Page 5 of Honey Trapped

“Um...”

“Give me your number and I’ll text you my address.”

I want to say no, but I don’t want to be rude. I know she rented to me because she felt sorry for me. Young single mother. I played the card to get a roof over our heads. If a dinner is a way to say thank you, I’ll take it. Besides its time to start planting roots.

We trade numbers with my promise to arrive at six and to bring dessert. No one rivals my banana pudding. Least that’s what Marco used to say.

My mood dampens with thoughts of him, but I push the emotions to the back of my mind and bury them. Today is the day I say no more running. No more looking over my shoulder and hiding.

I go back to the produce section to get bananas for my pudding and see this display table set up holding rustic décor. Little signs that say, ‘Home’, ‘Family’, and so on.

I’m tired of having a roof but no home for Lennon and me. We don’t even own real plates. I let out a snort. I’ve lived out of a suitcase for so long I’ve forgotten what it was like to have real silverware in a drawer and not rely on plastic.

I own one skillet and a saucepan. Nothing else other than Lennon’s toys, our clothes, my computer, and Hammie’s stuff. I don’t even own a hair dryer. The bare necessities to survive are all we travel with as much as we move.

I pick up one of the whitewashed signs with the metal letters that spell ‘Home’ across the center. I don't really have the extra money for it, but the purchase feels right.

Yeah. We’re home.

Finally.

This is the town I want to raise my daughter in.

I know the perfect spot to hang the sign in the kitchen.

**

I balance a plastic container holding my banana pudding in one hand, holding onto Lennon’s with the other as I carefully walk up the front cement pad steps to Patricia’s two-story home. The first thing I notice is her swing and the second is the abundance of plants in giant pots that are taking over. Behind the swing is lattice covered in vines blocking her neighbor’s view of the front porch.

I’m about to let go of Lennon’s hand long enough to ring the doorbell when a familiar faceappears in the glass of the door. His top lip curls as though he just got a whiff of a terrible scent.

I shrink back from his cold and calculating gaze. I was so taken aback by his hateful tone earlier I didn’t get a good look at him. The first thing I notice is he’s tall, and if he’d wipe that scowl off his bearded mug he might be handsome. Maybe we can have a do over from our first introduction.

From inside I hear a loud female voice call, “Well don’t just stand there. Let the poor girl in, Ace.”

So the grumpy biker from next door does have a name.

Ace glowers at me as though it physically pains him to open the door the rest of the way to allow us to enter.

My fingers and palms slick with sweat as he stares at me intensely, his hazel eyes swirling with flecks of gold and green “I brought pudding banana,” I blurt and immediately feel like the village idiot. “I mean banana pudding.”

The left corner of his lip twitches as if he might actually be capable of producing a smile. I can’t help but notice the tattoos snaking up his neck and wonder where they lead beneath his black long-sleeved tee-shirt. If he wasn’t so grouchy, he might pass as hot for an older man. The hints of grey in his beard give away the fact that he’s older than me along with the wrinkles around his eyes. His attention settles on Lennon, and I brace. If this dude is rude to her, he’ll be wearing my dessert. “Come on in. Tish is about to serve the grub.”

“Worms?” Lennon questions, looking up at both of us scrunching her little nose in disgust.

“It’s another word for food, baby.”

“I not like dat.”

Ace shakes his head and steps aside. “Cute kid.”

“My name Wennon,” she tells him.

Raising his brows, he mocks her, “Wennon?”

“Lennon,” I correct him, and he grunts in response.

We enter the house in the living room. The first thing I notice are all the photos on the wall behind the couch. Black and white portraits of motorcycles and people that surround one large portrait of what appears to be their family.

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