Heather snorted. “It’s fine.”
“I don’t want to cramp your style... Interfere with...” Cassie raised her eyebrows and didn’t finish since big ears were now settled at the kitchen table with a coloring book and crayons. Daisy might look like she was occupied, but Cassie knew her daughter was absorbing every word like a sponge.
“Yeah, well... We’ll just get you two ear plugs for the time being,” Heather teased.
Her twenty-eight-year-old sister had only married her husband a year ago and since Tyler was forty, they’d decided not to wait to start a family. Which meant, they’d been working on it and now with two more people in the household...
“Tyler’s parents are coming, right?” Cassie asked.
“Yep. And his brother, sister-in-law and nephew.”
“So that’s nine of us for Christmas.” She shoved a gallon of milk into the already full fridge. “I hope I got enough.”
“If not, we can do another run. We’ve got plenty of time and space since I’ve got an extra fridge plus a full-size freezer in the garage for when Ty hunts.”
Cassie paused. “What about...”
Heather’s hand stilled and her blue eyes hit Cassie’s. “I talked to Mom and Dad yesterday...” She shook her head.
“I had nothing to do with it,” Cassie forced the whisper past the lump in her throat.
“I know that, but they refuse to believe it. They don’t understand how you couldn’t have known.”
“I didn’t know!”
Heather came over to her and put a hand on her arm. “Cass, I know. I know you would never do anything like that.”
“I’m their daughter. Why don’t they believe me?” Her parents not having her back hurt more than everything else that happened.
Heather shook her head again. “I don’t know. You would’ve been,” her sister mouthed the word arrested before continuing, “too, if the,” she mouthed investigators, “thought you were. They found no,” she mouthed evidence, “of that.”
No shit. Cassie knew all of that. When everything went down it had been the scariest moments of her life. The rug had been pulled from under her and she had been left trying to make sense of it all.
“But the ‘rents are getting a lot of sh— crap from people they know because of it. Maybe once that all dies down and it’s old news, they’ll see things more clearly.”
If it took for everything to die down and become old news, Cassie wasn’t sure she’d ever forgive her parents. They should believe her now. Currently, they were blaming Cassie for everything that happened and everything they had to deal with.
Like being ashamed and embarrassed.
Well, she was ashamed and embarrassed, too.
Because of that whole damn thing, she also had to leave her job and her home in New York and come to Manning Grove to avoid some of the shit that had splattered all over her.
She’d already decided she wasn’t going back there ever again. She’d need to find a fresh start for her and Daisy elsewhere. A place no one knew who they were. Or who she’d been married to or who Daisy’s father was.
She just didn’t know yet where that would be.
In the meantime, her sister and brother-in-law, Tyler, were kind enough to take them in. Cassie just felt bad about putting them out. Especially since they were still in their “honeymoon” phase.
She turned and glanced over at her daughter, who was her clone. It was during her own honeymoon when Daisy was conceived.
At the time, Cassie couldn’t have been happier. She had a loving husband, a baby on the way and a good job that made use of her vet tech degree. She thought things were perfect.
And they were.
For a little while.
She needed to stop feeling sorry for herself, deal with the hand she was dealt and find a way to move on. However, there was no going back to New York, her job or her marriage.
And, apparently, the disgraced daughter couldn’t go home to her parents, either.
With a sigh, she stuck her hand into another shopping bag and pulled out a can of cranberry sauce. One that had a huge dent in the top. She rubbed her finger back and forth over the indentation, thinking about the big biker who had approached her in the parking lot.
Judge.
She’d only been in town a week and she’d already run into him twice in just as many days.
She turned to Heather who was putting away a couple boxes of cereal. “Do you know anything about some sort of local motorcycle club?”
Heather closed the cabinet door, turned and leaned back against the counter. With their similar looks, there was no doubt Heather was her sister. Both were tall, blonde, and curvy like their mother. Daisy would end up the same.
“In the last year, there’s been talk about them and I’ve seen them around town. So far, they haven’t created any trouble. At least, not that I’ve heard. Did some of them bother you?”
“I saw a bunch of them yesterday in town and Daisy ran up to one to introduce herself.”
Heather snorted. “That doesn’t surprise me.”
Cassie sighed. “Yes, this is why she’ll end up being abducted from right under my nose. She’ll flag down the da— darn van and hitch a ride just so she can tell them stories or tell them how they should drive since at five she’s already a backseat driver with all her years of driving experience.”
Heather’s smirk died as she slid closer along the counter and asked softly, “Were they rude?”
“Who? The bikers? Besides a couple of catcalls, no. But I only really talked to one.”
“The one Daisy ran up to?”
“Yes.”
“You talkin’ about Judge, Momma?”
“Judge?” Heather asked, frowning.
“Yes! Judge is my friend now. He’s gonna let me pet his face.”
Heather’s eyes shot to Cassie’s. “He is, huh?”
Cassie pinned her lips together and gave her head a little shake.
“Yes! Momma said I wasn’t allowed to last time because we only just became friends. But next time, I’m allowed.”
“You are?”
“Yes!” her daughter shouted needlessly.
“Why would you want to pet his face?”
“’Cause he’s got allllllllll this long hair just like a dog! And Momma won’t let me have a dog!” She ended her complaint on a loud huff.
“Well, young lady, I don’t think petting a man’s beard is appropriate,” her aunt told her.
“I don’t care if it’s not a... pah... apopiate.”
“Do you even know what that means?” Heather asked, clearly smothering a laugh.
“No, an’ I don’t care, ‘cause I’m doin’ it next time I see Judge.”
“You need to ask me first, Daze,” Cassie reminded her spitfire of a daughter.
Daisy rolled her eyes.
“And if I give the okay, then you’d have to ask Judge after that.” But it would never get that far because there was no way Cassie was giving Daisy permission to touch a stranger like that.
Her daughter turned back to her coloring and said, “He’ll say yes.”
“Don’t be so sure.”