More Than Miles (A Lost Kings MC Novel) (52 page)

I
could kill Wrath right now. Twitch is a prospect Wrath brought in. So I blame him for my current predicament. Somehow, Twitch knows Serena’s friend Amanda and brought her up to the clubhouse tonight.

Amanda zeroed in on me as soon as she got here and won’t go away. “Serena asks about you all the time,” Amanda says.

“That’s nice. She doin’ okay?”

“Didn’t you hear what I said? She moved down to Maryland. Got into school down there.”

“Oh, good for her.”

She runs her finger down my arm and tilts her head in a coy way, which in reality is ugly. “She always said you were a lot of fun.”

I hate myself for not going after Heidi earlier. I don’t have any excuse except that I was hurt and pissed by her attitude.

But not talking to her kills me.

So does seeing her dancing with Twitch.

Hellfuckingno.

I stare for a good minute, trying to figure out if I’m seeing what I think I’m seeing. I leave Amanda with no explanation. Nope, I’m too busy stomping across the room, shoving people out of my way to get to Heidi.

My hand wraps around her upper arm, and she stares at me in shock. “What do you think you’re doing?” I growl at her.

Before she has a chance to open her mouth, I turn my pissed-off face to Twitch. “She’s mine and off-limits. Touch her again, fuck, you even look at her again, I’ll bury you.”

He doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t look at Heidi before he takes off, either.

I’m expecting her to be spitting fire, but when I face her, she’s laughing.

Her mouth twists into a teasing grin that makes me want to kiss her and spank her at the same time. “You’re so predictable.”

“So are you, brat.”

“Your girlfriend looks upset,” she says, pointing to Amanda.

“She’s
not
my girlfriend.” I lean in close. “The only girl
I
want is seriously testing my patience lately, and I don’t understand why.”

We stare at each other for a second, then I drop my shoulder and flip her over it. “You know what? I’m tired of your bullshit,” I say, giving her ass a smack. She squeals and kicks, but I’ve got a good grip on her legs. She’s not going anywhere.

My eyes dart around the crowded clubhouse. Upstairs? My room? Or outside? I catch Wrath watching us and he flashes me a thumbs up. He points to the stairs and shakes his head. Yeah, Teller’s up there.

Outside it is.

Heidi hasn’t bothered with crap like “put me down.” She knows that ain’t happening. Instead, my little brat slides her hands over my ass. Tries to get them under my pants.

“Are you trying to distract me into dropping you?” I ask when we’re finally outside.

“You better not drop me.”

I’m not crazy about navigating the woods out to Rock’s house with her over my shoulder like this. Too many chances for her to get hurt. “If I set you down, will you behave?”

“Depends.”

Christ, she’s a pain.

“On what?”

“What do you consider behaving?”

“Fine. You get a branch to the face, don’t blame me.” I head straight for the woods.

“Okay. Okay. Set me down.”

I lean over until her feet hit the ground but keep an arm wrapped around her.

“What are we doing?” she asks.

“I’m taking you home.”

“I was having fun.”

Her mouth might be protesting, but her hand slips into mine and she follows me into the woods.

“No, you weren’t. You were trying to piss me off. You succeeded and now you’re gonna pay for it.”

“Oh, embarrassing me wasn’t enough?”

“Nope.”

She’s quiet after that.

“We need to talk. I’m tired of hanging around, waiting for you to figure shit out.” My words might be unfair, but she pushed me too far tonight.

“What happened to ‘take your time’ and ‘I’m here for you’?”

“I’m still here for you. But you’ve had enough time. Now it’s time we try something else.” I hate being mean to Heidi. She’s driving me nuts, though.

Hope’s up reading when we walk into the house. She smiles when she sees us together.

“Rock home?” I ask.

“Not yet.”

“Is Alexa okay?” Heidi asks, shaking loose from my grasp.

“She’s fine, honey.” Hope picks up the baby monitor and waves at us. “Sound asleep.”

Heidi glances at me. “Let me check on her?”

“Yeah. Go ahead.” I’m in awe of the way she can go from pain in my ass to responsible mother in the blink of an eye.

Once she’s gone, Hope gives me a knowing grin. I hook my thumbs in my pockets and make my way over to her.

“What’s up?” she asks with a smug smile.

“Nothing. Why?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Trinity sent me this.” Giggling like a nut, she whips her cell phone out and shoves it in my face. The screen’s taken up by a picture of me carrying Heidi out of the clubhouse.

My shoulders lift. I’m not embarrassed at all. “Man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.”

Her mouth tips up into a grin. “Rock will be so proud.” It looks like she’s struggling not to laugh.

“You’re not mad?”

The laughter disappears. “No.” She glances down the hallway. “But she had a rough day, so be kind to her.”

“I’m always—well, I try to be. She makes me a little nuts. What happened?”

“I think it’s better if she tells you.”

Why are women so damn frustrating?

“In fact,” She stands. “I’m going to run over to the clubhouse to talk to Trinity.”

Bullshit. This is her subtle way of giving Heidi and me some alone time. I feel like an ass for chasing her out of her own house. Rock moved her out here to get her
away
from all the shit going down in the clubhouse, now here I am chasing her back.

“You don’t have to do that. There’s a party going on,” I warn her.

“Nothing I haven’t seen before,” she says with an eye-roll. “I’ll text Rock and tell him to meet me there.”

