Page 27 of Outlaw

Stevie frowned, not liking that response. “You said I was going to Bwight Minds.”

Branwen’s eyes flickered over to me as she set her glass of cabernet back on the table after taking a drink. “I know, but there are some changes that you and I will be making. I was going to tell you about them tonight.”

Stevie stared at her, as if she was waiting for her mother to continue. Branwen picked up her glass again and took a much larger gulp. Her chest rose and fell as she took a deep breath. My eyes immediately went to her tits. The image of her large, round pink nipples flashed in my head, and I jerked my eyes off them and took my whiskey and drank what was left in my glass. That had to stop. I couldn’t keep thinking about the night I’d fucked her.

“Come here,” Branwen told her as she pushed her chair back and held out a hand.

Stevie scrambled down from her chair and hurried over to climb into her mother’s lap. I studied them. My DNA had done little to create her. All I could see of me was the eyes. Otherwise, she was her mother. Branwen’s hair wasn’t as curly, but it was longer and thicker. The weight causing the curls to loosen as they hung down her back and over her shoulders. Women spent hours trying to achieve that look, yet she woke up with it.

Branwen cupped her daughter’s—ourdaughter’s—small face and pressed a kiss to the tip of her nose. “You like it here, right? The pool and the slide. Your new room,” she said.

Stevie nodded her head, not taking her eyes off her mother’s face.

“Well, you see…” She paused and glanced at me before continuing.

I saw the concern in her eyes, but there was nothing I could do to make this easier. I wanted my daughter to know who I was. Branwen had lied to her, and perhaps the circumstances had kept her from letting me know about her pregnancy and our child, but she had found me and still not planned on telling me. That was what I couldn’t get over. It fucking infuriated me.

“Remember that day when you asked me why some kids had a mommy and a dad, but you just had a mommy, and I told you that your dad wasn’t alive anymore?” Branwen said slowly. Her tone was gentle, almost as if she was asking for forgiveness for what was to come.

She nodded her head. “Yes, but Hudson is gonna be my dad now.”

The way those words twisted me up was more than uncomfortable. I wanted to take my plate and throw it against the motherfucking wall. Branwen had almost allowed it too. After finding out my name and hunting me down, she had intended on robbing me of knowing my child. Letting another man raise Stevie as his own.

Branwen tucked a lock of blonde curls behind her ear. “You see, honey, that can’t happen anymore. Because your dad is alive and”—she glanced at me, then back at Stevie—“he wants to spend time with you. He didn’t know about you until very recently, and he is anxious to get to know you. To be…your dad.”

I didn’t like the hesitation in her voice, as if this was something bad.

“My weal dad?” she asked, her eyes as round as saucers. “I have a weal dad? But why didn’t he live with us in owah apawtment? Wheah is he?” Her little voice was a mix of curiosity and confusion.

Branwen cleared her throat and took another deep breath. “He didn’t live with us because he didn’t know he had a little girl.”

“Why didn’t you tell him?”

I was holding my breath and hadn’t realized it. Fuck, I was nervous. Why was I so nervous? Because there was a chance my daughter might not want me to be her dad. That she might want the pasty-ass dentist instead.

I’d kill him.

“I didn’t know where to find him. But I finally found him, and now he knows about you, he wants to be a part of your life.”

Her shoulders straightened. “Is he gonna move into Hudson’s house with us?” she asked, sounding hopeful at the thought.

Branwen shook her head. “No, no, sweetie. It doesn’t work that way. I mean, no. He has his own house. One you like very much. He wants us to live there for a while so he can get to be around you. So you can do things together.”

“Wheah is his house?” she asked, those big eyes searching her mother’s face.

“Well”—Branwen looked around and held out her hands—“this is his house. Mr. Shephard—uh, Linc is your dad.”

Stevie’s head swung around, and her gaze locked on mine. I couldn’t imagine what all was going through that little head of hers, but I could see so many different things swirling in her eyes.

“Yowah my weal dad?” she asked.

Emotion I hadn’t expected clogged my throat, so I simply nodded.

“I’m gonna live in this house?”

All I could do was nod. I swallowed, trying to clear the shit that had come over me. Damn, I hadn’t been ready for that. I’d thought I was, but I wasn’t.

She looked back at her mother, and I took the moment to compose myself.

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