Total pages in book: 180
Estimated words: 182075 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 910(@200wpm)___ 728(@250wpm)___ 607(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 182075 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 910(@200wpm)___ 728(@250wpm)___ 607(@300wpm)
She didn’t have any toys from her childhood left. Nothing to comfort her. Only her thumb.
But you can’t do that right now.
She watched as they all stiffened.
“Sylvia has a daughter?” Sin demanded.
Indie winced. Great. Had her mum not told anyone about her? Surely she’d told her new boyfriend?
“Yeah, it’s me,” she said with a wave of her hand.
What was that?
Why did you wave your hand?
Idiot.
“Your father never said anything about a girl, right?” Gray Eyes asked, looking over at Sin.
Wait. Did he live here?
Was . . . was his dad her mum’s boyfriend?
Holy shit.
This just got worse and worse.
The quiet, muscular guy grunted and the others all nodded.
Did they understand him?
Wow.
He looked like a . . . a sentry standing there, watching over his friends against any sort of threat. A guardian.
She was suddenly aware that her thumb was at her mouth, but instead of latching on, she just ran it over her lips.
“Nope,” Sin drawled, although she noticed he didn’t look as relaxed as he sounded. “A fucking daughter? What the fuck? What. The. Fuck!”
Picking up a glass, he threw it at the wall.
It was so sudden and unexpected that for a moment, she just froze.
And then she ran.
Slade let out a deep breath.
Fuck.
He didn’t need this fucking shit.
Also, his dad was the biggest fucking wanker in the universe.
“First, he shacks up with a woman he barely knows. And now he conveniently forgot to fucking mention that she had a daughter?” he yelled.
A cute, younger daughter.
Who did not look like she was tough enough for their world.
And now you’ve scared her.
Not that she’d be here long. Although it had been a while since his father had moved one of his women in with him. He usually rented them an apartment close by.
Just six more months.
Six more months and he was out of here. He’d graduate from high school and go to university. With his real family.
The three guys in this room.
Not his fucked-up father and whatever woman he’d shacked up with.
“He’s never brought someone here who had a kid,” Quaid mused.
“Why wouldn’t he tell you?” Spencer asked, sounding confused.
“Because he’s a fuckwit who doesn’t care about anyone but himself,” Slade snarled. “I can’t believe this!”
“It doesn’t matter,” Quaid said dismissively. “She’ll be gone in a few months once he gets bored.”
“Do you think she knew about you?” Spencer asked. “The girl, I mean, not the mum.”
“It didn’t seem like it to me,” Quaid said slowly. “She appeared a bit . . . lost.”
“Why isn’t her mum with her?” Spencer asked. “Where the fuck is she?”
Slade had only met Sylvia once when his father informed him that she was moving in with them. And she’d stared at him with a bit too much hunger and lust. Slade shuddered. He was used to that. To women of all ages coming on to him.
But she was supposed to be with his dad.
“What’s the bet she abandoned the kid the second they got here,” Quaid guessed.
Fuck.
Quaid’s guesses were usually fucking accurate. Which meant that poor kid had probably been dropped off and left to fend for herself. She might not have known about him. And he didn’t exactly make a good impression.
Yeah, he needed to work on his temper.
“I scared her,” he said.
“It might be for the best,” Quaid said. “Keep her away from us. Better than her getting close and . . . attached.”
Quaid sounded as if the very idea disgusted him. But he only let the three of them close.
He was even more damaged than Slade and that was saying something. Quaid hid his damage under layers of icy protection. Whereas Slade let his morph into angry outbursts.
“She’s just a kid,” Spencer said.
He was the kindest of all of them. The one they protected the most fiercely. Without Spencer to breathe some softness into them they’d probably be fucking sociopaths.
Sometimes Slade worried that that was exactly what he was becoming.
Rock shared a look with them all. He nodded to Slade, then at the door where she’d disappeared. Rock never said much, but then he didn’t really need to.
Slade got what he was saying. It wasn’t the kid’s fault that she had a fucked-up parent.
“Can’t believe you’re going to be a stepbrother,” Spencer said with a grin, obviously trying to lighten the mood. “Slade, the big brother. Are you going to get all protective? Sharpen your knife on the porch when she starts to date?”
“Don’t be a fucking idiot,” Slade muttered. “She’s just a kid. How old do you even think she was? Eleven? Twelve?”
She was small. Almost scrawny.
And he’d just frightened her so badly that she’d run off.
Yeah, he could be an asshole.
But scaring a little kid was a new low.
He set off to search for her. He had a date to get ready for tonight. The last thing he needed was his father pressuring him into a family dinner with his new woman.