“I hope the asshole’s dead.”
I raise my eyebrows, surprised at her venom. “That bad?”
“Fucker had a gun on me, but luckily, my uncles showed up before he had a chance to shoot me.”
“I hope he’s dead too,” I tell her, feeling a red-hot streak up the center of my back. My heart’s racing, and an anger I haven’t felt in so long takes hold. “Because if he isn’t, he should be.”
“Wylder.” She stares at me.
“Tate.” I stare back.
“Wylder, be serious.”
“I am.”
“You’re a dad.”
“And?”
“You have two sweet girls in there—” she points to the windows on the porch “—and they depend on you. You can’t go off trying to rescue a woman you barely know from something that happened years ago.”
“Have any of them reached out to you since?”
Tate shakes her head. “I put the MC behind me, and when I turned thirty, I promised myself I’d never date a biker again.”
I learn two things from her last sentence. She’s thirty, which is way younger than me, and she doesn’t want to date a biker. “Bikers in a club, guys who ride bikes, or both?”
“Bikers in a club. I don’t need that kind of hassle and bullshit in my life. I already have a nosy family. I don’t need a nosy club too.”
“I love riding my bike, but for the life of me, I could never understand why my brother, or anyone for that matter, wants or needs to be part of a club. It’s caused him nothing but trouble over his life.”
“I love motorcycles too, but the MC life isn’t for me. I wasn’t born to be someone’s old lady and turn the other cheek as they do bad shit. I want my partner to put me and our family before a bunch of leather-clad men.”
“That’s how it should be.”
“Tate,” Hazel says, running out of the house with her favorite teddy bear tucked in the crook of her arm. She’s moving so fast, she almost tips over when she stops in front of Tate. “Do you want to see my room?” She doesn’t wait for Tate to say yes before grabbing her hand, trying to yank her off the swing.
Tate glances at me with a nervous smile. “Is it okay?”
“Yeah, babe. It’s good.”
“Babe,” Hazel repeats before she giggles.
I hadn’t even realized I’d called her that. “Sorry.”
“I’ve been called worse,” she says as Hazel pulls her upward and then toward the screen door.
As soon as Tate and Hazel disappear inside, Maddox comes outside to join me on the porch. “How’s it going?” she asks as she slides into Tate’s spot on the swing.
“Good,” I say, drawing out the word and wondering where the heck Maddox is about to go with this.
“I like her, Dad.”
“Me too, kiddo.”
“I like her for you,” she explains.
I rub my palm down and up my jean-covered thigh. “It’s not like that.”
