Page 74 of Totally Off Limits

It had been the only way to survive with her demanding mother and passive father.

Except she’d also gotten good at lying to herself.

Pushing that unhelpful thought out of her brain, she looked at Mickey’s stubbly chin. It was always easier to tell a falsehood when someone couldn’t peer into your eyes. “At the risk of you thinking I’m a slut, I didn’t have a way to contact him.”

That was almost true. True enough.

“Hmm.” Pulling her close, he kissed her forehead. “I can’t tell you what to do but for Mia’s sake—and her dad’s—you might try to figure it out. I always thought having no dad would be better than having a shitty one, but I don’t know if that’s true. All I know is you’re an amazing mother, Sierra. The way Mia looks at you tells me all I need to know—and even if her dad wasn’t in her life full time, he could be a good influence, do all those things dads are supposed to do with their kids…and he could help support her.”

Sierra all but shrugged in Mickey’s arms, but she was glad she was looking at his neck instead of his eyes.

“If I was Mia’s dad…I’d want to know.”

Jesus. He was getting way too close to the truth for comfort—and that was all her fault, because she just couldn’t stay away. Before speaking, she reminded herself that no one—absolutely not a soul save herself—knew that Mickey really was Mia’s dad, so she could keep denying it and he would never know.

And if she severed their ties, starting tonight, then no one would be the wiser.

Then…if she either moved the hell out of here or married Austin, that would officially be the end of it.

Making her voice sound sleepy, she said, “I get that.” She almost added that she didn’t need anyone’s help but that was so not true. She’d begrudgingly taken her mother’s offer of watching Mia all these years to save on daycare costs. Even Layne had turned out to be a surrogate father of sorts and even though Sierra couldn’t understand why her daughter adored him, she wasn’t about to stop that relationship.

That was just the beginning. No doubt there were hidden benefits of having her family, even with all their dysfunctions, nearby that she hadn’t even considered.

And she knew deep down that if she chose Mickey, she could kiss all that goodbye.

But…

No buts.

Mickey could never know.

When he kissed her on the forehead again, he whispered, “Sweet dreams, sleeping beauty.”

That was all she needed to hear to know that she simply had to lie still until she knew for sure that he had fallen asleep.

Then it was time to grow the hell up.

CHAPTER25

Just like a few years earlier, Sierra crept around in the dim lights of the bedroom and bathroom to gather up all her things. This time, though, she’d risked kissing Mickey on the cheek. Maybe some small part of her hoped she’d get caught.

But he was sound asleep.

After putting her clothes back on, she picked up her phone off the bathroom counter and crept out to the living room.

Shit.How far away from Bad Boys was she? It was at least a mile away, give or take, and even though Winchester wasn’t that big, she didn’t want to walk in those cheap sandals back to that sketchy bar at one in the morning. And how stupid had it been leaving her money in the car? She hadn’t even brought her debit card.

So fucking stupid.

Deal with it downstairs. Get the hell out of here.

Quietly, she opened the door to the bright hallway and then closed it with the stealth of a ninja. It wasn’t until she got to the elevators that she stopped walking softly. Not that anyone sleeping on that floor would have heard her anyway.

Once she was heading downstairs, she started browsing through the app store, considering downloading either an Uber or Lyft app so she could get a ride home. When one popped up in her search, she started downloading it and then felt stupid. She didn’t know her debit card number off the top of her head.

Fuck.

She was going to have to walk.

---