Chapter 2
Chapter two
Barrett
“Are you Barrett O’Neil?” I hear someone ask. My gaze swivels in the direction of the voice, and I see a girl standing in front of me. Who the hell brought their kid here? Isn’t it past this girl’s bedtime?
“Yeah,” I answer. Suddenly, the dancers are gone, and Jude is standing next to me as I sway a bit from Chantel’s sudden departure.
“You knew my mom. Samantha Fuller.” The girl pulls out a picture and shoves it in my face. Or maybe I’m swaying toward the picture. Fuck, maybe doing a shot every time someone told me happy birthday was a bad idea.
Nah. Fuck that. It’s my birthday, and I’m fucking partying. I blink a few times and refocus my gaze on the picture in front of me.
“See. That’s you, and that’s my mom,” the girl says. “I’m her daughter, Sydney. And you’re my dad.”
No one says anything as I look from the picture to the girl standing in front of me. Sydney Fuller. The girl who says she’s my daughter.
All of a sudden, Jude clasps me on the shoulder, nearly causing me to topple sideways. Pretty sure if he didn’t have a grip on me, I’d fall over.
“Congratulations. It’s a girl.”
My head spins, and my stomach roils. I take two steps away from the small crowd that’s formed around us and throw up in the grass.
“Okay, party’s over,” someone calls. Pretty sure it’s my president, but the pounding in my ears is making it hard to make out the voice.
“Come on, brother,” Linc says, patting my back and helping me stand from my bent position. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”
I stand straight and look over at Sydney, who has disgust written all over her face.
“Where the hell’s your mom, kid?” And why would she let her daughter out of the house this late—especially to come to a fucking party at an MC clubhouse.
“She died in a car accident,” Sydney says, her chin trembling.
Fuck.
Lucy and Charlie move in front of her and say something before the three of them head into the clubhouse through the slider.
The rest of the girls follow as Linc leads me over to a chair. He grabs a bottle of water from the cooler next to us, and I grip it, unscrewing the cap and taking in a mouthful. I swirl the cold liquid around my mouth and spit it out, clearing the alcohol I just threw up.
“You okay?” Knox asks, coming to stand next to me.
I start to nod, but it turns into me shaking my head back and forth. “Not in the slightest, brother.”
Bending forward, I pour the icy liquid over my head in an attempt to sober myself the hell up.
It’s after midnight, and the only thing I should be doing right now is bending over one of the fine-as-hell dancers and fucking her from behind.
Instead, my head is between my knees as I try not to vomit all over my black motorcycle boots.
“What do we know?” Ozzy asks in his authoritative MC prez voice.
“Barrett found out he has a daughter and yacked all over the grass. That’s about it,” Jude oh-so-helpfully supplies before handing me another bottle of water.
“Fuck you, asshole,” I slur. I’m a fucking mess. “Where’s the girl?”
“Inside with the women. They’re talking to her now,” Braxton answers.
“I need to talk to her.” I stand and nearly fall right back on my ass.
“Not now, brother. You’re way too fucked up to have any sort of conversation with a kid,” Ozzy tells me, placing a hand on my shoulder. “We’ll get her set up in a room and figure out what the hell is going on in the morning.”
I nod and look around. When my gaze zeroes in on the bottle of tequila on the table, I reach out and grab it by the neck. Putting the bottle to my lips, I tip it back. Ozzy grabs the bottle from my grasp, and tequila spills down my chin.
“You need to go to bed. Killing your liver more tonight isn’t going to make tomorrow any easier,” my prez says.
“That an order?” I ask with a humorless laugh. Fuck this night.
“Yeah, asshole. It is,” Ozzy confirms. “Come on, I’m taking you to your room.”
“I’ve had worse offers,” I say
“Yeah, yeah. Get your ass moving.”
Stumbling into the clubhouse, I see Lucy and Charlie sitting next to Sydney on the couch.
The girl’s sad gaze lands on me. I stop in my tracks for a moment, taking in her dark hair and hazel eyes.
The same hazel eyes I look at every morning in the mirror.
A brownish green outlined with a dark-gray ring.
I bet hers change color depending on what she’s wearing, too.
I had a girl once tell me that my eyes were like mood rings.
