Page 33 of Timeless

She didn’t fight me but instead dropped her head on my shoulder.

“How mad are you?” she mumbled, and I took one of her nervous hands.

“Not mad, sweetheart.” And I wasn’t. Not with her anyway. I was furious with Tae. Wouldn’t mind getting my hands around his neck.

“You are, too. I can feel how clenched you are.”

I didn’t even realize I was clenched. But it was because I was thinking of all the ways I wanted to kill Tae. I made a point to relax. I didn’t want Amber thinking I was tight because of her. Or because I was panicking that I had just found out I had a son.

“What’s Jack’s last name?” I ran my hand down her sleeved arm. God, the fabric was soft. Nearly as soft as her skin.

“He doesn’t have one.”

“What?”

“He doesn’t have one.” Amber sat up and opened the folder. “I never filed his birth certificate. I didn’t want father unknown on his birth certificate.” She pulled out a form. “I’ve filled out the details, all it needs is his last name and your signature.” Her eyes locked with mine. “If you want Jack, that is. If not, I can file it as father unknown.”

She thought I wouldn’t take Jack as mine? “Where’s a pen?”

She smiled. “You sure? You don’t have to.”

“Pen, Amber.” I moved to the edge of the couch and dragged the coffee table to me.

“Do you want to at least think about it? Maybe sleep on it?” She was putting it off, giving me a chance to get out of it. Like I would back away from her or my son. I would man up and take responsibility for them.

“Pen.” And when she didn’t hand it over, I snatched it from her hand. God, my handwriting sucked, especially compared to hers. She might hate writing but when it came to anything Amber did, she did it perfectly.

As soon as it was done, I moved it aside. “What’s the rest of this?”

“That is all the stuff I kept for you. Actually, it’s only half of it.”

I pulled out a drawing.

“That you have to say you’ve had. Because Jack was adamant about you getting it.” Amber rolled her eyes. “He knows you don’t know about him. So, he scribbled Tae’s initials on it. Like that wouldn’t be a giveaway at all.”

“He thinks you sent it?”

She nodded. “Yep. He likes to think it’s been in your cell with you. Because he watched a documentary on prisons and after that he said that the white walls would make you sad. So, the picture was to brighten up your cell.”

My eyes widened. “He didn’t really know I was in prison? Like you lied to him, right?”

“No, I told him the truth.”

I groaned. “Great, now he thinks I’m some deadbeat.” I wasn’t going to get a chance to make a good impression on him if he thought I had spent all his life locked in a cell.

“He doesn’t think that.” She gave me a reassuring smile, like that was true. “He knows the truth, Jax. So, he knows the only reason you were in there was because of me.”

“You told him that?”

“He knows the truth. I’ve always told him the truth about you.” She said that like she hadn’t lied about one detail about me.

“He doesn’t know I’m a criminal, right?”

“I just told you I tell him the truth!”

“So, he knows!” I was furious. How the hell was I meant to make a good impression, when she hadn’t lied at all! “You could have lied, Amber. Told him I was businessman or something!”

“You’ve never been ashamed of being a biker.”

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