Page 63 of Biker's Babygirl

Disgust moves across my skin like goosepimples. It’s a knee-jerk, gut reaction. I don’t want him playing Daddy, not after I’ve had the real thing. But there’s no downside to taking whatever he’s giving me. It either helps my headache, puts me to sleep, or kills me. Either way, I come out better than I am right now. And in two of the scenarios, I don’t have to listen to Lucas anymore.

He reaches for another pocket and hands me a small bottle of water.

Taking a deep breath, I take the pills from his hand and with my other I reach for the water. I try to ignore the feeling of his eyes on me and close my eyes to the smile he’s wearing. I take the pills in one swallow then greedily gulp the water down.

“Good girl,” he murmurs approvingly, and I try to pretend it doesn’t make me want to kick him in the stomach.

I fall back against the pillows and feel a strong wave of exhaustion rolls over me. It could be the pills, but it also could be the bone-weariness of the last couple of weeks, which had been a roller coaster of secrets, fear, and falling in love.

I wonder what it would have been like… to have been honest with Duke from the start, to get to know him as Ginny from the first moment we met. To have fallen in love the right way…My eyelids close, a mercy because I no longer have to look at Lucas’s deceitfully handsome face, and I drift off with Duke being the last thing in my mind.

Duke

“Duke, this is my friend I was telling you about, Officer Carmichael.”

“Hello, Officer Carmichael. Nice to meet you.” I force myself to be polite as I offer my hand.

The officer, who looks to be my brother’s age, takes my hand. “Likewise. I’ve heard a lot about you from your brother.”

I cast Shep a glance and note his grim smile. It’s a funny thing, brotherly love. For all the animosity I felt only an hour ago and the angst I still feel, things between us are okay for now. I give him a nod, then turn my attention back to the officer. “Well, I hate we have to meet like this, but we could really use your help.”

“It’s my pleasure—under any circumstance.”

I smile briefly and then my expression turns pensive once when I fill him in. “We’ve already done a preliminary search, but we’re not cops.”

“Well, let’s go see what we can find.”

I swallow a sigh and follow them. We search around the house, then fan out as we comb through the five acres of land. It literally takes all day, and the sun is sinking in the sky, casting dying rays of light through the trees.

Every minute we go without finding anything makes my muscles tighten another fraction. By the time we call it quits, I can barely walk from the physical weight of the stress and fear. But I push those thoughts out of my mind—Ginny is probably doing so much worse, and knowing that is eating me alive.

“We can bring a team out tomorrow,” Officer Carmichael, who insisted on staying with me, says.

This time I don’t hold back when I tell him, “There’s no better team than the one right here. If we can’t find it, that’s because there’s nothing to find.”

He stares at me for a full minute before he says, “That may be, but still, a fresh pair of eyes?—”

“Duke!”

I whirl at the sound of the animated voice. My gut clenches instinctively. I know from the way Elvis hurries toward me, his strides purposeful, that he has news. But I also have learned thatnews isn’t always good. I can’t afford to get my hopes up until I know which he carries.

When he’s closer, however, I can tell by the flat look in his eyes that whatever he has to say, it won’t be what I’d hoped.

"Did you find something?” Officer Carmichael asks for me.

Elvis nods, his expression somber. He holds his hand out toward me, and cradled in his palm is a square of fabric.

Seeing it makes the knots in my stomach tighten into a vise that damn near kills me.

“You recognize it?”

I nod at the officer’s question, but I can’t find my voice. Though she only wore it once, seeing the fabric brings a vision of Ginny to my mind so clear that she might as well be standing in front of me. The fact that she’s not is like a punch to the gut and a klick to the groin all in one.

“I… I bought it for her,” I say at last.

Elvis puts a comforting hand on my shoulder.

“You find anything else?” Officer Carmichael asks.

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