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“That’s what I said.” He laughed. “Her hand is a bit sore, but she was determined to go back to work, so I’ll just keep an eye out until her shift finishes.”
“Thanks, brother.”
I hung up and handed Calli her phone back, my mind racing a little as I considered the footprints in the garden.
Someone watching us.
The guys at the bar.
Maybe they weren’t connected.
But what if they were?
What the fuck is happening?
MISSY
“Guess your swing isn’t as good without a bat,” Hawk teased quietly as we stepped into his house.
He’d picked me up at the end of my shift every night since Backroad had opened last week. Sometimes he’d stay at his place with Calli and Kadey until I was done. Sometimes he’d help at the bar or on the front door. But without fail, he’d be there waiting when I was done.
The first night I’d walked into his house, certain that I would just collect Kadey and get him to take us home. And instead, I saw her curled up in the brand-new bed he’d bought for her in his spare room, my baby girl wrapped up in princess blankets and sleeping like a log.
Not on a bean bag in the back room of a strip club.
Or in my car, as I drove us home after my shift.
In a home.
In a bed.
He’d got just for her, where she could sleep all night.
And after that first night, I’d told that voice in my head to hush.
All I’d wanted for so long was for my daughter to know what love was. To make sure that she felt loved and cherished in ways I didn’t for a long time. And from the moment Hawk met Kadey, all he’d done was show her that. He protected her and provided things she needed with no questions asked or ulterior motives, just because he wanted to.
So every night this week, that’s what Hawk did.
And Kadey and I hadn’t spent a single night back in our apartment since.
These men—they don’t date. They see something they like, and that’s it.
That was it.
We stepped into the kitchen, and Hawk instantly grabbed my hips and lifted me onto the countertop.
He held out his hand, and I placed my hand in his. He examined it for a moment brushing his thumb delicately over my knuckles. “It looks okay. Probably just going to be a little bruised.”
“Did any of the boys mention those guys? Whether they talked to them?”
I’d asked Banner before my shift finished, and all he said was that they were gone. But I could still feel this weird chill settling over me every time I thought of the way they spoke. How they’d said they were excited to meet me, like I was some kind of celebrity.
“The boys didn’t say much,” he answered, swiping a stray hair back from my face. “We know one thing, though.”
“What’s that?” I asked, eager to find out what I was missing.
He smirked, placing his hands on the counter on either side of my thighs and leaning in, his lips a breath away from mine. “We know what happens when someone putsBaby in the corner.”
