Page 11

Chapter Eleven

Tristan

B eing extremely careful not to wake Addy up, I eased out of bed, not even breathing until my entire body was off the mattress. Now that I knew that she was pregnant, I was going to make sure she got all of the rest that she needed and that she took extremely good care of herself. All of this toxic shit that she had been doing had to come to an end. She wasn’t just thinking of herself anymore.

But I knew that was going to be a fucking fight.

I walked into my connected bathroom and got a quick shower so I could go deal with club shit. I knew I needed to get a run organized and get ready to distribute funds at church today. I’d been slacking on my duties while trying to get Adelaide home.

After getting dressed in a pair of black cargo pants, my black steel-toed boots, a black t-shirt, and my cut, I walked out into the bar room, where Jesup was already behind the bar, talking to a couple of club women about cleaning up the mess from the welcoming back party last night.

Jesup arched an eyebrow at me when he noticed me. “You’re up early,” he noted.

I shrugged. “So are you,” I retorted.

Normally after a welcome home party, all of the club members, including myself, slept extremely late. Like well into the afternoon kind of late. But there had been too much shit on my mind to sleep, Addy being pregnant at the top of that list.

Jesup grinned at me. “I was expecting you to be balls deep inside of Adelaide for a while,” he lightly teased. I scowled at him. He shrugged at me. “What? It’s been years since you’ve been with her.”

I shook my head, thinking about Joey’s death, and then the fact that she had just found out that she was pregnant with his kid on top of it all. No fucking way was I about to sleep with her, much less try anything like that. I was a bastard, but I wasn’t that damn cruel. She wasn’t near ready for that kind of intimacy yet.

I nodded my head in the direction of the chapel, signaling for Jesup to follow me into the room. Once we were in the chapel, I shut the doors and locked them. Walking over to one of the windows, I crossed my arms over my broad chest and looked out at two of the prospects working on a car in the garage. “I think she’s pregnant,” I bluntly informed him, cutting straight to the chase.

“Woah, what ?” Jesup snapped in surprise. I turned to face him. His face was a mask of absolute shock and disbelief. “You’re fucking serious?” he asked after a moment. “She’s fucking pregnant ?”

I shrugged and heaved a deep sigh. “She woke up in the middle of the night last night to throw up. Probably a bit TMI for you, but I asked her when her last period was since she didn’t seem sick to me. No high temperature, not throwing up actual food since she didn’t eat anything yesterday. Her period is late.” Jesup’s eyes widened. “I’m going to take her to Dr. Howard when she wakes up so he can run a pregnancy test. She needs to know for sure.”

“Holy fuck , man,” Jesup breathed as he ran his hand through his hair. “How do you feel about that?” That was the question I was dreading. He shook his head. “On second thought, how the fuck does she feel about this?”

I was dreading that question even more.

I grunted and stuffed my hands into the pockets of my cargo pants. “I’ll step up and do what I need to do for her,” I told him, though I knew Jesup already figured that much. “I love Addy. I always have. If she’s pregnant with Joey’s kid, it’s not going to change how I feel about her.” I swallowed hard, blowing out a harsh breath as I glared at the table in the center of the room that had the club emblem engraved into it. “As for her… well, she fucking cried herself to sleep last night on the bathroom floor,” I told him quietly, pain lancing through my chest as I thought about how fucking heartbroken she had looked last night. “So, I don’t know how the fuck she’s feeling about this shit. She just lost Joey, only to find out she’s probably carrying his kid. It makes his death a double-edged sword straight through her heart.”

Jesup leaned against the wall, crossing his ankles and his arms as he steadily regarded me with that unnerving gaze of his. “What’s the plan if she is?” Jesup asked me.

I let my eyes meet his. “We protect her and that baby at all costs,” I told him. He nodded. “And we keep the Sons of Hell intact as much as we can because in about nineteen years, that club is going to fall into that child’s hands.”

Jesup nodded in understanding. “Charles looks like he might become a problem,” Jesup commented.

I nodded. “Addy has already warned me.” He raised an eyebrow at me. Adelaide had been in a lot deeper than me or him had originally thought, and she knew how that club worked. “When that club does fall apart, we’ll do what we have to do to make sure that the Sons of Hell stays a club.”

Jesup pursed his lips. “You think they’ll make Addy a president since she’s carrying Joey’s kid?” he asked me, knowing that was a possibility since she had been an actual club member.

I clenched my jaw. “Over my fucking dead body,” I snarled. Jesup smirked. “The life of a president is too fucking dangerous, and she’s a mother before anything else if she is pregnant. Her only worry and concern will be to make sure that child is safe, protected, loved, and taken care of. Nothing else. If the Sons of Hell eventually need a fucking leader, we’ll patch them over, but I will not have Addy as the president.”

Jesup nodded. “Understood.”

“I don’t know who the fuck you think you’re talking to,” I heard Addy snap at someone through the closed chapel doors, “but you better back the fuck down before I give you a goddamn reason to need plastic surgery.”

“Aaaand she’s awake,” Jesup drawled with a chuckle as he opened the door and we rushed out of the chapel to stop Adelaide from getting into a fight.

Addy was glaring at Emma, one of the newer women, and Emma was glaring right back at her. I let my eyes run over Addy, taking a moment to drink in her curvy figure. She was wearing a pair of jeans that clung to her round ass and thick thighs and a black t-shirt with her black combat-style boots. I swallowed hard.

