Page 2 of Kingpin (Blackjacks MC #1)

Chapter two

Hattie

It seemed like an eternity passed before I could extricate myself from Neil. After making my excuses, I left the hospital and quickly escaped into the fresh air to clear my head. I exhaled a shaky breath of relief.

Seeing my ex-husband stirred up feelings I thought I would never experience again. Feelings I had worked so hard to bury six feet deep.

And yet, they all came bubbling up to the surface as soon as I had been foolishly close enough to kiss him.

Falling in love with Neil “Kingpin” Gibson had been nothing short of insanity. We were at each other’s throats all the time over something—his club, that goddamn bike, our future, having kids. My mother had warned me repeatedly that he would break my heart, that he was no good for me.

But I didn’t listen. I wanted him.

With Neil, I felt limitless. Ever since I was a little girl, I had a temper that would get me into trouble. My mother told me to rein it in, behave myself, get it under control.

Neil never said anything like that. When my temper flared, he stood strong amid the heat. When I lashed out with my sharp tongue and cutting words, he got this… gleam in his eye. Almost as if he was proud of me.

Neil never shied away.

That’s probably why every fight we ever had resulted in sex. Pumped full of adrenaline. Tearing each other’s clothes off.

Fuck your frustration out, is what Neil always said, a little smug, daring me to finish what we’d started.

And it worked. Usually.

Except the whole…divorce thing.

No amount of sex could fix that.

I sighed, fishing around in my purse until I found the key to my rental car. That whiskey-rough grit in Neil’s voice had deepened even more over the years, if that was possible. Judging by the hot, tight coil in my lower belly, my panties still turned into a damp mess when I was around him.

After my separation with Neil, I moved out of Brightwater within two weeks. I knew I couldn’t stay in Montana. It would hurt too much. I needed a blank slate, somewhere that didn’t remind me of my ex-husband everywhere I looked.

So I took a job in Seattle—worlds apart from Montana. The sprawling suburbs, endless traffic, and the expensive rent I shelled out for my tiny apartment convinced me that I was making changes, moving on, and leaving Neil behind for good.

Every once in a while, I would revisit Brightwater to see my sister and her family.

Connie was ten years younger than me, with a second baby on the way.

I loved to fulfill my role as the overindulgent aunt to my five-year-old nephew, Wylie, and I couldn’t wait to meet my new niece when she arrived any day now.

But as soon as I set foot on Montana soil, I felt that familiar ache of longing.

To be home. To be near family. To live in the small town I adored since I was a young girl.

To live under the big sky of Montana and feel all that room to just breathe , with miles and miles of road and land in every direction you looked.

I missed it here.

And what scared me the most is that I missed Neil. After everything we’d been through. After the fighting, the divorce, and thirteen years separated…a tiny part of me still loved him.

Climbing into my rental car, I pulled out my phone and called Connie. She picked up right away, with the echo of a children’s television program brightly rhyming away in the background.

“How did it go at the hospital?” she asked.

I had called her from the airport when I landed, explaining the situation with Neil. She offered to visit him in my stead, but I couldn’t ask her to do that. Especially when she was eight and a half months pregnant. The last thing she needed was to deal with my drama.

“Neil will be okay,” I replied. “He’s not at death’s door or anything, which is honestly a miracle. Big G was there looking out for him, so he’s not alone.”

Connie gave a thoughtful hum as she listened.

“And what about you?”

I shrugged, scrubbing at the steering wheel with my thumb.

“I’m…”

I trailed off, too scattered to sum it up neatly.

Relieved that he wasn’t dying.

Frustrated that I still felt something for him after all this time.

Annoyed and a little pissed that I could have avoided seeing him again if he’d just taken my name off his emergency contact information like I told him to a thousand times before.

Pissed with myself for not simply changing my number.

There was no way I’m fine would roll off my tongue, and Connie certainly wouldn’t believe it.

Every time I visited Brightwater, I kept my head down, laid low, and didn’t show my face in town if I could help it.

All it would take was one Blackjack to see me, and word would get back to Neil that I was here.

I had successfully avoided him for thirteen years. Until now. When I dropped everything in a heartbeat and upended my life to come running when he was in the hospital.

“You should have let me handle it,” Connie said. “I know he’s a big, tough, scary biker, and I’m only five-foot-two, carting around a belly the size of a jumbo beach ball, but I can take him.”

I laughed.

“You’re as docile as a kitten, Connie. And you wouldn’t hurt a fly without bursting into tears.”

“Pregnancy hormones are a nightmare, all right? Last week, Nathan found me sobbing in the kitchen because we didn’t have any cookies and my cravings were driving me up the wall.

The poor guy ran to the grocery store in the middle of the night and came back with a dozen packages of cookies.

And two pints of ice cream, just to be on the safe side.

You’d be surprised at the level of fear a man experiences when he’s faced with a pregnant woman as big as a whale, bawling her eyes out. I could use that to my advantage.”

I smiled ruefully, saying nothing. At forty-six years old, I’d made peace with the fact that the chance to have children of my own had passed me by, bittersweet though it was.

I’d always wanted kids. But Neil was busy with his club. When I brought up the subject, we were never on the same page about it. My greatest fear was getting a call one day, with a baby in my arms, telling me that Neil was dead in a ditch somewhere because of his bike or his club.

I dreamed of being a mother, a wife, and having a family.

Neil dreamed of being President, the backbone of the Blackjacks MC, and a steady rock for his brothers to rely on when they needed support.

I never doubted Neil’s love for me. But we were never meant to be together. I didn’t have room in my heart, my marriage, or my bed, for that club between us.

