Page 41 of Property of Baffle
“I had to wake Nell up to check on her.She heard you out here and sent me with a message.”A message coming from my wife instead of her inviting me inside wasn’t a good sign.“Go back to the woman who is truly more important to you, Rick.I’m clearly not her.”
“Son of a bitch!That is not true,” I yelled back so she could hear me.“You are my everything, Nell.She’s fucking nothing.”
“Maybe you should have remembered that before you canceled date night with your wife to run off and rescue Roxy,” Angel said.Then, my sister turned around and walked back into the cabin.At some point, Brady had parked his ass back down in the chair on the porch, but that didn’t mean he relaxed his shotgun.
“Go on back to the clubhouse.She’ll still be here after you get some sleep.”
What choice did I have?I knew I’d fucked up the minute I sent Nell that text earlier, but there was nothing I could do to take that back.I turned around, hopped back on my motorcycle, and left.
22Healing
Nell
I rolledover and cried as my husband rode away from the cabin.Yes, I desperately wanted to see him.I wanted his arms wrapped around me and to feel safe with him again.The problem was, every time I closed my eyes, I saw that text he sent.More importantly, I saw her fucking name.It didn’t matter if my rational mind could explain it in a way where jealousy and heartbreak didn’t have to be involved.My heart ached because he picked her.He was there for her in my time of need and no matter how inexplicable, I couldn’t work my way around that.
“Did he say he was in an accident?”I asked Angel as she came back inside.
She nodded.“It looked like it, too.I wanted to go hug him so badly, but sister solidarity won out.After everything he learned about our parents’ past, you would have thought he would have sent someone else to deal with that bitch.”
Angel wasn’t even fully in the know about who the hell Roxy was, beyond the lies that her P.I.had been told.I took the time to fill her in while I was in the hospital to help keep my mind off everything.Everything being the fact that my husband hadn’t shown up for me.At all.Not before my ordeal, during, or after when I had to sit through X-rays and getting my leg set and cast.
“I know he would have passed it off to someone else if he’d been able to.Somewhere in here,” I lightly tapped the side of my head.“I also know that cell signal is impossible to get on some stretches of road, and maybe he didn’t even know I was hurt for a while.The logical side of my brain still works.”
“But it doesn’t stop your heart from hurting over the other parts,” Angel added.
“Yeah, I think I just need a couple days to try to process and make it all make sense in a way that no longer hurts my heart.Does that make me a bad person?”
“No.After what you went through, you need to put yourself first and focus on healing, whether that’s your body, mind, or your heart.I’ll be here by your side until you don’t need me anymore.”
“Was he hurt?”
“Maybe a little, but I think his hurt was more about his heart, too.”
“See, that makes this so much harder,” I mumbled as tears spilled over onto my pillow again.
“I know it does.You need to try to get your rest, Nell.I’ll be waking you again in about two hours.”
“Thank you for doing this,” I managed to tell her.
“What are sisters for?”Angel’s smile was real and it made me feel so fucking welcome and wanted.I’d never had siblings growing up, so it was wonderful that my new sister-in-law took the job seriously.I hoped she stayed around.Not just for my husband’s sake but for mine and maybe even Brady’s.I was wrong before.I no longer thought he just had a simple crush.The man had it bad for my beautiful sister-in-law, whether he was ready to admit it yet or not.
I tooktwo days to wallow in my own self pity.It was also in my own funk, but I remedied that with a shower, finally.Then I hopped on my crutches and made my way down to the UTV Brady had on standby and drove myself over to the shop.Wallowing with absolutely nothing to do except rot my brain further with reality TV was a suck-fest of misery even I could no longer inflict on myself.
When I made my way over to the shop, it felt as though I could breathe again.I needed to get back to work so I could get out of my damn head and stop arguing with myself over whether my logical mind or my heart was the one I needed to follow.Since I’d suffered a minor concussion, I didn’t think it was wise to slide on my helmet.Instead, I put on safety goggles, picked up the Dremel, and went to town on a few places where I needed to make some intricate little patterns in the metal.I was so lost in the hum of the tool and what I was doing that I didn’t even realize someone had pulled up a stool to watch me work.
After having someone look over my shoulder most of the previous week, I didn’t think twice about it.I should have.When I finally put the Dremel down to shake off the buzzing sensation in my hands, I glanced over and saw that it was my husband on that seat.
“I know you still don’t want to see me, but you deserve an update on what’s gone down.”
I gave a quick nod of my head as I gathered my things to put them away.It was wild that I was tired already and couldn’t have possibly been there for more than a couple hours at most.Still, eventually, there was nothing left for me to clean up or organize so I sat with a huff and listened as Rick told me everything.
“When I left, it wasn’t for Roxy or even her mother.It was because there were supposedly five members of the Mojave Devils looking to set up shop in a town that is only about three hours from here.Most of the men were in Flagstaff to help Squeak out of a situation.Some of our other guys were on distribution runs for our shrooms.There were only three of us available to go, and that included me.”He leaned over to touch my arm, but I rolled my chair out of his reach.
“I deserve that.Don’t fuckin’ like it, but I get it, sweetheart.Okay then.Right to the point and I’ll be on my way.There weren’t any fucking Devils in Truth or Consequences that day.Roxy and Lila came up with the lie to get us there in the hopes that it would soften the club’s stance on Rox.They were trying to make her look sympathetic.They fucked up, especially since the club had so much going on that day and was stretched far too thin to have to deal with their bullshit.”
I almost felt bad for Rick, especially because my husband sounded so damn defeated as he spoke.I had never heard him sound like that before.
“They’ve been banned from the club, both of them.Not just our clubhouse and properties, but nationally.They aren’t to have any contact with members, affiliates, families, or be anywhere near any club properties.They’ve also been exiled and aren’t allowed to settle in New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, or Colorado because they’re all too fucking close to home.We have someone making sure they land elsewhere and eyes will stay on them for a little bit.Every current member of the club throughout the country was sent notice of their exile along with pictures and the fact that they were tossed for multiple, major betrayals against a member and the club as a whole.”
