“She will remember, and she has to meet her little sister.” He said proudly.
“Sister?”
“Yeah, bro, Lorelai. Mikki gave me my princess. She’s going to be two.” The man smiled and pulled out his phone to show me a picture. How fucking domestic was that shit?
I laughed and patted him on the back. “Good shit, I’m happy for you, Prez. The both of you.”
I looked around at the buzz in the clubhouse, as much as I wanted to stay and help, right now I knew I needed to get back to Jazmine. They were probably worrying like crazy. I looked for Wire to tell him I was leaving.
“I gotta get back to the house, let them know that everything is okay.”
Wire nodded his head, “Alright, you carrying?”
“Yeah, I’m straight.”
“Good, your room is still how you left it. We took the weapons out, but all your clothes and shit is in there.”
“Ha!” Clean laughed loudly, “Bro! You see how big this motherfucker is? It looks like he ate the old, Ink, a few times over. He could use his old shirts as a scarf for that big ass head of his, though.” He laughed harder.
“Motherfucker!” I pushed him, and he stumbled to the side.
I smiled and rubbed my head as I made my way out of the bustling clubhouse. My head wasn’t that fucking big.
Chapter 18
I rolled to a stop in front of Jazmine’s house. I checked behind me to see if anyone had followed me. Jazmine and Angel jumped me before I could even get the front door of the house open all the way.
“Jeez, you would think I was gone for years.” I laughed.
“Don’t you do that to me again!” Angel stomped hard on my foot.
“Ow, damn it. Little terrorist.” I made a funny face at her, and she was laughing now and hugging my waist again.
Jazmine swiped the jewel in her tongue against her pursed lips, tugging on it. “So, what happened? You’re not dead or minus body parts, so that must mean it was good?”
I smiled brightly, “Yeah, it’s all good.”
The roar of motorcycles caused me to whip my head back toward the door. Was it all good?
“Stay back and don’t come out until I tell you,” I ordered the two of them. They complied right away.
I took a step outside. It was my brothers. Prez, Ripper, and Devin parked up their bikes, and a car stopped behind them.
The doors opened as soon as the car was put into park. Mikki and Vida jumped out, a baby in Mikki’s arm, her head laying heavily in the crook of her neck. Mikki and Vida were holding hands, their eyes searching for something familiar.
“Oh my god, is that Ink?” Mikki gasped as she took a few steps closer to the house.
“Yeah, that big ox over there is little skinny boy, Ink,” Prez replied before walking over to Mikki and taking the baby away. “Sorry, bro. They couldn’t wait. Can we see her?”
“Remember what I said,” I said softly to Prez. I didn’t want to break Mikki’s heart.
“I know. I’ll handle it.” Prez nodded.
I turned into the house and put my hand out for Angel, who was standing in the corner with Jazmine just in case something happened.
“It’s okay, Inkpop?” Angel asked as she slowly walked toward me.
“Yeah, baby, it’s okay.”
I pulled her outside, both Mikki and Vida gasped, crying out for her when they saw her. They ran toward her, but Angel darted behind me, gripping onto my pants tightly, hiding from the two women.
Prez put his free arm out to catch his wife and sister-in-law. “Wait, you got to wait.”
“Angel. Oh, baby. Angel.” Mikki cried and fell to her knees. If someone were to tell me that Angel wasn’t her child, I wouldn’t believe them.
I put a hand up, telling them to give me a minute. I turned and bent down to speak with Angel.
“Ink, who is that?” She asked her eyes full of fear and uncertainty.
“You don’t know who that is? Can’t you remember them at all?”
Angel looked over my shoulder for a flash before she came back to hide, “No, I don’t know them. Can we go back to Jazmine now?”
How the fuck was I going to get her to remember without forcing it. The last thing I wanted was to push her into the arms of someone she didn’t feel comfortable with.
“I want you to think back, I know it was a long time ago, but what’s the first happy memory you can think of?”
She looked at me strangely, “Painting with Jazmine, the doggies.”
“No baby, that’s as far back as you can remember? I want you to think back to your first memory.”
“Syrup, I found a bottle of syrup. Then a lady came and picked me up and said-”
“I said that it would go much better on chocolate chip pancakes. I’d never seen a baby go through so many pancakes. You had at least four of them.” Mikki laughed softly, thinking about the memory.
Angel’s head darted out to the side again, looking at the woman she didn’t recognize seconds earlier. I watched as her eyebrows scrunched in, and her head tilt to the side, then her eyes go wide with recognition.
“Mikayla?” Angel took a step out from in front of me. “Mikki?”
Mikki cried harder as she spread her arms out, “Yes, Angel, it’s me.”
Angel’s face lit up as she ran into Mikki’s outstretched arms. She hugged her hard and then looked up at the woman standing next to her, “Vida?”
“Hey, shrimp.” Vida played as she fell to the ground next to her sister and Angel and hugged them both.
It was a beautiful sight. I had gotten her home to Mikki like I had promised her in the beginning.
The women all
