ELLE REED
Romance never interested me. Guys were my friends rather than anyone to charm. Despite his good looks, my older brother had been the same way. Clint’s mind was on bigger things than dating. Mainly, he wanted to build his own motorcycle club, which he eventually did with the Crimson Guard.
Clint’s club was filled with our family and friends, both guys and foxes. I jumped at the chance to ride with them. The club was my main focus until I went wild on a Mexico trip. Apparently, my drunken self was far more interested in men than the sober version.
I didn’t remember much about my first baby daddy except that he had thick brown hair and a dumb laugh. The son we created during our drunken fun inherited the guy’s tawny hair. If the sperm donor was exceptionally intelligent, our kid inherited his big brain, too.
Sutter Cane was a remarkable boy. His mind grabbed hold of facts and never let them go. At seven, he grasped high school-level work. I couldn’t even imagine what it was like to be inside his head.
Though my life revolved around Sutter, I wasn’t a spinster. I still rode with the Crimson Guard Motorcycle Club. I got into fistfights at our clubhouse, The Fire Hooch. I was tight with the female members who lived at the Sorority House on the north side and the male members who lived downtown at the Five Points Lofts, like my brother.
But romance wasn’t a thing for me, even now, when I suffered from a ridiculous crush on a bad man who was the father of my second oops baby.
Zodiac Bondi was the president of the Black Rainbow Motorcycle Club. He got where he was by pushing out the men who founded the club. Zodiac was known to be ruthless, but he’d been a good ally to the Crimson Guard. When my older cousin, Lula, was abducted by a mobbed-up organization called the Void, the Black Rainbow was able to track her down within hours. Zodiac apparently had a snitch within our enemy’s ranks.
The Void had been quiet since they lost Lula. Clint and our club VP, Rock Savo, spent months hunting down every lead until our hometown felt safe again.
The alliance between the Crimson Guard and Black Rainbow was how Zodiac and I made our special little oops. I’d been drunk and curious. He’d been gorgeous and persistent. We had a few minutes to spare in the empty office at the Fire Hooch. I barely remembered our time together.
Zodiac was a terrible person to lust after, but his good looks left me hot and bothered. The biker was tall, perfectly muscled, and blond. His icy blue eyes refused to give away anything about the man lurking inside. Exuding confidence, Zodiac dressed slick in tight button-up shirts, open enough to reveal his tatted chest. His thick blond beard was tidy. When he smiled at me, I felt him digging around in my heart and claiming what I didn’t want to share.
Telling him no was easier when I was sober and sane. But that night, he smelled so good, and his voice held such promise.
Denying myself was never easy. I ate what I liked. Drank when I wanted. Mouthed off when the mood struck. I was always a hundred percent me, and I was horny as hell for Zodiac.
My positive pregnancy test left me feeling like a dipshit. I had rightfully kept my quickie with Zodiac secret from my family and closest friends.Now, people would know!
My parents responded to my baby news by arranging an intervention in the large family room of the house I shared with Ford and Shay. Sutter and I lived in the finished basement. My parents never showed the least bit of interest in us moving out.
Yet, Ford still announced during the impromptu intervention, “Your irresponsible drinking and fucking are filling our house with bastard children.”
My father looked like a wild man with his shoulder-length silver hair, bushy silver beard, tanned skin, and pale blue eyes.
In contrast, my mom looked lovely and soft with her silver hair and gray eyes. They sat together on the couch in matching white T-shirts and washed-out blue jeans.
With my parents putting on a united front, I pointed out, “You adore Sutter.”
“Yes, but who knows what this bastard will be like,” Ford insisted, though I felt him wanting to laugh at the entire situation.
However, once Clint outed the identity of my baby daddy, my parents switched from an intervention to planning an exorcism.
“He’s a weird, wicked man,” Shay insisted. “He said my rice casserole was dry.”
“I kicked his ass back in the day,” Ford muttered while stroking his beard. “So, clearly him knocking up my drunk daughter is how Zodiac plans to get his payback.”
Unable to defeat their arguments, I decided to play the drama card. “This baby will be a gift just like Sutter!” I insisted before faking tears and running out of the room.
Sutter wasn’t thrilled about my pregnancy. For the first few days after learning about the baby, my disappointed son kept looking at me and shaking his head.
“I swear I took my pill just like I was told.”
“You need to use something else,” Sutter insisted. “Medical science has come a long way.”
“Is itreallymy fault? I religiously take my birth control pills. I’m super careful. But then, I have sex twice in my life and get pregnant each time. Could I have been cursed by a fertility gnome?”
“A what?”
Shrugging, I hugged him to me and insisted, “Nothing will change.”
