“No, why?”
She reached for Tallulah, and I handed her over, watching her as she twisted in her seat and lifted Tallulah up and over the bench before placing her in the car seat.
“I’m glad she still rear faces,” Tally said as she clipped Tallulah into place.
I didn’t hear much of what she said because my eyes were on the way her ass looked in those jeans.
She was shimmying and shaking, so it took me a while to realize that during this time I should’ve been walking to my own door and getting in.
Instead, I was still standing there like a dolt and staring at where her cute ass used to be.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, then horror crossed over her face.
“Oh, God. Is there more?”
I blinked then shook my head.
“More of what?” I questioned in confusion.
“Blood.”
She said the word like it was some dirty secret, and I had to bite my tongue to keep the laugh from exploding from my body.
“No,” I told her the truth. “I was staring at your ass, and wondering if you’d have a problem with me stopping by to fuck you during the middle of night when nobody could see us a few times over the next couple months.”
Her face colored.
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” she murmured. “We could get caught. We could get into a lot of trouble, and then I’d not graduate. You’d have to quit your job due to your inappropriate behavior…”
I placed my hand over her mouth.
“Chill,” I ordered. “If you didn’t want to, all you had to say was ‘no.’”
She pursed her lips.
“Whatever.”
I grinned and shut her door, rounding the hood of the Impala and pulling open the door before I dropped down into my seat.
“Why aren’t you wearing your club vest/cut thingy?” she asked as soon as my ass hit the seat.
“It’s in my saddlebags,” I murmured. “When I come back and swap my car out for my bike, I’ll put it on.”
“Why not now?” she continued to push.
“Because when we’re in cages—that’s cars in biker speak—we don’t wear them. Don’t know why…just don’t,” I informed her.
“Do your women wear the ‘Property of’ vests like I’ve seen in some TV shows?”
I shook my head.
“A few do, most don’t,” he said. “Just depends on what the club does. Ours doesn’t. We’ve done it in the past, asking our old ladies to wear the Property patches, but it fell to the wayside when Stone became president. His old lady wore one for a short time, but then people started to get bent out of shape with the cops in this county, and she stopped wearing it one day.”
“Hmm,” she murmured. “I wonder why that was.”
I shrugged. “Don’t know.”
And I probably never would know.
Mei, Stone’s old lady, had gone downhill since Stone had died, and I didn’t think she’d ever be the same. She was a shell of the woman that I used to know. My heart hurt every single time I saw her.
I didn’t bother sharing any of this with Tally, either.
Mei was a proud woman, and she wouldn’t want anyone feeling sorry for her or Stone.
Stone died doing what he loved, protecting those who couldn’t protect themselves. He died happy, in love and content with his life.
What more could you ask for?
Starting the car up on that thought, I groaned when I saw Tally squirm in her seat.
Really? She had to do this now? With her kid in my car and me taking her home to her father?
Knowing I was about to see ‘the judge’ in this city was daunting enough. I didn’t need to add a boner for his daughter to the list of things that he would hate about me.
He already had plenty to hate me for, and Tally didn’t even know it yet.
The moment that the judge realized just who she’d been staying with the last two days, he’d freak the fuck out.
And I was counting on the fact that Tally was really into me, and already emotionally attached, to keep him from clouding her judgement.
We drove in silence all the way to her home…well partial silence. Tallulah had no problem letting us know how very much she was enjoying the hell out of the ride the entire way. We pulled into the driveway to Tally’s parents’ house, and she was still laughing, chatting and carrying on about something only she knew.
“Why are you so quiet all of a sudden?” Tally asked once we turned onto her road. “And how do you know where my father lives?”
I bit my lip, knowing where this was going.
“A long, long time ago, my family used to own the land that you live on,” I murmured. “Your father bought it from the bank after my parents lost it.”
A heavy silence filled the air after that.
She cleared her throat.
“I didn’t know that,” she murmured. “What happened?”
I made the final turn into her driveway—my old driveway—and stopped in front of the house—my old house.
“When I was fourteen, my mom overstretched my father’s and her resources, and she couldn’t get herself turned back around,” I started to explain. “They started to spiral downhill, until there was nothing else they could do but let the house and the land go back to the bank.”
“I think I can see where this is going,” she murmured.
I grinned, but there was nothing nice in it.
“Yeah,” I murmured. “We were evicted the summer that I graduated from high school.”
She breathed deeply. “Did you know me?”
I shook my head.
“No,” I admitted.
But if I had, she would’ve been mine the moment she turned eighteen.
I’d been full of piss and vinegar for years, and it’d taken me turning twenty-one to finally see the error of my ways. But by that time, I’d already done everything that I could to piss off the one and only person I now had to impress.
Judge Slater.
“That’s good…oh.” She reached for the handle of the car, and got out, heading for her father who’d just rounded the corner.
I twisted in my seat and unstrapped Tallulah from her restraints, and then lifted her into my arms before facing the music.
And the music wasn’t good music, either.
The moment that the judge’s eyes met mine, his scowl went thunderous.
“What the hell are you doing on my land?” he growled. “Give her to me.”
I handed him Tallulah, expecting the move the moment that he started stalking toward me.
“Sir,” I murmured.
The judge glared hard at me, and I realized that it was going to take a very long time to win this man over, if I even could at all.
Glancing at Tally, I nodded at her and headed for my car, knowing when I wasn’t welcome.
“Have a good one, Tally.”
Tally looked confused as she stared at me leaving, and the moment I turned my car around and I could see her in my rearview, I realized that it would take quite a bit of convincing to get her back on my side.
Shit.
***
Tally
“You will not have anything to do with that man ever again,” my father ordered me.
I blinked.
“What?” I asked. “Dad, I’m nearly twenty-one years old. Surely you don’t think you can still tell me what to do.”