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39

WRAITH

T wo days later, I’m sitting in church, thinking about Fen. The relief on Raven’s face when I’d stepped back into that apartment and told her Marco was gone from their lives was palpable. But Fen threw himself at me and, through tears, whispered, “I knew you’d come.”

I play lots of roles. Iron Outlaws brother. Sergeant at arms. Lover and future husband. But I think being the rock on which Fen can depend has got to be the one that honors me most.

Being a kid’s safe place? Yeah. That’s what life’s about for me. And I wonder how soon I can persuade Raven we should have more kids.

I spent the rest of the day with the two of them up at the clubhouse. Managed to get both Raven and Fen up on horses with a little help from Smoke. I know it won’t immediately fix how Raven and Fen felt after Marco left, but I just want to create a pathway to happy for them whenever I can.

Hearing the two of them laugh was everything.

Butcher strikes the gavel. “One last order of business.”

Grudge rolls his eyes. “Fuck me, how long is this meeting gonna drag on for?”

Catfish shrugs. “You always hate meetings about our budget.”

Grudge lights another cigarette. “Because I trust you to take care of numbers shit so I don’t have to.”

“Stop bickering,” Butcher says. “This will take two minutes.” He reaches beneath his desk and pulls out a delicate leather cut, then pushes it to me.

There’s a whole bunch of cheering and hollering, and I can’t help but grin. I turn it over, and on the back, it reads, Property of Wraith .

I gave one of these once. I wondered if it would still feel special having already done it. But I realized that love can be different without being less. Not sure I could live if I lost Raven and Fen. I’ve endured that kind of loss before and it’s devastating. What I have now is more than I ever imagined being lucky enough to find again.

It was the way we sat against that tree until it went dark, just talking. About what happened, about how it felt, and how we want to live the rest of our lives.

Without even knowing what I meant about a dom being in top space, she knew how to ease me while I was in it.

Felt like some real pagan shit, fucking her on the dirt beneath the trees, letting it unite us both in a way I didn’t think possible.

“Congratulations,” Catfish says.

“Fucking jealous, brother,” Smoke says.

He caught up with me the day after the picnic. He’d known we were there, had even come by while Raven was sleeping in my arms to see if we needed anything.

If you got a woman you can trust, love, have kids with, and fuck into the dirt, you’re a lucky man.

He told me he wanted the same.

I asked for a vote at church yesterday. It was unanimous.

And now I had a woman to hand it to. But there is something I have to do first.

“Thanks, brothers. Means a lot. You mind if I check out today to go put this on her?”

Butcher shakes his head. “Go do what you gotta do to get her to accept it.”

I didn’t tell them I already asked her and knew what her answer would be.

The flower shop is on the edge of town, and I call in on my way to where I’m going.

And I’m sure the florist thinks I’m a cheating bastard when I pick up two large bunches of flowers and one small one. But as I pull up to the cemetery where Hallie and Lottie are buried, I find it hard to care.

I grab the pale pink long-stem roses and the little pink buds, then step out of the truck.

The sun is shining through the new leaves unfurling on the trees. And when I reach their grave, the sun hits the ground in rays, landing straight on the headstone.

I place a palm on the cool gray marble, and the ground is dry as I sit in front of them.

“Hey, Hals. Happy birthday, Lots.” I lay the flowers on the grass above them. Hallie always loved pale pink. Was the color of her wedding flowers and bridesmaids’ dresses.

“I want you girls to know I will always love the two of you.”

I look up at the leaves on the tree and take a deep breath as the tears sting.

“It’s just…I’ve missed your constant chatter and babble, Lots. The way you were always so excited to see me when I came to pick you up out of the crib after a nap. The way you’d throw those chubby little arms of yours around my neck. I can’t help but wonder who you would have become and it hurts to know I’ll never find out the answer. And cover your ears for the next bit because it’s for your momma.”

I wait, imagining her as she was, in her highchair in the kitchen, when she’d cover her ears or her eyes and playfully laugh.

