Page 155 of Knight
Gray beamed. “He’s so fucking talented.”
Knight nodded. “Cyrus did the needle work. It was a coverup job, so it was a little tricky.”
“He did nice work with it. You can’t even tell something else used to be there.”
Flynn looked too. “Tattooing my brother’s nickname on your arm, huh? Are you two finally going to admit this is serious?”
I glanced at Knight, spotted the humor in his eyes, and said, “Nah. Just a phase. Right, Will?”
He nodded. “As long as the phase lasts the rest of my life.”
“Aw, so cute,” Bailey called, then pantomimed gagging.
“As if you have any room to say something!” I called. “You two are hopeless!”
A round of laughter said the rest of the guys agreed.
Gray excused himself to join Dalton, Axel, and Emory over at the picnic table.
“I’ll get us some drinks,” Knight offered, brushing a kiss to my cheek before heading toward the house. Halfway there, he got diverted by the new dog, bending down to give him a thorough petting.
“Careful, or you might be taking home a stray,” Flynn said with a chuckle.
“Oh, that’s a given. Knight was bummed when we had to return Waffles. He got pretty attached to him, especially when Waffles gave him all that loving and cuddles after his fight.”
“How is he doing with all that?” Flynn asked.
“He’s doing good. He was a little torn up that night. He hated revisiting his old life like that.”
Flynn nodded. “I know what that’s like. When Snake showed up and tried to drag me into shit, it was scary. I didn’t want anything to ruin what I’d found here.”
Snake was a former prison inmate who’d tried to manipulate my brother into helping him rob the junkyard. Thankfully, everything had worked out okay in the end.
“You don’t want to go to prison ever again,” I said softly. “That’s understandable. You lost so much time.”
I didn’t sayfor me, but it hung there between us anyway, unsaid but understood.
Flynn slung an arm around my shoulders. “It wasn’t really about that. I’d go to prison again for any of the guys here.” His gaze bounced from Bailey—playing with the rambunctious border collie, Oreo—to Holden and Shiloh by the grill to the other brothers at the picnic table, and finally to Knight, whowas coming back out the door with two Solo cups in his hands.
Flynn smiled. “I’d fight for any of them, you know? I love them. They love me. That’s what family is.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Yeah.”
I understood a little better after Knight’s fight. The way the Redemption Road guys all stepped up to have his back despite the risk to them. The way I hadn’t been able to bear the idea of sending him off and waiting at home where it was safe.
I’d have fought for him myself if I had the ability.
“But, Aids, the way you guilt yourself over what happened? I want you to stop. We were dealt a shit hand, you and me. Your dad was not a good man.”
I bit my lower lip, nodding. “That just makes it worse, though. He wasn’tyourdad.”
He squeezed me. “Only dad I ever knew, though. And besides, we don’t choose our parents, do we?”
“Guess not.”
“I owe you an apology,” Flynn said softly. “For leaving you there. I thought his violence was only for me, but—” He stopped and shook his head. “I should have checked in more.”
“You were young,” I said. “Mom told you to go. You were just doing your best in a shitty situation. We both were.”
