Page 60 of Viper
I sniffle, not looking away from the stars, and I admit, “I’ve told him he can have full custody, he doesn’t need to fight for me, Dad.”
“Fuck’s sake, Lake, he doesn’t want you just because of the baby. Why do you think he always picked a fight with you over the past six months?” Dad snaps, and I look at him as he admits, “He was angry because he knew he still loved you more than anything. He was angry because he knew you both blew this entire thing out of proportion, and he didn’t know how to stop himself. The baby is not the reason why he wants you back. He knows you both fucked up, he knows you both made mistakes but he’s willing to fight for what you have. The question is, are you going to fight as well or are you going to walk away and leave town like I know you are most likely planning not wanting to watch your daughter grow up without you.”
I look away, my tears falling, as I hear some hard truths, and Dad whispers, “That man is your everything, Lake, if he wasn’t, you wouldn’t have gotten his name tatted on your hip a month after you broke up.”
“Damn Callum,” I mutter, and Dad snorts, not denying that is where he got his information.
Okay so maybe taking him four towns over with me to get the tattoo done was not my brightest idea but I needed his support.
“He said that’s payback for not telling him about the baby,” he states, and I shake my head with a small smile as I wipe my tears.
“Raya had a run-in with the Hyena group.” Dad changes tactics suddenly, and I wince.
She had one before Fury proposed to Skylar, and he managed to scare the guy away and other than my dad, he is the only other person outside our little group that knows about Raya’s situation.
“I haven’t been a good friend, have I?” I confirm, and Dad replies, “You’ve kind of had a lot going on.”
Still no excuse…
“Is she okay?” I ask.
Dad hums and admits, “She’s alright, I was driving past when one of them tried to corner her and demand when she was leaving town, and I held my crowbar at him. He eyed the club's truck before making a run for it, realizing I was affiliated with the club. They don’t like to leave loose ends sweetheart and Raya is one of them.”
No, they don’t, and the only reason why they haven’t killed Raya is because they thought she left town after her mama remarried.
After the fire, it took them a while to figure out who the firefighter was who died. Thankfully for Raya’s mama, she was already remarried when they completed their research and to a man affiliated to the club no less so they wouldn’t touch them. Raya, on the other hand, they don’t trust her and now they know she’s been in town all this time, they’re watching her every move.
They’re also spineless weasels who need exterminating.
“She needs to tell Venom, pumpkin,” Dad says, and I nod, knowing he’s right.
It was the same thing he told me after I confided in him about her past, worried for her.
“She will when she’s ready, I’ve already put the seed in his head,” I admit.
A seed, I know she’ll kill me for.
“I love him, Daddy,” I finally admit, his tactic working as always, and his body relaxes next to me. “I love him so much that the guilt I feel for allowing that man to touch me is sending me into spirals,” I sniffle, “We have said so much hurtful stuff to each other over the past six months that it is so hard to see us pulling through it.”
“Do you miss him?” Dad asks, and I nod.
I admit, “With every single bone in my body. I couldn’t even sleep at the center until he brought me one of his shirts, and even when I extended, and Dr. Gren decided it was best I didn’t see him for my last two weeks, he still came and handed in another one of his shirts because he knew it was what I needed.”
I look down at my bump and I whisper, “He knows me inside and out, can read me like a book. I think that is why it hurt so much when he accused me of using him, of knowing he was a brother when I didn’t.”
“If it helps, he accused me of trying to set it all up,” Dad mutters with distain, and I snort as he growls, “I watched that boy run around in fucking diapers for fucks sake, used to have him in the shop with me a lot,” he sighs, “but I understood. The brotherhood, while amazing most times, some brothers are suspicious. As soon as it came out that Cherri got pregnant on purpose, they automatically assumed you’d be the same. That wasn’t fair to you and it pissed me off that they believed I would allow you to turn out like her.”
“How did it even become apparent that she did it on purpose?” I ask with confusion, “I mean, did they think, ‘Oh yeah, she did that on purpose? ’”
Dad snorts, “She gloated, holding a pregnancy stick claiming to have given me a condom with holes in, and the brothers, while angry as fuck for what she did to me, laughed because she thought I was a prospect, a brother in waiting.”
“You were close with Brick,” I confirm, and Dad grins as he looks at me and says, “She thought I was in line to become an officer.”
I chuckle, shaking my head, and he admits, “Though she was right, I was in line,” and my eyes widen. He shrugs, “I didn’t like how the brothers cheated on their women, how women tried to trap them for the cut, it was just stress I couldn’t be bothered with. I don’t regret my decision even if they do still try to convince me to join.”
Damn…
I look back at the stars, shocked that my dad was nearly a brother.
