Back to the Beginning: A Duet Read online

  “We could save time by showering together,” he yelled at her back.

  He could hear her laugh, and it absolutely made his heart sing.

  Sticking her head out of the door jam, she leveled him with a look. “Remember what happened last time we showered together?”

  He gave her a smug smile if there ever was one. Back then she hadn’t been on birth control like she was now, and their moment of spontaneity had resulted in Tatum. He wouldn’t give her up for the world, but he wasn’t sure they could handle another one either. “Tatum is a blessing,” he argued.

  “She is, but she’s also got the worst traits of each of us. Stubborn as hell too. Whoever ends up with her is gonna have to be a patient man.”

  Liam pressed the heel of his hand against his sternum. It positively gave him a panic attack thinking about his baby girl growing up. If he could, he’d lock her up and never let her age past toddler stage, but he knew he couldn’t, and he knew at some point in the future he was going to have to come to grips with that.

  As Denise closed the door, he hoped like hell that Tatum would have the type of relationship her mom and dad did.

  ‡

  Chapter Nine

  “Denise, meet Devin and Nina,” Liam made the introductions later on that night.

  Denise smiled at the couple sitting in front of them. She watched as the guy, Devin, got up from his seat and clapped hands with Liam, pulling him in for a brotherly hug.

  “Nice to meet you.” He smiled over at Denise, and damn if she didn’t kind of feel her heart flutter a little. This guy was gorgeous, and the colorful ink going up and down his arms rivaled what Liam had. “But everybody calls me Sketch.”

  “Nice to meet you too.” She smiled back and then waved at the woman still sitting at the table. She waved back, obviously used to being introduced by her husband.

  “I can’t believe you finally found a woman to put up with your sorry ass,” Sketch said as they had a seat across from the other couple.

  Liam titled his head to the side and gave his friend a bored look. “Not all of us can lock up women in high school. You’re lucky that damn divorce didn’t go through, let’s be honest.”

  Denise’s mouth opened in shock, and she clapped her hand on Liam’s knee, squeezing hard. “That’s not nice.” She could feel the heat moving up her neck, coloring her cheeks. Turning so that she could look at the man and woman sitting across from them, she was prepared to apologize but instead saw they were grinning in good humor.

  “It is what it is,” Nina said as she leaned into her husband, letting him drop a kiss on her forehead. They shared a look for a moment, feelings and unspoken words passing in the silence. “We did what we did, and everybody knows it. The only thing that matters is that we’re together now.”

  “Amen to that,” her husband agreed, accepting a bottle of beer as a waitress came to their table. She dropped off an appetizer and a drink for Nina as well.

  The waitress took Denise and Liam’s order, leaving them alone almost as quickly as she came.

  “So what are you lookin’ to do?” Sketch asked as he glanced at her husband. It was obvious he loved his job, because his eyes brimmed with excitement.

  Liam rested against the booth, slinging his arm behind Denise, sitting comfortably with her tucked beside him. “I wanna get something to honor our marriage. I already have something for the twins and Tatum,” he explained, gazing down at the woman at his side. Their eyes caught, and he could tell she was remembering the same day as he was.

  “We should’ve just gone to the courthouse.” Denise sighed as she tried to sit still, letting Christine work on her hair.

  “Would you stop moving around, woman? The two of you have waited over two years to make this thing legal. We’re not letting you do it at the motherfuckin’ courthouse.” Christine grabbed her hair, yanking it into the up-do she was working on.

  “I can’t.” Denise’s voice was quiet in the hustle and bustle of everyone else getting ready. She continued fidgeting, ignoring Christine’s request.

  Meredith heard something in the tone and turned from where she was helping Mandy put on her dress. Her gaze was all-assessing as she took a look at her friend. The person who tended to anchor the women of the club was pale, and she looked like she was about to bolt. “You okay?”

  “Nervous.”

  Getting up, Meredith ran around to her friend and shoved her head down, sticking it between her legs. “Breathe, Denise, breathe slow, breathe deep, and don’t you dare puke.”

