Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
Dagger
Wait a fuckin’ minute. What?
“Did you just say . . .” Cy trails off and looks from me to Hammer, then back. “Did Grinder just say Katrina is his sister?”
“She’s my fuckin’ sister,” Grinder grits out through the line. I could almost see him in my mind, gritting his teeth tight. “How the fuck is she Dagger’s ol’ lady?”
“It’s new, started two months ago,” I tell him, it’s the truth, though it’s not completely the truth.
“Right.” The tension escalates with Grinder’s terse tone. “Since she’s your ol’ lady, Dagger, tell me what she knows about her family? Her mother? Her father?”
“Doesn’t talk about her parents and what she does tell me, that’s between the two of us.
” I only know what she briefly shared in her blabbing when she’d been here.
Regardless, I won’t at any time tell something that’s not mine to share.
“I don’t have time to get into this. I need to get back to her.
” I need to set some things straight with her regarding what was going to happen.
“Her mother showed up at the clubhouse six months ago looking for the old man,” Grinder mutters.
“Said she needed him to get his daughter to talk to her since she refused to speak with her. Told her the old man was out on the road. Called him, said he knows exactly who the woman is and didn’t even know he had another kid.
To say he was pissed, still is, is an understatement.
We’ve been looking into Katrina for months to find the best way to approach her. The old man wants to know who she is.”
I don’t know what I should tell him, considering I still don’t know more about her other than the fact she’s a music artist and carrying my kid inside her.
“We’ll discuss this more later on. I’ll talk to her.
” I was gonna have to talk to her anyway.
“I’ll be in touch with you after.” There was a lot that I needed to talk and work through regarding all of this with Katrina.
Mostly, I needed to get out of here, find her, and tell her there was no way in hell she was doing this whole thing without me.
I wasn’t about to be a on the sidelines parent.
Hammer finishes the call with Grinder while holding my gaze. “You know why I declared her your ol’ lady, don’t you?”
I didn’t even want to think about it, but Katrina was carrying my kid, that’s exactly what she was going to be. Didn’t matter if she knew it or not. The woman is mine.
“She came to tell you she was pregnant, didn’t she?” Cy asks.
“Yeah, said she found out two weeks ago,” I say, gritting my back molars again. “Ran off before I could get my shit together enough to talk it through. Said she didn’t want anything other than to let me know that I was going to have a kid.”
Hammer whistles lowly and shakes his head.
Cy blinks and looks to the ceiling. “What is it with women and their stubborn independence?”
“Don’t know,” I grunt and look to the file. “Is there anything in that thing that I need to know before I face off with this woman?”
“Brief rundown for you is, she’s a music artist, doesn’t do tours or anything like that.
Simply makes music and puts it out there.
Also has other locals come into her studio to record.
The place is in a warehouse, the same area being bought up as we spoke of a bit ago.
Just as we now know she’s Grinder’s little sister, though she doesn’t know this just yet.
She pretty much lives a simple life. Has friends, goes out with them occasionally, but usually sticks to herself most of the time. That’s pretty much it.”
I nod, getting to my feet. “Address in there?”
“For both home and warehouse.” Cy grins.
“You gonna be all right with this?” Hammer asks.
“I’ll be more than all right once I have words with Katrina about her approach on something as important as carrying my kid,” I tell him, grabbing the file off his desk. “Woman is in for a rude awakening when I get to her.”
Hammer chuckles, and Cy shakes his head, grin fully in place.
“I’ll catch you all later,” I tell them both, taking the file with me. As much as I want to read through it now, I’m not going to. The only thing I need right now is the addresses of where she might be.
Heading to my room, I flip it open, the first page being known addresses. Good. I take the page out and toss the file on my nightstand. It’ll be good in here for the time being. No one will come in here and touch it.
Leaving my room with the door locked, I head for my bike, thoughts of everything swirl through my head.
This woman I was with one night, who has haunted me daily since, is carrying my kid.
I haven’t even been able to fuck any of the regular clubwhores around here.
They don’t seem appealing to me anymore.
Not in the way they have in the past when I wanted to get off and didn’t give a shit how I did it.
Even before that night, the excitement of having free and loose whenever I wanted it was starting to wear off.