Great. Rock’s gonna
love
that. This must be what it feels like to date someone who lives at home with their parents. An experience I never had.

Heidi and I somehow skipped over that fun, innocent, dating stage of things and went right into family mode. Although, to be honest, we’ve been doing the family thing our whole lives. It’s just different now.

Hope leans over and kisses the top of my head. “Be good.”

“I’ll do my best.”

She laughs and musses my hair before leaving.

Heidi still hasn’t returned. That’s cute that she thinks hiding out will save her from the discussion we’re about to have.

Except, when I find her, she’s passed out on the bed. Feet on the floor. Clothes still on, one sneaker off. Shaking my head, I peek at Alexa—also sound asleep.

Heidi doesn’t stir when I pull her other sneaker off. I work her jeans down her legs but leave everything else on. That’s not what this is about. Shit, I’m so busy being driven crazy by her when she’s awake, I hadn’t noticed the dark circles under her eyes. What the hell happened to her today, and why wouldn’t she talk to me about it?

Because you acted like a crazed caveman when she got home.

I snap the light off and Alexa’s nightlight throws off enough of a glow for me to see where I’m going.

Gathering her in my arms, I shift her to the other side of the bed and crawl in next to her. It’s only a double bed, so it’s a good excuse to keep her snuggled up against me.

I plan to be here when she wakes up, because one way or another, we’re having our talk.

I’ve got a screeching headache when I wake up.

No wait.

The screeching is Alexa.

I turn but collide with a hard, warm, wall of…muscle. “Murphy, move.”

I’m not even shocked to find him in my bed. For some reason, it feels right.

He grumbles and then comes to, jumping out of bed. Before I make sense of anything, Alexa stops crying. Blake’s holding her, quietly rocking her from side to side. I hold my arms out. “She needs to be changed.”

“I can do it.”

A head tilt expresses my disbelief better than words will at this hour.

“I figured it out yesterday, remember?”

Yesterday. Right. When he watched my daughter and then when I got home, I thanked him by being a brat.

“Ugh, did I dance with Twitch last night?”

“Yes,” he says in a low, angry voice.

“I came over to talk to
you
.”

When he’s finished, he turns to face me. “Should I feed her?”

“There’s bottles in the fridge, I’ll—”

He holds a hand out, stopping me. “Stay put.”

When he returns, Alexa’s happily sucking on her bottle. “Did you make sure—”

“Yes,” he answers. “Now, what did you want to talk about last night?”

“I don’t remember.”

The sharp stare he fixes on me makes me fidget. “You were busy talking to Amanda.”

“Yeah, Twitch brought her up.”

“Oh.”

“You know, the world is full of women. Sometimes I have to talk to them. Doesn’t mean anything else is happening.”

“That’s not how it looked. Besides, I know you have history with her.”

“History?” He raises an eyebrow. “No, actually I don’t. Maybe next time, you march right up to me and let me introduce you as my girlfriend”—my head snaps up at that word, but he continues right along—“instead of trying to make me jealous. We’re getting kind of old for that bullshit, don’t you think?”

“Maybe
you
are,” I grumble. “Seems like acceptable nineteen-year-old behavior to me.”

He throws his head back and laughs. Alexa smiles around her bottle and chortles along with him. “You’ve been older than your age as long as I’ve known you,” he says. Still sounding too chipper for this hour and at my expense.

“Well, you keep pushing me away.”

“Bullshit. Because I told you I wanted to give you time to figure things out?”

Alexa coughs and spits up all over him. “Oh, shit. I’m sorry. Did I do something wrong, Heidi?”

He looks so panicked, I can’t even tell him he should have stopped to burp her. I should have been paying better attention. “No. She’s fine. It happens.”

I take her from him and clean her up, while he whips his shirt up and wipes himself off.

“Oh.” It’s hard to ignore the tingle in my girly bits at the sight of his bare chest, ink, and muscles. Wow. “It’s way too early for that,” I mutter, setting Alexa back in her crib.

“What?” He catches the appreciative way I’m staring at him and grins. “See something you like?”

“Good God, yes.” What’s wrong with me?

He grins even harder and steps up behind me. “I like that,” he whispers in my ear.

“What?”

“That you like looking at me.”

“I’ve been drooling over you since I was twelve. This isn’t news.”

“It is to me.” His arms wrap around me and he runs his nose over my cheek, barely touching me but leaving goosebumps anyway. “You’re sweet.”

“Yeah, it was your personality that made me love you but your hot bod that made me thank God we weren’t actually related.” It’s an overly silly thing to say. And it oversimplifies how I really feel about him, but he laughs, his chest rumbling against my back.

My hands open and close, remembering all the times he hurt me in the past. “I hated all those girls who had your attention.”

He stops laughing.

“Hated the things you did with them.”

“Did you hate me too?”

“No. I wanted to. But no. I loved you too much.”

“I never, ever wanted to hurt you,” he admits. His voice comes out so raw, I know he means every word.

“I know that now. Then, it hurt.”

“I’m sorry.” He kisses the top of my head. “You’re all I want.”

My stomach makes this inhuman rumbling noise and he rubs his hands over my belly. “Maybe I should feed you, and then we talk?”

“Okay.”

He pushes me toward the bed. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

“I’ll be here.”