Fuck, I was never going to get over how fucking sexy she was.

“I don’t think you understand how things work around here,” Emma snarled at her. Adelaide sighed in aggravation. River, one of my patched members, gently pushed Adelaide back, giving her a stern look to stay back. My blood pounded in my veins, but I tamped it down. It wasn’t like he was hitting on her. He was merely keeping her ass out of trouble. “The president doesn’t allow women to fucking call on him. He gets us when he’s ready to have one of us. So, no, you don’t need to know where the fucking president is,” Emma snarled at Adelaide.

Emma wasn’t wrong, but Adelaide was different.

Before I could stop Addy, she grabbed River’s half-empty beer and threw it at Emma. Emma shrieked and ducked down right before the bottle could hit her in the face, letting it crash against the wall instead. Most men would be pissed that their beer had just been wasted, but River just looked amused.

“Woah—everyone chill the fuck out!” I barked, coming up behind a seething Addy. River stepped back, letting me take control of the situation. Jesup’s sorry ass was too busy laughing at the entire situation to be of much help.

I settled my hands over Addy’s shoulders, feeling some of the tension drain out of her shoulders as she subconsciously stepped back against me. “Grim, she’s fucking crazy!” Emma shouted, calling me by my street name.

“Watch your tone with me,” I snarled at her, making her flinch and cast her eyes away from me. Adelaide snorted. I gently squeezed her shoulders, warning her to get her attitude under control. “Now, what’s going on?”

“I’m about to break her fucking fake nose,” Addy snarled, tension bleeding into her shoulders again. “That’s what’s fucking going on.”

I massaged her shoulders gently. “That’s not what I asked,” I stated calmly, knowing that arguing with Addy wouldn’t get me anywhere. The woman was hotheaded as fuck. “I asked what was going on.”

“She demanded to know where you were, Grim,” Emma stated. “I told her what you tell all of us—not to ask for you.”

“You really don’t have any fucking idea who I am, do you?” Addy asked Emma as she tilted her head to the side the tiniest bit. It was a predatory move, and fuck if it didn’t make my cock hard.

“Obviously not,” Emma snarled at her. “But judging by the way Grim is with you, you mean something to him.”

“Smart girl,” Jesup commented. I sighed. He really didn’t help situations much. “I knew Grim kept you around for a reason.”

I rolled my eyes at Jesup. “Adelaide, meet Emma,” I introduced. “She’s one of the newer additions to the club. Emma, meet Adelaide, my old lady.”

“Your old nothing ,” Adelaide snarled, snatching herself out of my grip as she turned her angry eyes on me. I vaguely heard River snort in amusement, and I turned my gaze to his. He only raised his fresh beer to me before rolling his lips into his mouth, staying silent.

I looked back down at Adelaide. Fuck, she looked so gorgeous when she turned that fiery gaze on me. “I’m no one’s goddamn old lady, Tristan, and you better get that through your thick fucking skull.”

I narrowed my gaze at her. I hated when she fought this shit between us. We could be great together if she would just stop fighting me every damn step of the way. “You are mine , Adelaide,” I said, my tone coming off cold, but there was a hint of a warning there for her to stop while she was ahead.

She stepped up to me, jabbing her finger against my chest as she glared up at me. Fuck, she really wasn’t scared of anything. “I am no one’s , Tristan. I can be a girlfriend, but I am not yours , and I am certainly not your old lady.”

I gripped her finger in my hand and yanked her against me, wrapping an arm around her waist as I dipped my head down, covering her lips with mine. She instantly kissed me back, her hands gripping my cut tightly in her fists as she tugged me closer to her, a low moan sliding from between those perfect fucking lips.

God, she was fucking addicting.

I pulled back enough to stop kissing her, but my lips still brushed against hers as I spoke. “You are mine , Adelaide, and to claim anything different will only get you fucked into submission, understand me?”

Her breath hitched in her throat at my words as she nodded her head. I released her, stepping back as she drew in a deep, shaky breath. Jesup barked out a laugh. I glared at him, but Jesup had known me for so long that he didn’t even heed my silent warning to shut the fuck up. “I swear, even though she’s obviously not the same girl that she was when she was eighteen, the effect you have on her is still the same.”

Addy scowled at him and bared her teeth, not amused by him in the slightest. “Watch yourself.”

He held his hands up in a surrendering gesture, but the smirk didn’t drop from his lips. She sneered at him before she turned her beautiful eyes back to me. “Want to go to the doctor?” I asked Addy.

Her throat bobbed as she swallowed, and fear flashed through her eyes as the fight inside of her quickly disappeared, leaving behind a frightened, vulnerable woman. I stepped closer to her, resting my hands over her upper arms as I ran my hands up and down them, trying to soothe her. “You need to,” I told her quietly. She drew in a deep, shuddering breath. “I’ll be by your side the entire time. I swear,” I promised her.

She blew out a harsh breath, then nodded her head. I grabbed her hand in my own and laced my fingers through hers as I pulled my bike keys from my pocket. “Jesup, can you hold everything down here?” I asked him, though I knew he could without me having to ask.

He nodded, his eyes flickering to Addy for a split second before he returned them to me. “Got it, Grim.”