Chapter 27
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
M oon stormed forward, yelling loudly, “Larissa!”
The doctor who had worked on him in the E.R. recovered quickly from seeing him. “Lower your voice. My sister isn’t here.”
“Where is she?” Moon managed to lower his voice despite the fury surging through him.
“Larissa is none of your business.” The doctor’s chin rose haughtily.
Moon jerked the baby sleeper out of her hand, waving it in her face. “This makes it my business.”
“You are aware my sister is a doula and buys clothes for her clients’ babies as gifts, right?”
Moon wasn’t buying the bullshit she was trying to sell. He gave a curt nod to the woman standing by the doctor’s side. “What’s your name?”
“Priscilla.”
“Priscilla, do you normally give your clients’ sleepers for their babies that say, ‘Auntie’s Little Angel?’”
“All the time.” She was brazenly lying to him.
“Where. Is. She?” he gritted out.
“She moved away after you came here.” Priscilla lifted her chin higher than her sister had. “She didn’t want to chance running into you again in town.”
“Because she didn’t want me to find out she’s pregnant with my baby?”
Condescendingly, she glared at him. “Because you told her to leave, remember? All I want from you is goodbye ,” she mimicked him perfectly.
“I didn’t mean she had to leave Treepoint, just to stay out of my way.”
“How’s she supposed to know that? She gave you your wish, so don’t come in here, complaining to us.”
“Is she pregnant?”
“You’ll have to ask her that question.”
Priscilla might have appeared to be the meekest of the three sisters, but she had no trouble taking over once she got warmed up.
“I will when you tell me where she is.”
She folded her arms over her chest. “That’s not going to happen.”
Moon looked at the doctor for the answer to his question.
All that one did was raise a lofty eyebrow at him.
“Okay … I see how it’s going to be.” He gave them an unconcerned shrug. “Your family is going to regret screwing me over.”
The doctor curled her lip in disgust. “I believe my sister already regrets screwing you,” she said bluntly. “You can leave before I call the sheriff.”
Moon opened his mouth then snapped it closed. He would find Larissa, and she would regret not telling him about the baby.
As he marched to the door, he heard Priscilla’s parting shot.
“GOODBYYYYE!”
B lade took one look at his face when he stepped onto the porch before he quickly opened the door for him. Moon didn’t spare him a glance as he went inside, intent on regaining his equilibrium.
Feeling as if he had been thrown for a loop and was yet to regain his bearings, he grabbed a bottle of whiskey to pour himself a glass while disregarding Train and Rider as if they weren’t sitting at the bar, drinking beer.
Under their scrutiny, he drank a hefty amount of whiskey then poured himself another generous amount. The brothers broke off from their conversation and eyed the nearly empty whiskey bottle.
“Who pissed in your cereal?”
Moon turned a deaf ear to Rider’s question to focus on Train.
“Killyama’s midwife, where is she?”
Train’s disdainful expression showed he wasn’t ready to let bygones be bygones.
Fuck! He hated to admit that holding a grudge with the brothers for so long was biting him in the ass. They had all attempted to breach the gap he had placed between them, except for Reaper— that mean fucker couldn’t care less—but he had held on to his anger.
“Why should I tell you jackshit?”
There was nothing on earth which would get him to lower his pride, except one thing—his child.
“I think I knocked her up,” he stated, pouring himself another splash of whiskey.
Train raised a surprised brow. “You don’t know?”
Moon lifted the glass to his lips and slung the whiskey to the back to his throat. “Her sisters won’t tell me where she is,” he admitted in a choked voice.
“Then I don’t know what to say. You could go ask Killyama,” Train suggested with an evil smile. “I’ll even go with you.”
What the hell? Did he have sucker stamped on his forehead? “I’ll call.”
Train’s smile grew wider. “Good choice.”
Moon took out his cell phone and scrolled through his contact list before he found Killyama’s name, then pushed the call button.
The phone rang several times before it was answered.
“What in the fuck do you want?” Killyama snarled.
His balls clenched in fear. “Hello … This is Moon.” He winced at how lame he sounded.
“No shit. Tell me something I don’t know, like why in the fuck you’re calling me?”
Moon shifted, trying to jiggle his balls loose. “I was … I need to get in touch with your midwife. Do you happen to have her address or phone number?”
“I sure do.” Killyama’s voice dripped honey.
“Could I have it?”
“No problem,” she replied sweetly. “As soon as you walk barefoot to east of Bumfuck, Egypt and come back, I’ll get that information to you. Until then, fuck off, you pecker-head.”
Setting the phone down on the counter, Moon poured what was left of the whiskey into his glass. “Your wife is a bitch.”
“I should kick your ass for saying that, but she is.”
