Madeline Sheehan - Unbeautifully

Ripper and Cox looked at each other. Damn.

“Brother’s gonna blow,” Cox whispered.

Blow a load, maybe. Brother was about to tackle Tegen caveman-style and fuck her right in front of anyone.

“Naw, dude,” he whispered back. “Look at him, he’s hard up for that bitch. Who the fuck knew he’d been feelin’ Tegen all this time?”

Yeah, who knew? And really, who cared?

Not him.

This fucking club was full of secrets and it was getting straight up exhausting.

“Tegen.”

Everyone turned to look at Deuce.

“You’re gonna reel this bullshit in right the fuck now and go see your mother. I ain’t payin’ for that apartment in Cali so you can come home and act like an asshole, shittin’ on everyone just ’cause you fuckin’ feel like it. You feel me?”

Tegen snorted. “Yeah,” she said. “Whoop-dee-fucking-doo. I can’t wait to go hang out with my comatose mother. My fucking idiotic, comatose mother who got herself shot because she was stupid enough to fall for one of you assholes. Hopefully she’ll die, be put out of her misery, and I won’t have to keep watching her throw her entire life away for a man who doesn’t give two fucks about her.”

Everyone was openmouthed staring at Tegen who, even after her rant, was casually taking a bite of her sandwich.

“That’s right, fuckers,” she said around a mouthful of sandwich. “I said it.” Then spinning on her heel, she headed for the hallway.

Deuce started after her but Cage intercepted him. “This is my fault,” he said, pushing his father backward. “I’ll deal with it.”

“Motherfuck,” Deuce muttered, staring after him. “Ten bucks says he fucked that mouthy little asshole. Motherfuckin’ little fuck can’t keep it in his pants for shit. Cocksucker would fuck a hole in the wall. Probably has.”

“Prez,” Cox called out, laughing. “You remember his prom, him never comin’ home and we went lookin’ for him. Found him in the girls’ bathroom at the school, pants around his ankles, face in the toilet.”

Ripper couldn’t help himself, he burst out laughing. That had been some funny shit.

“Fuck me,” he said. “That shit was straight up awesome.”

“It was disgusting,” Danny interjected, her eyes on him. “And embarrassing. You know he had three dates that night, right?” She shook her head. “Disgusting.”

“You’re all disgusting,” Deuce muttered, his accusing stare locked on Ripper.

Ignoring him, Ripper stared at Danny, not knowing what the fuck to say but thrilled she’d spoken to him. She held his gaze, her muddled feelings plain as day. She still thought he was going to leave. She didn’t trust him. Not only that, she didn’t trust herself. She felt that her love for him was clouding her judgment.

So he tried to convey how determined he was to make it up to her. That he’d wait until she was ready. He didn’t want to wait, he wanted to straight up jump her, but he would wait. They could go as slow as she needed and he would fix this shit between them and try his damnedest never, ever to fuck up again.

Swallowing hard, she covered her mouth with the back of her hand and turned away from him. Deuce caught the slight movement, narrowed his eyes in concern, then turned to him and straight up glared.

“Good times,” Cox said, looking from Deuce to him and back to Deuce. “Always good fuckin’ times at Horsemen High.”

“Yo,” Tap called out, walking into the room. “Jase called. D’s awake.”

“Fuck,” Deuce breathed, running his hands through his hair. “Finally, some good fuckin’ news.”

“Yeah,” Tap said. “One problem.”

“What?”

“She don’t remember jack shit.”

“So?” Cox said. “Who’d wanna remember gettin’ shot in the head? I wouldn’t.”

“Idiot,” Tap muttered. “She doesn’t remember anything. Anyone. Nothin’. Not even her fuckin’ name.”

“She’s alive,” Deuce said, already heading for the hallway, most likely to grab Tegen. “Let’s focus on that.”

“It’s very rare that an injury this severe doesn’t result in some kind of permanent damage. And that’s something that can take months or even years to determine the full extent of.”

“Danny!” Ivy squealed, bouncing in the waiting room chair beside me, waving my cell phone around in the air. “I beat level thirteen!”

“Shh,” I whispered, trying to hear what the doctor was saying to Jase.

“Age is also a factor,” he continued. “Individuals in their teens and twenties have a tendency to recover more so than a woman in her thirties.”

“Great,” Jase growled. “But what the fuck about her memory? She doesn’t even know who the fuck I am!”

My father put his hand on Jase’s shoulder and on his other side, Eva slipped her arm through his. Jase shuddered through his next breath, before focusing back on the doctor.