I was genuinely, deeply happy for my sister as she experienced motherhood. But it would forever sting a little, that I couldn’t have that same experience for myself with the man I married.

“God, I’m talking your ear off,” Connie added. “Are you still in Brightwater? Can you drop by for a visit? Do you need to get back to Seattle right away?”

I tilted my head back against the seat, watching a sparrow hop across the hospital parking lot. Now that Neil knew I was in town, it was risky to stick around. He might come looking for me in the hopes we could talk things out. Again.

But the thought of jumping on a cramped airplane and returning to my lonely apartment didn’t hold much appeal either.

I craved the comfort of Connie’s presence.

I needed to be around family after my visit with Neil had unsettled me.

I wanted to hug my sister and pepper my nephew’s sticky face with kisses until he squirmed in protest.

“Would you mind if I crashed on your couch for a while?” I asked. “I picked up some treats for Wylie in the airport gift shop.”

“Hattie, sweetie, of course. You’re always welcome here. You know that. And there better be a marginal amount of nutritional value in those treats. Wylie has enough energy as it is. He doesn’t need to get loaded with sugar and hit turbo levels of hyper.”

I glanced at the gift shop bag in the back seat, bursting with brightly colored candy.

“Hate to break it to you, but I’m not showing up on your doorstep with nothing but carrots for my nephew. I’d be sleeping with one eye open for the rest of my life.”

Connie laughed. I smiled to myself as my heart warmed at the sound. Even though my feelings might be a conflicted mess after seeing Neil, visiting my sister and spending time with her family would set me right in no time.

When I pulled up to Connie’s cottage-style house, I felt my stress begin to melt away as soon as I parked in the driveway.

Her little homestead was nestled at the outskirts of Brightwater, with four acres of land that included fruit trees, a small pond, and a chicken coop.

Pink petunias cascaded from her window boxes, and brightly colored toys littered her lawn.

Wylie shoved the front door open and waved exuberantly, wearing his favorite red cowboy hat and dusty little cowboy boots.

I pretended to shield my eyes and squint into the distance as I climbed out of my car.

“Is that my favorite nephew?”

He cheered and raced toward me, flinging his arms around my leg with a grin.

“Hi, Aunt Hattie. Did you bring me any presents?”

“Well, that depends,” I replied. “Are you still the fastest cowboy in the West?”

Wylie bounced on his toes, blue eyes gleaming with eagerness to prove himself.

“Get ready,” I said.

He crouched into position.

“Get set,” I said.

Wylie practically trembled with excitement.

“Go!”

He took off, zooming around the corner of the house and out of sight at top speed. Two minutes later, he came careening around the other side of the house, breathing hard, cheeks flushed.

I caught him around the middle as he flew by me, sweeping him off his feet.

“A new world record!” I declared, spinning him in a circle. When I set him back on the ground again, I retrieved a box of candy from the gift bag and slipped it to him surreptitiously. “Here you go, champ. Enjoy your winning prize. And if your mama asks, I gave you a bag of carrots.”

Wylie tore into the candy, gobbling it up.

“I saw that,” Connie said dryly from the porch. A soft smile touched her lips as she rested one hand on her swollen belly. Her dishwater blonde hair was swept up into a messy bun and her blue eyes sparkled with fond amusement. “Gummy worms are not carrots.”

“I think they’re made with real fruit juice,” I countered, removing Wylie’s hat to ruffle his hair. “That’s healthy, right?”

She chuckled and shook her head.

“Not even close. Is that what you’re teaching kids in the classroom these days?”

“Can you imagine how popular I’d be if I did?” I replied.

Connie held her arms out to me.

“Get over here. I need a hug.”

My throat tightened. I made my way up to the porch and wrapped my arms around her. She rubbed my back, angling her stomach to one side so she could squeeze me as tightly as possible.

“Wylie helped me clean up the guest bedroom for you,” she said. “The sheets are still in the washing machine, but they’ll be done in about twenty minutes. So you don’t have to sleep on the couch.”

My eyes burned and I blinked back tears of gratitude.

“I’m sorry to spring this on you at the last minute.”

“Nonsense,” Connie said. “You know damn well I’m putting you to work while you’re here. I won’t waste a single opportunity to recruit you for babysitting duty so I can rest my poor feet.”

I tightened my grip on her with a sigh, comforted by her company. After a beat of silence, she spoke again.

“Was he hot?”

I groaned and sagged in her arms.

“Connie. Don’t ask me that.”

“I’m your little sister,” she replied. “It’s my job to poke all those tender spots you’re trying to hide. Besides, I know how much you used to drool over Neil’s tattoos and black leather. Now answer the question.”

I groaned again.

“Fine. Yeah, I hate to say it, but he was hot. I mean, besides the bruises and the hospital gown. But those tattoos still seem to have the power to make my common sense fly out the window.”

Tattoos. Muscles. That slow, sexy little smile. His voice . And the way he looked at me with such blatant desire in his eyes that I couldn’t think straight.

Connie huffed a laugh and pulled back, patting my shoulder.

“Why don’t we go inside? I’ll get you a stiff drink. You could probably use it.”

“I thought you got rid of any alcohol in your house when you found out you were pregnant with baby number two,” I replied.

She shrugged.

“I did, but I can still make a wicked cup of chocolate milk. If you add enough chocolate syrup, it qualifies as a stiff drink.”

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” I said, amused.

“Hey, if you really want to get crazy, we can go with chamomile tea. All that boiling water, dipping the tea bag in the cup. It’s a wild time, I’m telling you.”

I smiled at Connie. Lightening the mood with her sense of humor, cracking lame jokes to make me feel better. She smiled back and hooked her arm through mine, leading me into the sanctuary of her home.