Trix and I continued with our regular routine even though most of the club’s kids returned to school at the end of the summer. I decided to homeschool Trix for preschool that year. We’d had too many changes and upheavals as it was. I didn’t want to add to the things she would have to tell her therapist as an adult.

Thankfully, the weather cooperated, so we were able to spend most of our time outside, which left us both with golden tans. I’d actually never had a tan before. I’d either burned or stayed pale, but I guessed Dragon was on to something when he’d slathered us with sunblock this summer.

I missed Dragon the worst at night after Trix had gone to sleep and the house was quiet. I missed his hands on me, and the scruff of his beard rubbing against the back of my neck as I fell asleep. I missed falling into bed, exhausted, after he’d worn me out with a sweaty round of sex. I missed falling asleep with the window open and his hot body keeping me warm. I missed it all.

My belly grew, and Trix helped me rub lotion on it every night, laughing as we drew faces with the white lotion. I wanted her to feel like she was a part of things, so I included her in anything I could when it came to her little brother or sister. We both felt the hole in our lives, but just like every other time we’d been alone, we just grew closer. We played games, watched movies, and shopped for baby things. It was a relaxing way to spend my time while I healed and grew round.

Dragon’s ex, Kendra, never showed up at the club again. The boys had feelers out all over the West Coast, but nobody had heard from her. We weren’t sure if Tony had dumped her somewhere or if she’d just skipped town, but her whereabouts were the last on my list of worries. I had enough on my plate.

Pop never came home.

I’d gotten the full story from Vera after the lawyer left, the day he’d told me Tony was dead. Apparently, Tony was found in a luxury hotel suite, his throat slit by the steak knife that had come with his room service dinner. The security cameras in the hotel hadn’t caught a glimpse of anyone near Tony’s hotel room the night he was killed. There was no forced entry, and there were no prints to be found because it was such a high-traffic area. The murder case was still an open investigation, but the police had no leads. It was as if he’d slit his own throat.

Only a few of us knew the truth, and we weren’t talking.

Nobody had seen Pop since the day he’d dropped Trix off with Vera after they’d visited me at the hospital. I was worried. It wasn’t like Pop to just take off with no word. Slider didn’t seem to have the same concerns though. I finally asked him about it, a few days after I’d had the wires taken off my jaw.

“Brenna, your pop left that life behind him when he came here. That kinda shit…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “It leaves marks on a man, even if he feels it’s justified. He’ll be back when he gets here,” he told me as he started to walk away.

“Yeah, but where is he?” I asked in frustration.

“Your man has a hard day. What’s he want when he gets home, Brenna?” he asked me with his eyebrows raised in question.

“Oh,” I answered him faintly.

“Yeah.” He nodded. “He’s got a woman near Salem. I’ve met her a couple times…got some weird-ass fuckin’ hippie name and long-ass dreadlocks. Nice broad though…he’ll be here when he gets here.”

“His room…why’s it yellow?” I asked, the picture becoming clearer.

“Yup. That was her doing. Said it would help his aura. Whatever the fuck that means,” he told me and then walked out, leaving me standing in the middle of the clubhouse.

For the first two months without Dragon, I was weepy and lonely. I missed him, and I couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t see me. Did he not miss me as much as I missed him? Did he decide I was just too much trouble? Did he regret filing the papers for Trix? My mind spun ’round and ’round, each scenario worse than the last. I was a mess. I used the baby as my excuse every time Trix saw me crying for no reason.

“I’m okay, Trix. Sometimes, when mommies are making babies, it just makes them cry a lot,” I told her.

Dragon sent a message home with Casper after a visit one Sunday after he’d been gone almost two months. He loved me and missed me. He loved the babies. He’d be home soon.

I cried for two days.

Once I recovered from Dragon’s message, my attitude changed. With each day my belly grew, so did my anger until I was afraid I’d explode. How dare he tell me I couldn’t visit him! What an asshole! I’d just had the shit beat out of me, my Pop freaking assassinated my ex-husband, and my jaw was wired shut during the first queasy month of pregnancy, and he couldn’t even see me? I was livid. My indignation got me through the last month of Dragon’s incarceration. It was ironic, really. The anger I was finally feeling made the days pass quickly.

When it was almost time for him to come home, I cleaned the house from top to bottom. I didn’t know if it was because I wanted him to come home to a clean house or because I had way too much nervous energy. The entire place freaking sparkled when I was through with it. I also went with Vera and bought all new bras and underwear—frilly, lacy, silky pieces of nothing, which I knew he’d love. I’d only fit into them for another month before I had to start shopping in the maternity section. I even went to a salon and got my hair dyed back to its original bright red hue.

My anger hadn’t abated. I could still feel the fire in my gut every time I thought of Dragon, but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t counting the days until he got back. I was almost giddy when the day finally arrived.