Page 36 of Bruised MC Bear
“I can’t have you coming at midnight,” she added. “You’ll wake up the kids.”
His stomach did a flip of guilt at the thought of his niece, Annalee, and nephew, Asher. He had seen them all of maybe twice in their lives. That was pathetic on his part, inexcusable and completely his fault.
He cleared his throat. “I’m, uh, five minutes out.”
“Awww hell,” she whined. “You’re right in my damned back yard, huh? Why’d you even bother calling first? Anyway, you know what? Fine. Come. You’re the one who stayed away all this time, so I’m not going to give you another excuse to bail.”
“So that’s a yes, I’m guessing?” He said to provoke her.
“Yes, but on one condition.”
“What, Nance?” He was already mentally exhausted. How much worse could it get?
“While you’re here, we’re going to sit down and have a talk. I mean really talk. Deal?”
“I was expecting that. I’m game, but only if you’ll listen, instead of insisting there’s only one right way. If you’re good with parking the pigheadedness, then you have a deal. We can talk, but I won’t promise more than that.”
“I’m pigheaded?” she screeched. “If I’m stubborn, then you’re a goddamned bull in a china shop. One who runs away from his own kin and never looks back to see the trail of crap you broke.”
“Good. Are you done?”
“Jeez. Fair enough. I’ll see you soon, Alexander.”
The line went dead.
Axe was impressed. That actually went a lot better than he expected.
Now, it was time to move on to handling the panic-stricken, barefoot blonde woman running around haphazardly as though she was trying to avoid a sharpshooter from making her a target.
“Hey,” he called out to her. “What did I say about staying put?”
Angel ran up to him, breathing like she’d run a marathon. She gave him a painless punch on the upper arm. “Why didn’t you tell me you were going somewhere?”
“Relax,” he told her, shoving the phone back in his pocket. “Get back in the car. I’ll buy you some breakfast.”
She rolled her eyes and pointed down to her feet. “And shoes, please. Maybe a toothbrush, too?”
He pointed at the car so she’d start heading back, and added, “It’s a Chevron station, not a Walmart.”
“I noticed, dickhead,” she grumbled and left.
Axe got the food, coffees and a bag of whatever travel supplies he could find inside, returned to the truck. “Here, I got you some things. Don’t go whining about the shitty coffee.”
Angel started rifling through the pastry bag. “Thanks. So who were you talking to?”
He started the car. “You’ll see soon enough.”
Judging by Angel’s reaction, that answer was not the right one. She took a sip of her coffee and used her free hand to demonstrate her threat or plan to pour it all in his lap. He flinched just a little, and she grinned.
“I’m tired of you treating me this way, Axe,” she said, taking a bite of the donut from the brown bag.
Reversing the truck, he rolled out of the lot and waited to merge into traffic. “It’s for your own good.”
She arched her eyebrow and licked frosting off her top lip. “You think so? Keep it up and I’ll make sure you’ll pay for it in your sleep.”
“Fuck, that sounds hot,” he teased. “Whatever happened toI’m so not sleeping with you ever again, Axe?” he asked, adding the highest pitched female sounding voice he could mimic her.
She scrunched up her nose and narrowed her eyes at him. If looks could kill, he’d be six feet under.
