Page 140 of The Spare

I smile, gripping her free hand as the tattoo artist stays bent over her hand where she's having my signature tatted from her wrist to the base of her thumb.

"Almost done," I murmur, giving her fingers a kiss.

She gives me a shaky smile. "Does it look good?"

I look down, grinning. "It looks perfect."

"I start Monday morning at the bakery," she says in an awed voice before getting a little goofy smile on her face.

I chuckle into my fist, my eyes lighting up at her joy. I doubt she even notices this is her twentieth time saying that since she got the job two days ago.

"It sounds like a dream come true, baby." I indulge her, egging her on in her happiness. The only other subjects I've heard her speak in this kind of tone about have been track and, well….me.

My heart skips a beat at the knowledge that there's a person in this world who loves me for me. Despite my flaws, my sarcastic wit, and oftentimes overpowering temper. My fucked up family. She loves me in spite of it.

And her love is more than I could have ever asked for.

The tattoo artist finishes, smearing her with gel and then wrapping her tattoo in plastic. We pay, walking out of the shop and strolling down the sidewalk to our car, pretending to not see Dante and Stephen tailing us a few feet behind. There are a couple more men milling about with their eyes on us, courtesy of Luca, but I don't tell Melody.

Her phone rings, and she pauses, stepping to the side to dig in her purse for it. Holding it up to her ear she gets a wide smile on her face. "Hey, Daddy."

I swear, her dad coming along was the unexpected plot twist we all desperately needed. Taking advantage of the break, I pull out a cigarette and light up, my brows furrowing as she blinks and gets an irritated look on her face.

"You did what?" she says in a hushed, furious voice. Her mouth sets in a hard line, and I reach forward to touch my hand to her arm. She steps closer."She's there?"Uh oh. Her jaw clenches. "I don't want to talk to her, Dad. Yeah, I know it's been over a month.I'm not dumb!"

I blow out a plume of smoke, ignoring the judgmental look of a woman passing by.

Melody scrunches up her face and huffs a deep breath. I pull her into me, wrapping her with both of my arms and rocking her while she finishes her conversation.

When she hangs up, I snuff the cigarette out and then throw it in a bin, taking her hand as we resume our walk to our car.

"What's up?" I ask, but I don't need to. I already know.

She squints against the setting sun on the horizon. "Mom's in town. She's at Dad's."

I scoff and open her car door, letting her slide in. We've got a new car with the top down to really embrace Cali life. "Let me guess, she just showed up?"

"Yes."

"That doesn't sound like your mom, love."

I climb in the driver’s side, starting it and looking in the rearview mirror until I see our security smoothly pull out, holding up traffic for us to pull in front of them.

"I know."

"Are you going to talk to her?"

Her mouth tightens in a line, and she turns her face away, looking at the waves crashing along the coast as we drive past. "Well it'd be really fucked up of me if I turned her away after she flew all the way here. But if you're asking me if I'm going to accept an apology… I don't know."

I nod, taking her hand and kissing her knuckles.

Twenty minutes later we arrive at Maximus' place, and she gives me a pointed look as we park right outside the front. "We need our own house," she grumbles, looking put out for the first time since we've moved here.

And that's saying a lot because she was mad at me for those first few weeks until we made up.

"We've been looking. You've told your dad that, right?"

She nods, and though Maximus denies it, I feel we've outstayed our welcome.