Page 162 of Smooth Sailing

“Yeah, Pete’s with Di and I’m running an errand, but you got a second?”

“Got lots of ’em. Jag and Coe are on the dad and I’m kicking back at the rental until you get home with Diana. Then I’ll be keeping an eye on the complex. What’s up?”

“You and Georgie hooked up fast and put down roots just as fast.”

“Yeah.”

“How’d you…” Jesus, this was tough. “How’d you know with her?”

Dutch chuckled and said, “Man, at first, I didn’t. She was a major bitch when I met her. Then she wasn’t, and I said some stupid shit and nearly blew it. But then she was just her, and I just knew.”

“That was it?”

“You know Georgie?”

He did.

And yeah, she was a damn fine woman.

“I see your point,” he muttered.

“Not lost on any of us you got your eye on Diana,” Dutch said leadingly.

“She’s problematic in the sense she gives everything she’s got to pretty much everyone she knows.”

“Sounds like a match.”

Hugger stared at his fuel tank as he asked, “What?”

“You’re the first to volunteer on missions. You’re the first in to open the store. You’re the first to raise your hand when someone needs something covered. Hop said we gave you the wrong Club name. He said we shoulda called you Shaky, since that’s the opposite of Steady.”

Hugger lifted a hand to rub the back of his neck, which was getting scorched by the sun, but that wasn’t the heat that was concerning him.

That heat was happening in his gut.

“Hug?” Dutch called.

“You know who my dad is?” he asked abruptly.

“No,” Dutch replied. “I know whose seed made you. I also know he wasn’t even close to bein’ your dad.”

“I still was made from his seed.”

“Brother, you know Joker’s story. Now, is Joke one thing like that shitheel who made him?”

Fuck.

“No,” Hugger pushed out.

“And word got out about what Core grew up with, what happened, what his dad did. Core veered hard off the righteous path, but he pulled out all the stops to drag himself back. Hellen thinks he hangs the moon and ushers in the sun. He strayed, but he got his shit tight and earned the love of a good woman and lives a life doing good things for people who need it. In the end, he’s not one thing like the seed that made him.”

Hugger knew Hardcore’s story too.

And again.

Fuck.

“Listen,” Dutch said. “You need to talk to Tack.”

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