Chapter 27 #2
I didn’t argue with him, just nodded. "If I give them to you, and shit works out with her, can I stay?"
He pursed his lips. "We'll see."
Disliking being beholden to anyone, I reached for my JD to sink it back as he twisted around and returned to his hog.
Watching him and his Enforcer ride off into the fucking sunset, I grabbed my cell and keyed in her address.
Finding the route to her place, I wondered how the fuck a seventeen-year-old had managed to get an apartment on her own. If she’d emancipated herself, then I had to reason Maverick would have heard about that.
Had Ally left Jeremy?
And if she hadn’t, if Ally wasn’t there, how had Wynter gotten her own place, and would it be easier or harder without her adoptive parents there while I explained our mutual history?
There was no guarantee that Jeremy and Ally would let me into the fucking house, but if they did, then at least they’d be able to explain that I wasn’t some deranged lunatic who was also her biological dad.
Grimacing, wishing I could have about ten more JDs, instead, I reached into my jacket, downed a packet of gum, and considered finding a motel to clean up first. But I’d showered this morning, my gear was fresh and clean, and I didn’t stink of smoke or booze from the bar, so I knew if I did try to find a motel first, I was just stalling.
Like a goddamn coward.
The menthol explosion in my skull was strong as I tried to chew away the taste of JD, and it plagued me as I drove the short ride to my kid’s place.
The neighborhood wasn’t the best. So much so that I was grateful the Disciples had their eyes on her.
The apartment building wasn’t worthy of a goddamn drug runner. Never mind my kid, that was for fucking sure.
There were bars on every window, and the front door didn’t have a proper lock. Something that was only confirmed when I walked over to it after parking my hog and dragging my saddlebag with me, and it swung open with the kick of my foot.
No working intercom, no lock to keep non-residents out—this was a father’s idea of hell.
Nervous and pissed off, wondering what the fuck kind of game Jeremy was playing, I figured out that 220 was on the second floor.
Once I made it outside her place, I knocked on the door, half expecting no one to answer because it was early enough that she could have been in school still.
Well, that was unless she’d quit school and I just hadn’t known.
The last time Maverick and I had spoken, he hadn’t said dick about her moving out. Hadn’t said anything about her prick father being in debt up to his eyeballs with the Triads.
Although… in fairness, Mav wouldn’t pick up on that unless there were unusual withdrawals being removed from his account.
By the sounds of it, Jeremy made regular payments. Might have even done that for years so Mav likely wouldn’t have seen a pattern.
That didn’t stop me from being furious though.
Not just with Jeremy but with Maverick too.
When no one answered the door, I made to turn away, bitterly angry to realize there wasn’t even a peephole.
Then, just as I stepped aside, determining to return later, I heard a soft, “Go away.”
My kid.
Christ, so like her fucking mother.
What was it with the women in my life?
Always telling me to back off?
Sucking in a sharp breath, I rasped, “I’m not…”
My mouth worked as words failed me.
What was I doing here?
I hadn’t even thought about what I’d say to her. In all honesty, I’d figured it would be a fight to meet her. Hadn’t expected I could just roll up to her place and speak with her immediately.
I thought Ally would be the one to ease things after we argued for a couple hours about how they didn’t want a bad influence like me in her life…
Nothing about this was going how I imagined.
Clearing my throat, I continued, “I’m a friend—” A friend of the family? Was I? Jesus.
“I don’t care who you are. Go. Away.”
The words bit into me again, as she unknowingly beat an exposed nerve with a ball-peen hammer.
I gritted my teeth. “I came a long way to visit with you. You don’t know me, and I don’t know you but I’m R—” I heaved a sigh. “My name’s King. I went to school with your folks.”
Silence.
Not even a whisper.
Fuck, this was more of a disaster than I could have predicted.
“I know you moved out recently, and I figured that money must be tough for you to be staying here.”
I dug my hand into my pocket and pulled out some bills. I didn’t have much on me. A little over four hundred dollars right now. I dumped my bag on the ground, squatted in front of the door, and shoved the money beneath it.
