The Rampage MC #4: Max and Briony

Chapter 16 (Max): The Clouds Parted

Copyright © 2024 by GroveltoHEA

***TW for brief reference to suicide***

Beard had called a meeting late in the afternoon about an upcoming run that involved four of us brothers. He must have seen me subtly checking my phone for the time once too often because he asked me to wait for the others to leave his office.

"Ohhh, gotta stay after class, Shotgun?" Atlas razzed me on his way out. Chain and Guard just walked out after shooting me looks.

"Fuck off, asshole," I returned with no heat.

I still had time to pick up dinner for Briony and get to her house before she'd start to wonder if I was blowing her off. Just in case, I sent her a quick text asking if there was anything in particular she wanted for dinner. I already knew what she'd say -- or I thought I knew what she'd say, but maybe her preferences had changed in the last year.

Tapas, please

Something in that brief response made me smile because that was what I thought she'd say. There was an extremely popular Spanish tapas restaurant near her house that we ate at frequently because Briony loved the assortment of food you could order and the quality was excellent. I sent her back a quick thumbs up emoji because Beard was talking to me.

"You got somewhere you gotta be, Shotgun? Am I interrupting your life? By all means, I'll wait until you can give me your full attention."

"I got somewhere to be," I said back. "But you're not interrupting my life. Still have plenty of time to get there."

"A date?" He sounded surprised.

I shrugged, not sure if you could call this a date. I hadn't asked Briony out; I'd told her I was bringing dinner tonight and she hadn't objected. 

"Taking dinner to Briony. See if I can answer any questions she has, see where her head is before I talk with her about what I've been thinking, where my head is." See if she can ever forgive the unforgiveable and move forward with me after I prove myself to her.

Beard ran his hand over his beard several times. Since the twins had started eating food from jars, he'd trimmed his beard closer to his face and kept it short.

"You know how hard it was to clean that food shit out of my beard?" he'd snapped at us the first day he'd walked into the clubhouse with his newly-clipped beard and we'd all laughed our asses off. "Nobody told me they spit shit they don't like right back in your face. Thought fucking Fabio was going to piss himself he laughed so hard. Then they think it's funny and the little shits keep doing it, and you got no choice but to let them because there's nothing more fucking adorable than the two of them laughing their diapered asses off. Now all of you fuck off before I shoot you."

He grumbled, he grumped but his eyes were happier than I'd ever seen them and his grin was huge and completely smitten. I wanted that. I wanted Briony, and then I wanted little ones with her to laugh about and to love. I'd had a shitty childhood from hell, but I was going to give my wife and children all the love I'd ever wanted growing up. Of course, the only barrier to having children was needing Briony to be my wife and their mother so my future as a husband and father wasn't looking real possible. Right now, it seemed like the closest I'd come to fatherhood was being uncle to all the present and future Rampage rugrats.

"She forgive you?" It took me a second to come back from my dreams of Briony being my wife and creating a family together to realize Beard was asking me a question.

"No," I answered.

He leaned forward on his desk, a very telling Beard move.

"What if she never can?"