“It’s been lonely without you, Hals,” I continue. “I miss having someone to come home to. Someone who’ll listen to me. Who’ll ease me. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life alone, but I thought I was going to, because no one else would be you. But I met someone. Her name is Raven. And I really need to know you approve, Hallie. Because it would fucking kill me if you didn’t. She’s kind, hardworking, and brave. And, no, she isn’t you, because no one could replace who you were to me. But she’s also everything I thought I couldn’t have or didn’t deserve again. She’s fast become the sun that gets me up in the morning. I loved you hard, Hallie. Real fucking hard.”

The tears spill over now as I run my fingertip over the year she died engraved into the marble.

“But it’s time to say goodbye. I couldn’t say it the day we buried you. Couldn’t say it when I was killing anyone I thought was involved. But it’s time now. I’m sorry I wasn’t there at the end. But I hope I was a good enough husband and dad while you were alive that you don’t hate me for it. And I hope you can understand why having Raven see me through the rest of my life is a second chance at happiness. It’s fucking unfair that it wasn’t us, Hals. But it’s time to make my peace with being allowed to find the same kind of joy with someone else.”

I wipe my eyes with my hands, then run them through my hair.

“You sweet girls will always have a special place in my heart. Hallie, you’ll always be the one who wrangled the boy into a man. Lottie, you’ll always be my eldest daughter, no matter who follows. And Fen will learn who his sister was. He’ll know who you both were. You won’t be forgotten, I promise. But it’s time to let myself love and be loved by someone else.”

I kiss my fingertips and press them to the cold stone. Then stand.

Despite the tears, I feel like a weight has been lifted off my chest.

Grief is a weird thing. It changes form and intensity. It’s like a receding tide that occasionally rushes back to shore thanks to a big wave. It never goes away. I’ll always have been married before. I’ll have had a child before. The things I do with Raven and Fen in the future may remind me of Hallie and Lottie in my past.

But the melancholy shifts. I can simply remember their smiles and be happy about it.

I use the walk back to the truck to ground myself, and realize that I’m proudly walking to Raven, not sadly walking from Hallie. And my heart seals itself back together.

When I get to the apartment, I grab the colorful wildflowers and the cut, then let myself in. Raven was grateful I’d thought to keep the spare key and didn’t ask for it back. I got her a key to my place…even though she doesn’t have a truck to get there.

I’m working on getting them a vehicle, though.

There’s music playing through a phone. Some cartoon princess song. And I can hear Fen and Raven belting it out at the top of their lungs. I pause in the stairwell, certain they can’t hear me over the top of their performance.

Raven can carry a tune but doesn’t know all the words. Fen can’t sing at all but loudly shouts all the lyrics. He squeals with laughter when Raven hits an excruciatingly high note.

And everything I said in the cemetery is true.

It’s been lonely without this in my life. I step up the rest of the stairs and watch the two of them. They’re dancing, Raven spinning Fen around in circles.

I put the flowers down on the table and step in to scoop them both into my arms.

Can I dance? Fuck no.

Hallie wanted me to line dance with her, and I refused point blank.

But this? With my two favorite people in my arms in the privacy of our own place where no one else can see me? Yeah, this I can do.

“Axel,” Fen says, throwing his hands around my neck.

I love that he’s comfortable using my real name and how that might change to Dad eventually. “Hey, bud.”

Raven tucks herself into my other arm. “We’re not ready. I’m sorry. We just decided to have a dance party, and one thing turned into another.”

I press a kiss to the top of her head. “Dance parties are important.”

Fen wiggles out of my arms, and I put him on the floor before I gather Raven close again. “Wanna make more babies with me?” I ask.

Raven looks up at me and smiles. “I think we should. With our gorgeous genetics, it would be rude not to.”

Her answer makes me laugh, and I lead her to her gifts.

“I brought you flowers because I want to. But I got you this because I need to know you were serious.”

I hand her the leather cut and show her the back. “You ready to be my old lady, to ride on the back of my bike and be my property for the rest of your life?”

That was one of our conversations in the forest. What does it mean to be property? Raven listened, asked questions. She was nervous, after the way her ex treated her, that she’d be kept in place.

I assured her my only concern is to give her a happy life, whatever that looks like.

“Yes,” she says, clapping giddily. “A thousand times, yes.”

I hold it out for her, and she slips one arm through, then the other. “How does it look?” she asks, as she lifts her hair and tugs it over one shoulder so I can see the patch on her back.

I finally feel whole again. “It looks like you were always meant to be mine.”