She fidgets with her fork, pushing a small piece of ham around on her plate. “I’m on the pill.” She says softly, still looking at her plate.

I blink at her. “Come again?”

“The pill. Birth control.”

“I know what it is, Kenzi. Why?”

“I was having a lot of cramps every month so Rayne took me to her doctor for a checkup. The doctor said it would help, and it has. I didn’t tell my Dad, though, and I’m afraid he’s going to find them and go ballistic.”

“Well, yeah, of course he will.”

“Chloe says it’s a good idea anyway, though, because guys don’t like to wear condoms.”

My jaw clenches so hard I’m afraid I’m going to crack a molar. “Listen to me, Kenzi. There’s a lot more to sex than just getting pregnant. There’s all sorts of diseases you can get.” She stares at me, wide eyed. “When you start having sex, you better make the guy wear a condom until you’re damn sure you can trust him. I don’t give a fuck if some little douchebag doesn’t like the way it feels. You stand your ground and make him, okay?”

“Okay.”

“If anyone tries to pull that shit with you, I’ll put them in a fucking hole, Kenzi.”

I end the conversation by standing and taking our plates over to the sink. “I better get going, I should have been at the shop hours ago. I’ll see you tonight? About six?”

“Sounds good.” She stares out the window, lost in her thoughts.

“And wash my sweatshirt!” I yell over my shoulder on my way out the door.

As I drive to the bike shop, my mind keeps wandering back to the conversation I just had with Kenzi. Maybe I should have said more. Or nothing at all. I’ve always tried to be there for her, but I sure as hell don’t know how to give sex advice to a teenage girl who’s on the verge of giving up her virginity. The mere thought of it makes me feel sick. I can’t even get my own shit together when it comes to dating.

She always comes to me when she needs to talk, though. Or when she’s scared. Or has something exciting to share.

It really should come as no surprise since my name was the first word she ever said.

Now it’s like we’re verbally bonded.

The motorcycle shop is already open and blaring with the racket of heavy metal music and air tools when I get there. My brother Tanner usually opens up the shop and I close, because he’s a morning person and I’m usually up late at night, saving lost pets and stalking bad guys. You think I’m kidding? I’m not.

The shop belonged to my father, Thomas Grace, who lived, breathed, and ate bikes, and he passed that passion down to his boys. The only thing he loved more than riding was my mom. And his kids, of course. But mom came first, and that’s the way it should be.

That changed twelve years ago when my dad dropped dead of a heart attack. Bam. Gone.

Being the oldest, I had no choice but to step up and take care of the family business, my mom, my four younger brothers and my little sister. Six sets of eyes all looking at me to put us back together again. This went down just two months before the band’s big break, first major tour, and a record deal. I had to bail out of the band that me, Asher, and Ember started years before and watch from the sidelines as they became rich famous rock stars. Meanwhile, my guitar ended up in a closet collecting dust and my dreams slowly faded away. But hey, I get a royalty check since I wrote some of the songs on the first album. Yay, me.

In the blink of an eye, I went from being a wild musician living on the road out of an old suitcase, partying hard without a care in the world, to having to be the responsible one.

Life is funny like that.

I enter through the back door of the shop, where my brothers Tanner, Taran, and Tristan are busy working in their areas. Tanner and Taran mostly do engine rebuilds, and Tristan does all our custom airbrushing and pin striping. We have another mechanic, Sled, who works part-time. I mostly work on the older, vintage bike restorations. Dad’s strict rule was we only sell and work on cruisers – no racing bikes. To this day, I’ve made sure we held up that rule. No race bikes. No rice rockets. No scooters. Ever.

And yeah, my mom had a thing about the letter T and giving us unique names when she named all of us.

Every day starts the same for me at the shop, and it’s the part I hate the most because I have to hole up in my office and go through the mail, sort out the bills and purchase orders, and set the schedule for upcoming work. I fucking despise paperwork, but my Dad did this all himself so I figure I should, too.