That she could always tell what I was thinking.
She was full of shit. It only depended on what color shirt I had on.
Now that I think about it, it was Sami who told me that.
Fuck.
Even in my drunken state, I can still recognize Ozzy is right. I don’t need to try to talk to her tonight. I need to pass the fuck out and figure this shit out in the morning.
“What the actual fuck?” I groan as I turn over in my bed. There’s no one next to me, so at least I didn’t get blackout drunk and take a dancer back to my room with me the first night my daughter is in the clubhouse.
My daughter.
I have a fucking daughter.
I haven’t thought about Samantha Fuller in years.
Not since her old man showed up at the little house my pops and I rented.
I took off that night and never looked back.
Now, in one night, I found out that she’s dead, and she left her daughter behind—a daughter she said was mine.
Through the haze of my hangover, I remember walking into the clubhouse and looking at her—really looking at her.
She has my eyes. There’s no denying that.
They are the same color as mine, with the corners curved down slightly. And if memory serves, Sami’s were blue.
I was a drunken mess when Sydney showed up at the clubhouse and shoved that picture in my face.
It was my birthday, and I was partying with my nearest and dearest. Just when shit started getting good and the girls from the strip club were ready to show me a good time, my world got flipped upside down.
Chanel was whispering in my ear all the gloriously sinful things she and her friend planned for me.
Then a kid with dark hair dressed in baggy jeans and a beanie showed up out of the blue, saying she was my daughter.
“Fuck,” I groan as I roll over and check the time on my phone.
Barely eight in the morning. Too fucking early for this shit, that’s for sure.
I whip the blanket from my body and head over to the mini fridge in the corner.
Grabbing a bottle of water, I chug half of it.
When I pull it away from my mouth, I wait a few beats to make sure it stays down.
I feel like shit, but at least I’m not sick to my stomach this morning.
I walk into my bathroom and undress before turning my shower on.
Instead of waiting for the water to warm, I immediately move under the spray, letting the cold water snap me awake.
I blow out a shuddering breath and lean forward as the water runs over my head and shoulders.
It doesn’t take more than a few moments for it to turn hot, and I wash the alcohol stench from my body.
I’m halfway to normal when I step back into my room and pull on a pair of jeans, a black tank, and my cut.
After sliding my feet into my boots, I step out of my room and walk down the hall into the main area of the clubhouse.
One of the prospects is setting out trays of eggs and sausage, and the smell of something sweet wafts from the kitchen when he walks through the swinging door.
Lucy is sitting at the bar with a cup of steaming liquid in front of her.
“Isn’t coffee bad for the baby?” I ask as I head behind the bar and pour myself a cup.
“It’s mint tea,” she responds, leaning back in the stool and rubbing her protruding stomach.
My mouth tips down in a frown. “You still sick every morning?”
Lucy sips from her cup. “No, but this is what I drank when I was, and now I have a taste for the shit.”
“You and Jude are going to have a lot of work to do when that baby comes. Otherwise, their first word is going to be fuck or wanker.”
Her brow quirks up. “I could say the same to you. Though I’m pretty sure Sydney already knows the good swear words.”
Fuck. Sydney. My daughter.
“Where is she, by the way?” I ask.
“Glad to see you’re already turning into a doting parent,” Lucy says, rolling her eyes.
“Cut me some slack, Lucy. I just found out about her eight hours ago.” I run a hand through my hair and walk around to the other side of the bar to have a seat.
“I don’t know what the hell I’m supposed to do.
Not like I had the best life growing up.
My mom took off when I was still learning to walk, and my dad was a drunk who moved from one shit-paying construction job to the next. ”
Lucy swivels her seat so she can face me.
“I get it. I think if anyone in this clubhouse understands what having shit parents is like, it’s me and my sister.
” She nods toward the kitchen door where Cece is surely baking up something delicious and sweet.
“I was scared shitless when I found out I was pregnant. What do I know about raising a kid? But Jude said something that just kind of stuck in my brain.”
“And I’m sure it was brilliant as usual,” the man himself says, walking out of the hallway and behind the bar. He leans over, kisses his woman on the mouth, then turns to pour himself a cup of coffee. “Don’t leave us in suspense, love. What insightful bit of wisdom did I impart?”