Scratch

I grew tired of all of the damn worrisome bullshit, so when inspiration finally struck me, I ended up taking matters into my own damn hands and took my ass ass over to see that little cocky ass witch Taz.

Since Cherry was somehow able to block the others from their bond connections with her, I had my own suspicions that somehow Taz was definitely the one behind all of it. So I was more than determined to get some answers out of her, even if it meant that I had to lower myself to have to involve some type of simple violence against her.

Unfortunately, I did in fact have to end up threatening her ass with her own damn life before she begrudgingly handed over any information involving my sweet Cherrys whereabouts.

We tried for days to try to get ahold of Des but as always his ass is out running around on his own damn solo man mission. The selfish ass bastard probably has known all along exactly where she has been hiding out and just decided to chose not to inform any of us of it.

As soon as Taz unwillingly relinquished the information over to me I headed straight back to the mansion to gather everyone up so that we could all finally go out and find her to bring her ass back here where she rightfully belongs, which is right into my lonely aching arms.

Fuck, she just doesn't realize how much I have been missing her. I have found myself lying in my bed, almost every single damn night since she left, just constantly fantasizing about her and the day that she finally returns to me with so much damn longing in me that it has been nearly fucking breaking me in two.

I guess that damn old saying of 'that you don't know what you got until it's gone' is very fitting for me at this point.

I definitely didn't know what I fucking had, not until the night she just up and left me without even granting me the simple pleasure of saying goodbye to her.

None of us got to say goodbye to her actually and it's been eating away at all of us, little by little, as the time kept slipping by us without having our Cherry here with us or not knowing exactly where she is.

That's why now we are all crowded up into Rivers SUV, on our way to this motel that Cherry has been hiding away from us in.

Unfortunately, Brax is the only one of her mates that didn't come along on this little search and rescue mission of ours. He decided that after what occurred between him and that woman the other night that he didn't deserve to tag a long with us today. In my honest opinion I just think he's being absolutely ridiculous about all of it.

There's no doubt that Cherry is going to notice his absence from our little rag tagged group as soon as we are able to locate her and I honestly think that it's going to hurt her far more than Brax thinks that it might. It's all starting to really get to him. He has not even been able to think straight lately.

The damn fool. He needs to get his priorities in order and fast.

Edge ant Gage willingly stayed behind with him under the guise of them wanting to help Brax with a little welcome home surprise for her. I just think they are allowing us time alone with our missing mate and for that I couldn't be more thankful to them.

River starts to pick up his speed as we begin to grow ever closer to the little motel that Taz begrudgingly told me about.

As soon as our eyes set on the little rundown motel that she's presumably staying in, I let out a displeasing grumble intentionally. I can't believe she chose this decrepit little dump instead of being with us at the grand mansion.

As we draw even nearer to the motel  I quickly spot a very familiar looking Harley parked right out in front of one of the many rooms, I keep my eyes glued on it while River starts to pull slowly into the almost vacant parking lot, there's also another vehicle there that I don't seem to recognize. It's a smooth looking red Mustang that is parked right along beside Des's monster bike with the trunk of the car left wide opened for some strange reason.

Not giving the strange car any further thought I jump out of the vehicle hurriedly as soon as we pulled into the lot and came to a direct stop right beside Des's bike.

I eagerly start to look around for Cherrys room number on the doors of the motel as soon as my feet hit the damn asphalt under me.

I quickly spot an opened door in my search for her room. Silently, I edge my way over to it in a slow deliberate pace curiously while the others finally start climbing out of Rivers vehicle rather despondently.

Before I was able to find myself right in front of the room with the opened door Des surprisingly makes a sudden appearance in the doorway.

"Where the fuck is she?" Are the first words I growl out at him fiercely while stomping my way over to him heatedly.

Des rolls his eyes at me condescendingly, "Stop being an asshole Scratch. She's right behind me." He grumbles, as he steps away from the opened doorway to come to stand beside me.

I watch the doorway closely with apprehension flowing all through me. My sweet Cherry then steps out from the door of the motel room with her head lowered down to her hand as she adjusts her suitcase that's resting in her hand.

