Page 33 of Guarding Glenda

“She called Sam. They talked about therapy or some shit, so he called me and said she needed to leave here.”

“What the fuck, Hammer! He’s not even a member!”

Hammer crossed his arms. “He’s also the one that kept her alive. If you gave a fuck about her, you’d be more worried about her than your own fucking ego. Get a grip.” Hammer started to turn to leave. “Don’t come to the clubhouse until I say it’s okay.”

I glared at him. “Or what?”

“You show your face before I say, you will be fined and flogged.”

“Get out.”

Bruce was whining at the back door, but I waited for Hammer to leave before I let him in. “Good boy.”

Bruce sat at my feet, so I knelt down and rubbed over his ears and down his thick neck. “You tried to stop her, huh?”

He chomped his jaw.

“I figured you would.” Looking around, the kitchen was a mess and we’d knocked over Bruce’s food and water bowls. I told him, “Guess we gotta clean all this shit up now. And see how long it takes before I say fuck him and go, anyway.”

Chapter 14

Glenda

My nerves were shot. After calling Sam, Allie called. The irony. Bama’s sister was stuck at the clubhouse and was fighting to go back home and here I was trying to get back to the clubhouse. But Hammer didn’t want to come alone, plus Linny was still with me. Hammer had ridden over on his bike and Allie picked us up in her SUV. She lived back in Georgia, but when everything went down with Linny’s ex, who happened to be a cop, Bama worried for her safety. He and Hammer forced Allie to stay. She threw a fit, but when these guys tell you to do something, you may not like it, you may try to fight it, but ultimately you just do it.

Forcing Allie to stay close was for her safety. And I was glad she was there for this. Most of the other bunnies were friendly, but Allie was different. She was a lifer, even though she wasn’t an Old Lady… yet, anyway. We all had our suspicions about Hammer wanting her. When Bama was up the road, she’d visited a few times, and he checked in on her when he was up that way. She’d even gone on some runs with us. Always said it was just him being a friend to an old friend.

Hammer joined the Royal Bastards when Bama was locked up and Jameson, the national president, helped him start this new chapter in Mobile. Not long after that is when he recruited Bama, but he’d already recruited Leigh, Reggie, and most of the other officers by then. Something happened between Hammer and Allie somewhere in the middle of him becoming president and Bama getting out of jail, because she stopped coming around and his visits to Georgia got fewer and farther between. But that was none of my business. I figured if she wanted me to know, she would have told me.

That was the thing about Allie. She wasn’t necessarily the friend you could bare your soul to, but she’d always come if you needed her, no questions asked. And she never pushed me to talk. Anytime she was around, she cracked open a beer and just sat, chatting about everything but nothing that mattered.

“Did we lose Hammer?” I asked as I looked in the side mirror.

She ashed her cigarette out the cracked window, her long dark ponytail whipping around from the wind. “He told me he was hanging back to talk to Leigh.”

“Probably for the best. He was in a weird mood this morning,” Linny said from the backseat.

I giggled, but covered my mouth to stifle it. I really had to learn to control that. But I wasn’t laughing because it was funny. It was always a nervous thing, it just sounded like I thought something was funny.

Linny added, “Okay, weird is not the best word choice.”

“Bama’s face was all fucked up. Not the worst I’ve seen it. Said they had a little disagreement,” Allie said with a grin. She and her brother had a strong bond, but they still ribbed each other, especially her.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I said. Their argument was part of why I wanted to leave Leigh’s. What Dr. Stanley said made sense.

So why was my stomach in knots?

Linny had gathered my things for me, and the whole time I was shaking. But that was probably because I was nervous that Leigh would wake up. When we realized he had fallen asleep, it made sense to keep it that way. At least that’s what we thought.

Although, when we were trying to sneak out the front, and Bruce followed, I almost went to him. Leigh had been lying in his recliner, lightly snoring. There was a pull, like my body wanted to be in the chair with him. Of course, thinking of his dark, intense gaze when he looked at me didn’t help, nor did the fact that he’s practically chiseled from stone and covered in tattoos. But that was just my loneliness trying to run things. Not only was it probably best for me to get away from him, but it would be best for him, too.

We weren’t anything to each other. He didn’t need to be serving me, constantly checking on me, and waiting up for me to have nightmares, only to come and get a shitty night’s sleep so that I could rest. It wasn’t fair to him.

Thinking of all he’d done for me the last week or so made my throat tighten. I fought the pressure that tried to fill my face. I rolled my window down, letting the cool air hit my face and tamper the heat that was trying to rise.

This was the right thing. I was just emotional. And of course I was. I was relapsing hard, still recovering from almost being beaten to death, and I’d been stuck with a man I hated.

I kept telling myself that as we rode back to the clubhouse.