Page 21 of Karma (Deranged Drifters MC #23)

Chapter Twenty-One

Griffin’s Beach Lex

L ex sits with Lucas on the couch. It’s been a couple of weeks since she was released from the hospital, and Lucas still doesn’t want to leave her side.

They’ve had conversations about how she doesn’t blame him. In fact, she credits him for saving her. He did exactly what she needed. If anything happened to Lucas, Lex would have never gotten over it.

“Where is everyone?” Lucas asks.

“Colt took the kids to get ice cream. Don’t worry, I made him promise to bring some home for us.”

Looking at her, he studies her. “How do you feel?”

“I’m okay.”

“Not good enough. Rate it?”

She smiles. This has become his thing. He tracks her healing progress. “I’m about a five out of ten, which considering I was a three a couple of days ago, isn’t bad. How are you sleeping?”

“Six out of ten.”

“Better than before when it was a four.”

“I just don’t like knowing you were hurt.”

Running her fingers through his hair, she smiles. “I heal pretty damn well. Trust me.”

“That actually makes it worse,” he admits.

They’ve had many long talks since she’s been home, and she’s been completely honest with Lucas. For the most part. She’s sworn everyone to secrecy about Phillip’s gun not being loaded. Lucas can never know.

A headlight flashes through the window, and Lex narrows her eyes. “Dad must be home,” Lucas says.

“I don’t think that’s Dad,” she says, holding her hand out to have him help her stand. “I hear a motorcycle, and he took both Noah and Calla with him.”

He walks over to the window and looks out. “Asshole.”

“Who is it?”

“Zane.”

“Lucas—”

It’s too late. Her teenager runs outside, screaming like a banshee. “What are you doing here? You have a lot of nerve showing up here. What? You wanted to finish what your brother started? What you started?”

Lex steps onto the porch and smirks. “Lucas, it’s okay—”

“No, it’s not okay. Not when the men in your family either try to kill you or turn away and pretend like everything’s fucking… candy and good shit.”

She can’t help it. She laughs. “We gotta teach you real smack talk, kid.” Holding onto the railing, she slowly walks down to join them. “He’s here because I told him to stop by after I got home.”

“You wanna hit me?” Zane asks. “Payback for what I did?”

“I want to kill you!” he growls.

“Baby, go inside,” Lex says. “It’s okay.”

“I am not leaving you alone with him.”

Nodding, Zane smiles. “You’re protective of her. I noticed that you haven’t really left her side unless forced.”

“Whether you and VP believe it or not, she is my mom. And I wasn’t going to leave her.”

“I know she is, kid. I’m really sorry for the shit I said the last time I saw you here. And for what I did. It was out of line. All of it was so… unforgivable. It never should have happened, and I hope you can look past my mistakes one day.”

“I don’t care what you say to me. Or do to me. But I know you were going to kill her no matter what VP says. Or you.”

Running his bottom lip between his front teeth, Zane nods.

“Yeah, I was. I was out of my mind, and I needed to take my anger out on someone. Unfortunately, your mom has always been that person. It doesn’t make it right or okay, but…

I just hope you never have to experience what I did to get to that point. ”

“Like losing a parent? Yeah, I lost my dad. Then my bio mom chose drugs and an abusive, alcoholic man over me. It was so terrible at our house that my sister and I broke into abandoned houses to be safe. You’re not the only person in the world to have bad shit happen to them.”

“I didn’t—”

“I don’t care. What I do care about is how long until you’re not sorry anymore,” Lucas snaps. “You’re done taking out every bad thing that happens in your life out on my mom. She doesn’t deserve it.”

“Lucas—”

“I don’t think Dad would be too upset with me if I went inside, grabbed the gun he just taught me to shoot with, and killed you dead here.”

Lex places her hand on his shoulder. “Lucas, that’s enough.”

“No,” Zane says with a chuckle. “Colt probably wouldn’t have an issue with it. Hell, he’d probably buy you a car for it.”

“They already bought me a car.”

A car pulls into the driveway, and they turn to see Colt stepping out of the car, an angry glare shooting at Zane before he helps Calla from her booster seat. He hands something to Noah before walking over to them.

“Lucas, how about you go inside and get the kids set up with ice cream? We’ll be inside in a minute,” Lex says.

Having his father here makes him feel safe enough to leave Lex with her brother, and she kisses his temple before he helps gather the kids inside.

She reaches into her back pocket and extends an envelope out to Zane. “Here. This is what I needed you to stop by for.”

He stares at it for a few moments. “Lane.”

Griffin’s Beach Zane

S tanding near the spot where he almost killed Lex kicks Zane in the gut. As if that wasn’t bad enough, seeing his name on the envelope in his dead wife’s handwriting about pushes him over the edge.

Looking towards the house where Lucas just walked inside with Noah and Calla, he shakes his head. “I didn’t even know.”

“Know what?” Colt asks.

“That you saved the kids you adopted.”

“You kind of had a lot going on at that time. Plus, you know, you hate me,” Lex says.

Her face looks more normal now, but she still has swelling and scabs. The way she moves shows just what kind of beating she took from Phillip. Even though he’d been there, he thought it was a situation where it looked worse than it was. Or maybe he just hoped it was the case.

“That should have been me.”