  Everybody listened to Meredith when she spoke, and Denise was no different. They could hear Denise gulping in huge amounts of air. Finally, when her breathing calmed down, Meredith helped lift her head up. “You good?”

  “I don’t know what happened.” Denise pulled at the neckline of the cover she wore to keep her clothes from getting dirty. “The room closed in on me, and I got so nervous I couldn’t breathe. Why am I so nervous? This is the man of my dreams. He’s changed everything in my life and made it perfect.”

  “Because it’s a big thing when you put a ring on your finger. It makes it legal.” Meredith ran her hand up and down her friend’s arm. “All it is, is a piece of paper, but with that piece of paper, it’s official. It makes you feel like it’s forever. Weird, huh?”

  “Maybe that’s what scares me. I’ve never thought about forever before,” she admitted.

  “Then it’s about damn time you did.”

  “Did you?” Denise fired back. “You know, when you got your own piece of paper.”

  There was a round of snickers in the room. It was a running joke about Tyler and Meredith. Everyone assumed they were married, but nobody knew for sure, because neither one of them would ever fully confirm or deny. Meredith smiled the secret smile she always did.

  *

  The back porch had been cleared of furniture, and there was just enough room for everyone to stand and be witness to the most important day in his life. When he and Denise had talked about where they wanted to do this, the courthouse had come up more than once, but when Liam had suggested the place where so many things had happened for them, they had both agreed on it.

  “Are you ready?” Drew asked his dad, standing up next to him. Tyler stood not too far away, as did Mandy and Meredith on the other side of the aisle.

  “The question is, are you ready.” Liam clapped his hand on his son’s shoulder. “I’m going to be around for a long time.”

  Pulling his dad into a hug, Drew spoke low. “I really hoped you would, even the first time I saw you. I knew our lives would change. Thank you for changing them for the better. Love you, Dad.”

  Liam fought back the tears that stung at his eyelids, but he refused to let them fall. “Love you too, son.”

  As they broke apart, they heard the music that signaled Denise. The group turned around, watching as Denise walked up the small aisle.

  Liam met her steps before she met him. “You look beautiful.” He cupped his hands around the nape of her neck, bringing her lips to his. He didn’t give a shit that it wasn’t time for the kissing portion of the event. With this woman, he did what he wanted.

  Grasping her hand, he pulled her to the makeshift altar, and there in front of everyone they held dear, they committed themselves to each other for the rest of their lives.

  “Y’all have twins and a baby?”

  “Yeah, we have seventeen-year-old twins, and she’s our youngest at three.”

  Nina made a sound of protest. “Holy shit! First, the two of you are old enough to have seventeen-year-old twins, and you’ve started over? God bless you. We have a toddler, and he’s a lot to handle.” She laughed. “Once we get him settled, I’m not sure we’ll do it again.”

  Denise and Liam exchanged a glance, and Liam couldn’t help the lascivious smile that tilted his lips. “Sometimes you get caught up in the moment and surprises happen.”

  They all shared a laugh at that, because they could all understand.
/>   Denise noticed that, like always, everyone assumed Liam was the twins’ dad, and he never corrected them.

  “When you mentioned about adding something on to your back piece, I drew up a sketch.” He stopped and grinned before scrolling through his phone. “I took a picture of it before we left, because I wanted to see what you thought. I’ve got a ton of stuff on here though, give me a minute,” Sketch said as he used his finger to flip through his phone.

  “I saw on some magazine that you did Reaper not long ago.” Liam nodded a thank you to the waitress as she dropped off their drink order and a basket full of bread.

  “Dude.” Sketch grinned. “It was amazing. I’m still in awe that he lets me tattoo him.”

  “Mandy is obsessed with Black Friday.” Denise shook her head.

  From where she sat, Nina added her two cents. “I mean, looking at Reaper, can we blame her?”

  The two women locked eyes, shook heads, and laughed. “Nah!”

