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  Mad Minute

  Mayhan Bucklers MC Book Two

  MariaLisa deMora

  Edited by Hot Tree Editing

  Copyright © 2019 MariaLisa deMora

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination, or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is entirely coincidental.

  First Published 2019

  ISBN 13: 978-1-946738-32-5

  DEDICATION

  We are made to persist, that’s how we find out who we are. ~ Thomas Wolff

  To those who persevere, holding out a hope for maybe. I’ll always answer your call. You’re worth it.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Each story I write gracefully straddles the wavy line crossing between fact and fiction. I often tease the people around me that every conversation is story fabric for my imagination, mostly because it’s true. This book reflects hope I have for so many of my friends, to once again claim their place in the lives of those they love.

  Every veteran returning home from a tour of duty, or separating after enlistment shares many truths. In taking up the mantle of service on behalf of the ones left behind, they’ve set themselves on the path of change. It’s inevitable. Something they’ll do willingly, painstakingly carving a new identity out of unfamiliar experiences. They color themselves with emotions left-behind friends and family cannot comprehend, and at times glide as a ghost through a world that no longer understands them.

  Spend time with someone who served. Ask for their stories. Heed their hidden truths. Be the listening ear when they call in the wee hours, when their spirit is at its darkest, and the need for a guiding light desperate.

  Be their courage. It’s a worthy task.

  Woofully yours,

  ~ML

  Mad Minute

  Nathan Smith enlisted in the military with a goal: to provide for his new wife. As his family grew, he pushed to become everything both his loved ones and his country needed. One bomb blast tore through those dreams, shredding the night, his leg, and his life, leaving everything in disarray. As he dealt with the aftereffects of so much loss, his pain and anger drove away the things that mattered most, leaving him lost and alone.

  His friend Kirby approached him with a proposal impossible to turn down. Come to the tiny town of Mayhan, Texas, and become a founding cornerstone of an innovative veteran reintegration program.

  Challenge accepted.

  Chapter One

  Christmas Day

  As Kirby Westbrook smiled down at his new girlfriend, Nathan Smith watched his best friend’s eyes flash with happiness. The man—not only Nathan’s closest friend in the world, but his club president, too—was so in love it was nearly too much to believe, but God, it was good to see. After going through hell on earth, Kirby had managed to reconnect in the best way with someone from his past, a childhood friend he’d secretly had a crush on, and now they were all coupled up.

  “You know you’re marrying up, right?” Nathan blurted the question, hating himself in the moment, because his soul’s sick intent was to strip his friend of even a tiny bit of the happiness shining from his face. Strip it from him with a reminder that relationships came with expectations, and expectations came with the threat of failure, that flawed part of him trusting Kirby’d balk at the reality check. Nathan was contradictorily relieved to see that the look of love Kirby bore only intensified as the thought took hold and dug deep. Yeah, Kirby would clearly be happy to marry Dana, pleased as punch, since right now, right here, the man couldn’t imagine a life where he wouldn’t be with his woman.

  “Good for you,” Nathan muttered, taking a step backwards, hiding a wince when he put pressure on his bad leg. It’s a stump, he reminded himself, as if he could have forgotten. He hadn’t had a fucking leg for a long time, and it wasn’t like him to forget. The pain, though, that might be enough of a reason. He’d spent too much time in the socket over the past week and was paying for it now. As casually as he could, he leaned an elbow on the counter, taking the weight and strain off the prosthetic.

  It felt good but seemed too much like a relief he hadn’t earned, so he pushed upright, stoically accepting a resumption of the pain. Pain and exhaustion seemed to be his most loyal companions these days, and Nathan was tired, bone-tired. Sleep was elusive—and more often than not, avoided his stalking efforts completely.

  These days, when his body eventually submitted to his dogged demand for rest with his head laid on a pillow, he was the one stalked instead. Dreams chased through his head, through his mind, and tore him loose from the numbing arms of sleep.

  Good for you. In the silence of his own head, Nathan infused them with as much hope and prayer as he dared. He shook his head, adjusted his stance again, and watched as Kirby pulled Dana into a close embrace, head dipping until their profiles fused. You done good, old man. He pushed off the counter, teetered upright, and tensed all over until he caught his balance, then with gritted teeth left for the media room.

  There were ottomans thoughtfully placed in front of every seat, and he positioned himself in front of his favorite chair and toppled backwards into the cushions. The momentum and balance shift flung his leg up, and he held it aloft for a split second before gently bringing it down onto the supportive surface with a stifled groan.

  Fuck, it hurts today. Head back, he let his eyes drift closed in the darkened room, willing to let sleep find him here if it would. Come on, oblivion. The moment he got comfortable, though, it started, as it always did.

  Burning along his shin, the fiery pain wrapped around through his calf and down around the arch of his foot. Heavy pulses of sensation traveled along ghost synapses, driven there by the traumatized nerves in his stump. Agony he could never escape, would never, because it existed in a limb that was ash in the air near a crematory back in Germany. He needed to take off the irritating prosthesis, but the limited relief of pulling the swollen stubbie out of the socket wouldn’t be worth the pain it would take to replace it later.