“What the fuck did you just say?” Colt asks.

Swallowing, he looks at Lex. “Lucas. He’s a good big brother, yeah? Both him and Noah?”

“The best,” Lex says.

“That should’ve been me.”

Hearing her scream when Phillip stabbed her rings in her ears as she shifts, clearly struggling to find a comfortable position. She’s lucky to be alive. They’re all lucky she’s alive.

He looks down at the envelope in his hand again, and his chest aches. Lex gave him a letter from Lane after the funeral, it was like a group of men stabbed him with knifes and swords as he read it.

“It’s the last one,” she says. “From what I saw at the hospital, I figured it was time to give it to you.”

His eyes sting as tears flood them. “You could have burned this.”

“I made a promise. Now that I’ve fulfilled it, we’re done.”

“Done?” He snaps his head up to look at her, praying she doesn’t mean it.

“You’ve made it perfectly clear that you don’t want a sister, and I’m done fighting for you to love me.”

“Lex, I know things have been difficult—”

Looking over her shoulder, she wears a smile. “I have a house filled with people who love me. Four children and a husband. It took me a long time to learn that you won’t ever love me. And it’s not my fault. I’m done trying.”

His lip quivers, but he keeps himself together. “You’re giving up on me?”

“I’m letting go,” she says. “I’m tired of always being dragged behind the car. You and VP both do it, and it’s time to release the bumper and lick my wounds.”

“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m really sorry.”

“Too little, too late, huh?” Colt says. “I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with the men in your family, but you can go fuck all the way off, as my wife would say. I’m done with the lot of you.”

The comment confuses him. He knew there was tension with VP based on what Brock mentioned to him after Lex was admitted to the hospital, but he didn’t know it was this bad. “VP, too?”

“Your father’s barely holding onto his leather at this point.”

“What did he do?”

“It’s what he spent his entire life not doing,” Colt says.

Lex reaches out and rests a hand on his bicep, and she motions to the house with a slight tilt of her head. “Why don’t you go and help Lucas? I’ll be inside soon.”

He glares at Zane before kissing her cheek and heading up the porch. He turns and says, “I’m watching.”

“What did Dad do?” Zane asks, his stomach sinking.

“So many things,” Lex says and moves to sit on the steps of the house. “There was a rat in the club, and it wasn’t a member. Your name got brought up, and he was adamant it wasn’t you. He believed I would turn on the club before you ever would. He almost died on that hill.”

Eyes wide, Zane juts out his chin. He’d gone off the deep end, sure, but his father has to be out of his mind to think Lex would ever turn on the club. “Shut up.”

“There’s more, but that’s the majority of the tension.”

“I’d never rat, no matter what happened, but between you and me? Fuck, I’d be the one to turn first. Member or not, you are that fucking club. How can’t he see that?”

She smirks. “He doesn’t see a lot things when it comes to me. Especially when you’re in the mix. And then, when we figured out the De-Identifier was our big brother… Let’s just say his true colors really came out.”

“Who?”

“Uh, you might not remember, but there were women being found in Griffin’s Beach who couldn’t be identified because they were so mutilated. It started before Lane… Before I moved back.”

It sounds vaguely familiar, but Zane honestly paid little attention to the world outside Lane and Margaret when the C word came around again. “I kind of remember something about it.”

She tells him about Brock and Beckett getting arrested, and then Gerard Buchanan. Then, Undertaker’s ex-girlfriend Nina’s box of information being sent to them. His head spins as he realizes he’s missed so much while he was gone.

“How did Nina get that information when Brock and Grayson couldn’t?”

“That’s a great question. All I can guess is she’s creative and determined. Then again, if someone killed someone I loved, I’d stop at nothing to find them, too.”

“I saw the pictures of us out in the shop,” he says with a shake of his head. “I don’t… Have you started processing all of this? Because I can’t quite wrap my head around it all.”

Shrugging, she sighs. “It’s par for the course for me. I mean, I’ve already almost died at the hands of one brother, so it’s only fitting another wanted to kill me, too. But I still can’t get over how VP was only concerned about you when it all came out. That’s when I knew he doesn’t love me.”

“I don’t know why he was so worried about me. I was fine.”

“But he didn’t know that. None of us did.”

“Yeah, he did,” Zane says as he scrunches his face. “I talked to him at least once a week. Even though I was gone, I wanted to make sure Margaret was doing okay while I figured my shit out. He knew I was fine.”

Her eyes widen. “Well, if that’s not just a punch in the…”

“Lex, I’m really sorry.”

“I gotta get inside. Like I said, that’s the only other letter she gave me to give to you. I hope it helps with the dilemma I know wages a war in your mind.”

He chuckles. “You saw it, huh?”

“I’m pretty perceptive. It’s a flaw.” Pulling herself up with the railing, Lex walks to the house but stops at the door before turning to face him again.

“Margaret really misses you. It’s been incredibly difficult for her, so please don’t break her heart again. She barely survived it the first time.”

His sister disappears inside, and he wishes she’d just slap him. Punch him. Let Colt or Lucas beat the shit out of him. The kindness she still shows him, even after she says she’s through with him, hurts.

But one hit wouldn’t be enough. Not after everything I’ve done. I deserve more than I’ll ever be punished with, and that’s not fair.