meet me at Booker & Mann to remove the equipment from the lot. Between the two of us, it took a couple of trips back and forth. On the last trip, I spotted my dad’s beat up truck parked in front of his trailer. I cut Hawk loose, and I’ve been sitting out here ever since.
I don’t even know why. I’m not avoiding anyone in my family like I’m trying to avoid the club. Everyone from my parents to my sisters’ husbands, have all been supportive. Even Nonna called to tell me she was praying for Tara.
My phone rings and I tear my gaze away from the trailer to answer it.
“Dad?”
“Is there a reason you’re sitting outside there?”
My gaze shoots toward the trailer, and I spot him peering at me through the mini blinds covering the window.
“I brought back the equipment I borrowed.”
“Yeah, I saw. You finished unloading it an hour ago, though. Why don’t you come in? The coffee is percolating, and your mother is on her way with lunch.”
I scrub my hand over my face, scratching at the scruff. I haven’t shaved since before Tara got sick, so these days it’s more like a short beard. I’m sure my mom will have something to say about it. But that doesn’t stop my stomach from growling. I’ve been living off cafeteria food from the hospital. The promise of my good food is enough to drag my ass out of my truck.
As soon as I enter the trailer, my dad pushes a cup of coffee into my hand.
“You look like crap.”
Bringing the cup to my lips, I hold it there. “Thank you. It’s great to see you too, Pops.”
I take a sip of the coffee. It’s good. Really fucking good. That percolator of his is no joke.
“You need to shave, and a haircut wouldn’t be a terrible idea either.”
Lowering myself into the chair in front of his desk, I set the cup down and fold my hands behind my head.
“Anything else?”
“You’re not going to be any use to that girl if you don’t take care of yourself.”
“I’m no use to that girl anyway.”
He crosses his arms over his chest and cocks his head to the side. “How’s that, now? Lucia tells us you’re at the hospital day and night.”
“Yeah, and since I brought her in all I do is sit in the waiting room. I only got to see her once, and I don’t think I was very helpful. I just listened as she cried and told me all the things she’s too afraid to tell her parents.”
And I fucking kissed her. Again.
That’s the extent of what I did for Tara, and now, I don’t know when I’ll be able to see her again. It’s driving me nuts.
“Lucia told your mother and I that her parents took her to New York.”
I nod. “They want to get a second opinion.”
“Smart.”
“Yeah, and they took her to the best hospital, which I’m thankful for. But I don’t know what happens if they decide that’s where she’s going to get her treatment. I can’t be here while she’s there, and if I follow her, I’ll be asked questions that I don’t have answers for.” I glance up at my dad. “I think I’m in over my head.”
“No, son, you’re not. You’re just in love.”
I blanch at that. “You’re out of your mind.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Am I?”
It would be stupid of me to deny I have feelings for Tara, but to say I’m in love—well, that just seems crazy. Until a couple of weeks ago, I barely acknowledged her existence. It doesn’t happen that quickly, does it?
“You’ve dropped everything in your life to sit vigil in a hospital just so you can be close to her.” He pauses, uncrossing his arm. “Let me ask you something, son. When you look at Tara, what do you see? Do you a see a sick girl?”
“She is a sick girl. She has fucking cancer. She’s seventeen and she has fucking cancer.”
I can say it a hundred times and it still doesn’t feel real.
“But is that all you see when you look at her.” He sighs. “When you brought her to the house for Sophia’s birthday, everyone assumed she was your girlfriend, and you kept saying she’s your boss’ daughter.”
“Well, she is.”
If Maverick hadn’t ordered me to follow her, I wouldn’t have had any interaction with her. I wouldn’t have put her on the back of my bike, and I never would know how amazing it is to kiss her.
“So when you look at Tara all you see is cancer and obligation. That’s what you’re telling me?”
“I didn’t say that.” I sigh, spearing my fingers through my overgrown hair. “I look at Tara and I see everything a man like me could want but is too afraid to have.” I fix him with a look, one full of regret. “I’m not like you, Pop. I didn’t make decisions based on a family because I never thought I’d want one. I can’t be the guy who drags her down, but at the same time I can’t be the one who walks away from her either. It doesn’t matter how wrong it is for me to want her, I do, and I can’t turn it off. I got all these feelings, and I don’t know what to do with them. I keep telling myself God put her in my path for a reason and he isn’t cruel enough to take her away from me, but she isn’t even mine.”
