Page 75 of Stoker's Serenity

We spent the day on a sunshine-filled ride, the wind whipping all cares or worries away. Hope rode double with Cutter this time as we wound our way on scenic highways and byways on a loop of waterfall exploration.

Let me tell you, these weren’t anything like the waterfalls in Florida. The waterfalls in Florida were barely a trickle by comparison. We picnicked on a big blanket near one of them, which is where I learned about Cutter and Reaver’s propensity for knives as well as that the entire trip had been staged for my benefit – that part of the fun for these guys was target shooting back at the lodge, and rather than place me near the gunfire, they’d opted for this day-trip so everyone could be satisfied.

I couldn’t be upset about it. In fact, I couldn’t believe they had gone so far out of their way for my benefit. I may have even teared up a little.

“Aw, don’t cry!” Doll had hugged me and Hope had shaken her head a bit ruefully.

“You’ve got a family now, Orchid. Better get used to it.”

It was more than a bit of a foreign concept.

I’d been a mistake. My mother had, for the most part, been a working-poor single mother. I’d been a welfare baby, had been mostly in charge of taking care of myself starting when I was seven. I mean, from seven to nine I was a latchkey kid while my mother worked shifts at the local WalMart.

Then she met Daryl. He’d moved in, and let me tell you, he’d never had a problem telling me what a drain, what a waste I was.

I left school bullied and generally beat down, only to go home and suffer through it some more. I was living proof that words sometimes could hurt more than a rock or a fist. I don’t honestly know how I held my shit together, how I hadn’t attempted suicide or something.

Yes, you do.

Kyle.

Kyle, and then Linny.

“As long as it’s how families are supposed to work,” I said, “then I’m on board.”

Cutter shook his head and asked me, “Just what happened to you, anyway?”

“Shitty home life,” I said with a shrug. “Shittier school life. Kids are assholes,” I said and didn’t want to expand much beyond that.

“It’s cool,” he said. “You ain’t gotta tell us shit. We all got our pasts and secret pains. Just know that with us, you ain’t gotta hide it. You really do just get to be you.”

“I am,” I said with a smile. “There’s really not much to me.”

“Now, that is a damn lie,” Stoker said and pulled me into his side, smacking a kiss to my forehead. Everyone laughed and I laughed too, but I honestly didn’t see it or understand it. There really wasn’t anything to me that I saw.

“Someone mentioned you were in a school shooting, that’s why the little road trip – what was that like?”

“Reaver!” Doll slapped him in the chest, but he didn’t move, just kept that unsettling, still gaze on me.

“Awful, and no offense, it’s not something I talk about,” I said shifting uncomfortably.

“I’m sure Reave didn’t mean anything by it, sugar. What I think he meant to say was if you ever need to talk about it, any one of us is around to listen. Doesn’t do well to bottle things like that up,” Cutter said, stretching.

“He’s right, on all accounts,” Hope said.

I nodded.

“No, I know, I just don’t talk about it and would really rather not – like ever, if I can avoid it. It’s too painful.”

“Alright, you guys,” Stoker came to the rescue.

Doll jumped in to help.

“It’s totally time for a change of subject,” she said, and just like that, the subject changed to the fights that were supposed to happen that night.

As in fist fights between the guys. I was pretty sure Hope was the only female just as enthusiastic about it. I understood things like boxing and televised MMA fighting, but just randomly beating the crap out of someone that was supposed to be your brother?

“See, I don’t get it,” I said, laughing. “Maybe it’s lost on me because I never had any siblings.”

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