Since she apparently hasn't noticed my arrival just yet I start to take a tentative step toward her nervously.

Cherry raises her head before I could make it all the way over to her completely and the sudden surprise that appears on her face has me faltering quickly in my forwarding steps toward her.

"Cherry." I drawl out her name lowly as I keep languishingly trying to take all of her in, from her pretty little head all the way down to her tiny toes, not being able to fully register in my brain just yet that I'm finally in her presence again after all of this damn time.

"Scratch? What are you doing here? How did you find me?" She looks around the parking lot with confusion quickly masking her beautiful face, "Why are all of you here?" She tacks on unbelievably.

"You're coming home with us Cherry and I won't take no for an answer! None of us will. You are going to hear all of us out regardless if you like it or not. We deserve to have a chance to plead our case with you and this time you're not going to be able to run away from us." I assert firmly, after I snap out of my withering daze. I won't give her a chance to run away from us. That shit is not ever going to be happening again. Not on my damn watch.

"Cherry bomb I missed you so damn much. You had us all worried to death. Why didn't you call or text us? I know we had our disagreements but you have to know just how much I truly do love you Cherry. I know I have made mistakes but please just give me a chance to explain. Please come back home with us, so that I can." River pleads with her sincerely as he walks over a tad bit closer to her.

"Cherry sprite all of us have been missing you like fucking crazy. I can't take being away from you like this. Like River ask could you let us all explain and just please come back home with us." Rome tosses out as he too makes his way over closer to her. He goes to her left side taking the suitcase out of her hand to lay it down upon the sidewalk beneath him.

"Cherry tart, you need to come back with us. Let us make this all up to you." Micah pipes in doing the same thing as the others do but he chooses go stand directly behind her.

She is now surrounded by almost all of us, with me up front and River along with Rome blocking the sides of her, we all reach our hands out to her to start touching different parts of her anatomy gently, solely because we have missed and longed for her touch for so long now.

I softly place my finger right along the top of her jaw as I slowly trace the pad of my finger down her striking face tenderly. The sparks light me up desirably as I finally get to touch her soft pliable skin again. I instantly get a quick catch in my breath as I watch her eyes close up from our tender loving touches on her.

"Cherry treat I finally got everything you wanted packed up. You should be all set." We all suddenly hear a mysterious voice call out for Cherry from deep within her motel room.

I stop my gentle traces on her skin as soon as I hear him call out to her. Dropping my hand away for her face to my side loosely I peer over her and Micah's shoulders to look into the darkened motel room with my curiosity beyond peeked now.

Cherry steps away from us to peer back into her room, she angles herself away from Micah to step around him. Then just as quickly as she turns a guy walks right out of her darkened motel room while carrying one of Cherrys suitcases right in his hand.

He steps out dodging around both Rome and Micah to stand in front of Cherry. My jealousy begins to bloom as I watch the way he gazes down at her sweetly.

"Who the hell is this?" River grumbles as he ask Cherry. I would really love to know the answer to that damn question myself.

Cherry rolls her eyes skyward at us just as Des did with me earlier, "Everyone this is Rocket. My friend from high school. Rocket these are my mates. River, whom I think you already heard of and this is Scratch, Rome, and Micah. I have another mate but for some reason he's not here with them." Cherry introduces us to him. I grimace up my face at the mention of my dear friend Brax's name and his apparent notable absence.

That's not something that I actually want to have to deal with at this prescient moment. So I decide to quickly change the subject.

"Rocket? The one that Dante was after? How did you end up finding him?" I ask her sternly.

Cherry lets out a little huff of a sigh before she begins to inform us all of the little details of hers and Rockets suspicious unplanned reunion at the supermarket. By the time she's done I start to grow even more suspicious of the guy beside her.

"You just so happened to bump into her at a damn supermarket? I'm not fucking buying any of it. Dante suddenly dies and you just so happen to magically reappear and come out of hiding that damn quickly? How did you even learn of his death?" I question him suspiciously.

"A good friend told me." His simple explanation to me also comes with a dismissive shrug of his shoulders.