“So make her yours.”
I scoff. Does he really believe it’s that simple?
“I’m ten years older than her. You’re not supposed to encourage me.”
He shrugs. “I don’t know Gianluca. I have daughters, and if a man loved any one of them enough to sit in a hospital for days on end just to be in the same building as her while she was facing the fight of her life, I’d be okay with it. Life is short, and things like this have a way of opening minds. I’m not saying you should go ask for her father’s hand in marriage. But have a conversation with him. Let him know your intentions.”
“I don’t know what my intentions are. I’ve never had a fucking relationship in my life. It’s always been about sex, and oddly enough, that’s the farthest thing from my mind when it comes to Tara.”
Make no mistake, I want her. I’ve been struggling with that since the night she caught Mark cheating on her. The attraction I feel toward her is fucking palpable. But this is deeper than that. So much deeper than that.
“Well, figure them out, and talk to Maverick. But I gotta tell you, son, he probably already has you beat in that department.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“A father knows which guy takes his daughter’s hand long before the guy knows himself. It’s a terrifying thing at first. To look another man in the eye and know he’s going to be the one that takes your daughter from you. But then you start to make peace with it as he proves himself, and you feel nothing but gratitude toward him, because your little girl is going to be loved, and cared for when you’re no longer here to do it yourself.” His voice cracks slightly. “And that, son, is a remarkable thing. It’s probably even more remarkable when your daughter is sick, and the future she once saw so brightly is a bit dimmer now.”
I wound up sleeping at the clubhouse that night. I figured it was the best place to get information regarding Tara’s consultation with the other doctor. Maverick and Holly weren’t going to call me with any updates, but they might call Shady or Leftie.
However, Shady never showed his face at the clubhouse and Leftie was too busy making sure Ink didn’t give himself alcohol poisoning.
While I was having a heart to heart with my dad, the club had been laying Emmy to rest. I offered Ink my condolences and apologized for not being there, but my words fell on deaf ears.
I didn’t fault him for it. How could I?
I excused myself and disappeared into my room. Sleep didn’t come easily, not with my sheets smelling like Tara. As soon as the sun began to rise, I took a shower and went for a ride. Drove up and down the highway until my legs went numb. On the way back to the clubhouse, I passed by Maverick and Holly’s house.
Holly’s car was in the driveway, and Leftie’s trike was parked behind it, signaling they had returned from New York. There was no sign of Maverick’s bike, and I knew the only way to get to Tara was through him.
Peeling the helmet from my head, I dismount and tuck it under my arm. I swore I’d never wear the thing after Tara wore it, but wearing it somehow makes me feel closer to her, and I like that the scent of her shampoo still lingers inside of it.
I enter the clubhouse, immediately zeroing in on Maverick as he sits at the bar with Mamba and Ghost. It’s barely noon, and he’s already drinking.
Not a good sign.
“Mind if I join you guys?” I ask, making my way toward the bar. I set the helmet on top of it and Ghost pushes an empty glass my way. Mav, on the other hand, doesn’t even glance in my direction.
“Maverick was just filling us in on what happened in New York,” Mamba supplies.
He may not want to acknowledge my presence, but he’s not getting rid of me. I take the bottle of whiskey and fill my glass before topping off Maverick’s. It’s not tequila, but I don’t give a fuck. I’ll drink poison if that’s what it takes.
“Can I get in on that update?” I ask.
He lifts his chin, turning his head a fraction, and his beady eyes meet mine.
“You asking as my brother?”
That sounds like a trick question to me, and my mind drifts back to the conversation I had with my father. I’m starting to think he was on to something when he said Maverick has me figured out.
“Sure,” I reply.
As soon as the word leaves my lips, I realize it was the wrong answer. Foaming at the mouth, he turns fully toward me, and in one swift move, he’s got my kutte fisted in his hands.
“Get the fuck out of my face, Capone.”
“Mav—”
He tightens his hold, yanking me forward.
“That’s an order!”
Releasing me, his glare hardens. I get he’s hurting, but so am I. I guess that’s a me problem, though. Ghost catches my eye and motions for me to let it go by slicing his hand through the air in front of his neck.
