Chapter Eight
Raya St Claire

Bear was seated on the couch when I entered the living room. I was still soaking wet from training in the yard with the newcomer, but I didn't really care. The one who would care, however, was Archie if I were to dirty his grey couches. Those L-shaped couches were more expensive than all of our TV's combined and Archie saw it as his most valuable possession, therefore I kept my distance.

The water droplets made a trail behind me as I made my way to where Bear was seated, and when I neared him, there was something clearly off about him. He was looking out of the window with a faraway look as if he was homesick. It was definitely strange to see him look like that; he's usually in a joking mood and when he wasn't in a joking mood, he was in a killing mood, but even in a killing mood; he always had a big grin on his face.

Bear must have heard me approaching because he turned his head to look at me. He eyes the trail of water behind me, and instead of commenting on how Archie was going to freak out about it; he just looked out of the window with the same faraway look without saying absolutely anything.

I bounce on my feet, frowning at him. "What's wrong, Bear?"

I wanted to join him on the couch so that we could talk about what had him looking so down and distant, but Archie would literally kill me if I were to ruin his grey couches, so I stood instead, causing a pool of water to form at my feet.

"Nothing." He replies, still looking out of the window.

It's like it physically pained him to look at me because he was focusing really hard not to make eye contact with me, because when he did look at me, he quickly looked away again.

"I know you better than that, Bear." I tell him, wanting to touch his shoulder, but thinking twice about it. If he was in such a pissy mood like this, I didn't want to cause him to lash out on me, but it didn't stop me from asking, though. "I can tell when there's something wrong with you, so spill it."

"I said nothing's wrong, Raya." He says, his voice as cold as ice, piercing through my heart at how cold his tone sounded. He rarely lashed out on me, if ever. When he looks up at me, I see anger and even disappointment written in his eyes, but he didn't mention anything about why he was angry or even disappointed, he just changed the subject rather abruptly. "Take a shower before you get sick." He says, his tone was a little gentler than it was moments before, but the anger and disappointment was still evident on his usually kind face.

"Uhm, okay..." I say slowly, wondering what I did to piss him off like that.

As I was looking at him looking out of the window, a million thoughts raced through my mind as I tried to figure out what had him so angry, but none came to mind. It couldn't have been the mission where we went in lethally even after Archie has said that we shouldn't, because I took the blame and the newcomer took the blame too, so it couldn't have been the mission, but if it wasn't the mission, then what had Bear so pissed and disappointed?

Bear's gaze wanders to the ground as I stood in front of him.

"Bear, come on."

I wanted to ask him what I might have done to anger or to upset him, but I decided against it. He clearly doesn't want to talk to me. Hell, he doesn't even want to look at me, and that burned my heart and made me feel uneasy. I didn't like seeing Bear like this, and he always told me what bothered him in the before, so why wasn't he talking to me and telling me what was bothering him?

"I said nothing's wrong, Raya. Fuck. Can you just leave me the hell alone?"

I step away from him, but looked at him over my shoulder, seeing him still looking down at the ground as if it was the most important thing in the entire world. "I was just asking what's wrong." I tell him over my shoulder, shaking my head at him even though he was still looking at the ground. "It wasn't necessary to bite my fucking head off."

I only hear him release a deep breath when I moved away from him and toward the set of stairs.

When I reached the stairs, I spot Archie coming down, but he seemed to be in a much better mood than Bear was.

When he sees me, he smiles even wider. "You always did love the rain." He says, eyeing my soaking wet clothes still stuck to my body.

"It was unexpected today." I tell him. "But it was nice for a change."

"Well, I'm glad you had a nice nature-shower, but I'm afraid you need to get in an actual shower, and meet me downstairs when you're done. I have some good news to share."

My curiosity was clearly piqued and my eyebrows rose in curiosity while I waited for him to evaluate, but he never does. I'd have to drag it out of him.

"Good news? What good news?"

"Shower first and then I'll tell you." He says.

I nod, rubbing my arms to warm myself when a sudden cool breeze engulfed me, causing my entire body to erupt in a layer of goose bumps. It was like the talk with Bear made the entire mansion turn ice cold all around me, because he was never an ass to me before. This side of him wasn't pleasant at all. I hated it.

