“Iris, do you have any idea what time it is?” I hear Vike say as he opens the door, and I quickly get up, put on my robe, and go to support him.
“It’s almost eight. I assumed you’d have been up for hours with a newborn,” Iris responds as I enter the living room, and I notice a brown paper bag in her arms.
“We have been; she’s just gone back to sleep,” I explain, wiping the sleep out of my eyes.
“Oh, good. It’s good for her to sleep, that’s when babies grow, you know.”
“I’ll make us some coffee.” Vike kisses my cheek as he passes me on the way to the kitchen, looking unimpressed as he leaves me to deal with Iris.
“What's in the bag?” I ask, hiding a yawn behind my hand.
“Oh, just a few things of Seggy’s I found that I thought the baby might like.” She smiles, still refusing to use my little girl's name. Iris made it quite clear that she didn’t like it when we told her what it was. I’d already assumed that no name, other than her own, would have been good enough, but the fact that she has to make a point of not using it is just petty.
“There's a photo of him that I put in a frame, I thought that could go beside her crib.” She pulls out a framed picture of Griller, leaning against his bike and drinking a beer, and places it on the table. “And this stuffed rabbit, he used to love when he was a baby.” She drags out a faded grey, one-eyed rabbit that's obviously been stitched back together more than once and smiles as she props it up beside the picture.
“That’s sweet of you. I’m sure she’ll love it.”
“I’ll go give it to her now.” Iris goes to move past me, but I block her.
“As I said, she’s just gone back to sleep. Why don’t you have a coffee and wait until she wakes up?
“Oh, I won’t disturb her, I just want to have a little look at her. I didn’t get much chance to hold her yesterday with all those strangers at the club.
She barges past me into the bedroom, and Vike raises his eyebrows at me sternly when he steps around the kitchen island and hands me my coffee.
“Look who was lying awake, all by herself.” Iris returns, nursing Mia and the scruffy toy rabbit in her arms.
“Will ya look at that?” I can see Vike too close to losing his patience.
“She must have known Grandma was here.” Iris smiles down at her as she takes a seat on the couch. “I hear you’ve been keeping your mommy awake. You can rest now, Alicia. I can take care of her.” She pulls her eyes away to look up at me. “You can get some rest now that I’m here. I’m sure Vike has things to do at the club.”
“Actually, the three of us were gonna spend the day at home,” he tells her, giving me another one of his glares.
“She’s getting to look more and more like her daddy, every day.” Iris rattles the stuffie in front of my little girl's face, and when she starts to cry, Vike steps in.
“You hungry, baby girl?” He lifts her straight out of Iris’s hands and smiles at her. “Alicia, you should take her back to the bedroom and feed her in there. I’ll see Iris out.” He winks at me as she hands her over, and I smile at him with a relieved thank you as I head to the bedroom with Mia.
“I know you feel sorry for her, but you have to draw some boundaries,” Vike tells me when he joins us, bringing me the coffee I left on the table.
“I have, but she doesn’t seem to register them; she’s just excited. I'm hoping over the next few weeks she calms down and backs off.” I place Mia back in her Moses basket after she falls back to sleep in my arms.
“You should go back to sleep, you must be tired.” Vike hands me my coffee again.
“I’m awake now, and I was hoping we could go to the club today. Eden has a midwife appointment, so I was going to keep Peyton company.” I sip from the mug.
“Whatever you wanna do.” Vike smiles. “I was hoping to speak to Wrath; d’ya know what time their appointment is?”
“Yeah, it's at eleven. If we leave now, you’ll catch him before he leaves.” I start getting up so I can take a shower.
“Ya sure? I can catch him after.”
“I wanna be there for Peyton.” I kiss him on my way out the door.
“Hey, babe, when Greaser was living here, did he ever mention anythin’ about runnin’ a chop shop outta the garage?”
“Chop shop?” I shake my head, confused.
“It’s a thing some people do to help sell stolen cars,” he explains.
