Page 89 of Knot My MC
The doorbell rings and I head to the door, calling over my shoulder, “Will you grab some beers?”
“Kiki Malone, it’s only three in the afternoon.” Jag is already on the way to the fridge.
“And?” I open the door, catching the delivery van pulling away from the house. On the stoop is a small box addressed to Jag. I grab it and head back to the kitchen. “You’re getting mail here?”
“Technically, that’s for you.” Jag pops open two beers. “It’s your phone.”
“Oh.” I fight for the right response. I’m not exactly upset that they’d buy me stuff, but it still feels weird. Dad and I always took care of ourselves.
“You’re welcome,” he says with a smile.
“Right, thank you.”
“Come on.” He sets the beers on the table and we sit.
Opening the package, I pull out the instructions and unwrap the new device. It’s fancier than my old one, but somehow they managed to find a case that somewhat matched the one I had. My fingers pause on the rubbery material.
“How—” Oh right. They broke into my house. But breaking and entering is a little different than spying on me. I must pull a face because Jag sighs.
“Before you get mad, let me start by saying we never claimed to be good people.” The cards make that funny noise as he does a bridge.
“Stalkers.” I glance up at him. “How often?”
“In a week?”
“In general?” I ask, a little overwhelmed at what he’s implying.
“A lot.” He starts dealing. “Sometimes more, sometimes less. But at least a few times a week. The time you spilled water on your pants and freaked out because it looked like you pissed yourself? That might’ve been my favorite.” He gives me a simmering look. “We were alwayshere.”
“Would’ve been nice to know that.” I shake my head and turn on the device. “Scent blockers?”
“Yup. And carefully timed break-ins.”
The phone prompts me to connect to my cloud account. I’d forgotten about the online backup. That means everything, pictures, texts, voice messages from my dad, they’ll all come back. I enter in the information and take a sip of the beer, waiting for everything to finish loading. Finally, the phone completes the download, and I quickly unlock the device and click into the photos.
“They’re all here.” I blink up at Jag with watery eyes. “All my pictures.”
He leans over and looks through the photos with me. I pull up a selfie of me and Dad on his motorcycle.
“Your face looks weird in that helmet. Your Dad looks hot as hell though.”
“Screw you,” I say with a laugh, swiping at the tears. They’re not sad, more relieved. I hadn’t realized how many memories I’d been missing without my phone. I’m so happy to have them back. I scroll through more and Jag waits patiently. An alert flashes across the top of the screen. A text from Knox.
I open the message. It was sent the day my world turned to utter shit.
I’m sorry.
I hadn’t seen it; Axel had already taken my things. My heart clenches, and I shut off the device before the afternoon ends with me sobbing into a pillow.
I clear my throat. “Thanks for the phone.”
“Anything for you, Kiks.” Jag taps his cards. “If I win, you strip.”
He’s trying to distract me. I let him.
“And if I win?”
“Then I do whatever you want.”
