CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

 

Seven held a mug of coffee between her hands as she paced the length of her kitchen table, watching her father make origami creations out of her mail pile.

He might think that he was cool under pressure, but she knew better. As far back as she could remember, he would make pyramids and buildings out of the junk mail when he was nervous. Cullen would fidget with whatever crisp paper was at his disposal.

It had driven her mother silly. That was how they had always been able to tell when times were tough or Mayhem business was toeing the edge of a brutal decision, from the number of accordion-shaped pieces of paper stacked around the house and pinned down by beer bottles and lighters. No doubt Cullen's time in lockup had only expanded his origami talents—though he'd always gotten in a piss whenever she called it that, saying that was a girly word, that he was just folding shit.

Either way, she knew he wasn't as confident as he seemed.

"You have me alone. What do you want to say here that you couldn't possibly say there?" Seven backed against the wall, inhaling the scent of coffee to keep her calm. She leaned against the wall as though it were just a casual conversation and not one that she'd thought she had years to plan for.

He tossed his papers aside, and Seven gripped her coffee mug as the mess went in every direction, no order to how it landed. Even though he took time to stack and crease the papers, when they landed zigzag, on top of one another, the mess was like fingernails down a chalkboard to her. She wrenched her eyes back to her dad, and he pushed his chair onto the back two legs.

"You know? You disappoint me."

Her arms dropped a few inches, but she stopped their freefall, pulling the coffee mug against her chest. He could not bait her. He could not shock her. That needed to be the day's mantra. Seven painted on a fuck-you smile like it was war paint. "The feeling's mutual, Dad."

"I wonder if Johnny feels the same." He crashed down on all four legs of the chair to punctuate his thoughts.

"The only thing Johnny cares about right now is blow. So I'm sure it's fine. Is that what you came here to talk about? My ex? Your ex?"

"Sure, Lucky. Family. Loyalty. Where's your loyalty, kid? Your pop shows up out of the clink after six years, and that's how you act?" He raised a cocky eyebrow. "Sounds to me like you have too many masters."

Her heart beat faster, hating that even behind bars he was able to get information about her. "So long as my master isn't you, I'm doing all right in life. If that's what you had to say, just go to the compound if that's what you want to do. We'll be polite with each other if I'm there. I won't get in your way. Whatever it is that you're here to do, I think they're smarter than you are." Her dad shook his head, chuckling as though Seven were mistaken. "You still listen to me. Otherwise, we wouldn't be here, talking. You serve foolish masters and don't even know. But this is where your loyalty should be. Always with me. Not with your coffee shop. Not with those new bloods, who think they know better about my club."

Seven's heart jumped as he called it his club. It hadn't been his in a long time, and even though Mayhem had him on a pedestal, Cullen Blackburn was old news and no longer president. He was too dangerous and wanted things the club didn't need. It wasn't the intention of how he had set it up to begin with. That was what she could recall from when she was little—the great stories about why Mayhem had come to be. The talks about brotherhood and about bikes. The belief in Harleys as a lifestyle, the power of the open road. Not what they had become—greed and corruption and power.

The front door opened as the terrifyingly beautiful sound of Nolan and Bianca ran inside followed by Glamma trailing them. "Get a clean shirt. Next time, I'll find a smock first."

The temperature of the room plummeted to subzero, and Seven jumped in front of her dad as he stood. "Don't you dare go over there," she hissed.

"You want me to miss a chance to see my grandbabies—two other things that you're a slave to."

Tunnel vision was in full effect, and her hands itched to push him away, force him out of their world, away from what she loved best. "Don't go back there."

"At least you don't have a man who's your master too. Maybe that is the one benefit of Johnny choosing the powder over you."

"Oh—oh!" Gennita stepped into the kitchen behind Seven, and she had not heard the older woman even coming.

Masters and loyalty. The kids had been kidnapped. Her dad. There was so much in the tornado of chaos happening right now that Seven wanted to scream, and she hadn't even heard someone coming near—even though Gennita was as safe as one could be. Seven needed to clean up her life, control things more… better. She turned around, eyes imploring Gennita to get the kids out of the house.

"We'll be going. Right now." She backed out of the room, smart enough not to turn her back on Cullen Blackburn, and called to Bianca and Nolan that they were leaving that second, new shirts or not.

The door slammed shut, and Seven turned back to her dad.

Those babies, Nolan and Bianca, those were who she was supposed to be loyal to. That was who she was supposed to protect from horrible, life-sucking decisions and people like her dad and their dad. She was supposed to be their mother, their protector. "Get out." Cullen didn't move. "Get. Out!"

It was all she could say. Over and over and over until she saw his boots moving then heard the door close and his Harley roar away.

The sun was out, but her world was squeezing down. The walls inched in closer as the ceiling dropped, and the floor held her feet with every step, making walking an effort. Breaths were harder to take as she cleaned up her father's pile, first trying to smooth out the papers and fold them the way they should be then failing and shoving them in the trash can, where they mocked her, calling to her, making her skin crawl.

"Holy shit. This is too much," she whispered as her cell phone rang. Unable to catch her breath, Seven glanced at the screen. Adelia. She could handle Seven's mother fine.

Seven scooped every piece of paper that her father had folded out of the trash and brought them to her sink then lit a match and watched them burn. The black smoke was stronger than she'd expected, and the fire alarm beeped in her hallway, making her head pound as the alarm screamed. "Shit." She ran to the couch and grabbed a pillow, knocking over the blankets as she ran to fan the fire alarm.

Finally, the siren stopped. She was panting, not from effort or exertion, but from the mental toll that this exasperation had taken on her. The blankets were on the floor, and she wanted to pick them up immediately, but she forced herself to go to the kitchen, wash the ashes down her sink, and scrub them away.

This was too much. Tears burned her eyelids, and she had to force herself to slap off the water faucet. It felt as though Seven were drowning as the water dripped to a stop.

She turned, unable to look at each drop, and rushed to the living room to pick up the blankets, folding them as precisely as she could, when her phone rang again. Shoot, she didn't have time to talk to Adelia.

She didn't have time for any of this!

After the last blanket was folded and everything was stacked the way it needed to be, she walked over and picked up her phone, fingers shaking, and saw the text message.

 

JAX: Hey. I wanted to say hi. I won't be able to talk for a few days. If you're around now, that'd be cool.

 

She swiped the message open as though she were going to type something, but she had no idea what as overwhelmed tears spilled.

Her dad's words about loyalty and serving too many masters circled in her head as chaos erupted like a volcano, poisoning her thoughts. All she could see was Bianca and Nolan's faces, and how she had failed them. Her crushed heart hadn't dared even ask them how scared they had been when they were taken.

There was only one thing that she could be responsible for. It wasn't herself. It was her kids. Seven threw the phone onto the couch, and her tears refused to stop until she walked away, leaving Jax's message on the couch. With her dad's voice in her head, Seven kept walking out the front door to Gennita's house to be with her kids.