Chapter 1
Fawnie
Hart is the best decision I’ve ever made.
Getting to know the father who was wrenched from my life is one of the greatest blessings that I’ve ever known. The club that he belongs to is great. His new wife and their kids? They’re awesome. All the time and effort it took to relocate across the country was absolutely worth it. Dealing with my mom’s wrath about all of it, not so great, but I had to do it.
If someone nearly lost their life to save yours and then they disappeared before you could ever thank them, I think it’s natural to want to find them. Even if it’s been years.
Especiallyif it’s been years.
I visited my dad for the first time a few months ago. He left me alone in the clubhouse’s kitchen for fifteen minutes while he dealt with something, and I’m so glad he did. That quarter of an hour changed my life. It gave me hope.
I met Maverick and his beautiful old lady, Loreena. She’s incredible. He’s apparently good at finding people. I say apparently because he promised he’d find anyone I wanted him to, after I poured out half of my life story for them. Not that they asked for it. They didn’t. They sat and listened to me anyway, and at the end of it, Maverick extended the offer.
If he couldn’t find the man I’m looking for, there are others at the club who can.
His one condition? I needed to run it past my dad first.
Makes sense, given that it’s his club, those men are his club brothers, and I have zero business asking for any favors because no one there owes me anything.
It’s not hard to sit in this booth at the cute little diner on the edge of town and wait for my dad to arrive. What’s hard is that I know he doesn’t know what happened to me.
That’s not my fault. After the divorce, Mom kept everything from my dad, including me, and she kept everything from me, including him. Letters. Cards. Gifts. Phone calls. She screened it all. Dad didn’t give up. I never thought he had. I knew, even though I was still a kid when he left, that he loved me. I clung to that more than anything over the years. Because I loved both my parents, and people are complicated and life is hard, I couldn’t have a relationship with him until I was legally old enough to make my own decisions.
I’m old enough now, and even though this conversation is going to cause him pain, it needs to happen.
I trace a few beads of water on the Formica tabletop after I lift my glass and take a sip. I play with the lemon stuck on the edge while my stomach rolls into an even tighter ball of knots.
It gets worse, and also somehow better when I hear the faint roar of a motorcycle in the distance.
Patterson’s is a diner during the week, but the unofficial club hangout on the weekends. It could be anyone, but I know it’s not. It’s like being ripped from my dad caused me to have a sixth sense about his presence. That, and he’s fifteen minutes late for breakfast. Things might have changed, but Dad still hates not being on time.
He rolls into the parking lot outside on a great big chrome and leather beast. It never fails to blow my mind how big a bike is up close. When people ride down the freeway and you’re tucked up in your own vehicle, they never seem quite so large.
Dad’s bike is as loud and growly as it is massive. The whole diner seems to vibrate right along with it, until he kills the engine.
I watch out the window as he hangs his helmet on the handlebars. He’s in his fifties and used to be a pastor. Like, a full suited up, seminary school graduate, head of a church real deal preacher. His dad was also a pastor.
In his faded old jeans, black t-shirt, and a black leather jacket with the club’s big patch on the back, his hair grown out long, and a full beard, he looks every inch the biker.
“Preacher,” Patti Patterson greets him with real affection in her tone as he walks in. She owns the place, and though there are several waitresses, she seems to be everywhere at once, carrying out orders, taking them, greeting people, making conversation around the diner. She’s probably cooking when she goes to the back too.
It’s packed, with every table full, but Patti doesn’t appear stressed.
“Having breakfast with your daughter this morning?” I hear her ask as she leads him over to the booth right by the window overlooking the parking lot.
His massive smile breaks over his face. Leather, beard, long hair, and a loud bike or not, my dad is always going to have a kind face. He’s had two great loves in life. God and people. He chose people, and though it meant that he wasn’t in my lifefor seven years in any way, and I didn’t see him in person for a decade, I can’t be completely sad.
I got it when I was a kid.
I get it now.
“You bet I am.” Dad gives me the biggest smile. He slips into the booth right beside me and wraps his arm around me in a massive hug. I tuck close to his side, inhaling leather and the spicy cologne that Rita buys for him. It smells like trees, fresh air, and oranges. It suits him.
Patti sets down another menu in front of him. She’s probably in her early forties, tall and slim, with more lady balls than I’ll ever have. She radiates that she’s seen some shit, might see some more, and will survive it all, but she’s also rocking a straight up bleach-blonde mullet and somehow pulls it off.
“Coffee?”
