Page 81 of Ordinary Girl

“Yeah, well, maybe that’s not such a good idea.”

She frowns, she’s confused, and I know I’m fucking this up big time, I’m coming across as some amateur who hasn’t got a clue what he’s doing, but she’s skewing every emotion I have right now. Every train of thought. Every decision that’s connected to her.

“Come here.” I hold out my hand and she takes it, and I pull her against me. I kiss her, hold her close to me, I take a few minutes to forget we’re involved in so much shit, I just want it to be us. Nothing else. A temporary respite. And she feels so good, her body warm and firm against mine, and the longer we stand there, together, like this, the more I can see Skip’s reasoning for getting out of this life we’ve conditioned ourselves into thinking we need. “I’m sorry, Ana. I’m sorry, for all of this.”

She smiles, her fingers lightly stroking my cheek, and when I look into her eyes I can’t help but be taken aback at the change in her. And then the guilt returns, swamping me like a kick to the solar plexus, because she would have been beautiful and strong and capable of anything before she set foot in our club. Before we turned her world on its fucking head. And that wasn’t our fault, but every day it feels like it was. “You have nothing to be sorry for,” she whispers, running her thumb gently over my lower lip.

“Oh, I think we have a shitload of things to be sorry for.”

She’s still smiling, and she seems as reluctant to let go of me as I am of her. “Let’s stop apologizing, okay? And deal with whatever situation we’re about to have thrown at us. I’ll keep seeing my dad–”

“No, Ana, let me talk to Skip first. Please. Look, he’s still adamant he’s walking away from the club once this is all over, so maybe this is my chance to let him see that I’m capable of making decisions. That I can be the leader he wants me to be.”

“I’m sure he already knows that you are. Skip’s like a brother to you, isn’t he?”

“Yeah. Yeah, he is, but I don’t think he’s handling this situation in the best way.” Neither am I, all I know is I’d prefer Ana not to be involved in any of this. All this time we’ve been telling her we need to protect her, and nothing happened. Or maybe it was just because we were doing our job, keeping her safe, but this time, we know less. We’re dealing with a new enemy, one we’re still gathering information on, he’s a stranger, to us and to Ana. So I don’t want her anywhere near him.

“What are you going to say to him?”

“I don’t know,” I sigh, finally letting go of her and climbing onto my bike. “I’ll figure it out when I get there.”

She climbs on behind me, and I pull away, the roar of the engine piercing the silence, and I know without a shadow of a doubt now: I love this woman. Whatever the fuck that means…

Thirty-Three

Ana

“He was acting a bit weird, if I’m honest.” I pull myself up onto the counter and bite into one of the sandwiches Joel and I had never got around to eating at our hastily-cut-short lunch.

“Weird, how?” Cady asks as she puts the finishing touches to the window display.

“I don’t know. Like, he was contradicting himself, I suppose. At times it felt like was thinking out loud.”

“He’s worried about you.”

“He doesn’t need to be.”

“Yeah, well, you could tell him that a thousand times and it wouldn’t make any difference. That man cares about you, so he’ll worry.” She sits down in a rattan chair by the window and picks up her coffee from the small side table next to her. “Your estranged daddy is an unknown entity right now. They need to get a handle on him.”

I wasn’t aware that club girls played a big part in club business, or that’s what I assumed anyway, but then, Cady is no ordinary club girl. I’m beginning to see that now.

“I can look after myself, Cady.”

“Oh, I have no doubt about that now, kiddo.” She takes a sip of coffee. “So, how do you really feel about your dad coming back into your life?”

“He’s not back in my life.”

“Do you want him to be?”

I shake my head, because Idon’twant him in my life, I don’t know him. He’s a stranger, and not one I feel comfortablearound, but, if Skip needs me to keep on seeing him, I will. I’ll help, if I need to.

“All I want, Cady, is for somebody to get justice for my mama. No matter how twisted that justice might be.”

“It’ll happen. It’s just not straightforward, that’s all.”

“Joel thinks that’s why my dad’s come to Denmark. Because he wants justice too, for Mama.”

“Understandable.”

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