Chapter Three
The door snapped closed and Kori jumped. She was so on edge it might as well have been a cannon’s roar.
“Is this some sick fucking joke?” Kori’s father rose from his chair, his eyes wide and mouth hanging open.
So he noticed it too. Noticed how their eyes were the exact same shape, exact same shade of brown. And how their noses had a tiny bump in the exact same spot. Well, if Kori had any doubts as to whether Rebel was actually her father, this face-to-face blew them out of the water.
“You look…”
“I look just like you.” Well except for the craggy leathery face, a multitude of tattoos, and bald head. At one point, he had probably been attractive, with muscles and a fierce bad boy look, but now, his bulk had atrophied in an over-the-hill kind of way.
“Who the fuck are you?”
Frozen legs hadn’t allowed her to move from her spot in the smoke-filled office. She cleared her throat. “I’m, uh, I’m sorry to just show up here like this, but I wasn’t really sure a phone call would have been sufficient. The past week has been so crazy, and I finally decided two days ago that this was a good idea. So, I booked the first flight I could.”
“You gonna get to the point sometime this year?” He stabbed out the stub of his cigarette, then drew another from the pack and stuffed it between his lips. His tall, aging body still hovered over the desk.
The urge to smack the cancer stick from his face was overwhelming, but she moved to a worn chair on her side of the desk and plopped down instead. “Sorry, I’m rambling. I’m quite nervous.” She chuckled and blew out a breath. “Okay, here goes. My mother is, uh was, Barbara Morrison.”
Memories flickered in his deep brown eyes. Good? Bad? She couldn’t discern.
“She passed away about ten days ago and…and, well, she told me you were my father.” There you go. Rip off the Band-Aid.
“Holy shit.” He sagged against the back of his chair and inhaled a long drag from his cigarette. The sight enraged her.
“She died of lung cancer, so if you wouldn’t mind, could you put out the fucking cigarette?” Under normal circumstances she’d die before sniping at a relative stranger like that, but nothing about the past weeks qualified as normal.
The room grew thick with tense silence, then Rebel totally surprised her by barking out a laugh. Well, the reaction was better than she’d expected. As MC president, he was used to respect, not women cursing at him and ordering him around in a bitchy tone.
“Well if the eyes weren’t enough of a clue, that smart mouth gives it away.” He snuffed out the cigarette and looked at his hand as though unsure of what to do with it now that the nicotine was gone. “I’m sorry about your mother. We had some good times. I had no idea she was knocked up when she left here.”
Kori relaxed some in her chair. So far so good. He didn’t jump up and hug his long-lost daughter, but neither did he deny her and toss her out on her ass. But, now what? As the hush in the room grew uncomfortable, she let her eyes wander. The office was pretty sparse as far as knickknacks and personal touches went, though there were a number of framed pictures of Rebel with various bikers adorning the walls.
Four ceramic dishes full of gray ash and cigarette butts decorated the desktop. Looked like there was at least one thing he had in common with her mother. Hopefully, they wouldn’t do him in the way they did her.
“So…uh…” Hearing a big tough biker sound unsure of himself was a unique experience. “So, you sticking around at all?”
“I hadn’t really made any plans beyond today. I figured I’d see how this all went. I booked a hotel room for the night.” Did he want to see her again? Get to know her?
“You got an ol’ man to get back to? A job?”
Kori snorted. She was about to sum up her sad life with one word. “No. To either. No relationship and my job let me go after I took so much time off to take care of Mom. It was rough at the end.”
Rebel nodded, his face impassive. Almost as if by reflex, he reached into the cardboard pack and drew out a cigarette. The look of disbelief on her face must have registered with him because he shoved the stick in his mouth but didn’t light the thing. “What? I ain’t gonna light it. Geez girl, you’re in my life five minutes and already bitching at me.”
The sides of Kori’s mouth quirked, but she suppressed the grin. “I didn’t say anything.”
He grunted and withdrew the cigarette from between his lips. “Not with your voice. But you did that chick thing where you look at a poor guy and scream at him with your eyes.”
A genuine laugh bubbled out of her and she was surprised to see that Rebel was laughing as well. “Stay for a while,” he said. “I live by myself. Got an extra room. You won’t bother me none and, who knows, maybe we’ll even like each other.”
Kori’s jaw dropped. At a loss for words, she whipped it closed again. To say the offer was unexpected would be an understatement. She ran through the idea in her head. After her mom fell ill, Kori had given up her apartment and moved into her mother’s house. Well, actually, Rusty, her ol’ man’s house, but the faithless asshole barely spent any time there. She’d been staying there since her mom died, knowing full well time was running out and Rusty would want the space back at some point. And with no job to return to, there really wasn’t anything holding her back.
Hell, maybe she could stay here permanently. As a medical office assistant, she could find a job anywhere. The idea had merit. It was at least worth a trial run. Stay with Rebel for a bit and if things seemed promising she could relocate to Vegas permanently.
Only one problem with this grand plan. The only person she knew in Vegas was a biker. And she’d be living with him. Father or not, associating with bikers wasn’t in her plans, especially now that her mom had passed. After the very loud, raucous biker funeral her stepfather’s club held, she’d decided that bikers were out of her life for good.
“Girl, I didn’t ask you to solve the world’s hunger problem. You looking to stay? Yes or no. Simple.”
“Yes.” Wait, what? The consent was out of her mouth without any permission from her brain.
The leathery skin of his cheeks stretched as a wide grin graced his face. Warmth spread through Kori’s chest. Maybe there was still hope for her in the family department.
“Go on out and have a drink at the bar. I’ll be done in ten minutes and I’ll introduce you to the crew.” The command was given in that way of people who were used to having their orders followed.
She rose and turned for the door. “Uh, sure. I guess I could use a middle of the day drink.”
Looks like she was about to make a bunch of new friends.
Biker friends.
Shit.