“You said you’d call the cops; they’d do nothing for you, so I did.”

“Well, he came and had a go at me about it last night.”

“I’ll come and see him again.”

“God, no! Just stay out of it, okay? I think we’ve come to an understanding.”

I grinned. “Hate to break it to you, sis, but it looks like I was right again.” I held up my fists. “People listen to these.”

She rolled her eyes. I laughed and turned to Carla. “So kiddo, what do you want for your birthday?”

She groaned. “Nash, I’m a grown woman, I’m not your kiddo anymore.”

I hooked my arm around her neck and dragged her closer to me. “I think if we could just get this one thing agreed upon, it would make my life a lot easier. You’ll always be a kid to me and as such you shouldn’t date ever again. Okay?”

Jamison started laughing. “I’m with Nash on that one, Carla. If he and I didn’t have to deal with the guys that want into your pants, our stress levels would dramatically decrease.”

She struggled out of my hold. “I’m only thirteen years younger than you so I’m not sure why that’s a huge deal to you.”

“Hell, even if there was only three years between us, I’d still have issues with it,” I muttered. Carla had given us many reasons over the years to worry about her; Erika too. But Carla seemed to have a knack for finding the biggest dickheads around.

Mum stepped into the conversation again. “Thank God Nash and Jamison worry about you, Carla, I’ve lost track of the number of times they’ve had to bail you out, baby.”

“And score three to Nash. Right again,” I boasted with another huge grin on my face.

Everyone in the room groaned, but I continued to flash my shit-eating grin at them. Family. It was just what I’d needed tonight. And to think I’d almost walked away from them after I served time years ago. Thank fuck Griff had talked some sense into me and led me back to them.

***

I walked out of church the next day in a worse mood than I’d walked in. The feeling in the club at the moment was very apprehensive after the fall out between Marcus and J, and Marcus had just cemented his asshole status. Problem was that most of the boys were behind him, leaving the few of us behind J with our dicks swinging in the wind.

“Nash, got a minute?”

I turned to see Marcus walking towards me. “What’s up?”

“You know where J has gone?”

“No, that fucker doesn’t tell me anything,” I lied.

He assessed me for a second. His scrutiny pissed me off; actually, everything about him pissed me off.

“You seen Madison lately?”

“Fuck, Marcus, I don’t keep tabs on your daughter. If you wanna see her, you sort that shit out, don’t go through me.”

His anger threatened to erupt, but he kept it in check. “You need to learn some fuckin’ respect. Shit’s gonna go down and if you don’t pull your head in, things are gonna get real messy, real fuckin’ quick.”

I stepped closer to him. “Have the fuck at it, asshole, because the way I’m feeling, I could give a flying fuck.” My anger burned in me; it was getting harder each passing day to contain it, and Marcus copped a lick of it.

He growled. “Remember you said that.”

I watched him walk away; his shoulders were rigid and he strode like he was on a warpath.

“Marcus giving you grief?” Scott caught up with me, a scowl on his face as we watched Marcus talking to some other club members.

“Asked about J and then threatened me. What the hell was up with that meeting?”

Scott shrugged. “Got no idea. He keeps shit to himself these days; doesn’t tell me much of what’s going on.”

“Looks like his intention is to get us back into drugs. Not a good fuckin’ move.”

“That run he’s organised is a bad move. Cops are all over shit at the moment, the last thing we need is to be caught up in that.”

“You need to talk to him, brother,” I suggested. Marcus had volunteered our guys as protection for a drug run the Adelaide chapter was organising.

Our eyes were drawn to Griff who had just approached Marcus. Marcus gave him a friendly slap on the back and Griff hit him with a smile.

“That looks fuckin’ friendly,” I mused, “You know what’s going on there?” The last I knew, Griff had come around to our way of thinking and was trying to figure out what Marcus was up to.

Scott frowned. “Yeah. No idea what that’s all about.” He directed his attention back to our conversation. “Problem with this Adelaide deal is that Marcus seems to have convinced everyone else it’s a good plan. We’re in the minority on this one which doesn’t give us many options.”

“You heard from J?”

He shook his head. “Not yet. He’ll have to come back soon though or Marcus is going to get suspicious.”

Our attention was drawn again to Griff. He was laughing at something Marcus had said. That was odd because Griff never laughed at anything.

“Definitely something going on there,” I said, feeling mild irritation at Griff.

Scott watched them for another couple of moments. “Yeah.”

“Fuck!”

Scott raised his brows at me, questioning my outburst.

“It just feels like if it’s not one thing, it’s another at the moment.” I lifted my hand and rubbed my neck but it did little to alleviate the knots that had formed there. Shit was hitting the fan in all directions and I wasn’t sure if I would escape unscathed.