Dirty Desires (Devil Kings MC #3) - Nicole James Page 0,2

when everyone gets in the room. I get myself a cup of coffee. Probably not the best choice since my nerves are already frazzled. I return to my seat, take a sip of the horrid brew, and wait. The room slowly fills up with more visitors.

I’m nervous to see my father again. I was eleven years old the last time I saw him. That’s when I went to live with my mother’s parents, who raised me from then on. My mother was a wild child, stubborn and headstrong like her father, and they often bumped heads.

My grandparents were all too happy to take me in when she was no longer capable of raising me, and my life with them was happy and much more stable than it had ever been with my rebellious mother and my biker father. I had love, attention, structure, and positive encouragement—things I had little of before that summer my mother overdosed and the hospital called her parents because my father was off on some club run. One thing I’d learned at a young age: the MC always came first for my father.

When my mother met him he was the VP of the Devil Kings MC’s Atlanta chapter. By the time I went to live with my grandparents, he had risen to President.

I remember little of him except that when he did come home, he would be drunk and usually bring other members of his club. They would continue to drink and party into all hours of the night. They were loud, obnoxious, and cussed a lot.

I would stay locked in my room and read the books I’d brought home from the school library, which were the only books in our house.

My grandmother would come over every Thursday night, when my father was gone at his club meetings. I loved when she came; she would always bring us food.

My mother would lean against the kitchen sink and smoke a cigarette, giving her the stink-eye, her voice drenched in bitterness as she snapped, “I don’t need your charity.”

Grandma would ignore her, put the food in the fridge, and then she would hug me and ask my mother if I could come and stay with them for the weekend. Sometimes my mother would let me, other times she refused. Now that I’m older, I’m sure it was just to spite her mother, because she was always glad for the times I was out of her hair.

My mom would never say thank you for the food, but I always did, because I knew without it I would probably go hungry. After Grandma left and my mother returned to the living room with a glass of whiskey, I would sneak the tin of chocolate chip cookies Grandma baked into my bedroom and hide them. I often hid food because if my dad’s biker club came over, they would eat everything in the house.

It wasn’t that I was afraid of my father; I just wanted nothing to do with him.

Now, as I sit here waiting, I wonder what I’ll feel when I see him again.

Finally, they lead the inmates into the room. They file in, dressed in the Georgia State Prison uniform of white pants and shirts. The pants have navy stripes down the side of the legs and the shirts have navy collars and plackets. Across the back, emblazoned in big letters, are the words, State Prisoner. The men disperse around the room, and I get my first glimpse of my father. He’s changed so much since that last time I saw him that I hardly recognize him. If it weren’t for the short snippets of his arrest and trial from the news, I wouldn’t. But seeing him in person is still shocking. He’s overweight, his hair is graying, and his face has sagging jowls. The man I remember from my childhood was handsome, even though he rarely paid attention to me, and was always gruff.

This man looks tired, beaten down, and bitter.

I read all that as his eyes zero in on me, the only remaining visitor still sitting alone. His eyes sweep over me, and he trudges toward my table.

He settles his big body in the chair across from me, leans his elbows on the table, and runs a hand over his mouth. His knee begins to bounce up and down, the only sign that this visit is affecting him.

My throat is dry, and I don’t know what to say. We don’t exchange the allowed hug of greeting like