"And does this friend have a damn name?" I keep on grilling him ruthlessly.

"Relax Scratch. I'll explain everything to you." I'm actually taken aback that  its Des that is the one that volunteers to give us all the missing information instead of this guy Rocket?

Now my curiosities are definitely peeked.

I decide to settle back against Rivers SUV to listen intently to Des's forthcoming dialect.

As Des drones on about his ex Juanita and her gruesome demise I internally cringe as I hear it.

Then he comes directly to the point of the story where this guy Rocket just cowardly stood by and watched all of the shit happen right before his eyes without even trying to come to her damn rescue.

What kind of fucking coward is the man? My gaze jerks to him quickly, I know that my face must be showing pure unrequited disgust at him because of is non actions. As soon as he notices my revolted gaze locked on him he blanches away from my deathly glare on him. Good! I want his ass terrified of me.

Rocket swiftly drops the suitcase that he was holding of Cherrys beside her then leans in to her while whispering something into her ear.

I watch them both intently, Cherrys face soon registers a quick resolve on it of understanding as he keeps whispering softly into her ear.

Des soon finishes replaying all of the sordid details to all of us about Juanita's death ending it on a note with a visceral deep growl.

When Rocket hears the growl that emits out of Des, his chicken shit ass starts slowly taking tentative steps backwards toward what I'm assuming is his car with him not once taking his worried gaze off of any of us as he tries to slip away from us inconspicuously.

"Hold it!" I bark out my order loudly to him, as I sidestep around Des to find myself right in front of his cowardly ass.

"I think you should stick around just a little bit longer and explain all of this shit to us in more detail! Is it all true? Did Juanita nor you steal any drugs from Dante like he said that you did? Is Charlie still after Cherry? How do you know all of this shit anyway? Someone must be helping you to gather up all this personal information? Who the fuck are you trying to protect?" I vomit out my questions to him, one by one, with each question that I throw at him, Rockets entire body starts to tremble uncontrollably. I smirk.

I didn't mean to frighten him that damn badly but since he has the answers that we have all been desperately seeking for so long now locked up somewhere inside of him, I will do whatever it takes to get all of them out of him. Even if I have torture his ass.

Especially, since we now know that Charlie will not stop until he gets his grubby fucking hands on my sweet Cherry.

"Scratch you're scaring him." Cherry proclaims softly as she tries to stand in between the two of us.

I rapidly grab ahold of her tiny wrist into my hand as I gently pull her away from him to stand behind me. I don't fucking trust this dude one damn bit. Especially not with my mate.

"I don't care Cherry. He needs to start talking now or else. I will not jeopardize your safety over his damn feelings." I admit sternly.

"Look man I know what I did with Juanita was majorly fucked up but I wouldn't jeopardize Cherry treats safety either. She means way too much to me, she's my friend." His irate statement only provokes me more.

"Some fucking friend you are. How am I suppose to trust you around her when you couldn't even be trusted around your friend Juanita. Any self worthy man would of jumped out of that damn vent and stopped what was happening to her. She trusted you and you just let that shit happen to her as you fucking watched it all go down. What kind of person does that shit?" I admonished him fiercely.

"Scratch stop. He isn't like any of you. He's human. What did you expect him to do?" Cherry tries to come to his defense. I let out a disbelievingly scoff deliberately. Is she kidding me?

"Cherry I don't give a damn if he is human or not. Nobody, supernatural or human, would allow that shit to happen to another individual like that without trying to at least help them. Especially their own friend. He is nothing but a damn coward who let down his friend. How am I, or any of us, suppose to trust him anywhere around you?" I ask her as I bring her around to me so that I can hold her within my loving embrace.

She needs to understand that with Charlie now after her she will need to be surrounded with the people that love her and that she can completely trust. Ones that would do anything for her, even lay down their very own lives for her and that doesn't include some sniveling little ass coward who would probably just take off running at the first sign of any trouble.

With her head now pressed against my chest firmly, I lovingly start threading my fingers through the thick strands of hair while my other hand pulls her flush up against my body.