  Fucking thing can’t let me rest.

  He hated it. Hated the amputation that had taken his career, stripped him of one of the only things he’d ever been good at. Hated the loss of mobility, the need to depend on others for so much. The first military-assigned counselor had talked about grieving for the lost limb, and Nathan had outright laughed at him. “I won’t grieve for it. Fuck, at this point, I’d cut the damn thing off myself if it magically grew back.” It had betrayed him, betrayed the natural order of things, considering it just wasn’t fucking there.

  He’d woken in the hospital at Ramstein and had known. Ringing echoes of the blast still sang in his ears, the vision of their vehicle airborne happening over and over against the insides of his closed eyelids. Cutting through the buzz in his head was panic and fear, because he’d known something profound had happened to him. Even flat on his back, he’d felt off-balance somehow, clutching tight to the edges of the mattress, his body convinced it was about to be thrown off and topple to the floor. He’d known, and he’d been afraid to look down, terrified he’d be a full-on cripple, needing a chair for the rest of his life. Nathan had done an inventory, tensed every set of muscles independently, trying to find the missing piece through the mixed signals his body was sending. Hips, thighs, knees, calves, ankles, feet, toes
: He’d mapped and located all of them, but it had hurt so damn much. All of it, his everything had ached and throbbed, burning and spearing through him with agony. The pain had been overwhelming, drilling down from his head into his neck, and his damned leg had hurt the worst. That had been what tricked him, making him believe the worst hadn’t happened, seeing as if something hurt that badly, it had to still be attached, right?

  The moment he’d seen the lopsided drape of the sheet he’d believed. Warrior no more. Not accepted. No, dammit. He was still the same man inside. But he knew the military wouldn’t have a use for him. Didn’t matter the surgeon told him it was good news they’d saved his knee, didn’t matter the nurses’ many and varied messages about how lucky he was to be alive. His fucking leg was gone, brain rattled inside its bonebox, hearing a nonexistent thing, and he’d never walk on his own two feet again.

  He’d never serve alongside his brothers-in-arms, his friends, his healthy and whole comrades who were already walking sands he’d never see, having had the bad judgment to catch the blast from an IED without eating it wholesale. Just my luck. Taken from the land of war a bloody victor and turned into a piece of meat pitied for no longer being complete, and from then until now, every utterance of sympathy had been like another nail in the coffin of who he used to be.

  Old history, moving on. It was time to find something else to think about. If not his military family, then his real one.

  Christmas Day. He snorted. Supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year, and he wouldn’t get to see or talk to the best part of himself.

  Cathy’s Law. In his head, he said it like that, imparting his soon-to-be ex-wife’s proclamations with mocking status. “Fuck her.” I wish I could fuck her, his brain immediately supplied, but he squashed the idea. That was a no-go, something that needed a wave-off from a hot landing zone.

  He’d seen her exactly six times since he hit stateside. None of them had been golden moments, and he still couldn’t get his head around whatever had happened between stepping on that transport plane to head overseas and the first time he’d seen her head pop into his hospital room at Bethesda Naval. That person hadn’t been his Cath, his lover and friend, the woman who completed him in a way he couldn’t get past. Losing her had left a hole in his insides, putting him off-balance even more than losing the leg.

  Nathan glared at the bare metal of the prosthetic that stuck out beyond the cuff of his pants, only partially hidden by the foot shell and shoe. Maybe it’s the leg. He blinked, unsuccessful at wishing the metal and plastic monstrosity away. Or lack of one. That reasoning didn’t seem right, though, because his Cath wouldn’t have given a shit. She’d have just been glad to have him back, however that happened. Well, Cath’s gone, and Cathy rules. Which meant this Christmas, the only thing his little girl—his princess, the light of his life—would get from him was a card with cash in it. No presents, no calls, no visits. It was a shit move on his ex’s part, and his lawyer said she couldn’t do it, but he knew Cath. Had known Cath. Cathy. Nathan shook his head hard to settle his thoughts. His Cath wouldn’t do something like this without cause, and hard as it would be, he’d honor it.

  Didn’t mean he wouldn’t be thinking of a certain little five-year-old, though.

  Katie.

  If she were anything like he’d been as a kid, she’d have been up early this morning. Dancing around the Christmas tree, shouting at the mounds of wrapped presents there. Or maybe there weren’t any presents. Maybe that’s why Cathy had placed a moratorium on them, if she couldn’t afford any and didn’t want him to show her up. Not true. He reminded himself of the checks he sent every month, over and above what the state took out of his pay from Uncle Sam. Anything for them. But unless she was living lavishly, high on the hog, she’d have plenty to take care of her and Katie. What he sent was way more than they’d had any given month as a married couple.

  Still married. The thought hurt, surprising him with the wave of pain threaded through with longing. Yes, they were still married, since he was waiting on Cathy to decide she was well and finally done. He wouldn’t be the first to make a move. There’d be no flinching from him in this wild game of chicken she’d decided to play.

