Shattered & Scarred: The Sacred Hearts MC by A. J. Downey Page A

and broke elegantly at the end and I swear to Christ a tear sprang to my eye. Reaver sniffed and I looked over at him incredulously but that was when Ashton decided to turn around and saw all of us standing there like the eavesdropping idiots we were.
    She started hard and dropped her spatula with a clatter letting out a little shriek. Dragon and Reaver fell out laughing and I couldn’t help but smile and chuckle with them. She pulled her headphones out of her ears which were hidden beneath her hair and smiled, blushing a furious shade of pink.
    The two men started clapping and whistling and I went over to her. She was breathing hard from her fright and I pulled her into a hug.
    “You got a set of pipes kid.” Dragon commented.
    “Thank you.” Came her embarrassed reply, her face buried in my chest. I laughed.
    “Sorry we scared you.” I said.
    “It’s okay, sorry if I was being disruptive…”
    She was met with a round of “No…”, “ Naw!” and “Not at all.” From the three of us.
    “Sing any time you like.” Dragon said, “Anyone gives you trouble you send ‘ em to see me.” He took a seat at the bar, Reaver joined him and I reluctantly let her go, bending and retrieving her spatula for her. She washed it quickly at the sink.
    “What was that anyways?” I asked.
    “I dreamed a dream from Les Miserables.” She smiled and held up the pot, “Coffee?” she asked and was met by three caveman grunts in the affirmative.
    “You know its nice pee wee, but you don’t have to serve us.” Reaver said as she poured.
    “Oh it’s okay… I like to…” she put her headphones in and turned back to the kitchen. When she started singing again, softer this time, we traded looks.
    “How bad did I bone that last run?” I asked Dragon quietly.
    “You didn’t. My boy pulled it out.” Dragon answered.
    “Yeah, worth it.” I said.
    “Yeah, I don’t disagree.” The older man said.
    “Was tha t the last one?” Reaver asked.
    “For now, we got one more.” He grunted, “Then it’s time to cool it. We do any more they’re going to catch on and then this’ll turn into a real clusterfuck. Leastways now that we got people to worry about.” Dragon nodded in Ashton’s direction and I couldn’t help but smile.
    We weren’t your typical MC, at least not anymore. Once upon a time we’d done it all, running drugs, money, guns… you name it. The turnaround came about five years ago after Dragon’s Old Lady, Dray’s mom, got killed. A rival gang had shot up the old club house. She and two members had gone down in the fire fight.
    I was still just a prospect, fresh out of the military and off deployment looking for a home, trying to tame some demons of my own. After Dragon lost Tilly he decided to go legit, saying if he’d done it sooner than maybe she’d still be alive. We’d gone from an outlaw club to legit inside two years.
    Then last year we decided we could maybe do more and the pendulum swung the opposite direction. We went from illegal, to legit, to vigilante.  The key of smack that I had failed to deliver, I had failed to deliver to the rendezvous point where we destroy those kinds of thing s. We had a strict rule about not bringing that shit near our house and I’d broken it bringing Ashton here.
    Never was I so grateful to be a member in good standing with the rest of these guys. Because of the circumstances I had not only managed to save her but my own ass from a serious beat down for breaking the rules. The votes hadn’t even been slim. Dray was the only one to vote in favor of kicking my ass. He was a hardcore stickler for the rules, which wasn’t a bad thing, it’s just not everything was so black and white.
    Dray was pissed off at the fucking world, quick to anger and quicker to violence since his mom had died . Dragon kept him in line but just barely. He still had hope for his kid and the rest of us humored him but Dray just wasn’t cut from the same cloth. He was fiery and hot