I didn't realize just how much I missed her gentle touches until this very moment.

Damn, how I so longed for just this.

Unfortunately, she soon pulls herself away from me by placing both of her tiny hands up against my chest, she pushes off of me as she takes a small step away from me, I frown down at her as I drop my hands away from her, feeling saddened suddenly because she deliberately leaves me feeling the loss of her touch instantly.

"You can trust him. I trust him completely. He has helped me so much since I left all of you. Rocket has stood by me throughout all of it. He even let me cry on his shoulder and listened to my problems all night long as I constantly blubbered on about all of you. He is my friend and I was hoping that he could be all of your friend too. Yes, he messed up but he is only human after all. We all make mistakes and hopefully we can learn from them so that we can grow from them and move on. Please don't hold this against him. If it wasn't for him then I wouldn't be coming back to all of you." Cherry confesses as she makes her way over to stand by her friend.

She reaches her hand out toward him when she stops directly before him. Rocket eyes all of us around him with slight trepidation before he seemingly reaches his own hand out to her to take ahold of hers within his.

I couldn't help it, I couldn't control it, I couldn't withstand it, as soon as his hand clasps within hers I let out a viscously dark growl toward him.

I don't want her anywhere near this cowardly bitch she calls a friend. There's just something about his ass that I can't seem to bring myself to trust.

But Cherry bravely just keeps holding on to his hand within her own defiantly.

"Give it up Scratch. I already tried to convince her of just how bad this guy is for her but she's just to fucking hardheaded to even listen." Des asserts grimly.

That stops my growls toward Rocket instantly. I look back over my shoulder at Des in amazement. Where the hell did all that come from?

"I'm hardheaded? Des your an ass. You're just taking it all out on me because I wanted us to take a break." Cherry defends.

What the hell happened between them two? I thought after all of this time that he was with her without our knowledge that they would have at least worked out some of their differences with each other by now.

"A break? Cherry I never asked for a damn break. You're the one that asked for it. Not me! I keep trying to tell you that what I said was taken completely out of context but you're just to damn stubborn to listen to me." Des argues.

"Out of context? Are you kidding me right now? Des you admitted to me and Rocket that Juanita is and will always be your one and only true love. How is that taking it out of context?" Cherry fumes.

My eyes keep bouncing back and forth in between them both. I quickly take notice of the others that are slowly starting to make their way over to stand behind Cherry now with confusion and clear irritation masking their own faces now.

"Des I was only saying that you needed some time to grieve for Juanita. You need to work through all of this before you can even be allowed to try to commit to another person. Even if that person isn't me you need to take the time to allow yourself to come to terms with her death and your sudden loss."
Cherry tells him compassionately as she strolls over to him.

She is now standing off to the right side of him. She places her hand on his upper arm gently while she gently traces it along his arm.

"Please understand Des. I'm not pushing you away on purpose. I care for you and I think that you just need some time to yourself before you make any drastic changes in your life." She admits sincerely to him.

"I don't fucking need time away from you Cherry. Why can't you understand that? I just need you, that's all I damn well need." Des states to her almost dishearteningly.

Everyone around them chooses to remain perfectly silent as we all observe them.

"No that won't work Des. I'm going back to the mansion with my mates and I expect you to go off somewhere and try to resolve all of these inner conflicts that you are having with Juanita's death. I don't want to see you for a while not until you can come to terms with it all. You need this Des. Why can't you understand that?" She throws back his question to him with resolve flush in her tone.

Now I feel sorry for my conflicted brother. Not only does he now have to deal with the love of his life sudden gruesome death but that he also has to deal with losing his mate along with it. Poor bastard.

"I'm not going off anywhere Cherry. You are my mate. You can't just push me away like that. I told you that I loved Juanita and you knew that. Why are you all of the sudden trying to push me away when you knew exactly how I felt?" Des desperately tries to plead with her.

"Because of what you said to me and Rocket. I'm done with us continuously arguing back and forth over all of this Des. Just go. Work all of this out and when you have it all worked out finally then you can come back to us. I don't care if it takes you years to get through this. You need to do this. Not for me but for yourself. Then we can both start over." Cherry insists.

