I’m okay? You don’t have any other friends who live near L.A.? Perhaps ones who aren’t criminals?”
Little bit hypocritical of me, considering where I’m sitting right now, but still, come on.
She then has the audacity to come back at me with, “He’s not a bad man. I mean, he wouldn’t hurt you.”
I feel like my life is currently full of men like that. Ones who aren’t necessarily good, but are good to me. “I don’t even know what to say right now.”
She starts crying again before saying, “I had to call him, Abbie. He has connections. I didn’t know what was going on with you, and I know you left with one of the bikers. I’m not stupid, I looked at the camera surveillance! I told you to stay away from them!”
“The bikers are my friends” is all I can think of to reply to that one with. “If you can be friends with a drug dealer, I can be friends with bikers.”
She pauses, and then sighs. “He is your father.”
And just like that, once again, my whole world changes.
Chapter Seventeen
I grew up without a dad, and because I never had one from the beginning, I didn’t think much of it. Whenever anyone would ask about my father, I always replied that I didn’t have one, that I only had a mother. I wouldn’t say it in a sad way, it was just a fact.
Only when I got to about twelve did I ask about him, and my mom told me that he lived in California, and that we were all better off without him. Again, I didn’t think much of it, just that he mustn’t have wanted to be in my life, and that was it.
And now, after all of these years, she’s dropping this bomb on me? After hanging up on her in shock, I’ve been lying in bed staring at the ceiling and just trying to make sense of all of this.
I left town without a word, and when she found out I was staying near L.A., the same city as the father I’ve never met, the one who didn’t bother to be in my life or even send me a fucking birthday card once a year, she decided to call him, of all people, and ask him to find me and make sure I’m okay.
Now that I’m an adult and can take care of myself.
This is fucking rich.
At least I solved the puzzle and figured out why Palmer has been asking around about the MC: because Mom knew I left with Temper, who she knows is the president of the Knights of Fury MC. She would have passed on that information to him.
I can’t believe this.
Half of my DNA belongs to a drug dealer.
No, the drug dealer.
No wonder I was so drawn to Temper. I’m the daughter of a criminal.
I don’t know how to break this news to everyone, because it’s all kinds of fucked-up. How is the MC going to react to this? Temper has never asked anything about my dad, and I’ve never brought him up.
Really, it still hasn’t changed anything.
I still don’t have a dad.
Now, though, I know who my sperm donor is, and it’s looking like I haven’t won the genetic lottery.
Forcing myself out of bed, I drag my feet to the kitchen and pull out a bottle of vodka from the freezer, just as Crow walks in. His eyes widen as I start drinking it from the bottle, no chaser needed, because I currently feel like I’m dead inside. I can’t even taste the vodka; I might as well be drinking water.
“Wow, what’s going on, Abbie? Are you okay?” he asks, coming over and taking the bottle off me, and then he sets it down on the table. “I’m pretty sure anyone drinking liquor straight from the bottle is not okay. Do you want me to call Temper?”
“No, it’s okay. No need to bother him,” I say, sitting down at the table and looking into Crow’s blue eyes. “Life is hard.”
He nods. “Life