My jaw clenches and I stand, abandoning my drink, and my fucking pride as I stride away from them, and make my way back down the hall. I get to the mouth of the hallway, but then I freeze in my tracks.
I’m so fucking tired of everyone dismissing me like I’m some piece of shit. I’ve done everything that’s been asked of me since the day I became a prospect. I earned my patch, and I deserve the same fucking respect as every other member of this club. So maybe Maverick has an inkling that things aren’t all that innocent where his daughter is concerned, but that’s on him. He put me in this position. If anyone knows the power Tara has over someone, it’s him.
Ready to confront him, I turn around.
“Go easy on the kid, Mav,” Mamba says. “He’s been a mess over Tara too.”
“He’s not a kid, he’s a grown fucking man,” Maveric roars.
“Eh,” Ghost says. “Why don’t we all agree that he’s somewhere in between.”
“Yeah,” Mamba agrees. “He’s a manchild.”
These motherfuckers.
“Call him whatever you want, but I can’t look at him.” He goes silent for a beat, and I take a step forward, pausing again when he continues to speak. “After the doctors discussed the details of Tara’s surgery, they suggested she freeze her eggs before she starts treatment.”
I guess that explains the bad mood. I just don’t get what it has to do with me. Why couldn’t he explain this to me like he is them?
“Is that safe?” Ghost questions. “I mean it will delay treatment, won’t it?”
“Only by two weeks or so. They’ll shoot her up with hormones and extract her eggs. Ideally it would be better if she had embryos to freeze. They can be preserved for longer and have a higher success rate when implanted. The concern is that with her being so young, she may not want to have children for another ten years or so. By the time she’s ready to be a mother, the eggs will have less of a chance of surviving implantation. Something about the thawing process…I don’t know. I kind of tuned everything out after that.”
“Sounds like embryos are the way to go then,” Mamba says.
“That’s where things get tricky. Embryos are only option if she has a donor.”
“A donor,” Mamba parrots. “Like a sperm donor?”
Maverick taps his knuckles against the bar and reaches for his glass. “That’s the one.” He knocks back his whiskey, slamming the empty glass on top of the bar when he’s done.
My body goes completely still as I absorb that information.
“You know it’s one thing to hear them tell you your daughter has cancer, that she’s going to need chemotherapy, and a surgery that requires them to remove part of her femur so they can reconstruct the joint where the tumor is invading. That’s a lot to take in, especially when you look at your kid and you see she’s trying like hell to put on a brave face because she knows you and your wife are fucking falling apart. But then they tell her that the drugs she needs to take to save her life could kill the chances of ever being a mother…” His voice cracks. It takes a second for him to regain his composure, and when he speaks again the words come out choppy. “She tried her best to play it off, but when they explained everything in New York, she broke.”
My fists ball at my sides as I imagine what that must’ve been like.
“I can’t do this. I can’t watch her suffer and not be able to do a fucking thing about it.”
Yeah, that makes fucking two of us.
My mind wanders back to the talk we had in her hospital room, and the way she expressed her desire to be mother. Then I think about her with my nieces and nephews, and how fucking natural she looked when she was holding the baby or watching The Little Mermaid with Sophia. She even handled the boys like a pro.
I feel like I’ve been had. All this time I’ve been telling myself that God gives you these beautiful things—these little glimpses of what can be—to teach you a lesson. To encourage you to be better. To be grateful. But it’s all a crock of shit.
The anger I was experiencing for Maverick vanishes, and it twists into something uglier and transfers to a higher power. I’ve been a fucking fool to think God was on my side.
I think about the final line in the Lord’s prayer.
Lead us not into temptation. But deliver us from evil.
It’s what we say when we call on him to help us because we can’t resist the Devil merely on our own strength. I spent eight years taking catechism classes as a kid and received all my sacraments. I recited that prayer every fucking day. But instead of becoming one with God, I grew to be a man who proudly wears the Devil on his back.
His plan was never to guide me back to him.
And it wasn’t Maverick who put me in Tara’s path.
God saw my wicked ways and he led me straight to temptation.
He dangled that forbidden fruit right in front of my face.
Stripped me of my strength and made me a weak man.
Took this depraved sinner and robbed me of all my defenses.
Made me fucking helpless.