  “Oh, here we go.” Sketch stopped scrolling on his phone and turned it around. “So here’s what you already have.” He showed the picture of a tree on Liam’s back. The name Walker ran down the trunk in big, block letters, with big branches up top. In each individual branch, he had the kid’s name, along with their date of birth. “Provided that you haven’t gotten any more work done to that, I’m thinking of giving it some roots, adding your two names to those roots, and putting your wedding date along with a pair of wedding rings in the middle under Walker. If you decide to have more kids, we can add more branches. I can insert your marriage date and maybe a pair of rings here.” He pointed to an empty spot. “We can make the lettering the same as the kids.”

  “I like that.” Liam nodded, thinking about if they ever did have more kids. Would he want something different? “And trust me when I say no one else will be sticking a tattoo needle in this skin. It’s a pain in the ass, but I’ll come here anytime I need to.” He took a look at the sketch again, looking thoughtfully and thinking about the tattoo he already had. Since he had Tatum’s birth certificate, he’d always thought about getting her footprints done. “What about a pair of footprints next to Tatum’s?”

  Both Nina and Sketch stopped, a shadow crossing both their faces. Sketch reeled his emotions back in first. “That’s a personal thing with me. I only do those for memorials.”

  Liam didn’t know the reasoning behind it, but he suspected it was very personal. “If we have another one, maybe I should get a symbol that speaks of their personality. Like Tatum. We call her Tornado Tatum, because she’s wild.”

  “With you as a dad?” Sketch deadpanned. “No fuckin’ way.”

  “I know. It’s amazing, right? I thought for sure there was no way she’d be anything other than her mother’s child.”

  “There is nothing about that child that’s me. She’s all him, and oh my God, is she stubborn. He may as well have made the child on his own, because she is absolutely nothing like me,” Denise agreed. “It doesn’t help that she worships the ground he walks on and wants to be exactly like him.”

  “She asked me the other day how I got a president patch.”

  “How cute!” Nina laughed. “We have a guy from an MC come to the shop every once in a while, and he’ll let Jackson sit on his bike. I think Jackson loves it, and it scares the shit out of me.”

  “Try having a teenage son who’s as bad as the toddler daughter.” Denise grabbed her phone and showed Nina a picture of Drew on the bike he and Liam were building together.

  “Oh girl, you are in so much trouble. How many girlfriends does he have?”

  Denise and Liam glanced at one another. “One, surprisingly,” she answered. “And they are totally in love. We’re hoping they’re not making us grandchildren while we’re here this weekend.”

  “You’re way too young for that,” Sketch assured.

  Slapping her hand on Liam’s thigh, she leveled him with a glare. “Exactly what I said, but this one said, ‘baby, he’s a man now.’”

  “He’s a teenager,” Liam defended himself. “What were we all doing as teenagers?”

  No one could deny the truth of the words he spoke.

  *

  Later on, as they nursed more drinks, after food had been eaten, Sketch glanced at Denise. “Is she gonna get anything done tomorrow?”

  “Me?” She pointed a finger at her own chest. “I don’t think so.”

  “I’ve been trying to talk her into something, but she’s pretty adamant that she won’t be getting a tattoo.”

  Nina grinned secretly at her husband. “There’s piercings too. You might like them more than you thought.”

  “I don’t think that’s for me, at least not at this point in my life.” Denise shook her head, not sure what to say. She’d heard things about other people, and while she was sure it was enjoyable, she just wasn’t prepared to take that step.

  “Alright, so I’m going to do your tat tomorrow before the convention center opens to the public,” Sketch continued talking. “I don’t want you to be surrounded by a ton of people, and there’ll be a lot of visitors who will be really interested in that cut. I wanna give you as much privacy as possible.”

  That sounded good to Liam too. He’d had more than enough when it came to the interest in what he liked to do. This whole trip had been a lesson in how to deal with the general public. Not that he hadn’t needed it, some of it just hadn’t been what he expected.

