The Thunder Wolves MC - Clara (Book #3)

It was no surprise to anyone that I followed in my dad's footsteps and joined the MC as soon as they would let me. Sure Gunner wasn’t my biological father, but he was the one that raised me. My biological father, having killed himself when I was only five. I had hated him before then after watching him break my mother, and after he chose to leave, I hated him even more. She, of course, didn’t tell me how it happened at the time, I was only five, but that didn’t change my feelings at the time. I cried because I could tell she was sad, and I know she thought it was because I was sad my father was gone. But really, I was happy he wouldn’t be around to continue to break my mother's heart. Now some might say I was only a kid at the time, and there was no way I knew what was going on, and there is no way I actually hated my father. But I assure you I did. I will admit I didn’t know at first that my father had been cheating on my mom. But then, after their split, I watched as she cried every night for months. I watched as my father brought home a new woman every week and would disappear for hours into his room with her, leaving me to entertain myself. Then I watched as my mother tried to be happy in a new town my father forced us to move to. I knew she hated it. She loved the city. She no longer cried at night, but I still knew she was unhappy. All the while, my father still seemed to find a new woman to bring home with him. And now, on the days I was meant to be with him, he would spend days away, leaving me with random women I didn’t know. Not all of them were all that nice. I soon learned that once my mother dropped me off with my father, he would eventually take me back to her if I started crying for her and not letting up. This, of course, didn’t always work, but it did enough of the time that I would start in the second she was gone. So yes, when she told me he was gone forever, I cried, but not because I was sad he was gone. No, I cried because even with him gone forever, he still seemed to make her sad. The days following the news of my father’s death, my mother moved us in with her friend Gunner. I liked the guy. He made my mom happy. Even in the short time they had known each other at the time. Anytime he was around, she smiled again. I kept my guard up, though, for a while. He was still new, and I never wanted to see my mother sad again. But the longer we stayed with him, the happier my mother was. The happier she was, the more relaxed I allowed myself to be, and soon I didn’t worry anymore. Soon after, I looked to Gunner as my father and found he was more than happy to be there for my mother and for me. By the end of the first year of living with him, I decided I wanted to be just like him when I was older. I wanted to find the kind of love he and my mother had for each other. I wanted never to make a woman feel the way my biological father had made my mother feel. So when I asked for a motorcycle instead of a car for my sixteenth birthday, neither my mom nor dad were surprised. In fact, I think my dad was more excited than I was as we looked at bikes. Then on my eighteenth birthday, I asked to join the MC no one questioned it. Like all new members, I had to go through the prospect portion, but I was cool with it. By the time I finished my year of being a prospect, I had already gained a position with the MC as the go-to guy to work on all the guy's bikes. This whole time I stayed close to home, watching over the girl down the street. She was six years younger than me. The day her parents, my parents' friends, announced her mother was pregnant with her, a voice in my head told me I had to always be there to watch over her. She was my responsibility to protect. It didn’t make sense to anyone. She wasn’t my sister. Hell, I was more protective of Clara, the girl down the street, than I was of my own little sister Lizzy. Not saying I wasn’t protective of my little sister, but there was something about Clara that made me want to be there for her. She was my best friend. We knew everything about each other. She was the only one I let ride on my bike with me. I had a few girlfriends in high school like any other normal boy, but for some reason, I could never bring myself to let them on my bike. Anytime I took them out, I always borrowed my mother’s car to do so. This seemed to bother all of my girlfriends, and they always seemed to break up with me.