“All right,” Bambi announces once we’re in the kitchen overlooking the family room. “Now that we got the friendly hello out of the way, let’s see this baby.”
I fight the urge to back away from the cranky woman despite her wearing a smile. Instead, I lean my arms so she can see Carina’s face better.
“Oh, shit,” Bambi mumbles. “Barbie, get your fat ass over here and see this, will ya? The child has your nose.”
The younger, possibly bitchier sister stomps over, acting put out by the entire thing. Then Carina yawns, and the mood in the room shifts. Both sisters can’t stop grinning. The bearded man tells Bronco he makes pretty baby girls. Summer quits looking as if someone farted and gives her sister a quick peek.
“She’s got your nose too,” Bambi tells Summer, who almost smiles.
Mom decides she won’t kick these women’s asses right away and mentions how Carina has a swirly cowlick like I did as a baby. Everyone—except Sidonie—settles down. Bronco hugs his middle daughter to him and smiles softly at me. He’s wearing the same look as when I first walked to his table that night. For a few minutes, I can’t think straight. I only see Bronco while everyone coos over Carina.
Then a dog runs into the room, and Desi gasps with delight. “Mom, can I pet it?”
I look to Bronco, who nods. “He’s friendly.”
“No,” Sidonie says and pulls the dog away from where Desi kneels down to pet him. “Not you.”
Bronco rolls his eyes. There’s an annoyed-dad vibe about his expression, but also a darker emotion I noticed the night at the club. When a few men got loud during a show, he shot them a look that warned he’d end them as much as suffer their stupidity. He wore the same expression after another man tried to lure me away from the Executioners’ table.
I’m not an idiot. I know what kind of man Bronco has to be to run a motorcycle club. That stone-cold stare is scary, but I still can’t look away.
“It’s okay,” Desi says, standing up and smiling despite her embarrassment at Sidonie’s reaction.
My baby girl’s ease at shrugging off disappointment hurts my heart, and I feel tears burning my eyes. I instantly don’t like Sidonie. I no longer want to be around this family. I need to go home to be with my people.
But Sidonie’s brokenhearted expression when her father looks annoyed keeps me from losing my temper.
“Would you like to hold the baby?” I ask the girl.
Sidonie notices everyone looking at her. She stops yanking on her father’s hand and then studies her baby sister.
“She’s going to cry.”
“That’s okay,” Desi says. “She’s a baby. They always cry. It’s not hard to hold her.”
Sidonie looks at her dad and then at her aunts. Everyone’s too quiet. We’re putting way too much pressure on this moment, but no one thinks to say anything.
“She’s little,” Desi tells Sidonie. “But she gets heavy in your arms.”
Sidonie steps closer and then looks at her hands. “I’ll wash them.”
Suddenly, she isn’t a whiny little brat desperate for her father’s attention. Sidonie’s now just an excited kid. Walking over to the couch, she gives me such a sweet smile when I rest Carina in her arms.
“Like this?” she asks, sounding desperate for my approval.
“That’s perfect. If your sister cries, it’s because she’s hungry. Not because of you.”
Sidonie looks at Carina and then searches the sea of faces for her father’s. Does he see what she’s doing? Does he approve? Her desperate questions are written all over her pretty face.
I look back to find Bronco talking to Desi, who kneels down and pets the black-and-white dog. He smiles at his daughter, and then his gaze finds me. Something passes between us right then. I’ve comforted his child. He’s comforted mine. Maybe what we share might be bigger than the baby we made together in a fit of lust in the back seat of my SUV.
BRONCO
By the time Lana arrives in Elko, I’m exhausted. My sisters drove me nuts the day before, fighting over whether I should clean the house or order extra food. Barbie wanted me to make the mother of my child stay at a motel. Bambi offered to cook. Then they screamed at each other about shit that happened twenty years ago. There’s no dealing with them when they’re barking mad.
As my sisters raged, Summer tried to sneak out of the house. When I caught her, she asked to stay at her