There was a too-big gap that had warning signs flickering to being in my head, so it was easier than I’d like to pass something under the board.
“I don’t want your money.”
“It’s a gift. I just… You should be staying somewhere with an intercom and a front door that locks. Even better, somewhere with an alarm system.” That might have been asking for a lot, but fuck, I needed her safe.
“There’s four hundred bucks here!” The soft exclamation had me swallowing. My daughter. My baby girl.
“I can get you more. However much you need.” Anything to get her out of this shithole.
“I don’t know you. I can’t take money from a stranger.”
The words sank into me like bullets.
I staggered to my feet, pressed a hand to the door.
“I’m not a stranger, Wynter. I’m your biological father.
But it’s okay if you don’t believe me. It really is.
It’s okay if you don’t want to meet me. But please, take the money.
I can get you more. I know four hundred isn’t much to get somewhere decent to rent in this area. ”
There was a slight rattle from the door, and it opened a scant inch.
A chain.
At least she had a fucking chain.
I sucked in a relieved breath that morphed into a stunned one when a beautiful brown eye peeped at me through the sliver of space.
I wished I could see more. Could see who she was staying with to get an apartment in this dump.
Had she bribed the super?
It looked like the kind of place where blind eyes were turned.
“Your name’s King?” The chestnut iris flared as her pupil dilated with her apparent disbelief.
I licked my lips. “I have two names. Maybe you know me by the other. My friends call me Rex.”
There was no flicker of recognition.
“Rex is Latin for King.”
“Yes, it is.”
I knew she’d studied Latin at school.
I’d paid for a private academy, wanting her to have the best education money could buy.
“Is that intentional?”
My lips almost twitched. “It was.”
The wad of cash was stuffed into the space. “I don’t want your money.”
“I’m sure you don’t,” I agreed, heart sinking. “But this place isn’t safe.”
She gulped. “You think I don’t know that? It’s all I could afford until I get paid next week.”
I gritted my teeth. “You’re working?”
“As a waitress. Three nights a week.”
Her answer was rich enough with details that I knew she recognized my name.
At least, I hoped she didn’t tell every bastard who came to her door shit like that.
Reaching up, I scratched my jaw and said, “I can’t take that money back.”
“I don’t want it,” she said bitterly.
“Maybe you don’t, but I want you to have it. I have no need for it.”
She frowned. “It’s money. How can you have no need for it?”
“Because I’d prefer for you to have it instead.”
“That makes no sense.”
“You know I’m your biological dad, Wynter.” I hitched a shoulder. “What do you expect me to do?”
“Not stick around?”
Christ, this girl could wound.
“I would’ve if I could’ve.”
Her mockery stung as she said, “That’s a real comfort to me now. Dad.”
“I know it isn’t. But I promise you, if I could have raised you as my own, I would have.”
Her sniff told me she thought I was talking out of my ass. “Why are you here?”
“You’re seventeen.” I swallowed. “I-I tried to stay away because I didn’t want to make things confusing for you, but I lost my dad on Christmas Day, your grandfather Bear, and he… I…”
“Did he know about me?”
“No.” It was one of my darkest regrets.
I didn’t know why, out of everything, that was the trigger, but it was. She made to slam the door closed, but I stuck my booted foot in the opening, wedging it there so she couldn’t.
“Go away,” she snarled.
“Let me explain!”
“Why should I? Why should I listen to you when this is the first time you’ve bothered to come into my life?”
“I didn’t give you up because I was young and foolish. I didn’t set you up with Jeremy and Ally because I didn’t want you.”
“Why did you then?”
Jesus. How did I explain this?
“Your biological mother, Rachel, was young when she had you. It wasn’t planned.
Rachel’s a genius. She’s so fucking smart, Wynter.
I’ve seen your report cards, and I figure you take after her.
” I shot her a grin that went down like a lead balloon.
“She got into Brown for pre-law, and she was going to take on the world. The condom busted, but that didn’t matter.
You were unexpected, but we loved each other, Wynter. I swear.”
“You didn’t make her get rid of me?” she asked, her voice suspicious.
“No!” I barked. “I damn well didn’t. Your mom was delicate that year.
