Page 32 of Outlaw

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

The kid was so damn polite. That was Branwen’s doing. I couldn’t fault her for that at least. The fact that she had intended to keep my kid from me though? I doubted I could ever forgive her for that. But for our daughter’s sake, I had to find a way to be nice to her and not end up fucking her.

Fifteen

Branwen

At some point during the drive, I’d let go of my anger at Linc not consulting me about anything that concerned me or Stevie, and I began to grow more anxious about my seeing Hudson. I stayed focused at the apartment and pointed out things to the two men who had apparently driven my car to Nashville and would be packing up what we wanted to bring with us. I wished I could do this alone and have time to think, but Linc stood outside the door with a cigar, leaning against the rail, talking on the phone, waiting, while I was inside with Stevie and the men who I assumed were Mafia members.

“This box going?” the one who had introduced himself as Gathe asked as he pushed his surfer-boy blond hair out of his face.

“Yes, please,” I replied.

With my thoughts on what I was going to say to Hudson, there was a good chance that I would forget several things. He oftentalked over me to get his point across. I couldn’t let him do that this time.

Stevie came walking out of her bedroom, rattling away about something that had to do with her baby dolls to the tall, muscular, tanned one with messy, dark brown hair and light-blue eyes. His name was weird. Something like Than, I thought. My mind wasn’t computing things that well today. Too much to think about.

“You mean to tell me she can eat food and poop in a diaper?” he asked with a well-played look of surprise.

Stevie nodded her head. “Yep! She can! It’s gwoss too.”

“I sure hope she doesn’t do her business on the trip back to Linc’s,” he said, shaking his head and looking truly worried.

If I wasn’t so worked up with dread, I would have smiled.

“Than,” Gathe called out, and the guy carrying a box of Stevie’s toys looked up at him.

“Yeah?”

“How many boxes left in her room?”

“Five.”

“I’ve cleared out the other bedroom. Linc wanted to know how much longer.” He turned his gaze to mine. “You got anything else we need to box up?”

I studied the room, then looked back toward the bathroom. There really wasn’t much we needed from there. Our bathrooms at Linc’s were better stocked than ours had ever been.

I shook my head. “No. I think that’s gonna be it.”

He gave me a nod. “All right, we will get the rest in the moving truck and head out.”

When we had arrived, the two guys had already been parked outside with a U-Haul. Everything had been so efficient.

I glanced around for my purse and went to pull out some twenties I had tucked inside. “Here. Let me tip y’all. You’ve been so helpful.”

The blond one raised his brows and shook his head. “Thank you. That’s real nice, but we don’t want any money. This was nothing at all. Happy to help.”

His momma had raised him right, but I was still giving him something for doing this.

I held the money out. “Please take it. It would make me feel better.”

He shifted his eyes to Than, as if asking for backup.

“What he isn’t saying is that if we take your money, Linc will lose his shit. Besides, you’re family now, and we take care of family,” he said, shifting the box in his hands.

Family. They were Mafia. Born into this life, just like Linc had been. They looked close to Linc’s age when I had been a little girl. The brief moment of nostalgia helped ease the ball of tension in my chest.

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