“Why is she so fucking pissed at me? Hell, you barely had a mark on your ass.”
“Dude, seriously?” Train gave him a disappointed look. “I knew you were self-centered, but you needing me to tell you that takes you to another level. Killyama wanted Larissa as her midwife. I’ve been arguing with her about having a midwife because I want my kid born in the hospital. Killy doesn’t. You actually did me a favor by getting her to leave, which I will deny saying if you repeat it. I was losing the argument because I told her I wanted a doctor in the delivery room. Killyama waited until I opened my big mouth to tell me Larissa is not only a licensed midwife; she’s a doctor.”
“She’s a doctor?”
“A doctor. From what I found out from Killy, Larissa worked on becoming a certified midwife while helping putting the oldest sister through college. When Lana graduated, she decided to become a D.O. She also helped pay for the youngest one’s education. If I remember right, Priscilla is a doula, but she’s working toward becoming a certified nurse midwife. When you went to their office and confronted her, she was humiliated, and rather than taking the chance of seeing you in town, she decided to move away. Therefore, no home birth for Killy, which puts you on her shit list.”
Moon eyed him. “But you didn’t want Killy to have the baby at home.”
Train nodded. “I didn’t, but Killy was counting on me caving in. You took it out of her control. She doesn’t like that. She especially doesn’t like you since you were the person who put an end to their dream of opening a birthing center here in Treepoint. Seems they have been scraping by, living together in a one-room apartment, watching every dime they spent, trying to afford a lawyer to help them in their fight to get legislation passed so they can open a birthing center. So, not only did you run Killy’s midwife out of town, but a lot of other women in the county who wanted another option for giving birth to their babies are shit out of luck.”
Moon’s hand clenched around the empty whiskey bottle. “Or she could have left town because she had no intention of telling me I’m the father.”
Train’s eyebrows rose. “And that’s a shocker? Larissa witnessed the fight. Then Killy sent her after me when I didn’t see her texts the day she was sick. Larissa saw and heard it all. Then you come to her office to humiliate her? I would be more shocked if she had stayed.”
“I’m more shocked he was able to nail her,” Rider said cuttingly, taking a swig of his beer.
“Fuck you.”
Rider grinned. “No, thanks.”
Moon was tempted to grab another bottle of whiskey. Instead, he opened the drink fridge for a bottle of water.
Train got up from the stool and moved around the bar to throw his beer bottle away. “Since you’ve managed to snub anyone who could find out where she is, I guess you’re on your own.”
“I don’t need anyone’s help. I can find Larissa myself.”
Rider handed his empty bottle to Train to dispose of it for him. “You mind handing me another?”
Train gave him the beer.
Twisting the lid off, Rider raised the bottle as if to toast him. “I love being able to sit back and watch someone else fuck up beside me. For what it’s worth, I would be kissing everyone’s ass for help if she were carrying my baby around and I didn’t know where she was.”
“Well, it’s not your baby, is it? I’ll find her, and when I do, she’s going to regret fucking me over not once but twice,” he promised.
“Yeah, that’s right.” Train shook his head at him. “You go ahead and really fuck yourself over. Then, when you’re crying into your beer that your kid is calling another man daddy, I can really tell you I told you so .”
“I can promise that will never fucking happen,” Moon swore vehemently.
Rider gave him a sad smile. “Brah, you’ve made an art of fucking up. That’s why Viper and Wizard shuffle you back and forth. As a brother, we’ve all been able to count on you when we needed jobs done. You would have laid your life on the line for several of us, but brother, when it comes to personal life, it’s like we’re dealing with another person who takes a dump on everything. You’ve got the club to the point that having you as a brother isn’t worth needing to cleaning up all the crap. Larissa isn’t a member of the club who has to take your shit, nor does she have to clean up after it. She did the right thing taking her ass out of Treepoint, just like Jo walked away from me.”
Rider’s face turned reflective. “It took her walking out that back door for me to realize what I did, and I didn’t have a kid in the picture. Your next move is up to you, but I suggest you get your ducks in a row before you do anything. I would start mending fences because, even if you do find her, she’s going to slip right back out.”
Moon felt each of Rider’s words like a punch in his gut, so much so the dark side of him switched on, taking control of the pain.
“When I ask for your advice, I’ll take it. Until then, keep it to yourself.”
“Fair enough.” Rider lifted the beer bottle to his lips then stood, carrying the bottle to place it in the container for recyclables. “You ready?” he asked Train. “Nickel’s bike isn’t going to get fixed with us trying to pour sense into a lost cause.”
“I’m ready.”
Both men walked around the bar.
“Have fun.”
Moon frowned. “Doing what?”
“Cleaning up your own mess.”