Nathan didn’t hesitate to fill him in. “When I was younger and asked about my father, Mom told me he was a Marine and he was killed during a deployment. She said her heart belonged to him and only him, which was why she never dated. She told me a lot of stories about my ‘father’ and I just wondered if those stories were really about you.”
Tears were streaming down my face. I covered my mouth with my hand to hold in the sob that wanted to escape. “Doll face, what’s with the tears?” Phoenix asked.
Nathan turned to me. “Mom, what’s wrong?”
I shook my head. The words were desperate to leave my mouth, but I didn’t want to say them. Nathan put his arm around my shoulder and pulled me close. “Mom?”
“I wanted it to be him. He should have been your father. I love you with all my heart, but it should have been him,” I sobbed into my son’s shirt.
Nathan rubbed my back gently, trying to soothe me. After a few minutes he asked, “So, what, you want me to call him Daddy?”
I looked at my son like he was crazy and then threw my head back and laughed. Laughter from the three on the phone filled the room. My sweet boy, he always knew how to put a smile on my face.
We wrapped up the phone call, with me promising to call Phoenix later. When I told Nathan that Wave and Token were next door, he didn’t hesitate to invite them over. After some hugs and chit-chat, we enjoyed a nice dinner out. I had missed Nathan a lot, as well as Wave and Token. I made a mental note to thank Phoenix for having them tag along.
I met Nathan for an early breakfast the next morning. Then, he rode with Wave and Token to drop me off at the airport. After another tearful goodbye full of hugs and kisses, I was once again in the air.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Annabelle
The next morning, I realized I had some serious shopping to do. When I agreed to come home with Phoenix, I packed my bags with the essentials needed for two weeks. What I did not do was pack anything appropriate to wear to my daughter’s bachelorette party, rehearsal dinner, and wedding.
Phoenix wasn’t crazy about letting me out on my own, but he had too much work to catch up on with the club and the farm to come shopping with me. He did, however, assign two giant man-children to drive me to Cedar Valley and guard any shops I entered.
After scaring the pants off the little old lady working in the first boutique I entered, I considered giving up and telling the guys to take me home. Before I could find the words, Prospect Kellan reassured me, “We’re used to it, Annabelle. You go to whichever stores you want to and don’t worry about us.”
Well, okay then. The next store was much better. The staff was younger and seemed to be fascinated with the two bikers standing at the entrance. The clothes were much more my style, too. I grabbed a few dresses I liked and headed to the dressing room.
I liked the first dress I tried on, so I stepped out of the room to see how it looked in the 3-way mirror. I turned to get a look at the back of the dress and froze at the familiar voice. “Annabelle? Is it really you?”
I whirled back around and came face-to-face with Macy. “Hey, Macy,” I said shyly and gave her an awkward little wave.
“Annabelle!” she shrieked and pulled me into a fierce hug. “What in the hell happened to you? The whole town was looking for you for over a year! Hell, I think some never stopped.”
There was a loud commotion in the store and seconds later the dressing room was filled with two bikers ready to attack.
“Step away from Annabelle,” Edge commanded, looking far more lethal than I ever thought he could with his baby face.
Macy held her hands up in the air like she was being held at gunpoint and backed away from me. She looked terrified. “Guys, it’s okay. She’s a friend from high school,” I explained. When neither of them looked like they were going to relent, I continued, “She used to be Aaron’s, I mean Badger’s girlfriend.”
Edge kept his eyes on Macy while Kellan stepped out of the dressing room, pulling his phone from his cut. Moments later he returned holding his phone in his hand. “Phoenix said it was okay to leave her in here with Annabelle,” he said to Edge.
Edge nodded. “We’ll be outside if you need us.” With that, they went back to their original posts.
Macy was several feet away from me, still holding her hands in the air. “I’m sorry about that, Macy. Um, a lot of shit’s happened and Phoenix felt like I needed to have my own personal bodyguards while I was out shopping. They didn’t know who you were,” I tried to explain. When she continued to stare at me, I offered, “Would you like to go somewhere and talk?”
“Yeah,” she said hoarsely, “I would really like that.”
Forgetting about the dresses, Macy and I left the store and headed for the coffee shop on the corner. The guys sat a table far enough away to give us privacy while still being close enough to intervene if trouble came my way.
As soon as we had our drinks and were seated, Macy started. “So, what happened? I was supposed to pick you up from work one afternoon, but when I showed up at the shop, Phoenix’s grandmother said you didn’t show up that day and they couldn’t find you…”
“It’s a long story. Do you have time to hear it?” I asked.
“I’ve wanted to know what happened to you since the day you disappeared. Even if I didn’t have it, I would make the time to hear it.”
So, I told her everything. Every single heartbreaking detail from the day I was taken to the farm to the day Phoenix found me in California. By the end of it, we had both shed more than our fair share of tears and had gone through two extra-large cups of coffee.