” It was hard to settle on that word, but it was the only one that seemed to sit right with me.
“Something had happened to her, but she wouldn’t tell me what.
Someone had hurt her. It made her distant.
Things were awkward between us in the run up to her leaving. ”
“Who hurt her?”
“I-I found out recently that it was my uncle.”
Her eye rounded. “Your uncle hurt my mom?”
I figured the possessive pronouns were a step forward.
“Yeah, he did.”
“Badly?”
I rubbed my forehead with the back of my hand. “He assaulted her. Sexually.”
“I-I’m his?”
“No! No. You’re mine. She was fragile before she went to school, but when she was due to give birth, she was worse than ever.” I sucked in a breath. “I don’t live a life where… My world is dangerous, Wynter. You’ve watched Sons of Anarchy?”
She blinked. “I have.”
“Well, think that but worse.”
Her eye drifted down my length, fastened itself to the patches on my cut. “You’re a biker?”
“I am.”
“The Prez. You’re the leader?”
“Yeah, but I wasn’t back then. I’d have made it work if Rachel could have coped, but she couldn’t. She was broken, Wynter. In many ways, she still is.”
“Because of your uncle?”
“Yeah. Even now, if I touch her unawares, she flinches. It’s like I’ve hit her with a taser.
” The truth rattled through me, hurting me as much as it hurt Rachel.
“Whatever he did to her, something she still won’t talk about, it crushed her.
She dove into her studies then, and now, she lives and breathes her work.
“I wanted you, Wynter. I did. And I know, if things had been different, she’d have wanted you too. But things weren’t different—”
“You’re a biker?” she asked again.
“I am.”
“Did you hurt your uncle? For touching her?”
“He died a long time ago.”
Her eye closed for a split second. Slower than a blink. “Good. I’m glad.”
“Me too.”
Especially knowing how he died.
At the end of Sin’s fists as he beat the bastard to a bloody pulp that resulted in his death.
That was the least he deserved.
I swallowed. “I wanted you to have a stable home. A good life. With people who’d already been looking to adopt. I-I figured Jeremy and Ally were safe choices.”
The corner of her mouth that I could see, grew taut. “Ally… Mom… she’s good people.”
But her dad wasn’t.
“Did Jeremy hurt you?” I growled, straightening up as outrage filled me.
“No.”
Why wasn’t I reassured?
“Why did you move out?”
“That's my business. Not yours.”
I decided not to push my luck by prodding for more answers.
“Why are you really here?”
“You’re grown up. If you wanted, we could be friends.”
She studied me for a second, but her distrust was clear in her silence.
“You had seventeen years to find me. Why bother?”
“I didn’t have to find you. I knew where you were,” I told her carefully, “but I wasn’t about to walk into your life—”
“Just thought you’d do that today?” she sneered. “What’s changed?”
“I’ve changed.”
A hard laugh barked from her. “Yeah, okay, what do I look? Ten? I might have believed that bullshit before, but not now.”
Patience rattled, I told her, “It’s not bullshit. My dad just died. It made me realize that having a lot of family is a positive, not a negative.”
“Think I’m gonna call you Daddy and we can just make up and get along?”
“No.” Her bitterness shouldn’t have come as a surprise, but it did. “But having one more friend can’t be all bad, can it?”
“Friends are there for each other. As far as I can tell, you’ve never been there for me.”
I had. But she wasn’t to know that.
“I can start now, can’t I?”
“Don’t you think it’s too little too late?”
My smile was sad. “It’s not too late until we’re dead, and I’m not going anywhere.”
I wasn’t sure why, but that seemed to trigger a response in her.
At first, I just thought she was going to slam the door in my face, my foot be damned, but then, after staring at me for a minute, she told me, “There’s a coffee shop around the corner. It’s where I work. We can talk there tomorrow before school. Seven AM.”
Stepping back, I unwedged my foot. “I’ll be there,” I said as she closed the door in my face.
I sagged against the wall, unable to believe that she was letting me in, but I knew if she was anything like her mother, the war would be hard won.
Thanks to a lifetime’s experience with Rachel, I was battle ready.