I was going to have to get my priorities straight when it comes to what’s happening around me more than I already had. As Hammer said, I have an ol’ lady now. Didn’t matter whether we were together or not. The claim’s been made, and I won’t take it back.
Straddling my bike, I glance at the paper with the addresses and decide, with this time of day, that she’s probably heading to the warehouse where she has her recording studio.
I didn’t have to look up the location since I knew where it was. It wasn’t a hard place to find and I’d get there easy enough.
* * *
Fifteen minutes of riding wasn’t long enough of a ride to get to Katrina. Tension still rode me hard as thoughts of her and the baby she’s carrying flew around in my head on repeat. The picture in my pocket feels like a lead weight that I refuse to get rid of.
Parking my bike next to her car, I take in the car on the other side. She’s got company. It best not be some guy she’s seeing. I didn’t even think to ask Cy if there was a man in her life. I didn’t think there was considering what she said to me earlier and how she held herself two months ago.
The night I took her back to the clubhouse, Katrina had been nothing but class. The way she flirted. The way she’d taken me in. She wasn’t into seeming easy. In fact, she hadn’t been willing to talk to me at first. One of her friends had encouraged her to go with me.
Swinging my leg over, I straighten and make my way up to the door and inside, not bothering to knock.
“I’ve told you more than once, I’m not selling.” There’s no missing the annoyance in Katrina’s voice as the door closes behind me.
“Come on, Katrina, the deal is good. Money is even better. You sell, and you can find a better place,” the guy standing in front of her says.
From the side view of him, I could see the smug grin on his face. I also don’t miss the way Katrina holds herself stiff and poised, ready for an attack. I didn’t like it.
“You need to leave. I have a business to run, and you’re interfering with it,” Katrina snaps.
“You need to think about this, Kat, we’re making you a damn good offer.”
“And as I’ve said many times already, I’m not selling, and that’s that.”
I didn’t want her to get upset, especially now. With her being ten weeks, she could still be at risk of losing the baby, and I didn’t want her to do that.
“There a problem here?” I demand, making my presence known. Their intense focus on each other told me neither had seen me come in.
If I hadn’t been watching Katrina, I would’ve missed her slight jump at the boom of my voice as well as the slight relief I was there.
“It’s nothing, Carl here was just leaving.”
Carl turns his full attention to me, eyes taking me in, stopping on my cut. “There’s no problem. I was simply discussing something with Miss Raye here.”
“Well, Katrina has stated you were leaving. I suggest you do that,” I tell him, walking directly to Katrina and tucking her into my side. “You need to listen and get out of here.”
Carl narrows his eyes and glares at me before turning his focus back to Katrina. “I suggest you take the offer. This is the last time we’re offering what we are. Next time it won’t be as good.”
“I won’t be selling, so don’t come back here with anything. I won’t accept a penny from you or your company.”
I gotta admit the way she refuses to back down is hot. I have to appreciate a woman with a backbone and who knows not to let anyone walk all over her.
Carl huffs and stalks out of the studio, slamming the door open and shut as he goes.
It’s only when the doors closed again that Katrina moves, stepping away from me and asks. “What are you doing here, Dagger?”
“What am I doing here?” I repeat, cocking a brow,
“Yes.” She nods, crossing her arms and bracing.
“Where should I start?” I ask, shoving my hands in my pockets to keep from reaching for her. “How about the fact you got your say and didn’t give me a chance to say mine before you up and walked away like you didn’t just drop a bomb in my lap.”
“I was giving you time to think it over,” she huffs, though her eyes aren’t filled with annoyance as they’d been with Carl, but apprehension. “I didn’t want you to have to rush through the process.”
Rush through the process?
Was she for real?
“You’re not doing this alone, Kat,” I state, stepping closer to her, my hands going to her waist, tugging her the rest of the way to me. “You’re not getting rid of me. I don’t give a fuck how much you try.”
“I don’t need you to—”
“You might not need shit from me, but you got it anyway. We’re going to do this together. You and me.”
“What does that mean exactly?” she asks, head tilted back, eyes wide, lips parted slightly.
“Means I’m going to do what I meant to do after you left me while I slept.” I don’t waste a second longer in getting my mouth on hers, kissing her as I’ve wanted to for two long months.