Page 109 of Ice
“Unless you wear my name, babe. You have to be my old lady before I’ll let anyone else near you. They need to know you’re mine, and that I’ll kill anyone who even thinks of touching you.”
“Is this your idea of a proposal, Ice?”
His lips turned up slightly.
“You had something else in mind? I’ll let you talk to Reacher tomorrow, but I want a vote asap, because I want you as mine.”
“Vote?”
He shrugged. “Club life, innit. Everything that changes the dynamic here, or adds to the club, needs a vote. A unanimous vote.”
Hell, I knew a little about that, but I hadn’t considered we’d actually get to this point. What if one of them doesn’t like me? That’s all it would take to stop it from happening. To stop us from happening.
Fifty-Two
Itdidn’ttakemuchfor her to say yes, so the next morning, I hunted down Reacher, who wasn’t in his office, or his room, but the room we refer to as our ‘Church’. He was resting his head on one hand, eyes on the surface of the table. I tapped on the door, and he almost looked like he jumped, before he nodded me in.
“You were miles away, Pres. You want me to come back?”
He shook his head. “How are you doing, brother? You look like you’re doing better.”
I nodded, grabbing my usual chair.
“Lissa makes a big difference, and I know it’s not just me she’s helping. She’ll make time for you, Pres, just say when. I was thinking she might be able to help others in the club in the same way, what do you think?”
He smoothed his hair and shrugged his shoulders a little.
“Sorry, been here a while. Uh, yeah, I think that could be a good move. I’m sure Stitch will need someone to talk to whenhe’s back. Hell, everyone here has some kind of shit going on, right?”
“I have to make her mine first though, you understand that, right? Like, I can’t let her be in a room with any of the others without my fucking name on her. I get it now, how you felt, how Ryder felt. It’s fucking consuming me. I need to own her first.”
Reacher grinned briefly, then it slid from his face.
“Yeah, turns out it makes a big difference, that ink. Ally is my wife, but the club didn’t accept her, and that fucking eats at me every day. Nobody has their back more, outside of their own brothers, yet they denied me my claim on her.”
I couldn’t imagine how much it must have hurt both of them for her to be rejected by his family like that.
“You can’t overturn that? At least hold a re-vote? I’m sure they’d vote in favour this time, now they can see how important she is to you.”
Reacher stroked his beard, staring at the table again.
“I can’t just overrule their vote. I’m a President, but I’m not a dictator.”
“Could have fooled me.”
He smirked, which was pretty much what I was going for, because he wasn’t all bad, just a pain in my ass sometimes. Maybe even often.
“Maybe it’s time for a change to the rules, Pres. It shouldn’t be possible for one or two assholes to stand between any of us and the women we love.”
He shrugged. “I’ll talk to Stitch when he’s able to think about that shit. The club is a democracy, I just can’t go making changes like that for my own benefit.”
“The club is what you and Stitch made it to be. If you want to make changes, then we either suck it up, or we’re fuckwits and don’t deserve to be here. Same with the no riding rule. We’rebikers through and through, even if we end up unable to ride, right?”
He fixed me with a glare. “You making a point about me? I’m still fighting fit, dickhead, and Stitch’ll get back on his bike when he can.”
I was done hiding. If I kept holding back this secret, then I couldn’t put my focus on my woman, and our future together. Hell, I’m not a ‘future’ kind of guy, but with her, I really fucking wanted one.
“Pres, I need to tell you something.”