Unable to listen to another word, I turn back to the hallway and make my way to my room. I need to be alone. I need to fucking hit something. My gaze darts all around the room in search of something to destroy before landing on the bed. I flex my fingers as memories of her and I tangled between those sheets flash before me.
All the death and destruction.
Every crime I committed.
It was all child’s play.
Kissing Tara in that bed was my first true taste of sin, and God laughed.
It was his gotcha moment.
I stalk toward the bed, heaving the mattress and throwing it against the wall.
It’s not enough.
I grab the lamp on my nightstand and fling it across the room. The shade topples off and the bulb shatters into a million tiny pieces. I flip the nightstand next. High on adrenaline, fueled by rage, I slam my fist against the wall. The sheetrock caves as I repeat the action over and over until blood drips from my knuckles.
“Capone!”
My fist pauses against the broken wall as I pant, unable to catch my breath.
“Jesus, man, pull yourself together,” Hawk says, his voice clearer than when he first called my name. Still, I ignore him. There’s no pulling anything together.
I touch my forehead to the wall above the hole and close my eyes as I concentrate on breathing.
In through my nose.
Out through the mouth.
Hawk closes in from behind, laying a hand on my shoulder.
“Don’t fucking touch me,” I hiss.
He lowers his hand immediately.
“Brother, you need to calm down. None of this is going to help her, and if you keep it up, Maverick is going to start questioning why the fuck you’re tearing your room apart.”
I’m done giving a damn about what Maverick thinks. I don’t give a fuck what anyone thinks anymore.
“Get out of my way, Hawk,” I growl.
The motherfucker doesn’t move an inch. He just clucks his tongue against the roof of his mouth and crosses his arms against his chest. Like everyone else, he underestimates me. He doesn’t realize I’m five seconds away from reaching for my glock.
“I ain’t letting you go out there when you’re like this.”
“I’m not your fucking problem.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. You became my problem the day you acquired your patch. It’s what brotherhood is all about. I got your back, and you got mine. I can’t in good conscience let you go out there. Not in the state you’re in.”
He uncrosses his arms, dropping them to his sides as he takes a step forward.
“I know you’re hurting but this is not how you let the man who gives you your orders know that you’ve grown an attachment to his sick daughter.” He pauses, cocking his head to the side. “Don’t know how many times I gotta tell you, but I’ll keep sayin’ it. The crime isn’t in the attraction, Capone. It’s in the execution.”
“Stop saying that,” I roar. I don’t care what the crime is. Not no more.
“No,” he returns. “You only get one shot at this, and I’m telling you, if you go out there acting like this, you’re gonna blow it.”
Diverting my gaze away from Hawk, I focus on my bloody knuckles and bite the inside of my cheek. There is nothing to blow and even if there was, I’m ready to take my chances.
Let everyone and everything do their worst.
I can’t save Tara or trade places with her. I can’t develop a cure for cancer. I can’t do a fucking thing.
Maverick’s words sound in my head like a fucking siren.
Ideally it would be better if she had embryos to freeze. They can be preserved for longer and have a higher success rate when implanted. The concern is that with her being so young, she may not want to have children for another ten years or so. By the time she’s ready to be a mother, the eggs will have less of a chance of surviving...
It hits me like a ton of bricks. Maybe this was the plan all along.
“I know how to help her,” I rasp, turning back to Hawk.
“What are you talking about?”
I shoulder check him and charge out of my room. My long legs eat up the length of the hallway, and before I know it, I’m standing in the same exact spot I was when I overheard Maverick share the latest news on Tara’s situation with Mamba, and Ghost. The only difference now is Shady has joined them, and the bottle of whiskey they were nursing is completely empty.
I clear my throat, making my presence known, and all eyes swing toward me, but my gaze remains locked with Maverick’s.
Swallowing hard against the lump in my throat, I blurt, “I’ll do it.”
Mav’s bloodshot eyes narrow suspiciously.
“You’ll do what?”
“You dismissed me before, but I heard what you said,” I explain. “About Tara’s chances of one day becoming a mom.”
The room goes eerily silent, and I feel beads of sweat start to form at my brows. The words I’m about to say will ultimately change my life forever. That should scare me, and it doesn’t.
“What does that have to do with you?” Shady questions.
My gaze bounces from him then back to Maverick. I probably should’ve pulled the man aside instead of speaking in front of an audience, but here goes nothing…
“I’ll give Tara what she needs.”