“She’s very lucky to be alive, Mr. Brady. Ninety percent of people who suffer gunshot wounds to the brain die almost immediately. In Ms. Kelley’s case, the bullet traveled all the way through her brain but luckily did not pass through the brain stem. Right now, as far as we can tell, only her memory has been affected, whereas the majority of survivors of this type of injury not only suffer memory loss, but difficulty reading and problems with hand-eye coordination, some ending up in long-term rehabilitation or nursing care.”

Jase was already agitated by Tegen’s appearance at the hospital. She’d taken one look at Jase, marched right up to the nurses’ station, and very loudly stated that he was not family and under no circumstances was he allowed to see her mother.

And now the doctor was not telling him what he wanted to hear, worsening his mood.

I had to give that doctor credit for facing a room full of emotionally charged bikers and holding his own.

“You mentioned rehabilitation earlier,” Eva said, glancing worriedly up at Jase. “Is that something that could help with her memory?”

The doctor nodded. “But I don’t want to jump the gun. Her memory loss could be due to swelling from surgery. As she recovers, she might regain what she’s lost. We’ll have to wait and see.”

“Wait and see?” Jase repeated, shoving away from my father and Eva. “Wait and motherfuckin’ see?”

My father wrapped his arm around Jase’s chest and pulled him backward. Jase pushed away from him and spun around. “Fuck!” he yelled. “Fuck!”

Sighing, my father reached for him again. “Ja—”

“WHERE THE FUCK IS HE?”

My head jerked right. Now what?

The occupants of the waiting room went silent as everyone watched Hawk storm through the room. Still wearing his chaps, covered head-to-toe in road dust, his Mohawk significantly grown out, he must have been on the road awhile. He had probably had gone directly to the club, found out about Dorothy, and come straight to the hospital.

The moment Hawk zeroed in on Jase, his entire body tensed. The next thing I knew he was running, quickly closing the twenty feet between Jase and him, and everyone else was backing away.

“Call security!” the doctor shouted in the direction of the nurse’s station.

Hawk bent his head and barreled into Jase, sending them both flying backward into the elevator. Ivy shrieked, jumped into my lap, and buried her face in my chest. I wrapped my arms around her and turned my body away from the fight.

“You fuck!” Hawk roared, sending his fist into Jase’s face. His nose broke on impact, an audible, resounding crack that had me cringing in sympathy. And he just kept going. With every punch Hawk threw, blood from Jase’s broken nose sprayed everything in a ten-foot radius.

Two security guards came rushing from around the corner at the same time my father and Mick were trying to pry Hawk off Jase, without much luck.

It took four men to drag Hawk away and even then, all four of them were struggling to keep a good hold on him.

One hand covering his broken nose, the other grasping for the wall, Jase struggled to stand up.

“What is wrong with you?” he yelled, his voice muffled by his hand.

“What’s wrong with me?” Hawk bellowed. “You almost got Dorothy killed. You almost got my fuckin’ kid killed! That’s what’s fuckin’ wrong with me!”

Jase’s hand fell away from his face. “What did you say?”

“Danny,” Eva said frantically, grabbing Ivy’s waist and pulling her off my lap. “Let me take her.”

Clutching Ivy, Eva headed quickly toward the front doors while Hawk managed to wrench an arm free long enough to elbow one of the security guards in the face. The man went stumbling backward and Hawk used the distraction to break free. My father lunged for him but ended up missing him by a mere thread.

Jase found himself pinned up against the elevator by his throat.

“Do the math, asshole,” Hawk hissed. “Nine fuckin’ months ago, where the fuck were you?”

I quickly counted the months backward in my head and my mouth fell open. That wasn’t Jase’s baby. Jase and Bucket had been on a run through Mexico for over a month, if not longer.

“No,” Jase whispered. “No, she wouldn’t—”

“No? Brother, yes. She’s been comin’ to me for years, cryin’ about you. And if you’re still havin’ doubts, I know for a fact you were usin’ protection with her, and me, I wasn’t even tryin’ to safeguard my shit. I blew my load inside her every fuckin’ time, know why? Because,” Hawk growled. “I was tryin’ to knock her up. Wanna know why? Because I was tryin’ to get her the fuck away from you!”

Spittle flew from Hawk’s mouth into Jase’s face as he continued laying into him. But Jase couldn’t care less. Dumbfounded, unable to speak, he could only stare unblinking at Hawk.