"I AM NOT LEAVING!" Des screams out rather vocally. "I can work through all of this with you by my side Cherry. Please don't do this to us." He ends it on very discouraging whine.

I don't think that I have ever seen my brother acting so damn desperately before. There must be some part of him that actually has feelings toward her. Or else he wouldn't be acting so damn despondent over Cherry wishes.

Why doesn't he just tell her exactly how much he cares for her? Unless he doesn't even realize just how much that he actually does care for her?

But how could he not know how he feels? Then I think back to when I had the same exact thoughts toward Stella and Cherry.

I didn't know my own true feelings for Cherry until I was down to my last viable options. That night when I looked up into her beautiful blue eyes and seen just how hurt she was at that moment was the night I realized just how much I actually did love her.

Maybe Des just has to find that certain defining moment in time when he realizes, just as I did, that he actually does in fact love her and probably has always loved her from the very beginning.

"I'm sorry." Cherry states simply as she goes to retrieve her suitcase from beside Rocket. She then turns away from all of us headed off to Rivers SUV.

Rome picks up her other suitcase that was beside him as he follows along behind her. Micah then walks off also behind Rome.

I hear the door open to Rivers SUV suddenly then close just as quickly as it opened.

River begins to walk over to Des he stops when he gets beside him placing his hand on top of his shoulder. That's when I notice just how broken my brother actually is.

He has his head lowered as he tries to calm down his raging beast within him.

"Calm down Des. She's only doing this because she cares so much for you. She wants you to heal completely before you try to make a solid commitment to her. Just give it time." River speaks to him gently. He pats him on his shoulder once before he too walks off to his SUV.

I stand there beside Des nervously fidgeting with the toe of my boot on the asphalt beneath me. Not really sure on what I should actually say to him.

With a deep despairing sigh I finally work up the courage to go over to him.

"Des, she just needs time and so do you. You told her how much you loved Juanita and I can kind of understand where you are coming from. I didn't actually lose Stella to a grueling death like you did with Juanita but I did lose her regardless of how. I know you're going through a dilemma right now. Just take some time to work through it all like she said then come back to her." I hint to him with compassion.

"What if she won't take me back when I work through all of this shit? What if I go off and try to come to terms with all of this? It could take fucking years to process that type of trauma. Do you honestly think that she would wait that long for me? Because I fucking don't. She will probably just end up letting me go. Then what will I do Scratch? I can't lose her. She's the only thing that's been holding me together" I knew that, that admission had to be tough for my brother to finally admit to.

"She will wait for you. I've known her for years man. Cherry is loyal to a damn fault. If she does love you, then she will wait forever for you." Rocket pipes in suddenly. I almost forgot that his ass was still there.

"And what if she doesn't love me? What will happen then? Just because we are mates doesn't mean that she just automatically loves me. That's not how any of this shit works. She's never said that she loves me. So that doesn't leave me with a lot of damn hope!" Des growls at Rocket.

"Look man. Like I said, I have known her for years and if there's one thing that I know about my Cherry treat is that when she loves somebody she loves them fiercely. She wouldn't let you go like this if she didn't love you." Rocket tries his best to reason with Des.

"He has a point Des. I don't like the fucker but I do agree with him on this. Cherry is letting you go for now so that you can one day come back to her to prove that you truly do love her without her having to deal with any of your past ghost to come back to haunt her. I think she has enough of those to deal with by herself without you having to add your own ghost into the mix." I tease with him playfully. Trying to get some type of rise out of him.

"Whatever!" Des grumbles under his breath as he stomps his way over to his Harley.

I watch him intensely as he starts up his damn bike angrily he then peels out of the lot while squealing his damn tires heavily in his wake.

Fuck!

I thought that when we found Cherry that it would actually end up being a happy occasion for all of us but apparently I was completely wrong.

"I'll have Parker talk him. Don't worry." Rocket tosses out before he leaves me alone standing in the middle of the parking lot looking on at his retreating form bewilderedly.

How the hell does he even know Parker?