Priest: A Motorcycle Club Romance (The Viking’s Rampage MC: Tucson Chapter Book 2)

“Jenny! Over here!”

I skirted around tables and made my way to where Seek was sitting. A frown pulled at my brows as I realized she wasn’t alone. Oh no. How was I supposed to pump her for information if there were other women here?

Seek jumped up as I approached and pulled me into a hug. “Jenny, this is Kit, Susie, Daisha, and Tory. I thought maybe you’d like to meet the other old ladies in the club,” she said as she introduced us.

“They’re old ladies,” the gorgeous dark-haired woman said with a husky laugh. “I’m just the sister of one of the members.” This was Kit. Seek had tossed a lot of names at me, but I was good with details.

“Who’s your brother?” I asked after I said hi to all the others.

“Smokehouse,” she said with a roll of her gorgeous blue-gray eyes.

“Oh, I remember him,” I said with a grin. He’d nearly started a fight at my friend’s wedding. It’d been a bit of a misunderstanding, but had gotten cleared up. Quickly, and with a lot of fists.

Kit’s brows shot up. She gave Seek a questioning look. “I thought you said she was Priest’s?”

“She is.”

“Then why does she know my slutty brother?”

My eyes widened when I realized she thought I’d slept with Smokehouse. He was a charmer, so it didn’t surprise me that he had a reputation with the ladies. My response came pouring out so fast I couldn’t filter at all. “God no! Gross. I didn’t have sex with him,” I said it a bit too loud and three older ladies glared at us from the next table. “Or anyone else.” The last part was a weak whisper as my face flushed.

Daisha, Susie, and Tory all burst into giggles. Their heads had been swinging back and forth like they were watching a tennis match while they listened to our conversation.

“That’s good,” Susie said. “It’d take the whole club to pull Priest off Smoke if the idiot had fucked with his old lady.”

Temporarily side tracked by the thought of Priest and Smokehouse fighting I blurted out, “They would fight each other over a woman? Like, brothers from this chapter would fight?” For all I knew that was typical for the Austin Chapter as well. It was the women I’d known better than the men after all.

Kit gave me an indulgent smile. “Honey, if the cable so much as goes out and, absent of anyone else to hit? Yeah, they’ll fight each other. Sometimes out of sheer boredom.”

My head was spinning. I hadn’t spent a lot of time around the MC in Austin so a lot of this was still very new to me. “Okay…” I needed to get back on topic. Where to begin explaining? I motioned to Kit. “I met your brother in Texas about a year and a half ago or so. At a wedding.”

Seek explained to the others that I’d been living in Austin and had been friends with the MC there. Once she finished, I looked at the other women. “I don’t know where all of you are getting the idea that I’m Priest’s old lady. He broke up with me months ago.”

They all exchanged knowing looks. “We heard,” Kit finally said. “But we also know he was planning on heading back to Texas to clear the air and bring you back.”

I blinked in shock, my mouth momentarily unable to form words. He’d been coming back for me? I’d come to the conclusion that he was only claiming he wanted me because I was conveniently dropped on his doorstep. Now to hear he’d been planning to come back…

“Why can’t he ever tell me anything?” I growled in frustration.

That set them all off in laughter this time. “Welcome to the club,” Daisha said with a wink.

“Yeah, the MC, the old ladies club, and the group of us who can’t understand men at all,” Tory said in a droll tone.

“Especially not these men,” Seek added. “It took months before Hush stopped jerking me around and made me his old lady. I mean, I understand why now, but do you think he told me why at the time?”

“No,” everyone chorused together.

“I’ve come to the conclusion that they can only speak so many words a day, so by the time they need to tell you something important they’ve already hit their limit, so it’s up to you to guess your way through grunts and groping,” Daisha said.

That was Priest right down to the last grope. It lightened my heart to have a group of women who legitimately understood what I was going through. It made me feel an instant bond with them. I sighed and gave them all serious looks. “I don’t really know any of you yet, but I could use your help.”

“Ooo,” Kit said, shifting in her seat and eyeing me because she knew I was about to tell her something good. “Lay it on us.”

“I don’t want you guys to think I’m gossiping-”

“Pleeeease, gossip,” Susie begged. The others nodded.

I told them about everything that happened yesterday. Once I opened my mouth, it just spilled out. I probably shouldn’t be telling them about Wendy, but judging by the looks on their faces they already knew about her cancer.

“That’s so sad,” Tory said.

“Wendy is a nice enough lady,” Daisha added.

“And no one deserves what she’s going through,” Susie followed up with.

“But she never really belonged,” Kit said. “I’m not trying to be mean. She just never wanted to be a part of the lifestyle. Priest wanted to be in the MC and she just sort of…”

“Tolerated it,” Susie supplied.

Daisha continued, “As you’re well aware, this MC does more than ride bikes on Saturdays. These men especially, they need a bit…more…in their lives. They never really left the military lifestyle, that part of it anyways.”

I knew she was referring to their vigilante activities. I knew all about it since I’d seen them help the Austin Chapter out when they needed it. The fighting, the adventure, and helping others was ingrained in them. I didn’t mind that. Sure there were some who wouldn’t understand how I could condone it, but each of these guys had their own moral code. I’ve seen it in action, and I’ve seen how they love their families. Who am I to judge them? I wasn’t a saint either.

