Page 14 of Viper's Single Mom
Instead, I rolled to my side, pulling her with me.
"Stay," she whispered, like she knew exactly what I was thinking.
"Wasn't going anywhere." I kissed her forehead. "Sleep. I'll be here."
She was out in minutes, exhausted from stress and release. I watched her sleep, this woman who'd upended my entire lifein forty-eight hours, and felt something I'd never experienced before.
Peace.
I woke to whispering and giggling.
Sunlight streamed through the curtains. Tara was still pressed against me, naked and warm and?—
"Shh, don't wake Mama."
Izzy's voice. In the room. Fuck.
I carefully extracted myself from Tara, pulling on my jeans commando, and turned to find Izzy standing in the doorway with a toy tea set.
"Hi, Mr. Viper," she whispered. "Wanna have tea?"
I should have been the worst possible discovery—finding a strange man in her mother's bed. But Izzy just stood there in her pajamas, clearly more interested in tea than traumatic life events.
"Sure, princess. Let's let your mom sleep."
I followed her to the living room, where she'd already set up an elaborate tea party with three stuffed animals and two dolls.
"You sit here." She pointed to a spot that would require me to fold my six-foot-two frame onto the floor. "Mr. Bunny likes his tea with extra sugar."
Twenty minutes later, that's how Tara found us—me cross-legged on her living room floor, tiny tea cup in my massive hand, having a serious discussion with Izzy and Mr. Bunny about the proper way to stir tea.
She stood in the hallway wearing my t-shirt, hair wild, mouth open in shock.
"Mama! Mr. Viper is very good at tea parties!"
"I see that." Her voice was rough with sleep and something else. "How long have you been up?"
"Forever," Izzy said dramatically. "Mr. Viper says we should let you sleep 'cause you work hard."
Tara's gaze met mine over Izzy's head. I saw the questions there, the wonder, the fear that this was too good to be real.
It wasn't.
Three days.
Three perfect days where I fell into a routine I never knew I wanted. Morning tea parties with Izzy before school. Watching Tara work her lunch shift from my corner booth. Afternoons fixing things around the rental—the porch rail, the leaky faucet, the back door that didn't lock right. Dinners together like we were a real family. Nights in Tara's bed after Izzy was asleep, learning every way to make her come apart.
"You're getting domesticated," Wolf said when I showed up late to a meeting on day three. "Next you'll be driving a minivan."
"Fuck off."
But he wasn't wrong. Somewhere between teaching Izzy to ride her bike and helping Tara with dishes, I'd gone full family man. And I didn't give a single fuck what anyone thought about it.
"How's the ex situation?" Blade asked, bringing us back to business.
"Quiet," Wraith reported. "Too quiet. No movement on his accounts, no travel records, nothing."
The silence bothered me. Harrison Clarke didn't seem like the type to give up easy. But maybe knowing the MC was involved had been enough to scare him off.