  The sound of the crew in the kitchen grew louder, raucous laughter and teasing helping create unbreakable bonds between the men. Every one of them needed this club, this chance at learning how to fit into the world again. Kirby often said that starting the club, building this foundation, was one of the best things he’d ever done, and Nathan was damn glad his friend had dragged him along for the ride. A thrill of something undefined washed over him, and he grunted when his groin tightened. What the hell?

  Another crash of phantom pain blasted through his leg, and he hissed as a hand came down on his shoulder. “The fuck you want?” He didn’t even turn to see who it was. Truth be told, he couldn’t have opened his eyes right now for anyone. Blazing fire licked along those damned phantom nerves until he swore he could feel his toes curling, reaching for any relief to be found.

  “Nathan, you got some visitors,” Oscar Mayhan told him, the man’s gruff East Texas accent distinctive.

  “It’s fuckin’ Christmas Day. Who in the hell would be coming here to the backwoods of bumfuck Texas to visit me?” No way would it be the one woman he wanted to see more than anything, the other half of his heart. Nathan shook his head and shifted in the chair, making himself more comfortable. “Fuck straight off, asshole. I’m not getting back on that damned leg for anybody. Don’t wanna see anybody anyway. Just leave me alone.”

  “Daddy?”

  The lone word came from the opening that led to the kitchen, two syllables so soft and uncertain. If he could have bitten his own tongue off, he would have, because if his little girl was here, she’d never be one he didn’t want to see. In fact, if his ears weren’t deceiving him, this was one of only two people in the world he really did want to see today.

  “Katie?” Nathan twisted around in the chair so he could look across the room. There, standing in the doorway with the controlled chaos of the club’s breakfast behind her, was his little girl. “Oh my God, Katie? Sweet Katie?”

  He lurched upright, steadying himself on the back of the chair. The first step he took rocked him with pain so blinding he couldn’t see anything. His vision whited out, and he felt himself falling, knee giving way, and there was nothing to catch hold of, Oscar just out of reach, leaving him thundering to the floor. He landed awkwardly and felt something pop, more pain up his leg sending him writhing on the hardwood, crying out.

  “Daddy!” Little feet flying his direction had him ducking his head, hiding in shame from his little girl. She could run, and he couldn’t even manage to walk across a room without fucking up. Heat covered his cheeks, and she had to be using every muscle in her tiny body to lift his head. Tears in his eyes made everything watery, but he could still see her face. That beautiful sweet face he’d helped make, the face he loved more than life, and it crumpled, falling apart as wet spilled over her lids and down her cheeks. “Daddy, are you hurt? Do you gots a boo-boo?”

  He nearly laughed. Only a child would look past the wreck of his body to the immediacy of the fall and consider that the greater of his woes. Nathan stared at her, and she leaned closer until he could smell her scent. The perfume of little-girl happiness: a mix of strawberry shampoo, crisp winter air, evergreens, cocoa, and peppermint all rolled into one. “Yeah,” he said, pushing up to a hip so he could flip around, wincing when he tried to straighten his mangled leg. “I got a boo-boo.” He reached out and picked her up, tiny bones and tiny body, but a heart larger than any one person had a right to have. My girl. He settled her into his lap and drew in the easiest breath in months. “But seeing you fixed me. I’m all fixed, Katie. I missed you, darling girl.” He caught sight of Oscar hovering close and shook his head, turning away the offer of help before it was extended. With a frown, Oscar made his way to and through the door, leaving Nathan alone to cuddle the miracle in his lap.<
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  “I can kiss it.” She snuggled against him, trusting and sweet, so much a part of him he couldn’t imagine how he’d gone all these days without her here. “That’ll make it all better. Mommy kisses my boo-boos.” She leaned back and clasped his cheeks in her hands again, bright smile searing itself onto his memories for all time. “Oh, I know.” She shook his head side to side. “Mommy can kiss it. Her kisses are magic.”

  Oh, yeah. He knew how magic Cath’s kisses were. Years of living for her, with her, he’d studied that lesson every chance he could, acing every test. In the beginning, he’d hold his breath until she’d open the door of the apartment where she’d lived with her best friend, feeling complete only when she leaned into him, face lifted sweetly in invitation for his kisses. He would stand there on the landing and kiss her until her lips were red and swollen, until her neighbor laughingly told them to get a room, until she couldn’t catch her breath any more than he could.

  He’d known from the first time he’d seen her that Cathy was meant to be his. Meant to be together, that’s what he’d told her father when he’d called to ask for her hand. Meant for one another, the preacher had spoken over the rings they’d exchanged standing in the tiny country church her family attended.

  Long deployments hadn’t been any barrier to what they had. Nathan would walk through the door on his first day of leave and they’d pick back up like nothing had happened. Love and laughter had followed them through the house, hovering over their bed as they took and gave in equal measures. She hadn’t been afraid to call him on his bullshit, and he hadn’t been afraid to lose her either. They’d been in it for the long haul, laying plans for after his retirement, and she’d known he was a lifer when they wed, supported him without hesitation. She’d whisper her fears in the dark, face buried in his neck, trusting him to keep the pain at bay.