  “Sounds good. I’ll be there early.”

  “Then we’ll go ahead and knock it out. Just be sure and tell everybody that you got Sketched.”

  “I always tell everybody that I got Sketched, and you know what? That’s starting to mean something, my man. I’m proud of you.”

  Slowly but surely, it seemed like everyone’s lives were falling into place.

  *

  Denise gripped Liam’s hand as the two of them made their way across an almost empty parking lot at the convention center. They had been given special passes by Sketch the night before that allowed them to park their bike in the lot where the tattoo artists parked. Going in through the back, they were on the lookout for the booth number they knew to be Sketch’s. It was different to be there early, not to see so many people milling around. The thought of crowds was one thing that had initially made Liam nervous, but knowing Sketch understood made things much easier.

  As they approached the booth, they saw their friend sitting with his wife. “Hey,” he called out. “Glad you made it early. Let’s go ahead and get this done so the two of you can be back on the road to Bowling Green.”

  Neither one of them liked the thought that they would be going home today, but they both missed their kids. It had been a nice reprieve from the day-to-day monotony of being Mom, Dad, president, and old lady.

  This was the first time Denise had ever seen Liam get tattooed, and she had to admit it was one of the most interesting things she’d ever seen. She watched as Sketch gloved up, put the transfer paper on Liam’s back, and then got to work. She was scared to talk, afraid she would interrupt the man who was so focused on what he was doing, but Nina kept up a steady stream of conversation with her. At certain points, Sketch would interject his own thoughts, showing he was listening to them. Sooner than she realized, Sketch was done and cleaning Liam up.

  “You know the drill. Keep it as clean as possible, put your ointment on it, and don’t scratch.”

  “Thanks again for doing this for me.” Liam clapped hands with his friend. “If I’m not gettin’ Sketched, I’m not gettin’ inked.”

  “Means a lot to me,” Sketch grasped him on the shoulder, “that you let me do anything for you. You’re just as much a badass in my book as Reaper. When you get back, tell Tyler I said hey, and let him know my chair is open whenever he wants to get something for that little girl he and Mer are adopting.”

  “Will do.”

  They all said their goodbyes, and before she knew it, Denise was sitting behind him on the bike, headed north for Bowling
Green once again.

  ‡

  Chapter Ten

  They’d been riding for hours and were almost at their destination. Ten minutes before, they’d taken their Bowling Green exit at the Corvette Museum and were headed down Porter Pike. Two miles from their turnoff, Liam pulled over in a crop of trees and parked, turning off the bike.

  “What are you doing?” she asked. “We’re so close to home.”

  He got off the bike and motioned for her to get off. They stood in front of one another, each glancing at the other. His eyes were a stormy blue, and she had to wonder if she’d pissed him off. “Are you okay?”

  “I want assurances,” he finally spoke. His tone was all gravel and rasp, rough with emotions. “We’re gonna make time for each other. It’s not going to take our friends to get in the middle of our lives for us to do this for one another again.”

  Realization dawned on her as she listened to his words. He wanted to know they wouldn’t take each other for granted again. That they wouldn’t let the gap get so wide they wouldn’t be able to bridge it. While their kids’ lives were important, it was just as important that Mom and Dad have their time too.

  “I hear you and I understand. I won’t let myself get that way again, as long as you don’t let yourself get that way again.”

  He knew it would be hard; he could already feel the tension sweeping up his back and into his neck. There were so many responsibilities for them here, so many things they couldn’t say no to or they couldn’t put off for another day. Other things made themselves priorities because they allowed it. It was time to make them a priority.

  “I’m gonna need help,” he admitted, talking softly, his words carrying a hard truth. “I let members of this club make themselves important by taking on their problems as my own. I need you to call me on my bullshit, and I need you to do the hard love thing when I need it. Don’t pretend like you’re a weak woman and let me get away with being an ass. We both know you’re only submissive in the bedroom. Outside of it, you’re the strongest one I know.”