Patriot (Hades Abyss MC 6) - Harley Wylde Page 0,42

everything I need already.”

She pressed against me and I held her close. Yeah, I definitely had everything I needed already. Even if the adoption fell through, it wouldn’t matter to me. I’d love the little girl like she was my own flesh and blood, and I knew MaryAnne wanted a baby, but as long as I had her I didn’t need anything else.

“We should bring Hatter in here. Everyone else in the family is ready for a movie night,” she said. “Don’t you think he feels left out in the kitchen by himself?”

I smiled and kissed the top of her head. “Making sure my bird doesn’t get depressed?”

“Just doesn’t seem fair is all.”

“I’ll get Hatter. We’ll see how well Rascal does with him. I haven’t trimmed Hatter’s flight feathers lately, so if the kitten goes for him, he can fly away.”

“I’ll get a movie going. Any requests?”

“Whatever you want, Little Bit.”

I went to get Hatter from his cage. He ran up my arm and settled on my shoulder with a rustle of his feathers. When he started grooming my hair, I reached up and rubbed the top of his head. I carried him to the living room and sat on the couch next to MaryAnne. She immediately leaned into my side and clicked PLAY on the movie. The Year Without a Santa Claus started up. My girl was nothing if not predictable. She loved her animated holiday movies. Didn’t matter if it was Christmas or Halloween.

Hatter moved from my shoulder to the back of the couch. So far, Rascal hadn’t noticed him. Or just didn’t care the bird was roaming free. Archimedes groaned and rolled to his side, stretching out more on the floor. Rascal batted the dog’s ear before curling up next to him. The two had become fast friends.

I heard a scraping sound outside and my gaze strayed to the window. I didn’t see any movement through the blinds, nor did I hear anything else. It was possible one of my brothers was out there, probably taking a smoke break. Philly lived on one side of me and Poison was on the other. When we’d been assigned our houses, I’d joked with Titan and asked if he was trying to keep all the P names together.

Honestly, I didn’t mind having Philly and Poison as neighbors. Neither was overly loud, and I got along with them. Hell, I got along with everyone in the club, even if Smoke had overstepped with MaryAnne recently. And Galahad tended to get on my last nerve with the way he treated her. Or more accurately, the way he seemed to not give a rat’s ass. I knew that wasn’t the case. He’d about fallen apart when he’d found out she’d been taken, and he’d done some shit he shouldn’t have.

Another scrape from a different area caught my attention again. What the fuck was going on out there?

“Little Bit, I need to step outside for a second. Stay inside, okay?”

She tipped her head. “Are you going out to smoke?”

“Need to check on something. It’s warm in here and you aren’t wearing shoes.” I kissed her temple. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

I went to the door and slowly pulled it open. I didn’t want to worry MaryAnne, so I didn’t pull the gun I kept on me. Not until I’d gone outside. I stepped off the porch and made my way around the side of the house facing Philly’s home. His lights were off, which didn’t mean much. This time of night, he was most likely at the clubhouse.

I’d almost missed it, but there was a small footprint outside the house below the guest room window. Could have been MaryAnne’s, except she didn’t make a habit of hanging out on the side of the house. There was another outside the living room. This time, I knew for sure it wasn’t MaryAnne’s. The footprint faced the window, like someone had been trying to look through the blinds, or perhaps anticipated scaling up to the second floor.

“What the fuck?” I muttered. I looked around and didn’t see anyone. No more scraping sounds.

I walked the perimeter and didn’t see anything else out of the ordinary. I couldn’t shake the feeling something was wrong, but fuck if I could figure out what it was. I glanced at Philly’s house again. I squinted a little and studied his home, noticing the front door seemed to be partially open. It could have been a shadow, but I needed to make