"What's Bear's problem?" I ask Archie, who just lifts his shoulders in a shrug.

"I don't know. Why?"

"He's being an ass to me without reason." I tell him, tucking a wet strand of my hair behind my ear. "He could barely look at me in my eyes when I talked to him downstairs just a few moments ago."

"I have no idea." He says, shrugging yet again. "Maybe he'll lighten up when I tell you guys the good news."

I nod. "I guess we'll just have to see then." I tell him, releasing a deep breath. "I'll go take that shower now."

I make my way up to my room and shut the door behind me, but once I enter my room, something felt strange; not exactly strange, but something felt different somehow.

And when I looked up at the ceiling and at its edges, I knew why.

The LED lights were hung all around the edges of my ceiling. My room was bright with them shining; illuminating light all over my usual dark room. The box the lights were in was now lying on my bed instead of the trashcan where it was when I talked to Archie just this morning.

I couldn't help but stare at my ceiling in complete awe.

Whoever hung the lights did a nice job with hanging them.

There wasn't a light out of place and everything was cleaned up afterwards.

Someone did this and I have no idea who it was.

The remote to the LED lights were resting on my nightstand.

I had to pull myself out of my reverie to drag myself toward my en-suite to take a shower before Archie announces the good news without me.

• • •

"You said you have good news for us?" I ask Archie who was sitting on the couch, alongside Bear, Rossi and Storm.

The newcomer and the twins, Nikko and Junior, were sitting on the floor despite there being a lot of space left on the couches for them to sit.

I plop myself down onto the floor too, not wanting to be seated next to Bear who was in a foul mood. I don't want my head being bit off just by sitting next to him when he's in a mood.

Archie grins, clapping his hands together happily. "Geoffrey's Club has reopened." He says, looking between all of us with the same grin on his face from moments ago.

Geoffrey's Club was the official club where all the gang's hung out. And civilians too, of course. It was a club after all. Everyone was welcome. We used to hang out at GC's when we weren't huddled up in the mansion, doing jobs.

"That is some great news." Storm agrees, patting Bear's shoulder who just shrugged him off. Unlike me who noticed him shrugging Bear's hand off, Storm didn't, and just continued to cheer along with the rest of the boys.

The news about GC reopening again didn't brighten Bear's mood, not even just a little bit. He used to love that place before it got burnt down, so I expected him to be a little happier to know that it has reopened, but I was wrong.

"You said 'reopened'. What exactly happened for it to get closed in the first place?" The newcomer asks.

I immediately look at Bear.

"It was closed because someone decided to break in."

"It wasn't a break-in." Bear says.

Archie shoots Bear a dirty look. "Don't. That is in the past, Bear."

"Maybe for you, yes." He says, looking directly at Archie. "But I will always remember the remnants of that club. I helped Geoffrey clean that place up after The Ravens fucked it-"

"Bear, enough!" Archie says, cutting him off mid-sentence.

"The Ravens?" The newcomer asks, looking at Archie and Bear.

"We had agreed to meet up with The Ravens a few months back. We did business with them, and it went well, they even trusted us enough to do business with their second in command, but things went south. Their second in command didn't want to pay what was owed. We had to shoot him before he shot one of us. So they decided to take something of ours. Geoffrey's Club."

"All of this just because he didn't want to pay?" The newcomer asks. "It sounds more like a damn set-up, if you ask me."

"Set-up or not," Bear starts, "they think that they will get away with what happened. I will show them."

"No, Bear." Archie says. "The dust has settled between the NC and The Ravens. We are civil now and I'd like to keep it that way before they retaliate, again."

"Civil my ass." He scoffs. "We barely tolerate each other."

"Relax, man." Storm says. "GC is open again. You can drink your anger away when we go there, Bear."

"That will be tonight." Archie says. "There's a special on beers and I don't know about you guys, but I'm definitely going." Archie gets up from the couch after he patted Bear's shoulder. "You coming?" He asks.

Everyone nods, getting up from their positions, and followed Archie out of the mansion.

We never miss out on discounted drinks.