Walk Through Fire (Page 23)

Since Lanie’s Nash was hardly a year old, when Elvira mentioned Tasers, she was talking about my Rider and Cutter.

My boys were hellions. I knew it. I figured they’d work it out or become bikers and it’d work out for them.

This was Tack’s second round of kids, so he had more experience and more patience.

But my boys were who they were, so I wasn’t going to give my husband any ideas about Tasers.

“I’m in,” Lanie said.

“Me too,” I added.

“You thinkin’ Tabby on this or you thinkin’ she knew Millie?” Elvira asked me about Tack’s daughter, my stepdaughter. She was the Chaos princess and also an old lady since she was married to Tack’s lieutenant, Shy Cage, and now pregnant with his baby.

“That’s why she’s not here. I’m thinking she knew her,” I shared.

Elvira looked at Lanie. “Then, Lanie, softly-softly, but you get what you can outta Tabby and see where she’s at with bein’ pulled in on this. But we got our work cut out for us, and I can herd commandoes in my sleep, but whatever that bitch in that studio,” she jabbed her finger toward the door, “is dealin’ with, it’s all hands on deck.”

I nodded.

Lanie nodded.

And all three of us squatted down to right the crate and gather photos.

Not one of us suggested we should leave well enough alone.

But even if it had crossed any of our minds, sifting through those photos to put them back into that crate, it would have been banished.

Whatever ended Logan “High” Judd’s and Millie Cross’s love affair was not a play or a betrayal.

It was a tragedy.

And if a sister had the power to right a wrong, it was her sworn duty to do it.

We were sisters.

So we were doing it.

Millie

Twenty-three years earlier, outside the Chaos Compound…

“I’m Tabby,” the little girl declared.

She had a mass of thick, dark hair deep blue eyes and she was wearing jeans and a pink T-shirt that had a glittery decal on the front that declared her princess.

I sat on top of the picnic table outside Logan’s biker club headquarters, looking down at the little girl who had to be no more than four or five while replying, “Hey there, Tabby. I’m Millie.”

“Do you belong to Low?” she asked.

Belong.

She was certainly a princess.

A biker princess.

I grinned down out at her.

“Yep,” I answered, knowing this to be true even if this was only our sixth date.

But since our sixth date was coming to a cookout with his soon-to-be brothers, a date he had planned from the very beginning, a date that all the other dates led up to, regardless of how few there were, I figured I was right.

I was Low’s.

And that made me happy.

“I like Low,” little Tabby told me.

“I’m glad you do,” I replied. “I do too.”

“That’s good,” she said, her eyes going beyond me.

I felt him before I turned my head and saw him just as Logan settled in beside me, arm coming around my shoulders, leaning into the picnic table… and me.

But his eyes were on Tabby.

“Yo, Tab,” he greeted.

“Your girlfriend’s pretty,” she declared.

“No, she ain’t, little pea,” Logan returned. “Lots a’ things are pretty. Millie here’s loads more than that.”

Little pea.

Loads more than that.

God.

Seriously.

Even if I wasn’t his, I would make him be mine.

But I was.

Which meant he was.

Oh yes.

Happy.

I grinned again and leaned in to him.

“She ride on the back of your bike?” Tabby asked.

“Yup,” Logan answered.

“Rush says I can’t ride on a bike,” she announced, and looked from Logan to me. “That’s my brother,” she explained. “He’s older than me and thinks he knows everything.”

“I suspect most older brothers do,” I shared ruefully, like I felt her pain.

“He’s stupid,” she proclaimed. “I’ll ride what I want.”

“How ’bout you wait about fifteen, twenty years before you do that?” Logan suggested, a smile deepening his voice.

“Well, duh!” she cried like the next word she wanted to use but knew better than to use on a biker was silly. “I can’t do it now,” she went on. “Even if I had an old man, I can’t get my arms around his middle.”

I swallowed laughter but Logan didn’t bother. I heard his chuckle.

“You ever think of getting your own bike?” I asked her.

She tipped her head to the side and stated contemplatively, “Maybe. When I can reach the grips.” She righted her head. “Do you have your own bike?”

“Nope,” I answered.

“Want your own bike?” she asked.

“Nope,” I repeated.

“You like ridin’ with your old man,” she proclaimed knowingly.

“Yep,” I stated, and Logan’s arm around me tightened.

“Tabitha!”

I tensed at the shrill noise, Tabby’s body jerked and whirled, and Logan straightened but didn’t let me go.

I looked up just when a redheaded woman, who was pretty but she had an ugly look on her face and it was directed at the little girl in front of me, shrieked, “Get your ass over here!”

“Gotta go,” Tabby mumbled, and did it hightailing it over to the shrieking woman.

“Naomi,” Logan said, and I looked up at him to see his eyes still directed to the redhead. “Woman’d be okay, ’cept she treats her daughter like shit. Kid’s ’bout five years old.” He shook his head. “Do not get that.”