“Wendy knew Priest needed the club and this lifestyle, but she wanted a family man. Not that Priest isn’t. She wanted a banker, who’d be home by a certain time and never get into trouble with the law. Ultimately she just put up with it, until she didn’t,” Tory explained.

“Exactly. Which is fine, but with all of us living on the compound it made things awkward,” Kit continued. “Then there was what she did when they divorced. It’s sort of hard to forgive her for that, even though Priest has.”

“What did she do?” I asked, curiosity clawing at me.

“That’s his story-” Kit started.

“Took those sweet girls away from him and wouldn’t let them see each other…” Susie said, trailing off when she realized Kit wasn’t going to tell me that. “Oops.”

“We should tell her everything,” Seek suggested. “Not that I know much.” She gave me a sheepish grin. “When you asked if you could talk to me about him I figured not only could you meet the others, but they’d know more than me. Two birds, one stone.”

I laughed. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

Kit caught my attention again. “Priest is a pretty private guy. I know he looks all surly and grumpy a lot of the time, but he has a heart of gold.”

“Big as Texas,” Daisha said with a nod.

“He’s a good guy,” Kit continued. “He was torn up about sending you that text-”

“How did you know about that?” I asked.

“Priest and Kit are friends,” Susie answered. “She’s one of the few women around he talks to. He hardly ever talks to any of the sweet butts.”

“Except Sylvia,” Tory reminded her.

“Yeah, but Syl is different. She’s happy just having a place to belong and work. She’s not searching for a biker to make her an old lady, at least not the guys in the club now,” Daisha commented.

“We’re friends,” Kit reiterated, getting the conversation back on track. “I’ve known the guy for too many years for us not to be. Anyway, he never wanted to hurt you. He was just overwhelmed with taking care of his ex and his kids, and trying to make sure that everyone in his life was okay. That’s a common theme for him.”

Seek glanced over at me. “Is the Wendy thing an issue?”

I looked at her in shock. It was like they could read my mind.. “You mean am I jealous of her?” There was a tiny piece of me that was as awful as it was to admit.

“I would be,” Tory piped up.

We all fell silent as the waiter put down two glasses in front of each of us. The orange liquid could have just been orange juice, but the fact that it was in champagne glasses gave it away for what it truly was.

“Yum! I love mimosas,” Susie said with a grin. “I haven’t gotten to drink in far too long.” She shot me a pained look. “Can’t drink while breastfeeding. But I pumped enough this morning to make sure this is out of my system before I go back to being the milk cow.”

Everyone laughed and I just shook my head. She didn’t look like she had a young baby. At least not from what I could see while she was sitting down.

“Drink up,” Seek said with a laugh. We all picked up our glasses and said cheers.

“I don’t think I’m jealous of Wendy,” I told them. “At least not for the most part.” It was pretty obvious that Priest and she were over. Or as much as it could be between co-parents. Then I remembered what he’d told me last night. Wendy was going into hospice and wasn’t expected to live past a month.

Sourness spread in my stomach for even having the faintest negative feelings toward her. I took a large swallow from my mimosa to take the edge off the guilt.

“Don’t let her stop you from getting together with Priest,” Kit told me. They obviously hadn’t heard the news yet. Priest was probably spending the time with his kids. It could be days before the others would find out, but I wasn’t going to tell them. It wasn’t my place.

“That’s not it,” I replied, hesitating. If Kit was as close to him as she said, I didn’t want to piss her off talking about this.

As though she could read my mind she reassured me, “I’m not going to tell him anything we talk about here.”

“Those men can gossip with the best of us,” Tory said with a happy smile, “but we don’t tell them anything an old lady tells us in confidence.” They’d given me a quick rundown on who their men were. I was realizing I wanted to know more about these women and I hoped we could all be good friends, even if I didn’t date Priest.

“I’m not sure I can give him another chance,” I told them. It was embarrassing, but I admitted, “He really hurt me the way he went about it before. And then to find out he’d hid so much from me when I was opening up to him about my life… How can I trust him?”

They all fell quiet as I spoke. The others looked to Kit to explain. She gave me a sympathetic look. “I understand. All I can say, once again, is that Priest is super private. He doesn’t tell just anyone about his life. And I know he should’ve been more open with you, but he obviously hadn’t gotten there yet. I know he would have if Wendy hadn’t taken a turn for the worse.” She drained the first glass and plopped her elbows on the table, and her chin in her hands while she spoke. “I can promise you one thing, Jenny. If you give him another chance, he’s not going anywhere. He’ll make you his old lady. He’ll bring you into his family, both with his kids and the club, and he won’t let you go.”

“He let Wendy go,” I said softly. It was as though talking too loudly would break the hope that was building up from somewhere deep inside. Her words were everything I wanted.

Kit shook her head, her dark hair reflecting the light. “It was never going to last with Wendy. We all knew that from the moment we met her. Never told him that, of course, but those of us who know him, and love him, knew it. You?” Her eyes sparkled as she said the thing I longed to hear the most. “You’re different. He’s never going to be able to let you go, Jenny.”

God. I wanted that so badly. Was I letting myself get talked into this because it was such a deep-seated need burning within me? I wasn’t sure, but I somehow knew these women wouldn’t lie to me. Kit believed every word she spoke.

I didn’t mention to them that he was already claiming that I was his. A thrill raced through me at the thought of belonging to him. Of him being mine and always being there for me. I still had some thinking to do, but Mom had been right. Talking with these women, who knew Priest well, had eased some of my fears.